W E B Griffin - Men at War 1 - The Last Heroes

by The Last Heroes(Lit)

  "I thought you had a place in Georgetown," she said.

  "We do," he said. "I meant for... what I'm doing."

  "What are you doing?" she asked.

  "I'm Coordinator of Information," he said.

  "Whatever you're doing, Bill, it has nothing to do with information," she said. "If I shouldn't have asked, forgive me."

  "Information in the intelligence sense," he said.

  "Oh," she said. "I thought you were trying to make me befie-V you were some kind of press agent."

  "That, too." He chuckled. "I've got Bob Sherwood handling that. But, as I told Chesty, I need a house in Washington near the office-we're Twenty-fifth and E-a place where I could put people up, have dinners, that sort of thing. Chesty was willing to let me have the house. I want to know if that's all right with you."

  ,It,s really Jimmy's, you know. It was his father's. But there's no reason you can't have it. Whatever happens to Jimmy, I don't think he'd ever want to live in that old house. And he'll get this one, Of course. I have no idea what it's worth. And I can't legally sell it."

  "I was thinking of leasing it."

  "If Chesty said you can have it, Bill, of course you can have it."

  "I am being paid a dollar a year," he said. "How does that strike you as annual rent?"

  "I don't like it at all," she said. "It seems as if Franklin, aided d abetted by his friend Wild Bill Donovan, is finally succeeding an in taking advantage of the Whittakers."

  "I'll get an idea of what a fair rent would be and see if I can't find the money."

  "No," she said. "You misunderstand me. I don't like it, but if Chesty would have rented it to you for a dollar a year, Jimmy would want me to do the same."

  "Pressing the bargain," he said. "We talked about furnished."

  "I don't want anything in that house," she said bitterly. "Nothing. I don't ever want to think about it again."

  "I'll see if there's anything of Chesty's," Donovan said. "And-"

  "Nothing," Barbara Whittaker said. "Nothing, Bill. Understand?"

  "Yes," he said.

  She leaned up and kissed him on the cheek. "Thank you for coming," she said.

  "If there's anything I can do, Barbara..

  "Keep Jimmy alive," she said. "By fair means or foul. If you want to do something for Chesty or for me, do that." don't know what I could do."

  "Think of something," she said.

  She turned and looked out the window at Cynthia Chenowith again.

  "What's she or her mother going to do for money now that Chesty's gone?" she asked.

  "Chesty told me," Donovan said, "that he set up some sort of trust for her mother when Tom died. I don't think he was giving the girl money."

  "I didn't mean to suggest that he was... keeping her... in the usual sense," she said. "I don't think either of them was like that. if he didn't make some provision for her in his will..."

  "I don't think he would do that," Donovan said, "because of you.'

  "Then I will have to do it," she said. "Chesty always met his obligations. Does her mother know about her and Chesty?"

  "I didn't know about them," Donovan said. "And I was very close to Chesty."

  "Good," she said. "I like Doris, and it would be painful for her if she learned about them."

  "There is no reason she ever should," Donovan said.

  "You know what's really funny?" Barbara asked bitterly. "I've always had the thought in the back of my mind that I would match Jimmy up with her."

  He patted her shoulder and walked away.

  "Bill," she called after him. "I don't want her ever to know that I know."

  Donovan met her eyes and nodded his head.

  Then he found his overcoat and hat, put them on, walked down the wide front steps of Summer Place and down the brick walk to the beach.

  "It's time for us to go," he said.

  "I'll say my good-byes to Mrs. Whittaker," Cynthia said. "MY stuff is already in the station wagon."

  He hadn't considered that possibility and was embarrassed.

  Barbara obviously would have preferred not to speak to Cynthia Chenowith again. But he could not suggest to Cynthia that it would be best if she left Summer Place without saying good-bye. Cynthia was both bright and sensitive. She would know that meant Barbara knew.

  ,All right," he said.

  Cynthia walked briskly toward the house. Donovan walked slowly after her, so that he could see both of them in the breakfast room. They kissed and embraced. Then Cynthia came out of the front door again and walked with Donovan down the veranda to Douglass's station wagon. "May I drive?" Cynthia asked. "Certainly," Donovan said. "I'll spell you if you get tired." Forty-five minutes later, as they drove through the New Jersey Pine Barrens toward Philadelphia, out of the blue Cynthia said, "She knows about Chesty and me."

  "Yes," Donovan said. "I'm really sorry," Cynthia said. "I don't think I could be so much of a lady, under the circumstances."

  "Barbara is a fine lady,"Donovan agreed. "I'm not sorry," Cynthia said. "I'm sorry she knew, but I'm not sorry's "We're taking over the house on Q Street," Donovan said after a long pause.

  "Chesty told me," she said. "How much time do I have to get Out?"

  "Perhaps that wouldn't be necessary 7" Donovan said.

  "I don't understand," Cynthia said.

  "I'd like you to stay to work for me. For openers, whatever your civil service grade is now, I'll raise it two numbers."

  "I don't think you're suggesting you want to take Chesty's Place," she said after a moment. Then she made it a challenge: "Are YOU, Colonel?" vonovan," Cynthia "The most difficult personnel problems we have, doing ,hat we're doing-"

  "What is it, exactly, that you are doing?" she interrupted. '11,ve been wondering about that for a long time."

  He didn't reply immediately, and Cynthia correctly suspected he was very carefully, lawyerlike, framing his answer. She was uddenly aware that she was fencing with one of the best legal minds in the country.

  "Franklin Roosevelt has asked me to organize and operate an it,intelligence organization which will control all the other intelligence agencies during the war," he said.

  "And where would I fit in?" she asked.

  "I don't know," he confessed. "Which brings us back to what I was saying about our most difficult personnel problem."

  "Which is?"

  "Recruiting people who can function under pressure," Donovan said. "There is no way to prejudge that. Forgive me if this sounds insensitive, Cynthia, but you have just demonstrated how well you function under pressure."

  "The... circumstances... of Chesty's death?"

  "A very awkward situation ' " he agreed, nodding his head, "that you handled as skillfully, as-forgive me-ruthlessly as you considered necessary."

  "Is that a compliment?"

  "And a statement of fact," he said.

  "That brings us back to my question. Where would I fit in?"

  "I don't know. For the moment, I would want you to take over the house on Q Street. Starting immediately, we're going to have to think about security precautions, communications..."

  "About which I know nothing," she said. "It sounds like you want a housekeeper." a ,yo, didn't really think I was going to ask you to go to Berli ,ld rnae eyes at Adolf Hitler, did you?"

  "That annoyed her. have a responsible job at the State Department," she said. nd I have been led to believe that I can be commissioned into the -4A WAC." d Donovan. fhat, in turn, annoye 's Army Corps he said, "you would.If you went in the Women spend the war as a clerk in uniform. If you stay at the State Department, you will spend the war performing legal functions that your superiors feel are unimportant enough to be handled by a woman- If you complain, you will be told that is the sacrifice you must make for the war effort. Your naivete surprises me, frankly."

  She successfully fought down the urge to express the rage she felt. They rode along in silence for five minutes.

  -i want you on board," Donovan said, finally break
ing the silence, "as an asset in place, someone I can put to real work as soon as the need arises. In the meantime, I want you to take over the house on Q Street. I have to have absolute faith in the ability, common sense, and even ruthlessness of whoever is running it for me. If you consider that beneath your dignity, there is no point in continuing this discussion. Please forget it ever took place."

  She didn't reply at first, but a moment later said, "Chesty's Packard, the convertible, is in the garage. And he has personal things. Should I load it all up and send it to Summer Place?"

  "No ' " he said. "Barbara told me she wants nothing from the house on Q Street, and unless she changes her mind, I'm going to leave it that way."

  "I'll pack his personal things and put them in the attic," she said. "And I'll run the Packard every couple of days. If it's all right, I'll Move into the house."

  She had accepted his offer.

  He looked at her, and they laughed together. Later they stopped in Philadelphia for a late supper, boiled lobsters at Bookbinder S, and then drove on to Washington. lba,Luzon Commonwealth of the Philippines 1205 Hours 9 December 1941

  As the sixteen P40-E aircraft returning from a fruitless patrol over the South China Sea approached Iba, a single dirt runway auxiliary field in the hills forty miles from their regular base at Clark Field, Second Lieutenant James M. C. Whittaker went on the horn.

  "Delicious Leader, Delicious Blue Five.

  "Go ahead, Blue Five." There was a tone of impatience in the squadron leader's voice, even over the clipped tones of the radio.

  "My fuel warning lights are on," Whittaker said. "Request permission to land as soon as possible."

  There was no reply for a moment, and then:

  "Delicious Blue Five, you are cleared to land as number three. I'll want to see you on the ground."

  "Blue Five leaving the formation at this time," Whittaker replied. He dropped the nose and pointed the P40-E toward the tail of the second plane making its approach.

  "I want to see you on the ground, Whittaker," the squadron commander said. "Acknowledge."

  "You want to see me on the ground, acknowledged," Whittaker said.

  Whittaker knew his squadron leader did not like him, and most of the reasons why he didn't. The squadron commander was a Regular, and he was a reservist who had not troubled to conceal his annoyance at having been kept on active duty. He had not displayed what the squadron commander believed was the proper team spirit, and, probably just as important, he hadn't seen any point in trying to hide the fact that he had an independent income.

  Instead of spending his spare time with his peers at Clark, he had rented an apartment in the Hotel Manila, to which he would his brand-new yellow Chrysler New Yorker convertible. He drive in spent his time there playing polo with wealthy Americans, Filipinos, and officers of the 26th Cavalry. His photograph appeared regularly on the society pages of the Manila Times.

  Whittaker touched down and taxied directly toward one of the three fuel trucks. He was sure that the first thing the squadron cornniander was going to do when he got on the ground was ask the fuel guy how much Whittaker had taken. The commander didn't trust people he didn't like, and he didn't like Whittaker. Therefore he believed that Whittaker's fuel warning lights had not been glowing, and that Whittaker had simply wanted to refuel immediately, rather than wait his turn, which would have been just about last.

  Fuck him. He would find out that Whittaker had been running on the fumes.

  There were no hangars in Iba auxiliary field, just a radio shack which doubled as the control tower. There were several field tents, a canvas fly-covered mess and kitchen area, three olive-drab fuel trucks, two vans, two jeeps, a staff car, and Second Lieutenant Whittaker's new yellow convertible.

  The Chrysler was another bone of contention between Whittaker and his squadron commander. Once they had moved to lba, the Old Man had forbidden his officers to return to Clark Field for any purpose, including picking up their personal vehicles. Jim Whittaker felt that he had obeyed the order. He had not returned to Clark. He had called Manila and ordered his Filipino houseboy to go from his suite in the Manila Hotel out to Clark and drive the Chrysler to lba.

  "You're a guardhouse lawyer, Whittaker," the Old Man had told him when the Chrysler appeared. "You know I meant no cars up here. I don't like guardhouse lawyers."

  "We don't have enough transportation, Captain," Whittaker replied. "The car is at the disposal of the squadron."

  Under the circumstances, the Chrysler had remained. For one thing, Whittaker,s Filipino boy had taken off, and there was no other way to get the car back where it belonged. For another, )Vbit. taker was right: they needed transportation. But so far as the (id Man was concerned, it was another example of Whittaker's near in subordination whenever he could interpret an order to his own sat, isfaction.

  After Whittaker had been refueled and was taxiing to his park, I ing space, and seven of the squadron's sixteen aircraft touched down and were lined up to refuel, the Japanese began their attack. When the first Japanese plane appeared, Whittaker knew he had two choices. He could go to the threshold of the runway and wait until the last of the Out-of-fuel P40-Es had landed before he tried to take off, or he could take a chance of getting safely into the air by simply forcing his way into the landing pattern, He pushed on the left rudder pedal and advanced the throttle as he turned onto the runway. During his takeoff roll, he test-fired his guns.

  It was later learned from observers on the ground that there had been fifty-odd Mitsubishi dive-bombers and about as many Zeroes, possibly as many as fifty-six. In the air at the time, things were much too confused for anyone to count with any degree of accuracy.

  The engagement didn't last long. The carrier-based Japanese were operating at the far end of their operational radius, and when they had done what they had come to do, they headed home.

  Whittaker made two passes over Iba. The runways were blocked with furi ously burning P40s, shot down as they tried to land, and others, who had landed before the attack began, and been destroyed by bombs and machine-gun fire. The Japanese had gotten all three fuel trucks.

  Whittaker saw the Old Man, standing and watching his aircraft bum. Hands on hips, he looked up as Whittaker flew over, but he made no signal of any kind.

  Whittaker turned the nose of the P40-E toward Clark Field, forty miles away. There was no way he could land at lba, and with the fuel trucks gone, no reason to.

  ..rallech, Morocco DLCG=ber 9, 1941

  Two days after the burial of the pasha of Ksar es Souk,Thamiel Gja(ui, a man in his late sixties, wearing his customary white robes, climbed into his Delahaye convertible sedan and went to the mosque to pray that Allah had taken the pasha of Ksar es Souk into heaven.

  When he had finished praying, he dismissed his bodyguards with a curt wave of his hand and walked slowly and alone through the cool arches of the mosque, circling and circling again the found-tain and pool.

  This was always comforting when he was troubled and confused. The mosque had been there for several hundred years before the French had come, and would be there several hundred years after the French were gone. Thinking about that helped him put things into perspective. And often it reminded him of the quatrain of Haji Abdu Yezdi: "Cease, atom of a moment's span, to hold thyself an all in all. The world is old, and thou art young."

  He missed Hassan el Moulay, the late pasha of Ksar es Souk, both personally and in the discharge of the duties Allah the All-Wise had placed on him.

  Personally, they had been close friends, And Hassan had been an especially valuable chamberlain, whose intelligence network was beyond price.

  As he walked slowly through the mosque, his face hidden under the hood of his burnoose, Thami el Glaoui recalled that Hassan el Moulay had made first report on Helmut von Heurten-Mitnitz and Sturrabannfuhrer Johann Mfiller not long after their arrival. These two were most likely the people responsible for his friend's assassination.

  The report had given their
ranks and titles-minister in the case of von Heurtenmitnitz (which, el Moulay had told el Glaoui, gave him equal footing in diplomatic protocol with the consuls general of the governments accredited to the French colonial authority and th, kingdom of Morocco) and security adviser in the case Of Mfiller. It gave the locations and telephone numbers of their quarters, and the make and license numbers of the automobiles assigned for their use. Within days, their dossiers contained information about their alcohol, drug, and sexual proclivities. Hassan el Moulay had also discovered, among other things, that it was von Heurten-Mitnitz,s intention to stop the flow of jewels and currency from France through Morocco.