Griffin W.E.B. - The Corps 09 - Under Fire

McCoy had again left Zimmerman in charge on Tokchok-kundo, because he was obviously better qualified to have that command than George Hart, but after thinking about taking Hart with them on the Wind of Good Fortune, realized that Hart would be more useful on the island with Zimmerman, if for no other reason than Zimmerman could bring him up to date on what was planned. Hart was a Ma-rine, and all Marines can fire rifles, and when they finally went to seize Taemuui-do and Yonghung-do, Hart would be needed.

Only after it had grown dark had Taylor set a course that would take them to the rendezvous at sea with HMS Char-ity.

"I'm afraid you're going to tell me what that means," McCoy said.

"We don't know precisely where we are," Taylor said. "We have been sailing a compass course, which may or may not have taken us precisely where we want to go. There may be-probably are-currents moving us off course."

"What do we have to do to establish `precisely'?" Mc-Coy asked.

"Shoot the stars with a sextant is the usual means," Tay-lor said. "But we don't have a sextant."

A few minutes later, there was a flash of white light to port. It seemed to be pointed right at them. It was followed at ten-second intervals by a flash of light that seemed to be pointed ahead of them, then directly away from them, then behind them.

Then the light went out and stayed out.

"Are you trying to make this exciting for me, or don't you know what that is?" McCoy asked.

"Make for the lights," Taylor called in Korean to the Ko-rean on the tiller.

"That's the Charity?' McCoy asked.

"God, I hope so," Taylor said piously.

Taylor reached into the control compartment and came up with a four-cell flashlight. He flashed it-sending, Mc-Coy realized after a moment, the Morse code short and long flashes spelling M C-to port.

"Is that the flashlight Dunn dropped to us?" McCoy asked.

"All it needed was one battery, and it was as good as new," Taylor said, somewhat smugly. "I had batteries."

Now there came a light aimed directly at them, spelling C.

The C message was repeated once every sixty seconds after that. Five minutes later, just as McCoy began to think he could make out the ship on the horizon, floodlights mounted fore, aft, and amidship on the Charity lit the hull for five seconds and then went off again. It was now possi-ble to judge the distance-no more than two hundred yards-separating the sleek, dead-in-the-water destroyer from the junk.

A small spotlight flashed on and off at them until they were quite close to the Charity, and then floodlights illuminated a ladder swung over her side.

"Why do they call that a ladder when it's really a flight of stairs?" McCoy wondered aloud.

"Jesus, Ken!" Taylor said.

Two seamen, under the supervision of the diminutive chief petty officer who had supervised putting the lifeboats over the side of the Charity, were standing on the platform at the lower end of the stairs. The officer was wearing im-maculate whites.

"Captain," he called, as the Wind of Good Fortune drew quite close, "the captain suggests you gentlemen come aboard, and that your vessel circle astern of us."

"Got you, Chief," Taylor called, and issued the neces-sary orders to the helmsman.

McCoy saw that he also handed him the flashlight Colonel Dunn had dropped into the mud.

McCoy jumped from the deck of the Wind of Good For-tune onto the platform first, followed by Major Kim and fi-nally Taylor.

"Right up the ladder, if you please, gentlemen," the chief ordered.

As McCoy reached the level of the deck, the sea pushed the Wind of Good Fortune into the ladder, and the noise made him look down to see what had happened.

There didn't seem to be any damage; the Wind of Good Fortune seemed to be backing away from the Charity.

McCoy climbed the last two steps of the ladder and stepped onto the deck, where the executive officer was standing in his crisp white uniform. And there were two rows of sailors, in whites, three to a row, saluting. Just as McCoy realized what was going on, there came the shrill sound of a bosun's pipe, and a voice called out.

"United States Marines, board-ing"

McCoy faced the stern and saluted the British flag and then saluted the executive officer.

"Permission to come aboard, sir?"

"Granted."

The executive officer looked at Major Kim as he stepped onto the deck, dressed like McCoy and Taylor, in black pa-jamas, and for a moment a look of confusion crossed his face, but he rose to the occasion.

"South Korean officer, board-ing," he called out.

And Major Kim rose to the occasion by mimicking every step of McCoy's response perfectly.

And finally, Taylor stepped onto the deck in his black pajamas.

"United States Navy, board-ing"

When Taylor had finished saluting the British colors, the bosun's piping died out and the executive officer put out his hand to Taylor.

"Nice to have you aboard again, Lieutenant," he said. "Will you follow me, please?"

He led them between the lines of saluting sailors-who seemed to find nothing strange, McCoy saw, in their render-ing honors to three men in black pajamas-into the super-structure, and through interior passageways to the bridge.

Captain the Honorable Darwin Jones-Fortin waved them permission to come on the bridge.

"Your welcome overwhelms us, Captain," Taylor said.

"Well, the last time I rather sneaked you aboard. You're now here officially, and it seemed appropriate. First things first. I dislike sitting here dead in the water. How many knots can your magnificent vessel make? And do you have enough fuel?"

"Twelve to thirteen knots, sir," Taylor said, "in a sea like this. And there's plenty of fuel aboard."

"Good show," Jones-Fortin said. "Make turns for ten knots," he ordered. "Make a wide circle to port."

The helmsman repeated the order.

"You have the conn, Number One," Jones-Fortin or-dered.

"I have the conn, sir," the executive officer said.

"Why don't we go to my cabin?" Jones-Fortin said, and motioned them ahead of him into an interior passageway.

There was already someone in the captain's cabin, a Royal Marine lieutenant in field clothing and web gear.

"Gentlemen, may I present Lieutenant Richard Diceworth, Royal Marines?" Jones-Fortin said. "Diceworth, this is Captain McCoy of the U.S. Marines, Lieutenant Taylor of the U.S. Navy, and I haven't had the privilege..."

"Major Kim Pak-Su, Korean national police."

The men shook hands.

"Admiral Matthews," Jones-Fortin explained, "appar-ently after consulting with your General Pickering at some length, and having decided that your Flying Fish Channel operation deserved a bit more support than he initially of-fered, sent Diceworth and fifteen Royal Marines from HMS Jamaica, his flagship."

"I don't know what to say," McCoy confessed.

"Let me tell you what we have to offer, and then you tell me if you think it would be helpful," Jones-Fortin said. "In addition to Diceworth and his men, we have the boats that brought them to Charity from the Jamaica. There's two of them, each with a coxswain, and they're a bit larger- about twice the size, I would guess-of the lifeboats. They're also a bit faster and more seaworthy."

McCoy just shook his head.

"And while we were waiting for you to join us, my Number One and my gunnery officer, after studying aerial photographs of the islands, have offered the opinion that they can bring all of them under our guns."

"You'd have to go into the Flying Fish to do that, Cap-tain, wouldn't you?" Taylor asked.

"No, actually not. We can lay the cannon fire from a po-sition seaward of the islands, and use the islands, so to speak, as rocks behind which to hide from possible enemy observation."

"Jesus!" McCoy said.