The pilot was curious about that, and said so to the copilot.
"He's a courier," he said. "Didn't you see the briefcase?"
The pilot shook his head. "No."
"He had it when he came on board, chained-actually handcuffed-to his wrist."
"I didn't notice," the pilot said.
"And when he took off his jacket, he had a.45 stuck in his belt, and a knife strapped to his arm."
"I wonder what's in the briefcase?" the pilot said.
"I don't know," the copilot replied, adding, "but I don't think I'd want to try to take it away from him."
(Two)
The Willard Hotel
Washington, D.C.
1215 Hours, 26 December 1941
"Peacock Alley," which ran through the Willard Hotel from Fourteenth Street to Pennsylvania Avenue, was where, since before the Civil War, the elegant ladies of the nation's capital (and, some said, the more expensive courtesans) and their elegant gentlemen had strutted… like peacocks.
It was ornately decorated, still with Victorian elegance, and along the alley were small alcoves, furnished with tables and chairs where conversations could be held in private. The cynics said that more politicians had been bought and sold in the alcoves of Peacock Alley than in all the smoke-filled rooms in the United States combined.
Thomas C. Wesley, a tall, fifty-year-old, portly, ruddy-faced full colonel of Marines, got out of a 1941 Chevrolet staff car on Pennsylvania Avenue and entered the building. He removed his overcoat and hat and put them in care of the cloakroom. He tugged at the skirt of his blouse and checked the position of his Sam Browne leather belt, and then walked slowly down Peacock Alley all the way to the stairs leading down into the lobby, obviously looking for someone. When he didn't find him, he stationed himself halfway along the corridor and waited.
At just about the same time, a tall, thin, somehow unhealthy-looking man entered the Willard from Fourteenth Street. He was wearing a gray snap-brim felt hat, which he removed (exposing his balding head) as he came through the revolving door. He headed across the old and battered, but still elegant, lobby toward Peacock Alley shrugging awkwardly out of his gray topcoat. By the time he saw Colonel Wesley, he had it draped none too neatly over his left arm.
Colonel Wesley nodded stiffly, perhaps even disapprovingly, when he saw the tall, thin, unhealthy-looking man in the badly fitting blue pinstripe suit.
"Rickabee," he said.
"Colonel," Rickabee said, then looked around Peacock Alley until he found an empty table and two chairs in one of the alcoves and made a gesture toward it. Lieutenant Colonel F. L. Rickabee was carried on the Table of Organization of Headquarters, USMC, as "special assistant to the Public Affairs Officer," although his real duties had nothing to do with public relations.
Colonel Wesley marched to the alcove and sat down, leaving to Rickabee the other chair, which faced the wall. Rickabee moved the chair so that he, too, could look out into Peacock Alley.
"It's been some time, Rickabee, hasn't it?" Colonel Wesley said, and then, before Rickabee had a chance to reply, said what was actually on his mind: "Are you people exempt from the uniform requirements?"
"It's left to General Forrest's discretion, sir, who wears the uniform and who doesn't. The general feels I'm more effective in mufti."
Brigadier General Horace W. T. Forrest, USMC, was Assistant Chief of Staff, Intelligence, USMC.
"General Forrest explained the situation to you?" Colonel Wesley asked.
"He said that you and General Lesterby had been handed a very delicate problem by the Major General Commandant, and that I was to do what I could to help. How can we help you, sir?"
"He thought you might be interested in this," Colonel Wesley said, taking an envelope from his lower blouse pocket and handing it to Rickabee.
There was no question in Lieutenant Colonel Rickabee's mind who "He" was. Colonel Thomas C. Wesley was one of a handful of officers at the absolute upper echelon of the Marine Corps. They were somewhat derisively known as "the Palace Guard," because of their reputation for doing the bidding of, and protecting from all enemies, foreign and domestic, the Commandant of the U.S. Marine Corps.
"Captain James Roosevelt has been good enough to offer some suggestions on how he believes the Marine Corps should organize its own version of a Communist Route Army," Colonel Wesley said dryly.
"I thought he was working for Colonel Wild Bill Donovan," Rickabee said.
"Not any longer," Wesley said. "He now works for Lieutenant Colonel Evans Carlson."
Rickabee took from the envelope a thin sheath of carbon sheets. They were the fifth or sixth carbon, he concluded. They were just barely readable.
A waiter appeared.
"Nothing for me, thank you," Colonel Wesley said.
"I'll have a Jack Daniel's," Lieutenant Colonel Rickabee said. "No ice, and water on the side."
He sensed Colonel Wesley's disapproval.
"The way I handle drinking on duty, Colonel," Rickabee said, "is that for the first twenty-four consecutive hours I have the duty, I don't touch alcohol. After that…"
"Do what you like, Rickabee," Colonel Wesley said.
Rickabee returned to reading, very carefully, the sheath of carbon copies Wesley had given him. Finally, he finished and looked at Wesley.
"Very interesting," he said. "Where did you get this?"
"I'm not at liberty to say," Wesley said.
"You think he's actually going to submit it?"
"Yes, I do."
"And apparently you don't think that General Vogel is going to call him in for a little chat and point out that it's just a touch pushy for a reserve captain to tell him, much less the Commandant, how the Corps should be run?"
"I believe the letter will be forwarded to the Commandant," Wesley said. "I'm interested in your reaction to it."
"You are, or He is? Does He know you're showing this to me?"
Colonel Wesley nodded his head, signifying, Rickabee decided, that Wesley was running an errand.
"I would really like to know where you got this, where He got it," Rickabee said.
"I can assure you, Colonel," Wesley said, "that it is authentic."
"I'd still like to know how it came into His hands," Rickabee insisted. "That could be very important."
"The document was typed, from a handwritten draft, by a clerk, a corporal, who thought the sergeant major should see it. He made six, instead of five carbons. The sergeant major sent it on to… sent it on here."
"To you or to Him?" Rickabee asked.
"To Him," Wesley said.
The waiter, an elderly black man, delivered Rickabee's bourbon on a silver tray.
"I believe I will have one," Colonel Wesley said. "The same, with ice… This is obviously a very delicate situation," he continued, when the waiter had gone.
"Well, there's one way to handle it," Rickabee said. "I know several people at San Diego who would be happy to run Carlson over with a truck. Better yet, a tank."
Wesley was not amused; it showed on his face.
"Then you think that Colonel Carlson has a hand in this?" he asked.
"That seems pretty obvious," Rickabee said. "Have you read his reports, Colonel? Or his books?"
"As much as I could stomach," Colonel Wesley said.
"That 'leaders' and 'fighters' business," Lieutenant Colonel Rickabee said, "has appeared before. That's pure Carlson. So is the business about everybody being treated equally, officers, noncoms, and privates. He got all that from the Chinese Eighth Route Army… and the term 'column,' too, meaning 'battalion.' That's pure Chinese Red Army."
"Well then, let's get right to that," Wesley said. "Did he get himself infected by them when he was with them? Is he a Communist?"
Rickabee sipped at his bourbon, and then took a sip of water before replying.
"No, I don't think so," he said. "He's been investigated. When he applied to get his commission back, the FBI investigated him, and came up with nothing we didn't already know."