And then he stopped.
To hell with it If I’ve done something wrong, it was an honest mistake, and I’ll take the rap for it. I am no longer a bushy-tailed ensign.
For that matter, no longer a bushy-tailed captain. If the DCNO didn’t understand that my desk is crowded with stacks of paper and a clerk’s comptometer because I’m working, fuck him.
The door from the corridor was opened at 1523 hours by the DCNO’s aide-de-camp. The DCNO marched in.
“Good afternoon, Commander,” he said, and quite unnecessarily identified himself. He was a large man, tanned, who looked like–and indeed was–an ex-football player.
“Good afternoon, Admiral,” Bitter said. “Admiral Hawley expects you, sir, and has asked me to show you right in.” The DCNO’s aide-de-camp, a full commander who looked like a younger version of his boss, nodded at Bitter, and Bitter nodded back.
Bitter walked quickly, ahead of the DCNO, to Admiral Hawley’s door and pushed it open.
“The Deputy Chief of Naval Operations, sir!” he announced.
“Good afternoon, sir, “Admiral Hawley said as he rose to his feet behind his desk.
“Hello, Enoch,” the DCNO said as he walked, with hand extended, across the room. UHOW the hell are you?”
“I’m very well, sir. Yourself?”
“Overworked and underpaid and wishing I was anywhere else but here,” the DCNO said. He sounded sincere, if resigned.
“May I offer you some coffee, Admiral?”
“Only if you have something to put in it besides milk and sugar,” the DCNO said.
“I’m sure we can take care of that, Ed, can’t we?” Admiral Hawley said.
“Aye, aye, sir,” Bitter said.
When he was out of the room, the DCNO said, “He’s limping.” It was a question.
“He took a Japanese. 50-caliber, or parts of one, in his knee,” Admiral Hawley said.
“And what does he have pinned to his chest?”
“They’re AVG wings, Admiral. Commander Bitter was a Flying Tiger.”
“I find that absolutely fascinating,” the DCNO said.
Admiral Hawley had no idea what the DCNO meant.
“Bitter is a very good man,” Hawley said loyally. “Class of 38, and he was nearly a double ace–he had nine kills–when he was hit. By ground fire, I think I should add.” “Hummmpph,” the DCNO said.
Bitter came back into the room carrying a napkin-covered Coca-Cola tray and two cups of coffee. When he extended the tray, the DCNO said, “The name Canidy’ mean anything to you, Commander?”
“Yes, sir,” Bitter said, surprised at the question.
“You were in the Flying Tigers with him?”
“Yes, sir.”
“That all?”
“We were stationed together at Pensacola, sir, as IPS, before we went to China.”
“That all?”
“I don’t know what the admiral is asking, sir,” Bitter said.
“Is he a good man?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Friend of yours, you would say, Commander?”
“Yes, sir.” The DCNO looked at his aide.
“Charley, I think we have just been given a late Christmas present,” he said. “Would you agree with that?”
“Yes, sir, Admiral, it certainly looks that way.”
“Commander, get some of that coffee for Charley and yourself, and then sit down.” Bitter left the room, quickly returned with two mugs of coffee, and sat down, somewhat stiffly, beside the DCNO’s aide-de-camp.
“We came here, Enoch,” the DCNO said, “more or less directly, from meeting of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. The CNO was tied up, and so was Colonel William J. Donovan. A Navy captain named Douglass was sitting in for Donovan.” The DCNO took a swallow of his coffee and then looked at Bitter.
“Are you familiar with either of the gentlemen I just mentioned, Commander?”
“Yes, sir.”
“How?”
“Captain Douglass’s son was in the AVG, sir,” Bitter said. “I had occasion to meet the captain here in Washington. I met Colonel Donovan before I went to China.”
“You know what they do now?” the DCNO asked.
“Yes, sir.” “Charley,” the DCNO said, “I think we just climbed out of you-know where smelling like a goddamned rose.”
“It’s really beginning to look that way, sir,” the DCNO’s aide said.
“One of the items, actually several of the items, on the agenda, Enoch, ” the DCNO said, “was the German submarine pens at Saint-Lazare.
First, there was a rather disturbing report about what hell those subs are raising with shipping, both in terms of shipping per se–they’re sinking ships almost as fast as we can build them–and in terms of materiel that is not reaching England.