“I’m afraid I can’t tell you that, either,” Zabrewski said. “But Withers is on his way either to the States or to Pope Air Force Base right now, or shortly will be. He should get here the day after tomorrow, or the day after that.”
“I presume the documentation is in order?” Gregory asked.
“Excuse me, sir?”
“I’m presuming Sergeant Withers passed outside the United States?”
“That’s right.”
“Well, as I’m sure you can understand, there are certain procedures that have to be followed. We’ll need, of course, a certificate of death, as issued by the appropriate authorities. If death occurred in a foreign county, that will need verification by the Consul General—the United States Consul General—serving the country in which death occurred. Then there will have to be a copy of the autopsy, again verified by the Consul General, stating the cause of death, and that the remains are not infected with any of the contagious diseases. . . .”
“Captain Zabrewski, sir,” Sergeant Major Tinley asked politely. “May I have a word with you, sir?”
Zabrewski was visibly surprised, but recovered quickly.
“Certainly, Sergeant,” he said. “Will you excuse us, please, Mr. Gregory, for a moment while we step into the corridor?”
“I’ll just step outside for a few minutes,” Gregory said, nodding at a door. “And when you’re finished, you could just tap on the door.”
“That’s very kind of you, sir,” Captain Zabrewski said. “Thank you very much.”
When there was no tap on the door ten minutes later, Mr. Gregory cracked the door to see if he could be of some assistance.
Neither the captain nor the sergeant major was where he had left them, nor, when he looked, anywhere in the building.
Apparently, Mr. Gregory concluded, some sort of military emergency had come up.
[ FIVE ]
Office of the Corps Surgeon
Headquarters
XVIII Airborne Corps
Fort Bragg, North Carolina
1445 8 April 1965
“Sir, General Hanrahan is here,” SFC Stuart T. Cameron, the administrative NCO of the Office of the Corps Surgeon, announced.
Colonel Frederick A. Emmett, Medical Corps, rose to his feet.
“Please come in, General Hanrahan,” he said.
Hanrahan, trailed by Zabrewski and Tinley, marched into his office.
“Thank you for waiting for me, Doctor,” Hanrahan said.
Hanrahan did not believe it was necessary for medical officers to carry rank; he never addressed them by their rank; he called them all “Doctor,” except those he personally admired and/or liked, whom he addressed as “Doc.”
“We have a little problem I hope you can help us with,” Hanrahan said.
“Anything within my power, General.”
“One of my men was killed the day before yesterday,” Hanrahan began.
“I’m sorry.”
“We all are. Good soldier.”
“What happened to him?”
“That information is classified Top Secret/Earnest,” General Hanrahan said. “As of this moment, you have a Top Secret/Earnest clearance for those matters—only those matters—which in my judgment you have the need-to-know.”
“Yes, sir.”
“He was on an outpost in the former Belgian Congo, which was overrun by an insurrectionist group known as the Simbas.”
“I didn’t know we were in the Congo,” Dr. Emmett said.
“His body was partially dismembered,” Hanrahan said. “The head and part of one leg.”
“Jesus!”
“His body is now, or shortly will be, en route by air to Pope.”
“I see.”
“My aide, Captain Zabrewski, and Sergeant Major Tinley,” Hanrahan said, nodding at them, “have just come from a funeral home in SFC Withers’s hometown, Laurinburg, which is about fifty miles from here. The funeral director told them they need all sorts of paperwork which we don’t have, and have no way of getting. ”
“The AG isn’t handling the return of the remains?”
“So far as I know, the AG hasn’t been told of SFC Withers’s death.”
“Permission to speak, sir?” Sergeant Major Tinley asked.
“Granted,” Hanrahan said.
“We were hoping it could be done here, Colonel,” Tinley said. “The paperwork, I mean.”
“I see,” Colonel/Doctor Emmett said. “Captain, would you and the sergeant major step outside for a minute, please? I’d like a word with General Hanrahan.”
“Yes, sir,” they said, in unison, turned and walked out of the office.
When the door was closed, Colonel/Doctor Emmett looked at General Hanrahan and said, “Jesus Christ, Red, here we go again!”
“Doc, I can’t help it.”
“You know what it says in the Manual for Court-Martial? ‘Any officer who willingly and knowingly issues, or causes to be issued, any document’—”
“—‘or statement he knows to be false,’ ” Hanrahan finished for him, “ ‘is subject to such punishment as a court-martial may direct. ’ The way I read that—‘or