“Of course, sir,” Edland agreed calmly. “But the metal was fused. Melted and fused at the point of impact — like it was done with a torch, the XO said.”
McNamar sat back in his chair in resignation and signaled to a waiter. “Take this away,” he instructed the man, “and bring me a martini, neat.” After the table was cleared, the admiral eyed Edland.
“With your permission, sir,” Edland said. “I’d like to pursue this.”
“In plain language, Mike.”
“I want your authorization to capture prisoners. Perhaps an E-boat.”
“Oh, is that all?” McNamar said as the waiter arrived with his drink. “You know, the British have been trying to do that for the past five years.”
“Yes, sir. I’m aware of that. I’ve been researching the subject.”
“‘Researching?’ Yeah, you’re an intellectual, aren’t you? Archaeologist or something?”
“Anthropologist. Specializing in the Far East,” Edland said, watching McNamar carefully. The admiral was not the sort of man to reveal what he was really thinking, so Edland wasn’t certain if McNamar would accept his idea. They’d known each other for ten months, since he had been assigned to McNamar’s staff, and Edland had been impressed by the admiral’s pragmatic intelligence. McNamar was a clear, concise thinker who seldom ventured into the abstract. That was why he depended on Edland, to form concepts into realities.
“How do you plan on doing this?” McNamar said.
“There’s a PT boat squadron at Portland,” Edland said cautiously. “We know that the E-boats are operating out of Cherbourg, Boulogne, and Le Havre.”
“So you want to snatch one of the Cherbourg boats.” The statement was obvious. Cherbourg was closest to Portland, half the distance of Le Havre — a straight run across the Channel. “Well, you got guts. I was on a PT boat once and by God I’ll never do it again. Those guys are insane, which means the E-boat crews are probably just as bad. I’d bet they’re both just one step short of being pirates.” He sipped his drink and made a face. Edland saw him mulling over the idea. “You’re not bigoted, Mike, but you’re damned close. You know something about the invasion.”
“Everyone knows something, sir,” Edland said. No, he wasn’t bigoted; he was not declared important because his knowledge of some aspects of the invasion was deemed critical. Bigots bore the responsibility of carrying vital information, of maybe knowing how and where — but not when, only SHAEF knew that — the invasion was to take place. Bigots carried an additional responsibility: don’t get captured. If the Germans captured a bigot, they could force him to talk. It wasn’t like the movies where the handsome American outsmarted a comic German interrogator. There was a good chance the bigot would talk under torture, and they had information that could doom the invasion, or at least cost the lives of several thousand men.
“Yeah,” McNamar agreed, unimpressed. “Everybody knows something. And some of it may actually be true. But why take the chance, Mike? You know that I can veto this harebrained scheme of yours from the get-go. Or maybe I’ll just beach you and you pick someone to send.”
“Yes, sir,” Edland admitted. “You can do that.”
McNamar’s eyebrows arched as he realized that his bluff had been called. Edland was the type of man who could agree you into coming around to his way of thinking.
“There may be something to what you’re saying,” McNamar said, considering what Edland was proposing. “But—”
“Pardon me, sir. But if the Germans do have a new weapon, it’s better to find out about it now than to be surprised later on. During the invasion.”
“Yeah,” McNamar said skeptically.
“Yes, sir,” Edland said. He had his arguments all carefully arranged if McNamar denied him his PT boats. He planned his negotiations well in advance, playing the roles of both participants in his mind until he had exhausted point and counterpoint. From this intellectual encounter came his strategy. He expected McNamar to be skeptical at first; he also expected the admiral to accept his proposition.
“Okay, Mike,” McNamar said. “You’ve got your mission. I’ll cut the orders today and you’ll be on your boat in no time, puking your guts out.”
“Thank you, sir.”
“Just one thing, Mike,” McNamar said. “Those E-boat crews have been fighting their war for a long time. They’re very, very good at what they do, and the ones that have lasted this long are the best of them. Their boats are twenty feet larger than PT boats and they’re made of steel, not wood like our little cockleshells.”
“I’ll be careful, sir.”
“Yeah,” McNamar said, signaling for another drink. His eyes traveled over the starched white tablecloth before he turned them on Edland. He liked this boy, man really, but everyone seemed so young. Young men dying in war, what a waste. “You just be careful not to get yourself killed. Good staff are hard to come by. I sure don’t want to waste my time training another guy to put up with me.”
Chapter 4
PT boat 155 had slowed down to 10 knots, the mufflers closed and the exhaust pumped into the sea at her fantail. The sea burbled and burped along the stern of the boat as the gases mixed with water. The boat ran almost silently at this speed, but 10 knots was as fast as she could go with closed mufflers. Any faster and the powerful exhaust from the three Packard engines would blow the mufflers off.
Ewing’s 168 boat was about a mile off the starboard quarter of 155 as the two Elco boats neared the French coastline. Cole scanned the shore, still a good mile off, through binoculars.
“I’ve got a good view of the beach,” he said, the 7x50 Bausch and Lomb binoculars training steadily along the shore. “Looks like an abandoned shack, nothing on the bluffs overlooking the beach. There’s a derelict freighter just offshore. She’s been there for a while.” He lowered the binoculars and added thoughtfully: “I don’t see any Krauts. I don’t see anyone at all.” He grabbed the windscreen of the PT boat for support as an errant wave slapped the boat’s hull roughly, pushing her to port.
“Skipper?” Torpedoman 1st Class Tommy Rich called from the bow where he had been standing lookout. “There’s something floating at that freighter’s stern.” The rusting hulk was bow in to the beach and listing heavily to port. The shore had a firm grip on the old ship, the breaking sea battering her stern.
“I got it too, Skipper,” said Eckstam at the forward 20-mm gun. Cole watched as he adjusted his binoculars. Eckstam turned to Cole with a smile. “It’s our boy, Skipper. Sitting pretty as you please in his life raft.”
“About five hundred yards off the beach,” DeLong said, still manning the wheel.
“Yeah,” Cole said. He scanned the beach and bluffs again. “Okay. Let Ewing know that we’re going in. Tell him to wait here and cover us. The charts say twenty fathoms rising to five.”
“No telling what’s built up around her stern,” DeLong said, studying the motionless wreck.
“Yeah,” Cole replied, rubbing the stubble on his chin. “Tommy? You and Murray lay back to the life raft on the Day Cabin. Get it ready to go over the side if we can’t get the boat close enough to get that guy. Pass the word as you go aft. Tell everybody to keep their eyes open and their fingers off the triggers until I say. Eckstam, don’t let that pilot out of your sight.” He slid the binoculars into their pouch underneath the windscreen. “Randy,” he said to DeLong, “I want you to take us in at forty. Split the difference between the hulk and that point of land off to the right. Two hundreds yards out from the hulk, cut to the left and drop her down to twenty. We’ll use the wreck to shield us from the shore in case the Krauts have any guns on the bluff.”