1942

Roosevelt was visibly upset by the news that General Jonathan Wainwright, now commanding the Philippines, wished to offer to surrender his command to the Japanese. Wainwright saw the obvious- that there would be no reinforcements or relief, only prolonged agony. He had said that he felt he could hold out for several weeks more, even a couple of months, but for what purpose? The longer the siege went on, the more weakened the men would become. Thus, when the inevitable occurred and the Americans in the Philippines did surrender, they would have even less ability to withstand the privations of Japanese camps.

The time to surrender and save lives was now. The president knew he would be castigated for it, and accepted that as a fact of political life. “Is there no good news anywhere?” he asked.

King answered. “Intelligence says the Japs are gathering for a thrust into the Coral Sea as a prelude to taking Port Moresby. Warned as we are, we hope to ambush them.”

Roosevelt nodded. Again he felt exhausted. His strength seemed to ebb so much earlier each day. “See that you do.”

The sun-drenched beach south of San Diego was far from a solitary place. Even so, both Jamie Priest and Sue Dunnigan were in their own private worlds and able to ignore the several dozen people who were in view. Even the sounds of a foursome of drunken sailors and their dates failed to penetrate their shells. If it had been the weekend, the place would have been packed with humanity. But this was a work evening; the many thousands of military personnel were at their bases, and the tens of thousands of civilians in the area were working overtime producing bombers and the other materials of war that were just beginning to pour out of American factories.

Sue pried the top from a bottle of beer with an opener and handed the bottle to Jamie. “Was it that bad?”

He had been quiet since he’d picked her up and driven the short distance to the beach. The area was so lovely, so calm, that it was almost possible to forget there was a war on.

“I had to dredge up some memories I’d been trying to forget,” he replied.

She tucked her legs under her knees and took a bottle for herself from the cooler. Going to the beach had been her idea; the inquest had been the navy’s. Jamie looked so drawn and forlorn that she wanted to hold him to her and rock him like a baby. He was so thin and frail in his swimming trunks, she found it difficult to think of him as an officer, and a hero who’d survived both the Japanese and the ocean. At least the burns from the sun had gone and the cut on his back was a barely noticeable scar. He was pale, and the early evening in the sun would do them both some good.

When it came to thinness, she wryly thought that she matched him, bony limb for bony limb. Sue considered herself slender to the point of skinny and bemoaned what to her was an almost total lack of a bosom. At least she didn’t look foolish in her two-piece bathing suit like so many plump women did. She saw that the waist of her suit had ridden low and her navel was almost exposed. She pulled it up while thinking that, if she had better hips, it wouldn’t slide down so much.

This was the first time she and Jamie had done anything social. Their relationship had been very cordial but based entirely on work. Even the times they’d had lunch together had been because of the pressures of work, not because they wished to enjoy each other’s company. She hadn’t planned on suggesting anything like this evening at the beach, but he had looked so distraught after the inquest that she thought it was a good idea.

The Navy Department had finally commenced an investigation into the loss of the Pennsylvania. The sinking of a single ship, even a battleship, had largely been lost in the immensity of the disasters that had befallen the U.S. Navy since December 7. It seemed unlikely anyone even cared anymore.

Finally, however, four elderly and unimportant admirals had made the journey from Washington to interview Jamie Priest, the only known survivor of the sinking. In Jamie’s words, the admirals had been more than a little pissed that they had to travel to California instead of Jamie coming to them, but Admiral Nimitz had made it clear that he wanted Jamie to remain in San Diego. Thus, the four admirals trekked across the nation on a series of trains and buses, suffering through the inconsistencies and delays of a transportation system still paralyzed by the impact of war. They took the opportunity to loose their anger when they interrogated Jamie.