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

"Ken," Zimmerman said. "Keller?"

"Who's Keller?" General Pickering asked.

"The crypto guy in Pusan," McCoy said. "Eighth Army Rear. Master Sergeant. The one you talked to... the 're-turn immediately, repeat immediately' message?"

"Very obliging," Pickering said. "What about him?"

"General, he just got to Pusan," Zimmerman said. "He's new, not part of the SCAP setup."

"Good man, I think," McCoy said.

"Why do you say that?" Howe asked.

"He talked me out of my National Match Garand," Mc-Coy said, smiling. "And when I asked him why somebody as smart as he was wasn't a Marine, he said he didn't qual-ify for the Corps; his parents were married."

Howe laughed.

"That's terrible," Mrs. McCoy said, smiling.

"Charley?" Howe asked.

"He'd have the right clearances, General," Master Sergeant Rogers said. His voice was very deep and reso-nant. "And I could have a word with him about keeping his mouth shut."

That's the first time he's said a word, McCoy realized.

"You have the number of the SCAP Army Security Agency guy?" Howe asked.

Rogers nodded.

"Call him and have him send this fellow here on the next plane," Howe ordered.

Rogers nodded, and wrote on his lined pad.

"Have the message say, `Bring Marine weapons,'" Zim-merman said.

"Weapons? More than one?" Rogers asked.

"He's got my Thompson, too," Zimmerman said.

"This has to be one hell of a man," Pickering said, "to talk these two out of their weapons."

Howe chuckled.

Chapter Twelve

[ONE]

THE DEWEY SUITE

THE IMPERIAL HOTEL

TOKYO, JAPAN

0755 3 AUGUST 1950

Lieutenant David R. Taylor, USNR, a stocky, ruddy-faced thirty-two-year-old, walked down the corridor of the hotel and raised his eyebrows in a not entirely friendly manner when the young American in a business suit rose from a chair in the corridor and blocked his way.

"May I help you, sir?"

"If you can show me where the Dewey Suite is, that'd help."

"And you are, sir?"

"Who're you?"

The CIC agent produced his credentials, a thin folding wallet, with a badge pinned to one half and a photo ID card on the other.

Taylor was not surprised. He had spent the last four days in the Dai-Ichi Building, working on the plans to stage an amphibious landing at Inchon. The corridor out-side the G-3 section had half a dozen young men like this one in it around the clock.

"My name is Taylor," he said.

"May I see some identification, sir?"

Taylor produced his Department of the Navy officer's identification card.

The CIC agent examined it.

"They're expecting you, Lieutenant," he said. "Second door on the left."

Taylor walked down the corridor, and knocked at the door.

Brigadier General Fleming Pickering, USMCR, was in a crisp, tieless shirt, with the silver star of his rank on both sides of the collar.

I would have sworn they said Major General.

"My name is Taylor, sir," he said. "I was ordered to re-port to Major General Howe."

"We've been expecting you, Lieutenant," Pickering said. "Come on in. General Howe's taking a shave." He pointed into the room, where Howe, draped in a white sheet, was being shaved by a Japanese barber, a woman. "My name is Pickering."

Pickering offered Taylor his hand, and was pleased but not surprised at the firmness of his grip. He had decided the moment he'd seen Taylor at the door that he was prob-ably going to like him.

Taylor's khaki uniform was clean but rumpled. The gold strap and the insignia on his brimmed cap was anything but new. It looked, Pickering decided, one sailor judging an-other, that Taylor would be far more comfortable on the bridge of a ship than he would be sitting at a desk, and cer-tainly more comfortable on a bridge than reporting-rea-son unstated-to an Army major general in one of the most luxurious suites in the Imperial Hotel.

"Be with you in a minute," Howe called from his chair. "Have you had breakfast?"

"Yes, sir."

"Well, there's coffee, and if you change your mind, there's stuff on a steam table in the dining room."

Pickering smiled at Taylor, and motioned for him to fol-low him.

"You're the first to show up," Pickering said. "The oth-ers will be here soon."

Pickering went to a silver coffee service, poured two cups of coffee, and handed one to Taylor.

"Black okay?"

"I'm a sailor, sir. Sailors get used to black coffee."

"I know," Pickering said. "Once upon a time, I was an honest sailor-man myself."

What the hell does that mean?

"Yes, sir," Taylor said.

The first of "the others" to arrive was a Marine captain, who walked into the dining room and headed straight for the coffee.

"You got him, George?" Pickering asked when he had finished pouring coffee.

"Sergeant Rogers is having a word with him," the Ma-rine captain said.

Lieutenant Taylor was surprised that the captain had not said, "Sir," and even more surprised when he took off his tunic and pulled down his tie, and then still more when he saw that the captain had a.45 ACP pistol in a skeleton hol-ster in the small of his back.

General Howe came into the dining room.

"Did you get him, George?" he asked.

"Yes, sir. Charley's having a word with him," Hart replied.

"McCoy and Zimmerman?" Howe asked.

"They should be here now, Ralph," Pickering said.

"Should I call?" the captain asked.

"What Ernie's going to say," Pickering replied, "is that they're on the way, and should be here now."

The captain went to a telephone-one of four-on the sideboard and dialed a number.

"Could you get him out of bed, Ernie?" he said when someone answered.

Howe chuckled.

"Okay, sorry to bother you," the captain said, and hung up.

"And?" Pickering asked.

"They left early because of the traffic and should be here any minute," Hart reported.

Pickering spread his hands in a What did I tell you? ges-ture.

Howe chuckled again.

"We'll wait," he said. "Then we'll only have to do the welcoming ceremony once."

"I thought that's what Charley was doing to Keller," Hart said.

"No, what Charley is doing to Sergeant Keller is im-pressing upon him the wisdom of paying close attention to the welcoming ceremony," Howe said. He looked at Taylor and walked over to him. "My name is Howe, Lieutenant."

"Yes, sir."

A barrel-chested Marine master gunner with a chest full of ribbons came into the dining room.

"We got stuck in traffic," he announced. "Sorry."

"No problem, you're here," Howe said. "Zimmerman, this is Lieutenant Taylor."

Zimmerman wordlessly shook Taylor's hand.

Now this is the kind of jarhead with whom a wise sailor does not get into a barroom argument. And this kind of jarhead is the last kind of jarhead you expect to find in a room in the Imperial Hotel with two generals.

Another Marine captain came in the room.

Christ, I know who he is. He's the guy-McCoy is his name-who asked me, two, three times-once in Taipei, another time in Hong Kong, and some other place, places, I forget, the sonofabitch was all over the Far East-always the same question, Had I seen any unusual activity in North Korea, or along the China Coast?

And I told him yeah, I had. Why not? He had an ID card that said he was with Naval Element, SCAR

But then there was some scuttlebutt that they gave some Marine captain in Naval Element SCAP the shitty end of the stick when he tried to tell them this goddamn war was coming, and I figured it had to be the guy asking the ques-tions. The scuttlebutt was that he pissed off, big time, some big brass, and they sent him home; kicked him out of the Marine Corps. So what the hell is he doing here with an Army general? What the hell is going on here?

"Sorry, sir," McCoy said. "The traffic-"