Instead of spending his spare time with his peers at Clark, he had rented an apartment in the Hotel Manila, to which he would his brand-new yellow Chrysler New Yorker convertible. He drive in spent his time there playing polo with wealthy Americans, Filipinos, and officers of the 26th Cavalry. His photograph appeared regularly on the society pages of the Manila Times.
Whittaker touched down and taxied directly toward one of the three fuel trucks. He was sure that the first thing the squadron cornniander was going to do when he got on the ground was ask the fuel guy how much Whittaker had taken. The commander didn’t trust people he didn’t like, and he didn’t like Whittaker. Therefore he believed that Whittaker’s fuel warning lights had not been glowing, and that Whittaker had simply wanted to refuel immediately, rather than wait his turn, which would have been just about last.
Fuck him. He would find out that Whittaker had been running on the fumes.
There were no hangars in Iba auxiliary field, just a radio shack which doubled as the control tower. There were several field tents, a canvas fly-covered mess and kitchen area, three olive-drab fuel trucks, two vans, two jeeps, a staff car, and Second Lieutenant Whittaker’s new yellow convertible.
The Chrysler was another bone of contention between Whittaker and his squadron commander. Once they had moved to lba, the Old Man had forbidden his officers to return to Clark Field for any purpose, including picking up their personal vehicles. Jim Whittaker felt that he had obeyed the order. He had not returned to Clark. He had called Manila and ordered his Filipino houseboy to go from his suite in the Manila Hotel out to Clark and drive the Chrysler to lba.
“You’re a guardhouse lawyer, Whittaker,” the Old Man had told him when the Chrysler appeared. “You know I meant no cars up here. I don’t like guardhouse lawyers.”
“We don’t have enough transportation, Captain,” Whittaker replied. “The car is at the disposal of the squadron.”
Under the circumstances, the Chrysler had remained. For one thing, Whittaker,s Filipino boy had taken off, and there was no other way to get the car back where it belonged. For another, )Vbit. taker was right: they needed transportation. But so far as the (id Man was concerned, it was another example of Whittaker’s near in subordination whenever he could interpret an order to his own sat, isfaction.
After Whittaker had been refueled and was taxiing to his park, I ing space, and seven of the squadron’s sixteen aircraft touched down and were lined up to refuel, the Japanese began their attack. When the first Japanese plane appeared, Whittaker knew he had two choices. He could go to the threshold of the runway and wait until the last of the Out-of-fuel P40-Es had landed before he tried to take off, or he could take a chance of getting safely into the air by simply forcing his way into the landing pattern, He pushed on the left rudder pedal and advanced the throttle as he turned onto the runway. During his takeoff roll, he test-fired his guns.
It was later learned from observers on the ground that there had been fifty-odd Mitsubishi dive-bombers and about as many Zeroes, possibly as many as fifty-six. In the air at the time, things were much too confused for anyone to count with any degree of accuracy.
The engagement didn’t last long. The carrier-based Japanese were operating at the far end of their operational radius, and when they had done what they had come to do, they headed home.
Whittaker made two passes over Iba. The runways were blocked with furi ously burning P40s, shot down as they tried to land, and others, who had landed before the attack began, and been destroyed by bombs and machine-gun fire. The Japanese had gotten all three fuel trucks.
Whittaker saw the Old Man, standing and watching his aircraft bum. Hands on hips, he looked up as Whittaker flew over, but he made no signal of any kind.
Whittaker turned the nose of the P40-E toward Clark Field, forty miles away. There was no way he could land at lba, and with the fuel trucks gone, no reason to.