In other words, a perfect misrepresentation of the enemy situation on Biak.
One I must correct, Jock told himself.
They were packed up and ready to leave the OP. Josiah lingered, taking one last look with the binoculars. What he said didn’t surprise Jock at all:
“The Japanese, Major…they’re already working to repair the runways.”
They’d only been walking for an hour. Jock was already lagging far behind.
Steve Richards asked, “Your leg…it’s acting up, isn’t it, sir?”
There was no point in lying. There wasn’t even a way to put an optimistic face on it.
He was in pain and everyone knew it.
“You guys better push on without me,” Jock said. “Here…I’ve already written out the message we need to send. Take it, Steve. I’ll try and catch up when I can.”
If I can.
“Bullshit on that, sir. This is about where we ran into those tanks a while back, isn’t it? What are you going to do when more come? Run away?”
The Navy pilot might’ve been just a beginner at ground combat but he made a good point.
“Then what do you suggest we do, Steve?”
Richards reached down and eased Jock to his feet. “I’m going to be your crutch, sir. And when I get tired out, Hans and Josiah will take turns, too.”
“No good, Steve. I’ll slow you down way too much. That message needs to get to Hollandia ASAP. Too many lives depend on it.”
“A couple of hours one way or the other won’t change a damn thing, sir. Your invasion isn’t supposed to happen for another week, right? And didn’t Hans say it’s only about ten miles back to where Mister Dyckman’s going to be, instead of the fifteen we had to cover going the other way?”
“Yes,” Hans chimed in. “That is true. We’ll be crossing a narrower part of the island. And the trail is better.”
“It’s settled, then,” Richards said. “Now come on, sir…one foot in front of the other.”
They’d only walked for a few minutes when they again heard the bellowing engines of tanks making their way south. There was no cause for alarm; the tanks were a good distance behind them, not even close enough to be seen. With each passing second, those steel monsters would drive farther away.
Jock caught Richards grinning and said, “All right, all right…so you made a good call about the tanks, Steve. Don’t let it go to your head. We’ve still got a hell of a long way to go.”
It wasn’t meant as a reproach and Richards knew it. He kept right on grinning as he replied, “I’ll take that as a thank you, sir.”
Something had been bothering Steve Richards about this game-legged Army major ever since he boarded the Cat four days ago. He decided this was the time to clear it up. “Sir,” he asked, “why are you still even here? Couldn’t you have gone home with that leg wound?”
Jock was silent and pensive for a few moments, as if carefully composing his reply. Then he said, “This is my home now. Everything I care about in the world is right here. Like it or not, I can’t get off this train until this damn war is finished once and for all.”
Chapter Ten
The jeep was barely managing twenty-five miles per hour along the rutted dirt road. It had bounced and lurched for the past three hours but still had a long way to go in the choking dust and stifling morning heat. At the wheel, Lieutenant Jimmy Ketchum figured it would take another hour, at least, to reach Aitape, some one hundred miles down the New Guinea coast from Hollandia. He feared that hour would be spent in more awkward silence; this whole trip, the fierce-looking Australian woman sitting next to him hadn’t said a word, despite his many attempts to break the ice. As if immune to the rough ride, she never looked up from the papers she was trying to study.
Geez…would it kill her to shoot the breeze a little?
Ketchum tried to crank up a conversation one more time. “You know, Missus Miles, I served under your husband at Buna. I was a green platoon leader and—”
Without looking up, Jillian interrupted, “I know, Lieutenant. You told me that before we even left.”
“And I heard about all you did for us there, ma’am…”
She looked up—finally!—and fixed him in a questioning gaze.
“Go on, Lieutenant.”
“And I just wanted to say I’m real, real sorry it worked out so badly for you, getting captured by the Japs and all.”
“It came out a lot worse for the lads who didn’t make it through, Lieutenant.”
“I suppose you’re right, ma’am. But I’ll tell you what…if Major Miles asked me to, I’d go to hell and back for him all over again.”
He could only steal glances at her; the bad road demanded so much of his attention. But the look he saw on her face in those brief glimpses was one he’d only seen on strong men in the throes of combat: a calm, steely-eyed resolve in the face of death, forged in fear but not bending to it.
That look quickly softened. A knowing smile took its place as she said, “I know what you mean, Lieutenant, but I reckon I already have gone to hell and back for him.”
He expected her to return to the papers in her lap, but she didn’t. Suddenly, it seemed like all she wanted to do was talk.
“How’d you end up being my chauffeur? Doesn’t your Army have better things for its officers to do than drive an Aussie civilian around?”
“I’m convalescing, ma’am. Got wounded a few months back, at Aitape, of all places. Somebody’s idea of a joke, I guess, that I’m being sent back there now. And I’m not just your driver…I’m supposed to assist you in any way I can.”
She let out a roaring laugh. “Now that sounds exactly like your bloody American Army, Lieutenant. A job with no specific purpose.”
It was Ketchum’s turn to laugh. “Then maybe you can clear up for me what your purpose on this little trip is, ma’am.”
“It’s simple, Lieutenant. We’re going to find the whereabouts of these sixty some-odd unaccounted-for Dutch souls, so that bloody wanker I work for can balance His Royal Majesty’s books for him.”
“His Royal Majesty, ma’am?”
“MacArthur, Lieutenant. Your bloody General MacArthur.”
“But sixty people, ma’am, give or take a few? Hell…they could all be in unmarked graves somewhere. We may never find them. They were probably all POWs, right?”
“That would make it easy for us if they were,” she replied. “Japanese prison camps keep meticulous records.”
“Why would they bother keeping records, ma’am? They didn’t sign the Geneva Convention.”
“True, but certain prisoners could be very useful for propaganda purposes. If they didn’t know who they were, they couldn’t take advantage, now, could they?”
He took her word as gospel, since she knew from hard experience.
“If they’re on land, we’ll find them somehow, Lieutenant. The sea’s the only one who never gives up her dead.”
They knew they were close to Aitape now; tall signposts had begun to sprout along the roadside, the top of each decorated with a thicket of arrows pointing this way and that, each arrow stenciled with an Allied unit’s designation.
“Who are we looking for?” Ketchum asked. “The MPs?”
“Yes,” Jillian replied, “the One-Oh-Sixth Military Police Company. They’re responsible for keeping law and order around these parts…supposedly. Bloody thugs and head-bashers are all they are, if you ask me.”
“I know exactly what you mean, ma’am. Have you ever heard that old Army saying?”
“You mean the one that says I’d rather have a sister in the whorehouse than a brother in the MPs?”
“Yes, ma’am. That’s the one.”
As if their joking had summoned him somehow, a GI wearing an MP armband stepped into the middle of the road, his outstretched hand commanding the jeep to halt.
“What’s going on, Corporal?” Ketchum asked the MP.
“Nothing to concern yourself with, sir. You’ll be on
your way in a minute.”
A bit farther down the road, the reason they’d been stopped was now in plain view. Three white people—two men, one woman—were being led under guard across the road. They were civilians by their tattered and filthy clothes, barefoot, and gaunt. Their hands were tied behind their backs.
Skin that seemed thin as paper stretched tight over their sinewy frames. Jillian doubted they’d had a decent meal in months. Maybe longer.
Each man had tattoos on his bare upper arm which Jillian recognized immediately: the marks of seamen. The woman’s hair was a coppery red—dull and dirty, as if she’d been in the bush for a while, but unmistakably a ginger.
Jillian leapt from the jeep and brushed past the flustered corporal. A buck sergeant with the air of a bully was leading the parade of prisoners. She marched right up to him, and in a command voice that rattled the young man for just a moment, asked, “Just why exactly are these civilians being treated like prisoners, Sergeant?”
His surliness returned quickly. “Speaking of civilians, lady, just who the fuck do you think you are? You better get the hell out of here before I lock that big mouth of yours up, too.”
She reached into her trouser pocket, produced a document, and thrust it in the sergeant’s face. He got as far as The Supreme Commander’s seal on the letterhead. There was no need to read further:
This skirt’s got friends in real high places.
Jillian wished she had more time to enjoy watching this arrogant goon of a Yank turn to a sputtering idiot before her eyes. “What’s your name, Sergeant?”
“Polito, ma’am…Louis T.”
“Well, Polito, Louis T., let’s try this again. Why are these civilians being treated like POWs? Shouldn’t they be in the resettlement camp?”
“They’re Jap sympathizers, ma’am. They escaped from the camp last night, trying to make it to them yellow bastards still holding out up in the mountains.”
“Really?” she replied. “Jap sympathizers? Sounds a bit unlikely, Sergeant Polito.”
“Don’t matter, ma’am. I’ve got my orders.”
“I’m sure you do. How do we find your company HQ, Sergeant?”
Pointing down the road, he replied, “It’s the next turn-off…about a quarter mile down. You’d better check in with Sergeant Knox, ma’am.”
“Actually, I’m looking for your company commander, a Captain Hutchins, I believe.”
Polito let out a laugh. “Good luck finding him, ma’am. He usually makes himself real scarce. Like I said, ol’ Hard Knox is the man to see. He runs the show around here.” He pointed again down the road. “Now, if you’ll excuse me, ma’am…” Almost an afterthought, he looked to Lieutenant Ketchum and threw a careless salute.
As the prisoners were led away, the woman looked back, wanting to say something. She was stopped by the blow of a rifle butt against her back. But the look on her face, the way her lips had moved—Jillian was sure she was begging Help us…
As they climbed back into the jeep, Ketchum asked, “You buy that bit about them being Jap sympathizers, ma’am?”
“Not for a bloody minute, Lieutenant.”
To Jillian Miles, Technical Sergeant Franklin Knox was the walking, talking embodiment of everything she thought about military policemen: bloody thugs and head-bashers, all of them. Tall and stocky, with a barroom brawler’s beer belly that strained the buttons of his khaki shirt, his eyes seemed as cold and merciless as a shark’s.
No wonder that GI back on the road referred to him as “Hard Knox,” she told herself. Looks like a right mongrel to me.
But she saw something else going on behind those dead eyes. He’s a schemer…he’s at it right now. Either he’s trying to figure out how to turn my visit to his advantage or how to stop me in my tracks. Why on earth would he want to do that?
Unless he’s got something to hide.
At the moment, Knox wasn’t bothering to hide his distaste for rank or women. Looking right past Jillian, he told Jimmy Ketchum, “You can tell the lady this letter of hers don’t cut a whole lotta ice around these parts…” Like an afterthought, he tacked “Lieutenant” to the end of that sentence. It carried the same lack of respect he would have lavished on titles like dog catcher or shithead.
“Negative, Sergeant. That letter has the full effect of an order. You and your organization are to cooperate with Missus Miles to the fullest.”
The big sergeant sneered. He wasn’t even going to bother saying Yes, sir.
“And I’m not sure why we’re wasting our time with you, Sergeant Knox,” Ketchum continued. “Take us to your commander, Captain Hutchins, on the double.”
“Can’t do that,” Knox replied.
“Why the hell not, Sergeant?”
“Because it ain’t my turn to watch him, Lieutenant, so I ain’t got no idea where that man is at.”
Ketchum was starting to lose patience. “You’ve got a pretty route-step outfit here, Sergeant. Not very impressive at all.”
Knox just shrugged. “We take care of our business, Lieutenant.”
Jillian had had enough of the dick-measuring contest. “And I’m about to take care of mine, Sergeant,” she said, “with or without your help or your bloody captain’s. I’m sure your company clerk can provide me all the files I need to start the ball rolling.”
She pushed past the looming sergeant and headed straight to a meek-looking corporal seated behind a typewriter in the corner of Knox’s day room. At first, the corporal had trouble grasping the situation. Since he joined the Army, he’d never had to deal with a woman in an official capacity. Aside from the nurses, he didn’t know there were women in any official capacity.
But it was obvious this Aussie lady wasn’t just some clerk/typist for the brass: she was an undeniable force, a commanding presence sucking the air right out of the room. She hadn’t asked him for a thing yet, but he just knew when she finally did, every word would be precise, proving the lady definitely had her shit together.
She ain’t gonna ask no questions she don’t already know the answer to, I’m betting.
It only took one more bit of rationalizing for the corporal to fall into step:
She works for the Supreme Commander, for cryin’ out loud…hell, she’s got herself a fancy title, too…and even Hard Knox knows damn well she’s going to get what she wants, whether he likes it or not. That’s why he didn’t stop her from talking to me…
And hopefully, it’s why he won’t beat the shit out of me when I do what she says.
In short order, the corporal was handing over every document Jillian requested.
Hard Knox might’ve been silent but wasn’t amused. He grew agitated when, after just ten minutes going over the files, she announced, “Sergeant Knox, there seem to be quite a few discrepancies here. If I’m to believe these figures, some sixty refugees who arrived at this resettlement camp can’t be accounted for now. Can you explain that to me?”
“You’re gonna have to talk to Captain Hutchins, ma’am.”
“Then you’re going to have to find him for me, Sergeant, and right bloody now.”
The last person in the world Hard Knox wanted to find was Captain Hutchins: That stick-up-his-ass rich boy would only fuck things up now. Better he chases skirt up at the hospital, keeps getting piss-drunk at the “O” club, and stays the hell out of my way, like always.
He gunned the jeep onto a narrow side road which bore none of those arrows directing you to this or that unit. Soon, he came to a gate in a tall, barbed wire fence, manned by two American MPs who waved him through. Racing the short distance to a weather-beaten villa nearly hidden by trees, he slid the jeep to a halt at the back steps. A half-breed, light-skinned New Guinean—with the bushy hair of a native but the smooth features of a European—stepped from the house to greet Knox.
Sauntering like the cock of the walk, Fritz Van Flyss said, “Good afternoon, General. What brings you to our fine establishment at this time of day?”
“Shut the fu
ck up, Fuzzy,” Knox replied. “We gotta talk. We got big trouble.”
“So big the mighty US Army can’t handle it?”
“No, you numbnuts…the fucking Army is the trouble.”
They walked through the house—a warehouse, actually—where natives were busy breaking open boxes marked with bright red crosses and sorting their contents. Settling into a quiet back room, Knox refused the whiskey Van Flyss offered; that was enough to convince him the news his partner in crime carried was bad. Really bad.
“Never known you to turn down a drink, Sarge.”
“No time right now, Fuzzy. Now listen and listen good…”
Knox told him all about Jillian being on the verge of blowing their whole operation sky high. He concluded with, “If she finds what happened to them people and why, we’re fucked. So we gotta get rid of that skirt, and fast.”
“You mean kill her?”
Knox bounced a meaty backhand off the side of Van Flyss’ head. It nearly knocked him out of his chair.
“Oh, that’d be all we need, you imbecile—kill some Aussie split-tail working for MacArthur. This fucking place would be crawling with more brass than McNamara’s band.”
“So what are we going to do? And that hurt, by the way.”
“Tough shit, Fuzzy. Now here’s the deal—you’re gonna get some of your coons to put a damn good scare into her. Fuck her up a little…so she won’t never be coming back here again.”
“But won’t they just send someone else then?”
“They already did that once, remember? Those dumbass officers they sent couldn’t find their asses with both hands. Gave my unit a glowing report. This skirt can add two and two, though.”
“Let me get this straight, Hard…you want my boys to give her a beating?”
“Gee, you ain’t so dumb, are you, Fuzzy? That’s what I’m saying…beat her up real good…whatever it takes. Scare the shit out of her. Just make sure she can walk out of here.”
Van Flyss thought it over for a moment, and then said, “I told you we should’ve killed those people.”
Operation Fishwrapper (Jock Miles WW2 Adventure Series Book 5) Page 7