Mrs. Waterford returned to Carmel with the children by train. Lt. Col. Bob Bellmon bought a 1941 Buick convertible sedan and started out with Barbara on a slow, cross-country drive. One of their stops was at Manhattan, Kansas, outside Fort Riley, where Colonel Bellmon presented his respects to recently retired Colonel Philip S. Parker III.
Later Mrs. Parker confided to Barbara that so long as they had been married, she had never seen her husband quite as drunk as he got with Bob Bellmon. The two women tried to determine what it was that had so gotten to their husbands.
They each took what solace they could from learning that neither husband had chosen to confide in his wife.
Barbara Bellmon Was tempted to inquire of Mrs. Parker if her husband was impotent, too. But the words would not come.
Officers" ladies did not discuss that sort of thing among themselves.
It took them thirteen days to reach Cannel. Once there, Bob spent long hours working on the Buick, completely rebuilding the straight-eight engine and lining the brakes, all by himself in the garage. He took long walks, alone, very early in the morning along the Pacific Ocean, and ritually drank himself into a sullen stupor by five in the afternoon.
Barbara Bellmon concluded that it was a vicious circle. He drank because he was impotent; and because he was hung over and/or drunk, he couldn"t get it up. After doing everything but appear in pasties and a G-string, she sensed somehow that the thing to do was wait.
He asked for, and was granted, a thirty-day extension of his leave. His orders, to the Airborne Board at Fort Bragg;, N. C., came in the mail on the tenth day of the extension.
"You getting a little bored, honey?" he asked. "You want to report in early and see about getting someplace decent to live?"
"I think that would be a good idea," Barbara said.
Right after lunch on the day before they left Cannel, he began a frenzied search through his footlockers, which had been stored at Fort Knox during the war, then shipped to Cannel after his return. He took from them what he thought they would need in the; first weeks at Bragg before their household goods arrived.
Mrs. Waterford had arranged a small c.o.c.ktail party for old friends for five that afternoon. Barbara, afraid that he would be drunk when the party started, and afraid to say anything that . would make it inevitable, nevertheless went to their bedroom; and under pretense of getting dressed for the party and helping him pack, she gave him company.
At a quarter to five, when Barbara was looking through already packed suitcases for a slip, she heard the lid of a footlocker slam and turned to look at him.
He was. smiling.
"Finished?" she asked.
"Finished," he said. "Everything I won"t need is in-the one we"ll take with us. And everything I will need is in the other one, which will arrive in time for Christmas, 1948."
"You"d better get dressed, then," she said, and bent over the suitcase again.
"That"s exactly the opposite of what I have in mind" he said.
She didn"t quite get his meaning until he had walked up behind her, pressed his erection against her rear end, and slipped his hand under the elastic of her panties. She straightened, and pressed her head backward against his; and very slowly, very carefully, very much afraid that when she touched it, it would go down, she moved her hand to his crotch. Then she turned around without taking her hand off him, pulled him toward the bed, and lay down on it. She pushed her panties out of the way and guided him into her.
The Bellmon kids had a ball on the drive to Fort Bragg from Carmel. They were left much to themselves. They even had their own room in the motels at night. About the only thing wrong with the trip was the embarra.s.sment their parents caused them by constantly holding hands and smooching and not acting their age.
The records were also searched for prisoners whose skills were needed to administer the camp. Prisoners who spoke Russian were in great demand, and so were carpenters, foresters, tailors, and supply clerks. There was a surplus of food service personnel. Some of the NKVD records were flagged. These prisoners had either actual or professed socialist and/or Russian sympathies; and after a period of time, it was contemplated that they might be of some use. These were to be a.s.signed duties which would give them a greater chance-by no means a sure chance-of surviving a winter or two In the swamp.
Other prisoners" records were flagged in a manner indicating that they were to be kept alive. The phrase used was that "the physical condition and status of reeducation of this prisoner will be reported monthly." The NKVD expected to hear that the prisoner in question was not only alive, but that his reeducation was progressing satisfactorily.
One of the prisoners whose records were so flagged was identified on the NKVD records as Greiffenberg, Peter P. von (formerly Colonel), 88-234-017.
Number 88-234-017 was a.s.signed to work as a clerk in the office of the logging master. It was inside work, and that was important in the winter in the swamp.
(Six) Camp 263 Near cKyrtym"ya, Russian Soviet Federated Republic 21 June 1945 The German prisoners were ordered from the trains immediately on arrival. A detail was picked from them to load coal into the tender of the locomotive. Since there were no shovels, the loading was accomplished by a chain of prisoners between the coal pile and the tender. Each prisoner carried, an eight- or ten-inch lump of coal and pa.s.sed it along until it reached the tender. The locomotive was then detached from the string of cars and reattached to the other end. The train immediately left the siding. Since there was a shortage in Russia of both train cars and locomotives, the ones they had were kept moving as much as possible.
Bread and sausage were distributed among the prisoners.
They had not eaten much in the past three weeks, and they fought over the food.
Portable barricades, sawhorses laced with barbed wire were emplaced by prisoner laborers around the siding. Guard posts and a deadline were also established. More elaborate security measures were not required, for Kyrtym"ya was an island in the swamps, completely water-filled in the spring from melting snow. There was no place else for the prisoners to go, even if they had the strength.
The prisoners were kept where they had gotten down from the boxcars for four days, while the administrative processing was completed.
The records of some of the prisoners, and all of the SS, were immediately separated. These would be immediately put to work draining the swamp.
IV.
(One) Fort Bragg, N.C.
9 July 1945 There were twelve multicolored ribbons on the breast pocket of Lt. Colonel Paul Hanrahan"s tunic, and above them was pinned the CIB, the Expert Combat Infantry insignia: a silver flintlock rifle on a blue background circled by an open silver wreath, and above that, parachutist"s wings with two stars signifying two jumps into combat. There were no ribbons above Lieutenant Rudolph G.
MacMillan"s breast pocket, just his CIB and his jump wings with five stars.
MacMillan walked into Hanrahan"s office and saluted.
There was a pleased smile on his face.
"How the h.e.l.l are you; you kilt less Scotchman?" Hanrahan said, returning the salute casually, and then coming around his desk to warmly shake MacMillan"s hand.
"Permit the lieutenant to say," MacMillan said, grinning broadly, "that the colonel, so help me G.o.d, even looks like a colonel."
"With one exception, Mac," Hanrahan said, waving him into an upholstered chair, "you don"t look so bad yourself."
"What"s the exception?"
"There"s an order around here, Mac," Colonel Hanrahan said, "that officers are supposed to wear their ribbons." MacMillan shrugged, unrepentant.
"You want some coffee, Mac?" Hanrahan asked.
"Please," MacMillan said. "What"s this all about, anyway?" In 1940, Hanrahan had been a second john, and MacMillan had been a corporal. They had made their first jump together, when the entire airborne force of the United States Army had been the 1st Battalion (Airborne) (Provisional) (Test) of the 82nd Infantry Division. They had been paratroopers together before anyone knew if the idea would work, and long before the 82nd Infantry Division had become the 82nd Airborne.
They had last seen one another in 1942, when First Lieutenant Paul Hanrahan had suddenly vanished from the 508th Parachute Infantry .Regiment in 1942. n.o.body knew for sure where he had gone, but rumor had it that he was on some hush-hush operation in Greece with something called the OSS.
"You are about to be counseled about your career by a senior officer of suitable rank and experience," Colonel Hanrahan said. "So pay attention." He handed MacMillan a china cup, full of steaming black coffee.
"Thanks," MacMillan said. "Can you get me away from those G.o.dd.a.m.ned historians? I"m losing my marbles."
"The day after one war is over, we start training for the next one," Hanrahan said. "The historians have a place in that. The presumption is that somebody who lives through a war must have been doing something right. So they will write down the Saga of Mac MacMillan, and force unsuspecting people to read it. You"ll be immortal, Mac."
"Bulls.h.i.t, is what it is," MacMillan said.
"Shame on you!" Hanrahan said, laughing.
"The division is coming home," MacMillan said. "Can you get me a company?"
"I could, but I won"t," the colonel said, looking directly at MacMillan.
"Why not?"
"Can I talk straight, Mac, and not have you quoting me all around the division?"
"What the h.e.l.l is VOP?" Mac asked. He could translate without thinking all other abbreviations, but VOP was new to him.
"I had to ask to find out," the colonel said. "It stands for Verbal Order of the President."
"That"s funny," Mac said. "He told me when I was there, that when he was a battery commander, he found out there was A WOL and then there was AWOL."
"It"s not funny, Mac," the colonel said. "That VOP is going to follow you around the army from now on. Forever, until you turn in the suit."
"What"s wrong with it?"
"The bottom line is that you went AWOL," the colonel said.
"Not according to that, I didn"t. I went VOP," Mac said, smiling, p.r.o.nouncing it as a word, not as individual letters.
"Sure," Mac said.
"If we were going to war, you"d have a company," the colonel said. "But we"re going to have peace, Mac, and that"s a whole new ball game. They don"t want company commanders, even with the Medal, who quit school in the tenth grade." He looked at MacMillan to get his reaction. MacMillan didn"t seem very surprised.
"The war is over, soldiers and dogs keep off the gra.s.s?" he replied.
"Don"t feel c.r.a.pped upon," Hanrahan said. "They don"t want twenty-six-year-old light birds, either."
"They gonna bust you back?"
"They"re trying hard," Hanrahan said. "I want to show you something, Mac." He motioned Mac to the desk, where he had MacMillan"s service record open before him, and pointed to a line on one of its pages.
18Apr45 Returned US Mil Control, US Emba.s.sy Cairo Egypt.
20Apr45 Transit Cairo Egypt via Mil Air Ft Devens, Ma.s.s 22Apr45 VOP 4 days Iv 26Apr45 Transit Hq War Dept 29Apr45 Hq Ft Bragg Dy wlUS Army Historical Section "You went A WOL and were pardoned by the President.
You went AWOL! And every time somebody asks what the h.e.l.l is "vop," that story will be told. And what they are going to remember, because they will want to remember it, is that you went AWOL. That gives them a hook, Mac. And you better get used to the fact that the hook is going to be out for you from now on."
"What the h.e.l.l are you talking about? I"m a G.o.dd.a.m.n hero.
Didn"t you read that bulls.h.i.t citation?"
"Don"t mock it. You are a hero. And that"s your problem."
"I don"t have idea f.u.c.king one what you"re talking about," MacMillan said.
"Then pay attention. One officer in twenty gets into combat.
Of the officers who do get into combat, maybe one in ten gets any kind of a medal, and one in what-ten thousand? fifty thousand?-gets the Medal."
"So?"
"So there"s a h.e.l.l of a lot more of them, Mac, then there is of you. Call it jealousy. "How come that dumb son of a b.i.t.c.h, and not me?"
"So they"re jealous, so what?"
"So they will stick whatever they can-your-Lousy education, for example-up your a.s.s whenever they can." MacMillan didn"t like what he had heard, but he trusted the colonel; they went back a long way. He decided he was getting the straight p.o.o.p.
"What about me getting out and re-upping as a master sergeant?"
"No sense giving anything away," Hanrahan said.
"You just as much as told me I don"t have what it takes to be a good company commander," Mac said. "I may not be. But I know, G.o.dd.a.m.nit, that I"d be a good first sergeant."
"I didn"t say that you wouldn"t be a good company commander, Mac," Hanrahan said. "You"re not listening to me."
"Then what the h.e.l.l are you saying?"
"You"re a brand-new first lieutenant," Hanrahan said. "So you can forget about getting promoted for a long time. Five years, maybe six. Maybe longer."
"I don"t find anything wrong with being a first lieutenant," MacMillan said. "But I thought you were just saying they"d try to take it away from me."
"What you have to do is pa.s.s the time doing something where you can"t get in trouble, where there won"t be too much compet.i.tion for your job."
"That brings us right back to me commanding a company.
G.o.dd.a.m.n, airborne is what I know. Airborne is all I know." Hanrahan was losing his patience. No getting around it, MacMillan was none too bright.
"Airborne is dead. It just doesn"t know enough to fall over," Hanrahan said, patiently. "But for Christ"s sake, Mac, don"t quote me on that."
"That"s a h.e.l.l of a thing to say," MacMillan said. He was truly shocked. It was as if the colonel had accused Jim Gavin of cowardice.
"For Christ"s sake, think. You were at Sicily. Look what our own navy did to us, by mistake. How many planeloads got shot down before they got near the G.o.dd.a.m.ned drop zone? You made Normandy. Look how they tore us up in Normandy. And you jumped across the Rhine. That was a disaster, and you know it was." MacMillan was looking at him, Hanrahan thought, like a hurt little boy.
"For Christ"s Sake, Mac," Hanrahan said, "you were there. You were bagged there. And you don"t understand what a colossal waste of a.s.sets and people that was?"
"I never expected to hear something like that from you, of all people," MacMillan said. "Jesus Christ, you and me started airborne!"
"I"m a soldier, Mac. Not an airborne soldier, not any kind of special soldier. I"m a soldier. My duty is to see things as they are, not how I"d like them to be."
"And you think airborne is finished? You really think that?"
"It"s a very inefficient way of getting troops on the ground.
And it will grow more inefficient every pa.s.sing day. And it wastes a lot of talent."
"What"s that supposed to mean?" Mac demanded. They were no longer colonel and lieutenant, or even lieutenant and corporal. They were friends and professionals. They were, in fact, comrades in arms.
"You"ve heard that an airborne corporal is just as good, just as highly trained, just as efficient a leader, as, a leg lieutenant?"