Wingmen (9781310207280) (54 page)

Duane started
to push past Jack, saying as he did so, “Nothing much.” But Jack
grabbed him by the shoulders and shoved him fiercely against the
side of his Hellcat. Still holding him by the shoulders, Jack
brought his face up very close, so close Duane could feel his
breath as he spoke.

“I asked you
what happened.”

It occurred to
Duane that Jack might have listened in on the tactical circuit,
just the way he had listened to the morning interception. If he
had, surely he would have thought something was wrong when he heard
the panic-stricken babbling that had burst forth when the Zekes
came down on them.

“We were
jumped,” he said. “They hit us good. We lost Hill.”

“How could you
get jumped at twenty-one thousand feet?” The noise of a second
Hellcat pulling up drowned Duane’s answer. Jack looked and saw it
was Bagley. “Someone will tell me what happened,” he said.

Jack released
him, and Duane discovered that he had been standing on his toes all
the while.

Jack stormed
around the tail of Duane’s Hellcat, leaped up on the wing root of
Bagley’s plane, and strode to the cockpit. When Bagley shut down
his engine, Duane heard him ask the same question. “What
happened?”

Bagley pulled
off his helmet with an almost anguished slowness. “Hill went in.
Hammerstein bailed out…” The wind on the flight deck tore at his
words.

“Anyone
else?”

“Anders, the
new guy. They got him, too.”

“How?”

“Mister Higgins
took us low.” Bagley began to climb from his aircraft, slowly,
slowly.

Jack was
already back to Duane, who was still standing by the fuselage,
beside his white number twenty-three. Jack placed one balled fist
against Duane’s chest and pushed him up against the blue aluminum.
“Schuster got back before you did,” he said. “He tells me you were
up all night in a poker game.” There was controlled violence in
Jack’s voice.

“What about
it?” said Duane. It was the only way he knew how to respond. He was
scared. Jack kept the fist in his chest, applied pressure.

“I’ll tell you
what, Mister,” Jack said. “You led members of my squadron into a
fight you weren’t supposed to find and lost three men after not
sleeping, against regulation, for more than twenty-four hours. I’ll
tell you what I’m going to do. You see me in thirty minutes in the
squadron office. I won’t be alone.” He gave his fist one last
shove, turned away, and left.

Duane was still
standing there, dazed, confused, when one of the twenty-millimeter
gun mounts in the catwalk to his right suddenly fired off a short
burst, with a harsh, loud report. He looked into the gun platform.
It was a beehive of activity. Then two more guns further away began
firing in steady, droning explosions. In a second the entire
catwalk, a dozen small mounts, was blazing away. The loaders turned
like mechanical dolls, retrieved ammunition, turned again. Duane
stood stupidly and searched the sky, trying to spot their
target.

The
forty-millimeter mount on top of the island, high above his head,
opened up. The concussion from its muzzle blasts, its deep
drumming, struck Duane in the pit of his stomach like a bass drum
in a marching band. And now he saw what they were shooting at.

A single plane
wove in just above the surface of the water, dodging a destroyer
aflame with gun flashes and smoke. It was still far out, but flying
right for them. Exploding shells traced a dirty trail behind it,
tore the water into a white froth. When it still seemed far away,
the plane pulled up and dropped something that splashed in the
water below it. The
Constitution
heeled as it began a turn. One of the
forward five-inch mounts blasted a salvo that nearly knocked Duane
down. Then, the enemy bomber, its flank exposed as it turned,
seemed to disappear in a shifting web of tracers and exploding
shells, caught fire, plunged into the water.

The firing
stopped as suddenly as it had begun and in the deafening silence
that followed, Duane could hear cheering, tiny human voices that
seemed laughably puny after the voices of the guns.
Constitution
heeled
again, causing Duane to stagger slightly to maintain his balance,
and then he saw the torpedo.

It made a thin
white wake, like a chalk line drawn on the deep blue blackboard of
the sea.
Constitution
was turning toward it, to avoid its
ruler straight journey. Infuriatingly slow, the huge carrier turned
parallel to the torpedo, but the weapon was too close, the turning
radius too big, and Duane knew that it would hit. The wake
disappeared under the overhang of the flight deck. Duane waited,
breathless, for long terrible seconds before it detonated against
the side of the ship, near the LSO’s windscreen. The cheering from
the gun platform stopped.

A muffled
whump
reached Duane’s ears first, and a column of water rose
majestically, towering over the flight deck aft like a living
thing. Then the deck seemed to disappear, just as if someone had
jerked a rug from beneath his feet. He hit the deck on an elbow,
just as the water from the explosion found him. And as it rained
sea water. Duane felt a movement that reminded him of an earthquake
in Hawaii years before. When it was over, he lifted his body
painfully. Then he saw the frantically scurrying flight deck crew
and the rising smoke flattening out astern of the speeding ship,
and the whooping breakdown alarm told him that
Ironsides
had just finished
her contribution to the assault on Kwajalein.

31 January 1944
: In
company with CVL
Independence
, en route Pearl Harbor naval station
for repairs to damage sustained in torpedo attack 29 January. All
flight operations have been suspended due to port list incurred
after the hit. Squadron Commander Lt. Comdr. J.E. Hardigan has been
officially credited with one kill and Lt. (j.g.) Frederick Trusteau
with two kills, during the night action of 29 January. Air Group
Commander Buster Jennings has been credited with two kills during
this action and failed to return.

Following first
strike on Japanese aerodrome at Roi-Namur, Lt. T.J. Schuster has
been credited with one sure kill and two probables. Lt. (j.g.)
Heckman has been credited with one kill. Lost in action were Lt.
(j.g.) F. Hammerstein, Ensign William Hill, and Ensign John Anders.
Squadron Executive Officer Lt. Duane Higgins has been officially
reprimanded for his actions allowing the participating divisions to
be attacked without warning at low altitude leading to the loss of
three pilots.

This Diary is
being prepared again by Lt. (j.g.): Fred Trusteau.

The party at the Ford
Island BOQ was a pitiful simulation of the previous “strategy
conferences” that had marked Fred’s earlier association with
Fighting Twenty. Although it was the first night ashore, a few
resourceful pilots, including Fred, had managed to drop in on some
of the other air stations on Oahu and draw a meager liquor ration.
There was no known way to get over to the naval station across the
harbor. The great anchorage was so desolately empty of warships
that the liberty boats that taxied people around the harbor were
not running after five in the afternoon. Fred reasoned that that
was how they had managed to be bunked in the BOQ instead of staying
aboard the
Constitution
. Pearl Harbor had become a backwater of
the war.

“We ain’t worth
shit,” said Duggin, sitting on the floor beside a metal
wastebasket. At least twenty sweaty, smoking pilots were packed
into the room of one of the new men. It was a little room with two
single beds and one desk, a folding door closet and little else;
the bathroom was shared by another room on the other side of the
building. The hard-won liquor was in the bathtub, on ice.

“What the
hell’re you talking about?” asked Schuster.

“I mean, shit,”
said Duggin, “we ain’t done nothing right since we went into action
last November.”

“September,”
said Bracker. “It was September.”

“You’re both
screwed up. It was October. Marcus.” Bradley sat on the bed next to
the inevitable new men, two of them, both ensigns, both looking
terribly uncertain of themselves. Fred sat in the single chair at
the end of the bed and wondered what the hell kind of reception
this was for a combat outfit.

“I heard
someone say we’ll be headed back to the States for a yard period,”
Jacobs said.

“Really?”

“That’s
horseshit,” said Schuster. “We’ll be out of here in a month.”

“No way,” said
Bracker. “You see the way she’s listing. Hell, she’s twenty degrees
over to starboard.”

“The States,”
said Duggin, smiling stupidly. “American girls.”

“They tipped
her over on purpose.”

“Come on.”

“No shit.”

“What about it,
Trusty? You were over there this afternoon. Is that right?”

Fred took a sip
from a glass of Scotch, diluted with water so that he wouldn’t get
drunk. “Yeah,” he said. “That’s right.”

He had gone
aboard with the skipper for a briefing on the single action of Bat
Team One that had resulted in him becoming an ace and CAG getting
killed. The list made walking belowdecks a nightmare. He was glad,
doubly glad, they were staying ashore.

“That was too
bad about Mister Higgins,” said Levi.

“Yeah,” said
Jacobs. “I think the skipper was too hard on him.”

“It could have
happened to anyone,” said Duggin.

“What the hell
do you guys know?” said Schuster. “You weren’t there.”

“He couldn’t
help it if the Japs jumped him.”

“The hell he
couldn’t.”

Fred listened
to the argument. Arguments—that was all they had now. They never
had simple conversations anymore. He tried to think of a way to
slip out without drawing too much attention. There was the chance
that he and the skipper could be alone in his room for a while. But
the morose, argumentative group of pilots made getting up there
somewhat difficult. Fred leaned back in the chair, rested his head
against the wall, and closed his eyes.

“Trusty?” A
hand plucked at his sleeve. Fred opened his eyes and sat forward.
It was one of the new ensigns, sitting on the end of the bed next
to him. “Is that your name?”

“No. It’s
Fred.”

“Fred. I’m Tom
Jenkins.” The ensign extended his hand and they shook. Jenkins was
a pleasant-looking young man with short, curly hair and a smooth
face. Fred leaned back again to watch the party and plan his
escape.

“How come they
call you Trusty?”

“Beats me.”

“You have any
kills yet, Trusty?”

“A few.”

“Really? How
many?”

Fred stood up
suddenly. “You want a drink?” he asked. Without waiting for an
answer he took Jenkins’ glass from his hands and made his way
across the crowded, smoky room to the bathroom. He refilled the
glasses with bourbon; the Scotch was all gone. While he sat there,
he had an idea for getting away. He carried the glasses back to his
seat, sat, handed one across to Jenkins.

“Thanks,”
Jenkins said. “How many kills do you have, Trusty?”

“Five.” Maybe
Jenkins would lay off now. He would have found out on his own
anyway.

“You’re an
ace
,” said
Jenkins. And Fred thought, yes, he had killed maybe twenty
Japanese, seven in each Betty and two in each Kate. “That’s
something else,” Jenkins was saying. “You ever have to ditch?”

“Yes,” said
Fred. “Once.” The bathroom idea would work, he was sure.

“Damn,” said
Jenkins, properly impressed. “I can’t wait till we get back out
there again.”

“Why?”

“So I can get a
few Jap planes. Geez, I just want to write home and tell ’em I got
myself a Jap plane.”

“I’m sure
you’ll get the chance,” said Fred. He checked his watch. It was
past nine. He drained his glass and stood. “Back in a minute,” he
said to no one in particular. Carrying his glass, he went across
the crowded room and into the bathroom. Once there, he pushed the
door partly shut and urinated in the toilet, set his glass down on
the edge of the bathtub, then quickly opened the door leading to
the other room.

It was dark in
the other room. Figuring it to be a mirror image of the one he had
just left, he walked quietly and quickly straight through to the
door. On the way, he trod on an unidentified piece of clothing,
realizing with a start that someone was sleeping, snoring, in the
bed near the door. He tried the doorknob, found it locked, unlocked
it, and went through. It clicked snugly behind him, and he was
safe.

The BOQ was
modern; obviously it had been built sometime during the war. It was
long and rectangular, two identical stories high, and all the rooms
faced the outside. Plain concrete steps led to the second-story
landing. Fred knew that the Skipper’s room was up there on the
second floor, where the night breezes made sleeping easier. He went
back around the building to the side where the squadron was
berthed, up the steps, and directly to Jack’s room.

He knocked
softly three times, opened the door, and entered the room. It was
dark there, too, but this time someone got up and came to meet him.
It was Jack. He put a finger to his lips and said, “Shh”; then he
jutted his thumb toward the bathroom door. There was someone in
there, running water into the tub and moving about. Light shone out
under the edge of the door.

Fred looked
around suspiciously, but Jack embraced him strongly and whispered
in his ear, “It’s okay. The door’s locked.” He kissed Fred on the
mouth, fiercely, and began slipping loose the buttons of his shirt.
He led him, half-undressed, to the single bed standing forlornly in
the middle of the room. Before lying down, though, Jack paused and
whispered into Fred’s ear again: “This is the worst thing we can
do.”