While he was not arrogant about itPelosi was really a nice kid, who had the makings of a good officerhe was nonetheless unable to conceal his conviction that he knew more about explosives and demolition than anyone he'd met in the Army.
After Pelosi gave him his Explosives Requirement list, his more than a little annoying aura of self-confidence inspired McGuire to go back and recalculate the explosives necessary for the job. Recalculation confirmed McGuire's belief that all Pelosi's charges were going to do was make a lot of noise.
Captain McGuire's major problem with Pelosi, however, was not his misplaced self-confidence, but his application for transfer. McGuire was trying to be philosophical about it.
For one thing, he told himself, no officer is indispensable. Losses of officers, either through routine transfers or eventually in combat, were inevitable; and as commanding officer, he should be prepared to deal with them. For another, when a young, full-of-piss-and-vinegar second lieutenant, fresh from both Officer Candidate School and the Parachute School at Fort Benning (in other words, he had volunteered for both OCS and Airborne), saw a notice on the Bulletin Board soliciting volunteers for an unspecified military intelligence assignmentvolunteers who were parachute-qualified officers fluent in one or more of a dozen listed foreign languagesit was to be expected that he would volunteer.
Lieutenant Pelosi was not quite old enough to vote; and, Captain McGuire was quite sure, he had not yet lost either his boyish enthusiasm or his boyish taste for adventure. He almost certainly saw himself parachuting behind enemy lines, Thompson submachine gun in hand, a la Alan Ladd or Tyrone Power in the movies. On the ground, when he was not blowing up Mussolini's headquarters, he'd spend his time in the arms of some large-breasted Italian beauty. (He was fluent in Italian; where else could they send him?)
If real life actually worked that way, McGuire thought, he would have been happy to see Pelosi go. But McGuire had been around the Army, long enoughhis father, also a West Pointer, had just been promoted to Brigadier Generalto view somewhat suspiciously the recruitment of parachute-qualified officers with foreign language skills.
Military Intelligence, for example, needed people to read the Osservatore, the Vatican newspaper, to see if there was anything there that could remotely be of interest to the U.S. Army. After receiving permission to recruit volunteers, Military Intelligence had decided to recruit from the Airborne Forces, since a selection process eliMi?ating all but the most intelligent and highly moti vated officers had already been performed.
Captain McGuire did not believe that Military Intelligence would be crippled if Second Lieutenant Pelosi did not join its ranks. Able Company, however, needed him. He possessed a quality of leadership that McGuire to a large degree found missing in his other lieutenants.
McGuire was therefore determined to retain at all costs the services of Second Lieutenant Pelosi in Able Company.
First he tried to counsel the young officer, suggesting to him that he could make a greater contribution to the war effort right here in Able Company than he could reading the Vatican newspaper behind a desk someplace. When that failed (Pelosi was polite but adamant), McGuire wrote what he frankly thought was a masterful 1st Indorsement to Pelosi's application for transfer, outlining his present value to Able Company and his potential usefulness in the future, and recommending that for the good of the service, the application should not be favorably considered.
He then led the Battalion Sergeant Major to understand that he would not be heartbroken if Lieutenant Pelosi's application for transfer became lost.
Next, he tried, and failed, to have the battalion commander declare Pelosi as essential, and thus ineligible for transfer.
"The only thing you can do is talk him out of it, Red," the battalion commander said. "There's nothing I can do to keep the application from going forward."
That had been more than a month ago, long enough for Captain McGuire to begin to hope that Pelosi's application would never reemerge from the maw of Army administrationlike so many other documents inserted into it.
But this morning it had finally surfaced.
And now there was one last hope ... because it actually looked like MI had sort of shot themselves in the foot: When Pelosi saw what they'd done, he could, after consideration, withdraw his application for transfer. An officer could change his mind about a volunteer assignment. People decided every day, for example, that they'd rather not jump out of airplanes anymore. Since parachute duty was voluntary, they could quit. This MI assignment was also voluntary; Pelosi could change his mind about it.
When the charges Pelosi had been laying all morning (in half the time McGuire felt was necessary to do a proper job) failed to do more than make noise, a chastened, humiliated Second Lieutenant Pelosi might be willing to listen to reason. Instead of jumping all over his ass, McGuire was going to be kind and understanding.
When McGuire's jeep reached the power station, he found the company scattered over a small rise two hundred yards from the chimney, some on the ground, some sitting on trucks and three-quarter-ton dozers, scrapers, and the flatbed tractors that had carried them to the site.
When they saw the company commander's jeep, some of the noncoms started moving among the men, to get them up and at least looking interested.
McGuire turned toward the chimney and saw Second Lieutenant Pelosi coming out of one of the gutted buildings. He signaled for his driver to head for the chimney.
When he drove up, Second Lieutenant Anthony J. Pelosi saluted crisply, smiled, and said, "Good afternoon, Sir. I'm glad you could come out. I'm just about ready to blow this sonofabitch."
McGuire returned the salute.
"I'm glad you waited until I came out here, Pelosi," McGuire said, more than a little annoyed.
Pelosi picked up on the sarcasm.
"Sir," he said, a little uneasily. "The Captain did not say he wished to be here when I blew it."
No, I didn't,McGuire realized. It never entered my mind that you would come close to having your charges in place before fifteen or sixteen hundred.
"No problem, Lieutenant. I'm here now. You say your charges are laid?"
"All I have to do is hook up the detonator, Sir. This was my final look-around."
"Well, let me have a look," McGuire said.
He gestured for his driver to take the jeep over to where the company waited for the show to start, then walked around the site, following the electrical cord to the various places Pelosi had laid his charges.
They were in much the same places he would have chosen himself, the difference being that he would have used at least twice as much explosive.
"You're sure you're using enough explosive?"
"Yes, Sir. If anything, I used a little more than I had to."
That, Lieutenant, is the voice of ignorance speaking.
He noticed more wire on the ground and followed it with his eyes. The first pair disappeared under one of the derelict World War I tanks.