“Did you give the tower General Pickering’s name, Captain?” Albright said.
“I’m afraid I did, sir.”
“Then he will expect to see you immediately, sir,” Albright said.
“What’s the rush about seeing General Stillwell?” Pickering asked.
“Right now, he hates everybody connected with his having been ordered to relieve Dempsey and Newley,” Albright said. “And he thinks you’re the man responsible.”
“Is there someplace where I can get a quick shower and change my uniform?”
“You’ll be staying at the VIP guest house, General,” Colonel Platt said.
“Doesn’t the OSS have a house here?” Pickering asked.
“Yes, sir, of course, we do,” Colonel Platt said. “But I felt you would be more comfortable in the VIP house.”
“If General Stillwell has left word here that he wants to see me, I’ll bet he left word at the VIP place,” Pickering said. “So long as I don’t have his invitation to come to see him, I can’t be accused of ignoring it, can I? And I have no intention of going to see General Stillwell looking like a bum and smelling like a horse.”
“There’s a staff car coming this way,” George Hart said. “That might be the air base commander.”
“Waterson, you have not heard about General Stillwell’s kind invitation, and I did not tell you where I was going.”
“Yes, sir.”
“And you can take care of the Captain and his crew? Get them a truck, whatever they need?”
“Yes, sir.”
“I’ll want a word with you, too, and you, too, Colonel Platt, before I see General Stillwell. Will you meet me at the OSS house?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Let’s go, Albright,” Pickering said, and quickly got into Albright’s Studebaker.
Hart hastily stuffed their luggage in the trunk, then crowded into the front seat beside General Albright’s aide-de-camp.
At the last moment, Captain Jerry Sampson jumped into the backseat.
“Colonel Platt suggested I go with you, sir, to take care of things at the house.”
“Fine. Thank you,” Pickering said, although he was annoyed. He had things to discuss with Albright he could not discuss within the hearing of Sampson.
Or for that matter, in the hearing of either Albright’s aide or his driver. So no harm done.
“You never told me where Banning is,” he said to Albright.
“He’s either in the crypto room—with the Special Channel up; there’s a lot of traffic—or out looking for McCoy.”
“‘Looking for McCoy’? That sounds as if he’s missing.”
“Yes, sir,” Albright said.
Pickering bit off the impulse to ask for details.
That, too, will have to wait until we’re alone.
It was impossible to tell from the cobblestone street what was behind the gray stucco wall surrounding the building on three sides. The compound backed up against a vertical sandstone hill. The wall was topped with broken glass bottles that looked as if they had been there for half a century, and by coiled barbed wire now uniformly covered with rust. On an ornate wrought-iron gate now-rusty corrugated-steel sheets had been affixed, to keep people from seeing what was inside.
A guard shack was occupied by two Chinese soldiers, wearing quilted cold-weather jackets and trousers. Both were armed with Thompson .45-caliber submachine guns. One of them came out of the guard shack when the Studebaker stopped before the gate. He saluted and then pulled the gate open.
Pickering wondered if the guard knew Albright by sight, which was possible, or if he simply passed any car with a general’s star on it, in which case security might just be a little lax.
Inside the wall, Pickering saw a three-story, tile-roofed old building, with its rear wall against the sandstone hill, and four small outbuildings, three against the left wall and one against the street-side wall.
Several vehicles were parked nose-in against the front wall of the house: four jeeps, battered and unwashed; a Dodge three-quarter-ton weapons carrier; a Dodge ambulance, with the usual Red Crosses painted over not quite completely with a brownish paint that did not match the olive drab of the rest of the body; and another Studebaker President sedan.
Heavy closed shutters were on all the windows. Pickering wondered if they were closed for security or as protection against the freezing winds.
Captain Sampson jumped out of the car as soon as it stopped. “I’ll get things set up inside,” he said.
“All I need, Hugh, is a place to take a shower and to have a word with you,” Pickering said to General Albright.
“You make these people nervous, General,” Albright said, “in case you haven’t noticed.”
Pickering got out of the car and walked to its rear, intending to help Hart with their luggage.
Three Chinese in black ankle-length gowns not unlike a priest’s vestments came trotting out of the house and snatched the luggage from their hands.
Captain Sampson appeared at the door. “What I’ve done, General, is put you into our visitor’s room,” he said. “It’s not much—”
“All I want to do, Captain,” Pickering said, “is have a quick shower and change my uniform.”
“Yes, sir.”
They followed him into the house, through an empty foyer furnished with large, dark, and uncomfortable-looking furniture, and up a narrow flight of stairs to the second floor. Halfway down a narrow corridor illuminated with bare bulbs, Sampson pushed a door open and waved Pickering into a large, sparsely furnished room. The house boys scurried into the room after them with the luggage and started to unpack it.
“That can wait,” Pickering said. “Where’s the shower?”
“Right in here, sir,” Sampson said, and showed him a small bathroom. It was equipped with a showerhead on a rubber hose and a hole-in-the floor toilet. A china toilet bowl and seat had been jury rigged over the toilet.
“If you like, sir, I can put you in Colonel Platt’s room.”
“This will do,” Pickering said. “Thank you, Captain. That will be all.”
“Would the General like a cup of coffee? Something else, perhaps?”
“That will be all, Captain. Thank you,” Pickering said.
He waited until Sampson had left.
“Okay, Hugh, first of all, tell me about Captain McCoy. What is this missing business?”
“When Banning got here and Dempsey was being an ass, Banning told McCoy to disappear. To stay in touch, but to disappear. He’s disappeared, except for one visit here, when he asked for Banning and disappeared again. He had a run-in with Platt.”
“What kind of a run-in?”
“Platt told him to stay here, consider himself part of the station, no matter what his orders from Banning. Frankly, I would have told him the same thing under the circumstances.”
“And McCoy elected not to?”
“That’s the last time anyone has seen him. Or Zimmerman.”
“Do you think something’s happened to him?”
“Banning feels that McCoy can take care of himself,” Albright said. “I wish I shared his confidence.”
“See if you can get word to Banning to come here. Before I go to see General Stillwell, if possible. But come here. I need to talk to him.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Is there anything I should know before I see Stillwell?”
“He really doesn’t like what’s happened,” Albright said. “He made a point of telling me I was acting signal officer, pending his discussion with you.”
“I guess I should have asked this first: How badly has MAGIC been compromised?”
“I don’t really know. General Dempsey won’t talk to me.”
“What do you mean, Dempsey won’t talk to you?”
“He has the right, under The Manual for Courts-Martial, 1928, to refuse to answer any question that might tend to incriminate him. And that’s what he’s doing.”
“Christ!�
��
“The sooner you get over there and see Stillwell, the better,” Albright said. “By now, he knows you’re here.”
“I need a shower, and I’m going to have one,” Pickering said.
“I suggest you make it a quick one,” Albright said.
“Anything else I should know?”
“To further brighten your day, General, Platt knows all about Operation Gobi, and has his own Opplan—already furnished to Donovan—which he feels is considerably better than yours.”
“That wouldn’t be hard,” Pickering said. “But who told him about Operation Gobi?”
“I don’t know,” Albright said.
“Okay, Hugh, that’s enough bad news for now. Let me have my shower.”
Pickering came out of the bathroom wearing only a used towel. It offered little protection against the damp chill, and he was shivering.
He saw with genuine gratitude that Hart had laid out a change of underwear and a clean shirt on the bed for him. He walked quickly to it and pulled a T-shirt over his head. Hart, meanwhile, was trying to get the wrinkles out of their clean uniforms, which were hanging from a light fixture on the wall.
“Thanks, George,” he said, as he reached for his shorts.
“We have a shoe problem, General,” Hart said.
“What?”
“This is no place to wear low-quarters,” Hart said. “Snow, mud, dirt, et cetera. The Army’s wearing—did you notice?—boots, like boondockers, except that they have a strap thing on the top, you tuck your trousers in it. General Albright was wearing them.” The USMC ankle-high field shoe, constructed with the rough side of the leather out, were known as boondockers.
“I didn’t notice,” Pickering confessed. “I don’t think I would have noticed if Albright’s pants were on fire.”
“And they shine them.”
“They shine boondockers?” Pickering asked incredulously.
“Their version, yes, sir. And what we have is boondockers. I didn’t think to pack puttees.”
“Good thinking. I didn’t wear puttees on Guadalcanal, and I’m not going to wear them here. Can you get us, do you think, some of the Army shoes?”
“Aye, aye, sir, I’ll get us some.”
“In the meantime, we have boondockers?”
“Yes, sir,” Hart said, and went to Pickering’s luggage. As he bent over it, Pickering saw that he had a Colt Model 1911A1 .45 pistol in the small of his back.
“What happened to your .38, George?” Pickering asked.
“I’ve got it, sir. But General Rickabee said I was to carry a .45 once we got here.”
“And did General Rickabee tell you how he thinks I should arm myself?”
“Not exactly, sir,” Hart said. “But he did send this along, and asked me to show you how it works.”
Hart stood up with a pair of Marine Corps boondockers in one hand and a Colt 1911A1 .45 pistol in a shiny leather shoulder holster in the other.
“For your information, Lieutenant, I qualified as Expert with the .45 when I was younger than you are now.”
“I think he meant the shoulder holster, sir.”
“I’ve never worn one,” Pickering said. “I think it would make me feel like a gangster.”
“I also have a regular holster and a web pistol belt for you, sir.”
“You’re not using either,” Pickering said.
“You can only do this for a couple of hours,” Hart said, patting the .45 in the small of his back. “And even then, sometimes it’s uncomfortable. I’ve got a shoulder holster for it.”
“Okay, I’m convinced. Show me about the shoulder holster.”
“General Rickabee told me he got these from the Secret Service, sir,” Hart said. “The pistol is held by a leather-covered spring. All you have to do is pull on it to get it out.” He demonstrated by pulling the pistol from the holster and laying it on the bed.
“And it gets some support from a clip on your belt,” he went on, “as well as the strap over your shoulder. The weight is distributed.” Hart adjusted the various clips and springs and buckles until the holster fit Pickering’s body. Then he picked up the pistol and ejected the magazine. Next he worked the action to make sure the chamber was empty, then reinserted the magazine and handed the pistol to Pickering.
“Seven rounds in the magazine, sir,” he said. “The chamber is empty.”
“Thank you, George,” Pickering said. He put the pistol in the holster, took it out again, then put it back. He waved his arms around to see how the shoulder holster fit, and smiled at Hart. “Very nice,” he said.
After that, he started to take the holster off, looking for the snap holding the bottom of the holster to his waist belt.
“Why don’t you keep it on, sir?” Hart asked, too politely. “See how it fits after a couple of hours? Get used to it.”
A very clear image of the voice of Brigadier General Fritz Rickabee popped into General Pickering’s brain. “And you make goddamn sure Pickering wears it, Hart, I don’t care how.”
“If you think I should, George, why not?” Pickering said.
Hart’s relief showed on his face.
Pickering sat down on the bed. “Toss me the boondockers, and then we’ll go face the lion in his den,” Pickering said.
“Aye, aye, sir.”
“Did Colonel Banning show up?”
“No, sir.”
“Don’t take offense, George, but couldn’t you use a bath?”
“There’s not time, sir. You heard what General Albright said about getting to see General Stillwell as quickly as possible.”
“Fuck General Stillwell,” Pickering said. “Take a shower, George.”
Hart looked at him in surprise.
“I will deny under oath that I said that,” Pickering said.
“Said what, sir?” Hart said. “And now, with the General’s permission, I think I’ll have a shower and change into a clean uniform.”
[THREE]
Office of the Commanding General
United States Military Mission to China
Chungking, China
1625 7 April 1943
Brigadier General Fleming Pickering, USMCR, and Second Lieutenant George F. Hart, USMCR, freshly shaved and in clean—if somewhat mussed—uniforms marched into the office of General Joseph Stillwell, USA, and saluted in front of his desk. “Brigadier General Pickering, sir,” he said. “Thank you for seeing me.”
Another officer was in the room, an Army colonel, dressed like General Stillwell, in a belted olive-drab jacket—which to Pickering looked like something a white hunter in Africa would wear—over a tieless khaki shirt. Both officers wore the insignia of their rank on their collar points, but not on the epaulets of their jackets.
As Pickering entered, the Colonel rose out of the chair beside Stillwell’s desk.
Stillwell returned Pickering’s salute with a wave in the general direction of his forehead. He was a trim, lean, sharp-featured man in his middle fifties. He examined Pickering coldly and very carefully for a very long moment—long enough to give Pickering cause to worry that the meeting was not going to go well. “I left word at the airfield that I wanted to see you immediately upon your arrival,” he said.
“If I have kept the General waiting, I apologize.”
“I understand you traveled here by B-17?”
“Yes, sir.”
“You must be a very important man, General,” Stillwell said finally. “Washington tells me they don’t have enough B-17s at the moment to send here. And I know for a fact that General MacArthur has bitterly complained he doesn’t have nearly as many as he feels he needs. And yet General MacArthur—who is known for his reluctance to divert assets—seems to have seen fit, in your case, to provide one to fly you here.”
Pickering could not think of any reply he could make.
“You may stand at ease, gentlemen,” Stillwell said.
“Thank you, sir,” Pickering said. He and Hart assumed a position that was clo
ser to Parade Rest than At Ease. “Sir, this is my aide-de-camp, Lieutenant Hart.”
Stillwell nodded at Hart.
“This is Colonel Easterbrook,” he said. “He’s my IG, and my son-in-law.”
Easterbrook walked over to Pickering, and they shook hands without speaking. Easterbrook actually smiled at Hart.
To show him, no doubt, that he doesn’t believe in guilt by association.
“I’d like to have Colonel Easterbrook sit in on our conversation, General. Is that all right with you?” Stillwell asked, his tone making it clear that he would be surprised by any negative response.
“Sir, with respect, there are some things we have to talk about that I am not at liberty to discuss in Colonel Easterbrook’s presence,” Pickering said.
Stillwell’s pale face colored, and he met Pickering’s eyes for a long moment. Finally, he shrugged.
“Ernie, get yourself a cup of coffee,” he ordered. “And take the lieutenant with you.”
“Yes, sir,” Colonel Easterbrook said, and with Hart trailing him, left the room.
“Frankly, General, you’re not what I expected,” Stillwell said when the door had closed behind Easterbrook and Hart. “When General Marshall informed me you were coming, I got out my Navy Register to look you up. You don’t seem to be listed therein, General.”
In peacetime, the Navy Register, issued annually, provided a brief biography of every officer in the Naval Service, which of course included the Marine Corps. The biographies included the dates of promotion, assignments, and schooling. Pickering had subscribed to it for years, both to keep track of his World War I friends who had stayed in the Corps, and to identify Navy officers who had some sort of business with Pacific & Far East Shipping.
“I don’t believe I am, sir,” Pickering said.
“So I went from that—the reputation of the OSS precedes you, unfortunately…”
Oh, Jesus, this is really going to be bad.
He doesn’t like the OSS any more than Douglas MacArthur or Nimitz does.
“…to the presumption that I was about to be visited by one of Colonel Donovan’s—what is it they call them?—Twelve Disciples? A distinguished member of the business community, perhaps. Or an academic. A civilian given a brevet rank as a general officer to better carry out his clandestine intelligence duties…”
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