Read Online Orders Is Orders by L. Ron Hubbard - Free Book Online

affected that he had to wipe his glasses
     half a dozen times during the meal.
    After he had stoked himself until he had to let out his belt a notch, Toughey renewed
     his attack on the car to learn at last that a battery cable had jarred loose.
    He stood back and swabbed the grease from his hands and face with an already grimy
     handkerchief. He climbed up under the wheel and started the car. It ran with great
     smoothness.
    With satisfaction radiating from him, he got down again and stowed the keg into the
     rear seat. “Who’s drivin’, Sarge?”
    “I’ll take the first trick ,” said Mitchell. “Are we all set, Father?”
    “My boy, you have saved my life! We must get out of here before those troops come
     back.”
    The reverend got into the front seat, knowing of old that it was the smoothest riding.
     Goldy luxuriously stretched herself on the cushions and went to sleep abruptly in
     the middle of a yawn.
    Toughey planted both feet on the keg, settled his enormous bulk, stood his rifle between
     his knees and was snoring before the car had even reached the gate.
    Mitchell drove out between the pillars and turned into the road, heading west.
    Until that turn, the reverend was most complacent. Clamorously, now, he cried, “James!
     You have mistaken the direction! The coast is to the east ! James!”
    “I haven’t mistaken anything,” said Mitchell.
    “But . . . but . . . good gracious, this is the direction all those troops took! We’re
     going into the very heart of the battle area! I demand that you turn around.”
    “Demand away,” said Mitchell. “If you don’t like this direction, you can get out.”
    “No. Oh, no. My goodness. I can’t stay in Yin-Meng! Please, my boy, have you no sense
     of duty to your father? Have you no sense of duty?”
    “Father,” said Mitchell, “we’re headed for Shunkien. If you would rather come with
     us than stay behind, settle down and ride.”
    “Shunkien,” wept the reverend. “But, my boy, it’s in a state of siege . You can never even approach the city!”
    “I got orders to deliver a box and a keg to Shunkien, siege or no siege. And whether
     you like it or not, that’s our destination. Now put up or shut up.”
    The reverend subsided for a long while and then he muttered, “You always were a wayward
     boy, James. A Marine and then a chorus girl and now you defy your own father.”
    Rolling deeper into hostile China, the reverend wiped the emotional mist from his
     glasses and watched the rough miles go by.

Chapter Ten
    A T the end of a rough twenty-five miles, during which they had been lucky enough to receive
     no attention from occasional cavalry squadrons, the sergeant gave up the wheel to
     Toughey.
    Yawning and rubbing his eyes, Toughey slid under. Mitchell paused as he started to
     get into the rear seat.
    “This is noon, Thursday,” said Mitchell. “Or is it?”
    “I think so,” said Toughey, yawning cavernously.
    “We ought to be rolling in there before night—if we can get through the Japanese lines
     ahead. Don’t drive too fast.”
    “Okay, Sarge. You’ll be as safe as a babe in a cradle. Cork off to your heart’s desire.”
    Mitchell got into the rear seat beside the sleeping girl and Toughey started up.
    The sergeant looked at his pack lying in the bottom of the car. He pulled it to him
     and fumbled with the buckles, searching for an extra package of cigarettes. His hand
     encountered the cold side of the whisky bottle.
    He glanced sideways at the girl and then at the back of the reverend’s neck. The reverend
     was sleeping, pince-nez awry, mouth open to display gold teeth. Toughey was intent
     on his driving.
    It wouldn’t hurt, thought Mitchell. Not one small swig. He was getting so jittery
     he could hardly sit still. He pulled the bottle out of the pack and read the label:
    Canadian Whisky. Five Years Old. One Quart.
    He broke the seal and touched the cork.
    Somehow he would have to bluff his way through the Japanese