Command Decision by William Wister Haines Read Free Book Online Page B

said Dennis.
    Kane cleared his throat. “General,” he said, “as you know I pride myself on never interfering with the functioning of my subordinate echelons. But in a matter that touches one of our combat boys I know you will forgive an older commander’s concern. With your permission I should like to talk to Captain Jenks alone.”
    Dennis dismissed Evans and invited Garnett and Prescott into the Ops room with him, but Kane stopped them. He himself would go into the anteroom with Jenks.
    “That civilian’s out there, sir,” said Dennis.
    Kane’s voice was tart. “Brockie is my friend, General, and he has a very long head.”
    He led Jenks to the anteroom and, with an afterthought, beckoned Prescott to follow them. Dennis shrugged. There was no help for it. He tried to make himself smile cordially as he faced Garnett and waited for some more dirty linen.
    Garnett, however, had understood his earlier rebuke. On everything except this lamentable family trouble he was a man of delicacy and perception. Recovering his normal urbanity now, he opened with some remarks about Dennis’s own family. He had made a point of calling on them the day before he left. It was a normal courtesy but it was the kind many men overlooked. His consideration and the fresh letters he now delivered disarmed Dennis.
    “They’re fine, Casey, fine, and terribly proud of you.”
    Dennis judged that Garnett might be using this as a cover for whatever official business had brought him over, but he was grateful for the chance to forget official business momentarily. The thought of Cathy and his children, especially in such inevitable contrast to poor Ted’s troubles, took him for a minute out of that bleak room. He asked some further questions and warmed himself in Garnett’s ringing reassurances. It was decent of Cliff to have driven way out into Maryland in all the haste and turmoil of his departure. And Cliff genuinely did like his family.
    “Lucy carries a picture of you in a cellophane case she made herself, Casey.”
    “Yeah?” He was embarrassed but greedy, too. “How’s the kid?”
    Garnett smiled. “Young William Mitchell gave me special orders. You’re to destroy all of Germany except one little piece which he wants saved for his first bomb. He means it, too, Casey. He asked me if I thought you could do it.”
    Dennis could feel the very thought of that freckle-faced bundle of trouble renewing him. But he could no more share with Cliff than he could with anyone except Cathy the way he felt about his kids. He tried to make himself sound impersonal.
    “What did you tell him?”
    “Well, I told him with war you never know.”
    It was a typically guarded Garnett answer but it shattered the serenity Dennis had momentarily regained. Every time Ted took the Division he reminded himself sternly that it wasn’t as bad as if young William Mitchell were doing it, but the margin was too thin for comfort. He spoke almost to reassure himself.
    “Seven and a half years would be pretty bad even for the United Chiefs, Cliff.”
    Garnett tensed a little. “Don’t be bitter, Casey. They have their troubles, too.”
    Then, sensing Dennis’s instant contrition, he moved immediately to the inevitable topic.
    “Helen is worried about Ted, Casey.”
    “Is she?”
    “Very. You know that always was the real trouble.”
    “Was it?”
    “Yes. In the early days, especially when you and Ted were testing, she got so she couldn’t even answer the phone. That was why she wouldn’t have kids then. She had no security, even for a day ahead.”
    He knew that Garnett realized as well as he did that none of the other girls had had any more security. It was the thing that made him so sensitive about it, so desperate to change it somehow, by talk. But it was past the help of talk and Dennis wanted only to drop the whole subject.
    “No?”
    “Oh, I know she left him, Casey, but think of her side of it….”
    ***
    Dennis had known from the first that he