Chapter 58: More Hard Time

Here’s an important safety tip for all you new Provost Marshals - if at all possible, never arrest somebody in front of armed troops. On the one hand, they might disagree with your decision to haul away their friend or leader. On the other hand, they might be so overjoyed to be rid of the asshole they decide to help you take care of justice! It is better to get the offender away from the group and do it quietly and privately.

The major was the provost marshal, and the sergeant and corporal were military police. While I stood there in disbelief, the sergeant grabbed me, and the corporal stripped me of the two pistols I was carrying. There was a loud murmur of disapproval from the Third Platoon, however, and several edged closer. I even heard a couple of their M-16s being charged, which made me very nervous. Somebody had to do something before this got out of hand!

I shrugged out of the sergeant’s grasp and marched over to the men I had just come back with. “STAND DOWN! STAND DOWN! YOU WILL STAND DOWN!” The men were cowed by this and backed up. “This is the 82^nd Fucking Airborne and you will act like it! Now I don’t know what’s going on, but you will not act like a fucking third world pisshole army. Is that understood?”

There was some grumbling, and the sergeant was moving closer to me. I shrugged him away again. “IS THAT UNDERSTOOD?”

Sergeant Briscoe answered, “YES, SIR!” and the moment was over. He turned to the rest of the men and shouted, “Third Platoon, PRESENT ARMS!” and the men came to attention. I returned their salute, and Briscoe ordered, “ORDER ARMS!”

I turned back to the sergeant and held my arms out to him to be cuffed. He had a furious look on his face, and my hands were grabbed and wrenched behind my back, where steel handcuffs were placed on them. Then he and the corporal frog-marched me over to the Jeep and put me in the back. The major got back in the passenger seat and the corporal was driving. As soon as I was out of sight of the troops, the sergeant gave me a vicious shot to the kidneys. “You’re going to be sorry, now, asshole,” he growled quietly.

I wasn’t sure what was going on, but this was not the way things were supposed to be run. As an officer I should never have been manhandled and cuffed by a non-com. It is presumed that as an officer and gentleman, I can be trusted not to attempt an escape. Even taking my pistols was unusual; as an officer I could be asked for my parole and then left armed. Something was going on, and I didn’t think I was going to like it.

We drove across the base to a permanent building that had been loaned to us by the Honduran Army. I wasn’t quite sure what century it had been built, but it was old! The small Judge Advocate General detachment, the Provost Marshall, and the MPs were all using this building as their headquarters, probably because it was the least useful building available, and better buildings were being used by more important elements of the deployment. I was dragged downstairs and processed into the system, such as it was. The cuffs were removed, and I was stripped down to my skin. The makeshift wrapping around my knee was cut off. My boots were taken, along with my watch (a Timex the sergeant took great delight in stomping on the floor; I had left my Rolex back in the States before the deployment), and the picture of Marilyn and little Charlie my wife had sent me. The MP sergeant enjoyed tearing that in two and tossing it in the garbage. I was then issued a bright orange jumpsuit with the word ‘PRISONER’ stenciled on it, and a pair of orange flip-flops. Then I was shoved into a cell and given one last love tap to the kidneys by the MP sergeant. I noticed the corporal giving him a disapproving look behind his back, but that didn’t do me any good.

Again, this was just extraordinary conduct. If I was to be arrested, I should have been taken to the hospital where I would be treated for my injuries, and then be told I was restricted to my quarters or bed or something of the sort. I didn’t know what was going on. Somebody was obviously trying to send me a message, and not a very subtle one, either.

I looked around at my new home. The last time this place had been cleaned must have been before the World War, but I wasn’t sure which one. It was a basic 8’ by 8’ iron bar cage. The lock mechanism to the door was so rusty they had a chain looped around the door frame with a padlock on it. A toilet was at one side, without a seat, and a sink was mounted on the wall, with a single faucet over it. The bedframe was bolted to the floor and had steel springs with a moldy thin mattress laying on it.

The only thing going through my mind was, ‘What the fuck was going on?’ Mutiny? They hang people for mutiny! Brigadier General Hawkins must really have it in for me, I thought.

I limped over to the toilet and jiggled the handle, but either the water line was blocked, or the valve was shut off. It didn’t flush, and it was bone dry. The faucet and sink were better. The faucet handle worked, and a thin stream of water came out. Then the handle broke off completely. The water continued flowing. The sounds of splashing water on the concrete floor made me look under the sink, to where the rusted plumbing was allowing the water to run out into my cell. I watched as the trickle of water went across the floor of the cell and down into a drain in the corner. Great!

I had to pee, so I unzipped my jumpsuit and pissed directly into the drain. I was going to reserve the toilet for Number Two. After relieving myself, I went to the sink and looked at myself in the polished steel mirror, now rusted and scratched, that was over the sink. I was filthy and buried under a layer of grime and grease paint. I was also hungry and thirsty. I lowered my face to the faucet and drank the warm and rusty water, and then spent the next hour washing my hands and face as best I could.

I was left alone until about noon or so, when the corporal stuck his head in to see if I was still alive. I asked for something to eat. He didn’t say anything, but he came back an hour later and tossed a couple of Lurps into the cell through the bars. You need a knife to open ration packs, which I didn’t have, so I spent the next half an hour working the plastic against a corner of the rusty bedframe until I could rip it open. It was better than nothing. You have to be very careful eating Lurps dry, since they are freeze dried and can swell in your stomach and you need to drink a lot of water with them.

I fell asleep on the moldy mattress and slept, exhausted, until the next morning. I almost forgot where I was, at least until I rolled upright and set my feet on the floor. The running water was starting to back up in the drain, and now was covering the floor and running into another drain on the other side of the room. My cell was now a half inch deep lake. I unzipped my jump suit and peed out through the bars in the general direction of the working drain.

I looked in the steel mirror and washed my face some more, and this time tried to get the grime and dirt out of my hair. I felt some gurgling in my stomach, so I figured that either I was hungry or that, more likely, the water wasn’t pure, and I was about to come down with the Hondo version of the runs. No more Lurps were forthcoming, but about noon or so, the sergeant and his helper returned to the basement and let me out of the cell. I was cuffed again, and the sergeant said, “I don’t care what your lawyer says. You’re going to sign the confession or you’re never going to come out of here alive.” Then I took another couple of shots to the kidneys. The last one made me stagger and drop to my knees, which made my right knee shriek with agony. I was dragged upright and then hauled upstairs.

I tried to remember anything about court martials, but the only thing I really knew about military justice was the Article 15s I had handled, non-judicial punishments that didn’t involve a court. I had never been involved in a real court martial before.

I found myself deposited on a chair in a small conference room, bolted to the floor, with a table also bolted to the floor. It reminded me a lot of that one morning in Towson all those years ago. Déjà vu all over again! This time the guard made sure to give me a couple of shots to the ribs after I sat down, with a warning to behave and confess, if I knew what was good for me. Ten minutes later the door opened, and a teenager came in. As the door opened, I heard a voice say, “One hour, no more.”

Okay, he wasn’t a teenager. He was actually a first lieutenant with a JAG insignia on his lapels, the crossed sword and quill pen. I hoped this kid was good with the pen, because he didn’t look old enough to know what a sword was used for. He smiled at me and placed a folder and legal pad on the table and then sat down across from me. “Captain Buckman?”

“Yeah. Who are you?”

“I’m Lieutenant Dorne. I’m your attorney. I’m pleased to meet you!” He smiled like an eager young puppy.

“Uh, huh. Listen, what the hell is going on? What the hell am I supposed to have done?”

“Well, I have the list of charges here.” They had a list? Dorne fumbled through the file and then looked back at me. “Originally, the most serious was mutiny. Then there’s failure to obey a direct order, destruction or loss of military property, and failure to follow proper radio procedures. Oh, and insubordination, I almost forgot that one.”

“You said the most serious was mutiny. Does that mean that it is the most serious, or that there is something else now more serious?” I asked him.

“Well, this morning they added four counts of murder and a count of resisting arrest. Who’d you kill, anyway?”

“Nobody, Lieutenant. Nobody! What I did was piss off a general!”

Dorne started looking through his paperwork again. “That must be the insubordination and failure to obey a direct order.”

“Must be. Let me ask you a question. Who picked you as my lawyer?” I asked him.