«Yes, sir. 'Will be', sir?»
«You're the first one to show up. Don't interrupt me again.»
«Yes, sir.»
«The mission is being run by Major Jake Dillon—«
«My father's involved in this?» Pick blurted.
«Goddamn it, I told you not to interrupt me!»
«Sorry, sir.»
«And the volunteers will be housed at Muku-Muku. Both to give the condemned a hearty meal before they fly off on this idiotic mission, and to keep them from running off at the mouth in the O Club bar about what they're doing. I would really like to order you to draw a pup tent and pitch it behind Hangar Two, but that would draw attention to you. You will proceed to Muku-Muku and there await further orders from Major Dillon.»
«Aye, aye, sir.»
«While you are at Muku-Muku, you will not confide in anyone—Major Dillon, Captain Galloway, Gunner Oblensky, and especially not the bona fide noble volunteers—what has caused you to be in their midst. Is that clear, Mr. Pickering?»
«Yes, sir.»
«You will engage in no activity while you are under my administration that might possibly draw attention to you or the mission. You will not drive a privately owned vehicle. You will not go into Honolulu, and you will not partake of the facilities of any officers' club unless you are accompanied by Major Dillon or Captain Galloway. You get one drink of spirits a day. Do you understand these restrictions, Mr. Pickering?»
«Yes, sir.»
«Good, because if you violate any one of them, I will ground you and I will court-martial you. Your father and Admiral Wagam—and, I am reliably informed, Admiral Nimitz himself—regard this operation as very important. I am not going to run any chance whatever of having it fouled up by a spoiled child wearing a Marine officer's uniform who doesn't have enough sense to know when to put his whisky glass down and his zipper pulled up.»
«Yes, sir.»
«You are dismissed, Mr. Pickering,» Colonel Dawkins said. «Ask the sergeant major to arrange for a jeep—a jeep, not a staff car—to transport you to Muku-Muku.»
«Aye, aye, sir,» Lieutenant Pickering said, did an about-face movement and marched out of Dawkins's office.
note 83
Headquarters, Marine Air Group 21
Ewa Marine Air Station
Oahu, Territory of Hawaii
1530 13 April 1943
Lieutenant Colonel Clyde W. Dawkins's sergeant major put his head into Dawkins's office. «Captain Galloway would like a couple of minutes, sir,» he announced.
«Send him in,» Dawkins ordered.
He's heard Pickering's at Muku-Muku and wants to know what's going on.
Galloway, in an oil-stained flight suit, came through the door. «Good afternoon, sir.»
«Close the door please, Captain,» Dawkins said.
Galloway turned and did so.
Dawkins took a bottle of scotch from his desk drawer. «You flying, Charley, or can you have one of these?»
«I'm through for the day, sir. Thank you.»
Dawkins poured stiff drinks in Kraft cheese glasses and handed one to Galloway.
«To Marine fighter pilots, goddamn them,» Dawkins said, raising his glass. «If we didn't need the bastards. I'd put a bounty on them.»
«I'll drink to that,» Galloway said. «I just came from 'counseling' one of the bastards. And I need this.»
He raised his glass, then drank half of it.
«I see no scrapes, bruises, or contusions,» Dawkins said. «This was one of your smaller hooligans?»
«I haven't actually had to… 'strongly counsel' anybody in some time,» Galloway said. «All I have to do now is show my fangs and growl.»
Dawkins chuckled. «What's on your mind, Charley, or did you just come in to drink my liquor?»
«Lieutenant Stevenson,» Galloway said.
«A problem?»
«Sort of.»
«What happened? Did somebody teach him how to box?»
«Actually, he's pretty well been on the straight and narrow,» Galloway said. «He wants to fly one of Dillon's Cats.»
«Does he, now? And what does he know about Dillon's Catalinas? Are we about to have another problem with somebody's big mouth?»
«He's figured out they're going to make a long, long flight,» Galloway said. «And he came to me and said he'd heard the pilots were all volunteers for whatever it was, and he'd like to volunteer.»
«Just for the record… Belay that:
Off
the record, Charley, are you volunteering this guy?»
«No, I'm not,» Galloway said. «This was his idea.»
«And what do you think prompted this selfless act on the part of Mr. Stevenson? We are talking about the same Stevenson, right, the one you wiped the hangar floor with when Mclnerney was here?»
«What I was doing was offering a little extra instruction in the manly art of self-defense. Yeah, same guy. He wants to redeem himself.»
«And you believe him?»
«Yeah, I do,» Galloway said. He drank the rest of his drink and looked at Dawkins. «I really do. He's come around. He's a regular, you know. I think he wants to see if he can salvage his career by doing something heroic.»
«Who told him the pilots were going to be volunteers?»
«Probably the Navy pilots who volunteered. He drinks with them.»
«Jesus Christ, what do we have to do to get people to keep their mouths shut?»
«Okay, Skipper,» Galloway said, holding up his hand in a mock gesture of self-protection. «I told him I would ask. I asked. I will now leave without even asking for another taste.»
«I would be ever so honored, Captain Galloway, if you would join me in another libation,» Dawkins said.
«I accept your kind offer with great gratitude, sir,» Galloway said, then walked to where the bottle sat and picked it up.
«How much Catalina time does this guy have?» Dawkins asked.
«About six hundred hours pilot-in-command. He flew antisubmarine patrols on the East Coast.»
«Before or after he got in trouble?»
«When they kicked him out of a fighter squadron, they sent him to the Cats. When he got in trouble there, they sent him to VMF-229, the Alcatraz of Marine Aviation,» Galloway said. «So I guess you could say, while he was getting in trouble.»
«On the record, Charley. There's no one in the Corps who could have done what you've done with that collection of misfits and ne'er-do-wells.»
«And
off
the record?» Galloway asked, trying to make a joke of the compliment.
»
Off
the record, Charley,» Dawkins said seriously, «there's no one in the Corps who could have done what you've done with that collection of misfits and ne'er-do-wells.»
Galloway was now visibly embarrassed. He tried to change the subject: «Can I tell him I asked and you're thinking about it?»
«You can tell him to come see me,» Dawkins said, then plunged on. «I got a back channel from Mclnerney, on that special communications system that Dillon has somehow managed to latch onto. There have been damned few volunteers. General Mac is down to volunteering people. He said he wants Marines to fly the Cats. By using the term loosely, your pal Stevenson can be considered to be a Marine.»