Terrified, the two women said they didn’t know. They’d reached this room about ten minutes ago, and the sign asking for room service was dangling from the outside handle.
Officer Oh ordered them to drop everything and to step outside. They did. She checked the room, in the bathroom and even under the bed, but Mr. Covert P. Walton was nowhere to be found.
We went back downstairs to the lobby. Mr. Kill called some KNP officers over and gave them instructions to search the foyer and the dining room and the shopping boutiques and to check the identification of every foreigner they encountered. As soon as they found Mr. Covert P. Walton, they were to escort him back to the main lobby. When they bowed and scurried off, Mr. Kill and Officer Oh and I looked at one another.
“You should sit down,” Officer Oh said.
But something was bothering me, I wasn’t sure what. When we had reached the main lobby, I’d glanced outside through the big glass doors and seen the reassuring presence of the doormen and the KNPs standing guard. For some reason, something seemed missing. And then I realized what it was.
“Come on,” I said.
Mr. Kill and Officer Oh followed me outside. Her sedan was still parked there, in a place of privilege only allowed for the vehicle of the Senior Homicide Inspector of the Korean National Police. Mr. Kill stared at me curiously, as did Officer Oh. Everything looked normal; everything except one thing.
“The Red Cross van,” I said. “There was a woman inside, wearing a nurse’s uniform. I only saw her back. I imagine there was a driver up front and I spotted an elderly American in back.”
“They’re gone,” Officer Oh said in English.
Mr. Kill cursed. He ran toward his sedan, flung open the passenger door, and leaned in and switched on the radio. Immediately, he was ordering an all-points bulletin for the missing Red Cross van. Officer Oh questioned the doormen and the KNP officers standing guard. They all confirmed the same thing. As soon as we’d stepped inside, the back door of the van had closed, and they’d driven off.
“Did the American get out?”
Not everyone had been watching but the few who did said he hadn’t. They’d assumed he needed medical attention and he’d been taken away for that reason.
We checked with the hotel manager and asked who had authorized the Red Cross van. He didn’t know. He assumed it had been part of the government effort to provide first class service to the visiting Americans. He made a few phone calls, and everyone he talked to denied having authorized the van. Within minutes the posse of KNP officers returned from their search of the hotel. They’d talked to many foreigners, most of them veterans there for the conference and they’d checked every passport, but none of them was Mr. Covert P. Walton.
— 16-
I returned to Yongsan Compound.
Ernie and Captain Prevault had also returned by now, and we met at the CID admin office. Despite the rawness of my physical presence, Captain Prevault hugged me.
“We searched everywhere for you,” she said. “The KNPs didn’t help at first but then when Ernie insisted Mr. Kill in Seoul be notified, they started to cooperate.”
“How’d you find out I was okay?” I asked.
“I called Riley,” Ernie said. “The MPs got your radio message.”
Riley said, “The Provost Marshal wants to talk to you, trooper. Now.”
“Shouldn’t I change first?”
“Now!” Riley repeated, pointing down the hallway.
I bowed to the inevitable. Before I left, Ernie said, “Give me the keys to your wall locker. I’ll go to the barracks and get you a change of clothes.”
I checked my pockets. “I lost them. But Mr. Yim has a set. And there’s an extra pair of boots under my bunk.”
“I’ll get ’em,” he said and hurried away.
Captain Prevault squeezed my hand. “Good luck in there,” she said.
It was a routine ass chewing. Even the Provost Marshal realized that if Ernie and I hadn’t broken free of his controlling hand, we never would’ve flushed out the man with the iron sickle like we had. Still, now the 8th Army faced the problem of having a civilian murdered right under its nose.
“Where are they?” Colonel Brace demanded.
“Maybe they’ve returned to Mia-ri,” I said. “Madame Hoh has contacts there.” I thought of the thugs who’d chased me. “Mr. Kill already has the KNPs checking that out.”
“Where else might they have gone?”
“After that, they could be just about anywhere, sir. I’m sorry I blew it.”
If Ernie could hear me, he’d accuse me of brown-nosing. Apologizing to a field grade officer is something he’d never do. But I did feel regretful. At every step so far the man with the iron sickle had outsmarted us.
“What’s wrong with your nose?” he asked.
“A cold,” I said.
“And your feet?”
“My boots are too tight.”
The Provost Marshal shook his head. “Get some rest,” he said. “Change clothes. Then get back here and be prepared for whatever we have to do.”
I stood up and saluted.
As I limped down the hallway, I was thinking of a long shower and a change of clothes and a nap in a bunk with clean sheets. But instead when I reached my desk, I opened the top drawer and pulled out the hand-carved radio dial that had been left beneath the totem. I wasn’t sure but I believed I knew now why it had been left for us to find.
I stepped toward Riley’s desk. “Who do you know at the Signal Battalion?” I asked.
“To do what?”
“To give us information. Old information. Somebody whose been around a long time.”
“Grimaldi,” Riley said. “That old DAC has been here since MacArthur was a boy scout.”
“Call him.”
Riley did. Then he handed the phone to me. Mr. Grimaldi was the Department of Army Civilian who ran the signal battalion repair shop. I described the carved dial to him and he explained that when signal equipment was lost or destroyed during the Korean War it was often replaced by jerry-rigged items. And then I described the numbers on the dial and the deep notch at a certain frequency.
“Armed Forces Radio,” he said. “They were the only outfit broadcasting during that first winter of the war. Everyone was listening to it, hungry for news. Knowing where the Chinese were-or weren’t-could save your life.”
“Thanks, Mr. Grimaldi,” I said, not knowing what good this phone call had done me. But before I hung up he said, “After we re-took Seoul, they set up a permanent station for a while.”
“Permanent? They weren’t in mobile trucks?”
“Not for a while at least.”
“Where’d they set up?” I asked.
“In one of the few buildings in Seoul left standing. The Bando Hotel.”
I thanked him and slammed down the phone.
Ernie returned and I changed into a dry set of fatigues and a polished pair of combat boots.
“You still stink,” he told me.
“Thanks.”
We hopped in his jeep. “You need some rest,” he told me.
“Yeah, but first we’re going to the Bando Hotel.”
“What’s wrong with the barracks?”
I explained it to him.
“Sort of a long shot,” he said.
“Sort of,” I agreed.
Before we pulled out of the parking lot, Captain Prevault hopped into the back seat. “You’re not leaving without me,” she said, “not after all this.”
We didn’t have time to argue.
The concierge at the Bando Hotel held his nose as he talked to me but when I explained what we wanted he led us into an elevator and took us straight to the top floor. From there we walked up a flight of stairs that opened onto the roof. The Bando was ten stories high and during the Japanese occupation it had been the tallest and most luxurious hotel in Seoul.
“Here,” the man said, motioning with an open palm. “We set it up as a tourist attraction. A shrine to the only radio station functioning during the Korean War.” He frowned. “Now see what they’ve done.”