«Absurd? No. Imaginative? Yes. I guess you're just going to have to ask the President for clarification of your role.»
«Yeah,» Pickering said thoughtfully.
«When are you going to Washington, Fleming?»
«As soon as I can,» Pickering thought aloud. «The day after tomorrow, if I can get things here organized by then.»
«Please be good enough to personally pass to the President and Mrs. Roosevelt the best regards of Jeanne and myself,» MacArthur said. «Now, with that out of the way, would you like another drink before I speak to Manuel about dinner?»
«I would very much like another drink, please, General,» Pickering said, and raised the glass in his hand to his mouth and drained it.
note 15
Water Lily Cottage
Brisbane, Australia
0815 12 February
Second Lieutenant George F. Hart, USMCR, knocked at the door to Brigadier General Fleming Pickering's room. «General, Colonel Waterson is here.»
Using the first joint of his thumb as a gauge, Pickering was in the act of pinning his brigadier general's stars to the collar points of a tropical worsted shirt.
«Offer the Colonel a cup of coffee—for that matter, breakfast—and tell him I'll be right out,» Pickering called.
Pickering had specified the time he expected Colonel Waterson to arrive at Water Lily Cottage: 0830. Waterson was fifteen minutes early.
What the hell, if I was meeting my new boss, I would err on the side of being too early myself.
But does he know that I'm his boss? Or does he think I summoned him over here to tell him he's finally going to get the audience with El Supremo that Willoughby promised him
?
He pushed the pins on the underside of the star through the cloth of the right collar point, then compared that with the star on the left collar point. It was close enough. He picked up his fruit salad—an impressive display of colored ribbons, all mounted together, representing his decorations and services in two world wars—and started to pin the device to the shirt. And then changed his mind.
While he certainly wasn't ashamed of his decorations, wearing some of them sometimes made him uncomfortable—especially the Silver Star Admiral Nimitz had given him for taking the con of the destroyer USS
Gregory
when her captain had been killed and he himself painfully wounded; he thought that was worth no more than a Purple Heart. He was proud of his Navy Cross. He had been too young and stupid to think about what he was doing at the time, but the bottom line, looking back, was that he had behaved in Belleau Wood the way Marines are supposed to behave and the Navy Cross proved it.
To judge by the curriculum vitae MacArthur had provided, Colonel Waterson was not going to have many ribbons pinned to his chest; and Pickering decided that he was not going to make him uncomfortable by using his own ribbons to rub it in that Waterson had never heard a shot fired in anger. It was going to be bad enough as it was. MacArthur had made it quite clear that he still had no intention of permitting the OSS to operate in the South West Pacific. There was only one role he saw for Waterson, and he probably wasn't going to like it. Nor would Donovan when he heard about it.
Pickering put the shirt on, tucked it in his trousers, zipped up his fly, checked in the mirror to see that the button line on his shirt was aligned with his belt buckle and the trousers fly, shifted the belt buckle until it was in alignment, and then walked out of his bedroom.
Waterson, a chubby forty-odd year old who brushed his hair straight back, was sitting on one of the upholstered rattan couches in the living room. He was in civilian clothing—which surprised Pickering—a well-tailored, single-breasted, tropical worsted suit, a white button-down collar shirt, a finely printed silk necktie, and well-polished wing-tip shoes. When he saw Pickering, he stood up.
He looks more like a business executive than an Army colonel
, Pickering thought.
But, of course, that's what he really is. El Supremo told me he had been vice president of some company
—
Malloy Manufacturing. He's no more a bona fide colonel than I am a bona fide brigadier general
.
«Good morning, Colonel,» Pickering said, offering his hand. «I'm Fleming Pickering.»
«Good morning, sir.»
«Have you had your breakfast?»
«I had some coffee, sir.»
«Well, I'm about to have my breakfast,» Pickering said. «You can either have some with me, or you can have a cup of coffee and watch me eat.»
«That's very kind of you, sir.»
«George,» Pickering ordered. «Round up Pluto and ask him to come to the dining room. I want you there, too.»
Pickering gestured for Waterson to precede him into the dining room.
«I have—this sounds like a line from a B movie—no secrets from either Hart or Major Hon,» Pickering said. «Not only because they have to know everything that's going on, but also because they generally know things before I do. They both have magic clearances. Pluto—Major Hon—knew about this latest development before I did, because he decrypted the message when it came in. You are familiar with this latest development?»
«I received a radio message from Colonel Donovan, sir,» Waterson said, «telling me that OSS Station Brisbane is now under your command.»
«Have a seat, Colonel,» Pickering said, as he sat down himself.
Pluto came into the room, trailed by George Hart. Pickering introduced Pluto.
«Let's go over our problems,» Pickering said. «Problem One is that General MacArthur doesn't want the OSS here at all.»
«But, General…« Waterson began.
Pickering held up his hand to shut him up.
«Problem Two is magic,» he went on, «which breaks down into three sub-problems: the analysis part of magic; magic clearances; and people to assist Pluto in the encryption/decryption.»
«General,» Waterson said, «you're going a little fast for me.»
«Let's talk about magic,» Pickering said. «How much do you know about that, Colonel?»
«I know it exists,» Waterson said.
«That's all? I'm disappointed.»
«I probably know more than I should, General,» Waterson said.
Pickering made a «give it to me» gesture with both hands.
«We've broken the Japanese codes,» Watersoi. said.
»
Some
of them,» Pickering corrected him. «Enough to be of enormous value. And obviously, it's the most important secret of the war.»
«Obviously,» Waterson agreed.
«People with a magic clearance cannot be placed in any situation where there is any chance at all they will be captured,» Pickering went on. «Right now we have three people here, Pluto, Hart, and Lieutenant Johnny Moore, who have magic clearance. Hart will be leaving with me. And two people are not enough to handle the traffic, particularly since the big brass have learned that the Special Channel is the best way to get a message through securely and in the shortest possible time.»
«Is that why Director Donovan has had trouble gaining access to the Special Channel?»
«Donovan is on the magic list, but General MacArthur decides who is to be given access to the Special Channel to SWPOA. I presume he decided the OSS didn't need it. But that's something else that's been changed. I have magic access, and I have every intention of using it—when necessary—to communicate with you.»