by Martin Limon
“You didn’t take long getting into her blue jeans,” I said.
Ernie shrugged. “She didn’t take long getting out of them.”
I sipped my black coffee. It was bitter but strong, and so hot that I could barely hold on to the cup. Women walked into the commissary and women walked out of the commissary, most of them Korean, a few of them American. Middle-aged Korean men in gray smocks pushed huge carts overflowing with groceries for them, loaded the goods into the trunks of black Ford Granada PX taxis, and then bowed as they accepted a gratuity—usually a buck—for their services. I let the silence grow until Ernie spoke.
“She wants something from me.”
I swiveled my head to look at him. “Not money?”
He laughed. “You’ve been here too long. No, not money. She wants information.”
I waited. The coffee wasn’t quite as hot anymore, but it was still just as bitter.
“She wants me to find somebody for her. A G.I.—an officer, actually. One Captain Frederick Raymond Embry.”
“Never heard of him.”
“Neither have I. She says she met him when he was an ROTC cadet at Texas A&M. They started dating, only casually, and then she got busy with her band and they drifted apart. But later he came to visit her after he received his commission.”
“Where was all this at?”
“At the time, she’d moved to Austin, Texas. Freddy Ray, as she calls him, apparently looked real attractive to her, wearing his uniform with his shiny new butter bars, and that’s when it happened.”
“What happened?”
“She got pregnant.”
“Did she have the kid?”
“Of course. She’s a good Southern girl. Goes to church every Sunday.”
“So, where’s the kid now?”
“Staying with Marnie’s mother.”
“And she wants you to find this Freddy Ray?”
“You got it.”
I sipped my coffee again. “Are you going to do it?”
“He owes her child support.”
Maybe, maybe not, I thought. There are ways for state agencies to apply through the Department of the Army to collect back child support directly from a soldier’s pay.
“Why doesn’t she use the usual channels?” I asked.
“She has. Hasn’t worked. Maybe Freddy Ray has some influence with the Finance Officer.”
I didn’t believe it. When a mandated allotment is slapped on a soldier’s pay, as far as I knew, there was no way around it. Still, Ernie seemed to be buying the story.
“So, what are you going to do?”
“Find him,” he said. “Can’t hurt.”
“How does she know he’s stationed over here?”
“Mutual acquaintances.”
“Does she know what unit?”
“No idea.”
“You shouldn’t be doing this,” I said.
“I know.”
“Think about it.”
Ernie tossed his empty Styrofoam cup out the jeep’s window. “I just did.”
“What’d you decide?”
“Screw her.”
“That’s what you’ve been doing.”
“And I’ll do it some more, unless she decides she doesn’t like it when I tell her she can find her old boyfriend on her own.”
The cannon sounded in the distance for Close of Duty Day. Metal speakers at the edge of the parking lot belted out a scratchy version of the bugle call for retreat.
“Damn,” Ernie said.
We both clambered out of the jeep, stood at attention facing the main post flagpole, and saluted. I always felt like an ass doing this. So did Ernie. Normally we’d be indoors at this time of day so we didn’t have to go through the ritual of standing at attention and saluting a flag being lowered somewhere off in the unseen distance. But today, what with all that was happening, we hadn’t paid attention to the time.
When we returned to the CID office, Miss Kim had already gone home, but Riley was waiting for us. Frowning.
“The Provost Marshal wants to see you,” he said.
“You’ve been talking to the KNP Liaison Officer,” Colonel Brace told us. “And don’t try to deny it.”
“We just wanted to keep him updated on the case,” I said.
“I ordered you off it.”
“Yes, sir.”
“So now that you told this Lieutenant Pong that 8th Army has decided not to exercise jurisdiction, he ran it up the flagpole, and somebody in the ROK government decided they didn’t agree. So now the word comes down from the Chief of Staff that they want you, both of you, tomorrow morning at zero eight hundred hours to report to the SOFA meeting at the J-1 building.”
Colonel Brace rubbed his eyes, as if he were extremely tired. “When will you two guys learn to keep your mouths shut?”
We didn’t answer.
“Do you know where the J-1 building is?” he asked.
I nodded my head. “Yes, sir. We know.”
SOFA stands for the Status of Forces Agreement, the treaty between the US and the Republic of Korea concerning the legal standing of American forces stationed on the Korean peninsula. Whenever there’s a dispute that needs to be resolved or a serious crime that comes to their attention, the SOFA Committee holds a meeting and the Korean and American representatives try to hash out a resolution. Apparently they’d been apprised of the Blue Train rape case, and now they’d also been apprised that 8th Army wasn’t going to investigate. Ernie and I, by spilling the beans to Lieutenant Pong, had stirred up some serious bureaucratic waste. Not that we hadn’t expected to.
Colonel Brace studied us. “When you appear before them,” he said, “you answer their questions truthfully. Is that understood?”
“Yes, sir.”
“But you only answer the questions they ask. You don’t volunteer information. Is that understood?”
“Yes, sir,” we said again.
He stared at us for a long time, seemed about to speak, but finally shook his head and then waved his hand dismissively. “Get out of here. Both of you. Out!”
We saluted, performed a neat about-face, and marched out of his office.
* * *
Marnie was all over Ernie in the van, one arm draped around his shoulders, the other hand toying with the buttons of his shirt. Shelly, the lead guitar player, slapped Marnie’s hand away.
“Behave yourself,” she said.
Marnie pouted, frowned, and then turned back to Ernie, cooing, “You don’t mind, do you?”
Ernie ignored her. “What compound was that again, where you’re playing tonight?”
Shelly, sitting stiffly and continually glancing at Marnie, checked the itinerary. “Someplace called Camp Colbern,” she told us.
“That dump?” Ernie turned to me. “We should’ve brought the jeep, so we could get out of there early.”
“You want to leave me?” Marnie asked.
Ernie shoved her hand away. For the rest of the drive, she sat alone, pouting like a little girl.
After thirty minutes of winding roads, the van finally rolled through the main gate of Camp Colbern. The narrow road between Quonset huts was lined with G.I.s, smiling, waving, blowing kisses. The van’s engine churned as we climbed a short hill and came to a halt in the alley behind the Camp Colbern Enlisted Club.
Once we stopped, Mr. Shin and the other driver and their two assistants began unloading the equipment. We hustled the girls through the back door of the club. After a hallway lined with latrines, we entered a ballroom lit by dim yellow lights, with seating that would hold about a hundred people. The wall-to-wall carpet was tattered and spongy and reeked of mildew. Near the stage, beneath yellow floodlights, a reception committee waited. The post commander introduced himself, and he and his staff started fawning over the girls. Within minutes, Marnie had them rearranging the seating and running errands; soon she had appropriated the club manager’s office as the band’s official dressing room. MPs stationed at the front door kept t
he rank-and-file G.I.s at bay. The Korean staff—bartenders, cocktail waitresses, and cooks—stood back respectfully, awed by the celebrities from America who had dropped into their midst.
Everything seemed to be under control. The girls were in their dressing room getting ready. Ernie and I wandered out the back door and, after asking for directions, we found the PX snack bar. We both grabbed aluminum trays and slid along the metal railing in front of the steam table, selecting the only items on the menu: meatloaf, mashed potatoes with gravy, and yellowed green beans that had spent more time in the can than the Count of Monte Cristo.
As we ate, we sipped bitter coffee and listened to James Brown screech painfully out of a blinking jukebox.
“Did you tell her?” I asked.
“Tell her what?”
“That you’re not going to find Freddy Ray for her.”
“What’s the rush?”
That was Ernie. Get what he wants first and ruin it later.
“What about this SOFA meeting tomorrow?” he asked. “What do they want from us?”
“They want information,” I said, “to make Eighth Army admit that the Blue Train rapist is a G.I. At least that’s what the ROK side wants.”
“And if they get that?”
“They’ll want an investigation.”
Ernie shook his head. “Colonel Brace is gonna be pissed.”
I jabbed my fork into a small mountain of spuds. It can’t be helped, I almost said. Instead, I kept my mouth shut.
When we returned to the Camp Colbern Enlisted Club, the place was packed with G.I.s, standing room only, and the din of their howling was so loud that a pair of NCOs at the front door were handing out artillery ear plugs. I accepted a pair and twisted them into my ears. The Country Western All Stars were a massive hit, although I doubted anyone could hear their music. Marnie was shaking every quivering bit of flesh she had, and a squad of MPs lined the front of the stage, warning enamored G.I.s off with their nightsticks.
During one of their breaks, I walked out back behind the Enlisted Club to the area near the manager’s office that was being used as the band’s dressing room. An MP stood on duty in front of a high, painted-over window.
“Any problems?” I asked.
“None, other than I’m freezing my balls off.”
“If you see anybody, give us a holler.”
“Over that noise?”
“Do your best.”
I continued on around the building. Everything was secure. And it continued to be secure for the next few minutes while I stood outside enjoying the fresh air, until I heard a voice scream, “Halt!” It was the MP who’d been freezing his balls off. I ran back around the building in time to see him returning from a dark lane between Quonset huts.
“What happened?”
“I took a leak,” he said. “While I was back there, I heard footsteps. When I finished my business, some joker was hanging from the window ledge. He was pulling himself up so he could peek inside.”
The window was mostly painted over with green paint, but from the edges, yellow light seeped out.
“How long had he been hanging like that?” I asked.
“Less than a minute. I had to piss something fierce, and when I spotted him he dropped from the window and started to run.”
“Did you recognize him?”
“Naw. Too dark.”
“What was he wearing?”
“Fatigues. What else?”
“Then he was a G.I., not a Korean.”
“A Korean wouldn’t do something like that—try to catch a peek, I mean. That’s G.I. stuff.”
I didn’t disagree with him.
Finally, he said, “You going to report me?”
“What for? You were just taking a leak.”
“Yeah. But I hadn’t been properly relieved.”
I let the irony of the remark pass and told him not to worry.
Later that evening, on the drive back to Seoul, Marnie kept pestering Ernie to the point that the other girls were embarrassed, and right up until we finally arrived at the Crown Hotel. Without waiting to help with the unloading, the two lovebirds ran upstairs to their room.
* * *
The next morning, I sat on an upholstered chair in the lobby of the J-1 building wearing my dress green uniform and fiddling with the collar of my poplin shirt. My low quarters were highly polished, my chin shaved, and my black tie looped into a double Windsor. I looked sharp, I was on time, I was sober, and I didn’t care who knew it. I was also ready to testify, remembering Colonel Brace’s instructions: answer the questions honestly but don’t volunteer information.
A young lieutenant carrying a clipboard emerged from the SOFA conference room. “Where’s your partner?”
“Haven’t seen him yet, sir,” I replied.
The lieutenant glanced impatiently at his watch. “It’s fifteen after. He was supposed to be here at zero eight hundred hours.”
“Probably got tied up in traffic,” I said.
“Tied up in traffic? Doesn’t he live on the compound?”
“Generally.”
“‘Generally.’ What does that mean?”
Just then, Ernie shoved his way through the door. He was wearing his dress green uniform, as we’d been instructed to do, but his tie was loose and his jacket open. His brass hadn’t been shined, much less his shoes.
The lieutenant glared at him. “You look like shit.”
“You don’t look so terrific yourself.”
Red-faced, the lieutenant replied, “Listen, I could have you brought up on charges.”
“For what?”
“For being late.”
Ernie shook his head. “When was the last time a SOFA meeting started on time?”
The lieutenant’s lips tightened, but he didn’t answer. Finally, he said, “You two stay right here. You are to go nowhere, do you understand?”
Ernie tucked in his shirt.
When neither of us answered, the lieutenant said, “I’ll be back. Don’t go anywhere.”
He swiveled and pushed through the swinging double doors into the SOFA conference room. Ernie sat in the chair next to me, straightening his tie. There was a scratch on his neck, starting just above his collar and extending below it.
“You broke the news to Marnie,” I said.
Ernie shook his head. “She likes to get her way.”
“I’ll say. Any more damage, other than that scratch?”
“Nothing that major surgery won’t fix.”
The lieutenant emerged from the double doors and motioned for us to enter. We did, Ernie taking the lead, pushing through the doors and marching regally across the carpeted floor until he reached the skirted tables in front of a row of uniformed men on a dais. The lighting was bright, aimed into our eyes, as if we were going to be given the third degree.
Ernie stood for a moment; I stood next to him. When they didn’t tell us to sit, Ernie reached across the table and poured himself a glass of water. I did the same. Finally, the chairman of the committee, a ROK Army colonel, told us to take our seats. Then the questioning began.
Colonel Brace wouldn’t ask us for a rundown on how the SOFA meeting had gone—that would be beneath his dignity. Instead, he’d have Staff Sergeant Riley do it. As we pushed through the big double doors of the CID admin office, I fully expected to be accosted with Riley’s questions. Instead, I saw Marnie.
She was smiling and laughing, sitting in a chair next to Riley’s desk, leaning toward him, the top button of her blouse open, exchanging confidences as if they were two long-lost friends. They both glanced over at us, frowned, and returned to their conversation.
Ernie groaned but walked right past them, heading for the coffee urn.
Miss Kim wasn’t at her desk. Her hangul typewriter was covered and her desk drawer locked. Apparently, she’d gone home for the day. The rose too was missing.
Marnie had permission to enter the compound. All USO performers were provided with not only a pa
ss to access military compounds but also temporary ration cards, so they could purchase items out of the commissary or the post exchange. Most of them didn’t use the privileges much. After all, they were only here for a few days—two or three weeks at the most—and they were put up in tourist hotels and were pretty much constantly on the go. But somehow Marnie had not only made her way from the Crown Hotel to Yongsan Compound, but she’d also managed to locate the CID office. Resourceful girl.
Ernie carried his cup of coffee back to Riley’s desk and sat down in a chair opposite Marnie.
“What are you doing here?” he asked.
“None of your beeswax,” she said.
Ernie continued to stare at her.
“Okay, if you must know,” Marnie continued, “Staff Sergeant Riley here is going to help me find Freddy Ray. Apparently he doesn’t think it’s right for my little girl not to receive the child support that is due to her.”
“Bull,” Ernie said.
“I beg your pardon?” Marnie said.
She was acting extremely ladylike this morning.
“I mean ‘bull,’” Ernie said. “You’ve got a grudge against this Freddy Ray, and when you find him, you’re going to do something to embarrass the hell out of him.”
Marnie’s face flushed red. “Well, maybe he deserves it.”
Riley grabbed his hat. “Come on, Marnie,” he said. “Let’s go talk somewhere where we won’t be interrupted.”
“Yes,” Marnie replied. “Let’s do.”
Still pouting, she stared at Ernie and then turned and walked out of the office with Staff Sergeant Riley. Ernie waited until the door closed and their footsteps faded down the hallway. Then he said wistfully, “You think he’ll get any of that?”
“Not a chance,” I replied.
The SOFA meeting had been an unpleasant experience. Translators were used for the ROK Army officers—most of whom could speak English but didn’t want to lose face by mispronouncing words in a formal setting. The American officers kept trying to get us to admit that we had no idea, for sure, that the Blue Train rapist was a member of the United States military. This was in fact true. The ROK Army officers kept trying to get us to admit that the chances of the Blue Train rapist being anything other than an American G.I. were slim to nothing. This also was true.