Conor stirred. His head was pounding like the bass drum in the US Naval Academy marching band. When he opened his eyes, one person stared back at him. The facial features were out of focus, as if he were looking through cheesecloth. He blinked. The onlooker’s mouth began to flap. He sat up, but his head almost exploded. A hand pushed him back. The cheesecloth dissolved, and he could see someone smiling at him. Given the slow shake of his head, Captain Jack Waddon was not pleased to see him.
“You are one lucky bastard, Conor,” Waddon said.
Conor looked around and recognized that he was back aboard Waddon’s Consolidated PBY-5 Catalina, the ship that had taken him, Emily, and Father Sean Sullivan to Italy on their mission to snatch Ettore Majorana. “What did you say?” He could barely hear his own words. “What the hell happened?” He reached for his throbbing forehead and felt a knot the size of a billiard ball. The surface of his forehead radiated a low heat.
“You were introduced to a blackjack swung by one angry MP, that’s what happened,” Waddon said. “As far as being lucky, well, that’s because Commander Butcher saved your butt. Told the MP that he’d take it up with Colonel Eddy himself and see that you, being nonmilitary, would exit the theater as soon as he could arrange transport.”
Conor rolled over onto his right side. The two men were in the plane’s compartment forward of the waist gunner’s area and aft of the flight engineer’s compartment. He reached for the back of his head and discovered a lump where the blackjack had ambushed him. “Stevens?”
“Hauled out of there to the field hospital. Out cold. Like you were.”
Conor groaned.
“Here,” Waddon said as he handed him a damp handkerchief.
Conor spied white gauze peeking out from under Waddon’s left sleeve. Waddon had been wounded three weeks prior when his PBY approached the beach near Anzio to exfiltrate Conor, Emily, Sean Sullivan, and Ettore Majorana.
“How’s the arm?”
Waddon waved off the question. “On the mend. Already back in the left seat.”
Conor nodded, then held up the handkerchief. “What’s this for?”
“Your ear. There’s some dried blood. Stevens must have landed at least one blow.”
Conor took the handkerchief and dabbed at his right ear, loosening some dried flakes but also coming away with some fresh blood. The bass drummer in his head pounded away. His head had seen better days.
“So you dragged my ass here after Butcher saved it?”
“Yep. Me and DiLazzaro. We thought you had some lead bars in your pockets. You were a load getting you in here.” Seaman Eugene DiLazzaro was one of Waddon’s crew and had wound up part of Conor’s team that went ashore at Anzio. The New Jersey–born Italian American had handled himself like a pro, particularly when the shooting started.
Conor’s stomach roiled. Bile crept upward. A mixture of oil, perspiration, fuel, and grease hung in the air, fanning the flames of his nausea. “Jack, do you have a bucket? I don’t feel too good.”
“Conor, don’t you lose it in my ship,” Waddon said, scurrying forward in search of something to keep his Catalina puke-free. Conor wondered what did the most damage: the blow to the back of his head from the blackjack or the oak bar that gave no quarter when his head collided with it. Waddon returned with a collapsible canvas bucket and shoved it into Conor’s hands. “Here, and don’t miss.”
Conor leaned over the side of the bunk and let loose a stream of vomit that filled the bottom two inches of the bucket. When he finally felt he had no more to give, he handed it to Waddon and lay back. “So you just happened to be in the area when the action started?”
“Hey, I was thirsty.” Waddon went aft and tossed the bucket’s contents out through the open starboard-side blister. He returned and sat across from Conor on the port-side bunk. “When I approached the bar’s entrance, I saw Butcher coming from the other direction. We were about ten feet from the bar when we heard a massive crash. That must have been Stevens doing a back flop on the backbar. Two MPs were already there. We saw one lower the boom from just inside the doorway. We both cringed when your head hit the bar.”
“Well, thanks for the sympathetic cringes. Then what?”
“I already told you. Don’t you remember?”
Conor shook his head and felt the pain surge as if his brain were bouncing around inside his skull.
“Like I said, Butcher jumped in, threw Ike’s name around a bit, and eventually, the MPs backed down. He told them to get Stevens to the field hospital and told me to take care of you, but not to go far. That he needed to see you when you got put back together. He wanted me to get this to you.” Waddon handed over a note.
Conor unfolded the paper. It was short and sweet. He folded the note and put it in his pants pocket, then settled back to let the whitecaps in his stomach calm down.
“Well, you going to let me in on it or not?”
“He wants to know why Donovan shitcanned me.”
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