"Hello, sir." Colonel John Abell gave him a crisp salute and a smile that, like most of the General Staff officer's, looked pasted on. "I hope I'm not interrupting anything important."
Dowling snorted. They both knew better. "Oh, yes, Colonel. I was just finishing up my latest assignment from the President-the plan that will win the war in the next three days. Remember, you heard it here first." Dowling hardly cared what he said any more. How could he get an assignment worse than this one?
Abell smiled again. This time, he actually bared his teeth. That was as much reaction as Dowling had ever got from him. He said, "Are you prepared to take command of General MacArthur's First Corps in Virginia?"
Dowling's jaw dropped. His teeth clicked together when he closed it. "If this is a joke, Colonel, it's in poor taste." Kicking a man when he's down, was what went through his head. Did Abell think he was too far down to take revenge? If Abell did… he was probably right, dammit.
But the slim, pale officer shook his head and raised his right hand as if taking an oath. "No joke, sir. General Stanbery's command car had the misfortune to drive over a mine. They think he'll live, but he'll be out of action for months. That leaves an open slot, and your name was proposed for it."
"My God. I'm sorry to hear about Sandy Stanbery's bad luck. He's a fine soldier." Dowling paused, then decided to go on: "I think I'd better ask-who proposed me? As much as I'd like to get back into action, I don't want to go down there and find out that General MacArthur wishes somebody else were in that position."
"Your sentiments do you credit," Abell said. "You don't need to worry about that, though. MacArthur asked for you by name. He said you were very helpful in his recent meeting with you, and he said bringing you in would cause fewer jealousies than promoting one of General Stanbery's subordinates to take his place."
That made some sense, anyhow. Dowling didn't know that he'd been so helpful to MacArthur, but he wasn't about to argue. He did ask, "How will this sit with the Joint Committee on the Conduct of the War?"
"Well, sir, I would say that's largely up to you." Abell's pale eyes-Dowling never could decide if they were gray or light, light blue-measured him. "If the attack succeeds, how can the Joint Committee complain? If it fails, on the other hand…" He let that hang in the air.
"Yes. On the other hand." Dowling left it there, too. He hadn't thought much of what he'd heard of MacArthur's plans. He didn't think Colonel Abell had, either. Do I really want this assignment? Am I sure I do? But he did, and he was. Anything was better than sitting here counting raindrops. "I'll do my best. Can you get me a copy of the plan? I'll want to be as familiar as I can with what I'm supposed to do by the time I get down to the border. The attack should begin soon." The attack should have begun a while ago, but he didn't mention that. All the rain that had fallen lately wouldn't make things any easier.
"I'm sorry. I should have brought one with me, but I wanted to make sure you would say yes first," Abell said. "I'll have a runner get you one right away. How soon do you plan on going down to the border?"
"As soon as I can throw a change of clothes into a duffel bag-sooner, if they need me there right away," Dowling answered.
"I'll put a motorcar at your disposal," Abell said. "It will have a civilian paint job-nothing to draw special notice from the air."
"Thanks," Dowling said, and then, in a different tone of voice, "Thanks. I'll do everything I can." Colonel Abell nodded, saluted, and left.
Two hours later, Dowling was rolling south in a middle-aged Ford that was indeed thoroughly ordinary. He paid little attention to the landscape. He did notice bomb damage dropped off sharply once the motorcar got out of Philadelphia. It didn't pick up again till the Ford went through Wilmington, Delaware.
For the most part, though, he found the three-ring binder spread out on his ample lap much more interesting than the countryside. Daniel MacArthur-or rather, the clever young officers on his staff-had planned everything down to the last paper clip. MacArthur knew exactly what he wanted the First Corps to do. If everything went according to Hoyle, it could handle the job, too.
If. As usual, the word was the joker in the deck. One of the few things Dowling found inadequate in the enormous plan was its appreciation of Confederate strength. MacArthur's attitude seemed to be that the men he commanded would brush aside whatever enemy soldiers they happened to run into, march into Richmond, and hold a victory parade past the Confederate White House and Confederate Capitol.
Maybe things would work out that way. Every once in a while, they did. If the Confederate thrust through Ohio hadn't gone according to plan, Dowling would have been amazed. He shifted in the back seat. He'd been on the receiving end of that plan. Getting his own back would be sweet… if he could.
"You all right, sir?" the driver asked. He must have seen Dowling fidget in the rearview mirror.
"Yes." Dowling hoped he meant it.
The sun started to sink below the horizon as they passed from Delaware to Maryland. Dowling held the plan ever closer to his nose so he could go on studying it. One other thing that seemed to be missing from it was any notion of how bad weather would affect it. Listening to rain drum on the roof of the Ford, Dowling found the omission unfortunate. The driver turned on the slit headlights that were all anyone could use these days. They were inadequate in good weather, and almost completely useless in this storm. The motorcar slowed to a crawl. Dowling hoped other drivers would have the sense to slow to a crawl, too. Every so often, he got glimpses of wreckage hauled off to the side of the road. He could have thought of lots of things that would have done more for his confidence in the good habits of other drivers.
Outside of Baltimore, the Ford stopped crawling. That didn't mean it sped up: it stopped moving at all. "What the hell?" Dowling said irritably, wondering if Abell shouldn't have laid an airplane on for him instead.
"Some kind of mess up ahead. We'll find out when we get there." The driver sounded philosophical.
That did little to ease Dowling's irritation. "If we get there, you mean," he growled. There was barely enough light to let him see the driver's shoulders go up and down in a shrug.
They took twenty minutes to go half a mile to the trouble. A bomb crater rendered the road impassable south- and northbound. Engineers had just finished spreading steel matting of the sort that made instant airstrips out to either side of the damage. Without it, motorcars would have bogged down in the mud when they went off the road and onto the shoulder. With it, Dowling felt as if he were being shaken to pieces. He breathed a sigh of relief when the Ford got on the road again.
The relief didn't last. No sooner had they got into Baltimore than the Confederates started bombing it. With that cloud cover overhead, the enemy bombers couldn't hope to be accurate. But they didn't seem to care. The bombs would come down somewhere on U.S. soil. If they didn't blow up ships in the harbor or factories or warehouses, they'd flatten shops or apartments or houses. And if they hit a school or a hospital or a church-well, that was just one of those things. U.S. pilots didn't lose sleep over it, either.
Cops and civil-defense wardens were shouting for everybody to get off the streets. "Keep going," Dowling told the driver. The man shrugged again and obeyed.
Somewhere near the middle of town, a warden stepped in front of the Ford. He almost got himself run over for his trouble. "Are you out of your frigging mind?" he yelled as a bomb crashed down a few hundred yards away. "Get into a cellar, or the undertaker will bury you in a jam tin."