“I’m on the ground at ten past the hour.”
“Six-one-one, take the taxiway to your left, and taxi to the east door of the dirigible hangar.” The hangar looked even bigger on the ground than from the air-simply incredibly vast. As he approached, with the building looming over him, a Navy officer walked from the hangar, stood in his path, and made 4(come to me” ground handler signals. Canidy thought it was odd that an officer should be parking aircraft, but his signals were even stranger. The officer with the commander’s shoulder boards was giving him a left-turn signal, into the hangar itself.
Canidy made the turn, but stopped. One does not taxi airplanes inside hangars. Prop blast does interesting things inside confined spaces such as hangars-like turn other airplanes over on their backs. But inside the hangar was a proper plane handler, a white hat with wands in his hands. And he, too, was giving “come to me” signals. Canidy released the brakes, opened the throttles a crack, and obeyed. There was, he thought, an exception to every rule, and this hangar was obviously the exception to the one about not operating engines in a hangar. There were six other aircraft inside. A Catalina with both of its en genes running taxied toward the far door. It looked at least a mile away. The ground handler, walking quickly backward, led him a hundred ards into the hangar and then signaled for him to turn left, turn around, y and shut it down. When Canidy climbed out of the D18, the officer who had met him outside the hangar was standing there, waiting for him. Canidy saluted, and the commander returned it, then offered his hand. “Major Canidy?” the commander asked. When Canidy nodded, he introduced himself as Commander Reynolds, the air station commander. “I like your hangar,” Canidy said. Reynolds laughed.
“It’s supposed to be the largest covered area without roof supports in the world,” he said. “I can believe that.”
“The sun gets hot here,” Reynolds said.
“When we have the room, we like to park airplanes inside, keep them from baking.” He’s a nice guy, Canidy decided, but that isn’t the only reason he’s being so charming. He is aprofessional, keeping the apple polished.
NASLAKE burst had orders coming directly from the Office of the Chief of Naval Operations to provide whatever guard force was deemed necessary for Summer Place, and to place that guard force under the absolute authority of a United States deputy marshal who would make his identity known to them. And that morning the “deputy U.S. marshal,” who was in fact one of the FBI agents on loan to COT, had told the commander, NAS Lakehurst, that he was being relieved by an Air Corps major named Canidy, who would be arriving in a Navy airplane. “Mr. Delaney said that he’d like to turn over to you at Summer Place,” Commander Reynolds said.
“And I thought, if you had no objection, I’d tag along. I don’t know what your requirements are going to be, and it might save time if I was there from the beginning.”
“I’m glad you can spare the time,” Canidy said. “I understand the importance of your mission,” Reynolds said. Translated, Canidy thought, that means you don’t want me to make any waves.
… Commander Reynolds drove Canidy to Summer Place in his Navy gray Ford staff car. The last time he had been in a Navy car with a white-hat driver had been at Pensacola. The admiral had dispatched his car and driver to fetch Lieutenant (j.g.) Canidy from the beer hall to the admiral’s quarters, where he had been introduced to a leathery-faced old Army fighter pilot named Claire Chennault.
Chennault promptly announced that he was asking for volunteer pilots to fly Curtiss P-40B Tomahawks for the Chinese, and that Canidy had been selected.
It’s a beautiful place,” Commander Reynolds volunteered.
“A turn of-the-century mansion right on the ocean,” “I know,” Canidy said.
“I’ve been here before.” Reynolds obviously thought he meant in connection with whatever was going on there now. But what Canidy meant, what Canidy was thinking, was how often Jimmy Whittaker’s aunt and uncle had entertained him-and Eric Fulmar-there when the three friends had been in St. Mark’s School together. Mounted every hundred feet or so on the fence that surrounded the estate there were signs announcing that this was a U.S. Government Reservation, where trespassing was forbidden, and that trespassers would be prosecuted.