"I think that must be the toughest thing an officer ever has to do," Sessions said. "God, what a humiliation!"
"It was on the radio last night that General Sharp surrendered Mindanao," the Sergeant Major said. "That's it. The Japs now own the Philippines."
"I know some of the people who are now prisoners," Sessions said, sounding as if he was thinking aloud, "if they're still alive."
"Yes, Sir, I know," the Sergeant Major said.
"How do you know that?" Sessions asked.
Moore sensed that Sessions had been made uneasy by the apparently innocent statement and wondered why.
"I'm an old China Marine, too, Captain. In my last hitch I was the S-3 Operations Sergeant for the 4th."
"Were you?" Sessions asked, and now the suspicion in his voice was evident.
"Yes, Sir. The 4th was a good outfit. Good people. I had sort of a special buddy. Guy named Killer McCoy."
"You're moving into a mine field, Sergeant Major," Sessions said, softly. "Sometimes, playing auld lang syne is not the thing to do."
"Oh, I don't mean to... I wasn't trying to pump you for poop, Sir. Really. It was just that Killer and I had the same ideas about who was a good Marine officer and who wasn't."
"Which means?"
The Sergeant Major hesitated momentarily, and then met Sessions's eyes.
"I got three, four staff NCOs who could have taken care of Sergeant Moore for you, Sir. I sort of wanted to do it myself. You know, any friend of The Killer's..."
Sessions looked at the Sergeant Major for a long moment before he replied.
"That's very kind of you, Sergeant Major. I'm touched. Thank you."
"No s thanks necessary, Sir," the Sergeant Major said. "There's not many of us old China Marines left now. I figure we should try to take care of each other, right?"
"You didn't get this from me, Sergeant Major," Sessions said. "But the Killer made it out. He's with the 2nd Raider Battalion."
"I hadn't heard that. Thank you, Captain."
"What's the word on the courier plane?" Sessions said, obviously changing the subject.
"We better get out to the airport by say nine-fifteen, Sir."
Sergeant John Marston Moore had no idea what the conversation between the Sergeant Major and Captain Sessions was all about, but he understood that Captain Sessions had done something-probably in China, there was all that talk about Old China Marines-that had earned him the respect of the old Marine non-com. And he had the feeling that earning the Sergeant Major's approval didn't come easily.
He wondered about "The Killer." If he was the "special buddy" of the sergeant major and held in high regard by Captain Sessions, "The Killer" was obviously one hell of a Marine. Hash marks from his wrist to his shoulder, a breast covered with twenty, thirty years worth of campaign ribbons, barrel chested and leather skinned, with a gravel voice to match.
There was something really admirable about these professional warriors, Moore thought. They were latter day Centurions. Or maybe gladiators? Whatever they were, they weren't like ordinary men. For them, war was a way of life.
Captain Sessions looked at his watch.
"Well," he said. "Let's get the show on the road. It never hurts to be early."
"You're all packed, right?" the Sergeant Major asked Moore.
"All packed," Moore replied, stopping himself just in time from replying, "Yes, Sir."
"Go get your stuff then," the Sergeant Major said. "I'm parked right out in front."
"One late thought," Captain Sessions said. "There's always one late thought, too late to do anything about. Have you been paid? Have you got enough money to carry you, Moore? Enough for the train ticket between Washington and Philadelphia?"
"The train ticket between Washington and Philadelphia"? I'm actually leaving Parris Island and going home. Why is that so incredible?
"I haven't been paid, Sir," Moore said. "But I have money."
"You're sure?"
"Yes, Sir."
"Go get your gear, Moore," Captain Sessions said.
Chapter Four
(One)
MARINE CORPS AIR STATION
PARRIS ISLAND, SOUTH CAROLINA
0905 HOURS 16 JUNE 1942
As the Sergeant Major drove them to the small airfield that served the Parris Island Recruit Depot, Sergeant John Marston Moore, USMCR, wondered what his father was going to say about his turning down an officer's commission and then going off to God only knows where in the Pacific. His father-to put it mildly-had not been pleased when he joined the Marine Corps in the first place; and he'd probably go into a righteous rage that he was not going to be an officer, at least not for the foreseeable future. To make matters worse, John couldn't even tell his father the reason why he'd made his choice.
All the same, there was no sense worrying about his father.... He'd learned not to worry about things he had no control over. And besides, no matter how used his father was to getting his own way, he could not bend the U.S. Marine Corps to his will.
Moore had flown only twice before in his life, both times during the family's last trip home from Japan: They'd left the ocean liner in San Francisco, and then they'd flown on from there via Chicago to New York. The flight from San Francisco to Chicago had been on Transcontinental and Western Airlines, and from Chicago to New York on Eastern. The airplanes had been essentially identical, large, twenty-odd-passenger Douglas DC-3s. Eastern had called theirs "Luxury Liners of the Great Silver Fleet."
John Marston Moore knew he would never forget that trip. He still had a flood of memories from it. He even remembered the name stenciled on the Eastern airplane's nose; it was The City of Baltimore. He also recalled watching his father take his mother's hand, bow his head, and mouth a prayer as the TWA airplane started down the runway in San Francisco. He hadn't forgotten, either, the justification his father put forth for the extra expense of flying: "The Lord is a hard taskmaster," he would intone in his most virtuous voice, "who wants all that I can give Him. 'Missions' needs me in Philadelphia as soon as I can reach there. I've already spent a great deal of time at sea on the voyage from Yokohama, and that has kept me out of touch with 'Missions' for weeks, If I take the train, I'll be traveling another five days, while it will only take thirty-six hours by airplane. Obviously, taking the plane is the clear will of the Lord."
By then, John Marston Moore had long since decided that the Reverend Doctor John Wesley Moore was a pious hypocrite. A number of arguments supported this judgment. His father, for example, had delayed their departure from Japan for nearly three weeks, so they could return to the United States in first class aboard the Pacific Princess, the flagship of the Pacific and Far East Shipping Corporation fleet. The alternative would have been to travel on one of the Transpacific freighters which made their comfortable but spartan passenger accommodations available to missionaries and their families at reduced rates.
"Your Uncle Bill would insist," the Reverend Doctor Moore told John Marston Moore and his sisters. "He would know how much I need the rest."
Uncle Bill-William Dawson Marston IV-was president of the family business, Dawson and Marston Paper Merchants.
Dawson and Marston had been in business in Philadelphia since 1781, on Cherry Street, near the Schuylkill River. If John Marston Moore had been a betting man, he would have laid five to one that the first time Uncle Bill heard about the first-class cabins on the Pacific Princess was when the bill arrived for payment at Dawson and Marston.
John knew no one in the world who could muster the audacity to ask his father the obvious question: "You could have flown alone at one third the cost, and then the family could have followed by train... why didn't you do that?" If someone by chance had dared to ask him such a thing, his father would have replied-with a perfectly straight face, believing every word that poured from his lips-that it was clearly his Christian duty to be with his family and protect them from the well-known hazards of a transcontinental journey.