"I'm telling you for the last fucking time, Eric!" Banning flared furiously. "Don't you ever refer to Pluto as a Nip, mine or anyone else's!"
"Sorry," Feldt said, sounding genuinely contrite. It did not satisfy Banning.
"For one thing, he's a serving officer. For another, he's a friend of mine. And finally, for Christ's sake, he's Korean, not Japanese." Pluto Hon had made a good many trips by puddle-jumper from MacArthur's headquarters to Townsville to deliver to Banning classified messages that could not be entrusted to ordinary couriers. It was a long way to fly in a Piper Cub. Pluto Hon was a good man, a good officer, and he was not a fucking Nip.
"I'm really sorry, old boy," Feldt said. "That just slipped out"
"That's your fucking trouble!"
Feldt did not respond.
Banning decided he had gone far enough. In fact, he was chagrined that he had lost his temper.
"Well, what do you say?" he asked. "Should we go down to the field and see if that is the Asshole?"
"Sod him," Feldt said. "Let him walk."
"We'd just have to send one of the men back for him," Banning replied as he braked and prepared to turn around.
"And if one of my guys were out of uniform, say wearing one of these RAN sleeved blankets, the Asshole would have apoplexy."
Feldt and Banning had been en route from the Coastwatcher Establishment antennae farm to their headquarters when Feldt had spotted the airplane. The airfield was in between; it took them only a few minutes to reach it.
By then the C-47 had landed and taxied to the transient ramp. The door opened as Banning stopped the Studebaker at the hurricane fence between the parking lot and the field itself.
As Banning walked to the policeman guarding the gate, Colonel Lewis R. Mitchell climbed down the short ladder, tugged at his trench coat to make sure it was in order, and marched toward the terminal.
He looks like an illustration.- "Field Grade Officer, Dress Uniform, Winter, " Banning thought.
He intercepted him and saluted crisply, "Good afternoon, Sir." Colonel Mitchell returned the salute but said nothing.
What he's doing is mentally composing something memorable to say to me about the duffel coat.
Colonel Mitchell's lips worked as if he was distinctly uncomfortable.
"Major Banning," he said finally, "a communication has arrived which I have been instructed to place before you." What the hell is he talking about?
"Yes, Sir?" Mitchell reached into the inside pocket of his blouse, removed an envelope, handed it to Banning, and then adjusted his uniform again.
The envelope was unsealed. It contained a single sheet of paper. From its feel, even before he saw the red TOP SECRET classification stamped on it, Banning knew that it had come from the Cryptographic Room. The paper was treated somehow to aid combustion. When a match was touched to it, it almost exploded.
TOP SECRET
URGENT
HEADQUARTERS USMC WASH DC 29 AUG 1942 1105
TO: HEADQUARTERS SOUTHWEST PACIFIC AREA
ATTN: (EYES ONLY) COLONEL L. R. MITCHELL USMC
1. Reference your radio 25Aug42 subject, "Request for clarification of role SWPOA-CINCPAC liaison officer vis-a-vis USMC Special Detachment 14 and RAN Coastwatcher Establishment, which has been referred to HQ USMC for reply.
2. You are advised that you have no repeat no role vis-a-vis USMC Special Detachment 14 or RAN Coastwatcher Establishment. You are further advised that Commanding Officer USMC SPECDET 14 is under sole and direct repeat sole and direct command of the undersigned and therefore not subject to orders of any USMC officer in CINCPAC or FPOA, regardless of position or rank.
1. In order to insure that there is absolutely misunderstanding, you are directed to personally make the contents of this message known to Major Edward Banning, USMC; LTCOM Eric A. Feldt, ; and 1st Lt S.D. Hon, SigC, USA.
It Hon is directed to inform the undersigned )f date and time he has seen this message. Major Banning is directed to inform the undersigned of -the date and time he has seen this message, and to inform the undersigned when its contents were made known to LTCOM Feldt. A consolidated reply, classified Top Secret, will be dispatched by urgent radio.
5. You are further advised that your raising of this question has called into doubt your ability to perform the duties of your present assignment.
FOR THE COMMANDANT
HORACE W. T. FORREST
MAJOR GEN, USMC
ASSISTANT CHIEF OF STAFF, G2, USMC
TOP SECRET
Banning raised his eyes to Colonel Mitchell's.
"Yes, Sir," he said.
"I apparently overstepped my authority and responsibility as I understood it..." Mitchell said.
Jesus Christ, I actually feel sorry for him.
"... and if an apology is in order, Major, please consider one extended."
"No, Sir. No apology is required, Sir. They should have briefed you."
"Is that Commander Feldt in the car?"
"Yes, Sir."
"If you will give me that message back, I will show it to Commander Feldt and then see about getting back to Melbourne."
"Colonel," Banning said, "unless you have some pressing business in Melbourne, why don't you spend the night with us, and let us show you what we're doing here?"
"In light of that message, that strikes me as-"
"Sir, it was a question of Need to Know. With respect, Sir, you have not been cleared for what we're doing here."
"I have a TOP SECRET clearance," Mitchell said. "I'm the liaison officer between the two senior headquarters in the Pacific, and I'm the senior Marine officer present at SWPOA." Banning, aware that he was about to lose his temper, spoke very carefully.
"Colonel, you have two choices. You can get back on that airplane or you can spend the night with us, let us show you why this is all so important."
"You had something to do with that message I just got, didn't you, Major? It was not just a reply to my radio, was it?"
"Sir, when you told me what you wanted me to do, and I told you what you asked was impossible, and when I learned you had sent that radio, I sent a back-channel message-"
"Who told you about my radio? That Oriental cryptographer?"
"That Oriental cryptographer"? Fuck you, Asshole!
Banning came to attention.
"Sir, I will bring this message to Commander Feldt's attention and arrange to have the confirmation of its receipt radioed to General Forrest. Good afternoon, Sir." He saluted, and without waiting for it to be returned, executed a perfect about-face movement and then marched toward the Studebaker.
"Now see here, Banning!" Colonel Mitchell called after him.
Banning reached the Studebaker, got behind the wheel, and drove off.
"The Asshole, I gather, is not coming to tea?" Commander Feldt asked.
"Sod him," Major Banning said.
The story that ended with the arrival of Colonel Mitchell in Townsville had its start some months earlier with what Banning now recognized to be a hell of a smart idea on the part of Secretary of the Navy Frank Knox. At the beginning of the war, Knox realized that he was going to read very few honest reports on the functioning of Navy in the Pacific so long as those reports were written by Navy captains and admirals.