Griffin W.E.B. - The Corps 08 - In Dangers Path

The Marquis da Lafayette Suite

The Foster Lafayette Hotel

Washington, D.C.

1140 28 March 1943

Brigadier General Fleming Pickering, USMCR, was sitting in a red leather armchair in the library, a long thin black cigar in his mouth, his feet up on a matching footstool, and reading the

Washington Star

. Except for his tunic, he was in uniform. Hart had that laid out on a library table, making sure that all of its insignia, plus the three-by-five-inch array of ribbons, were precisely in position.

Hart's own uniform, complete to the cord identifying him as an aide-de-camp to a general officer, was fresh from the hotel valet.

Four new, identical canvas suitcases had been placed in a row by the door to the sitting room. When they returned from lunch, they would immediately leave for Anacostia Naval Air Station. A Naval Air Transport Command R4-D had been provided to take Pickering to the West Coast. It would also carry just over two tons of meteorological equipment and shortwave radios, plus two Navy meteorologists. They would pick up three more Navy meteorologists at the Great Lakes Naval Training Station outside Chicago.

They were all enlisted men. One of those waiting at Anacostia was a chief weatherman, an old salt with eighteen years in the Navy. With him was a weatherman third class who had been a meteorologist before being drafted into the Navy eight months previously. The men they would pick up en route to San Diego were apprentice seamen who had been meteorologists before they were drafted into the Navy. All had volunteered for a «classified mission outside the continental United States involving great personal risk.» None of them yet knew they were going into the Gobi Desert to operate a weather station—more accurately, that it was

hoped

they could be sent there. Pickering planned to tell them what they had volunteered for on the long flight from San Diego to Pearl Harbor.

Since their route to Chicago would make a stop at the Memphis Naval Air Station almost convenient—they had to refuel someplace en route, and Memphis was a good choice—Pickering had told Captain David Haughton, Navy Secretary Frank Knox's administrative assistant, to schedule an overnight stop at Memphis.

He wanted to have dinner with Pick before departing again for the Pacific. After wondering whether he was taking advantage of his position in arranging it, he decided to hell with it. He wanted to have dinner with Pick. There was no telling when they would get together again. There was also no telling, in fact, when he'd see his wife again. She was too tied up in San Francisco, she told him, to come to San Diego to see him off.

The chime sounded. Pickering looked up at Second Lieutenant George F. Hart, USMCR. «With a little bit of luck, that will be someone regretting that lunch is off,» he said, «and we can get the hell out of here now.» He immediately regretted saying that. Hart was really looking forward to the luncheon. He had even told his father and mother about it.

Hart walked quickly out of the library to answer the door. A moment later, Brigadier General F. L. Rickabee, USMC, entered the library, wearing his customary mussed and somewhat ill-fitting suit. He carried a briefcase chained to his wrist, and there was a bulge in his left armpit Pickering knew was a .45 pistol in a shoulder holster.

«Hello, Fritz,» Pickering said cordially. «What's up?»

«I'm glad I caught you,» Rickabee said, setting the briefcase on the library table and unlocking the handcuff.

«I was hoping you were a messenger telling me I didn't have to go,» Pickering said without thinking.

Rickabee worked the combination lock on the battered briefcase, took from it a single sheet of paper, and handed it to Pickering. «I don't like to think how this came into my hands,» Rickabee said.

«What is it?» Pickering asked, as he started to read it.

T O P S E C R E T

SPECIAL CHANNEL

DUPLICATION FORBIDDEN

US MILITARY MISSION TO CHINA

CHUNGKING

1730 25 MARCH 1943

VIA SPECIAL CHANNEL

EYES ONLY

BRIG GEN FLEMING PICKERING USMCR

DEPUTY DIRECTOR PACIFIC OPERATIONS

OSS WASHINGTON DC

1. ALL PERSONNEL AND EQUIPMENT ARRIVED HERE SAFELY AND WITHOUT INCIDENT 0830 LOCALTTME 26MAR43.

2. MAJGEN FT. DEMPSEY, USA, CHIEF SIGNAL OFFICER HQ USMMCHI AND HIS DEPUTY BRIGGEN J.R. NBWLEY, USA HAD PREVIOUS KNOWLEDGE OF ARRIVAL PERSONNEL AND EQUIPMENT AND PURPOSE THEREOF. MAJGEN DEMPSEY HAS INFORMED THE UNDERSIGNED HIS AND BRIGGEN NEWLEY'S MAGIC CLEARANCES ARE EXPECTED SHORTLY.

3. MAJGEN DEMPSEY HAS STATED UNDERSIGNED IS TO CONSIDER HIMSELF CRYPTOGRAPHIC OFFICER ATTACHED TO HIS STAFF WITH RESPONSIBILrrY FOR MAGIC AND SPECIAL CHANNEL. PRESUMABLY SAME APPLIES TO LT EASTERBROOK, GUNNER RUTTERMAN AND ON HIS ARRIVAL LT MOORE.

4. MAJGEN DEMPSEY HAS DIRECTED THAT ALL MAGIC AND SPECIAL TRAFFIC COMMUNICATION BE ROUTED THROUGH HIM OR HIS DEPUTY.

5. WHEN UNDERSIGNED RESPECTFULLY DECLINED TO ANSWER MAJGEN DEMPSEY"S QUESTIONS REGARDING MISSION OF MCCOY AND ZIMMERMAN, MAJGEN DEMPSBY ORDERED THE UNDERSIGNED TO ORDER MCCOY AND ZIMMERMAN TO REPORT TO STATION CHIEF OSS CHUNGKING.

6. COMPLIANCE WITH THIS ORDER WAS NOT POSSIBLE INASMUCH AS UNDERSIGNED HAD, PRIOR TO REPORTING TO MAJGEN DEMPSEY, DETACHED MCCOY AND ZIMMERMAN WITH ORDERS TO PROCEED ON THEIR MISSION. THEIR PRESENT WHEREABOUTS UNKNOWN, BUT STRONG POSSIBILITY EXISTS THEY WILL CONTACT UNDERSIGNED BEFORE LEAVING CHUNGKING SOMETIME WITHIN NEXT SEVEN TO TEN DAYS.

7. IN COMPLIANCE WITH ORDERS OF MAJGEN DEMPSEY, ALL FUTURE TRAFFIC UTILIZING SPECIAL CHANNEL WILL BE BROUGHT TO HIS OR BRIGGEN NEWLEY'S ATTENTION.

BANNING, LTCOL, USMC

T O P S E C R E T

«What the hell is this all about?» Pickering asked. He passed the document to Hart.

«It means magic may damned well be compromised,» Rickabee said.

«Yeah,» Pickering agreed thoughtfully.

«Who told this General Dempsey?» Pickering asked, then warmed to his anger. «And where did he get the idea he has the authority to tell my people what to do? And what the hell is this 'OSS station Chungking'?

What

OSS station Chungking?»

«The magic compromise, possible compromise, is more important than the Gobi Desert operation,» Rickabee said. «This came in two hours ago. To confirm what I suspect, this is the first you've seen of it?»

«Yeah,» Pickering said. «Damn!» He looked at Rickabee.

If it came in two hours ago, there was plenty of time to send it over here from the OSS.

«Where did you get it, Fritz?» Pickering asked evenly.

«One of my people was in the crypto room at Navy when it came in,» Rickabee said. «A pal of Rutterman's, and an admirer of Banning and McCoy. He thought I would be interested in it, and defying just about every regulation in the book, he brought it to me. I don't know whether I should court-martial the sonofabitch or promote him for his initiative.»

«This is the original?» Pickering asked, confused.

«No. That's the JCS file copy. You're supposed to have the original.»

«And I damned sure don't!»

«Is Donovan going to be at lunch?» Rickabee asked.

«Oh, yeah. Marshall, Leahy, Donovan, me, and, of course Frank Knox and the President.»

«You're in a minefield here, I guess you understand,» Rickabee said. «

We're

in a minefield.»

«You don't think Donovan is going to blame me for the compromise of

MAGIC?»

«I don't know,» Rickabee said. «I'm paid to look for the worst that can happen.»

«General,» Lieutenant Hart said, «the car is supposed to be downstairs right now.»

«Okay,» Pickering said as he rose to his feet and walked toward Hart, who was holding Pickering's tunic out to him. Pickering put it on and buttoned it, then, examining himself in the mirror, tugged at its skirt. Satisfied, he looked at Rickabee.