"It appears to have healed and knitted satisfactorily," he said.

"The question, Doctor," Jamison said, "is, in your professional medical opinion, can the cast be safely removed? "

"There's a difference, Jamison, between taking it off and declaring this officer fit for duty."

"Can it be safely removed?" Jamison replied. "If so, please remove it."

"Jesus Christ," the other doctor, a lieutenant, said disgustedly.

"Would you get me the cutter, Nurse?" the captain asked.

Janos didn't like what he saw when the cast was removed. The skin beneath, where it was not marked with angry red marks, was unhealthily white, and although he couldn't be sure without actually comparing it side-by-side with his good ankle, it looked to him to be much thinner.

Both doctors manipulated the ankle and the foot. There was no pain, but it was uncomfortable.

"Well?" Jamison asked.

"The fractures," the captain said, "seem to have knitted satisfactorily. There is no pain or impediment of movement that I can detect."

"He can walk, in other words?" Jamison asked.

"Before he can be determined to be physically fit for duty," the captain said, "he will require therapy. Do you concur, Doctor?"

"Jamison," the younger doctor said, "there is muscle atrophy-"

"What kind of therapy?" Jamison asked.

"Walking, actually," the captain said. "Short walks, gradually extended. Manipulation of the foot and ankle to restore movement."

"That'll be all, Janos," Jamison said. "Thank you."

"You said you would tell me," Janos protested.

"You're being considered for an operation," Jamison said.

"When and if it is decided you're going, you'll be told about it."

"When will that decision be made?"

"Tomorrow morning, probably," Jamison said. "Do you think you can manage without your crutches?"

"I don't know," Janos said.

"Give it a try," Jamison said. "If you can, leave the crutches here. If you go back to the bar, go easy on the booze. I don't want you falling down and breaking it again."

The lieutenant, shaking his head, chuckled.

The captain said, "Jamison, I might as well tell you, the moment Major Canidy returns, I'm going to protest this."

"Captain," Jamison said, "all I'm doing is obeying my orders. That's what you do when you put a uniform on, obey orders."

He turned and walked out of the room.

The captain called after him. "Jamison, in my capacity as the senior medical officer present, I absolutely forbid this officer to partic.i.p.ate in a parachute jump."

"Your position has been noted, Doctor," Jamison called, over his shoulder.

Janos got off the X-ray table and gingerly lowered his bare, sick, white foot to the floor.

"Any pain?" the captain asked.

"No," Janos said.

"f.u.c.k him," the captain said, "You use the crutches, Janos. You start using that leg carefully. I'll deal with Jamison. "

Janos hoisted himself back onto the X-ray table and removed his other shoe and sock.

"With the shoe off," Janos said, "I think I can manage."

He lowered himself to the floor again, and then, awkwardly and carefully, walked very slowly out of the X-ray room.

2.

OSS WHITBEY HOUSE STATION KENT, ENGLAND 0600 HOURS 18 FEBRUARY 1943.

First Lieutenant Ferenc Janos marched into the office of the commanding officer, came to attention, and saluted. He was wearing a wool OD (olive drab) Ike jacket and trousers. Parachutist's wings were on the jacket, and his trousers were bloused over glistening Corcoran jump boots. His woolen "overseas" cap was tucked in an epaulet of his jacket.

"Sir, Lieutenant Janos reporting as directed, Sir."

Lt. Colonel Edmund T. Stevens returned the salute.

"Stand at ease, Lieutenant," he said.

Janos was surprised to see the good-looking blond WAC lieutenant in the room. He wondered why. The story about her (which had quickly circulated through Whitbey House) was that she would work for Jamison, taking care of the women.

"How's your ankle, Janos? Straight answer, please," Stevens said.

"With the boot on, sir," Janos said, "no problem."

"How far do you think you could walk on it?" Stevens asked.

"As far as I have to," Janos said.

"An overestimate of capability is dangerous, Janos," Colonel Stevens said.

"Yes, Sir," Janos said.

"A mission of the very highest priority has come up," Stevens said. "You have already expressed your willingness to partic.i.p.ate in a mission involving great personal risk in enemy-occupied territory. You were also made aware that if you were captured, you would be treated not as a prisoner of war but as a spy. I ask you here and now if you still wish to volunteer for such a mission?"

"Yes, Sir," Janos said.

"From this point, Lieutenant," Stevens said, "this conversation is cla.s.sified Top Secret. Divulging what I am about to tell you to anyone, or discussing it with anyone not now present in this room, will const.i.tute a general court-martial offense. Do you fully understand that?"

"Yes, Sir."

"The mission is to free certain people from confinement in the hands of civil authorities in Hungary. I am now going to pose a question to you that I want you to think over very carefully before replying," Stevens went on. "If the mission goes sour, or if the mission cannot be accomplished within a set time frame, you will be required to eliminate, by which I mean kill, or cause to have killed, the people presently imprisoned. Now, are you willing to accept the mission, knowing that may be necessary?"

Janos hesitated, but not for long.

"Yes, Sir," he said. He became aware that the good-looking blond WAC was looking at him. More than looking at him, he realized-evaluating him and doing that very coldly.

"You believe you would be able to . . . and this is the only phrase that fits the situation . . . kill in cold blood the people presently imprisoned. And possibly a substantial number of others who can only be accurately described as 'innocent bystanders'?"

"You're not going to tell me what this is all about?"

"Just please answer my question," Stevens said.

"With your a.s.surance that it's a military necessity, Sir," Janos said.

Stevens nodded.

"Charity?" he asked.

"Even, Freddy," Charity Hoche asked, "if the people who had to be eliminated were known to you? Even if you had met them here?"

"Holy Mother of G.o.d," Janos blurted, and then found control again. "With the same caveat as before, that Colonel Stevens a.s.sures me this is militarily necessary."

There was a knock at the door.

"Yes?" Stevens called impatiently.

"Colonel Dougla.s.s is on the phone for Lieutenant Hoche, Sir," a male voice said.

"I guess I better take it," Charity said after a moment's thought. "He probably just got his orders and wonders what they're all about."

She walked out of the office.

"That was the the important question," Colonel Stevens said. "But there is another important question. For reasons I cannot go into, it is impossible for us to send Lieutenant Shawup on this mission. But the team that he commands will make it. There will be a certain resentment on their part toward you. Can you handle it?" important question," Colonel Stevens said. "But there is another important question. For reasons I cannot go into, it is impossible for us to send Lieutenant Shawup on this mission. But the team that he commands will make it. There will be a certain resentment on their part toward you. Can you handle it?"

"Yes, Sir," Janos said without hesitation.

"They will resent-after having received promises to the contrary-not being under Shawup's leadership. And they will resent being told . . . they will not be asked, they will be told . . . that elimination of the people being held may be necessary. They will resent that, too."

"They'll do what I tell them to do," Janos said confidently.

"You sound very sure of yourself," Stevens said.

"Look at me, Colonel," Janos said. "As big as I am, wouldn't you hate to make me mad?"

Stevens's face went blank for a moment, and then he chuckled.

"Yes, I guess I would," he said.

He leaned over the desk and offered Janos his hand.

"I have every confidence that you can handle this, Lieutenant Janos," he said. "Good luck!"

3.

FERSFIELD ARMY AIR CORPS STATION BEDFORDSHIRE, ENGLAND 1200 HOURS 18 FEBRUARY 1943.

When the P-38 flashed over them, Lieutenant Commander Edwin W. Bitter, USN, Captain Stanley S. Fine, USAAC, and Lieutenant j.g. Joseph P. Kennedy, Jr., USNR, were sitting on folding wooden chairs outside the Quonset hut that served officially as the orderly room of the 402nd Composite Squadron and secretly as the headquarters for Operation Aphrodite.

They were taking the sun. There was precious little sun in England in February, and when it did pop out, everyone who could take the time tried to get out in it.

"I have been told by everybody from Bill Donovan to that ferocious WAC captain in David Bruce's office that asking questions is like farting in the Sistine Chapel," Kennedy said, "but I would still dearly like to know where the h.e.l.l you are taking my brand-new airplane."

"Come on, Joe," Commander Bitter said, a mild reproof.

"Yours not to reason why, Lieutenant," Fine said, smiling at him, "yours but to take yon fighter jockey aloft and see how much you can teach him in an hour or two about driving the B-17."

He gestured in the direction of the P-38, which the pilot had stood on its wing to line it up with the main Fersfield runway.

"I am also just a little curious why that is necessary," Kennedy said, "since here sit Commander Bitter and myself, both fully qualified B-17 pilots, and in my case at least, an extraordinary 'Look Ma, No Copilot' 17 chauffeur. "

Bitter and Fine laughed.

"Your country, Lieutenant," Fine said, "is saving you for more important things."

"You aren't going to tell me, are you, you sonofab.i.t.c.h?" Kennedy said.

"I can't, Joe," Fine said seriously.

They stood up to watch the P-38 land. It came in hot, in a crab, lining up with the runway at the last moment before touching down.

"If yon fighter jockey tries that in a 17," Kennedy said dryly, "we will have one more to park over there."