W E B Griffin - Men at War 4 - The Fighting Agents

by The Fighting Agents(Lit)

  The smart thing to do, the chief had said, was to keep your pecker in your pocket and wait until you got home and could stick it in some nice, clean, respectable girl you knew wasn't going to give you nothing that would fuck up your life permanently.

  There were a couple of nice girls Joe Garvey knew back in Louisville, but none who had given him any hint that they would go to the movies with him, much less let him do that to them, but he had decided to keep his pecker in his pocket anyway. He didn't want his dick rotting off before he had a chance to use it.

  And he wanted to get promoted. He was already a petty officer second, and if you were a skinny little shit who wore glasses, he knew that was a good thing to be. What he had wanted most out of life, at least until they'd put him on a plane at Mare Island and flown him here, was to make chief radioman.

  That wasn't such an impossible dream. Not only was he one hell of a radio operator--he could knock out fifty words a minute and read sixty--but he knew about radios.

  There were a lot of radiomen who were good operators, and there were a lot of radiomen who were good technicians, but there weren't all that many who were both. Since the Navy wasn't going to send him to sea, the next best thing was to make chief radioman. Nobody would believe that a chief radioman had never been to sea. Or if that came out, people would understand that the Navy had its reasons for keeping him ashore. If he was a chief, it wouldn't matter that he was a skinny little shit who wore glasses. A chief was a chief, period.

  And making radioman first was going to be easier than he had thought it would be. He was going to go back to Mare Island when they were through with him with a letter of commendation from a goddamned Navy captain.

  "Makes you sound like John Paul Jones, Garvey," Chief Ellis had told him.

  "I

  know, 'cause I wrote it."

  The next time the promotion board sat, he was probably going to be the only radioman second going for first with a letter of commendation like that.

  just kept his mouth shut, he was going to make radioman first, and a little later, he would make chief radioman.

  But that was no longer good enough. He didn't want to sit out the war in the commo section at Mare Island. He wanted to get into the war. When somebody asked him, later, what he'd done in the war, he didn't want to have to tell them he'd been at Mare Island, period.

  And he thought he had figured out what to do about it.

  "Puck it!" Radioman Second Joe Garvey said aloud, which made the bartender look at him strangely.

  Then he got off the bar stool, shrugged his arms into his peacoat, put his hat at a jaunty angle on his head, and walked, somewhat unsteadily, out of the bar of the petty officers' club.

  He didn't stop to pick up his Liberty Card. He was afraid the master-at-arms would smell the beer on him and not give it to him. He had been given an "any hour in and out" duty card, which would get him past the Marine MP at the gate.

  As he went through the gate, a taxicab rolled up and an officer got out. Joe Garvey saluted and got in.

  "Q Street, Northwest," he ordered.

  "I'll show you where."

  On the way, he fell asleep, and the cabdriver had to stop the cab and re in the back and shake him awake when they were on Q Street.

  "Further down," Joe told him, and the cab drove slowly down the street til Joe recognized the brick wall.

  "Right there," he said, and handed the cabdriver a five-dollar bill.

  "Keep change."

  He had almost made it to the door in the gate when a large man in a overcoat appeared out of nowhere.

  "Hold it right there, sailor!"

  "It's all right," Garvey said.

  "I'm to report to Chief Ellis."

  "You missed him, then," the man said.

  "He left an hour ago." , Another, equally burly man appeared.

  "What have you got, Harry?" he asked.

  "I got me a drunken sailor," the first man said.

  "The sonofabitch can ba stand up."

  "Fuck you," Joe Garvey said. , "I got me a belligerent drunken sailor," the man said, laughing. He put hand on Garvey's arm. i "What the hell do we do with him?" ;

  "I'll take him inside and ask the duty officer," the first man said.

  "He he's supposed to report to Ellis." ' "Kid," the second man said.

  "I think you just fucked up by the numb The first man, firmly gripping Garvey's arm, propelled him a hundred farther down the street, then through the automobile gate to the prop then up the drive, and finally into the kitchen.

  Joe Garvey recognized the two men in shirtsleeves sitting at the kitchen table drinking coffee. As well as he could, he came to attention and salui "Sir," he said (it came out "Shir"), "Radioman Second Class Garvey, J." rep permission to speak to the captain, Sir." i "What have we here?" 1st It. Horace G. Hammersmith, Signal Corpse Army, asked, smiling.

  "He just got out--fell out--of a cab," the burly man said. ' "Garvey, my boy," Capt. James M. B. Whittaker said, "if one didn't know!

  tee, one would suspect that you have been communing with John Barleyce "You know him?" the burly man asked.

  Whittaker nodded. ' "Sir, I wish to volunteer," Garvey said, very thickly, i "Volunteer? For what?"

  "You're going into the Philippines," Garvey said.

  "I want to go with y "So much for the big secret," It. Hammersmith said, chuckling.

  "You're drunk, Garvey," Whittaker said.

  "no, I'm not," Garvey said righteously.

  "I'll take care of Garvey," Whittaker said.

  "Thank you."

  "I don't know, Captain," the burly man said.

  "I think I better see what the duty officer has to say" "Hey," Whittaker said, smiling, but with a layer of steel just beneath the surface.

  "I said, I'll take care of Garvey."

  "Not only am I a much faster operator than the lieutenant," Garvey said, "but you'll be working a Navy net--" "Garvey!

  "Whittaker said, sharply.

  "Shir?"

  "Sssshhhh," Whittaker said.

  "Yes, shir," Garvey said obediently. Hammersmith laughed. Garvey looked at him with hurt eyes.

  "That will be all, thank you," Whittaker said to the burly man.

  "You understand, Captain, that I'll have to make a report of this," the burly man said.

  "You just report that you turned him over to me," Whittaker said evenly.

  "Okay?"

  "Yes, Sir," the burly man said after a moment's hesitation. Then he left the kitchen.

  Garvey was making a valiant and unsuccessful effort to stand at attention.

  He swayed.

  "If I may make a suggestion?" It. Hammersmith said.

  "By all means," Capt. Whittaker said.

  "Why don't we each take one arm and guide him to a place of rest? Before he falls down, I mean?"

  "Splendid suggestion, Lieutenant," Whittaker said, as he made for Garvey.

  They had just about made it to the kitchen door when it swung inward and Cynthia Chenowith came in.

  "What in the world?" she demanded.

  "You remember Garvey, of course, Cynthia?" Whittaker said.

  "He's drunk!" Cynthia said.

  "Didn't I tell you Cynthia was perceptive?" Whittaker said.

  "what's he doing here?" Cynthia said.

  "Where are you taking him?"

  "We're putting him to bed," Hammersmith said.

  "Not here, you're not," Cynthia said.

  "I'm going to get Chief Ellis back here Ad let him handle this."

  "Don't be a bitch, Cynthia," Whittaker said.

  "Make a real effort."

  "Now, just a minute, Jimmy!" Cynthia said.

  "Cynthia?" Whittaker said.

  "What?"

  "Sssshhhh," Whittaker said, and by that time, Whittaker and Hammersmith were through the kitchen door, with Garvey more or less suspended between them.

  lONE]

  0615 Hours 12 February 1943

  Canidy was late
. He had been expected at 0600. And It. Hank Darmstadter had been waiting to go since he had awakened, after a restless night, at quarter to four. When he looked out the window, there was thick fog, so thick that flight in his Troop Carrier Squadron would not even have been considered. It was likely that the fog would keep them from flying, but there was no one at 0345 whom he could ask.

  Dolan knocked on Darmstadter's door at 0500 and seemed surprised to find him wearing the high-altitude flight gear over his uniform.

  "Why don't you leave that sheepskin gear here?" Dolan suggested.

  "I

  thought we'd ride over and get breakfast in the Air Corps mess."

  Dolan ate a hearty, air-crew-about-to-go-on-a-combat-mission breakfast, complete with real eggs and a slice of ham. Darmstadter's Troop Carrier Squadron had not gone on combat missions and consequently had been issued no fresh eggs, so they should have been a real treat. But he was so nervous he had no appetite, and he ate them only because he told himself he needed the nutrition.

  A jeep took them to the revetment where the B-25G had been readied for flight. Dolan made a careful, if leisurely, preflight examination of the aircraft, then hoisted himself onto the hood of the jeep and waited for Canidy to show up.

  "You think we're going to go, Commander?" Darmstadter asked. When Dolan's eyes rose in question, Darmstadter added, "The fog?"

  "What I'm wondering about is where's Canidy?" Dolan said.

  For lack of some better way to kill time, Darmstadter walked around the airplane again. Knowing that he was not only to be checked out in the

  B25G

  but that they were about to make a long-distance flight in it, Darmstadter had studied at length and with great interest TM 1-B-25-G, Flight Operations Manual, B-25G (Series) Aircraft.

  He had realized the moment Commander Dolan had taken him out to the airplane for his first ride that most of his dedicated study had been a waste of time.

  "You'll notice," Dolan had told him, "that we've modified this one a little."

  It was a massive understatement.

  The B-25G had been delivered to the Eighth Air Force with a twin.50caliber machine-gun position in the tail; with another pair of.50s in a rotating turret on top of the fuselage at the leading edge of the wing; with two single.50caliber machine-gun positions--"waist guns"--in the sides of the fuselage;

  and with two fixed.50s and a 75mm M4 cannon in the nose.

  All of the guns had been removed and their positions faired over. The bomb-dropping racks and mechanism were gone, and the bomb-bay doors were riveted permanently closed. Auxiliary fuel tanks had been installed in what had been the bomb bay, where the bombs were supposed to be.

  In the fuselage aft of the trailing edge of the wing, where the radio operator's and waist gunner's positions had been, there were now five--as many as would fit--light brown leather civilian airliner passenger seats.

  The seats had been "salvaged," Dolan told Darmstadter, from a U.S. Navy Boeing "Strato-Cruiser" transport, that Canidy had "dumped in Africa."

  Darmstadter was very curious to learn more about that, but he had come to understand that while Major Canidy and the others seemed to make jokes about everything else, Canidy had been dead serious about the "Ask No Questions "rule.

  Dolan had given Darmstadter seven hours of in-flight instruction in the B25G, which was really more than it sounded like, because with the exception of the first takeoff and landing, Dolan had never touched the controls again.

  Somewhat to Darmstadter's surprise, he had been an apt pupil. Dolan's only criticism had come right at the start, "Don't try so hard. It's not that hard to fly, and you're a better pilot than you think you are."

  He had made mistakes, of course, but after Dolan had shown him what he was doing wrong, he had not made that particular mistake again. He had had the most trouble, not surprisingly, in landing. The B-25G came in a lot hotter than the C-47, and if the power settings were not right on the mark, it dropped like a stone. The Gooney Bird was a very forgiving aircraft; the B-25 was not.

  But he'd shot hour after hour of touch-and-go landings until his technique satisfied Dolan. Then he'd spent another two hours trying to touch down right at the end of the runway and to bring it to a complete stop as quickly as possible.

  He was aware that he had not been able to accomplish that to Dolan's satisfaction. And he was embarrassed about that, even after he told himself that he should not be. What Dolan was asking would have been difficult for a good, experienced pilot, and he knew he was neither.

  They heard the crunch of automobile tires a minute before they could see the glow of headlights in the fog. But then the distinctive grille of the Packard limousine appeared.

  "I stopped to get the latest forecast," Canidy said by way of greeting.

  "I presume that the rubber bands are all wound up and we can go?"

  "It'll take five minutes to light the runway," Dolan said.

  "It'll take that long to warm it up," Canidy said.

  "Tell them to light it."

  Darmstadter was confused by that. There were no landing field lights at Fersfield. If there were, he thought, he would have seen them.

  Commander Bitter and It. Kennedy drove up in a jeep.

  "I would suggest that you wait until you've got at least a thousand feet," Bitter said.

  "But Weather says it's going to be this way until noon, maybe later."

  "I think we can get off," Canidy said. He turned to Darmstadter.

  "Get aboard, Darmstadter," he said.

  "Strap yourself in the seat that faces backward."

  Then he gestured for Dolan to precede him aboard. It was more than a gesture of courtesy, Darmstadter saw. He was telling Dolan that Dolan would function as aircraft commander.

  As Darmstadter was strapping himself in, Canidy appeared momentarily in the cabin to wedge a canvas Valv-Pak between one of the seats and the fuselage ribs. Then he disappeared. The plane shook as the left engine started to turn, then caught.

  From where he was sitting, Darmstadter could look out the small window where the waist gunner position had been faired over with Perspex. Though he couldn't see much, he did see Sgt. Draper standing beside Commander Bitter, both of them with their hands raised in farewell. And then there was nothing to see but the edge of the taxiway as the B-25G trundled to the threshold of the runway. Then he saw a fire at the end of the runway. He unstrapped himself for a better look, and saw that it was a GI can--a No. 10 tin can--and that the fire burning in it was gasoline. Pressing his head against the Perspex, he looked as far as he could down the runway. It was lined at fifty-foot intervals with naming GI cans.

  He realized that the burning sand-and-gasoline-filled cans were the runway lights Canidy and Dolan had been talking about. They would not "light" the runway, in the sense of illuminating it, but they would provide an indication where the runway was. He quickly counted cans. He got to fourteen. That meant seven hundred feet. Not nearly enough to take off.

  And at that moment, having completed the run-up of engines, the B-25 started to move.

  As Darmstadter watched with something approaching terror, the dull glow of another burning can appeared through the fog, and then another. Despite the thick fog, he realized, it would be possible to take off by staying on the runway between two lines of burning GI cans.

  And then the rumbling of the undercarriage suddenly stopped. A moment later the nose of the B-25 lifted, so steeply that he fell against the seat that he was supposed to be strapped into, and he heard the whine of the hydraulics as the gear was retracted.

  The reddish glow of the burning cans disappeared; there was nothing whatever to be seen through the Perspex window now but gray.

  Darmstadter found the heavy sheepskin flying gear, put it on, and plugged it in. Then he put earphones over his ears and adjusted the oxygen mask, with its built-in microphone, over his lower face.

  "Do you read?" he asked.

  "We have been calling you, Lieutenant," Ca
nidy's dry voice came through the earphones, "with no response. We thought maybe you'd had a last-minute change of heart."