you don’t know General Almond,” MacArthur said. “Ned took Dick Sutherland’s place as chief of staff.”
Almond offered his hand.
“I’ve heard a good deal about you, General,” he said.
“If you’ve heard it from these two,” Pickering said, indicating Huff and Willoughby, “then I deny everything.”
Jean MacArthur laughed. MacArthur smiled, and so did Huff and Willoughby, but for them it was visibly an effort.
A photographer, a middle-aged master sergeant, appeared, holding a Speed Graphic camera.
The subjects of the photography were posed in three different positions: all the officers standing together, with MacArthur and Pickering in the middle; MacArthur and Pickering standing together; and MacArthur, Mrs. MacArthur, and Pickering with Mrs. MacArthur in the middle.
The photographer left and the Filipino steward served drinks. Pickering was not offered a choice, but when he sipped at his whiskey and water the taste was familiar.
Somewhere, obviously, it has been filed away that Pickering, Fleming BG, USMCR, likes Famous Grouse whiskey.
“Old times, my dear Fleming,” MacArthur said, raising his glass.
“Old times, General,” Pickering repeated.
“I was just telling Almond,” MacArthur said, “that you were in Australia when, having been ordered from Corregidor, Jean and I and the others arrived.”
“I remember it well,” Pickering said.
“What I remember was that you were a Navy captain,” Jean MacArthur said, “who I remembered as a friend, as a merchant marine captain in Manila. And then you went to the Guadalcanal invasion, and the next time I saw you, you were a Marine general officer. I never quite understood that.”
“Either did I, Jean,” Pickering said. “There were a lot of us who received commissions in the services for which we were clearly not qualified.”
“Now, that’s simply not true,” MacArthur said. “You were a splendid officer. Your contributions, not only to my campaigns, but to the entire war effort in the Pacific, prove that beyond any question.”
He turned to General Almond.
“General Pickering was not only deeply involved in the planning of my invasion of Guadalcanal, but went ashore with the first wave of Marines to make that landing . . .”
That’s not true.
I was involved in the planning, but only because I knew shipping and the practical knowledge of the subject on the part of most of the logisticians involved—Army, Navy, and Marine Corps—was practically nonexistent.
And I was not in the first wave of Marines to land on Guadalcanal, or the second, or the third. I didn’t go ashore until I heard that the MCCAWLEY was about to sail away, leaving the Marines on the beach, and I realized that I couldn’t live with myself if I sailed with her. Then I went ashore.
“. . . where General Vandegrift immediately put him into the breach as his intelligence officer, to replace an officer who fell in action . . .”
Well, that’s true.
“. . . and, when leaving Guadalcanal on a destroyer,” MacArthur went on sonorously, “despite grievous wounds, Pickering assumed command when her captain was killed in a Japanese attack . . .”
It wasn’t anywhere near as heroic as you’re making it sound. I was on the bridge when her captain was killed; I’m a master mariner; and when a ship’s master can’t perform his duties, the next best qualified man takes over. That goes back to the Phoenicians. That’s all I did.
“. . . for which he was decorated at the personal order of Admiral Nimitz,” MacArthur continued.
And I’ve always wondered if Nimitz didn’t regret having done so, when Roosevelt shoved the OSS down his throat on my back.
“And of the many Distinguished Service Medals it was my privilege to award, Fleming, I can think of none more deserving than yours.”
What did the Killer say about the DSM? “It’s the senior officers’ Good Conduct Medal, awarded to rear-area chair-warmers who have gone three consecutive months without catching the clap.”
“That’s very kind of you, General,” Pickering said. He turned to General Almond. “What happened was that Secretary of the Navy Knox wanted me to do some intelligence work for him, and decided that I could do that job better as a Marine.”
“You were never a Marine, previously?” Almond asked, surprised.
“In the First World War, I was a teenaged Marine buck sergeant,” Pickering said.
“And in the First World War, as a teenaged enlisted man, General Pickering was awarded the Navy Cross,” MacArthur said, almost triumphantly, as if winning an argument. “I really don’t understand you, Fleming. Modesty is certainly a virtue, but denying that you’re not every bit as much a soldier as anyone in this room is simply absurd.” He paused and then drove