It was not an uncommon characteristic, or ability, of pilots, but the only other people he had ever seen do something similar were experienced radio telegraph operators, who could carry on a conversation with one part of their brain while transcribing the dots and dashes of Morse code at forty words a minute.
What the speaker transmitted now—
“Pope, Air Force Three Eleven, a Learjet, at flight level two five thousand sixty miles north of your station. Estimate ten minutes. Approach and landing, please.”
—caused him to stop thinking about suitable punishments for the battling junior officers and consciously await the reply of the Pope control tower operator.
There were very few Learjets in the U.S. Air Force, and as far as General Hollostone knew, all but two of the small, fast little airplanes were assigned to the special missions squadron in Washington. The other two were assigned to the four-star generals commanding the U.S. Air Force, Pacific, and the U.S. Air Force, Europe.
It was illogical to think that the commanding generals of the Air Force in the Pacific or Europe were about to drop in unannounced at Pope Air Force Base, but that left open the logical probability that the Learjet was carrying someone of the upper echelon of the military establishment, ranging downward from the Secretary of Defense to a lowly lieutenant general representing a four-star general.
No one with fewer than three stars would be aboard the Learjet. Riding in a Learjet was a symbol of power.
Hollostone waited until the Pope tower had told Air Force Three Eleven how to get on the ground at Pope, then stood up. He walked into his outer office, which was occupied by his secretary, his sergeant major, and his aide-de-camp.
“Steve,” General Hollostone ordered, “get on the horn and tell Bragg there’s a Learjet nine minutes out, and we don’t know who is aboard.”
“Yes, sir,” the sergeant major said, and reached for the telephone. He understood that Bragg meant the Office of the Commanding General XVIII Airborne Corps and Fort Bragg, who would also be interested to hear that a Learjet was about to touch down at Pope.
“You and I will just be walking out of Base Ops when the mysterious stranger arrives,” General Hollostone said to his aide-de-camp. “Make sure the car is available.”
“Yes, sir,” the aide-de-camp said.
Seven and a half minutes later, General Hollostone marched through the door of Base Operations onto the tarmac in front of it. He looked first skyward, and picked out a tiny shining object that had to be the Learjet.
Then he looked around him, to see if there was anything in front of Base Ops that shouldn’t be there.
There was.
There was a soldier—a soldier, not an airman—in fatigue uniform, green beret, and parachutist’s jump boots leaning against the concrete blocks of the Base Ops building.
And he didn’t even come to attention when he saw a general officer. That’s unusual. Usually the Army—especially the paratroops at Bragg—carries that sort of thing too far.
Then General Hollostone understood why the Green Beret in fatigues hadn’t popped to attention when he saw a general officer. He was not required to do so, because he was senior by three months to Brigadier General Hollostone.
Salutes were exchanged.
“It’s cold out here, Red,” General Hollostone said. “Why didn’t you go inside?”
Inside Base Ops was a VIP lounge for colonels and up.
“I didn’t want to get your carpet muddy,” Brigadier General Paul “Red” Hanrahan, the slight, wiry forty-three-year-old who was commandant of the Special Warfare School at Fort Bragg, said as they shook hands.
“What brings you here?” Hollostone asked.
Hanrahan pointed skyward.
The tiny shining object had grown into a recognizable Learjet making its approach to Pope AF Base.
“Anyone I know aboard?” Hollostone asked.
“I don’t think so, Matt,” Hanrahan said, chuckling. “Several of my people.”
“Nobody important, in other words?”
“Probably not to you, Matt,” Hanrahan replied. There was reproof, perhaps even contempt, in his voice.
“I didn’t mean that the way it sounded, Red,” Hollostone said.
“Good,” Hanrahan replied.
“Anything you need, Red? Anything I can do for you?”
“No. But thanks anyway, Matt.”
“Come see us,” General Hollostone said.
“You, too,” General Hanrahan said.
Salutes were exchanged, and then General Hollostone marched back inside the Base Ops building trailed by his aide-de -camp.
He returned to his office and got there in time to see—through the mostly closed venetian blinds of his window—the Learjet taxi up to the tarmac in front of Base Ops and stop.
The fuselage door opened and two people got out. One of them was a skinny black man in a white linen suit that