In Danger's Path

by W. E. B Griffin

  Waterson, a chubby forty-odd year old who brushed his hair straight back, was sitting on one of the upholstered rattan couches in the living room. He was in civilian clothing—which surprised Pickering—a well-tailored, single-breasted, tropical worsted suit, a white button-down collar shirt, a finely printed silk necktie, and well-polished wing-tip shoes. When he saw Pickering, he stood up.

  He looks more like a business executive than an Army colonel, Pickering thought.

  But, of course, that’s what he really is. El Supremo told me he had been vice president of some company—Malloy Manufacturing. He’s no more a bona fide colonel than I am a bona fide brigadier general.

  “Good morning, Colonel,” Pickering said, offering his hand. “I’m Fleming Pickering.”

  “Good morning, sir.”

  “Have you had your breakfast?”

  “I had some coffee, sir.”

  “Well, I’m about to have my breakfast,” Pickering said. “You can either have some with me, or you can have a cup of coffee and watch me eat.”

  “That’s very kind of you, sir.”

  “George,” Pickering ordered. “Round up Pluto and ask him to come to the dining room. I want you there, too.”

  Pickering gestured for Waterson to precede him into the dining room.

  “I have—this sounds like a line from a B movie—no secrets from either Hart or Major Hon,” Pickering said. “Not only because they have to know everything that’s going on, but also because they generally know things before I do. They both have MAGIC clearances. Pluto—Major Hon—knew about this latest development before I did, because he decrypted the message when it came in. You are familiar with this latest development?”

  “I received a radio message from Colonel Donovan, sir,” Waterson said, “telling me that OSS Station Brisbane is now under your command.”

  “Have a seat, Colonel,” Pickering said, as he sat down himself.

  Pluto came into the room, trailed by George Hart. Pickering introduced Pluto.

  “Let’s go over our problems,” Pickering said. “Problem One is that General MacArthur doesn’t want the OSS here at all.”

  “But, General…” Waterson began.

  Pickering held up his hand to shut him up.

  “Problem Two is MAGIC,” he went on, “which breaks down into three subproblems: the analysis part of MAGIC; MAGIC clearances; and people to assist Pluto in the encryption/decryption.”

  “General,” Waterson said, “you’re going a little fast for me.”

  “Let’s talk about MAGIC,” Pickering said. “How much do you know about that, Colonel?”

  “I know it exists,” Waterson said.

  “That’s all? I’m disappointed.”

  “I probably know more than I should, General,” Waterson said.

  Pickering made a “give it to me” gesture with both hands.

  “We’ve broken the Japanese codes,” Waterson said.

  “Some of them,” Pickering corrected him. “Enough to be of enormous value. And obviously, it’s the most important secret of the war.”

  “Obviously,” Waterson agreed.

  “People with a MAGIC clearance cannot be placed in any situation where there is any chance at all they will be captured,” Pickering went on. “Right now we have three people here, Pluto, Hart, and Lieutenant Johnny Moore, who have MAGIC clearance. Hart will be leaving with me. And two people are not enough to handle the traffic, particularly since the big brass have learned that the Special Channel is the best way to get a message through securely and in the shortest possible time.”

  “Is that why Director Donovan has had trouble gaining access to the Special Channel?”

  “Donovan is on the MAGIC list, but General MacArthur decides who is to be given access to the Special Channel to SWPOA. I presume he decided the OSS didn’t need it. But that’s something else that’s been changed. I have MAGIC access, and I have every intention of using it—when necessary—to communicate with you.”

  “Does that mean I’m to be given MAGIC access?”

  “I don’t think so. For one thing, it would cause trouble with MacArthur. In SWPOA, only he and Willoughby have MAGIC clearances. If I suddenly arranged for the Brisbane Station Chief to be placed on the list, MacArthur would think I had betrayed him. I don’t want to do that.”

  “Sir, I don’t quite know quite what…”

  “What I want from you are the names of two of your officers—now two of our officers—who (a) can be trusted with MAGIC information; and (b) are junior to Pluto. I don’t want anybody trying to tell Pluto how to do his job. Bear in mind that once they get MAGIC clearance, they will no longer be available to do anything operational.”

  “Let me think about that, sir,” Waterson said. “About the names, I mean.”

  “Pluto will have the right of rejection,” Pickering said. “And then, once these men—one at a time—are taught how to encrypt and decrypt MAGIC, Pluto will see that you have access to it.”

  Waterson thought this over a moment, then said, “That will work.”

  “Pluto and Moore are also analysts,” Pickering continued. “It would be nice if the people you select could be helpful in that area as well.”

  “I think I have the guy,” Waterson said. “Let me think about it.”

  Good. He’s cautious.

  “It would also be nice if he were a bridge player,” Pluto said. “A good bridge player.”

  “You’re a bridge player, Major? So am I.”

  “So is El Supremo,” Pickering said. “Pluto, see if you can subtly let it drop to El Supremo that Colonel Waterson plays bridge.”

  “Anything to get the camel’s nose further into the tent?”

  “Precisely,” Pickering said with a smile. He looked at Waterson again. “I want to make sure you understand the command structure,” he said. “I have just decided to name Major Hon and Lieutenant Moore to my personal staff. Appointments two and three.”

  “Who’s one?” Pluto asked.

  “McCoy,” Pickering said, and met Waterson’s eyes. “That way, if Director Donovan tells you to simply order either of them to do something, your reply is that you can’t do that, General Pickering made it quite clear that they are not subordinate to you.”

  Waterson nodded. “Sir? May I speak freely? Before these gentlemen?”

  “Of course.”

  “Question. I’m aware, of course, of the…relationship…between Director Donovan and yourself.”

  “I thought you might be,” Pickering replied.

  “The question: What are the chances of a truce?”

  “I’ve been wondering the same thing,” Pickering said. “Frankly, I don’t have high hopes. If the…relationship…between myself and Donovan is awkward for you, Colonel, feel free to ask Donovan to reassign you.”

  “Oh, I don’t think I’d want to do that, General. From everything I’ve heard, I think I’m going to enjoy working for you.”

  “Four,” Pickering said.

  “Sir?” Pluto and Colonel Waterson asked in chorus.

  “Appointment Four. I need Banning. Fritz Rickabee won’t like it, but whatever I wind up doing, I’m going to need Ed Banning to help me do it.”

  “Yeah,” Pluto agreed thoughtfully.

  That was not the proper military response, Pickering thought, but it means, Thank God, that Pluto agrees with me.

  “General, I’m getting the idea you’re going home soon?” Waterson asked.

  “Tomorrow,” Pickering said. “I’ve got some good-byes to say here, and then I’m going to Washington.”

  Where, unless I’m mistaken, Pickering thought, I am going to get assigned one hellishly impossible project in the deserts of Mongolia.

  IV

  [ONE]

  Aboard Transcontinental & Western Airlines

  Flight 303

  Above Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

  1530 16 February 1943

  Fleming Pickering was not the only one traveling to
the United States just then.

  “And there it is, the City of Brotherly Love,” the pilot of the DC-3 announced to the two other pilots in the cockpit, gesturing out the windshield at the city below.

  The two other pilots chuckled dutifully.

  The pilot picked up his microphone, checked to see that the proper frequency was set, and called the Philadelphia Tower.

  “Philadelphia, TWA 303, ten miles north at 3500. Request landing instructions.”

  “TWA 303, Philadelphia. You are cleared as number two to an Eastern DC-3 now on final to runway one-seven. The altimeter is two-niner-eight, winds are negligible.”

  “Three-oh-three understands number two to one-seven after the Eastern DC-3 on final. I have him in sight.”

  “Affirmative, 303.”

  “You want to sit it down, Charley?” the pilot asked of the copilot.

  “Thank you very much,” the copilot said.

  With an exaggerated gesture, the pilot took his hands from the wheel.

  “You’ve got it,” he said.

  The copilot retarded the throttles and began a shallow descent.

  “TWA 303, Philadelphia,” the radio went off again.

  “Three-oh-three, go ahead.”

  “Three-oh-three, be advised you will be met by a Navy ambulance and a medical team. You are requested to off-load the Navy patient before, repeat, before, you off-load your passengers.”

  “Oh, shit!” Captain James B. Weston, USMCR, said, shaking his head. He was riding on the jump seat between and just behind the pilot and copilot.

  The pilot looked at Jim Weston curiously, then reached for the microphone again. “Philadelphia, TWA 303. We will off-load the Navy patient first,” he said. Then he turned and looked at Weston again. “Do you know what’s that about?”

  “I’ll bet that ambulance is for me,” he said.

  “Something wrong with you?” the pilot asked with concern.

  “Not a goddamn thing, but I am having trouble convincing the goddamn Navy about that,” Weston said, adding, “It’s a long story.”

  The pilot did not press for an explanation. He had earned his own wings as a Naval Aviator at Pensacola, and had tried to get back in the Navy after Pearl Harbor. They told him he was (a) too old and (b) there was a shortage of airline pilots because all the younger ones were going back into the service. Logic told him the Navy had been right, but he still felt a little guilty to be flying an airliner between St. Louis and Philadelphia instead of a Navy plane in the Pacific.

  Especially when he saw a kid like this one, who didn’t look old enough to be a captain, and wearing not only wings but ribbons representing the Silver Star, Purple Heart, and Pacific service.

  For that reason, he had asked him if he would like to fly up front when he saw him get aboard. For the same reason, if the kid didn’t want to talk about why the Navy had sent an ambulance to meet him, he wasn’t going to embarrass him by asking.

  “You ever fly one of these?” the pilot asked, indicating the DC-3.

  “Some,” Weston said. “I’m rated—I was rated—in it, but most of my multiengine time is in Catalinas.”

  “You fly Catalinas?”

  “Past tense,” Weston said. “I’m a fighter pilot.”

  “I’m jealous,” the pilot confessed.

  “The Corsair is one hell of an airplane,” Weston said.

  The pilot looked at the window and picked up his microphone.

  “Philadelphia, TWA 303 turning on final.”

  “Three-oh-three, take taxiway twenty-seven right. The Navy ambulance will meet you at gate eleven.”

  “Understand twenty-seven right, gate eleven,” the pilot said, and then turned his attention to see how well his copilot was going to handle the landing.

  The ambulance was a civilian vehicle, a Packard painted white with US NAVY lettered on its doors, rather than the GI ambulance that he was used to, which was built on the frame of a Dodge three-quarter-ton truck, the sides and roof decorated with large red crosses. The medical crew consisted of two Corpsmen, in hospital whites, and a very well-assembled nurse in a crisp white uniform. She wore a stiffly starched white cap, perched precariously, and very attractively, atop her short blond hair. Her face was very serious. She looked to be in her very early twenties.

  Because I am a Marine officer and a gentleman by act of Congress, with certain standards to maintain, I would not kick that out of bed.

  The Corpsmen were equipped for any eventuality. They had a wheelchair, and also a chrome stretcher on wheels that sat on the ground beside the open rear door of the ambulance. As soon as the pilot had shut down the left engine, a curt nod from the nurse directed the Corpsmen toward the airplane. She walked in front of them.

  The pilot turned to Weston, putting out his hand.

  “Good luck,” he said.

  “Thank you,” Jim replied, “and thanks for letting me ride up front.”

  “My pleasure,” the pilot said.

  “Mine, too,” the copilot chimed in and offered his hand.

  Weston rose from the jump seat and fastened it in the up position, then left the cockpit and started down the aisle. When he turned after taking his small canvas bag from the rack over his seat, he saw that the nurse was already in the plane.

  She looked at him curiously as he walked down the aisle.

  “And good afternoon to you, Lieutenant,” Jim said with a smile.

  “Are you my patient?” she asked, as if surprised that he could make it down the aisle by himself.

  “I don’t think so,” he said.

  “I’m looking for a Marine captain named Weston,” she said.

  “Then this is your lucky day,” Jim said. “And perhaps mine, too. Captain James B. Weston at your service, ma’am. I didn’t catch the name?”

  “If you’ll come with me, please, Captain,” she said.

  “That’s a funny name for a pretty girl,” he said.

  She colored, gave him a dirty look, then turned around and got off the airplane. He went down the stairs quickly after her.

  The fatter of the two Corpsmen pushed the wheelchair toward him.

  “Is someone ill?” Weston asked innocently.

  “Please get in the chair, Captain,” the nurse said.

  “Thank you ever so much, Lieutenant, but I don’t need a wheelchair.”

  “It’s procedure,” she said. “Please get in the chair.”

  “Something wrong with your hearing, Lieutenant? Is that ambulance our transportation?”

  “If you’ll please get in the back, Captain.”

  He walked to the rear of the ambulance and looked inside.

  “There’re no seats in there,” he said reasonably. “Where am I supposed to sit? On the floor?”

  “You’re supposed to lie down on the stretcher,” she said.

  “Again, thank you but no thank you,” he said. “I’ll just ride in front, if that would be all right.”

  “I would appreciate it if you wouldn’t give me any trouble,” she said.

  “Captain,” the fatter Corpsman said, “Sir, you’ve got to ride in the back.”

  “Butt out!” Weston said coldly, tossed his small bag in the back of the ambulance, and then walked to the front and got in.

  The nurse and the corpsmen had a discussion, following which the fatter Corpsman got behind the wheel and the nurse slipped in beside Weston.

  “Perhaps there’s been some sort of mix-up,” the nurse said. “The officer we were supposed to meet was just rescued from the Philippines.”

  “Oddly enough, I was in the Philippines until a couple of months ago,” Weston said. “Until Christmas Eve, as a matter of fact.”

  “You were hospitalized…in the Pacific…until now?”

  “I haven’t been hospitalized at all,” he said. “Do I look like I need hospitalization? In your professional judgment, I mean?”

  “Let’s go, Nevin,” she ordered.

  “Yes, ma’am,” the chubby Corp
sman started the engine.

  “I suppose this really isn’t any of my business, Lieutenant, but is there anyone in your life, in a romantic sense, at the moment? What I’m leading up to is wondering if you’re free for dinner?”

  “You’re going to be in a hospital bed when I have my dinner,” she said. “But thank you just the same.”

  “Well, we could have dinner there, I suppose,” Weston said reasonably. “I really hate to eat alone.”

  “You understand that I’m going to have to report your conduct?” she said.

  “I wouldn’t have it any other way,” he said.

  “Please sit in the wheelchair,” she said when they had pulled up to the Admissions entrance to one of the buildings in the hospital complex on South Broad Street.

  “I thought we already had this discussion,” he said.

  “You have to!”

  “Where do I report in, Lieutenant?”

  “Nevin,” she ordered, “go find a couple of psychiatric Corpsmen.”

  “Yes, ma’am,” the chubby Corpsman said, and hurried into the building.

  What are they going to do? Wrap the nutty escapee from the Philippines in a straitjacket and drag me inside to a padded cell?

  The two muscular Corpsmen who appeared moments later—almost running—did not have a straitjacket with them.

  They don’t need one. I have seen smaller gorillas.

  “Would you please escort this patient to Five-B, please?” the nurse said.

  “Yes, ma’am,” one of them said. “You want to get in the wheelchair, please, Captain?”

  “No,” Weston said evenly.

  “Why not?”

  “I don’t need a wheelchair; I don’t like wheelchairs.”

  The Corpsman looked at him intently for a long moment. “Yes, sir. Will you come this way, please, Captain?”

  “Certainly,” Weston said. He turned to the nurse. “The memory of our meeting, Lieutenant, will remain with me always.”

  She ignored him. “I’ll call Commander Kister and alert him that you’re coming,” she said to the Corpsmen, and walked quickly into the building.