He laughed. “No, I’m not in the Army, Z. At least, not technically. I’ll tell you all about it when we land.” Jack dropped his smile and said, “It really was luck, Z … no doubt about it. I was supposed to go to Nagasaki the same day I heard from Blaine Harrington. I just happened to be in the right place at the right time.”
“Why were you going to Nagasaki?”
“I was ordered to write a report about what I saw for a few people in Washington.”
“Don’t worry, Jack. I’ll tell you all about it. People everywhere should know what that bomb did.”
Jack shot me a look. “What? You saw it, Z?”
“Oh, yes, I saw it, all right. I saw the bomb drop and I saw Nagasaki … afterward … and it is in my mind forever.”
“Tell me later,” Jack shouted. “It’s too damn loud in here.”
I nodded my agreement and tried to get comfortable in the stiff makeshift seats. Jack tossed some blankets over to me. We were flying at several thousand feet and it was chilly inside the big plane. I turned to pass Sailor and Sheela a blanket and found them both asleep. She had her head on his shoulder and he was holding her hand. I put the blankets around them as gently as possible. For a moment they looked like two innocent children who had played all day and stayed up past their bedtime. I laughed to myself at the thought and closed my own eyes. I was on my way home. I couldn’t believe it, it seemed too good to be true, and even though Sailor’s “plan” had fallen through, he had been right about one thing — he said we would be on our way to Hawaii within a day, maybe two. And so we were, but not because of his or anybody’s “plan.” No, it was simpler than that. As Jack had said, it was nothing but pure dumb luck.
3. Orbain (Scar)
The event usually happens in an instant. The resulting injury is severe and traumatic. The healing is painful and slow. Time becomes the handmaiden, the nurse, and the clock that will gradually change, rearrange, and sometimes erase the event from memory. The mind plays tricks on itself, the body moves on, the soul calms and the spirit forgets, but the scar … the scar is permanent. The scar remembers.
“Pick it up, son. Pick up the baseball and give it to me,” the voice behind the mask said. The sun was shining. I stood on the pitcher’s mound and he was walking toward me. Who was he? Was he the umpire? I looked down and saw the baseball lying in the dirt. Instead of normal laces, the ball had been stitched together with jewels, and they reflected sunlight in every color and every direction. “Give it to me,” the voice repeated. I was confused. Why should I give the baseball to him? Why?
“Wake up, Z! We’re landing.”
I was jarred awake just as the airplane’s huge wheels hit the runway. I turned to Jack. “Where is this?”
“Hickam Field — but we won’t be here long. I want to get the three of you to my place before anybody asks any questions.” Jack looked over at Sailor and Sheela. He rubbed the stubble on his face and laughed once to himself. “You’ve got to tell me about her, Z. She’s amazing … I had no idea …”
Jack didn’t need to finish his sentence. I watched Sheela as we taxied to a full stop. I knew what he meant and he was right — she was amazing, and so was her story, but I knew I would only be able to tell Jack a portion of the truth about Susheela the Ninth. I could tell him she was the last of her kind among the Meq; I could tell him she had once known famous painters, princes, and queens; I could even tell him she possessed unique mental powers, but I could never tell him one thing — her true and actual age. He would never believe me. With the engines still running, Jack opened the door. The sound was deafening. He lowered the ladder, saluted the two pilots, and we stepped out of the plane and onto the ground. Jack waved us toward an empty hangar while the big transport turned around and taxied off to another runway. The last remnants of a storm were dissolving in the western sky and the sun was setting. Only a long, lone, horizontal sliver of bloodred light shone through the clouds. It looked like a scar between two worlds.
Jack had left his car parked inside the empty hangar. It was a 1939 Ford convertible, and the three of us piled into the backseat while Jack drove off the base. We put our heads down as he waved to the guards at the exit gates. One of them yelled, “Good to see you back, Jack!”
“Good to be back, boys,” he shouted, then turned north onto the highway. About twenty minutes later we pulled into his house, a small bungalow on the north side of Pearl City. The house was only a few hundred yards from the beach and shielded from view by an overgrown hedge on two sides. We spent three days in Hawaii, mainly at Jack’s place. During that time we talked often at the beach and learned about the obscure nature of his current “occupation” and some of what he had been doing during the war.
In 1940, well before the attack on Pearl Harbor, Jack was approached and asked to join a government covert intelligence unit, which later became known as the O.S.S. After agreeing to serve, he trained in Washington and later in England under British command. In July of 1942, he was ordered to set up his own network of agents in Lisbon, Madrid, and Marseille, along with direct connections to the French underground. His mission was simple and direct: by any means necessary he was to help certain people, primarily downed British and American pilots, escape through France and into Spain via the Pyrenees.
Absolute trust is absolutely necessary for any clandestine operation to work, particularly during wartime. I learned that fact from Captain Woodget and I have always found it to be true. Jack chose the first members of his organization from those he knew well — those few people who also happened to know of the Meq. He traveled to Caitlin’s Ruby and enlisted the aid of Willie Croft and Koldo Txopitea. They both agreed on the spot to do whatever they could to help. The memories of Guernica and the German bombs killing most of his tribe, including his father, were still fresh in Koldo’s mind. Arrosa even volunteered, but Jack told her to stay at Caitlin’s Ruby, along with Star and Caine. He said he would need a place to plan operations when he was in England and the Ruby was perfect because it was remote and unattached to the British and the Americans. A year later, and against the protests of Star, Caine dropped out of college to join Jack in the field. Mitch Coates and Antoine Boutrain were also brought into the group. Jack found them in Marseille, along with Mercy, Emme, and Antoinette. They were all living together in one of Antoine’s homes. Mitch and Antoine became essential to Jack because almost everyone they knew was in the French resistance to some degree. Koldo recruited several of his Basque friends and relatives, and the whole operation was a success for the next two years.
Shortly after D-day in 1944, Jack was ordered to disband his group and transfer to Hawaii. Three months later he was assigned the task of training new recruits for covert intelligence missions in northern China and parts of Korea. Captain Blaine Harrington, then a first lieutenant just out of Princeton, was one of Jack’s first trainees. After only one mission, Jack had to recommend that the young lieutenant be removed from the field and transferred to another position. Blaine Harrington’s amazing facility with languages was a valuable asset, but his inability or unwillingness to improvise and act “outside the book” was a serious liability. Improvisation is a skill as necessary in the field as absolute trust. Blaine Harrington was soon promoted to captain and transferred to General MacArthur’s staff. For the rest of the war, he held Jack responsible for steering his career into a long series of insignificant and boring assignments.