"My orders say 'Special Detachment 14.' I don't know what that means, Sir."
"Well, I guess that's the reason for the secrecy. So I won't go into that. But your new CO is one of the good guys. His name is Major Ed Banning. I used to work for him in Shanghai. So did Captain Sessions. For that matter, so did Zimmerman. What he's doing is very important, and the reason you're travelling on a Six-A priority is that he needs someone, yesterday, who speaks Japanese."
Moore nodded.
And then he put everything together.
"Lieutenant, are you the one they call 'Killer McCoy'?"
The friendly smile that had been in McCoy's eyes vanished. Moore did not like what he saw in them now.
"Where did you hear that?" McCoy asked, and his voice was as cold and menacing as his eyes.
Moore knew that it had been the wrong question to ask, and tried to frame a reply that would be placating. When he did not immediately reply, McCoy, now visibly angry, asked, "Did that fucking Zimmerman run off at the fucking mouth again?"
Moore didn't reply instantly.
"I asked you a question," McCoy snapped.
"No, Sir. I heard that at Quantico. There was a Master Gunnery Sergeant there..."
"Name?" McCoy snapped.
"I don't remember his name, Sir," Moore said, and then remembered. "He said he was the S-3 Sergeant of the 4th Marines..."
"Nickleman," McCoy interrupted. "He always had a bad case of runaway mouth."
"... and he was talking about the 4th Marines, and Shanghai, with Captain Sessions."
McCoy stared at him for a long moment. Gradually, the cold fury in his eyes died, and blood returned to his lips.
"I'm sorry, Sir, if..." Moore began.
McCoy waved his hand to shut him off.
"To answer your question, Sergeant," McCoy said. "There are some people who call me 'Killer,' including people who should know better, like Mike Nickleman and Captain Sessions. I don't like it a goddamn bit. But you didn't know, so don't worry about it."
Moore's mouth ran away with him. "Why do they call you that, Sir?"
The ice came instantly back into McCoy's eyes, and his lips drew tight and bloodless again. He looked at Moore for a long moment, and then shrugged.
"OK. Let me set that straight. I had to kill some people in China. I didn't want to. I had to. It just happened that way. Some Italians, the Italian equivalent of Marines. Three of them. And about a month later, when Sessions and Zimmerman and I were fucking around in the boondocks, trying to find out what the Japs were up to, we had to kill some Chinese. They were supposed to be bandits, but what they were was working for the Kempae Tai-Japanese secret police. There was about twenty of them got killed. The word got back to Shanghai and some wiseass-I still don't know who-in the 4th heard about it. He didn't know what we were really doing up there, just that we got in a fight with Chinese bandits, so what he did was have a sign painted, 'Welcome Back, Killer' and hung it in the club. The name stuck. It makes me sound like a fucking lunatic, like I go around getting my rocks off knifing and shooting people."
"I'm sorry, Sir, that..."
McCoy held up his hand to cut him off again, and then, switching to Japanese, which startled Moore, said, "I'd be damned surprised, Moore, if you haven't figured out you're now in the Intelligence business, that we both are. Rule One in the Intelligence business, and I'm surprised Captain Sessions didn't tell you this, is to disappear into the wallpaper. The one thing you can't afford, in other words, is to have people point you out and say, 'there he is, Killer McCoy, who killed all those people.' Understand?"
"Yes, Sir," Moore replied in Japanese. "I understand."
McCoy looked at him appraisingly for a moment before he went on. "Well, we know that you speak Japanese, don't we? And damned well. Where'd you learn that?"
The subject of Killer McCoy, Moore understood, was closed.
The truth of the story is that he is called "Killer" because, very simply, he has killed people. Three Italians, probably by himself, and "about twenty" Chinese with Captain Sessions and Gunny Zimmerman. It would be hard to believe if I hadn't seen his eyes. I would hate to have Killer McCoy angry with me. Or, hell, just be in his way.
"I'm fairly fluent, Sir. I lived in Japan for a while," Moore replied in Japanese.
"There's damned few people in the Corps who speak Japanese," McCoy said, "for that matter, anything but English. On the other hand, about one Jap-or at least, one Japanese officer-in three or four speaks English. You'd be surprised how important that is."
"Yes, Sir."
"Well, what happens now is that in the morning, Zimmerman will go to Outshipment at the Seaplane base. When he finds out they're making up the manifest for the Pearl Harbor flight, he'll send his driver out here to pick you up. So you'll have to be dressed and ready after, say, seven o'clock in the morning. Standing by. You show up with your orders and they'll have to put you on the plane."
"Yes, Sir."
"Any questions?"
"No, Sir."
"Not even about the boat? Or Ernie?" McCoy asked, wryly.
"They're both... very nice... Sir."
"Yes, they are," McCoy chuckled.
As if on cue, Ernestine Sage appeared at the door.
"Dorothy and Marty just came home," she said. "He brought abalone. Unless you two would rather stay here and tell some more dirty stories in Japanese."
McCoy switched to English. "Ernie thinks that whenever people speak Japanese around here they're talking dirty," he said. "Not true, of course. I'm perfectly willing to say in English that she has a marvelous ass and spectacular boobs."
"You bastard!" she said, but Moore saw that it was said with affection.
Dorothy and Marty turned out to be a First Lieutenant and his wife, who was heavy with child. The lieutenant's tunic had no campaign medals above his marksmanship badges. And although first lieutenants outrank second lieutenants, it was immediately apparent not only that McCoy gave the orders on board the Last Time, but that the lieutenant was just about as impressed with Lieutenant McCoy as Sergeant Moore was.
"I didn't mean to disturb you..." the lieutenant said.
"No problem," McCoy said. "Ground rules: This is Sergeant Moore. John. You didn't see him here. You don't ask him where he came from, or where he's going. But feel free to talk about the Raiders. He's cleared for at least TOP SECRET. Moore, this is Marty Burnes and his wife, Dorothy."
Lieutenant Burnes crossed the cabin to Moore and gave him his hand.
"How are you, Moore?"
"How do you do, Sir?"
"Hello," Mrs. Burnes said.