"Bullshit," Pickering blurted. "You're not that old."
"I was eleven when we went there," Stecker said, smugly. "I was born in the Corps. My father was the master gunnery sergeant of the Fourth Marines."
"And now he's a captain, right?" Pick demanded, suddenly. "He won the Medal of Honor in the First World War?"
"How'd you know that?" Stecker asked.
"They were sticking it to my buddy when we went through Quantico," Pick said. "'Captain Jack NM1 Stecker showed up like the avenging angel of the Lord, banged heads together, boomed, 'go and sin no more,' and left in a cloud of glory."
"That sounds like my old man," Stecker said. "He's one hell of a Marine. I'm surprised you know about the Medal, though. He never wears it."
"He wasn't wearing it," Pick said. "But I asked my buddy who he was, and he told me about him."
"How did he find out?"
"I told you, he's another China Marine," Pickering said.
"They stick together," Stecker said. "The Medal got me in the Point. Sons of guys who won it get automatic appointments to service academies if they want one. My brother went to Annapolis, but I was sick of being the little brother following him everywhere, so I went to West Point."
"How come you didn't go in the Army, then?" Pick asked.
"I will consider how recently you have been a Marine, and forgive you for asking that question," Stecker said. "The Army?" he added incredulously.
"You said you had reconnoitered the area?" Pickering asked, chuckling.
"Would you like the full report, or just the conclusions I have drawn?" Stecker asked.
"I think I'd better hear the full report," Pickering said. "I don't want to do anything that will get me thrown out of flight school."
"Okay," Stecker said. "It does not behoove a second lieutenant to act impulsively."
Pickering chuckled again. He liked this boy-faced character.
"The lecture begins with a history of Naval aviation," Stecker said solemnly. "Which carries us back to 1911, which was six years before my father joined the Corps, and ten years before I was born."
Pickering was aware that he was giggling.
"The flight school was established here, with two airplanes… and if you keep giggling, I will stop-"
"Sorry," Pickering said.
"We career Marines do not like to be giggled at by reservists," Stecker said. "Keep that in mind, Pickering."
Pickering laughed, deep in his throat.
"As I was saying," Stecker said, "flight training has continued here ever since. Pensacola is known as the Mother-in-Law of Naval Aviation."
"I heard that," Pickering said.
"You do keep interrupting, don't you?" Stecker said, in mock indignation.
Pickering threw his hands up in a gesture of surrender.
"Between wars, Pensacola trained three categories of individuals as Naval aviators," Stecker went on, seriously. "Commissioned officers of the Navy and Marines; enlisted then of the Navy and Marines; and Naval aviation cadets."
"Enlisted men? As pilots, you mean?"
"Since the question is germane, I will overlook the interruption," Stecker said. "Yes, enlisted men. There was argument at the highest levels whether or not flying airplanes required the services of splendid, well-educated, young officers such as you and me, Pickering, or whether a lot of money could be saved by having enlisted then drive them. The argument still rages. For your general fund of Naval information, there are a number of Naval aviation pilots-petty officers-in the Navy, and 'flying sergeants' in the Corps. And while we are off on this tangent, most Japanese pilots, and German pilots, and a considerable number of Royal Air Force pilots, are enlisted men."
"I didn't know that," Pickering said.
"Much as I would like to add to your obviously dismally inadequate fund of service lore by discussing the pros and cons of enlisted pilots," Stecker said, "we have to face that salty captain with the mustache in"-he looked at his watch- "thirty-two minutes, and I respectfully suggest you permit me to get on with my orientation lecture."
"Please do," Pickering said, unable to contain a chuckle.
"Marine and Navy officers who applied for flight training had to have two years of service before they could come here. Since promotion to lieutenant junior grade or first lieutenant was automatic after eighteen months of service, this meant that even the junior officer flight student wore a silver bar, and there were some who were full lieutenants-or captains, USMC- and even a rare lieutenant commander or major.
"Rank hath its privileges, and it is presumed that anyone with two years of service as a commissioned officer does not need round-the-clock off-duty supervision. Officer flight students are given their training schedule and expected to be at the proper place at the appointed time. What they do when they are off duty is their own business."
"And that includes us?" Pickering asked.
Stecker put his index finger in front of his mouth and said, "Ssssh!" Then he went on: "The enlisted flight students are selected from the brightest sailors and Marines in the fleet. They pose virtually no disciplinary problems for Pensacola. And, like the officers, it is not necessary for Pensacola to teach them that a floor is a deck in the Navy, or that patting the admiral's daughter's tail is not considered nice."
A remarkably detailed image of Martha Sayre Culhane's tail popped into Pickering's mind.
"The third category, Naval aviation cadets, is a horse of an entirely different hue. In addition to teaching them how to fly, Pensacola must also teach them what will be expected of them once they graduate and are commissioned. Actually, before they come here, they have been run through an 'elimination program' at a Naval air station somewhere, during which they have been exposed to the customs and traditions of the Naval service, including close-order drill, small-arms training, and things of this nature; and, importantly, they are given enough actual flight training to determine that they were physically and intellectually capable of undergoing the complete pilot training offered at Pensacola."
"As fascinated as I am by your learned discourse," Pickering said, "so what? What has this got to with this cell they've put us in?"
"There was a fourth category of students," Stecker said. "Newly commissioned ensigns and second lieutenants. Such as we, Pickering. Since it came down from Mount Sinai graven on stone that ensigns and second lieutenants cannot find their ass with both hands, they were run through courses intended to teach them not to piss in the potted palms at the Officers' Club and otherwise to behave like officers and gentlemen."
" 'Was'?" Pickering asked.
"For a number of reasons, including complaints from the fleet and the Fleet Marine Force that Aviation was grabbing all the nice, bright ensigns and second lieutenants the fleet and the Fleet Marine Force needed, they stopped sending new second lieutenants here. If you want to become a Naval aviator in the future, you will have to start as an aviation cadet, or have completed two years with the fleet or with troops in the Corps."
"But we're here," Pickering asked, now genuinely confused.
"That's precisely the point of my lecture," Stecker said. "We have fallen somehow through the cracks; there has been a hole in the sieve. I know why I'm here… I qualified for aviation training last fall, before they decided to send no more second lieutenants through Pensacola. My guess is that the word didn't reach the Navy liaison officer at West Point. All he knew was that there was a note on my record jacket that I was to be sent here when I got my commission. And when I got my commission, he cut the orders. But what about you? How'd you manage to get here? You should be running around with an infantry platoon in the boondocks at Quantico, or at Camp Elliott."
Pickering decided it was the time and place to be completely truthful.
"I should be working in the Officers' Club at the Marine Barracks in Washington," he said. "That's where they sent me when I graduated from the Platoon Leader's Course at Quantico."