OWL -- Tuesday Noon
The day was warm. The sky was a clear blue with a few wisps of clouds here and there. The humidity was thick enough to cut with a knife. The dirt road was dusty. There was opposing foot traffic, both human and animal dodging its way on the road. Going down from the road on the right was a near sheer drop of nearly 1,000 feet. On the left was a near sheer cliff that went up at least 500 feet. The road was crooked as a snake's back. Rock falls were always a worry.
The truck that Owl was riding in kept grinding along at something less than 30 miles per hour. The road was decent but the convoy could only go so fast on the twisty mountain road in some of the remotest mountains in Yunnan, China. Varoom was more like just a faint rumble. The convoy stopped for ten minutes approximately every hour. There were local people on the road with animals heading to or from market. Most of the people were women, old men and children. The older boys and working age men apparently had been corralled by the Chinese Army either for work up north or drafted into the largely illiterate and ill-organized army. Owl and his platoon of truck driver/guards had made two round trips previously. This was the third round trip in about six months. Mostly they stopped for the night in official rest stops where they could park the trucks inside a fence and sleep with some assurance that the trucks would still be there in the morning. This trip had turned into a slog. There had been lots of rain and a few washouts that slowed progress. Tonight they still hoped to make the regular rest stop but they might be late. Their radio was useless in these deep valleys.
Up ahead Owl could see a jeep with a Chinese Army officer and three military policemen in it. The spiffy looking officer was sitting in the front seat. As the convoy got closer the officer unwound from the seat and flagged them down to a stop. Owl signaled for a halt. After the break they would start up a long and steep grade. Then they would drop down along a valley with a village in the middle and some springs. They had never stopped there but this time is might be a good place to bivouac for the night. There was ample water and Owl had sensed a hot spring from the odor of rotten eggs on previous trips.
"Sir, I am Captain Lo. I have a message from up the road. There is a bridge out from flooding and no detour yet. You are to stay in the next village until the bridge can be repaired and the road reopened." Captain Lo passed over the written order to Owl.
"Thank you Captain. We will move on up to the next village and wait for the order to resume. One question. Is the village friendly toward Americans? As you know, some are not. We want no trouble."
"Lieutenant Owl, I believe you will be safe. There are no bandits." Captain Lo replied.
There were salutes and the captain turned around and departed up the road. He wanted to get back to his base before dark if possible. He knew that he wasn't welcome in that village.
Owl called for his sergeants. They chatted and were told about the change in plans. None of them were really upset. One village was as good as another and there was water and presumably food. When they got near the small town Owl and the senior Chinese driver would go into the village and meet with the headmen. A bargain would be struck and the bivouac locations worked out. The important parts were safe parking for the trucks away from the river and dry ground for camping. The Chinese drivers camped away from the American soldiers but they worked together as a good team. One group needed the other to survive in the event of trouble.
What no one knew was that Owl spoke Mandarin Chinese like a native. He could speak, read and write Chinese fluently at a high native speaker level. He had been born in Hankow in 1922. His father had been working there for Standard Oil. A bit later they moved to Ichang further up the river where his father had been manager of the tank farm. In 1940 with an active war in the Yangtze Valley, Standard Oil had greatly reduced staffing and the family had moved to California.
Owl's fluency in Chinese had been earned by daily exposure and an insistence on the part of his parents that he learn. In this part of Yunnan the language was a variant of Mandarin. After more than six months of living in Yunnan he could understand the local language well and could speak it with some fluency too. The written language was universal throughout China. He kept his language skill quiet. That way he could check on the conversations between the local officials and the head driver. The head driver was a mission Chinese and spoke passable English. Owl had caught him out in minor stuff once or twice but in the main the head driver was honest.
The meeting broke up. Tentative plans had been made. They would stop at the next village and set up camp for 2-3-4 days. There would need to be guards at night but the days would be free except for doing maintenance on the trucks.
With a roar they rumbled down the road. They convoy ground along in low gear over the summit and then picked up speed going down the gentle grade into the beautiful farm valley. There was rice everywhere with vegetables and some fruit. Each cluster of households had pigs and chickens. Some of the damn chickens were enormous. They were as big as turkeys but were still chickens. Owl was thinking some fresh eggs would be good and some good Chinese food would not go amiss for the next few days. A few of the soldiers claimed they hated Chinese food but Owl knew that the slop they had eaten previously was just that, slop. The real deal with good rice and vegetables would change their minds. Besides, how much canned corn beef hash could you eat, day after day, before anything would taste better?
OWL -- Tuesday late afternoon -- The convoy came to near the edge of the village. It was bigger than Owl had thought. It spilled across the road in both directions. The river was about 200 yards to the east down a slope that made the village just high enough that it usually wouldn't flood. On the west were several good streams coming off mountains that were less than a mile away. There were fields all around. Owl noted an empty shelf of nearly bare dirt on the uphill side of the road that would be perfect for a bivouac. He observed that the market appeared prosperous. There was lots on offer. He also noticed, a little out of town up on a hill what appeared to be a church, a nice looking semi-western style house and a smaller building that could also be a house. He would explore that later.
Now came the deliberations. The delegation from the village came out to talk. After much head nodding and general chit-chat they got down to business. The men deliberated back and forth. Owl used the head driver as the middle man. Since he understood the whole conversation comletely Owl bargained for camping. They, of course, wanted money. Way too much money. After much tough bargaining they agreed on a fair price. Owl also wanted fresh food. That was possible. The buyers would be welcome in the market. Cash or selected goods could be traded. There was one firm demand though. Keep the soldiers out of the town after dark. Owl understood there were two reasons. The elders didn't want to deal with drunken soldiers that were twice the size and weight of any of the elderly local men and they wanted to avoid sexual misconduct between the soldiers and women in the town.
Owl had previously observed that there were no men of working age and no older boys. No males between the ages of 14 and 50 appeared to be around. There were no babies either. There were young children of two and more but no babies.
Owl agreed that his soldiers would be well behaved during the daytime and stay out of the village after dark. If there were problems they would be taken care swiftly. Smiles all around now. The head driver was pleased and said so. They went inside a nearby tea shop and sealed the bargain with multiple cups of tea, a bowl of rice and soup.
Then it was time to go.
The soldiers and drivers quickly organized the bivouac with camps at both ends and a ring of trucks parked so that the rear doors couldn't be opened without moving the trucks. The tankers were completely surrounded. It appeared that three men would be enough to look after the camp at night.
One of Owl's soldiers reported that he had discovered a hot spring just up from the road that looked as if it was used by local folks for soaking. Owl went to look and indeed, there were three pools of water. One was very hot, almost scalding, and held the water as it came out of the ground. The other two were larger and had rock benches built along the edges. One appeared to be hot but somewhat cooled. The other mixed the hot water with cold water coming from a nearby cold spring fed stream. After some thought it was decided that daytime and afternoon use would be fine but between four pm and six pm the soldiers would stay out. It was already approaching late afternoon and it was time to organize food and get cleaned up. Tomorrow would be maintenance all day.
The men worked efficiently to organize food. They would bathe that night down at the river.
While this was going on Owl wrote up his daily report. They had done well but were really about two days behind schedule. There was nothing to do about that. If a bridge was out and he had an order to lay up for a few days that was that. The men were happy for a break. The setting was good and it appeared that the cooks among the crew had done well in the market. No canned corn beef tonight. In fact one case each of corned beef hash and spam had been traded for fresh local food. Owl thought that was a real bargain.
