W E B Griffin - Corp 07 - Behind the Lines
Page 40
"Next question?" Sessions said.
"If I really wanted ice for the drink, where would I find it?" Lewis asked.
Chapter Thirteen
[ONE]
Gentlemen's Bar
The Maritime Club
Brisbane, Australia
1825 Hours 29 November 1942
"Nice place," Admiral Wagam said to General Pickering, looking around the comfortably elegant room, furnished with dark-maroon leather couches and chairs, its paneled walls holding discreetly lighted oil portraits of men in mer-chant marine uniforms and sailing ships under full sail.
An elderly, white-jacketed waiter appeared immediately as Pickering, Stecker, and Wagam sat down.
"Good evening, gentlemen," he said.
"Are you a scotch drinker, Admiral?" Pickering asked. Wagam nodded.
The waiter delivered glasses, a soda siphon bottle, a bowl of ice cubes, and a bottle.
"We'll pour, thank you," Pickering said, and when the waiter left them, did so.
He picked up his glass.
"How about to 'Interservice Cooperation'?" he asked.
"How about 'The Corps'?" Admiral Wagam said. "Jack NMI and Flem-ing, I give you The Corps."
They sipped their drinks.
"The Navy," Stecker said, and raised his glass again.
"How about to the kids we're sending off on Operation Windmill?" Pickering said. "God protect them."
"Hear, hear," Wagam said.
"Before we get really carried away," Stecker said. "Are there any unan-swered questions? Have we done everything we can?"
"I've got a question," Wagam said, "about the OSS involvement."
"Apparently," Pickering said, "Colonel 'Wild Bill' Donovan got the President to order Frank Knox to order me to include two OSS agents in the Fertig operation. Which Donovan, apparently, has decided to name Opera-tion Windmill. When my deputy in Washington, Colonel Rickabee-"
"I know Fritz," Wagam said.
"When Fritz learned the identity of one of the agents, and was reliably informed what a-for lack of more forceful words-miserable sonofabitch he is, and protested to Knox, he got a nasty note saying in effect that the OSS, including the sonofabitch, goes on the mission, and no further discussion is desired."
"Ouch," Wagam said. "I suppose it's too much to hope that the agent who was lost-"
"The good one is the one who went down with the B-17," Pickering said. "Jack had a word with this chap-he's a Marine captain named Macklin-and made it clear to him that McCoy is in charge of the mission, even if he is only a first lieutenant."
"I'll have a word with Chambers Lewis before I go back to Pearl," Wagam said, "and make sure he understands that."
"I think that would be a very good idea," Pickering said. "Thank you."
"I was very impressed with McCoy," Wagam said.
"He's a very impressive young man. And he has the experience. He made the Makin raid, and he ran the operation when we replaced the Marines with the Coastwatchers on Buka. There's no question he should be in charge."
"And we're working on getting a Marine Raider to go along, a master gunnery sergeant who was with McCoy on the Makin raid," Stecker said. "I think he'll show up in time."
"If you don't mind my saying so, Fleming," Admiral Wagam said care-fully, "there is one thing wrong with McCoy. At least for your purposes."
"And what would that be?" Pickering said coldly.
"He's only a first lieutenant. I somehow don't feel that General MacArthur will change his opinion about Fertig based on the judgment of a lowly first lieutenant."
"The original plan was that Jack was going on the mission," Pickering said. "He has guerrilla experience in the Banana Republics."
"What happened?"
"The incoming Commandant of the Corps decided he needed him in Washington," Pickering said.
Stecker looked uncomfortable.
" 'Incoming Commandant'?" Wagam asked, surprised. "I hadn't heard that. Who? Vandegrift?"
"You didn't hear that from me," Pickering said. "And changing the sub-ject, you're right. McCoy's rank is going to pose some problems. I'm wide open to suggestion."
"Send somebody out right away who's been with Fertig all along, the higher ranking the better. I mean, on the Sunfish."
"That makes a lot of sense," Stecker said.
"OK, we'll do it," Pickering said. "Presuming McCoy can find some-body to send."
"I really wish I could go," Stecker said.
"You're too old and decrepit, Jack," Pickering said, and reached for the bottle.
[TWO]
Naval Air Transport Passenger Terminal
Brisbane, Australia
0715 Hours 30 November 1942
Lieutenant Chambers D. Lewis, USN, was not surprised when Brigadier Gen-eral Fleming Pickering and Colonel Jack (NMI) Stecker showed up to see Ad-miral Wagam off. But he was a little surprised when Captain Ed Sessions, at the wheel of a jeep, drove up as the Pearl Harbor-bound Coronado, two of its four engines running, began to taxi away from the tie-down buoy.
Pickering-about to get into the Studebaker staff car with Stecker- changed his mind and walked up to Lewis as Sessions drove up.
"Everything go all right, Ed?"
"McCoy's all set up, and I've got Lewis the room right next to Macklin, but the telephone's going to take some time," Sessions replied.
Macklin? Lewis wondered. Why does that name ring a bell? There was a guy at the Academy by that name. That would be too much of a coincidence.
"Maybe Pluto knows somebody in the Signal Corps," Pickering said. "I'll work on it."
"Yes, Sir."
"Lewis, Sessions is going to set you up in the BOQ."
"Yes, Sir."
"Did Admiral Wagam have a chance to discuss the... who's in charge of arrangements... for this mission?"
"Yes, Sir. I'm to take my orders from Lieutenant McCoy."
"If you've got any problems with anything, bring them to either Colonel Stecker or me."
"Yes, Sir. Thank you, Sir."
"I hope you brought some bathing trunks with you," Pickering said.
"Sir?"
"I got some for him, Sir."
"Well, then, I'll see you both later at the cottage. Have fun."
"I'll try to see that he does, Sir," Sessions said.
Pickering walked to the Studebaker.
"How's your head?" Sessions asked when Lewis slid into the jeep beside him.
"I am a Naval officer, Captain. Naval officers know how to hold their liquor. What gets The Marine Corps up at this early hour? And what was that about swim trunks?"
"First, we're going to get you settled in the BOQ, and next we're going to show you-or maybe you'll show us-how to get heavy and awkward objects down a curved, wet, and very slippery surface into rubber boats. And then you're going to practice paddling a rubber boat overloaded with heavy and awkward things around the harbor. And presuming you don't drown today, you'll do it again tonight, or before daylight tomorrow."
"Really? Where are you going to get a curved and slippery surface?"
"McCoy found an old coastal freighter that went belly-up at a pier," Ses-sions replied. "He rented it for a week from the Aussies."
"What do you mean, 'rented it'?"
"When he asked if he could use it, the owners said, 'Certainly, and exactly how much were you thinking of paying?' "
"I don't think you're kidding."
"I'm not. Anyway, he and Koffler and Hart have been over there since daylight, setting things up. I hope you remember how to swim?"
"Are you involved in this exercise?"
"No. I'm not going on the mission, therefore I don't have to practice. But I thought I would watch. With a little bit of luck, the OSS might drown him-self."
"You've really got it in for this guy, don't you?"
"Let's say it wouldn't break my heart if he did drown this morning."
"You going to tell me why?"
"What did your admiral tell you?"
"He said McCoy's in charge, and to conduct myself accordingly."
"If that's all he said, then one of two things is true. Either the General didn't tell him about the OSS, which means that I can't tell you; or he did tell him, and your admiral decided he didn't want to tell you, which also means I can't tell you."
"If you hate this guy so much, why don't you just drown him?"
"I think that's probably been considered. If anyone had asked me, I would have voted 'yes.' "
Sessions reached into the back of the jeep, dipped his hand into a musette back, and came out with a pair of blue swimming trunks.
"Don't let it be said the Marine Corps never gives the Navy anything," he said as he handed them to Lewis.
"General Pickering used the name 'Macklin,' " Lewis said, making it a question. "The OSS officer's name."
"That's his name."
"I think I may know him."
"I don't think so," Sessions said.
"Why not?"
"If you knew him, you'd try very hard not to let anybody know," Sessions said.
Chambers Lewis examined the swim trunks. According to a Royal Aus-tralian Navy label on the inside waistband, they were four inches too large, and they did not have a built-in jockstrap.
"They don't have a jockstrap."
"They're Navy trunks," Sessions said. "Sailors have no balls, and there-fore a jockstrap is unnecessary."
"Screw you, Captain Sessions."
But you 're right. Some sailors don't have balls. This sailor in particular doesn't have balls.
Lieutenant Chambers D. Lewis, USN, Annapolis '40, had been forced to the conclusion that there was serious question whether he had the balls-the intes-tinal fortitude, the courage, however more politely the condition might be phrased-to wear the uniform he was wearing, to represent himself as an offi-cer of the Naval Service.
He was also alive, he believed, because he was a coward.
The first indication that he was equipped with something less than the nec-essary balls came-as one hell of a surprise-shortly after he reported to the Submarine School at New London, Connecticut, six months after he graduated from the Naval Academy.
During an orientation ride on a fleet submarine before beginning their training, Lieutenant Commander Thomas B. Elliott, USN, Annapolis '32, gave them a little talk, explaining that the makeup of some people simply disquali-fied them for the silent service. These individuals had nothing to be ashamed of, Lieutenant Commander Elliott said, any more than they should be ashamed of having blue eyes, or red hair. It was the way God had issued them.
The Navy's intention with the orientation ride was to save both the Navy and the individual whose makeup was such that he couldn't take submarine service time and money by sending him back to the surface Navy now-and without any sort of stigma attached-before the lengthy and expensive training began.
That, Ensign Chambers D. Lewis knew, was bullshit pure and simple. Any officer who couldn't handle being in a submarine shouldn't be in the Navy at all. And certainly a notation on a service record that an officer who volunteered for submarine training, and was accepted, and then left New London within a week of his arrival would be tantamount to stamping the record in three-inch-high letters, COWARD. Cowards not only deservedly enjoy the contempt of non-cowards, but are unfit to command men, which is the one basic function of a Naval officer.
Lewis remembered very clearly the first time he heard a submarine skipper give the order to "take her down." He had nightmares about it, waking up from them in cold sweats.
He was standing not six feet from the skipper when he heard that com-mand. And the moment the Klaxon horn sounded, and the loudspeakers blared, "Dive! Dive! Dive!", he was bathed in a cold sweat, virtually overcome by a mindless terror. For a time he thought his heart stopped and that he was going to faint. He remembered little else about his first voyage beneath the sea except that he was aware they were under it; that just a foot or two away the sea was doing its best to break through the flimsy hull and crush and smother everyone inside, including him.
Lieutenant Commander Elliott gave them another little chat after they tied up back at New London-and Lewis had a clear picture of Elliott, too. He looked competent and professional, everything an officer, an officer of the si-lent service, was supposed to be.
He wanted to emphasize, Lieutenant Commander Elliott told them, that absolutely no stigma would be attached if anyone decided now that the sub-marine service was not for them. To the contrary, it was their duty to make their uneasiness known, to save themselves and the Navy a good deal of diffi-culty down the line. The lieutenant commander went on to say that he knew of a dozen young officers who had the balls to speak up, and were now doing very well elsewhere in the Navy, in both the surface Navy and in Naval Aviation.
He would be in his office from 1900 until 2200 that night, Lieutenant Commander Elliott said. If anyone wished to speak with him regarding a re-lease from the silent service, they should come see him. Anyone who did so would be off the base within two hours, and there would be absolutely no stigma attached to their transfer. He would also be in his office for the same purpose every Saturday morning from 0800 until 1100, so long as they were in training.
Ensign Lewis talked himself out of seeing Lieutenant Commander Elliott that night by telling himself that the mindless terror he experienced on the dive was an aberration, an isolated incident that would not be repeated, and that it would be the highest folly to throw away his Naval career-and the tough four years at Annapolis that preceded it-because of one incident, an aberrational incident that would not be repeated.
And he got through the rest of his training at New London in much the same way, one week at a time, telling himself that this Saturday he was going to bite the bullet and see Lieutenant Commander Elliott and tell him that he'd tried, he just didn't have the balls to be a submariner.
And every Saturday morning he decided to wait just one more week. He came closest to seeing Commander Elliott after the Momsen Lung training. The training itself-you're inserted at the base of the famous water-filled tower, you put the lung in place, and then you make your way up a knotted rope to the surface-didn't bother him as much as what it implied:
Submarines, and thus the submariners aboard them, would inevitably get in some kind of trouble, and an attempt to escape from a disabled, and doomed, submarine would be necessary. In Lewis's opinion, there was little chance that the Momsen Escape Procedure would work as well in combat as it did in New London-if it worked at all. If an enemy depth charge caused sufficient dam-age to a submarine to leave her without power, her crew might as well kiss their asses good-bye.
The various possibilities of dying aboard a submarine ran vividly through his imagination at New London, and later at Pearl, and on patrol, and now in Australia.
He graduated fifth in his class, and after an initial evaluation cruise aboard the Cachalot, a 298-foot, 1,500-ton submersible of the Porpoise class operat-ing out of Norfolk, Virginia (SUBFORATL), he was transferred to SUBFOR-PAC at Pearl Harbor, and assigned to the Remora, another Porpoise-class submarine.
By then he had, he thought, his terror under control. At the same time, he came up with a solution to his no-balls dilemma. If he applied for Naval Avia-tion while aboard the Remora, no action would be taken until he completed his assignment. His records would show that he was relieved to transfer to Naval Aviation, not because he quit. And completing his tour, holding his terror under control while he did so, would solve the moral question of whether he had enough balls to remain a Naval officer.
He was on patrol, a long way from Pearl Harbor, when the Japanese struck on December 7. Remora immediately went on the hunt for Japanese vessels. She found six, and fired a total of fourteen torpedoes at them. Of the fourteen, nine missed the target-they ran too deep, something was wrong with the depth-setting mechanisms. Of the five which struck their targets, only one detonated-something was wrong with the detonators.
When the
Remora returned to Pearl Harbor, the crew were sent to Waikiki Beach Hotel for five days' rest and recuperation leave. He spent the five days drunk in his room, not just tiddly, plastered, happy, but fall-down drunk.
He made four more patrols. After each of them he drank himself into ob-livion. And then there was a fifth patrol, the last-of three-that the Remora made to Corregidor to evacuate from the doomed fortress gold and nurses, and, on one of them, a dozen men blinded in the war. He woke up after that drunk in the hospital at Pearl Harbor with his head swathed in bandages. He had been found, they told him, in his hotel bathroom, where he had apparently slipped in the tub and cracked his head open. He had been unconscious for four days and had lost a good deal of blood. And it had been decided that his medical condi-tion precluded his return to sea until there was time to determine the extent of the concussion's damage to his brain. The Remora, he was told, had sailed without him.