tells me that he’s a military genius, and Pickering agrees with him.”
“General Howe . . .” Smith began, then stopped to look at the President for permission to go on. Truman nodded. “You said you place credence in this major’s intelligence?”
“That’s right, I do.”
“It doesn’t surprise you at all that he seems to have intelligence that refutes what we’re hearing from General MacArthur?”
“The only thing that surprised me . . . What do I call you? ‘General’?”
“Not ‘General,’ please,” Smith said. “I really don’t mind ’Beetle.’ ”
“Okay, Beetle. The only thing that surprised me—and now that I think about, it didn’t really surprise me—was that the Killer was back in Korea. Charley and I saw him just before we left Seoul to come home. General Almond told me he took a pretty good hit.”
“What did you say, Ralph?” the President asked. “ ‘Took a pretty good hit’? What do you mean?”
“The Killer? Is that what they call him?” Smith asked, chuckling.
“His friends can,” Howe said. “Charley and I are in that category.”
“ ‘Took a hit,’ Ralph?” the President pursued. “Back in Korea from where?”
“The Navy Hospital in Sasebo,” Howe said. “He was in North Korea, way up where the Russian, Manchurian, and North Korean borders come together, listening to Soviet Army radio traffic. On his way out, he got hit.”
“You didn’t tell me that, Ralph,” the President said.
“I didn’t think it was important. All he heard was routine stuff. Not enough to be able to say the Russians won’t come in, but enough to make him think they probably won’t.”
“Goddamn it, Ralph,” the President said. “I meant about him getting hit. How badly?”
“Apparently not badly enough to keep him from going back to Korea,” Howe said.
“Presumably he had General Pickering’s okay?”
“Mr. President,” Charley Rogers said, “if the Killer thought he should be in Korea, he’d go if he had to crawl, and I don’t think General Pickering would try to stop him.” He paused, then added: “He wasn’t crawling, sir. He was limping, and you could tell he was in some pain, but—”
“Sonofabitch,” the President said.
“You sound as if you’re angry with him, Har . . . Mr. President,” Howe said. “Don’t shoot the messenger.”
“My displeasure, General, is with Emperor Douglas the First, and this deaf, dumb, and blind intelligence officer of his, not Major McCoy,” the President said. “And my displeasure is such that, knowing myself, I know that whatever decision I make right now I’ll regret later.”
“You have time, sir,” Smith said. “McCoy’s message said he was going to insert observation teams to verify what the prisoners told him. It’ll be twenty-odd hours before we get that report, probably.”
“Yeah,” the President said, then grunted. “When I heard what he did to rescue Pickering’s son, I told General Bradley I wanted him decorated. With the Silver Star. Did that happen?”
“I understand General MacArthur ... at least intended . . . to make the presentation himself,” Rogers said. “McCoy didn’t say anything about it. He wouldn’t.”
“Goddamn it, I was decorating him, not the goddamn Emperor!” Truman exploded. “Give him another medal. Give him a . . . Legion of Merit. That’s for senior officers, isn’t it? He’s been functioning like a senior officer—give him a senior officer’s medal!”
The President saw the look on Rogers’s face.
“You find that amusing, Charley?” Truman challenged. “Why is that amusing?”
“I’m afraid to tell you, sir,” Rogers said.
“What’s so goddamn funny, Charley?” the President said, and there was menace in his tone.
“The thing is, sir,” Rogers said carefully, “that enlisted men, like me, and junior officers, like Major McCoy, who are close to the men, consider the Legion of Merit to be the brass’s good-conduct medal. If they don’t get social disease for six consecutive months, they get the Legion of Merit.”
Howe laughed. Truman glowered at him.
Then Truman laughed.
“I never heard that before,” he said, shaking his head. “Did you, Smith?”
“Yes, sir, Mr. President,” Smith said. “My wife told me, when I was given the Legion of Merit.”
That produced a hearty laugh from the President.
“Well, then, to hell with the Legion of Merit for McCoy, ” the President said. “Give him something else. Give him another Silver Star.” He paused. “Will you relay my wishes to the Pentagon for me, Smith? Right now, I don’t want to talk to anybody over there.”
“Yes, sir, of course.”
“And while you’re at it,” the President ordered, “find out if Pickering’s boy got the Navy Cross I ordered for him. If he doesn’t have it already, find out why.”