In Danger's Path (93 page)

It looks like a very large, shaggy dog
, Williamson thought.

“Captain McCoy, sir. Welcome to Station Nowhere.”

So that is the legendary Killer McCoy, is it?

“Good afternoon, Captain,” Williamson said, snappily returning the salute. “It's very nice to be here.”

By then Sea Gypsy Two was on the ground and had taxied next to Sea Gypsy One.

The fairing that had replaced the right bubble of Sea Gypsy Two opened and a huge man wearing cold-weather gear and a chief petty officer's cap jumped out. He dropped to his knees and kissed the snowy ground. “Thank you, God!” he announced dramatically.

McCoy laughed.

“What was that all about?”

“That's Chief McGuire,” Major Williamson said dryly. “He was thrown over the side, so to speak, of the
Sunfish
.”

A second figure came through the opening.

“That's Captain James B. Weston,” Major Williamson said. “One hell of a man, one hell of a Marine. He was a guerrilla in the Philippines.”

“I know,” McCoy said, “What's he doing here?”

“He volunteered. You say you know him?”

“I met him briefly one time,” McCoy said. “In the Philippines.”

McCoy started to walk toward him.

A third figure came through the fairing and jumped to the ground.

In the instant McCoy recognized him, the third figure shouted furiously: “Don't try to get away from me, you sonofabitch!”

Captain Weston stopped and waited for Lieutenant Pickering to catch up with him. “What the hell is the matter with you, Pick?” he asked, confused, just before Lieutenant Pickering punched him in the mouth. Captain Weston fell over backward.

McCoy rushed to Pick and wrapped his arms around him. “What the hell is the matter with you?”

“That sonofabitch has not only been fucking my Martha,” Pick said, “but taking despicable advantage of her!”

“Oh, my God!” Captain Weston said. “You're the one she told me about!”

“Despicable advantage?” McCoy asked incredulously. “What the hell does that mean?”

“He's right,” Captain Weston said. “My behavior has been despicable.”

“I don't believe what I'm seeing,” Major Williamson said. “Pickering, you get your childish temper under control, or, so help me God, I'll have you placed in irons.”

“That might be a little difficult here, Major,” Captain McCoy said. “But I guess we could spread-eagle the crazy bastard on a wagon wheel.”

That was too much for Major Williamson. He could not control his laughter. That triggered the same reaction in Captain McCoy, making it very difficult to hold on to Pick.

“Lieutenant Pickering,” Major Williamson said, as sternly as he could, “you will consider yourself under arrest to quarters. And you, Weston, will stop your despicable behavior, whatever it is!”

These words triggered a further outburst of hysterical laughter from Major Williamson and Captain McCoy, and also served to dampen Lieutenant Pickering's fury.

McCoy, feeling him relax, let him go.

Pickering stood where he was, looking embarrassed.

But not before Chief Motor Machinist's Mate Frederick C. Brewer, USN, and Technical Sergeant Moses Abraham, with very confused looks on their faces, rode up to them on two very small ponies.

Only three people were in the ambulance now—Major Williamson, Chief Brewer, and McCoy—all that McCoy felt were needed to talk about what had to be done. This took no more than five minutes, including an explanation to Chief Brewer of the reasons why they had to immediately destroy the aircraft and move out of the area. Though Brewer seemed to accept all this calmly, McCoy wondered how successful Brewer would be in passing it on to the gypsies.

“The only question, as I see it,” McCoy said, “is whether we torch the airplanes now or in the morning. If we do it tonight, the light could be seen a long distance. In the morning, ditto for the smoke.”

“There is one more option, Captain, that you haven't considered,” Major Williamson said.

“Sir?”

“We had a tailwind coming in here,” Williamson said. “I think there may be enough fuel remaining between the Catalinas to fly one of them out of here.”

“I hadn't even considered that,” McCoy said. “From the beginning, this was supposed to be a one-way mission.”

“I'd like to try it,” Williamson said. “I've got a wife and kids waiting for me in Pensacola.”

“Do you have a map?” McCoy asked. “There's an airfield at Yümen. That's where we came from.”

“That's where I was thinking we might go,” Williamson said. He took a folded map from the side pocket of his leather jacket. “You will notice, Captain, that this is not your standard aeronautical navigation chart,” Williamson added. “So this proposed flight plan will not be up to my usual impeccable standards.” He took a pencil from the same pocket and used it as an improvised compass to compute the distance from where they were to Yümen. Then, on the back of an envelope bearing the return address of the Pensacola Yacht Club, he made some quick—but careful—calculations.

“Yeah,” he said. “I think it can be done. Between the two airplanes, I think we should have enough fuel. Weston is a better Cat driver than I am; he probably has more fuel remaining than I do. And I've got enough for two hundred miles, maybe a little more.”

“How many people could you take with you?” McCoy asked.

“The problem there, Captain,” Chief Brewer said, “is who would go? We have two really sick men and one sick woman. But who else?”

“I could probably take a ton,” Williamson said. “That's seven people at a hundred and fifty pounds per. The old rule of the sea is women and children first.”

McCoy did not respond directly. “And torch just the one plane,” he said.

“I have a suggestion there, too,” Williamson said. “Leave enough fuel in the tanks of the other Catalina for ten, fifteen minutes. Take it off. The pilot trims it up in a shallow climb and jumps. That would take it thirty, fifty miles—maybe more—before it ran out of gas and crashed. Empty, a Cat will glide a long way.”

“That way we wouldn't have to move right away,” McCoy said.

“Who would you send out?” Chief Brewer asked. “A lot of people will think they have the right to go.”

“Gunny Zimmerman is going out,” McCoy said, looking at Brewer. “And he's not about to leave his wife and kids again, so they're going.”

“That's liable to cause some resentment,” Chief Brewer said.

“So is Mrs. Banning and her baby,” McCoy said.

“When my people find out that a plane is leaving,” Chief Brewer said, “they'll want to decide who goes on it. Either vote on it or maybe pick names out of a hat.”

“This is not open for discussion, Chief,” McCoy said coldly. “Gunny Zimmerman is going, and so are his wife and kids. And Mrs. Banning and her baby. If there's any more room, then the sick people. And if there's any room after that, you can send whoever you want.”

“You're going?” Brewer asked.

“No, I'm not. Major Williamson will pick his copilot. Everybody else stays.”

Williamson raised one eyebrow but said nothing.

“If we're going to do this,” McCoy said, “we'll have to do it first thing in the morning. So we'd better start getting the fuel transferred.”

“Okay. That shouldn't be much of a problem. Chief McGuire, the guy who kissed the ground, built some special fuel-transfer pumps to get fuel to the main from the auxiliary tanks—which he also built.”

“And there's one thing more,” McCoy said. “Major, I want you to find Lieutenant Colonel Ed Banning—he's probably in Chungking—and personally turn Zimmerman and the women over to him. I'm going to write Banning a letter saying how I think we can get the rest of these people out, and I don't want anybody but Banning to see it.”

“Sure,” Williamson said after a just barely perceptible hesitation.

I'll be damned. I almost said, “Aye, aye, sir
.”

“McCoy,” Williamson said. “If we can get the Army Air Corps in Yümen to loan us a C-46—or, for that matter, a C-47—we can get these people out of here in a matter of days.”

“No,” McCoy said simply.

“Just like that, ‘no'?” Chief Brewer said. “Why not?”

McCoy turned to look at him. “The priority here, Chief, is to keep this weather station going. The only way to do that is not draw the Japs' attention to it. Every time an airplane leaves Yümen, the Japs know about it. And when it lands wherever it's going, they know about that, too. If a C-46 took off from Yümen and didn't land someplace else, the Japs would start wondering why. And start looking for answers.”

“It would only take one flight,” Brewer protested.

“I almost told Major Williamson to torch both planes,” McCoy said, “because when that Catalina lands at Yümen, the Japs will be wondering where it came from. And start looking for answers.”

And
, Williamson thought,
if he had told me to torch both planes, I would have
.

“I decided sending Gunny Zimmerman out,” McCoy went on, “justified the risk—”

“Your sergeant and his wife and kids, and the Colonel's wife and—” Chief Brewer interrupted.

“Get this straight, Chief,” McCoy cut him off, coldly angry. “I don't have to justify a goddamned thing to you.”

“McCoy,” Williamson said, “I can sort of understand the chief's position—”

“Or to you, either, Major,” McCoy snapped, turning to meet Williamson's eyes. “With respect, sir, I'm in command here. My orders regarding you and the other airplane drivers is to get you out of here as soon as I can, without endangering the mission. In other words, you'll go, or not go, when and how I decide.”

“No offense.”

“If you're uncomfortable flying the one plane out here, fine. I'll have Weston fly it out. The only reason I decided to let you fly it is that you're the only pilot who's married.”

“I didn't mean to question your authority, Captain.”

“Thank you, sir,” McCoy said.

[SEVEN]
Headquarters, 32nd Military District
Yümen, China
1430 3 May 1943

Major Avery Williamson, USMC, estimated that he had had one-point-two-five hours of fuel remaining when he touched down at Yümen, escorted by two Chinese Curtiss P-40 fighters that had intercepted him a hundred miles away.

He felt bad about that. He could have brought out more people, and it didn't help much to tell himself that he had done what he could to bring out as many people as he could, including flying without a copilot.

As he should have expected, Weston refused to fly as copilot. He could not in good conscience do so, he said, if that would mean leaving women and children behind. Weston's selflessness had shamed Lieutenants Stevenson and Pickering into making the same statement. In fact, Pickering was so inspired—or maybe shamed—by Weston that he insisted on flying the other Catalina off into the desert and then parachuting from it.

Williamson waited to hear that Pickering had landed safely—a little bruised, but not seriously hurt—before taking off with Gunny Zimmerman and fifteen women and children aboard, plus two seriously ill male gypsies, a Yangtze River sailor, and a 15th Infantry soldier.

The two P-40s stayed on his wingtips until he actually touched down, then they added throttle and went around to land themselves. Until the very last moment, Williamson suspected, they probably feared he was a Japanese aircraft in American markings. They didn't see many Catalinas in inland China, and, with the bubbles removed and faired over, his Cat did not look like any of the Catalinas in the Aircraft Identification Charts.

Williamson was not surprised when he turned off the runway to find two machine-gun-mounted jeeps waiting for him, in addition to a Follow Me jeep. The fighters had obviously radioed ahead that a very strange aircraft, very possibly a Japanese suicide bomber, was on the way. The machine-gun jeeps followed him to the parking area in front of base operations.

A tall Marine officer came out of base operations. His overcoat collar was turned up against the icy wind.

Well, that's luck. A fellow Marine should know how I can find this fellow Banning
.

Williamson shut the Cat's engines down. He wondered if the Air Corps had any people here who had ever even seem a Catalina before, and would be qualified to inspect it before he flew on to Chungking. If something needed to be replaced, whatever it was would have to be flown in, and Christ only knew how long that would take. Presuming that the airplane was OK, was he going to be expected to try to get it from here back to Pearl Harbor? Without a copilot?