Suddenly, I was nervous. Much more nervous than I had been before.
The General finished with the paperwork, slipped a metal clip on a short stack, and tossed it into the “Out” basket. Then he stared at us, each in turn, long and steady.
“First,” he said, “forget all the bullshit.”
I sat with my back ramrod straight in the chair.
He turned his attention fully to me. “They’re going to bring a Report of Survey down on you, Sueno, for losing your forty-five. A Report of Survey that could lead to court-martial.” He stared at me for a few moments. I stared back. He turned toward Ernie. “And an official reprimand against you, Bascom, for being the senior man and allowing it to happen.”
He waited for a reaction, but Ernie and I were still too stunned at being in the presence of a four-star general to say anything. Ernie shows no reverence for anyone alive. And I’ve seen him mouth off in circumstances that were bound to get him slapped in the stockade or even killed, but he chose to mouth off anyway. Threats don’t scare him. Yet even he knew that now was not the time to say anything. A private audience with the Commanding General of 8th Army was not something two lowly CID agents experienced every day. It was as if we’d suddenly been shoved in a cage with a Bengal tiger.
“I believe in redemption,” General Armbrewster declared. “We all make mistakes. The test of a man is whether or not he corrects them.”
He paused and seemed to want a response to this. Was he saying that neither Ernie nor I would be punished if we caught the people who stole my. 45 and shot Han Ok-hi? I think he was. However, I was afraid to say so out loud. Negotiating with a four-star general was not something I was used to. The silence grew longer. Finally, I found the courage to speak. “Yes, sir,” I said. Nothing more.
Armbrewster nodded his bony head, taking my statement as complete acquiescence. Which, of course, it was.
“On the other hand, if one doesn’t correct one’s mistakes…”
The General let the sentence trail off, spreading both his hands, as if allowing sand to sift through his fingers.
His meaning was clear. If Ernie and I don’t catch the people who perpetrated these crimes, he’d allow all charges to be brought against us. The full force and power of the Uniform Code of Military Justice would hammer us senseless.
These weren’t idle threats. In the military justice system, the commanding officer performs the same function that the district attorney and the grand jury do in civilian proceedings. He decides who is going to be prosecuted and who isn’t. In addition, he appoints the officers who will preside as judges over the trial. And often there’s an understanding as to what the CG expects the verdict to be. So the Commanding General functions as the district attorney and grand jury and also-if he chooses to-as the judge and the jury. Ernie and I were toast if the CG decided against us, and we both knew it.
When General Armbrewster was satisfied that we understood what he was saying, he crossed his arms and leaned back in his swivel chair.
“He’s a killer.”
Ernie and I both jerked forward. My first thought was for Han Ok-hi-she hadn’t made it, after all-but the General said, “A traveling man.”
“Where?” Ernie croaked.
“Up in Songtan.”
We knew the place. The village outside Osan Air Force Base, the largest U.S. Air Base in Korea.
“I don’t know much more about the victim yet,” General Armbrewster said. “An old hag who works the streets, they tell me.”
“Who told you, sir?” Ernie was already investigating.
“The Korean National Police Liaison Officer,” Armbrewster answered. “He says the KNPs are worried because they don’t have access to our compounds or much good intelligence amongst the GIs who work mischief off base. He’s going to need American help.”
“How do the KNPs know it’s the same guy?” I asked.
“The way she was killed. Raped, strangled, stabbed, and then she was…”
“But that’s not the way Han Ok-hi was hurt,” Ernie interrupted. “Not at all.”
“I’m not finished.” Armbrewster stared at Ernie until he quieted. “Once this cretin was through with the old bag, he put a hole in her skull. With a forty-five.”
My side was still throbbing from the knife wound last night. In fact, I was worried it had started bleeding again. But now it felt as if another hot blade had been shoved into my stomach, by the same guy who had pulled the trigger of my pistol.
“It could be anybody’s forty-five,” I said. “The KNPs couldn’t run a ballistics test that quickly.”
“No, they couldn’t,” Armbrewster agreed. “But they also have this.”
He shoved a small piece of cardboard wrapped in plastic across his desk. Then, while Ernie and I leaned forward, he lifted the portable lamp and shone the beam directly onto the document.
It was made of rectangular white cardboard. Wallet-sized. Perforated edges. A standard 8th Army Form: USFK 108-b, Weapons Receipt. The card that was needed by every GI when he checked out his weapon from his unit’s arms room. This one described the type of weapon authorized-. 45 pistol, automatic, one-each-and next to that the serial number of the specific weapon.
I recognized the serial number. I had memorized it over a year ago, when I’d arrived in Korea and been assigned to the 8th Army CID Detachment.
I also recognized the name typed into the top square: Sueno, George (NMI).
There was a thumbprint on the card. Brown. Probably dried blood. Clear. As if it had been purposely placed there by a professional.
I looked back at General Armbrewster, still too stunned to speak. Ernie spoke for me.
“He wants us to catch him,” Ernie said.
General Armbrewster nodded his skeleton-like skull.
“Yes. On that, if nothing else, I and this cretin agree. I want you to catch him. Now. Not tomorrow, not the next day, but now! I saw your MPRFs.” Military Personnel Records Folders. General Armbrewster took a deep breath. “You’re both a couple of fuck-offs. You never do anything right. Your black market arrest statistics are for shit, and you’re always embarrassing some staff officer with a lot of scrambled eggs on the brim of his cap. Why? Because you don’t care about a damn thing except catching crooks.” He looked directly at us, eyes blazing. “Good work, goddamn it! Keep the bastards on their toes. You two are the only cops I’ve got who can find out anything in the ville. All the other investigators are like the assholes who work for me here in the headshed. Always trying to impress somebody, disdainful of going where the real soldiering is. This case fell on you two like a ton of latrine waste. God only knows why. But it’s yours now. You solve it. You catch this creep. You do it now. Not later. Now! Before he kills again. And if anybody gives you any bullshit, any bullshit at all, you contact me. You understand?”
We both nodded.
He handed us each another wallet-sized card. This one clean, no blood on it, only his name and personal phone number and his radio call sign. English on one side, Korean on the other. The card was stamped “Secret.”
“Don’t stop until you find him.”
We both stood and were about to salute again when General Armbrewster waved us off. “I told you. Forget about the bullshit. Get this guy. Get him now.”
We turned and started to walk out, but he called me back, as if he’d forgotten something.
“Sueno,” he said. General Armbrewster was standing. “One more thing. Sorry to have to break this to you, but that casino dealer in Inchon, the woman named Han Ok-hi. Bad news. She died less than an hour ago.”