“Mrs. Feller will also be living here. I have assured her that you are a well-bred gentleman who will not be bringing any wild Australian lasses home for drinking parties late at night.”
“No, Sir.”
“There’s only two bedrooms, Pluto,” Pickering said. “I’m afraid you’re stuck with the Commerce Hotel. The important thing, I think, is to keep Moore out of the hands of Headquarters Company—without calling attention to him.”
“Absolutely, Sir,” Hon said.
“Take Mrs. Feller to the bank later today or tomorrow and see that she is authorized to draw on our account,” Pickering said. “And on that subject, Banning has been spending a lot of money. I have asked for more, and it should be coming quickly. If, however, one of the officer couriers does not bring you a check within the next week, radio Haughton. The one thing I do not want to do is run out of money for Banning and Feldt.”
“Yes, Sir.”
“Can you think of anything, Pluto? Or you, John?”
“No, Sir,” Moore replied immediately.
“No, Sir,” Hon said, a moment later.
“Ellen?”
“Credentials for me, Captain.”
“Oh, yeah. There’s a Major Tourtillott who handles that sort of thing. Ellen needs what you and Banning and Moore have. Anywhere in the building, at any time. If Tourtillott gives you any trouble, see Colonel Scott, who works for Sutherland. If he gives you trouble, radio Haughton.”
“Yes, Sir,” Hon said.
“The liaison officer, Captain,” Ellen Feller said.
“Oh, yeah. Thank you. That’s important. I suggested to Frank Knox that he send a liaison officer between here and CINCPAC. Ellen tells me that Colonel Rickabee found one. He should be coming in soon. He is not, repeat, not, to be made a member of your happy circle. He’s not cleared for MAGIC, or for what Banning is doing. I mention that solely because Rickabee’s name may come up. Or because I’m afraid the poor bastard may be another orphan around here and may seek company in his misery.”
“I understand, Sir,” Hon said. He looked at his watch. “Captain, what time is your plane?”
Pickering looked at his watch.
“Christ,” he said. “And I didn’t give you the coffee I promised.”
“No problem, Sir.”
“Moore can drive me to the airport, Pluto. You don’t have to go.”
“I’d like to see you off, Sir, if that would be all right.”
“Why thank you, Pluto,” Pickering said. He looked at Ellen. “Sorry to have to leave you in the lurch like this.”
“Take care of yourself, Fleming,” Ellen Feller said.
Why does the way she said that make me suddenly think that they have been making the beast with two backs?... Even after the modest declaration she just gave about how myhusband-and-I-were-missionaries-in-China and Fleming-andI-are-just-old friends?
Because you’re a dirty-minded young man, Pluto Hon, who hasn’t had his own ashes hauled in so long you probably wouldn’t know what to do with an erection.
“Where’s your bags, Sir?” Hon asked.
“I’ll get them,” Moore said.
“I’ll carry my own damned bags, thank you,” Captain Pickering said.
(Four)
HEADQUARTERS, VMF-229
EWA USMC AIR STATION
OAHU, TERRITORY OF HAWAII
1555 HOURS 25 JULY 1942
Corporal Alfred B. Hastings, USMC, followed Captain Charles M. Galloway, USMCR, into his office.
“Whatever it is, Corporal Hastings, fuck it,” Captain Galloway said. “Your beloved commanding officer has had it for today.”
Galloway’s cotton flight suit was sweat soaked. His hair was matted on his skull, and his hands and face were covered with a film of oil. He looked exhausted. He settled himself like an old man in the chair behind his desk.
“It’s the colonel, Sir,” Hastings said. “He said for you to phone him the minute you got in.”
“Did he say what he wanted?”
“No, Sir, but he’s called three times.”
Galloway pointed to the telephone on his desk. Hastings took the handset from the cradle, listened for a dial tone, handed the handset to Galloway, and then dialed a number.
“This is Captain Galloway, Sergeant. I understand the colonel wants to speak at me.”
Hastings left the room. He returned a moment later with a bottle of Coke, which he set on Galloway’s desk. Galloway covered the microphone with his hand.
“Bless you, my son,” he intoned solemnly.
“Yes, Sir,” Hastings said, smiling.
“Galloway, Sir,” Charley said to the telephone. “I just got in.”
“And how many hours is that today, Captain Galloway?” Lieutenant Colonel Clyde W. Dawkins asked, innocently.
“I haven’t checked my log book, Sir.”
“But you can tell time and count, right? Up to say five hours and forty-five minutes?”
What the hell has he done? Gone and checked the goddamned board?
“Was it that much, Sir?”
“You know goddamned well it was,” Dawkins said. “On the other hand, if you’re dumb enough not to believe me when I say I don’t want you flying more than four hours, maybe you are too dumb to count.”
“Yes, Sir.”
“But that is not the reason, at least the main reason, I wanted this little chat with you, Captain Galloway.”
“Sir?”
“Knowing as I do your penchant for obeying only those orders you find it convenient to obey, I suppose it’s hoping too much to expect you to have a white uniform for formal occasions?”
“Sir, I have a set of whites.”
“Just in passing, I believe the regulation says you are required to have two sets. Is the one set you have suitably starched and pressed for wear at a formal occasion, for example, taking cocktails and dinner with an admiral?”
Charley took a quick mental inventory of his closet in the BOQ. His whites, never worn, were there, still in the bag they’d come in. If they weren’t pressed, he had an iron.
“Yes, Sir,” he said.
“Good. The admiral will be pleased. He is sending his car for us at 1830. Try not to spill tomato juice on your whites between now and then. With you owning only one set, that would pose a problem.”
“What admiral is that, Sir?”
“Take a guess.”
Since Charley was reasonably convinced that for reasons he could not imagine, Dawkins was pulling his chain about dinner with some admiral, he could not resist the temptation:
“Admiral Nimitz?”
“No. Close, but no. Guess again.”
Christ, he’s serious!
“I have no idea,” he confessed.
“I’ll give you a hint: How many officers do you have with uncles who are admirals?”
“Oh, Christ! What’s he want?”
“I don’t know. What I do know is that his aide was over here around noon—in his whites by the way, with the golden rope and everything—bearing an invitation for you and me to take cocktails and dinner with the admiral at his quarters. The admiral is sending his car for us, and the uniform is whites.”
“Jesus!” Charley said.
“Have you been saying unkind things to Lieutenant Schneider, Charley?”
“No. I was just flying with him, as a matter-of-fact. He’s doing very well, and I just told him so. He’s going to be all right, Colonel.”
“Well, he is not, repeat not, to be informed of where you and I are going tonight. The way the aide put it was, ‘the admiral thinks that it would be best if Lieutenant Schneider didn’t hear of this.’ ”
“I wonder what the hell is going on?”
“Considering how you ignore me when I tell you I don’t want you flying more than four hours a day, I wonder if you will be able to keep our dinner plans a secret from Lieutenant Schneider.”
That won’t be a problem. Schneider at this very moment is probably alrea
dy showered, shaved, shined, and doused with cologne, and breathing through flared nostrils as he arranges tonight’s rendezvous with Mary Agnes O‘Malley; he won’t surface until tomorrow morning, looking wan, exhausted, and visibly satiated.
“That won’t be a problem, Sir.”
“You told me that keeping your flying under four hours a day wasn’t going to be a problem, either, as I recall,” Colonel Dawkins said. “My quarters, not a second after six-thirty. We don’t want to keep the admiral waiting, do we, Charley?”
Colonel Dawkins hung up while Charley was on the “No” of “No, Sir.”
At 1825 Admiral Daniel J. Wagam’s aide-de-camp arrived at Lieutenant Colonel Dawkins’s BOQ in the Admiral’s Navy gray Plymouth staff car. Captain Charles M. Galloway arrived a moment later in his nine-year-old yellow Ford roadster. By the time Charley found a place to park the Ford, Colonel Dawkins had emerged from the building and was standing by the Plymouth.
The admiral’s aide, a Lieutenant (j.g.), got in the front seat beside the driver, affording Captain Galloway, in deference to his rank, the privilege of riding in the back. Charley had often wondered why in military protocol the back seat represented privilege and prestige. If he were the brass hat, he would have chosen to ride in front, where there was often more room and you could see better.
After considerable idle thought, he’d finally figured out an answer that made sense: It went way back, to horse-drawn carriages. The front seat then had been less comfortable, and often out in the rain.
The services were very reluctant to change tradition. Charley knew that chances of his ever having to take a swipe at somebody with a sword were pretty goddamned remote. But a sword, in the pattern prescribed for Marine officers, was like his white uniform, yet one more thing he had had to buy when he took the commission.
The crown of his white brimmed hat cover had embroidered loops sewn to it. These were not the gold embroidered loops (“scrambled eggs”) worn by senior officers on their caps. So anyone could tell at a glance whether or not he was looking at some lowly company grade officer. The loops went back to the days when Marines were posted as sharpshooters in the rigging of sailing ships. The officers then had fixed knotted rope to their headgear so the sharpshooters would not shoot them by mistake. Charley somewhat irreverently wondered if that now sacred tradition had come into existence after too many officer pricks had been popped “by mistake” by their men in the rigging.
“You should not have shot Lieutenant Smith in the head, Private Jones. You could see that he was an officer. He had rope on his hat. ”
How come, Charley wondered, only the officers wore rope loops? Why not all Marines? Or in those days, was it considered OK to shoot enlisted Marines by mistake?
Admiral Wagam’s aide turned around on the front seat.
“Colonel, by any chance do you know Commander C.J. Greyson?”
“Yes, I do,” Colonel Dawkins replied. “He was a classmate.”
“Yes, Sir. I knew that. I didn’t know if you knew Charley.”
“Knew him well. We were both cheerleaders.”
You were what? Cheerleaders? Jesus! Siss Boom Bah! Go Navy!
“Charley’s my brother, Sir.”
“Oh, really?”
“He’s on the staff of COMDESFORATL now, Sir. I had a letter last week.” (Commander, Destroyer Force, Atlantic.)
“Well, when you write him, please give him my best regards,” Dawkins said.
Back in Central High School, those of us who played varsity ball thought the male cheerleaders were mostly pansies. But I guess things are different at the United States Naval Academy, huh?
“Yes, Sir, I’ll be happy to.”
“You went to the Academy?”
“Yes, Sir. ‘40.”
Lieutenant (j.g.) Greyson smiled at Charley.
“I understand you were directly commissioned, Sir.”
“Well, the Commandant had to make a choice,” Charley said. “It was either commission me, or send me to Portsmouth.”
Lieutenant (j.g.) Greyson looked uncomfortable and turned to the front again.
“Watch it, Charley,” Dawkins said, softly and sternly; but he was unable to suppress a smile.
In 1937—39, when he was still a Captain, Rear Admiral (upper half) Daniel J. Wagam and his family occupied the quarters he shared now with Rear Admiral (lower half) Matthew H. Oliver.
(Rear Admirals, upper half, are equivalent to Army and Marine Corps Major Generals. Rear Admirals, lower half, are equivalent to Army and Marine Corps Brigadier Generals. Army and Marine Corps Major Generals wear two silver stars as the insignia of their rank, while Army and Marine Corps Brigadier Generals wear just one star. All Rear Admirals, however, wear the same two stars that Major Generals wear. This practice is said to annoy many Army and Marine Corps Brigadier Generals, particularly when they learn that they actually outrank the Rear Admiral, lower half, whom they have just saluted crisply.)
Though the Pearl Harbor officer corps had tripled or quadrupled in size since 1939, there were now very few dependents. That meant that many former family quarters were now occupied by “unaccompanied” officers. It had worked out remarkably well.
Placing “unaccompanied officers” in family quarters afforded senior officers with quarters appropriate to their rank. This was valuable not only because these provided greater creature comforts—such as privacy and luxury—than can be found in Bachelor Officer quarters, but because these also gave them a place where they could hold private meetings over drinks, or drinks and dinner.
Admiral Wagam’s quarters were a four-bedroom house. He occupied the master bedroom, Admiral Oliver the guest room, and their aides-de-camp occupied what he still thought of as Danny’s and Joan’s rooms. The admiral’s children were now waiting out the war with their mother, near Norfolk, Virginia.
Three Filipino messboys took care of the housekeeping and cooking. (Two of them were assigned as a prerogative of rank to Admiral Wagam and one to Admiral Oliver.) The loyalty and discretion of Filipino messboys was legendary. Admiral Oliver was not senior enough to have a permanently assigned staff car and driver. Admiral Wagam’s driver lived over the garage.
Admirals Wagam and Oliver got along splendidly. When one or the other of them wished to hold a meeting in the house, he simply asked the other if it would be possible for him to eat in the Flag Mess that night. Neither, both being gentlemen, ever asked who was being entertained. It might be CINCPAC himself, for example; or it could be an old family friend—female—with whom the admiral had a platonic relationship but did not wish to wine and dine at the mess because of the way people talked. No matter who it was, each admiral could count on the discretion of the other.
A white-jacketed, smiling Filipino messboy had the front door of Admiral Wagam’s quarters open even before Lieutenant Greyson could put his finger on the highly polished brass door bell.
Greyson waved Dawkins and Galloway through the door.
“I’ll tell the Admiral you’re here, gentlemen,” he said, and went to the closed door to the study and knocked.
In a moment, Admiral Wagam emerged, carrying a leather briefcase.
“Lock that up, will you please, Dick?” he said, as he handed the briefcase to his aide-de-camp.
“Aye, aye, Sir.”
“Gentlemen,” Admiral Wagam said, smiling at Dawkins and Charley. “Welcome. I’m glad you were able to come tonight.”
“Very good of you to have us, Sir,” Dawkins said.
“Dick’s been telling me, Colonel, that you and his brother are classmates.”
“Yes, Sir. ‘32.”
“I’m ‘22,” the admiral said, and turned to Galloway.
“And the famous—or is it infamous—Captain Galloway. I’ve been looking forward to meeting you, Captain. I was present, Captain, for the famous ‘Q.E.D.’ remark.”
“Sir?” Galloway asked, wholly confused.
“I was in Admiral Shaughn’s office when word came that you we
re flying that F4F out to the Saratoga. Captain Anderson of BUAIR [Bureau of Aeronautics] was there, sputtering with rage. He said, ‘Admiral, this simply can’t be. My people have certified all of VMF-211’s aircraft as totally destroyed.’ And Admiral Shaughn replied, ‘Quod erat demonstrandum, Captain, Quod erat demonstrandum. ’What made it even more hilarious was that Anderson didn’t have any Latin, and it had to be translated for him.”
“Yes, Sir,” Charley said, still wholly confused.
“He didn’t know that ‘Quod erat demonstrandum‘ meant ’the facts speak for themselves‘?” Dawkins asked. “Really?”
You made that translation for me, Charley realized. Thank you, Skipper.
“He hadn’t the foggiest idea what it meant,” Admiral Wagam said, chuckling. “And he gave an entirely new meaning to the word ‘ambivalent.’ Like everybody else ... Anderson is really a nice fellow, personally ... he was hoping that Galloway would make it onto Sara. But on the other hand, if he did, in an airplane Anderson’s BUAIR experts had certified was damaged beyond any possibility of repair, he was going to look like a fool.”
Admiral Wagam laughed out loud. “Which Galloway did, of course, making him look like a fool. No wonder BUAIR was so angry with you, Galloway. Well, it turned out all right in the end, didn’t it? All’s well that ends well, as they say.”
“Yes, Sir,” Charley said.
“Let’s go in the living room and have a drink,” Admiral Wagam said. “I’ve been looking for an excuse since three o‘clock.”
A small, pudgy Filipino messboy in a starched white jacket was waiting for them behind a small, well-stocked bar. Through an open door, Charley saw a dining room table set with crystal and silver. A silver bowl filled with gardenias was in the center of the table.
“We’ve got just about anything you might want,” the Admiral said, “but Carlos makes a splendid martini, and I’ve always felt that a martini is just the thing to whet the appetite before roast beef.”
“A martini seems a splendid notion, Admiral,” Dawkins said.
“Yes, Sir,” Charley said.
“Four of your best, Carlos, please,” the admiral ordered. “And I suggest you have a reinforcement readily available.”
Battleground Page 35
