Hunter Sniper

“Yes, sir.” Oatmire’s blank look indicated that he still had no idea what the general had in mind. What the hell was interservice learning and cooperation, anyhow? “What do you want me to do while I’m there, sir?”

“Relax, Oatmire, you’re not being transferred to the navy. Not yet, anyhow. I want you to observe and report back to me.” A smile creased the general’s face. “You’re going to be my fox in the navy henhouse. In other words, son, you’re going to be my spy.”

CHAPTER NINE

There was a reason that Oatmire had joined the army rather than the navy. The reason was that he preferred dry land rather than the sea.

He was reminded of this preference while being bounced around in a small launch that was crossing a very large expanse of ocean. He suspected that the boatswain was doing his best to hit all the waves sideways, thus maximizing the rocking and bouncing of the boat to unnerve the ground pounder huddled miserably in the bow.

Oatmire felt his stomach begin to churn. He tried not to dwell on the extra helping of reconstituted powdered eggs that he’d had that morning, washed down by a mug of the navy’s thickest black coffee.

His mood was not helped by the salty spray that pummeled him in the bow. In fact, he seemed to be doing a good job of blocking the spray and thus preventing any of the actual navy personnel from getting wet, God forbid.

“How much farther?” Oatmire shouted, the breeze threatening to whip away his words.

“The ship is just over the horizon, sir.”

“All right. For a minute there I was worried that we were headed back to Pearl.”

“No, sir, we wouldn’t have enough fuel for that.”

Oatmire checked for a smile on the boatswain’s face, but the man had said it deadpan, as if he had taken Oatmire’s wisecrack about crossing the Pacific seriously. On top of that, the sailor had been concerned only about the lack of fuel, and not the lack of size of the launch.

“Good to know.”

Oatmire shook his head, managing to take a fresh face full of cold sea spray in the process. Sailors. Everybody said it was the marines who were trouble, but he wasn’t so sure about that.

He wouldn’t have been surprised if someone in the navy brass really had decided to send MacArthur’s aide all the way back to Hawaii in an open boat, just as a way of poking a stick in the general’s eye.

Disconcertingly, USS Nashville was slipping out of sight. Though massive in person, the distant ship seemed insignificant on the blue Pacific. A vast sky studded with puffy clouds swept down to meet the sea at the horizon. They were much too far out to sea for any glimpse of Leyte, of course.

The launch rode up a wave and sliced down in the trough, then up again, wild as any roller-coaster ride. His head spun, and he suddenly felt himself losing the skirmish with his queasy stomach.

He leaned over the side and heaved up his breakfast. He sat up and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. At least he’d had the good sense to lose his breakfast over the downwind side of the launch.

The boatswain made no comment, perhaps out of a sense of interservice diplomacy. Oatmire suspected that he’d been trained to ignore seasick army officers, lest they be even further embarrassed.

Oatmire groaned. He thought back to the conversation he’d had with his closest friend on the staff when he had suggested that perhaps someone else would be better for the job. Anybody else. But they both knew his orders weren’t going to change. These orders had come from General MacArthur himself.

“What I don’t get is, why me?” The look on Oatmire’s face made it clear that he still didn’t understand his situation.

“Look, Oatmire, if MacArthur sent Sutherland on that ship, those squids would all be on their best behavior. They’d never say anything in front of him. Besides, MacArthur would miss him too much. He is the chief of staff, after all. You, on the other hand, nobody is even going to notice. Hell, nobody is even going to miss you here.”

“Thanks a lot.”

“You know me. Just trying to cheer you up.”

Oatmire’s thoughts were interrupted by a change in the engine noise. The launch that had been bravely pushing through the Pacific chop suddenly slowed to a crawl, nearly wallowing in the waves. Oatmire had thought that going slower would be a good thing, but he realized that he was mistaken.

He looked up, but there was nothing on the horizon. “What’s going on? Why are we slowing down?”

“We’ve got two aircraft incoming, sir. I don’t think that they’re ours.”

Following the sailor’s glance, he saw the two planes. “I’ll be damned.”