"Lieutenant?" the aide asked.
"Scotch, please," McCoy said. "Soda, please."
Not another word was spoken until the drinks had been made and the aide-de-camp and the orderly had left the room.
General Lesterby picked up his glass.
"I think a toast to the Corps would be in order under the circumstances, gentlemen," he said, and raised his glass. "The Corps," he said.
The others followed suit.
"And under the circumstances," Lesterby said, "to our oath of office, especially the phrase 'against all enemies, foreign and domestic.'" He raised his glass again, and the others followed suit.
Then he looked at McCoy.
"Obviously, you're a little curious, McCoy, right? Why I sent my aide-de-camp from the room?"
"Yes, sir," McCoy admitted.
"Because if he is ever asked," General Lesterby said, "as he very well may be asked, what happened in this room today, I want him to be able to answer, in all truthfulness, that he was sent from the room, and just doesn't know."
McCoy didn't reply.
"The rest of us, McCoy," General Lesterby said, "if we are asked what was said, what transpired, in this room this afternoon, are going to lie."
"Sir?" McCoy blurted, not sure he had heard correctly.
"I said, we're going to lie," General Lesterby said. "If we can get away with it, we're going to deny this meeting ever took place. If we are faced with someone's knowing the meeting was held, we are going to announce we don't remember who was here, and none of us is going to remember what was said by anyone."
McCoy didn't know what to say.
"And we are now asking you, McCoy, without giving you any reasons to do so, to similarly violate the code of truthfulness incumbent upon anyone privileged to wear the uniform of a Marine officer," General Lesterby said, looking right into his eyes.
When McCoy didn't reply, Lesterby went on: "As perverse as it sounds-as it is-I am asking for your word as a Marine officer to lie. If you are unable to do that, that will be the end of this meeting. You will return to your duties under General Forrest and Colonel Rickabee, neither of whom, obviously, is going to hold it against you for living up to a code of behavior you have sworn to uphold."
McCoy didn't reply.
"Well, Sessions," General Forrest said, "you're right about that, anyway. You can't tell what he's thinking by looking at him."
"Yes, sir," McCoy said.
"'Yes, sir,' meaning what?" General Lesterby asked.
"You have my word, sir, that… I'll lie, sir."
"And now I want to know, Lieutenant McCoy-and I want you to tell me the first thing that comes to your mind-why you are willing to do so."
"Colonel Rickabee and Captain Sessions, sir," McCoy said. "They're in on this. I'll go with them." General Lesterby looked at McCoy for a moment. "Okay," he said. "You're in. I really hope you don't later have cause-that none of us later has cause-to regret that decision."
McCoy glanced at Captain Session. He saw that Sessions had just nodded approvingly at him.
"I presume Colonel Rickabee has filled you in at some length, McCoy, about what this is all about?"
"Yes, sir," McCoy said.
"Just so there's no question in anyone's mind, we are all talking about a brother Marine officer, Lieutenant Colonel Evans F. Carlson, who is about to be given command of a Marine Raider battalion. We are all aware that Colonel Carlson was awarded the Navy Cross for valor in Nicaragua, and that he was formerly executive officer of the Marine detachment assigned to protect the President of the United States at Warm Springs, Georgia. We are all aware, further, that he is a close friend of the President's son, Captain James Roosevelt. Because we believe that Colonel Carlson's activities in the future may cause grievous harm to the Corps, we see it as our distasteful duty to send someone-specifically, Lieutenant McCoy here-to spy on him. This action is of questionable legality, and it is without question morally reprehensible. Nevertheless, we are proceeding because we are agreed, all of us, that the situation makes it necessary." He looked around the room and then at General Forrest. "General Forrest?"
"Sir?" Forrest replied, confused.
"Is that your understanding of what is taking place?"
Forrest came to attention. "Yes, sir."
"Colonel Wesley?"
"Yes, sir," Wesley mumbled, barely audibly.
"A little louder, Wesley, if you please," General Lesterby said. "If you are not in agreement with us, now's the time to say so."
"Yes, sir!" Colonel Wesley said, loudly.
"Rickabee?"
"Yes, sir."
"Captain Sessions?"
"Yes, sir."
General Lesterby looked at McCoy. "I understand, son," he said, "that you're very unhappy with this assignment. That speaks well for you."
Then he walked out of the room.
(One)
Pensacola, Florida
0500 Hours, 7 January 1942
Pick Pickering pulled the Cadillac convertible up before the San Carlos Hotel in Pensacola at a quarter to five in the morning. The car was filthy, covered with road grime, and Pickering himself was tired, unshaven, dirty, and starved.
From Atlanta, it had been a two-hour drive down U.S. 85 to Columbus, Georgia. Pickering saw a sign reading COLUMBUS, HOME OF THE INFANTRY, which explained why the streets of Columbus were crowded with soldiers; he was close to the Army Infantry Center at Fort Benning.
He crossed a bridge and found himself in Alabama. There he found a small town apparently dedicated to satisfying the lusts of Benning's military population. Its businesses seemed limited to saloons, dance halls, hock shops, and tourist cabins.
The next 250 miles were down a narrow, bumpy macadam road through a series of small Alabama towns and then across the border to Florida. Twenty miles inside Florida he came to U.S. 90 and turned right to Pensacola, a 125-mile, two-and-a-half-hour drive.
He had grown hungry about the time he'd passed through Columbus, Georgia, and had told himself he would stop and get something to eat, if only a hamburger, at the first place that looked even half decent. But he had found nothing open, decent or otherwise, between Columbus and Pensacola. He dined on Cokes and packages of peanut butter crackers bought at widely spaced gas stations where he took on gas.
He was grateful to find the open gas stations, and he filled up every time he came upon one. This was not the place to run out of gas.
When he opened the door of the Cadillac at the hotel, he was surprised at how cold it was. This was supposed to be sunny Florida, but it was foggy and chilly, and the palm trees on the street in front of the San Carlos Hotel looked forlorn.
The desk clerk was a surly young man in a soiled jacket and shirt who said he didn't know nothing about no reservation. When pressed, the desk clerk did discover a note saying the manager was to be notified when a Mr. Pickering showed up.
"I'm here," Pick said. "You want to notify him?"
"Don't come in until eight-thirty, Mr. Davis don't," the desk clerk informed him. "Don't none of the assistant managers come in till seven."
"Is there a restaurant?" Pick asked.
"Coffee shop," the desk clerk said, indicating the direction with a nod of his head.
"Thank you for all your courtesy," Pick said.
"My pleasure," the desk clerk said.
Pickering crossed the lobby and pushed open the door to the coffee shop.
It was crowded, which surprised him, for five o'clock in the morning, until he realized that nearly all the male customers were in uniform-officer's uniforms, Marine and Navy. They are beginning their day, Pick thought, as I am ending mine.
He found a table in a corner and sat down.
A couple of the officers glanced at him-with, he sensed, disapproval.
He needed a shave, he realized. But that was impossible without a room with a wash basin.
He studied the menu until a waitress appeared, and then ordered orange juice, milk, coffee, biscuits,
ham, three eggs, and home fries; and a newspaper, if she had one.
The newspaper was delivered by a Marine captain in a crisp uniform.
"Keep your seat, Lieutenant," he said, as Pickering-in a Quantico Pavlovian reaction-started to stand up, "that way as few people as possible will notice a Marine officer in a mussed uniform needing a shave."
"I've been driving all night, Captain," Pick said.
"Then you should have cleaned up, Lieutenant, before you came in here, wouldn't you say?"
"Yes, sir. No excuse, sir," Pickering said.
"Reporting in, are you?"
"Yes, sir."
"Then we shall probably have the opportunity to continue this embarrassing conversation in other surroundings," the captain said. Then he walked off.
Pickering, grossly embarrassed, stared at the tableware. As he pretended rapt fascination with the newspaper, he became aware that the people in the coffee shop were leaving. He reasoned out why: Officers gathered here for breakfast before going out to the base. The duty day was about to begin, and they were leaving.
When his breakfast was served, he folded the newspaper. As he did that he glanced around the room. It was indeed nearly empty.
But at a table across the room was an attractive young woman sitting alone over a cup of coffee. She was in a sweater and skirt and wore a band over her blond hair. And she was looking at him, he thought, with mingled amusement, condescension, and maybe even a little pity.
Pick, with annoyance, turned his attention to his breakfast.
A moment later, the blonde was standing by his table. He sensed her first, and then smelted her perfume-or her cologne, or whatever it was-a crisp, clean, feminine aroma; and then as he raised his eyes, he saw there was an engagement ring and a wedding band on her hand.
"That was Captain Jim Carstairs," she said, "and as a friendly word of warning, his bite is even worse than his bark."
Pick stood up. The blonde was gorgeous. He was standing so close to her man he could see the delicate fuzz on her cheeks and chin.
"And you, no doubt, are Mrs. Captain Carstairs?" he said.
"No," she said, shaking her head. "Just a friendly Samaritan trying to be helpful. I wouldn't let him catch me needing a shave again."
"The last time he caught you needing a shave, it was rough, huh?" Pick said.
"Go to hell," she said. "I was trying to be helpful."
"And I'm very grateful," Pick said.
She nodded at him, smiled icily, and went back to her table.
What the hell was that all about? Pick wondered. Obviously, she wasn't trying to pick me up. Then what? There was the wedding ring, and she knew the salty captain with the mustache. She was probably some other officer's wife, drunk with his exalted rank. Well, fuck her!
He sat down again and picked up a biscuit and buttered it.
The blonde, whose name was Martha Sayre Culhane, returned to her table wondering what had come over her; wondering why she had gone over to the second lieutenant she had never seen before-much less met-in her life; wondering if she was drunk, or just crazy.
That he was good-looking and attractive never entered her conscious mind. What had entered Martha Sayre Culhane's conscious mind was that the second lieutenant looked very much tike Greg, even walked like him. And that resemblance made her throat catch and her breathing speed up.
Greg was- had been-First Lieutenant Gregory J. Culhane, USMC (Annapolis '38), a tall, lanky, dark-haired young man of twenty-four. A Navy brat, he was born in the Navy hospital in Philadelphia. His father, Lieutenant (later Vice Admiral) Andrew J. Culhane, USN (Annapolis '13), was at the time executive officer of a destroyer engaged in antisubmarine operations off the coast of Ireland. He first saw his son six months later, in December of 1917, after the War to End All Wars had been brought to a successful conclusion, and he had sailed his destroyer home to put it in long-term storage at Norfolk, Virginia.
Admiral Culhane's subsequent routine duty assignments sent him to Pearl Harbor, Hawaii; Guantanamo Bay, Cuba; San Diego, California; and to the Navy Yards at Brooklyn and Philadelphia.
Two weeks after his graduation from Philadelphia's Episcopal Academy in June of 1934, Greg Culhane, who had earned letters in track and basketball at Episcopal, traveled by train to
Annapolis, Maryland, where he was sworn into the United States Navy as a midshipman.
On his graduation from Annapolis in June 1938 (sixty-fifth in his class) he was commissioned at his request-and against the advice of his father-as second lieutenant, USMC, and posted to the Marine detachment aboard the battleship USS Pennsylvania, the flagship of the Pacific Fleet, whose home port was Pearl Harbor, Hawaii.
He immediately applied for training as a Naval aviator, which may have had something to do with his relief from the Pennsylvania four months later and his transfer to the Marine Detachment, Peking, China, for duty with troops.
Second Lieutenant Culhane traveled from Pearl Harbor to Tientsin, China aboard the USS Chaumont, one of two Navy transports that endlessly circled the world delivering and picking up Navy and Marine personnel from all comers of the globe.
In Peking, Greg Culhane served as a platoon leader for eighteen months, along with the additional duties customarily assigned to second lieutenants: He was mail officer; athletic officer, custodian of liquor, beer, and wine for the officer's mess; venereal disease control officer; and he served as recorder and secretary of various boards and committees formed for any number of official and quasi-official purposes.
In April 1939, he boarded the Chaumont again and returned to the United States via the Cavite Navy Base in the Philippines; Melbourne, Australia; Port Elizabeth, South Africa; Monrovia, Liberia; Rio de Janeiro and Recife, Brazil; and Guantanamo, Cuba.
Second lieutenant Greg Culhane reported to the United States Navy Air Station, Pensacola, Florida, on June 10,1939, nine days after the date specified on his orders. His class had already begun their thirteen-month course of instruction.
The personnel officer brought the "Culhane Case" to the attention of the deputy air station commander, Rear Admiral (lower half) (The Navy rank structure provides four grades of "flag" officers corresponding to the four grades of "general" officers of the Army and Marine Corps. The lowest of these grades, corresponding to brigadier general, is rear admiral (lower half). But where brigadier generals wear only one star, rear admirals (lower half) wear two silver stars, as do rear admirals (upper half) and major generals. The result of this inconsistency is a good deal of annoyance on the part of brigadier and major generals of the Army and Marine Corps) James B. Sayre, USN, for decision.
When he had not shown up, the training space set aside for the young Marine officer had been filled by one of the standby applicants. There were two options, the personnel officer explained. One was to go by the book and request the Marine Corps to issue orders returning Lieutenant Culhane to the Fleet Marine Force. The second option was to keep him at Pensacola and enroll him in the next flight course, which would commence 1 September.
"There's a third option, Tom," Admiral Sayre said. "For one thing, it's not this boy's fault that the Chaumont was, as usual, two weeks late. For another, I notice that he came here just as soon as he could after the Chaumont finally got to Norfolk; he didn't take the leave he was authorized. And finally, he's only nine days late. What I think is in the best interests of the Navy, as well as Lieutenant Culhane, is for me to have a word with Jim Swathley and ask him to make the extra effort to let this boy catch up with his class."
"I'll be happy to talk to Captain Swathley, sir, if you'd like," the personnel officer said.
"All right then, Tom, you talk to him. Tell him that's my suggestion."
"Aye, aye, sir."
Admiral Sayre had not considered it necessary to tell the personnel officer that he had been a year behind Greg Culhane's father at the academy, nor that in 1919-20 (before he had volunteered for aviation) he had served under Admiral Culhane with a tin-can squadron.
"I wonder why he went in the Marines?" Jeanne Sayre said absently, and then without waiting for a reply, she asked, "I wonder if Martha remembers him? They were just little tykes the last time… Well, we'll just have to have him to dinner. I'll write Margaret Culhane and tell her we're keeping an eye on him."
The engagement of Martha Ellen Sayre, the only daughter of Rear Admiral and Mrs. James B. Sayre, USN, to First Lieutenant Gregory J. Culhane, USMC, elder son of Vice Admiral and Mrs. Andrew J. Culhane, USN, was announced at the traditional Admiral's New Year's Day Reception.
It was a triple celebration. Admiral Sayre announced jovially at midnight when he was getting just a little flushed in the face: It was the new year, 1941, and that was always a good excuse for a party; he had finally managed to unload his daughter, who was getting to be at twenty-one a little long in the tooth; and her intended, even if he was a Marine, could now afford to support her, because as of midnight he had been made a first lieutenant.
Greg and Martha Culhane were married in an Episcopal service at the station chapel at Pensacola on July 1, 1941, the day after he was graduated as a Naval aviator. It was a major social event for the air station, and indeed for the Navy. Seventeen flag and general officers of the Navy and Marine Corps (and of course their ladies) were in the chapel for the ceremony. And twelve of Greg's buddies (nine Marines and three swabbies) from flight school, in crisp whites, held swords aloft over the couple as they left the chapel.
Despite secret plans (carefully leaked to the enemy) that the young couple would spend their wedding night in Gainesville, they actually went no farmer than a suite in Pensacola's San Carlos Hotel. And the next morning, they drove down the Florida peninsula to Opa-locka, where Greg had been ordered for final training as a fighter pilot.
That lasted about two months. They had a small suite in the Hollywood Beach Hotel, which was now a quasi-official officers' hotel. Martha spent her days playing tennis and golf and swimming, and Greg spent his learning the peculiarities of the Grumman F4F-3 fighter.
The Corps II - CALL TO ARMS Page 10