The Corps I - Semper Fi

Master Gu

As it often is in Virginia in late August, it was hot and muggy, and Jack Stecker had rolled the driver's-side window down. But as he approached the Known Distance Rifle Range close enough to hear the firing, he rolled the window up. The crack of.30-caiiber rifle fire does more than make your ears ring; it permanently damages your hearing if you get enough of it.

A large red flag hung limply from a twenty-five-foot pole, signaling that the range was in use. A young Marine had been assigned to bar access to the range by unauthorized perso

When Master Gu

Stecker was not offended. What was important was that he had not caught him failing in his duties as a guard. He would have burned him a new asshole if he had caught him doing what he damned well knew he had been doing, but he had not.

When the trainee, recognizing Master Gu

When he first recognized the pickup as Master Gu

He had decided in the end that the safest course was to presume that whatever Master Gu

It had not been difficult to differentiate Master Gu

When Master Gu

With that done, the vehicle went through prescribed daily maintenance. The fuel tank was filled; the tire pressure checked; and the oil level and radiator water replenished. The vehicle was then turned over to whatever enlisted men had run afoul of Rocks and Shoals; had gone to Office Hours; and were now performing punitive extra duty in the motor pool.

They washed the vehicle with soap and water, every inch of it, inside and out-except for the glove compartment, which was off limits. When the vehicle was washed and dried, it was swept out with whisk brooms, making sure there was no dust or sand in the cracks of the rubber covering of the ru

In the morning, a motor transport corporal drove the pickup to Base Headquarters, where he parked it in a space marked FOR OFFICIAL VISITORS ONLY, so that it would be available should Master Gu

When the first Trucks, one-quarter ton, four-by-four, General Purpose (called "Jeeps") had been issued to Quantico, it had been proposed to Master Gu

Master Gu

There was absolutely nothing that Stecker could find wrong, which is to say unmilitary, in finding comfort wherever it might be found. In his twenty-five years of service, he had been acutely uncomfortable on more occasions than he liked to remember. And there was no question whatever in his mind that he would be made acutely uncomfortable again- possibly, the Corps being what it was, as soon as tomorrow.

It was not necessary to train to be uncomfortable. That came naturally, like taking a leak.

When Master Gu

"He's all right, Gu

Stecker nodded. Then, with hands folded against the small of his back and the range sergeant trailing him, he marched to one end of the firing line, pausing now and again when the targets were marked or to stand behind one prone rifleman and his coach. Then he reversed course and marched to the other end. He found nothing that required correction. He really hadn't expected to. Except for the general truth that the way to keep things ru

Then he returned to the pickup and drove back to his office.

There was a glistening LaSalle convertible in one of the "Official Visitor" parking spaces. Stecker had almost bought a LaSalle convertible. Although he considered his Packard Phaeton to be a fine piece of machinery, sometimes he wished he had gone to the LaSalle. It wouldn't have cost nearly so much money, and it was, under the skin, a Cadillac. And there would not have been so many eyebrows raised at a Master Gu