by Martin Limon
I nodded toward the little kisaeng. “Only if she goes with us.”
“She stays!” he shouted.
Ernie raised his .45 again.
“Burning her isn’t going to do any good,” I said. “Burning yourself alive isn’t going to do any good either. The game’s over, Demoray. Best to keep your mouth shut and hire a good lawyer.”
“Some Second Looey who doesn’t know his ass from a hole in the ground?”
“You can hire a stateside lawyer,” I said. “Other people have done it. You must have plenty of money.”
“What do you know about money?”
“Not much,” I admitted.
“Enough of the bull,” Demoray said. “I want you and your partner out of here now.” He raised the lighter, his hand on the striking wheel.
“Okay,” I said. “We’re moving.”
I took a step backward and, as I did so, I flashed a hand signal to Ernie. We’d used them plenty of times in tight situations. They weren’t regulation. You couldn’t find them in any Army Field Manual, but they worked for us. This one said, “I’ll distract him while you take him down.”
I moved quickly to my left, stuck out my hand toward the little kisaeng, and said, “Ka-ja,” which in Korean means “Let’s go.” On cue, she rose to her feet. Demoray flinched and Ernie sprinted forward. Startled, Demoray swiveled at the sound of the footsteps, but he was too slow. Ernie plowed into him like an All-Pro linebacker. The lighter flew from Demoray’s hand and skittered along the cement floor. I ran forward and pulled the little kisaeng behind me, then I crouched, dropping my right knee onto Demoray’s thigh, grappling with one of his flailing arms, and simultaneously pulling my handcuffs out from behind my back. Within seconds we had him trussed up, lying facedown on the floor. I retrieved the lighter and placed it carefully into my pocket.
“Not so tough now, are you, Demoray?” Ernie said.
I started to walk toward the little kisaeng, expecting her to be relieved and happy, but instead of greeting me she stared off into the hallway to my left. Footsteps approached. Someone kicked my broom handle across cement and then a shadow emerged around the corner. Standing in front of us was Rick Mills, Executive Director of the Central Locker Fund.
Accompanying him, in all its macabre glory, was a double-barreled shotgun aimed straight at us.
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“Don’t even think about it, Bascom,” Rick Mills said.
Ernie had his hand on the hilt of his holstered .45.
“Take off your jacket,” Rick Mills said. Ernie did, and dropped it on the floor. “Now, unbuckle the leather. Without touching the weapon, drop the entire holster on top of the jacket.” Ernie followed instructions.
“Now, gently,” Rick Mills said, “using your feet, slide the jacket and the holster toward me. Ernie did, shoving it forward a few feet. “Now you, Sueño. Keep sliding it over here.”
When it was close enough, Rick Mills told me to stop, then reached forward with his right foot and pulled Ernie’s jacket right in front of him. By now, the jacket was soaked with gasoline. The little kisaeng had sat back down on her stool, both her hands now covering her face. Carefully keeping the shotgun aimed at us, Rick Mills crouched down, released Ernie’s .45 from its holster, stood back up, and shoved the automatic into his front belt.
By now, Demoray had realized what was happening and was struggling to get up.
With the shotgun, Rick Mills motioned for me to move to my left. He also motioned for Ernie to step closer to me and the little kisaeng.
Then he said, “Demoray, can you hear me?”
“Yeah, boss. I’m okay now.”
“These boys knocked you for a loop, eh?”
“They got lucky.”
“I doubt that. They’re just smarter than you. Why don’t you admit it?”
Demoray didn’t answer.
Mills said, “Come over here.”
“I can’t move, boss.”
“Sure you can. Just wriggle forward a little bit at a time. You can do it.”
“I can’t.”
“Try, goddamn it!”
Demoray tried. He made a few inches’ progress. Then he made more.
“That’s it,” Rick Mills said. “Just keep coming like that. Like a big worm. The big worm that you are.” He paused, stared at us, and then back at Demoray. “We had the perfect operation going,” Mills said. “For years. Everybody was getting fat. The DACs were getting what they wanted, the generals were getting the swimming pools and golf courses, the ROK government was getting contracts and gifts every year, but nobody was getting greedy. Everybody played it cool, made sure the records stayed clean and questions weren’t asked, and every Eighth Army inspector general was either handpicked by one of our commanders or kept busy with projects that kept him away from the Central Locker Fund. Everybody played it cool. Played it smart.”
Demoray was just a few feet away from Rick Mills now, sweaty and smeared with gasoline. Like the worm Mills had suggested, Demoray looked up and said, “Get the keys, boss. Let me up.”
Mills looked down at him, his lips twisted in disgust. Then he spit off to the side, took a step backward, and as fast as a striker kicking a ball toward the goal, his foot flashed forward. Demoray’s head snapped back, and blood and flesh and what might’ve been molars flooded over his front lip.
“Dumb shit,” Mills said.
The little kisaeng started to whimper.
“Can you shut her up?” Mills said. He shook his head. “Korean women used to be strong. My wife would never have whined like that. No matter what.”
The little kisaeng stifled her crying.
“What now?” I asked Mills.
“Whadda you mean, what now?”
“I mean, you can shoot us. A lot of good it’ll do you. The game’s over now, Mills. You must’ve been listening when I gave Demoray advice. A good lawyer. You can definitely afford one, probably from one of those fancy law firms. Somebody who specializes in going up against the government. You know what Eighth Army JAG is like. You’ll get a slap on the wrist. They won’t just be intimidated by your legal representation; they don’t particularly want the embarrassment of what’s been going on beneath their noses for all these years.”
Mills grinned. “You’re a cynical bastard, aren’t you?”
I shrugged.
“How about you,” Mills said, turning to Ernie. “Do you agree with your partner here?”
“He’s right about most things.”
“But not everything.”
“Nobody is,” Ernie said. “Like how many cartridges do you have in that shotgun. Two? If you miss with one, either me or my partner will be on your ass.”
I don’t know how he managed it, but Ernie was somehow chomping on ginseng gum again.
Mills grinned even more broadly. “By God, I like your spirit. Shit, if I would’ve had guys like you working for me, instead of this piece of shit . . .” Demoray shook his head. “. . . we’d still be in business and going strong.”
“We wouldn’t work for you, Mills,” I said.
“Why not. You don’t like money?”
“I like money fine. I just don’t like raping and torturing helpless women.”
Mills frowned. Maybe it was my imagination, but I thought his finger tightened on the trigger of the shotgun. He glared at me. For a long minute, I held my breath. Mills was making a decision. Ernie felt it too. An aura of tension seemed to emanate from his body. I knew what he wanted to do. He wanted to attack. If he had to go down, he would at least go down fighting; but he was also weighing the odds. Rick Mills knew how to handle that shotgun. If either Ernie or I made a play for him, our guts would be blown out of our stomachs and splattered all over onionskin.
Finally, Rick Mills took his eyes off of mine and glanced at the little kisaeng.
&nbs
p; “Get her out of here,” he said.
I reached for her. She stood.
“That’s what it was,” Rick Mills said. “Not the money. Who gives a shit if wasted tax dollars land in my pocket or somebody else’s? It was the arrogance. The cruelty. The thinking that we were better than the Koreans. So much better than their women that we could use them in the ways we saw fit. Ways that made us feel good. That’s why this piece of shit deserves to die.”
Demoray twisted his bloody mouth away from the floor, saying “Please.”
Mills kicked him again.
“Go on,” Mills said. “Get out. All three of you. Get out now.”
Ernie grabbed the little kisaeng and started to back away.
I stepped backward, keeping my hands raised and my eyes on Rick Mills’s shotgun. When I was almost out of range, I said, “You don’t have to do this, Mills.”
“Sure I do,” he said.
“You’ll be in trouble, sure,” I said, “but you didn’t kill anyone. You know how it works. You pay your dues and life goes on.”
“I paid my dues,” Mills said, “when my wife died.”
“How about him?” I said, motioning toward Demoray. “You can’t just shoot him.”
“Why not?”
“You’re not the judge and jury.”
“I am now.”
In the distance, a siren sounded. As we listened, it grew louder. “You better get out, Sueño. While you still can.”
I backed away, stepped around the edge of the long row, and finally out of the line of fire. I leaned against the stanchion, breathing deeply, suddenly realizing that my knees were wobbly. Apparently, Ernie’d already hustled the little kisaeng out of the warehouse. He ran toward me, grabbed my arm, and without a word yanked me toward the exit.
I followed.
We were just stepping outside the warehouse into the blessed fresh air when we heard it. A shotgun blast. And then, as we dived toward the ground, a huge whoosh, like a mighty monster inhaling all the oxygen in the world, and the 8th United States Army Non-Appropriated Fund Records Repository exploded into flame.
-16-
Orrin W. Penwold, the Ville Rat, was declared “persona non grata” by the ROK Ministry of the Interior, which meant that he’d never be allowed to return to the Republic of Korea. It took the KNPs a few days to find him, but eventually they did. The US Embassy bought him a one-way ticket back to the States.
Mr. Wilbur M. Robinson Sr., long-time Department of the Army Civilian with the 8th Army Comptroller’s Office, decided to retire and discreetly took his leave.
The warehouse fire made some news, especially when the bodies of Master Sergeant Demoray and Noncommissioned Officer Rick Mills were found in the rubble. An Associated Press stringer did a story on it that not only appeared in Stateside newspapers, but was even cleared for publication in the Department of Defense official publication, the Pacific Stars and Stripes. It was a strictly factual story, however, and mentioned nothing about the long-term misappropriation of Non-Appropriated Fund merchandise.
Meanwhile, the Gunslinger was always good copy and the same AP stringer, tipped off by some anonymous source, got wind of the melee during the court-martial of Private First Class Clifton Threets. He reported on the shooting of Sergeant Orgwell and the official accusations against Threets, but the main focus of the story was the Gunslinger and how, according to eyewitnesses, he’d fired one of his pearl-handled revolvers into the ceiling of the courtroom. This made for quite a story back in the States, but since it couldn’t be corroborated by official 8th Army sources, it didn’t appear in the Stars and Stripes. Lieutenant Peggy Mendelson at 8th Army JAG never explained why, but after the story appeared, the charges against Threets changed from attempted homicide to aggravated assault. And when Second Lieutenant Bob Conroy threatened to fight even that, the charges were lowered to simple assault. Threets pled guilty to the charge, was sentenced to time served, and dismissed from the Army with a bad-conduct discharge.
Sergeant Orgwell was deemed no longer medically fit for duty and was granted disability retirement, including a lump-sum payment, a monthly pension for the rest of his life, and medical care provided by the Veterans Administration.
As per his wishes, Rick Mills was laid to rest in the burial mound he shared with his wife. Ernie and I attended the ceremony and even performed duties as ceremonial grave diggers, in accordance with Korean custom. Sure, Mills was a crook, but he’d also been a fellow soldier once, and in the end he’d conducted himself, if not with wisdom, at least with honor.
Mr. Kill, Chief Homicide Inspector for the Korean National Police, put a halt to the investigation of how many kisaeng Demoray had killed. A GI serial killer was not the type of story that either the Korean government or the United States wanted to hear about.
Miss Kwon, the little kisaeng, returned to her job as a hostess at the Bright Cloud Inn. Officer Oh, Inspector Kill’s stalwart female assistant, was appointed to watch over her and make sure she made a successful readjustment to normal life. Or as normal as life gets in a kisaeng house.
Leah Prevault and I took a few days off work and traveled to a resort area in southern Korea on the island of Jindo, far from any military bases, or any Americans at all for that matter. We wandered along fishing wharfs and deserted beaches and ate platefuls of fresh fish and dried seaweed at well-lit restaurants at night. She made me tell her all about what happened and waited patiently as I tried to sort it all out. There’s something to this head-shrinking stuff. Just speaking my thoughts aloud made me feel better. Especially when someone was there to listen.
Back in Seoul, Ernie and I entered the CID office together. Staff Sergeant Riley said, “Where in the hell you guys been?”
“None of your freaking business,” Ernie told him.
Unfazed, Riley pulled out a sheaf of paperwork. “The provost marshal wants you both to sign this.”
“What is it?” Ernie asked.
“Read it. You’ll see.”
“What is it?” Ernie repeated.
Riley turned away. “An apology to the Second Division commander.”
“What?”
I grabbed the paperwork. It was two typed sheets, one with Ernie’s name on it, one with mine. I skimmed it quickly. What it said, in essence, was that we were responsible for engendering a false impression that the 2nd Infantry Division had a race-relations problem in its ranks. It also said that we had spread false rumors that the Division had training and leadership problems. Finally, there was a statement to the effect that both Ernie and I were responsible for these transgressions and very sorry for having any hand in perpetuating said falsehoods.
“You’ve got to be kidding me,” Ernie said.
“Nobody’s kidding, Bascom,” Riley said, hands on his hips. “You insulted the Second Infantry Division and the Second Infantry Division commander and now you’re going to apologize.”
“And if I don’t?”
Riley’s eyes narrowed. “Shit Detail City.”
“I’ve been on shit details before,” Ernie told him. He reached for the paper, crumpled it into a small ball, and tossed it into Riley’s trash bin.
“You’re going to regret this, Bascom,” Riley said.
“Never.”
Ernie stalked out of the office.
Both Sergeant Riley and Miss Kim, the secretary, stared at me. I lifted the paper and studied it. Instead of balling it up, I carried it across the room, set it on my wooden field desk, rolled a clean sheet of paper into my Remington manual, and started to type.
“What the hell you doing?” Riley growled.
“Preparing my rebuttal,” I said.
Miss Kim brought me a cup of Black Dragon tea.
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