"Are you a drinking man, Lieutenant?"
The question surprised Weston.
"Yes, Sir."
"And a couple of beers, please," the General said.
"Yes, Sir," the Filipino said.
Fertig met Weston's eyes again.
"Welcome to Headquarters, United States Forces in the Philippines, Lieu-tenant. Weston, you said?"
"Yes, Sir. Thank you, Sir."
"You will, from this moment, consider yourself and your men under my command."
That announcement made Weston uncomfortable. His imagination shifted into high gear.
What this guy may be-probably is-is a staff officer who went around the bend. He was unable to accept that the Army got the shit kicked out of it, that the Japanese have won the battle for the Philippines hands down. That must have been even tougher to accept for someone of senior rank, with twenty years or so in the service, than it was for somebody like me.
And unable to accept the facts, he's now living out some fantasy where he is still a general, the U.S. Army in the Philippines still exists, and any moment The Aid will appear, galloping to our rescue like the cavalry in the movies.
"Yes, Sir," he said.
"Things are a bit primitive around here at the moment," Fertig said. "We hope to improve on them." "Yes, Sir."
"Please tell me how you came here, Lieutenant."
"One of my men, Sergeant Everly, Sir, was contacted by one of your men while he was on a patrol. He showed Sergeant Everly your..."
"Proclamation?" Fertig asked.
"Yes, Sir. Your proclamation... nailed to a telephone pole. He, Everly, brought it to me, and then your man led us here."
"What I was really asking, Lieutenant, was how you came to Mindanao. Presumably, you were formerly assigned to the 4th Marines on Bataan?"
"On Corregidor, yes, Sir."
"And you somehow got off Corregidor and decided that it was your duty not to surrender when Corregidor inevitably fell?"
"Yes, Sir."
Well, at least he knows that we lost Bataan and Corregidor. Fertig looked at him, obviously waiting for him to continue. "I was a pilot, Sir," Weston heard himself saying. "I mean, I am an avia-tor. I was stranded in the Philippines and assigned to the 4th Marines as a supernumerary officer. My commanding officer... my commanding officer sent me to Bataan looking for supplies...."
Why is it important to tell this man what really happened? Am I looking for his approval? His forgiveness?
"I was provided with five thousand dollars and a Spanish-speaking ser-geant, Sir. I wasn't ordered to desert, that was my decision. But I believe Major Paulson hoped I would not return; that I would try to get out of the Phil-ippines, to Australia." Fertig nodded.
"We attempted to rent a boat," Weston went on. "We found one. And then the Filipinos on the boat attempted to murder us."
"Banditry and piracy have a long history in the Philippines," Fertig said. "What happened?"
"We killed them," Weston blurted, aware of that but unable to stop. "Ev-erly killed the one who was trying to cut my throat, and then we... killed the others. And threw their bodies into the sea."
"Where was that?" Fertig replied. He seemed neither surprised nor shocked.
"Right off the Bataan Peninsula, Sir."
"It was just you and your sergeant at first? You picked up the others en route here?"
"Yes, Sir, that's about it."
"You're apparently a resourceful officer, Lieutenant. It must have been difficult to obtain the necessary food and water, and of course the charts, to make a voyage such as you have made. You are to be commended."
"Sir, it wasn't that way," Weston confessed, uncomfortably. "We had neither rations nor charts."
"But?"
"We found a cabin cruiser adrift in the passage between Lubang Island and... I can't remember the other island. A little one. Uninhabited."
"Ambil Island," Fertig furnished. "I know the passage. Tell me about the cabin cruiser."
"It was, I think, a locally built copy of a Chris-Craft."
"Did it have a name?"
"Yes, Sir. Yet Again. "
The General looked pained. His eyebrows rose, and then he shrugged, in what Weston thought was sadness and resignation.
"You're very observant, Lieutenant," the General said, his voice level. "Yet Again was a locally built copy of a Chris-Craft. It belongs-belonged, apparently; past tense-to friends of mine. Joseph and Harriet Dennison. He was the Chrysler dealer in Manila. Was there any sign of them, by any chance?"
"In the master cabin, Sir, there were two bodies. A middle-aged couple. The woman was in the bed. She was apparently killed when the boat was at-tacked by Japanese aircraft. There were bullet holes-"
He was interrupted by a Filipino woman, who thrust at him a plate of pork chunks in rice and some kind of sauce. When he took it, she handed him a fork and a cup, made from bamboo.
"The pork is very nice," Fertig said. "The beer, unfortunately, seems to be proof that a civil engineer and a Navy Chief who don't know what they're doing should not try to brew beer."
Weston wolfed down the pork and rice.
"There's more," Fertig said. "But I would advise waiting an hour or so. When you haven't been eating normally..."
"That was fine, Sir. Thank you. It'll hold me for a while."
"You were telling me about what you found on the Yet Again."
Weston tried to remember where he had broken off the story, and then resumed:
"The woman was apparently killed in a strafing attack. The man shot him-self in the temple. The boat was out of fuel."
Fertig closed his eyes and said nothing.
Weston took a sip of the beer. It was warm and thick and reminded Weston of a disastrous attempt to make home brew in his fraternity house at college.
"There was canned food aboard, Sir," he went on, "and water. And charts. We took it all and started out for here."
"Leaving everything as you found it aboard the Yet Again?"
"No, Sir. I mean we... buried the bodies at sea. In blankets, weighted down with batteries. We didn't burn the boat. Everly thought it would attract attention, and I agreed."
"Inasmuch as doing so, under the circumstances, obviously posed a risk to you, it was quite decent of you to... bury... the Dennisons, Lieutenant."
Weston could think of no reply to make.
"I knew them rather well. Nice people. He was the exception to the rule that you never can trust anyone in the retail automobile business. Mrs. Fertig and I used to see a good deal of them at the Yacht Club."
"You were stationed in Manila, Sir?"
"I was a civil engineer in Manila. I had the foresight to send Mrs. Fertig home when I entered the Army."
"Yes, Sir."
"Though few others-including, sadly, the Dennisons-were willing to face that unpleasant fact, I knew there was no way we could really resist the Japanese when they came here. Roosevelt believes the Germans are the greater threat; our war effort will be directed primarily against them, the Pacific and the Japanese will be a secondary effort. There never was going to be The Aid that everybody was talking about."
"Sir, you said, 'when you entered the army'?"