W E B Griffin - Men at War 2 - Secret Warriors

by Secret Warriors(Lit)

  The halves of a Ping-Pong table, resting on folding chairs, now held large sketches drawn from memory --of the battleship itself, Deadly serious, the admiral had used the charts and drawings to show Canidy how the vessel could be seized by a small force and by judicious use of watertight doors, and how the vessel could afterward be refueled under way at sea. By the time the admiral finished outlining his plan to steal the sixth or seventh-largest naval vessel in the world from under the noses of the German forces in Casablanca, Canidy was no longer convinced that the old man was living in cuckoo land. Improbable was not quite the same thing as insane. First of all, the admiral had made it dear that his chief and only reason for stealing the jean Bart was as a symbol.

  Removing the ship from the shaming control of the Germans would not just humiliate them; More important, it would Profoundly challenge the belief now held by most Frenchmen that since nothing could be done against the Bodies, the logical thing to do was accommodate them. And Admiral de Ver beys plan to seize the battleship met the first test of any good naval tactic: simplicity, In compliance with the terms of the Franco-German armistice, the battleship still remained in French hands with her full crew and enough ammunition for both her main turrets and her extensive complement of antiaircraft cannon and machine guns. In the event of an attack by any enemy-read English or American-against the sovereign soil of neutral France, the jean Bart was expected by the Germans to respond with all its firepower. For several reasons, the Germans were not particularly wo tried that her crew would turn the jean Bart's weaponry on them or suddenly decide to let loose the lines and go to sea. For one, the honor of the French Navy was at stake, France had signed an armistice with Germany. Marshal P6tain, as Chief of the French State, had through official channels ordered her captain to remain in port, and to defend French soil, More practically, the jean Bart's fuel tanks were virtu y d She was all ry regularly refueled, but with only enough oil to run one of her four engines at steaming speed for twelve hours. That was not nearly enough fuel for a dash for the open sea. A dash like that would require all four engines running at full power. It was, however, sufficient fuel to provide electrical services and THS SECRFT WARRIORS 0

  101 wer for her turrets and separate cannon and their ammunition hoists. Po ing order.

  Each of her four engines was run in turn, which kept all four in good runnaccording t o the admiral, there were thus only two major problems to be overcome in the "liberation" of the Jean Bart. The first was the question his orders. of the willingness of her captain to fly in the face of his honor and violate The presence of Vice Admiral de Verbey on the scene would handle that problem. He was not only the former captain of the jean Bart, but was also now the senior admiral not under the German thumb.

  If he ordered her to sea, his orders would be obeyed. The second problem, fuel, was by no means as hopeless as it might first appear.

  Though the main tanks were officially empty, there was still residual fuel-many tons of it-in each tank, left there because it was beyond the reach of her between-the-tanks fuel-transfer pumps. But by setting up portable pumps, the "empty" tanks could rather easily be pumped dry of their "residual" fuel, and that fuel transferred to the "active" tank.

  The admiral's calculations had determined that there would be enough fuel in the "active' tank to run all jean Bart's four engines at full power for almost two hours. That would see her out of the harbor and into the Mediterranean. There she would be met, the admiral planned, by an American tanker and an escort, preferably of destroyers and a cruiser.

  If the escort-and the Jean Bart herself-could provide defense against the aircraft the Germans would send after her, sufficient fuel could be transferred in an hour to give the jean Bart the means to sail into the Atlantic out of range of German aircraft. Then full refueling could be accomplished more or less at leisure. What the admiral still required, and what Canidy decided to get for him, were a few technical facts: How much fuel per minute could be pumped from a tanker into the Jean Bart's tanks? Using how many lines? What was the pressure of the lines? At what speed could a U.S. Navy tanker steam while her fuel lines were attached to the Jean Bart? In what sea conditions? when Canidy called him in Washington, "I wasn't aware that delusion was contagious," Captain Doug lass said "What would it hurt to give the old man the information he wants?"

  "Well, for one thing, I'm sure that's classified."

  "Who are you afraid he'll tell?" Canidy asked. "I'll work up some figures, then," Doug lass said. "Get him the right ones," Canidy said.

  "He's no fool."

  "You ever think of making an investment in a bridge, Canidy? " Doug lass said.

  "I'm sure the admiral has one he'd be willing to sell you cheap." But two days later, probably because Doug lass had decided it would keep the admiral happy and away from the press, a messenger delivered an enormous stack of technical manuals containing details of U.S. Navy tanker refueling techniques and capabilities.

  THREE I Deal, New jersey June LIS, 1942

  Dick Canidy, dressed in a business suit and carrying a briefcase, after a full day in coveralls in Hangar 17, stepped off the New jersey Central train at As bury Park. The Rolls Royce was waiting for him.

  After making another killing on Wall Street, home comes Richard Canidy, well-known internationalfinancier, to he met by thefaithfulfamily retainer in the Rolls. When the Rolls delivered Canidy in his stockbroker's uniform to Summer Place, the admiral, Barbara Whittaker, and the admiral's chief of staff were drinking wine at an umbrella-shaded cast-iron table on the lawn. The lawn was green and lovely and it stretched down to the beach.

  Without being asked, the admiral's middle-aged orderly brought Canidy some of Chesly Whittaker's older-than-Canidy Scotch. With a breeze coming off the ocean, it was so pleasant at the table that Barbara Whittaker ordered that their dinner be served there. And they lingered over coffee and brandy until it was dark and fireflies came out. The admiral finally announced he was going to take a stroll along the beach, and Canidy was flattered when the old man asked if perhaps he would care to join him.

  They caught up with one of the Navy sentries, who was patrolling the beach with a Springfield rifle on his shoulder and an allegedly ferocious German shepherd on a leash.

  The shepherd obligingly chased pieces of driftwood for the admiral, proudly delivering them with his tail wagging. Finally, the sentry resumed his rounds, and Canidy, without thinking, idly asked a question he immediately regretted. He asked the admiral about his family. "My wife lives as I do, on charity," the admiral said calmly. "When I was court-martial ed-" "Court-martial ed?"

  "In absentia, almost immediately after I left Morocco," the admiral said matter-of-factly, "I was convicted of treason. The court stripped me of my rank and decorations. That of course stopped my pay, and my property was forfeit."

  "Jesus Christ!" Canidy exploded. The admiral shrugged.

  "My son was dismissed from the Navy shortly after my court-martial. As my son, he was obviously not trustworthy. He has been arrested by the Germans. I don't know where he is."

  "I'm sorry."

  " I have old friends in New York," the admiral said, "Madame Martin and her husband, who have been kind enough to provide a little pocket money for me, enough that I can share a little with my staff."

  "You don't get money from the Free French?" I have a letter from Brigadier de Gaulle," the admiral said, his tone making it quite clear what he thought of de Gaulle, "in which he states that he, representing the Free French, does not of course regard my court martial as valid, and that so far as the Free French are concerned, I am in honorable retirement. He went on to express his profound regret that because of other, more pressing claims upon the limited funds made available to him, he will unhappily be forced to delay the payment of my pension until after the war. "That sonofabitch!" Canidy said. "You are referring, mon Major," the admiral said dryly, "to the head of my government. But under the circumstances, I do not believe I will offer you the choice of a duel or an
apology." They walked along the beach in silence for a couple of minutes, nodded to the sailor when he came walking back down the beach with the German shepherd, then turned and headed back to Summer Place. When they got back to the house, Barbara Whittaker was waiting for them. Captain Doug lass had called, she said.

  Canidy was to fly the Beech 110 11 W.R.R. GRIFIFIN to Anacostia Naval Air Station in Washington first thing in the morning Someone would meet him at the airport.

  FOUR I MOM Phis, Tennessee Sune 26,1942

  Two signs forbidding personal long-distance telephone calls were tacked to the employee bulletin board of the Memphis Advocate. One was a poster published by the Office of the Coordinator of Information. It showed an Air Corps officer sitting at a desk with a telephone to his ear. He was wearing a look of pained frustration in response to a balloon coming from the telephone: "Sorry, Captain, all the lines are busy." In black letters was the legend "Telephones are tools of war!

  If you have to call, make it quick! The second was smaller and more succinct. It was hand-lettered:

  A RECORD OF LONG-DISTANCE CALLS is NOW BEING KEPT. CHARGING PERSONAL LONG-DISTANCE TELEPHONE CALLS TO THE ADVOCATE IS GROUNDS FOR DISM188AL.

  Ann Chambers ignored both. For one thing, she doubted that one two-minute telephone call from Memphis, Tennessee, to Cedar Rapids, Iowa, was really going to lose more battles than were already being lost. For another, the Memphis Advocate was one of nine newspaper properties owned by Chambers Publishing Corporation. The president of Chambers Publishing was Brandon Chambers, and Brandon Chambers was Ann's father.

  She had begun thinking about making the telephone call to Iowa in the elevator in the Peabody Hotel the day her cousin Ed Bitter had told THE SECRET WARRIORS 0 III her that Dick Canidy had been sent home in disgrace from China for "re fusing to engage the enemy." Ed obviously believed what he told her to be true. And it certainly would explain why her pen-pal letters to Canidy had gone unanswered. It was possible that he was a coward, though she didn't feel that was likely. In fact, the truth was that even if Dick did run away from the japs she didn't care.

  The truth was that she loved him more than she'd ever believed she could love any man. And what she wanted more than anything in the world right now was to get his head on her shoulder. Or her breast.

  "This is Reverend Canidy," the voice on the telephone said curiously.

  "Reverend Canidy, this is Ann Chambers," she said.

  "I'm Ed Bitter's cousin, and, more to the point, a friend of Dick's."

  "Oh, how nice!" he said, puzzled. "The reason I'm calling is that I'm going-I live in Memphis-East, and I seem to have lost Dick's address."

  "He's horn ig e from China," the Reverend Canidy said, as I guess you know? "Yes,' Ann said. "And he's found work with the National Institutes of Health, as a pi lot." The National Institutes of Health?

  "I'd heard," Ann lied.

  "Could you give me his address in Washington? And his phone number?

  I'd really like to say hello when I'm there."

  "Just a moment," he said.

  "I've got it somewhere." Later, when she called the number Canidy's father gave her, a woman answered and denied any knowledge of anyone named Canidy. When Ann called the National Institutes of Health, they had never beard of him either. When she called the Washington information operator, she said she had no listing for the address Reverend Canidy had given her on Q Street, NW Ann walked into the teletype room and sat down before the Chambers News Service teletypewriter. She typed rapidly, a service message to the Chambers News Service Washington Bureau. She asked for ALL INFO, FACT AND SPEC the Washington bureau could develop SOONEST on what was going on at the address Reverend Canidy had given her on Q Street, Northwest. She signed it CHAMBERS ADVOCATE. if they thought her father had sent the service message, so much the better. Her name was Chambers, too, and if they were inspired to drop something unimportant and get on this right away, fine.

  As she'd hoped, the response was quick, but it was not quite the one she expected. Two hours after she sent the service message, she had a telephone call.

  "Exactly what is your interest in that address on Q Street? " her father began without other preliminary. "Hello, Daddy," she said.

  "I'm fine, how are you?"

  "What are you into?" he said.

  "What have you heard?"

  "How did you get involved in this?" she asked.

  "That address, so far as we're concerned, doesn't exist," Brandon Chambers said.

  "Do you take my point?"

  "No, I don't,' she said.

  "It's a government installation," he said. "We don't know it's there.

  We don't write about it."

  "Oh," she said.

  "When you signed my name to that service message, they checked with me."

  "I didn't sign your name to it," she said.

  "My name for the time being is Chambers, too."

  She beard him sigh in exasperation, but he chose not to argue about that.

  "I have to know, honey," he said, "what you're working on. "I was looking for Dick Canidy," she said.

  "I got that address from his father." There was a long pause.

  "Eddie returned from China with an unpleasant report on Mr. Canidy," Brandon Chambers finally said.

  "That he was a coward," Ann said. "Eddie told me."

  "And Canidy's father gave you the Q Street address?"

  "And two telephone numbers," Ann said.

  "I called both of them, and they said they had never heard of Canidy."

  "What's behind your deep interest in Canidy?"

  "I swore Mother to secrecy," Ann said, "but I thought she'd tell you anyway. I'm going to marry him."

  "For Christ's sake!" he said.

  "This is not a joking matter, Ann," "Who's jokin&" "Now, listen to me," he said.

  "Drop your inquiry right now. Right here. If you don't, you can do us a great deal of harm. I've come to an agreement with certain people-" "It's a military secret, right?" she challenged, "And I'm a Nazi agent."

  "It is a matter of military secrecy, Ann," her father said. "Odd, wouldn't you say, that a coward is involved with military secrets?" she said. "Just drop it, Ann, okay?" he said.

  "I want your word."

  "Or what?"

  "Or you're fired, This moment." He's absolutely serious.

  "It's that important?"

  "It is."

  "All right, then," she said. "And I don't want you talking to anybody-even Eddie or your girlfriend-" "Mrs. Edwin Howell Bitter, you mean?" Ann said. "Goddamn it, I'm serious."

  "I know," she said.

  "Okay, Daddy, you've made your point."

  "I really hope so, Ann," he said. Thirty minutes later, Ann walked into the office of the Advocate's managing editor and told him her father wanted her to come to Washing ton for a couple of days, and she was thinking of going Saturday afternoon after they'd gotten most of the Sunday edition to bed. She hated to ask, but if she could have a business travel priority certificate for an airplane ticket, that would get her back to work that much quicker. "Yeah, sure, Ann," he said.

  "We can work that out." Being in love does strange things to you.

  Sofar this morning I have tied to an Episcopal priest, my father, and my boss.

  And I'm not at all ashamed of myself Then she called Sarah Child Bitter at the Willard Hotel in Washington and announced that she would be in Washington on Saturday and needed a place to stay. Sarah and Ed Bitter were living in Sarah's father's suite in the Willard. Ed was probably going to be more than a little annoyed when she showed up, since they had been married only a few days. Having Ann around would be like having your sister on your honeymoon. To hell with him, Ann thought.

  He owes me for taking care of Sarah.

  [ ONE I Lakehurst Naval Air Station Labehurst, New Jersey June 27, 1942

  While Canidy was doing the preflight on the Beech D18S, Commander Reynolds's Plymouth staff car drove into the hangar and stopped bes
ide the aircraft. "I didn't know where you were going, Major," he said.

  "But I thought you could use a thermos of coffee and a couple of sandwiches."

  "Washington," Canidy told him.

  "Thank you." Commander Reynolds was impressed.

  There is something about Washington that impresses professional naval officers, Canidy thought, as if the place were the residence of God.

  "I'm glad you're here," Canidy went on.

  "I didn't know about starting the engines inside the hangar."

  "We push aircraft to the center lane," Reynolds said, "and make sure that both hangar doors are open. Then you might as well be outside.

  You've already been refueled."