"He was thirty pounds underweight," Canidy went on, "and he's going to have to have some serious dental work."
"What of his attitude?" she asked. She means, Is he out of his mind?
"The President had him to dinner, after that business with the newsreel cameras," Canidy said, and went on to tell her what Jim Whittaker had done to demonstrate what a three-eighths ration was. "Even under the circumstances, that was extremely rude to Franklin and Eleanor," Barbara Whittaker said. "Well, please don't apologize for him," Canidy said.
"If you do, they'll know who told you about this." She waved her hand to show him she understood, then asked, "Is that why he's been hospitalized? Why I can't see him?"
"I think he's hospitalized because he needs hospitalization," Canidy said, hoping she would believe it. "It said in the newspapers that he carried a letter from Douglas MacArthur to the President," she said.
"And General Marshall was there for dinner. Do you know how much Marshall and Douglas MacArthur loathe each other?"
"I've heard," Canidy admitted. "Does that have anything to do with Jimmy's hospitalization? "I don't know," Canidy said after a moment.
"I just don't know." She thought that over. "Chesly and Franklin Roosevelt were not the best of friends," she said.
"But I am unable to believe that Franklin would-" "Colonel Donovan said he was going to find out what he could," Canidy said.
"I think the thing to do is wait for him to do that." She leaned over and patted first his knee and then his cheek. "Thank you," she said.
"I'm sure you shouldn't have told me any of this, but I'm glad you did."
"Just make sure Colonel Donovan doesn't find out," Canidy said. "He won't," she said. She stood up.
"When I heard you were coming," she said, "I had Commander Nadine moved out of your old room. He didn't like it much, but I told him you were an old friend of the family. Now I'm sorry I said that."
"Excuse me?" Canidy asked, confused. "I should have said you were family, period," she said. She looked down and met his eyes.
"We generally have a cocktail at half past six, and then dinner around seven. If you can't make it until then, you know where to find the refrigerator."
"Thank you."
"Welcome home, Dick," she said, and then she walked off the porch.
TWO I 2745 Lake shore Drive Chicago, Illinois April 21, 1942
Despite Brandon Chambers's assurance to Chandler H. Bitter that he would have a report on Ed Bitter's condition from one of his war correspondents in India within a matter of days, the first amplification of what had happened came to Chandler in the morning mad two weeks after the radiogram from General Chennauh. The envelope was cheap brownish paper, and the letter itself appeared to have been typed on mimeograph paper on a battered portable.
HQ, I at Pursuit Sqdn, AVG APO 607 S/F Cal.
25 Mar 42
Dear Mr. Bitter:
By the time you read this you will have heard that Ed has been hurt. I thought you would like to know what happened.
! [email protected] 1NNN We mounted a two-flight (10 ac) low-level strafing assault on the Japanese air base at Chien&aaai, Thailand. Our squadron commander led one flight, I had the other, and Ed was in line to take the place of either of us if anything should happen. We went in on oxygen at 20,000 feet, and went down near the field for a straftng run. Some of the ships had 50-pound HE bombs in their flare chutes. There was a lot more antiaircraft on the way down, and many more heavy machine guns on the deck when we got there, than intelligence had led us to expect.
The skipper took a hit and was shot down his first pass, and Ed took a hit just below his right knee on his third pass. I think it was a glancing shot or a rickoshay (sp?), because the wound, while unpleasant, isn't nearly the mess it wo
uld have been had he taken a direct hit from a.50, which is what the Japs use, we having obligingly showed them how to build them.
Ed managed to get his aircraft up to altitude again, but on the way home he went on the radio and said that he was feeling bad, and faint, and wanted to set down (rather than risk lo sing consciousness while still in the air).
Luck was with him. There was a riverbed in the middle of nowhere that looked like it was hard enough to take a landing, and he set it down without trouble. Once he was there, and we knew it was safe to land, we were able to land another plane, load him into that, and with the pilot sitting on Ed's lap and ducking his head to get it out of the prop blast, he was able to make off and get Ed back to the base. That was the worst part. Once he was on the ground, they gave him something for the pain, did what they could here for his knee, and arranged for him to be flown to India, where there is a brand new General Hospital (US Army) in Calcutta. Probably the best indicator of his condition is that he told me just before he left for Calcutta that he will be back in six weeks. I don't think so. I think they will probably ship him home just as soon as they can arrange for it. He is not in danger, so the worst that Will happen is that he may have a stiff knee.
I have to out this off now, because I'm now the squadron commander and I'm finding that means a lot of work. Ed and I had become good friends, and what I've been thinking is that if something like this had to happen, this wasn't so bad. We're really going to miss him around here, but he's going to come out of it all right.
Sincerely, Pt,44 D,04-S&", Al" Peter Doug lass, Jr.