Second Lieutenant McCoy and Gunnery Sergeant Zimmerman were relieved, but not really surprised, when Warrant Officer Ripley showed them the clipboard on which was the pencil copy of his report. (A neatly typewritten report in many copies would be prepared later.) He had found their armory "Excellent" overall (one step down from the theoretical, never-in McCoy's experience-awarded "Superior"); and aside from "minor, readily correctable discrepancies noted hereon" there was no facet of their operation that would require a reinspection to insure that it had been corrected.
Gunnery Sergeant Zimmerman then produced a jug he just happened to come across where someone had hidden it behind a ceiling rafter, and they had a little nip.
"The brass'll keep at it for a while," Ripley said. "Between us China Marines, most of 'em got a real hard-on for Carlson. What the fuck is that all about?"
"I think it's because he got out of the Corps and then came back in," McCoy said. "And then got promoted."
"Carlson got out of the Corps?" Ripley said, obviously surprised. "I didn't know that. How come?"
McCoy shrugged his shoulders.
"I was with him in Nicaragua when he got the Navy Cross," Ripley said with a touch of pride in his voice. "The last I heard, he had the Marine detachment at Warm Springs. What'd he do, piss off the President?"
"I don't think so," McCoy said. "Otherwise the President's son wouldn't be the exec."
"No shit?" Chief Warrant Officer Ripley said. "That tall drink of water is really the President's son? I thought they were pulling my chain."
"That's him," McCoy said.
"I'll be goddamned," Ripley said.
"Is the brass going to fuck with your report? So they can stick it in Carlson?" McCoy asked.
"I call things like I see them," Ripley said indignantly. "You guys are more shipshape than most. And nobody fucks with my reports. Shit!"
"Well, this isn't the first time I heard that they're trying to stick it to Carlson," McCoy said. "And there are some real sonsofbitches around."
"When they handed me this shitty assignment-I'd rather be with the First Division; hell, I'd rather be here-the Commandant himself told me if anybody tried to lay any crap on me, I was to come to him personal."
Chapter Nineteen
(One)
Aboard the Yacht Last Time San Diego Yacht Club 1900 Hours, 9 April 1942
Major Edward J. Banning, Captain Jack NMI Stacker, and Lieutenants McCoy and Burnes were sitting on teak-and-canvas deck chairs with their feet on the polished mahogany rail at the deck. Music and the smell of something frying came up from the portholes of the galley.
"You look deep in thought, Jack," Banning said.
"You really want to know what I'm thinking?" Stecker replied. "That there are two kinds of Marines. There is the one kind, the ordinary kind, the Campbell's Baked Beans with Ham Fat kind; and then there's the steak kind. That one"-he pointed at McCoy-"is the steak kind. I don't know how they do it, but they always wind up living better than other people."
He smiled at McCoy. "No criticism, McCoy. I'm jealous. Christ, this is real nice."
Banning chuckled. "I know what you mean, Jack," he said. "When all the other PFCs in the Fourth were playing acey-deucey for dimes with each other in the barracks, McCoy was playing poker for big money in the Cathay Mansions Hotel with an ex-Czarist Russian general, and he was living in a whorehouse the General owned."
"Jesus!" McCoy said. "Be quiet, Ernie'll hear you."
Stecker and Banning laughed.
"I didn't know you knew about that," McCoy said to Banning.
"I know a good deal about you that you don't know I know," Banning said, a little smugly.
"The first time I saw him, he was a corporal; but he was driving that big LaSalle," Stecker said, pointing down the wharf. "I was a technical sergeant before I drove anything fancier than a used Model A Ford."
"This seems to have developed a leak, Ken," Banning said, examining his bottle of Schlitz. "It's all gone."
"I'll get you another, sir," First Lieutenant Martin J. Burnes, USMCR, said quickly, taking the bottle from Banning's hand and scurrying down the ladder to the aft cockpit.
"There's another proof of your theory, Jack," Banning said. "When I was a second lieutenant, I did the running and fetching for first lieutenants."
Stecker chuckled.
"He's all right, Major," McCoy said. "Eager as hell. Gung ho!"
Marty Burnes returned almost immediately with four bottles of Schlitz.
"Here you are, sir," he said, respectfully, handing one of the bottles to Banning, and then passing the others around.
"Burnes," Jack Stecker said, "McCoy just accused you of being 'gung ho!' I keep hearing that phrase around here. What's that all about?"
"You never heard it in China?" Banning asked, and then before Stecker could reply, he went on. "Oh, that's right. You had your family with you. No sleeping dictionary. You weren't really a China Marine men, were you, Jack? No speakee Chinaman."
McCoy snorted.
"It's a Chinese phrase, sir," Burnes said, almost eagerly. "It means 'all pull together.'"
"What's that got to do with the Raiders?" Stecker pursued.
"Cooperate, sir, for the common good. Do something that has to be done, even if it's not your responsibility."
"Give me a for-example," Banning asked, politely.
"Oh, for example, sir," Burnes said, "suppose an officer is walking around the area, and he sees that a garbage can is knocked over. Instead of finding somebody, an enlisted man, to set it up, he would do it himself. Because it should be set straight, sir, for the common good of the unit."
Banning looked at McCoy and saw that his eyes were smiling.
Burnes sensed that the example he had given was not a very good one. "You can explain it better than I can, Ken," Burnes said. "You tell the major."
"First of all," McCoy said, in Cantonese, "it doesn't mean 'all pull together.' It means something like 'strive for harmony.' And while it strikes me, and probably strikes you, as the night soil of a very large and well-fed male ox, you can see from this child that the children have adopted it as holy writ. What's wrong with it?"
Burnes's eyes widened, first at the flow of Chinese, and then as Major Banning choked on his beer. He went to Banning and vigorously pounded his back until Banning waved him off.
"You all right, sir?" Burnes asked, genuinely concerned.
"I'm fine," Banning said. "It went down the wrong pipe."
"Well, Burnes," Stecker said. "We know who had those dictionaries, don't we? Nobody likes a wiseass second lieutenant, McCoy."
Ernie Sage came onto the forward deck skillfully balancing a tray in her hands. The tray held two plates of hors d'ouevres, one with bacon-wrapped chicken livers, the other with boiled shrimp and a bowl of cocktail sauce. She was wearing a T-shirt and shorts. The front of her T-shirt was emblazoned with a large, red Marine Corps insignia.
"Steak," Stecker said. "See my point?"
Ernie smiled nervously, wondering if that meant disapproval of the T-shirt.
Banning laughed.
"I'm not so sure all these hors d'ouevres are a good idea," Ernie said. "The steaks are enormous. Ken ran into some China Marine he knew working in the commissary."
Stecker laughed out loud in delight, and Banning shook his head.
Ernie smiled with relief; they did not disapprove of her shorts and T-shirt. But now that she thought about it, she did. It was a dumb idea, something she had done in hurt and anger. Her mother had called the day before, and they had gotten into it. The conversation had started out politely enough, but that hadn't lasted long. And her mother had played her ace: "I just hope you know how you're hurting your father's feelings, how it hurts him to have his friends seeing his daughter acting like… like nothing more than a camp follower."