The Corp - Counterattack Part 17

There was a certain tone of superiority in Captain Kelso's voice. Stecker knew what was behind that. Although Captain Kelso was in fact outranked by Captain Stecker, by date of rank, he could not put out of his mind that Captain Stecker was a Mustang, an officer commissioned from the ranks. As an Annapolis man himself, Kelso considered that he was socially superior to a man who had served in the ranks. This opinion was b.u.t.tressed by his duty a.s.signment: he was aide-de-camp to the Commanding General, 2nd Joint Training Force.

What Captain Kelso did not know was that the Commanding General of the 2nd Joint Training Force had discussed him with Captain Stecker over a beer in the General's kitchen when Captain Stecker had first reported aboard.

"My aide may give you some trouble, Jack," the General had said. He and Stecker had been in Santo Domingo, Nicaragua, and France together. "He's an arrogant little p.r.i.c.k, thinks he's salty as h.e.l.l. Efficient as h.e.l.l, too, to give the devil his due, which is why I keep him. But he's capable of being a flaming pain in the a.s.s. If he does give you any trouble, let me know, and I'll walk all over him."

"General, I've had some experience with young captains who thought they were salty," Stecker had replied dryly, "going way back."

"Your commanding general, Captain, is sure you are not referring to anyone in this kitchen," the General replied, laughing.

"Don't be too sure, General," Stecker chuckled.

"I have never known a master gunnery sergeant who couldn't handle a captain," the General said. "I don't know why I brought that up."

"I appreciate it," Stecker said. "But don't worry about it."

"And how may I be of service to the General's aide-de-camp, Captain Kelso?" Stecker said, oozing enough sarcastically insincere charm to penetrate even Captain Kelso's self-a.s.surance and cause him to become just a little wary. Kelso recalled at that moment that the General habitually addressed Captain Stecker by his first name.

"There's a Navy captain, from the Secretary of the Navy's office, on his way to see you . . ." He paused just perceptibly, and added, "Jack."

"Oh? Who is he? What's he want?"

"His name is Pickering, and I don't know what he wants. He just walked in out of the blue and asked for the General; and when I told him the General wasn't available, he asked for you. I've never seen a set of orders like his."

Now Stecker was curious.

"What about his orders?"

"They say that he is authorized to proceed, on a Four-A priority, wherever he deems necessary to travel in order to perform the mission a.s.signed to him by the Secretary of the Navy, and that all questions concerning his duties will be referred to the office of the Secretary of the Navy."

"That's G.o.dd.a.m.ned unusual," Jack Stecker thought aloud. "I wonder what the h.e.l.l he wants with me?"

"I have no idea. But I'm sure the General would be interested in knowing, too."

"What did you say his name was?"

"Pickering."

Stecker's office door opened and his sergeant stuck his head inside.

"Sir, there's a Captain Pickering to see you, a Navy captain."

"He's here," Stecker said, and hung the telephone up. He got to his feet, checked the knot of his field scarf as an automatic reflex action, and then said, "Ask the Captain to come in, please."

Captain Fleming Pickering, USNR, walked into the office.

"Good afternoon, Sir," Stecker said. "Sir, I'm Captain Stecker, G-3 Special Planning."

Pickering looked at him, smiled, and then turned and closed the door in the Sergeant's face. Then he turned again and faced Stecker.

"h.e.l.lo, Dutch," he said. "How the h.e.l.l are you?"

"Sir, the Captain has the advantage on me."

"I always have had, Dutch. Smarter, better looking . . . You really don't recognize me, do you?" Pickering laughed.

"No, Sir."

"I would have recognized you. You're a little balder, and a little heavier, but I would have known you. The name Pickering means nothing to you?"

"No, Sir."

"I'm crushed," Pickering said. "Try Belleau Wood."

After a moment, Stecker said, "I'll be d.a.m.ned. Flem Pickering, right? California? Corporal? You took two eight-millimeter rounds, one in each leg, and all they did was scratch you?"

"I don't think 'scratch' is the right word," Pickering protested. "I spent two weeks in the hospital when that happened."

"You went into the Navy? Back to college, and then into the Navy? Is that what happened?"

"I just came into the Navy," Pickering said.

"Am I allowed to ask what's going on? You awed the general's aide with your orders, but they didn't explain much."

Pickering reached into his uniform jacket pocket and handed Stecker a copy of his orders.

"I'm awed, too," Stecker said, after he read them.

"You don't have to be awed, but I thought I should show them to you."

"What do you want with me?" Stecker asked, as he handed the orders back. "You didn't come from Was.h.i.+ngton to see me?"

"To tell you the truth, it wasn't until that self-important young man told me that General Davies was not available that I remembered that Doc Mclnerney told me you were out here someplace."

"You've seen Doc?"

"Sure have. And I got another interesting bit of information from him. Our boys are roommates at Pensacola."

"I'll be d.a.m.ned!" Stecker said. "How about that?"

"It would seem, Dutch, that we're getting to be a pair of old men, old enough to have kids who rate salutes."

"I don't know about you, Captain," Stecker said dryly, "but I still feel pretty spry. Too spry to be sitting behind a desk."

"They don't want us for anything else, Dutch," Pickering said. "Mac made that painfully clear to me. We're relics from another time, another war."

"How'd you wind up in the Navy? Or is that one of those questions I'm not supposed to ask?"

"I tried to come back in the Corps. I went to see Mac. He made it pretty plain that I would be of no use to the Corps. Then Frank Knox offered me a job working for him, as sort of a glorified gofer, and I took it. I jumped at it."

"Frank Knox? The one I think of nearly reverently as Secretary Knox?"

"You'd like him, Dutch. He was a sergeant in the Rough Riders. Good man."

"And you're out here for him?"

"Yeah. I'll tell you about it over lunch. Let's go over to the Coronado Beach Hotel. They generally have nice lunches."

"They generally have great lunches, and everybody knows about them, and you need a reservation. I don't think we could get in. We could eat at the club here."

"Indulge me, Dutch," Pickering said. "It isn't only the food I'm thinking of."

"You want to see somebody else?"

"I'm about to appoint you-I'd really rather have gotten into all this over lunch-the Secretary of the Navy's Special Representative to See that Carlson's Raiders Get What They Want. You know about the Raiders?"

"I'm already the General's man who does that," Stecker said. "Is that why you're here?"

Pickering nodded. "So much the better, then. The Navy bra.s.s are as curious as a bunch of old maids about what I'm doing here. It will get back to them that I had lunch in the Coronado with you. It might come in handy for them to remember you have friends in very high places when you're asking for something outrageous for the Raiders."

Stecker looked at Pickering for a moment, until he concluded that Pickering was both serious and right.

"OK. But first we have to get from here to the hotel, and my car may not start. Bad battery, I think. I had to push it off this morning."

"The Admiral's aide met my plane and graciously gave me the use of the Admiral's car for as long as I need it," Pickering said.

"And then we have to get in the dining room."

"I think I can handle that," Pickering said. "Can I have your sergeant make a call for me?"

"Sure," Stecker said, and called the sergeant into the office.

"Yes, Sir?"

"Sergeant," Pickering said, "would you call the dining room at the Coronado Beach for me, please? Tell the maitre d' that Captain Stecker and myself are on the way over there, and that I would like a private table overlooking the pool. My name is Fleming Pickering."

"Aye, aye, Sir," the sergeant said. "A private table, Sir?"

"They'll know what I mean, Sergeant," Pickering said. "They'll move other tables away from mine, so that other people won't be able to hear what Captain Stecker and I are talking about."

"Why is this making me nervous?" Stecker asked.

"I have no idea," Pickering said. "Maybe because you're getting old, Dutch."

"If there are any calls for me, Sergeant, tell them that I went off with Captain Pickering of Secretary Knox's office, and you have no idea where I went or when I'll be back."

Pickering chuckled. "You're a quick learner, Dutch, aren't you?"

"For an old man," Stecker said.

(Five) United States Naval Hospital San Diego, California 1515 Hours 2 February 1942 "Tell me, Sergeant," the Navy doctor, a full commander, said to Staff Sergeant Joseph L. Howard, "do you suffer from syphilis?"

"No, Sir."

"How about gonorrhea?" Commander Nettleton asked.

"No, Sir."

Commander K. J. Nettleton, MC, USN, was a career naval officer. In his fifteen years of service, he had discussed venereal disease with maybe fifteen thousand Navy and Marine Corps enlisted men. In his experience, it was seldom possible to judge from an enlisted man's appearance whether he had been diving the salami into seas of spirochetes or not.

He had treated angelic-looking boys who-as their advanced state of social disease clearly proved-had been sowing their seed in any cavity that could be induced to hold still for twenty seconds. And he'd treated leather-skinned chief bosun's mates and mastery gunnery sergeants who had not strayed from the marital bed in twenty years, yet were hysterically convinced that a little urethral drip was G.o.d finally making them pay for a single indiscretion two decades ago in Gitmo or Shanghai or Newport.

But it was also Dr. Nettleton's experience that when regular sailors and Marines-sergeants and petty officers on their second or third or fourth hitch-contracted a venereal disease somewhere along the line, they tried to get their hands on their medical records so they could remove and destroy that portion dealing with their venereal history. They had learned how the services subtly and cruelly treated men with social diseases.

His experience told him that's what he had at hand, in the person of Staff Sergeant Joseph Howard, USMC. Sergeant Howard was taking a pre-commissioning physical. That meant he had applied for a commission. An Officer Selection Board was likely to turn down an applicant who had a history of VD, even one who was obviously a good Marine. You didn't get to wear staff sergeant's chevrons as young as this kid was without being one h.e.l.l of a Marine-and one who looked like he belonged on a recruiting poster.

"Sergeant," he said, "if anyone was to hear what I am about to say, I would deny it."

"Sir?" Howard asked, confused.

"There are ways to handle difficult situations," Commander Nettleton said. "But destroying your records is not one of them. Now, what did you have, and when did you have it?"

"Sir, if you mean syphilis or the clap, I never did."

Nettleton fixed Howard with an icy glare.

You dumb sonofab.i.t.c.h, I just told you I'd fix it!

"Never?"

"No, Sir," Howard replied, both confused and righteously indignant.

I'll be d.a.m.ned, I think he's telling the truth.'

'Then how do you explain the absence of the results of your Wa.s.sermann test in this otherwise complete stack of reports?"

Staff Sergeant Howard did not reply.

"Well?"

"Sir, I don't know what-what did you say, Wa.s.ser Test?- is."

"Wa.s.sermann," Doctor Nettleton corrected him idly. "It's an integral part of your physical."

"Sir, I don't know. I went everywhere they sent me."

Commander Nettleton looked at him intently, and decided he didn't really know if he was looking at Innocence Personified or a skilled liar.