The Last Heroes (Men at War 1)

As they were having breakfast the next morning in the hotel dining room, John B. Dolan came in and sat down with them. There was no fouled anchor insignia pinned to the collar points of his khaki shirt, and there was no brimmed uniform cap perched cockily atop his head, but with those exceptions, he looked no less a chief petty officer of the United States Navy than he had at Pensacola NAS.

Dolan motioned with his finger for a cup of coffee and helped himself to a sugared bun from a basket on the table.

‘‘CAMCO’s got a house for use,’’ Dolan said, ‘‘with its own mess and laundry. Right now there’s only Finley and me and an ex-chief radioman named Lopp. You’d probably be more comfortable there than here. Interested?’’

‘‘Fascinated,’’ Canidy said immediately.

Bitter felt uncomfortable sharing quarters with ex-enlisted men, even if they were now, as civilians, technically social equals. Dolan and Canidy immediately made him even more uncomfortable.

‘‘There’s more,’’ Dolan said. ‘‘They sent me down to the wharves to pick up a car. There’s a whole godown full of new Studebaker Commanders. All you have to do, I think, is walk in, sign a chit, and ride out with one the way I did.’’

‘‘All they can do is tell me to give it back, right?’’ Canidy said.

‘‘Who owns the cars?’’ Bitter asked.

‘‘CAMCO,’’ John Dolan replied. ‘‘What we need is spare engines and assembly racks, and stuff like that, which we don’t have, instead of Studebakers, but what the hell, use what you do have, right? No sense in letting them just sit in the warehouse.’’

‘‘Isn’t the group going to need them?’’ Bitter asked.

Dolan gave him a patient look.

‘‘The way it is, Mr. Bitter,’’ he said slowly, with more than a little disdain, ‘‘is we need all this stuff in China, which is the other end of the Burma Road. And we can’t get it there, at least right now, you understand?’’

‘‘Yes, of course,’’ Bitter said. He was uncomfortable that he had been treated like a fool.

‘‘I’ll go change,’’ Canidy said, and got up and walked out of the dining room.

‘‘I guess I’m a little surprised that an old salt like you and Mr. Canidy could be friends,’’ Bitter said.

Dolan gave Bitter a tolerantly contemptuous look.

‘‘Let me put it this way, Mr. Bitter,’’ Dolan said. ‘‘There’s three kinds of officers. At the bottom are the really dumb ones. That’s maybe two percent. Then there’s most of them, say ninety-six percent. They do their job, and most of the time they don’t cause anybody any trouble. Then there’s the last two percent. You learn to spot them, and if you’re smart, you really take care of officers like that, because you know that they’ll take care of you. Not only when that’s easy for them, but when you really need taking care of and it costs them.’’

‘‘And you think Mr. Canidy is in the elite two percent?’’

‘‘Oh yeah,’’ Dolan said. ‘‘I spotted him right away, first time I took a ride with him. I’ve flown some, Mr. Bitter. I used to be a gold-stripe chief aviation pilot.’’

‘‘I didn’t know that,’’ Bitter said. The Navy had a small corps of enlisted pilots. The elite of the enlisted pilots were the chief petty officer pilots, and the elite of that elite were the gold-stripe chief aviation pilots. The chevrons of their insignia were embroidered in gold thread.

‘‘I figured if you’re not flying, you shouldn’t be wearing wings,’’ Dolan said. He was, Bitter realized, letting him off the hook.

‘‘And that’s why you recommended Mr. Canidy to be a test pilot?’’

‘‘That’s part of it,’’ Dolan said. ‘‘And at Toungoo, what Chennault’s going to do is run everybody through pursuit pilot school, the Army way. Mr. Canidy doesn’t need that, especially if it means he has to sleep in some old English barracks knocking bugs off his bunk.’’

‘‘You don’t think he needs pursuit pilot school?’’

‘‘You know the difference between flight training and pursuit pilot training?’’ Dolan asked.

‘‘Tell me,’’ Bitter said.

‘‘In pursuit pilot school, they unlearn you everything you’ve been taught so far about what not to do with an airplane, and they try to teach you just how far you can go without dinging it. I think Mr. Canidy’s got that down pretty pat already.’’

‘‘And you think I have, too?’’ Bitter asked. ‘‘I understand you recommended both of us for test pilots.’’

Dolan didn’t answer for a moment. Then he turned in his chair and looked right into Bitter’s eyes.

‘‘There’s a couple of things with you,’’ Dolan said. ‘‘You went to the Academy, for one thing. For another, Mr. Canidy told me about you losing your engine while you were barrel-rolling. But I guess what’s most important is that I know that no matter what some people might think, Mr. Canidy wouldn’t have a genuine asshole for a buddy.’’