Eagle Station Part 41

Tanaka's voice was calm.

"There, shoot up there," Wolf said, pointing up the trail to figures crouching and running. Both Court and Mister Sam blasted away with their AKs. The figures slowed, melted off to one side, then started a steady cadence of fire at the bunker.

"They're sending out flankers and there's nothing we can do about it,"

Wolf said. "What about Hak's men?" he asked Mister Sam.

"We lost contact about the time you guys went out. I think he's been overrun."

"Eagle Station, Eagle Station-this is Jolly Green Three Two on Fox Mike.

Do you read?"

"Jolly Green, this is Phantom Zero One at Eagle Station. Read you loud and clear. We've got two to go, one badly wounded and bleeding."

"How's the weather and is there any ground fire?"

"Inbound weather reported bad. You've got Phantom Zero Three overhead for a pilot report. The helipad is clear down here-no ground fire yet-but the approaches are clobbered."

"Hate to say this, Eagle, but we might just not be able to get to you guys."

0615 Hours LOCAL, SAt.u.r.dAY 2 NOVEMBER 1968 HANOI CITY HOSPITAL.

HANOI, DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC OF VIETNAM.

It was dawn by the time he had finished dictating to her. It had been painful and he had had to stop and rest and think it through many times.

He was exhausted and wasn't sure how he would present himself at the press conference. Finally, he had fallen into a nightmare-ridden sleep and had awakened covered in sweat, trembling. The girl had fallen asleep in the wooden chair in the far corner. He looked at her troubled face. Even in sleep, when her face should be relaxed as a child's, she wore a wary look as if any moment something terrible would happen and she would have to wake and face it. He cringed inwardly as the awful realization of what he had heard yesterday about King and Kennedy surfaced in his memory. He didn't know what hurt more, his body or his spirit. He decided his body would heal someday, but he wasn't sure about his spirit.

He looked down at himself. His hospital garb, a thin gray poncho-like garment, given to him fresh yesterday before the conference, was now damp with his sweat and stained with yellow and red liquid that oozed from sores in his body. He pictured the awful comparison between this room and a cell at Hoa Lo. As backward and dirty and rough as this hospital room was, it was heaven compared to the sweat and stink and fear of solitary in black cells where rats and c.o.c.kroaches slipped through the ooze and feasted on human flesh. He knew he would not be returning to this room and this bed ever again.

He remembered then what she had done and turned suddenly and pulled the papers she had written for him from beneath the tick-filled mattress. He admired the neat small printing she had made with the curlicues and extra lines of a European hand. He folded them nervously, again and again. When he was done, he looked over at her.

"Princess," he called softly. "Hey, Princess." Her eyes opened and she had a momentary look of terror until she realized where she was and who was calling to her. She arose silently and went to his side.

He gave her the papers. "You must get this to one of the Americans." He described Connert. "Put them in your hand.

I will get him to shake hands with you. Give it to him then.

Be very careful."

"Yes," she said so softly he had to strain to hear her words.

She tried to conceal the papers in her right hand. "They are too thick." She looked up and made a tiny smile at the crestfallen look on Flak's face. "But I know what to do." She rose. "Wait," she said and ghosted out the door. In a moment she returned holding a glossy magazine called Soviet Life. "They give them to us. I like to read English."

"Do you believe what you read?"

"Russia is a beautiful country. I would like to visit someday."

"So is America."

"We see such bad pictures. It does not look nice."

"They only show you the bad parts. Come visit us someday."

"You could show me your country. That would be nice." She smoothed the pages and put them in the magazine.

He leaned on her to get up from the bed. "There is one last thing," he said as he took her hands and kissed the palms. "I wish we had made love."

Her hands folded around his face. "Yes, my black king, mon roi noir, I too wish we had made love."

They kissed, tentatively at first, then deep and thrusting.

Finally they pushed apart.

"I ... have never kissed like that before," she said. "I only heard about it ... in France."

He held her close for a moment before he spoke. "I think it's time."

She glanced at the position of the sun through the window.

Yes, it is time." She looked almost serene.

"It is going to be very bad for you when they take me away."

She nodded and looked up from her normal downcast view and gave him a small smile. "I am not afraid. It will be worse for you.

"If only I could get you away from here," he said.

She put her fingers to his lips. "That is not to be. What is to be is now. We must go." She put her arm around his waist and he hobbled through the door.

Richard Connert arched his back and tried to keep his hands from trembling. G.o.d, he had worked so hard to get to this point.

He had literally sacrificed his Air Force career to get to Hanoi and communicate with the POWs. There had been long sessions in the Air Force intelligence community, trying to decide the best way to get messages to and from them. Originally, crude codes had been used in family letters to the men and they had tried the same in return. The method was excruciatingly slow, as few words could be incorporated in each short letter and there was no a.s.surance it reached the POW. The Navy had used a simple invisible ink to one of its men, Stockdale, and in broad hints in the letter from his wife, Sybil, he had been told about it and how to bring it out.

In joint sessions with the other services they had thought of ejecting a man in from the backseat of a fighter during a raid to carry in messages. But what kind of messages do you carry in? "Hang on, guys"?

What was needed was a two-way street: messages in and messages out. When the ejection idea had been rejected as too risky and pointless, the Marines had said they thought it was nifty and they would probably do just that.

Connert had heard no more about that project. He didn't know if the Marines, acting on their own, had done it or not. Then the joint committee had buckled down and started teaching Project Mailman in special adjuncts to survival schools. That at least was a method of teaching air-crew how to identify mailmen, but no one had any idea how to get a mailman in and back out. Finally someone had talked about the peace groups going to Hanoi. If we could just get a guy in and out with them, he had said. So Project Combat Dancer began. Combat was a prefix word used before a mission-t.i.tle word.

Richard Connert and eight other men from the OSI had been identified as likely prospects and given a chance to volunteer.

Like the others, he had been trained and filtered back into the Air Force to develop the legend he had invented in training.

Each man had had to develop his own legend to include how he would get out of the service and infiltrate the organization he thought stood a good chance of getting to Hanoi. Once submitted for approval, the legend would be accepted, rejected, or modified by a board in the bas.e.m.e.nt of the Pentagon.

Connert's had been as a F-4 simulator instructor-he had actually served in that capacity for a few months at George Air Force Base-who would be transferred to Vietnam, where he would go visibly bonkers. Connert used to grin a lot to himself after his discharge. He had had a ball discomforting his frontseater on some missions in South Vietnam. After great study, he had picked Shawn Bannister as the star protestor to which he would hook his red wagon and, by an interesting turn, it was Shawn's half-brother, Courtland, with whom he had flown. it hadn't been planned that way, but when the opportunity had presented itself at Tan Son Nhut during the Tet Offensive, Connert couldn't resist the irony of the situation.

Court had needed a backseater for a few days, and Connert was available.

He had done things in the rear c.o.c.kpit just short of disastrous, but enough to drive Court Bannister to ground him and find out he was, according to his legend, a non-rated man acting as a pilot. That had earned him the discharge and notoriety he had sought. Though not an Air Force-rated pilot, Connert had flown with the base Aero Club as a hobby and earned a private pilot's rating. That experience plus his training in the F-4 simulator had allowed him to pretend to be a pilot more dangerous than he really had been in the backseat of the F-4. His pilot's license had also given him the edge over all the other volunteers.

He had not had much trouble getting into Shawn Bannister's campaign headquarters. Once out of the Air Force, he had grown a beard, joined the Vietnam Veterans Against the War, and been loud and vociferous in the front ranks of protest groups. With those credentials and a real college degree he had easily been accepted into Bannister's group. His roommate, Michael LaNew, had tried another method, but so far had been unsuccessful in getting to Vietnam in any capacity.

Connert put his hand in his pocket and touched the ring made from a shot-down American airplane. We'll get 'em for you, buddy. We'll get the motherf.u.c.kers. He looked at Flak Apple on the stage. G.o.d, what that man has been through, he thought as he began flashing.

The bright lights on tripods were powered from the operating room circuit. They blinded Flak when he stood next to the raised platform Thach had caused to be constructed. He decided not to shield his eyes, but to appear unmoved by the lights.

There was a curtain forming a wing where he could see Thach standing next to Co Dust but those in the audience could not.

In front, he saw, there were more journalists and photographers than before. They were standing around, waiting, he supposed, for someone to tell them to be seated on the rows of folding chairs. Flak stood as straight and tall as he could without the pain doubling him over. He searched for and finally found . Dancer, the Blue Mailman. He watched Dancer's hand and fingers and listened to his coughs. It would be hard.

He would have to use blinks and nods in addition to his hands. He wasn't sure Dancer would be able to read him.

WHAT R U GOING TO DO ... Dancer asked.

IS KING DEAD...

YES ...

AND KENNEDY...

YES ... WHAT R U GOING TO DO ...

READ MY CONFESSION...

DO U HAVE THE LIST...

GET MAGAZINE FROM GIRL ...

Connert could see no girl. Perhaps she was behind the curtain and would be whisked out at the completion of the interview.

Shawn Bannister sat down impatiently, muttering about how soon was the show going to start. Connert remained standing and suddenly spoke out.

"Say, what's behind that curtain? How do we know he isn't going to be signaled from back there?"

"You crazy?" Shawn hissed out of the corner of his mouth.

All the newsmen ignored him, except the j.a.panese, who put their camera on him. The East Bloc people had been admonished to film only what was acceptable propaganda. Although the j.a.panese had been warned to do that and follow the Party line, they nonetheless did exactly as they wished.

"I think we should be allowed to see what is behind the curtain,"

Connert said to the audience in general. All but one ignored him. This was not supposed to be part of the program.

"Sit down," Shawn said and tugged at his pant leg.

"Yes," the j.a.panese newsman said. "What is back there, please?" Connert sat down.

There was a fluttering of the curtain, then it was pulled back on the wire from which it hung. Trying to appear calm, Thach spoke.

"All we have here is the nurse for the patient Apple. He is a sick man and the lenient and humane policy of Ho Chi Minh provides him with a nurse when even our own people are suffering."

Co Dust stood straight and tried not to blink in the light. She nervously twisted a rolled-up magazine in her hands.

Connert walked rapidly toward her as he pulled a steno notebook and a pencil from his pocket and started a series of rapid-fire questions he hoped would complicate and confuse the situation.

"Do you speak English? Are you his nurse? How do you feel about having to attend an American war criminal? What are you reading? It's in English. Is it an American magazine?"

He took the magazine quickly from her nerveless fingers and rapidly glanced at the cover. "Oh, this is about Russia. Is it good? I must read this!" He covered it with his notebook.

"Please, Mister." Thach inserted himself between Connert and Co Dust.

"Please to be seated. We must begin." Connert allowed himself to be led off and returned to sit next to Shawn Bannister, who rattled off words in a low and furious voice.

"G.o.ddammit, Connert, you're crazy! Give that to me." He s.n.a.t.c.hed the magazine from Connert's hands. "I'll give it back to them so they don't think we're completely nuts." He looked up as Thach led Flak Apple to the stage. Connert's face drained as he realized Shawn Bannister would probably open the magazine and discover the list.

The Committee Chairman sat motionless and took in the lights and cameras. He studied the black man who stood before them. He allowed himself one small movement of his upper lip in satisfaction. it was going just as had been planned in Bratislava. It had taken hard work and some anxious moments, but it was working out. Valiant Struggle, as conceived by the American in Bratislava and put into effect by his men, was proving worth the effort. The resultant publicity and photos of a black American imperialist renouncing his country in Hanoi, coupled with the fail of the clandestine site exposing the American military imperialists in Laos, would, he had been told by the American, a.s.sure election of the proper man in the United States. He did not understand, he admitted to himself, how these elections worked. They seemed such a waste of effort to attain a dubious outcome. Better to know what is best for the people and give it to them by force, if necessary, until they are reeducated about their duties to the State. The proper man, that Horn-free, needed help against that reactionary Nik-shun. That man Horn-free had said he would crawl on his knees to Hanoi to free the air pirate prisoners. He almost smiled. He would give him that chance.

Flak tried not to look at Connert and the magazine. He had heard that the young seaman Doug Hegdahl had been ordered out on early release by SRO Navy Commander d.i.c.k Stratton with the POW names, but so far hadn't made it, so maybe here was the chance for this vital information to reach America.

He looked out over the a.s.sembled newsmen. He saw several that looked East Bloc and some j.a.panese. One smiling man he knew to be Wilfred Burchett, a card-carrying communist from Australia. He was not popular among his countrymen.

The POWs called him Willful Bulls.h.i.t because he frequently broadcast propaganda to them and sometimes met with them in an effort to get them to do the same.

Flak flash/fidgeted as long as he could and figured he'd better start talking. He had done all that he could. It was up to Dancer to get the magazine to the proper people.

Thach led Flak by the arm and mounted the stage and told the audience to be seated. After the cameras were readied and coughs and sc.r.a.ping of chairs died, he said, "The man Apple has something he wishes to confess to you." The cameras quickly rotated a few degrees back to Flak, who stood as straight as he could.

"Yes. I wish to confess," he said.

The Chairman shifted imperceptibly in his chair. This was what he had been waiting for. The first half of Valiant Struggle was about to culminate.

0730 Hours LOCAL, SAt.u.r.dAY 2 NOVEMBER 1968 EAGLE STATION AT LIMA SITE 85.

ROYALTY OF LAos Aboard Jolly Green 32, Joe Kelly turned to his copilot, a new captain from Udorn. "Doesn't look good, does it?" he said on the intercom.

"Wanna try it?"

"Sure, if the rest of the crew does."

"How 'bout it, guys?" Kelly said to the two PJs and the crew chief. They exchanged a few words, then said in unison, "Press on, oh fearless leader."

Kelly smiled at their new malapropism, took a bearing on the Udorn TaCan, and started to descend. His hands and feet were busy as he spiraled the big ship down through the clouds two miles west of the Eagle karst. At two thousand feet he broke out in the clear beneath the clouds and flew back to the Eagle karst. It thrust up into the clouds like the top of a skysc.r.a.per on a bad day in New York. He circled the karst. There were no breaks.

"Phantom, this is Jolly. Can you bring your survivors down the karst?

It's clear down here and we can make an easy pickup."