He handed him the manila folder stamped TOP SECRET.
Donovan waved the two of them into the two red leather chairs in front of his desk, sat down, and opened the folder.
T O P S E C R E T
SUPREME HEADQUARTERS SWPOA 1515 HOURS 11DEC42
EYES ONLY -THE SECRETARY OF THE NAVY WASH DC
COMMANDER-IN-CHIEF PACIFIC PEARL HARBOR TH
VIA SPECIAL CHANNEL
DUPLICATION FORBIDDEN
ORIGINAL TO BE DESTROYED AFTER ENCRYPTION AND TRANSMITTAL
RADIO FROM BRIQGEN FLEMING PICKERING USMCR REPORTS SSN SUNFISH DEPARTED ESPIRITU SANTO 0505 LOCALTIME 11 DEC 1942 CARRYING ABOARD FERTIG CONTACT TEAM. FURTHER DETAILS WILL BE FURNISHED AS AVAILABLE. SUPREME COMMANDER SWPOA HAS BEEN ADVISED.
BRIGGEN PICKERING DESIRES CONTENTS THIS MESSAGE BE FURNISHED COL F. L. RICKABEE USMC OFFICE OF MANAGEMENT ANALYSIS IMMEDIATELY AND STATES HE HAS NO OBJECTION TO THIS
INFORMATION BEING MADE AVAILABLE TO DIRECTOR, OFFICE OF STRATEGIC SERVICES:
A. PERSONNEL OF FERTIG CONTACT TEAM ARE AS FOLLOWS:
MCCOY, KENNETH R FIRST LIEUTENANT USMCR 489657 OFFICER-IN-COMMAND
ZIMMERMAN, ERNEST W GUNNERY SERGEANT 18909 USMC DEPUTY COMMANDER
KOFFLER, STEPHEN M STAFF SERGEANT USMC 504883 USMC RADIO OPERATOR
B. IN ADDITION, BRIGGEN PICKERING STATED SUNFISH ALSO CARRIED ABOARD LIEUTENANT CHAMBERS D. LEWIS, USN, AS PERSONAL REPRESENTATIVE ADM NIMITZ. LEWIS WILL NOT GO ASHORE.
C. IN ADDITION, BRIGGEN PICKERING STATED CAPTAIN ROBERT B. MACKLIN, USMC, OF OSS QUOTE
OPERATION WINDMILL ENDQUOTB WITH WHICH HE IS NOT FAMILIAR IS ALSO ABOARD SUNFISH AND MAY
GO ASHORE AS OBSERVER. THE DECISION WILL BE MADE AT TIME OF LANDING BY LIEUTENANT MCCOY
BASED ON HIS ASSESSMENT AT THAT TIME OF MACKLINS POTENTIAL VALUE AND/OR THREAT TO MISSION.
D. CAPTAIN EDWARD SESSIONS, USMC WILL DEPART BRISBANE FOR WASH DC VIA PEARL HARBOR AND SAN
FRANCISCO 0900 12DEC42 AND IS PREPARED TO BRIEF INTERESTED PERSONNEL ON ARRIVAL.
BY DIRECTION BRIGGEN PICKERING USMCR
HON MAJOR SIGNAL CORPS USA
T O P S E C R E T
Donovan smiled as he began to read the message. By the time he was fin-ished, the smile was visibly strained.
"First rate, Fritz," he said. "We're moving."
"Yes, Sir."
"This lieutenant, McCoy. And the others. Are you familiar with them?"
"Yes, Sir. They're assigned to us."
Donovan waited until he was sure that he had gotten all he was going to get from Rickabee without prompting, then made a come on gesture with his right hand.
"Lieutenant McCoy and Gunny Zimmerman made the Makin Island raid with Captain Roosevelt, Sir. Sergeant Koffler spent some time on Buka with the Australian Coastwatchers, Sir. They're experienced in this type of opera-tion."
"I felt sure General Pickering would select the best available men," Donovan said.
"I think he did, Sir," Rickabee replied.
"You were not familiar with 'Operation Windmill,' Fritz?"
"No, Sir."
"Our fault, obviously. Sorry. We should have made sure you, and General Pickering, were brought in on that. It is, of course, simply the name we as-signed to the Fertig operation."
"Yes, Sir."
"I would be grateful, when Captain Sessions arrives, if he could brief Mr. Morrissette and myself."
"I'll see to it that he does, Sir."
"Have you got anything else for me, Fritz?"
"No, Sir. That's about it."
"Well, thank you for bringing this so promptly to my attention."
"My pleasure, Sir."
"Well, then, Fritz, I won't keep you. Thank you very much."
"Yes, Sir."
"Mo, stick around a minute, will you?" Donovan said.
"Thank you, Colonel Rickabee," Morrissette said, and offered his hand.
"Good morning, gentlemen," Rickabee said.
Donovan waited until Rickabee had closed the door after him and then turned to Morrissette.
"What would you say are the chances that the President has already seen, or will soon see, that goddamn special channel?"
"One hundred percent, Bill. If Frank Knox doesn't show it-hasn't al-ready shown it-to him, I'm sure he'll get it back-channel. Nimitz to Leahy to FDR."
"I don't like to be sandbagged like that. I'll burn Pickering's ass for this."
"For what?
"What do you mean, for what? Did you read that?"
"General Pickering, in compliance with his orders, is making every rea-sonable effort to include our guy on the mission. He's on the submarine. If he doesn't go ashore, it will be because the officer in charge decides that his pres-ence would pose a threat to the mission."
"Our guy is a captain. This McCoy is only a lieutenant. Our guy should be the officer-in-command."
"This one made the Makin Island raid with Roosevelt's son," Morrissette said. "And if you think Pickering hasn't made sure that FDR knows that, you're underestimating him again."
"Meaning?"
"You'll have a hard time convincing FDR that Pickering's sandbagging you by putting this lieutenant in charge. This lieutenant is a Marine Raider, and Marine Raiders generally-and especially one who was on the Makin raid with young Roosevelt-are the apples of FDR's eye."
"You don't really expect me to take this lying down?"
"Are you. asking for advice?"
"Yeah. Advise me."
"Make your peace with Pickering."
Donovan looked at him for a long moment.
"Thank you, Mo," he said. "Is there anything else?"
Morrissette shook his head, no.
Chapter Fifteen
[ONE]
Headquarters, U.S. Forces in the Philippines
Davao Oriental Province
Mindanao, Commonwealth of the Philippines
1845 Hours 23 December 1942
It was raining, and Captain James B. Weston, USFIP, stumbled while climb-ing-and nearly slipped off-the rain-slick ladderlike stairs leading to the quarters of Brigadier General Wendell W. Fertig. He managed not to drop his Thompson submachine gun, but his campaign hat fell into the darkness, and he had to climb back down the stairs and look for it on his hands and knees under the house.
Finally, he gained the porch and walked down it to the door. Hanging over the door as a blackout device was a piece of canvas-reclaimed by United States Forces in the Philippines after six months of service to the Japanese on a captured U.S. Army ton-and-a-half truck.
Someone remembered reading that the light of a candle could be seen from an aircraft on a dark night for seven miles. It sounded a bit incredible, but Headquarters USFIP was in no position to put their incredulity to the test, and General Fertig had ordered blackout curtains over all doors and windows after nightfall, whenever lanterns or candles were alight inside.
Weston pushed aside the blackout curtain and stepped inside. The only light came from one kerosene lamp and three homemade lamps consisting of burning wicks in the necks of Coca-Cola bottles filled with coconut oil; but Weston's eyes, accustomed to the absolute blackness of the night, took a mo-ment to adjust.
After they adjusted, he saw General Fertig behind his desk, and two of the three members of the USFIP Signal Section-Second Lieutenant Robert Ball (signal officer) and Sergeant Ignacio LaMadrid (chief radio operator)-sitting on rattan chairs. Ball and LaMadrid held Coca-Cola bottles containing the getting-better-all-the-time USFIP brewed beer, and four bottles of beer, three of them empty, were on Fertig's desk.
The cocktail hour, Weston thought, to which I was not invited.
"You sent for me, Sir?" he asked.
'"As our intelligence officer, and, of course, as a Marine, Captain Wes-ton," Fertig said. "I'm sure you are a veritable cornucopia of arcane informa-tion vis-a-vis Naval lore."
"Sir?"
I don't think anybody but The General was invited to his cocktail hour.
"Lieut
enant Ball, Sergeant LaMadrid, and myself have all been wonder-ing what the Navy expects to find in heaven," Fertig said.
Is he plastered?
"I don't think I understand, Sir."
"I'm disappointed," Fertig said. "I was hoping the answer to that intrigu-ing conundrum would immediately occur to you."
"Sorry, Sir, I just don't understand."
"What occurred to me was that what a sailor would hope to find would be a bevy of naked beauties and real, cold beer, but that doesn't seem to fit. Show that to Captain Weston, would you, please, Lieutenant Ball?"
Ball handed Weston a sheet of paper, its carbon-paper characters hard to read in the dim light.
1334567890123456789012345
LUDMILLAZHIVKOVZANESVILLE
U S E W H
02 20 19 04 10
A T N A V
17 09 18 14 21
E B W I L
19 25 04 05 23
L F I N D
24 09 11 18 03
I N H E A
22 18 10 19 08
V E N A S
12 19 18 08 20
S I M S U
20 05 04 20 02
B C 0 D E
09 13 14 03 25
"That came in about an hour ago," Lieutenant Ball said.
"A strong signal, Sir," Sergeant LaMadrid amplified, "and it was re-peated, two, three times, from both Australia and Pearl Harbor."
"Use what Nave-Navy-" Weston read haltingly, "will find in heaven as sim sub code. 'Use what Navy will find in heaven'? What the hell does that mean?"
Jesus, that sounds familiar, Jim Weston thought, and then felt a chill.
" 'If the Army and the Navy,' " he intoned softly, " 'ever look on heaven's scenes, they will find the streets are guarded by United States Ma-rines. '
"Bingo!" Lieutenant Ball said. "That has to be it."
"The Marine Hymn," Weston said. "How long will it take you to decrypt the message using that?"
"About ten minutes," Ball said. "After we get the message."
"That's all you've got? You don't have the message?"
"That's all we have," Sergeant LaMadrid said.
"I'm sure there will be more," Fertig said. "And while we're waiting, Captain Weston, would you care for a beer?"
"Yes, thank you, Sir."
The Signal Officer of USFIP, the Intelligence Officer, his deputy, and the Commanding General had considerably more trouble decrypting the number blocks of Message Two when it arrived two hours later.
06 07 06 08 03
18 23 36 40 45
49 81 04 05 06
07 08 IS 23 38
33 39 43 51 53
01 02 06 18 21
34 47 50 07 15
22 46 27 27 38
02 06 83 47 27
49 51 06 11 26
The highest number used was 53. It was therefore logical to presume that the phrase to use for simple substitution contained fifty-three characters.
STREETSGUARDEDBYUSMARINES
1234667890123456789012345
This was twenty-five characters, although it was possible that the phrase would be repeated twice. They could, Lieutenant Ball said, come back to this later if nothing else seemed to work.
STREETSAREGUARDEDBYUNITEDSTATESMARINES
12345678901234567890123456789012345678
was thirty-eight characters, too short by itself and too long if the phrase was to be duplicated.
THESTREETSAREGUARDEDBYUNITEDSTATESMARINES
12345678901234567890123456789012345678901
was forty-one characters, also too short and too long.
THESTREETSAREGUARDEDBYUSMARINES
1234567890123456789012345678901
was thirty-one characters, also too short by itself, but if used twice, not too much longer (sixty-two characters versus the required fifty-three). It was wor-thy of further consideration. Perhaps the extra nine characters in the repeated phrase would not prove to be important.
Finally, the complete phrase from the Marine Hymn-as precisely as it could be remembered by Weston and Second Lieutenant Percy L. Everly- was tried:
THEYWILLFIINDTHESTREETSAREGUAREDBYUNITEDSTATESMARINES
12345678901234567890123456789012348678901234567890123
It was precisely fifty-three characters. It had to be the substitution phrase. The number blocks of Message Two were decrypted. They made some-not very much, but some-sense.
Lieutenant Percy L. Everly had a stab at it. "Lille-who the hell is Lille?- and Erny-that has to be Zimmerman-will eat beans-what the hell does that mean?-thirty miles suuth-that could be, probably is, 'south' but south of what?-this murning-this morning."
"Sir," Sergeant LaMadrid said, "that's iiller.' With an 'r,' Sir, before the 'and.' "
"Killer!" Lieutenant Everly said. "Goddamn, LaMadrid, you're not as dumb as you look. 'Killer and Erny,' that's what it is."
"Killer and Erny meaning the people you knew, Lieutenant Everly?" General Fertig asked.
"Yes, Sir. China Marines, Sir. Ernie Zimmerman and Killer McCoy."
"Will eat beans thirty miles south this morning?" Weston thought aloud. "The key words are 'beans' and 'thirty miles south.' What the hell can that mean?"
"Beans, beans, beans, lima beans, string beans... isn't there a village called 'St. Rose of Lima" or something like that?" Ball asked.
"Yes, there is," General Fertig said. "And there is also a village called Boston on the east coast. Boston baked beans. Weston, for God's sake I hope you still have our one National Geographic Society map of this island?"
"Yes, Sir."
"I suggest you bring it," Fertig said.
"Thirty miles south of St. Rose of Lima is fifty miles from nowhere, up here in the hills," Captain Weston said, using his finger as a pointer on the tattered map. "Thirty miles south of Boston is this little bump sticking into the ocean."
"I believe they call that a 'promontory,' Captain Weston," Fertig said. "How far is that from here?"
Weston measured it with a scrap of paper applied to the legend on the Na-tional Geographic Society map.
"Sixty miles, Sir."
"If we are to accept that these two people will be eating beans there this morning, we have to define 'morning,' " Fertig said. "One of two things is true. They are already on Mindanao, and are suggesting this as a rendezvous point. Or they will land there, presumably from a submarine. I think I'd bet on the latter. If this assumption is correct, and we further assume a submarine would prefer to surface no longer than is absolutely necessary, I would suggest 'morning' would mean at first light."
"My God," Ball said. "Do you really think someone's coming this morn-ing?"
"Are there any arguments to my assumptions?" Fertig asked.
There were none.
"The next question would then seem to be, gentlemen, what are we going to do about it? There is no way we could get anyone from here-you said sixty miles, Weston?"
"Yes, Sir."
"No way we can get anyone to this point," Fertig went on, "sixty miles distant from here by first light. The possibility exists that whoever these people are, they will attempt to make contact with USFIP, fail to do so, and withdraw."
"General, Sir, excuse me?" Sergeant LaMadrid said.
"Yes, Sergeant?"
"I have the motorcycle, General, Sir."
"Shit," Lieutenant Percy L. Lewis said. "I forgot about that."
"Can we get the motorcycle down to the road at night?" Fertig asked.
"More important, is it running?" Weston asked. "Do we have gas for it? Will it make it for sixty miles?"
"It doesn't have a muffler. It'll call every Jap in ten miles," Everly said.
"It has the gasoline," Sergeant LaMadrid said. "And it will go the dis-tance if the oil does not exhaust itself. I will conduct it with great care."
"You're not going, Sergeant," Fertig said. "I can't afford to lose my radio operator."
W E B Griffin - Corp 07 - Behind the Lines Page 46