W E B Griffin - Corp 05 - Line of Fire

by Line Of Fire(Lit)

  "May I have the key to 614, please?" she asked.

  Although every effort had been made to prepare him for every possible contingency, the request posed certain problems for the desk clerk.

  For one thing, he had no idea who this woman was. For another, 614 was a three-room suite maintained year-round by American Personal Pharmaceuticals, Inc., for the convenience of corporate executives who had business in Washington. For another, the desk clerk was aware that the Chairman of the Board of American Personal Pharmaceuticals, Inc., and his wife had a personal relationship with the Foster family: Mrs. Elaine Sage had been the college roommate of Mrs. Patricia Pickering, Andrew Foster's only child.

  A quick look at the key board confirmed the desk clerk's recollection that 614 was not occupied at the moment.

  The stunning young woman in the pageboy was obviously not Mrs. Elaine Sage. She was not even married; there was no ring on her finger. Neither was there a ring on the third finger of the left hand of the uncomfortable-looking young Marine officer standing behind her.

  "Six-fourteen, Miss?"

  "Please. I'm Ernestine Sage."

  "Just a moment, please," the desk clerk said and walked quickly to the small office occupied by the assistant manager on duty.

  "There is a young woman at the counter-a real looker, in bangs-who wants the key to 614. She says her name is Sage."

  "A looker with bangs? Give it to her. That's Ernest Sage's daughter."

  "She's got a Marine with her," the desk clerk said.

  `Really?" the assistant manager said, and got up and walked through the door to the counter.

  "Hello, Miss Sage," he said. Then, in one smooth move, he snatched the key from the key board, handed it to her, and tinkled the bell for a bellboy. "Nice to have you in the house again. And you too, Lieutenant McCoy."

  "How are you," Ken McCoy responded, running the words together and flashing a brief uncomfortable smile.

  "Thank you, it's nice to see you," Ernie Sage said, and turned to follow the bellboy with their luggage to the elevators.

  The assistant manager picked up the telephone and asked for room service.

  "Send flowers, fruit, and a bottle of champagne, Moet, to six fourteen," he ordered. After he hung up, he turned to the desk clerk. "That was indeed Miss Ernestine Sage. The gentleman with her is Lieutenant K. R. McCoy. Lieutenant Malcolm S. Pickering-who was once the bell captain here, by the way, did you know that?"

  "No, I didn't."

  "-Lieutenant Pickering once told me that Lieutenant McCoy was his best friend. He asked me as a personal favor to him to take very good care of Lieutenant McCoy whenever he was in the house. Is everything clear now, Tom?"

  "Crystal clear."

  In the elevator, oblivious to the presence of the operator, the bellboy, and a well-dressed couple in their fifties, Ernie Sage said, "Don't you dare look embarrassed! I'm not the one who doesn't want to get married."

  "Jesus, Ernie!" McCoy said, flushing.

  "I have no objection to becoming an honest woman," Ernie said, enjoying herself. "You're the one who insists on living in sin." McCoy rushed off the elevator before the doors were fully open and hurried down the corridor. Ernie smiled warmly at the well-dressed middle-aged couple before following the bellboy.

  Once the door was open, McCoy headed for the couch in the sitting room and picked up the telephone from the coffee table in front of it. He gave the operator a number.

  "Give me the watch officer, please.

  "Lieutenant McCoy, Sir. The Colonel told me to check in when I got to Washington.

  "No, Sir. I'm in the Foster Lafayette Hotel. Room 614.

  "Thank you, Sir." Ernie, meanwhile, had led the bellboy into the largest bedroom, tipped him, and then watched him leave. By the time McCoy was done with the phone, she had removed all her clothing but her underwear. She was now standing in the bedroom doorway with her hip thrust out provocatively. Her arm was behind her head and a rose was in her teeth.

  "Hi, Marine! Looking for a good time?"

  "You're nuts, you know that?"

  "I don't know about you, but I find it terribly sexy to be in a hotel room with someone I'm not married to."

  "You're going to keep that up, are you?"

  There was not time for her to reply. There was a knock at the door. After she closed the bedroom door, McCoy opened the corridor door to a waiter delivering a rolling cart with champagne, fruit, cut flowers, and a copy of The Washington Post.

  The bellman refused the two dollars McCoy extended to him.

  "No, Sir. Professional courtesy. Pick and I used to run bells together. Any friend of Pick's.

  "Thanks," McCoy said.

  As soon as the door had closed behind the bellboy, the bedroom door opened.

  "Isn't that nice?" Ernie said. "Why don't you just roll that in here?"

  "I've had worse offers," McCoy said.

  The telephone rang. Ernie picked up the phone on the bedside table.

  "Hello?" she said, and then extended it to McCoy.

  "Lieutenant McCoy."

  "Yes, Sir. I'll be there."

  "Sir, I have someone with me. A friend of General Pickering's. She would like to visit with him. Would that be possible?"

  "Try to keep me away! I'm not in the goddamned Marines! Ernie announced.

  "Yes, Sir. I understand. Thank you, Sir.

  "Whichever would be easier, Sir. I'll be here. Yes, Sir. Good night, Sir."

  "You understand what'?" Ernie said when he put the telephone down.

  "You can see him for thirty minutes at half past seven in the morning."

  "Oh, I'm so grateful!"

  "Hey, I told you this was duty."

  "What's it all about?"

  "I don't know. I'm-which does not mean `you'-about to find out. Captain Sessions is coming over here."

  "Great!" Ernie said sarcastically.

  "He could have made me go to the office. You're getting to be a pain in the ass, Ernie." Her face tightened. She opened her mouth to reply, then visibly changed her mind.

  "Sorry," she said.

  "I'm sorry I said that," McCoy said, genuinely contrite.

  She waved her hand, signifying it didn't matter.

  "When's Ed Sessions coming?"

  "It'll probably take him thirty minutes, maybe forty-five. He's got some stuff the Colonel wants me to read before We see General Pickering."

  "I don't know about you, baby," Ernie said, "but on general principles, I have nothing against a quickie."

  When Captain Edward Sessions walked into suite 614, Lieutenant K. R. McCoy and Miss Ernestine Sage, fully clothed, were sitting on the couch in the sitting room, working on an enormous platter of shrimp and oysters. It did not escape his attention, however, that despite the early hour, the bed he could see through a partially opened door seemed to have been slept in.

  "Good to see you, Ernie," he said, and she stood on her tiptoes and kissed his cheek.

  "Would you be crushed, Ed, if I told you I suspect something is about to happen that I'm not going to like at all?"

  "No," he said.

  He fumbled in his pocket for the key to the handcuff which chained his briefcase to his wrist, freed his wrist, and handed the briefcase to McCoy.

  "If some kind soul were to offer me a drink and an oyster, I could occupy myself while you read that, Ken," Sessions said.

  "We just had a bottle of champagne," Ernie said. "I would order another, but I don't think we have anything to celebrate.

  "Scotch, Ed?"

  "Please," he said.

  McCoy settled himself in a corner of the couch and opened the briefcase. Before she made Sessions' drink, Ernie looked long enough to see TOP SECRET cover sheets on the manila folder he took from the briefcase. After a moment's thought she made one for herself.

  She glanced at Ken. She recognized the look of absolute concentration on his face. She knew he would be annoyed if she offered him a drink or even handed him one.

 
She gave Ed Sessions his drink.

  "How's Jeanne, Ed?"

  "Great. If she knew you were here, she would have come. She'll be sorry to have missed you."

  Five minutes later McCoy raised his eyes from the stack of folders on his lap.

  "OK. I gave it a quick once-over. What's this got to do with me?"

  "All I know is that General Pickering told the Colonel to send for you," Sessions said.

  "Is Banning behind that?" McCoy asked.

  Sessions shrugged his shoulders.

  "I don't know. All I know is that the Colonel wants you `conversant' with that stuff before we see The General in the morning."

  "We who?"

  "The Colonel, me, and you," Sessions said.

  "I can't memorize all this by morning."

  "He said `conversant' not `memorize."' McCoy nodded and returned his attention to the folders with their TOP SECRET cover sheets. Finally he stuffed everything back into the briefcase.

  "I didn't know until just now that Marines were involved in that operation." Sessions grunted.

  "I'm sorry you had to come over here," McCoy said. "I could have gone to the office."

  "They don't have oysters and good whiskey in the office. Anyway, I got to see Ernie,"

  Sessions said as he picked up the briefcase and handcuffed it to his wrist.

  "Give Jeanne my love," Ernie said.

  "Maybe we can get together while you're here."

  "How long will we be here?"

  "I guess we'll find that out in the morning," Sessions said.

  He shook hands with McCoy, kissed Ernie, and left.

  McCoy got off the couch and made himself a drink.

  "You're not going to tell me what that was all about, right?" Ernie asked.

  "I don't know what it's all about," McCoy said. And then, obviously to change the subject, "Well, what should we do now?"

  "I've never had any problem with `early to bed and early to rise,"' Ernie said, and then added, "You know what I'd really like to do? Take a walk."

  "A walk?" he asked incredulously.

  "A walk. One foot after the other. It's beautiful out. Past the White House. Take a look in the windows of the department stores." McCoy shrugged. "Why not?" They'd stopped outside the Washington Theater to scan the posters showing Flight Lieutenant Tyrone Power of the Eagle Squadron about to climb in the cockpit of his Spitfire when the doors opened and a Marine sergeant and his girl came out.

  The Marine sergeant spotted the officer's bars on McCoy's shoulders and saluted before he recognized McCoy.

  "How are you, Hart?" McCoy said.

  "Can't complain, Sir."

  "I'm Ernie Sage, Sergeant," Ernie said, "since I doubt if the Lieutenant will introduce us."

  "Ernie, this is Sergeant George Hart. He works for General Pickering," McCoy said.

  "How is he?" Ernie demanded. "And a straight answer, please?"

  "You can tell her," McCoy said. "She's going to see him in the morning anyway."

  "He's much better. He's not nearly as strong as he thinks he is."

  "Since I doubt if Sergeant Hart is going to introduce us, Miss, my name is McCoy."

  "Wise guy!" Ernie said.

  "Elizabeth-they call me Beth-Lathrop."

  "And I'm Ernie, and I'm Ken's girlfriend, and I just decided that we should all go somewhere for a drink."

  "You can't do that in public," McCoy said uncomfortably.

  "It's against regulations for officers to drink with enlisted Marines."

  "Well, then, we'll go to the hotel," Ernie said. "Sergeant, that's not as snobbish as it sounded. When the Lieutenant was a corporal, he was just as much a by-the-book Marine."

  "I don't want to-" Hart protested.

  "Nonsense," Ernie said. "I want to hear more about Uncle Fleming."

  "The hotel and a drink's a good idea," McCoy said. "I've had enough walking for the night."

  "I know who you are," Beth said. "You're Pick's friend."

  "You know Pick?" Ernie asked delightedly.

  "I know him," Beth said.

  There was a strange note in her voice. Ernie concluded from it that this was one of Pick Pickering's discards. Their number was legion.

  "Well, then, you have to come," Ernie said. "We can swap nasty stories about him." McCoy, too, picked up on her uneasiness, and Hart's-his reluctance to come with them.

  it s either that I'm an officer, he decided, or more likely, that he wanted to go off with the dame and get a little and is afraid this will screw that up.

  Tough luck, if that's what Ernie wants, that's what she'll get.

  Chapter Twelve

  [One]

  WALTER REED ARMY GENERAL HOSPITAL

  WASHINGTON, D.C.

  0725 HOURS 23 SEPTEMBER 1942

  "Ernie, I hate to run you off, but we have to shuffle some paper," General Pickering said. "I'll have Sergeant Hart run you back to the hotel."

  "We drove up, Uncle Fleming," Ernie said. "We have our car. You behave, you understand?"

  "You call my wife and make a valiant effort to convince her that I am really in prime health, and I will behave. Deal?"

  "Deal," she said, and kissed him. "You take care of Ken, too."

  "I'll do my best," Pickering said. "Make sure you give your mother and dad my best." She smiled and then turned to McCoy. "I will see you at the hotel, right?"

  "I just don't know," McCoy said. "I'll call if-"

  "You'll see him at the hotel," Pickering interrupted. "Now get out of

  here."

  She blew him a kiss and left.

  Pickering looked at McCoy.

  "'We drove up'?" he quoted. "'I have our car?" When McCoy didn't answer, Pickering went on. "You could do a hell of a lot worse than that girl, Ken. I always hoped she'd marry Pick."

  "Yes, Sir. She told me. So did her father."

  "Her family scare you? Their money?"

  "I don't think people who earn their living the way I do should get married," McCoy said.

  "I just heard about the Mongolian Operation yesterday. Is that it?"

  "That's part of it, General."

  "Well, since it's none of my business, I think you're wrong. Take what you can when you can get it, Ken. Life is no rehearsal."

  "Yes, Sir."

  "I admitted it was none of my business," Pickering said.

  "Maybe I'd feel the same way you do." There was a knock at the door and Sergeant Hart came in.

  "Colonel Rickabee and the others are here, Sir."

  "Major Dillon, too?"

  "Yes, Sir." Pickering waved his hand, signaling Hart to bring them in.

  "Thank you for coming, Jake," Pickering said. "I think it's important. Is this going to get you in hot water with General -Whatsisname? -Stewart?"

  "I sent word that I was sick," Dillon replied, "and sent the film over there by messenger. It'll be all right."

  "General, I can call General Stewart," Rickabee volunteered.

  "Hold off on doing that a while," Pickering said.

  "Jake, you don't know McCoy, do you?" ?"

  "Only by reputation. Killer McCoy, right

  "He doesn't like that, don't call him that again," Pickering said, giving him a hard look.

  "Sorry, Lieutenant," Dillon said, shaking McCoy's hand. "No offense."

  "None taken, Sir," McCoy said, not entirely convincingly.

  "I guess you've seen this?" Dillon said, taking a copy of the m his pocket and INS story about Machine Gun McCoy fro handing it to him with a smile.

  "Yes, Sir, I've seen it."

  "This one came by messenger this morning," Dillon said.

  "There's talk about making a flick about him."

  "I heard they're thinking about making a movie about the Makin raid," McCoy said.

  "Not thinking. They approved the treatment, a screenplay is in the works, and they signed Randolph Scott to play Colonel Carlson."