The Line

CHAPTER 25

The Antietam turned broadside to the Arizona Memorial, its crew on deck saluting in unison as the bosun’s whistle signaled. The only difference between their actions in this rehearsal and what they would be doing tomorrow was that today they were dressed in work blues; tomorrow it would be dress whites.

Overhead, a thundering that had been approaching from the north reached a crescendo as a flight of Navy F-16s roared by, one plane on the wing missing. Mike Stewart stepped up to podium where the President would speak in the morning and stood there, taking the place of the Commander-in-Chief for this practice. He looked around at the harbor, watching the guided missile cruiser slipping by, the jets overhead, and the Navy security police cruising about in launches, and it all looked so much different than it had forty-eight hours ago.

Stewart watched it all with very different feelings. Everything that had looked comforting before now seemed threatening.

Who could he trust here? Was Major Watson’s story true? If it was, why had he disappeared? And why was the Secret Service doing nothing as far as Stewart could tell.

There was no additional security being laid on, and there was still time to fly agents in from LA. Staring at the large gray bulk of the Antietam though, Stewart wasn’t sure fifty more agents would do much good if the Joint Chiefs were in on this plot.

“Time for the wreath laying,” the Navy protocol officer said, looking at her stopwatch. Stewart obediently stepped away from the podium and walked over to the naval honor guard standing at the railing. He simulated taking a wreath from them and throwing it over the edge. As he did so he looked down at the water. The rusting ring that had once held one of the large guns on the Arizona lay just below the surface. A small bead of oil, still leaking from the hull after all these years drifted to the surface and broke into a rainbow of colors. Stewart shivered, thinking of all the bodies just below, then he thought of what he could be facing in the morning at the President’s side and the chill deepened.

From the hillside Boomer could clearly see the rehearsal taking place on the memorial. He lowered the binoculars as the participants broke apart, boarding launches to take them back to the mainland.

Boomer frowned. There was too much going on at once.

He wished he could sit down with Trace and talk. And Skibicki certainly didn’t seem too pleased to have him here.

Ski seemed sure that The Line was going to infiltrate Pearl and destroy the memorial with the President on it.

He had seen Stewart in the rehearsal. Who was who?

Who could he trust? Skibicki wasn’t being totally honest with him any more. Boomer knew. And Trace’s warning on the manuscript pages. What did that mean? And the most important question for Boomer was where was she and who had the diary?

“What’s going on, sir?” Trace asked General Maxwell.

They were seated in a room on the floor below the President’s.

They had not heard from Senator Jordan since he’d left with the diary.

Maxwell shook his head.

“I don’t know. According to Army records there have been no Delta Force operations in the Ukraine in the past twelve months. The Sam Houston is under the command of Navy Special Warfare Group One and is currently conducting training missions off the coast of California on radio listening silence, and this Colonel Decker does not exist.”

Maxwell had come by the room she was “staying” a little while ago and told her about last seeing Boomer and his attempts to find out where he was being held. In the short time she’d been here, she’d begun to like the old general. She could tell he was very uncomfortable with everything that was going on.

“The Joint Chiefs are at Pearl Harbor,” Maxwell said.

“If one-tenth of what you said Hooker wrote in his diary is true, it is the most shocking document ever to surface in this country.” They both looked over as the door to the room opened and Senator Jordan stood there.

“Major Trace,” Jordan said, “there are some pages in the diary missing.”

“Yes, sir. In 1963.”

Jordan nodded.

“Yes, I noticed that. But it also looks like someone tore out pages from an earlier time. I was wondering if you knew anything about that.”

“I did that after the crash when I was afraid the diary might be taken from me. I gave them to a friend.”

“A friend?” Jordan asked.

“The man who rescued me,” Trace replied.

“I gave them to him just in case things didn’t work out here.”

“So those missing pages are here on the island?”

“Yes, sir.”

“What’s your friend’s name?”

“Harry Franks,” Trace said.

“He worked with Colonel Rison.”

“Where is he now? How come he didn’t land with you?”

“I believe he’s with Sergeant Major Skibicki,” Trace answered.

“Who no one can find either,” Jordan said.

“All right.

Thank you.” Jordan shut the door before Maxwell or she could ask any questions.

“Well, at least it sounds like he’s doing something,” Maxwell said.

“I hope it’s enough,” Trace said.

“Fifty-four years ago this evening the Japanese fleet turned to the southeast in order to be in position to launch their first wave at 0600 Sunday morning,” Skibicki said.

He was smoking a cigarette, his years of training showing in the way he kept the glowing tip hidden in the cup of his hand.

Boomer looked down at the lights of Pearl Harbor and thought of all those men so many years ago, going to sleep at Taps in ignorance of their approaching doom. He had no doubt that Skibicki was almost as much an expert on the events here as his mother.

“The Jap fleet was bearing down on the island at twenty four knots. In Washington — at exactly 0238 local time, early evening here — the fourteenth part of the Japanese reply to the latest American peace proposal was received. The message ended by saying that the Japanese government found it impossible to reach an agreement through further negotiations.”

Skibicki’s voice was bitter in the darkness.

“Maggie told you that Marshall relayed a warning to the fleet. Of course it arrived over fifteen hours after Washington received the fourteenth part of the message. It did the men dying down there little good, but the message did manage to cover Marshall’s ass.”

Skibicki field-stripped the cigarette, putting the remains into his pocket.

“There was a battle of the naval bands that night in Honolulu. The Arizona band won.”

Skibicki suddenly stood.

“Time to be going.” He grabbed one of the scuba tanks to load it onto his jeep, but paused, his eyes focused on the spotlit memorial.

“It’s been a long time coming, but the men who were responsible for that morning are finally going to pay.”

The diver held his breath, kicked his legs up into the air, and slid under the waves. His right hand was on the thin nylon line that led down from the small buoy. The cord ran through his palm as he descended. The far end of the line was tied off on the bow of the deflated Zodiac twenty feet below the surface. Reaching the boat and gripping the line with one hand, the diver reached around in the dark water, searching by feel along the inside of the boat.

His fingers touched a canister. Quickly, his breath running out, he found the lanyard and pulled. The CO2 canister immediately began filling the five chambers. The diver held on as the boat rose and broke the surface. He scrambled aboard, sealing off the valves between the chambers. He checked the engine — the watertight seals still held.

Pumping the primer, he gave’a pull. The engine started on the second try.

The man looked around. Off the port side a second boat popped to the surface with his comrade on board. Once that boat was ready, the two turned toward shore. They beached the noses lightly and twelve men materialized out of the jungle abutting the shoreline, their faces darkened with camouflage paint and their weapons locked and loaded. Six men got on each boat and they pushed off. They had a long ride to their destination, and they had to be there long before the sun rose.