After lunch, when Sergeant Agnes Draper brought the Packard to the door, Admiral Foster suggested they take it to High Wycombe. His aide followed them in his car.
As soon as they were out of London, Foster asked if the divider could be raised, then got down to business.
“Damned good luck that you and this Canidy fellow are old friends, Bitter,” the admiral said.
“Admiral,” Bitter said, “when I reported into Berkeley Square, Colonel Stevens made a point of telling me that Canidy is under orders to send me home the minute he suspects I’m reporting to the Navy.”
“You don’t think your friend Canidy’d really do that to you, do you?”
“Yes, sir, I think–I know–he would.”
“What the Navy expects you to do, Commander, is to do what you can to make sure the Navy comes out of this–by this I mean all operations in the European Theater, not just the submarine pen project–looking neither foolish nor like poor relations. And what you can do is let me know what the Army is up to that they’ve chosen not to tell the Navy about.
From everything I’ve heard, the OSS has its nose in everybody’s tent.” IX be damned, Bitter thought. Canidy was right “Admiral,” Bitter said, ado you know what the OSS does to people they suspect can’t be trusted to keep what classified information they have been made privy to?” “No, I don’t,” the admiral said. “And for God’s sake, Commander, we’re talking about the United States Navy.”
“In the States, they send them to St. Elizabeth’s Hospital for psychiatric evaluation.”
“Excuse me?”
“And over here, they have a similar facility in Richodan, Scotland.” Admiral Foster looked at him incredulously.
“Apparently, sir, the principle of habeas corpus does not apply to persons undergoing psychiatric examination,” Bitter said.
“Commandeg I don’t know where you heard that, but I wouldn’t pay much attention to it. For one thing, it’s illegal. Let me put it another way, If you should wind up in a psychiatric hospital, in possession of your faculties, the Navy will get you out. Do I make my point?” “Yes, sir,” Bitter said. “That’s encouraging to hear, sir.” It was Canidy who had told Bitter about St. Elizabeth’s hospital and the Richodan, Scotland, facility. And Bitter knew that Canidy had not been pulling his leg about either place.
All his good feeling about his assignment now vanished. For political reasons having nothing to do with the prosecution of the war, he had been asked by a two-star admiral to spy on the OSS. He knew that he could not do that, even though his failure to do so would be regarded by the Navy as disloyalty.
He suddenly understood that the OSS could have been given its extraordinary authority only by someone of extraordinary authority within the government. And that would not have happened if there was not some extraordinary reason for it. A reason that transcended matters as unimportant as the Navy looking foolish or like poor relations.
When Stanley Fine gave him OSS identification, he had thought it a bit amusing, a touch of schoolboy melodrama. It no longer seemed that way.
The truth was that without realizing it, he had just left the Navy again, just as he had left it when he went off to the Flying Tigers.
Well, not quite. I volunteered for the Flying Tigers, and I damned sure didn’t volunteer for this. itwo] At Headquarters, Eighth Air Force, at High Wycombe, they paid the ritual courtesy call on the senior officer present. The lieutenant general was formally correct, managing to convey the impression–without, of course, ever openly stating it–that giving the sub-pen-busting mission to the OSS was a lousy idea, but that, as a dutiful soldier, he would comply with his orders to cooperate fully.
Then they went to meet Admiral Foster’s friend, the Eighth Air Force officer charged specifically with supporting the project.
Kenneth Lorimer turned out to be a very youthful brigadier general, who was wearing the same spectacular all-pink uniform Whittaker had been wearing at Croydon.
Foster introduced Bitter as the Navy man who would be dealing with Project Aphrodite on a day-to-day basis. He did not fail to mention that Bitter was Annapolis, 38.