Semper Fi

by W. E. B Griffin

  “Yes, sir,” McCoy said. “It’s a good place to spend the night. There’s a good hotel there.”

  “So Lieutenant Macklin tells me,” Sessions said. “More importantly, McCoy, it’s not too far from Yenchi’eng, is it?”

  McCoy’s eyebrows went up as he looked at him. The Japanese 11th Infantry Division was at Yenchi’eng.

  “No, sir,” he said, “it’s not.”

  “Have you ever been to Yenchi’eng, McCoy?” Sessions asked.

  “Yes, sir,” McCoy said.

  “Do you know how the divisional artillery of the 11th Japanese Infantry is equipped?”

  “Yes, sir,” McCoy said. “They’ve got four batteries, they call it a regiment, of Model 94s. That’s a 37-mm antitank cannon, but the Japs use it as regular artillery because they can throw so much fire. And the Chinese have damned little to use for counterfire.”

  “I want to check that out, McCoy,” Lieutenant Sessions said.

  “Sir?”

  “I want to find out if the 11th Division has been equipped with German PAK381cannon.”

  “They haven’t,” McCoy said. “What they’ve got, Lieutenant, is maybe thirty-five Model 94s. Eight to a battery, plus spares.”

  “You seem very sure of that, McCoy,” Lieutenant Macklin said.

  “Yes, sir, I am.”

  “You know the difference between the two cannon?” Macklin pursued, more than a little sarcastic.

  “The PAK38 is bigger, with a larger shield and larger wheels than the Model 94,” McCoy said, on the edge of insolence, Lieutenant Macklin thought. “And it has a muzzle brake. They’re not hard to tell apart.”

  “And you’re absolutely sure the 11th Division doesn’t have any of those cannon?” Sessions asked.

  “I took some pictures of their artillery park a couple of weeks ago,” McCoy said. “That’s what they’ve got, Lieutenant. Thirty, maybe thirty-five 94s. Captain Banning sent the pictures to Washington.”

  “But we have no way of knowing, do we, Corporal McCoy, whether or not the Japanese have received German cannon since your last visit? Without having another look?” Macklin asked sarcastically.

  “We have people watching the docks, and the railroad, and the roads. If the 11th Division had gotten any new artillery, we’d have heard about it.”

  “‘We’?” Macklin asked sarcastically.

  “Captain Banning,” McCoy said, accepting the rebuke, “has people watching the docks and the railroads and the roads.”

  “Under the circumstances—and after all, we are so close—I’m afraid I can’t just accept that,” Lieutenant Sessions said. “How long would you say it is by car from Chiehshom to Yenchi’eng?”

  “If you drive down there, Lieutenant,” McCoy said, “they’re going to catch you, and you’ll find yourself being entertained by the Japs for a couple of days.”

  “What do you mean by ‘entertained’?”

  “They’ll take you on maneuvers,” McCoy said. “Walk you around in the swamps all night, feed you raw fish, that sort of thing.” He stopped, and then his mouth ran away with him: “Some of them have got a pretty good sense of humor. They had Lieutenant Macklin three days one time.”

  “That’s quite enough, McCoy!” Macklin flared.

  “Well then, we’ll just have to make sure they don’t catch us, won’t we?” Lieutenant Sessions said.

  “Lieutenant, I’m not going to Yenchi’eng with you,” McCoy said. “I’m sorry.”

  “How long did you say it will take us to drive from Chiehshom to Yenchi’eng, Corporal?” Sessions asked.

  “It’s about a two-hour drive, maybe two and a half, with the roads like this.”

  “And you presumably can manage the road at night?”

  “Sir, I’m sorry, but I’m not going to Yenchi’eng with you,” McCoy said.

  “I didn’t ask you if you had volunteered, Corporal,” Lieutenant Sessions said reasonably. “The decision to go has been made by Lieutenant Macklin and myself. Your presence will lend your knowledge of the terrain to our enterprise. I don’t have to remind you, do I, that despite your special relationship with Captain Banning, you still remain subject to the orders of your superiors?”

  “Lieutenant,” McCoy said, “you’re putting me on a spot.”

  “The only spot you’ll be on,” Macklin flared, “is if you persist in your defiance.”

  McCoy looked at him, shrugged, and took an envelope from his hip pocket. He extended it toward Sessions.

  “I think you better take a look at this, Lieutenant,” he said.

  “What is that?” Sessions asked.

  “My orders, sir, in writing,” McCoy said. “Captain Banning said I wasn’t to give them to you unless I had to. I think I have to.”

  Sessions took the envelope, tore it open, and unfolded the sheet of paper inside. He glanced at the sheet and then shook his head.

  “What is it?” Lieutenant Macklin asked.

  “It’s a set of letter orders,” Sessions said, and then read it aloud: ‘Headquarters, 4th Marines, Shanghai, 13 May 1941. Subject, Letter Orders. To Corporal Kenneth J. McCoy, Headquarters Company, First Battalion, 4th Marines. Your confidential orders concerning the period 14 May 1941 to 14 June 1941 have been issued to you verbally by Captain Edward Banning, USMC. You are reminded herewith that no officer or noncommissioned officer assigned or attached to the 4th Regiment, USMC, is authorized to amend or countermand your orders in any way.’” Sessions looked at Macklin. “Corporal McCoy’s letter orders are signed by the colonel.”

  “Well, I’ll be damned,” Macklin said. “I never heard of such a thing.”

  “Lieutenant,” McCoy said to Macklin. “I wish you’d read those orders.”

  “Just what the hell do you mean by that?” Macklin snapped.

  “With respect, sir,” McCoy said. “I’d like to burn them.”

  “Go ahead and burn them,” Macklin said coldly.

  Sessions handed the orders back to McCoy, who ripped the single sheet of paper into long strips, which he then carefully burned, one at a time, letting the wind blow the ashes and unburned stub from his fingers.

  “I presume your ‘confidential verbal orders’ forbid you to go to Yenchi’eng?” Macklin asked, when he had finished.

  “No, sir, except that Captain Banning said I was to use my own judgment if you wanted me to do something like that.”

  “Then you have not been forbidden to go to Yenchi’eng? You’ve taken that decision yourself?” Sessions asked.

  “That’s about the size of it, sir,” McCoy said.

  A very self-confident young man, Sessions thought. Highly intelligent. He almost certainly believes in what he’s doing. So where does that leave us?

  “I presume you have considered, Corporal,” Macklin said, icily, “that Lieutenant Sessions’s interest in the cannon of the 11th Division is not idle curiosity? That he has been sent here by Headquarters, USMC?”

  “Yes, sir,” McCoy said. “Captain Banning told me all about that.”

  “And you are apparently unimpressed by my decision that knowing that for sure is worth whatever risk is entailed in going to Yenchi’eng?” Macklin asked, coldly furious.

  “I’m convinced there’s no way you could go there without getting caught,” McCoy said. “You have to go by road. The first checkpoint you pass, they’ll phone ahead to the Kempei-Tai, and that will be it.”

  “There are ways of getting around checkposts and the Kempei-Tai,” Macklin said. “You have done so.”

  “That was different,” McCoy said.

  “That was different, sir,” Macklin corrected him.

  “That was different, sir,” McCoy parroted.

  “Well, then, perhaps you’d be good enough to tell Mr. Sessions and myself how you would go to Yenchi’eng.”

  “If I told you that, it would look like I thought you could get away with it, Lieutenant,” McCoy said.

  “So you refuse even to help us?” Macklin said, incredulously
.

  McCoy pretended he hadn’t heard the question.

  “And I don’t see any point in taking the risk of going myself,” he said. “If they had any German cannon, I’d know about it.”

  “Corporal,” Lieutenant Macklin said, icily sarcastic, “I stand in awe of your self-confidence.”

  “Yes, sir,” McCoy said.

  “You will, I hope, tell us what you can about the location of the artillery park?” Lieutenant Sessions asked conversationally. “How we can find it?”

  “Aye, aye, sir,” McCoy said. “I hope you’ll make it clear to Captain Banning, sir, that I told you you’re going to get caught?”

  “Oh, yes, Corporal McCoy,” Lieutenant Macklin said. “You can count on our relating this incident to Captain Banning in detail.”

  (Two)

  Chiehshom, Shantung Province, China

  15 May 1941

  The three classes of accommodation at the Hotel am See at Chiehshom had (in descending order) been originally intended for Europeans, European servants, and Chinese servants. On McCoy’s first couple of trips to and from Peking, all the enlisted Marines had been put up in the rooms set aside for European servants. But on the last couple of trips, like this one, the management had made quite a show of giving the noncoms “European” rooms—small ones, to be sure—in the main wing of the hotel.

  McCoy realized that the proprietor had figured out that the sergeant, rather than the officer-in-charge, was the man who really decided (by speeding up or slowing down) where the convoy and its ten-man detail would stop for the night. That meant the sale of ten beds and twenty meals, plus whatever they all had to drink. There wasn’t all that much business anyway.

  McCoy really liked to stay at the Hotel am See. The food was good and the place was spotless. And even the small rooms they gave the noncoms had enormous bathtubs with apparently limitless clean hot water. He would take a bath at night, a long soak, and then a shower in the morning. It was the only shower he’d had in China that made his skin sting with the pressure. All the others were like being rained on.

  After settling into his room, McCoy had hoped to have dinner with Ernie Zimmerman and be gone from the dining room before the officers and the Fellers came down for dinner. That would give him a chance both to avoid Lieutenants Macklin and Sessions and to steel himself for another meeting with them that was scheduled for after dinner. They wanted him to go over their route to and from Yenchi’eng. As pissed as the both of them were with him, that was going to be bad enough without having dinner in the same room (where they didn’t think enlisted Marines had any right to be anyway) with them.

  But Ernie Zimmerman got hung up somehow getting the other Marines bedded down and was ten minutes late. Zimmerman and McCoy had no sooner sat down in the dining room when the officers and the Fellers showed up. Mrs. Feller said something to the Reverend, and he came over and insisted that they all have dinner together.

  McCoy thought the officers would be pissed. Eating in the same room with enlisted Marines was bad enough, but not as bad as having to share a table with them. But they weren’t. They were playing spy again, McCoy saw, and the dinner table gave them a stage for the playacting they thought was necessary.

  “Mr.” Sessions announced that he had asked Lieutenant Macklin if it would be all right if they spent two nights in Chiehshom, instead of the one originally planned. The Christian & Missionary Alliance was considering opening another mission in Yenchi’eng, and they wanted to take advantage of being close to it to have a good look at it.

  He’s a goddamned fool, McCoy thought. They’re all goddamned fools. They think they will look more innocent brazening it out, two missionaries and a Marine officer in fulluniform simply out for a ride looking for a new place to save souls. It will take the Japs about ten minutes to learn they’ve left here, and there will be a greeting party waiting for them long before they get anywhere near Yenchi’eng.

  The only thing more dangerous than an officer convinced he’s doing what duty requires is two officers doing the same thing. Two officers and a missionary.

  They would be back in Chiehshom by nightfall, Sessions said, and spending the extra day would give Sergeant Zimmerman and his men the chance to go over the vehicles and make sure everything was shipshape.

  “You’re not going with them, Corporal McCoy,” Mrs. Feller asked, “to drive the car?”

  “No, ma’am,” McCoy said. “I’m not going along.”

  Ernie Zimmerman, uncomfortable in the presence of the officers, and fully aware there was some friction between them and McCoy, bolted down his food and pushed himself wordlessly away from the table.

  McCoy went after him.

  “Ernie, jack up one of the trucks and drop the drive shaft,” McCoy said.

  “What the hell for?” Zimmerman demanded.

  “Just do it, Ernie, please,” McCoy said.

  “What are they up to?” Zimmerman asked.

  “You heard it,” McCoy said.

  “What was that bullshit anyway?”

  “Just get somebody to drop a drive shaft, Ernie. And make sure one of the cars is gassed and ready to go,” McCoy said. Then he went to his room to mark the route the damned fools should take to Yenchi’eng.

  When McCoy met with the three of them in Sessions’s room, they made no further attempt to get him to take them to Yenchi’eng. This surprised him until he realized they’d concluded that their brilliant inspiration of brazening it out was going to work, and they didn’t need him.

  After they came back from successfully spying on the Japs, they’d be in a position to rack his ass with Banning for refusing to go with them. They would have been right all along, and he would have been nothing but an insolent enlisted man with the gall to challenge the wise judgment of his betters.

  There was nothing he could do to stop them, of course, and (except for having one of the missionary trucks jacked up and the drive shaft dropped so that it might fool the Kempei-Tai watching the hotel) there was nothing he could do to help them either.

  But he set his portable alarm clock for half-past four and went down to the courtyard to see them off. Mrs. Feller was there too, the nipples of her teats sticking up under her bathrobe and her blond hair, now unbraided, hanging down her back.

  Jesus Christ, without her hair glued to her head, she’s a hell of a good-looking woman. I would give my left nut to get in the sack with her.

  The officers and the missionary were a little carried away with the situation. They saw themselves, McCoy thought contemptuously, as patriots about to embark on a great espionage mission. McCoy had to temper his scorn, however, when Sessions took him aside and told him, dead serious, that no matter what happened today he wanted him to understand that he understood his position.

  “This is one of those situations, Corporal, where we both must do what we believe is right. And I want you to know that I believe you thought long and hard about your obligations before you decided you couldn’t go with me.”

  He’s not so much of a prick as a virgin.

  “Good luck, Lieutenant,” McCoy said, and offered his hand.

  What the hell, it didn’t cost anything to say that. And if Sessions means what he said, then on the off chance they don’t get bagged and Macklin tries to get me in trouble, maybe it’ll help.

  As they walked back to the hotel, Mrs. Feller’s leg kept coming out of the flap of her bathrobe, and she kept trying to hold the robe closed. He remembered that all through dinner she had kept bumping her knee “accidentally” against his.

  McCoy was now convinced she was just fucking around with him, getting some kind of sick kick out of trying to make him uncomfortable, the way some people get a sick kick out of teasing a dog. He intended to stay as far away from her as he could.

  “Is there any interesting way you can think of to kill the time until they get back?” she asked, when they were inside the hotel.

  She goddamned well knows there are two or three meanings I could put on
that.

  “Until it starts to rain, which should be about noon, you could fish, I suppose,” McCoy said. “They’ve got tackle. I’ve got to work on the trucks.”

  “That doesn’t sound very exciting,” she said.

  “I guess not,” he said, turning and walking away from her down the corridor to his room.

  He didn’t see her at breakfast, and he ate with the Marines at lunch. They asked him where the officers and the Christer had gone, and how long that would keep them all in Chiehshom. Zimmerman had already told them he didn’t know, they said, or else he wouldn’t tell them. McCoy told them he didn’t know, either.

  At half-past three, a boy came to his room and told him that Sergeant Zimmerman wanted to see him in the lobby. When McCoy went down, there were two Japanese soldiers with Zimmerman, a sergeant and a corporal. They were both large for Japanese, and they were wearing leather jackets and puttees. Goggles hung loosely from leather helmets. Motorcycle messengers.

  They bowed to McCoy and then saluted, and he bowed back and returned the salute. Then Zimmerman gave him two envelopes, one addressed to him and the other to Mrs. Feller.

  “This is addressed to you,” McCoy said.

  “I can read,” Zimmerman said. “And they want me to sign for it. I thought I better ask you.”

  One of the Japanese soldiers then handed McCoy some kind of a form to sign. He saw that it was just a message receipt form.

  “Sign it,” he said to Zimmerman.

  “What is it?”

  “A confession that you eat babies for breakfast,” McCoy said.

  Zimmerman, with obvious reluctance, carefully wrote his name on the form. He gave it to the Japanese sergeant, who bowed and saluted again, then marched out of the lobby with the other Japanese hopping along after him.

  As he tore open the envelope and took out the message, McCoy heard their motorcycle engines start.

  From what his note said, Lieutenant Macklin had obviously decided that the Japanese were going to read it before they delivered it:

  Yenchi’eng

  Sergeant Zimmerman:

  The Reverend Mr. Feller, Mr. Sessions and I have accepted the kind invitation of the commanding general of the 11th Division of the Imperial Japanese Army to inspect the division.