"About the ships? Oh G.o.d, that sounds ominous!"

"He wants me to go into the Navy," Pickering said.

There was a pause before Patricia replied, "If you had turned him down, you would have said 'wanted.'"

"Yes, that's right."

He heard her inhale deeply; it was a moment before she spoke.

"When do you go? What are you going to do?"

"Soon. Work for him. He's arranging for me to be commissioned as a captain."

"Oh, G.o.dd.a.m.n him!"

"I suppose I should have discussed this with you," Pickering said.

"Why should you start now, after all these years?" It was a failed attempt at lightness; a genuine bitterness came through.

"I'm sorry, Pat," he. said, meaning it.

"My father would say, 'Never be sorry for doing something you want to do.' And you do want to go, Flem, don't you?"

"Yes. I suppose I do."

"Don't come home now. I'd say things I would later regret."

"OK.".

"Give me an hour. Make it an hour and a half. Then come."

He heard the click as she hung up.

(Three) Building "F"

Anacostia Naval Air Station Washington, D.C.

30 January 1942 First Lieutenant Charles E. Orfutt, aide-de-camp to Brigadier General D. G. Mclnerney, stepped inside Mclnerney's office, closed the door quietly behind him, and waited until the General raised his eyes from the paperwork on his desk.

"Sergeant Galloway is outside, Sir."

That the news did not please General Mclnerney was evident on his face. He shrugged, exhaled audibly, and said, "Give me two minutes, Charlie, and then send him in."

"Aye, aye, Sir," Orfutt said, and quietly left the office.

Precisely two minutes later, there was a polite knock at Mclnerney's door.

"Come!"

Technical Sergeant Charles M. Galloway, USMC, in greens, marched into the office, stopped precisely eighteen inches from Mclnerney's desk, and came to attention. Then, gazing twelve inches over Mclnerney's head, he said, "Technical Sergeant Galloway reporting to the General as ordered, Sir."

General Mclnerney pushed himself backward in his chair, locked his fingers together, and stared at Galloway for a full thirty seconds before he spoke.

"Look at me," he said.

Oh, s.h.i.t. Here it comes, Charley Galloway thought. He dropped his eyes to meet Mclnerney's.

"Do you have any idea how much G.o.dd.a.m.ned trouble you've caused?"

"Yes, Sir. I think so."

"You don't look especially penitent, Sergeant."

"Sir, I'm sorry about the trouble I caused."

"But you think it was really caused by a bunch of chickens.h.i.t swabbies, and in your heart of hearts you don't think you did anything wrong, do you?"

The old b.a.s.t.a.r.d can read my mind.

Galloway's face went pale, but he didn't reply.

"You're thinking that you were almost a Marine Corps legend, is that it? That you'd be remembered as the guy who fixed up a shot-up fighter with his own hands, flew it without orders onto the Saratoga, and then on to Wake, and died gloriously in a battle that will live forever in the memory of man?"

Again, Galloway's face paled momentarily, but he didn't say anything.

That's not true. I wasn't trying to be a f.u.c.king hero. All I was trying to do was get that Wildcat to Wake, where it was needed.

"What the h.e.l.l were you thinking, Galloway? Can you at least tell me that?"

"I was thinking they needed that Wildcat on Wake, Sir."

"Did it occur to you that in the shape that Wildcat was, you could have done some real damage, crashing it onto the deck of the Saratoga?"

"Sir, the aircraft was in good shape," Galloway said.

"It had been surveyed, for Christ's sake, by skilled BUAIR engineering personnel and declared a total loss." He was referring to the U.S. Navy Bureau of Aeronautics.

"Sir, the aircraft was OK," Galloway insisted doggedly. "Sir, I made the landing."

General Mclnerney believed everything Galloway was telling him. He also believed that if he were a younger man, given the same circ.u.mstances, he would-he hoped-have done precisely what Galloway had done. That meant doing what you could to help your squadron mates, even if that meant putting your a.s.s in a potentially lethal crack. It had taken a large set of b.a.l.l.s to take off the way Galloway had. If he hadn't found Sara, he would have been shark food.

The general also found it hard to fault a young man who, fully aware of what he was going to find when he got there, had ridden-OK, flown-toward the sound of the guns. Purposely sailed, to put it poetically, into harm's way.

And he also believed that Galloway had actually come very close to becoming a Marine Corps legend. Professionally-as opposed to parochially, as a Marine-General Mclnerney believed that it had been a mistake to recall Task Force 14 before, at the very least, it had flown its aircraft off to reinforce the Wake Island garrison.

That move came as the result of a change of command. Things almost always got f.u.c.ked up during a change of command, at least initially. How much Admiral Husband E. Kimmel, the former Commander in Chief, Pacific Fleet, was responsible for the disaster at Pearl Harbor was open to debate. But since he was CINCPAC, he was responsible for whatever happened to the ships of his command. And after the j.a.panese had wiped out Battleship Row, he had to go.

Mclnerney privately believed-from his admittedly parochial viewpoint as an aviator-that the loss of most of the battleship fleet was probably a blessing in disguise. There were two schools in the upper echelons of the Navy, the Battleship Admirals and the Carrier Admirals. There was no way that the Battleship Admirals could any longer maintain that their dreadnoughts were impregnable to airplanes; most of their battleships were on the bottom at Pearl.

Conversely, the Carrier Admirals could now argue that battleships were vulnerable to carrier-borne aircraft, using the same carnage on Battleship Row at Pearl Harbor as proof of their argument. That just might give command of the naval war in the Pacific to the Carrier Admirals.

Mclnerney knew that it wouldn't be an all-out victory for the Carrier Admirals over the Battleship Admirals. The battleships that could be repaired would be repaired and sent into action; those still under construction would be completed. But if it came to choosing between a new battleship and a new carrier, the Navy would get a new carrier. And the really senior Navy bra.s.s would no longer be able to push Carrier Admirals subtly aside in favor of Battleship Admirals.

No aircraft carriers had been sunk at Pearl. It might have been just dumb luck that they were all at sea, but the point was that none of them had been sunk. And since there were no longer sufficient battleships to do it, it would be the aircraft carriers that would have to carry the battle to the enemy. And when the discussions were held about how to take the battle to the enemy, the opinions of the Carrier Admirals would carry much more weight than they had on December 6, 1941.

Admiral Husband E. Kimmel had to go, and he knew it, and so did everybody else in CINCPAC Headquarters. From 1100 on December 7, Kimmel had had to consider himself only the caretaker of the Pacific Fleet, holding the authority of CINCPAC only until his replacement could get to Hawaii. As it actually turned out, he wasn't even given that. He was relieved, and an interim commander appointed, while Admiral King and the rest of the bra.s.s in Washington made up their minds who would replace him.

They had settled on Admiral Chester W. Nimitz. Mclnerney personally knew Nimitz slightly, and liked him. Professionally, he knew him better and admired him. But Nimitz hadn't even been chosen to be CINCPAC when the decision had been made to send three carrier groups to sea, two to make diversionary strikes, and the third, Task Force 14, to reinforce Wake.

The decision to recall it had come after the humiliated Kimmel had been relieved, and before Nimitz could get to Hawaii and raise his flag as CINCPAC.

Mclnerney believed the recall order did not take into consideration what a b.l.o.o.d.y nose the Americans on Wake had given the j.a.panese with the pitifully few men, weapons, and aircraft at their disposal. Commander Winfield Scott Cunningham, the overall commander on Wake, and the Marines under Majors Devereux and Putnam, had practically worked miracles with what they had.

The decision to recall Task Force 14 had obviously been made because it was not wise to risk Sara and the three cruisers. Mclnerney was willing to admit that probably made sense, given the overall strength of the battered Pacific Fleet; but there was no reason for not making a greater effort to reinforce Wake.

Another twelve hours' steaming would have put them within easy range to fly VFM-221's F2A-3 Buffalo fighters (and Galloway's lone F4F-4 Wildcat) off Sara onto Wake. It seemed likely to Mclnerney that risking the Tangier, with her Marine Defense Battalion and all that ammunition aboard, by sending her onto Wake would have been justified. Tangier could probably have been given air cover by VFM-221 and, for a while at least, as Sara steamed in the opposite direction, by Navy fighters aboard Sara.

Instead, Tangier had turned around with the others and gone back to Pearl Harbor . . . and at the moment she turned, she was almost at the point where the carriers could have launched aircraft to protect her.

Mclnerney was not willing to go so far as to a.s.sert that the presence of the additional aircraft (he was painfully aware of the inadequacies of the Buffalo) and the reinforcement Defense Battalion would have kept the j.a.panese from taking Wake, but there was no doubt in his mind that the planes and the men- and, more important, the five-inch sh.e.l.ls-would have made it a very costly operation for them.

If that had happened, and if T/Sgt. Charley Galloway had managed to get his Wildcat onto Wake and into the battle, he would have become a Marine Corps legend.

But it hadn't happened. Sara and the rest of Task Force 14 had returned to Pearl with Galloway and his F4F-4 aboard.

There was a good deal of frustration aboard Sara when that happened. Mclnerney had learned that a number of senior officers had actually recommended to the Task Force Commander that he ignore the recall order from Pearl and go on with the original mission. In the end, of course, they had obeyed their orders.

Meanwhile, Mclnerney guessed-very sure he was close to the truth-that some chickens.h.i.t sonofab.i.t.c.h, probably a swabbie, had pointed out that what that d.a.m.ned Marine flying sergeant had done was in clear violation of any number of regulations.

Since that sort of thing couldn't be tolerated, charges were drawn up. And since people were looking for something, or someone, on whom to vent their frustration, Galloway had wound up being charged with everything but unlawful carnal knowledge.

General court-martial charges had actually been drawn up against him. But when it came to convening the court, they had found out that general court-martial authority was not vested in CINCPAC, but in the Commanding General of the 2nd Marine Aircraft Wing, back in San Diego, because VFM-211 was under its command.

So they had put T/Sgt. Galloway under arrest, on a transport bound for San Diego. And they'd air-mailed all the charges and specifications to the Commanding General, 2nd Marine Air Wing, "for appropriate action."

The Commanding General of the 2nd Marine Air Wing, realizing a hot potato had dropped in his lap, had quickly tossed it upstairs and into the lap of Major General D. G. Mclnerney, at Headquarters, USMC.

A court-martial was now out of the question, as a practical matter. It would be impossible to gather the witnesses necessary for a successful prosecution in Washington. They were all over the Pacific. And some of them were dead. There was, besides, the question of the press. It would look to the press-as it looked to Mclnerney-as though the Marine Corps was about to try to punish somebody for trying to fight for his country.

"But we have to do something, Mac," the Major General Commandant had said when Mclnerney reluctantly brought the matter to his attention. "Even Ernie King has heard about your Sergeant Galloway. Use your best judgment; I'll back you up, whatever you decide."

Mclnerney knew what would satisfy the Navy, short of a court-martial: a letter saying that Galloway had been relieved of flying duties and a.s.signed elsewhere.

"I'm really furious with you, Galloway, about this," Mclnerney said. "You've cost me a fine fighter pilot and what I'm sure would have been a superior squadron commander."

"Sir?"

"You! You dumb sonofab.i.t.c.h!" Mclnerney said, with a fury that started out as an act, but became genuine as he realized that he was speaking the truth.

"I'm sorry, Sir, I don't understand."

"If you could have restrained your Alan Ladd-Errol Flynn-Ronald Reagan movie-star heroics for a couple of weeks, there would have been bars on your collar points and a squadron to command. You could more than likely have done some real damage to the enemy, a lot more than you could have caused even if you had managed to get that jury-rigged wreck to Wake. And probably taught some of these kids things that just might have kept them alive."

"I never even thought about a commission," Galloway replied, so surprised, Mclnerney noticed, that he did not append "Sir" to his reply.

"That's your G.o.dd.a.m.n trouble! You don't think!"

"Yes, Sir."

"The Corps spent a lot of time and money training you, Galloway, and now that's all going to be wasted."

"Sir?"

"It will be a cold day in h.e.l.l, Galloway, before you get in a c.o.c.kpit again."

"Yes, Sir," Galloway said.

Mclnerney saw in Galloway's eyes that that had gotten to him. The worst punishment that could be meted out to someone like Galloway was to take flying, any kind of flying, but especially flying a fighter plane, away from him.

I wonder why I said that? I don't mean it For a number of reasons, including both that the Corps needs pilots like Galloway, and that I have no intention of punishing him for doing something I would have done myself.

"It has not been decided whether to proceed with your court-martial, Galloway. Until that decision has been made, you will report to MAG-11 at Quantico. You will work in maintenance. But you will not get in the c.o.c.kpit of a Texan, or any other aircraft, to so much as taxi it down a taxiway."

"Aye, aye, Sir."

"That's all, Sergeant. You may go."

"Yes, Sir. Thank you, Sir," T/Sgt. Charley Galloway said. He did an about-face and marched out of General Mclnerney's office.

Lieutenant Orfutt came into General Mclnerney's office a moment later.

"Have a memo typed up to General Holcomb," Mclnerney said, "saying that I have temporarily a.s.signed Sergeant Galloway to Quantico for duty as an aircraft maintenance supervisor. And then do a letter to CINCPAC saying that appropriate action in the case of Sergeant Galloway is being implemented."

"Aye, aye, Sir," Orfutt said. "d.a.m.ned shame to lose his experience."

"You're not listening carefully, again, Charlie," Mclnerney said. "The operative word is temporarily."

"Oh," Orfutt said, and smiled. "Yes, Sir."

"And I said something in the heat of anger that might make some sense. Get a teletype out to the 1st and 2nd Aircraft wings, telling them to review the records of the Naval Aviation Pilots and submit to me within seven days a list of those they can recommend for commissions. Put in there somewhere that the lack of a college degree is not to be considered disqualifying."

"Aye, aye, Sir."

"Is there anything else, Charlie?"

"Sir, you're having lunch at the Army-Navy Club with Admiral Ward."