The Wandering Ghost (george sueno and ernie bascom)

by Martin Limon

  Jill became so passionate about this subject that I had to slow her down. Ernie still snored. Kim Yong-ai still hid silently behind the door leading to the kitchen.

  “Okay, Jill,” I said. “They broke you in buying wristwatches and then larger items and having you transport them from the PX out to Tongduchon. You were working nights on the ville patrol. Then one morning, as you were getting off duty, something bad happened. Something involving a deuce-and-a-half.”

  Her face soured. She sipped her lukewarm coffee, composed herself, and then resumed. The outline of what she told me, I already knew, having been briefed by Sergeant Bernewright, the Division Safety NCO. Two GIs were coming back from the Western Corridor, hungover and driving too fast and the road was slick with intermittent rain. As they approached a group of middle-school girls waiting for a bus, the driver lost control of the truck on a slippery curve and slid into the crowd, injuring two and mortally wounding young Chon Un-suk.

  “I wanted to shoot the bastards,” Jill told me. “I even pulled my. 45 and held it to the driver’s head. He believed I was gonna do it, too, and I almost did.” She barked a short, mirthless laugh. “The silly bastard wet himself.”

  “And then you gave the girl first aid?”

  “I tried. But someone had informed her father and he showed up, absolutely in a panic, and he started to lift her up and people were helping him and I told them to stop, that the medics would be here any minute and if she had a spine injury that they could cripple her for life. But they weren’t listening and when I tried to stop them, her father shoved me. I kept trying to reason with him but other men in the crowd helped him carry the little girl and I could see her head lolling backward and her tongue hanging out, pink, and I was afraid they might snap her neck. I tried again to interfere and this time someone smacked me and I smacked him back and then we were fighting, and a jeep full of MPs arrived firing their weapons into the air and everyone backed off. Except me. I ran after the father, followed him to his home and, without anyone asking me to, I went through the gate. Her mother was hysterical. Tearing her hair out. Moaning over her daughter. I pushed my way through and felt the carotid artery and there was nothing left and I knew that Chon Un-suk was dead. She’d died on the way over, while being carried by her father.”

  A long silence ensued. I sat cross-legged on the ondol floor, trying to picture the scene, trying to feel what Jill Matthewson must’ve felt. Finally, she spoke again.

  “What pissed me off,” she said softly, “was why those two doo-fus MPs were sent to the Western Corridor in the first place. And why they were driving back so early in the morning.”

  “Why?”

  “Fred Otis told me the story,” Jill said.

  Him again? Why was I surprised? He was a veteran NCO, well aware of what was going on around him, experienced, and it figured that a young MP as bright as Jill Matthewson would gravitate toward him for advice.

  Otis told Jill that the two MPs had been sent to a notorious GI village in the Western Corridor known as Yangjukol. Spending the night there had been their reward for driving the deuce-and-a-half after regular duty hours and picking up an ancient vase from some Korean antiques dealer and transporting it back the next morning to Camp Casey.

  “The Division honchos are busy black-marketing their butts off,” Jill said, “and little Chon Un-suk gets herself killed because of them.” Jill shook her head and whispered softly. “Bastards. And to cover it up, they let the two guys in the truck off easy. Sent them back to the States, out of harm’s way.”

  “What type of antique were they transporting?” I asked.

  “I caught a glimpse of it when I first approached the truck. Tied in the center of the bed of the truck, all by itself, partially encased in wood. Beautiful.”

  “A celadon vase,” I said, “covered with white cranes.”

  “How’d you know?” Jill asked.

  “Just a guess.”

  We talked about Pak Tong-i. Yes, he’d had a soft spot for Kim Yong-ai but the feeling was not mutual. She’d played along with him mainly because he was the only man who could provide her with steady work. “She’s been poor all her life,” Jill told me. “Born to a farming family down in South Cholla Province. Her father died when she was twelve. She had to quit middle school and go to work to help support her mom and her younger sisters.”

  “Doing what?” I asked.

  Jill frowned. “You don’t need to know.”

  I dropped the subject.

  What I needed was evidence of black-marketing. If the operation was as widespread as Jill Matthewson claimed it was, I should be able to get it. That, coupled with her testimony, which I had to admit was extremely believable, would nail them.

  Just before dawn, we talked about Marv Druwood.

  “He was sweet,” Jill told me. “A couple of years younger than me and still a kid, you know. I liked him but I didn’t like him that way. He had a crush on me so I tried to be nice to him. He was no happier about the black-market situation than I was and he told me that everything that went on at the Turkey Farm made him sick, but I noticed that he didn’t stop going there.”

  “Did he have enemies?”

  “No. He took a lot of ribbing because he was so mild mannered. He’s from some country town in Iowa. What must’ve happened is that after I left he stopped cooperating with Bufford about the black-marketing. If that happened, they’d immediately become suspicious. Probably afraid that because of his friendship with me, he might decide to turn them in, go above the Division IG, report the operation to somebody.”

  “Reason enough to kill him?”

  “Maybe. Maybe not. But it’s reason enough to start in on him. Start needling him. Start making him angry. He had a temper, you know.”

  “Tell me about it.”

  “It only flared up occasionally. It was kind of cute in a way, like a little boy throwing a tantrum. Nothing dangerous. But it might’ve been enough so that he said things or threatened things that maybe got him killed.”

  “They’re that desperate that they’d kill a fellow GI?”

  “They shot at you, didn’t they?”

  More than once.

  “These guys,” Jill told me, “are out of control.”

  I thought of Marv Druwood’s corpse. I believed she was right.

  Everything Jill Matthewson told me made sense. It all tied together. She wanted to put a stop to the corruption in high places within the 2nd Infantry Division and therefore she’d put her mom up to writing to her congressman. But why not just come to us directly? I asked her.

  “Because then everybody at Eighth Army would know,” Jill told me. “They’d notify Division. The cover-up would start and be completed before you even got here. I had to lure you up here for another reason.”

  “Like finding a missing female MP.”

  “Exactly.”

  One more thing was bothering me. Jill Matthewson had good reason for everything she was doing. Still, people don’t face charges of desertion and possible time in a federal penitentiary just to mollify their sense of right and wrong. Usually there’s a personal reason. A deep-seated personal reason. We were both tired. Both yawning. Both ready to go to sleep. I popped the question.

  “I know you’re angry at these SOBs, Jill. And I know they deserve all the punishment we’re going to try to lay on them. But what about you? What made you go AWOL? What made you chuck your entire military career? What, exactly, did Colonel Alcott and Mr. Bufford and the honchos at Division do to you?”

  She set down her coffee cup and stared at me long and hard. Finally, she spoke. “Never,” she said, “and I mean never, ask me that question again.”

  With that she rose from her cross-legged position, opened the sliding door, and stepped out into the dark courtyard. She stood alone in the cold night air, arms crossed, head bowed.

  13

  O ur first problem was trying to figure out how to return to Tongduchon. My guess was that after the gunplay last
night in Bongil-chon, the Division MPs would set up roadblocks throughout the Division area.

  That meant we couldn’t use the jeep.

  “Where will we leave it?” Jill asked.

  The three of us stood next to the jeep, in the raked gravel lot in front of the Wondang Buddhist temple.

  “Back to I Corps,” Ernie said.

  Camp Red Cloud, where we’d left it before, was the logical place to stash the jeep. I Corps was a higher headquarters than Division and the 2nd ID MPs had no jurisdiction there. But to get to Red Cloud we’d have to return to Reunification Road, drive south past Camp Howze in Bongil-chon, and then turn east at Byokjie. Anywhere along that route, the 2nd Division MPs might be waiting for us.

  “I have a better idea,” I told Ernie.

  While Jill and Ernie waited, I entered the temple, taking my shoes off at the elevated wooden floor. I pushed my way through a heavy wooden door and entered a room filled with carved effigies of devils and demons and gods. Candles were lined up on an altar, along with bouquets of pungent incense. No people. I knelt in front of the central figure of the Hinayana Buddha and waited.

  Soon a bare-headed monk appeared. He kneeled beside me and bowed three times to Buddha. In Korean, I asked for a favor. Could we leave our jeep in his parking lot for a couple of days.

  “You’re here to help the American woman?” he asked.

  “You know about her?”

  “Wondang is a small community.”

  “Yes,” I said. “I’m here to help her.”

  “Then, by all means, leave your jeep.”

  “It will only be two days.”

  “Two days. Two years. It will be here when you return.”

  I asked if I could make a contribution to the temple. He told me it was up to me. Then he guided me to a bronze urn near the entranceway. I shoved a few military payment certificates into it, bowed to the monk, and exited.

  Outside, Ernie said, “We can leave it here?”

  I nodded.

  “For how long?”

  “Until you attain enlightenment.”

  “I thought I had already.

  The bus that ran most often out of Wondang Station was the bus to Seoul. Second to that was the express to Uijongbu, the one we bought three tickets for. After waiting twenty minutes, we hopped aboard. The seating, as usual, was tightly packed. There were two seats on either side of the aisle. I had hoped to sit next to Jill but Ernie aced me out. I was across from them, listening to their conversation, but unable to participate over the whine of the big diesel engine. The little old Korean lady who sat next to me smiled and nodded repeatedly but didn’t attempt to engage me in conversation. Instead of moping about not being able to talk to Jill, I decided to use the time to think. I leaned back in my tiny seat, inhaled the aroma of stale kimchee and cigarette smoke, and closed my eyes.

  So far, the only hard evidence I had of the 2nd ID black-marketing were the ration control records of Colonel Stanley Alcott’s open RCP. And, actually, I didn’t have them yet. Staff Sergeant Riley down in Seoul was still trying to obtain a copy of the records from his buddy, Smitty, who worked at 8th Army Data Processing. But as Riley’d told me before, the records were classified and therefore Smitty was having trouble getting a copy. Even if we obtained the records, all they would prove is that Alcott had bought truckloads of merchandise from the Camp Casey PX. They wouldn’t prove that he’d broken army regulations and Korean law by actually selling those goods in Tongduchon. For that, we’d need the testimony of the MPs who’d made the purchases on Colonel Alcott’s behalf and then transported them in military vehicles to the Turkey Farm. Incidentally, that would result in another charge: misappropriation of a military vehicle. However, there was a big flaw in all this.

  Jill had told me that it was Bufford who handled the day-to-day use of the open ration control plate. Colonel Alcott was the man responsible for the plate, the RCP’s “owner” in effect. Alcott could always testify that he didn’t know what Warrant Officer Bufford nor Corporal Matthewson nor Private Druwood nor any of the other MPs involved in the black-marketing were doing with his open RCP. He could claim they’d used it without his knowledge. Of course, no one would believe that such a huge operation could be operated using his RCP without his knowledge. He’d be reprimanded for not supervising his subordinates more closely, he’d almost certainly be relieved of his position as Division provost marshal, and probably he’d be shipped back to the States fast enough to make a brass Buddha’s head spin. But he wouldn’t be found guilty of any crime.

  Somehow, I had to nail Alcott with evidence that would tie him to the black market. Jill told me about the money he kept in his safe. I’d seen for myself, albeit briefly, the meticulous records that the Turkey Lady had kept of the incoming and outgoing black market merchandise at the Turkey Farm. Those records had been destroyed by fire. But what good are records on one end of a transaction, if the seller doesn’t have comparable records on the other end of the transaction? That would be the only way to insure that the men ultimately in charge of this black-market operation-the colonels of the mafia meetings- weren’t being ripped off by the Turkey Lady. Alcott must have kept records of his own. Could they be in the same safe in his living quarters where, according to Jill Matthewson, he kept piles of cash?

  Most likely. Alcott would want to keep the records close, so he could destroy them if the heat was ever turned on. Well, the heat would be turned on soon. I decided to call Riley, check on our duty status at 8th Army, and see about getting the 8th Army JAG to provide us with a search warrant for Lieutenant Colonel Alcott’s living quarters. I was still hopeful that 8th Army would see the light and allow us to do what needed to be done.

  Something woke me. I checked my surroundings. Jill and Ernie seemed to be sleeping. So was the elderly Korean lady sitting next to me. The bus had been zooming eastward toward Uijongbu, but the driver was now downshifting and pumping the brakes. That was what had roused me. Why was he stopping? We weren’t in Uijongbu yet. I tapped Ernie on the shoulder. He opened his eyes.

  “Trouble,” I said.

  From his aisle seat, Ernie leaned across Jill and poked his head out the window. He turned back to me.

  “Roadblock,” he said. “They’ll check everybody.”

  “Let’s get out of here,” I said.

  “How?” Jill asked. She was awake now.

  “The back door.”

  We all rose, the only three Miguks on the bus, and hurried down the aisle to the rear. Most of the old-model Korean buses, the ones that ran country routes, had large doors in the back for accepting oversize loads. When they weren’t transporting passengers, some of the seats could be taken out and something large and boxlike could be slipped onto the bus through that rear door. Usually, it was a coffin. Buses were often chartered to carry entire families out to the countryside, with the dearly departed in his or her elaborately painted Korean coffin in the back, and professional mourners in hemp cloth robes riding up front.

  Politely, I asked the young man in the back seat to move.

  Groggily, he looked up at me and said, “Weikurei?” What’s the matter with you?

  The bus had stopped now, behind a line of vehicles being inspected at the checkpoint.

  I asked the young man again to move. He pouted and stared up at me as if I were mad. Ernie grabbed him my his jacket, tugged, and pulled him roughly to his feet. Other men sitting nearby stood and started to shout and wag their fingers at Ernie. Jill tried to mollify them but it wasn’t working. Koreans are usually unfailingly polite. But if they believe that one of their own is being mistreated by a foreigner, hostility can take the place of propriety. Quickly.

  Ernie growled at the men, shouted back, and wagged his own finger.

  I kneeled in front of the door. The long handle had been painted over with gray paint. I tried to move it but it wouldn’t budge. I needed more leverage. It had to be pulled up. I stood, grabbed the handle with both hands, and hoisted upwards with a
ll my strength. ROK Army soldiers were at the front of the bus now, shouting instructions at the driver, motioning for him to pull closer to the side of the road.

  You could bet that 2nd Division MPs were up ahead as the last line of defense.

  My fingers were red and indented from pulling but so far the handle hadn’t budged. I took off my jacket, folded it, and slipped it beneath the door handle. This time I flexed my knees and took a better grip. Two-handed again. Using the strength of my thigh muscles along with my shoulders and my arms, I heaved with every ounce of strength I possessed. Jill knelt and examined the handle, seeing if there was anything she could do to help. There wasn’t.

  Korean men were now shoving Ernie. As soon as he started shoving back the fists would begin to fly and we’d never get out of here.

  I was about to give up, wondering if we could climb out a window, knowing that the ROK Army MPs would spot us if we did. I gave the handle one more pull, it moved this time, just slightly, groaned, and then popped upwards. I fell sideways onto two young women huddling next to the window.

  Jill kicked the door open and, still clutching her AWOL bag, hopped out. I regained my balance, grabbed Ernie, and dragged him toward the back door. He was punched in the back a couple of times as I pulled him out onto the road. He tried to go back to finish the fight but I told him we had to get out of there. Finally, he followed.