I guess it didn't matter much where we docked, for the point of land on which the Admiral had his quarters was covered with uniforms. Marines and sailors were kept back by MP's.
The Chief Staff Officer placed me formally under arrest, "for absence over-leave," he said—though there was a suggestion of excitement in his voice that made me suspect subterfuge. One thing was certain, an officer under arrest kept his mouth shut. I couldn't tell anybody anything. The same thing, or something like it, happened to every one of us. We were all completely muzzled by being placed under arrest. Whatever else we might be, we were "hot."
Then it was that we worked together as even marines did not always work together—and the six gobs pitched in, too.
I made out this report, with the understanding that it would be seen by every leatherneck and sailor, and not submitted until all were satisfied with its accuracy.
I told what seemed to have happened to us. As commanding officer I was requested also to express an opinion. I had none to offer, except that two news bulletins, received over the radio the next day after our return, gave me something to think about.
One of the bulletins explained in somewhat guarded language, that new A-bomb experiments were being made—not in mid-Pacific, in Bikini, but in the heart of the Kalahari Desert! So careful were the brass hats in this important series of tests, that no words in any civilized tongue were allowed to be spoken even on intercom sets! The report didn't mention Mangbetu, but it did say "little known African dialects." This wasn't an unusual procedure, by the way—Comanche Indians had been so employed in World War II.
And what were those people testing, besides the newest thing in A-bombs?
"Part of the test," said the voice of the announcer, "involves an amazing above-ground bomb-shelter! This shelter, of secret manufacture, is believed to be proof against anything except the explosion of the planet itself. Not only is each such shelter capable of great extension, thus to handle large groups of people, but built into it is something new in provisioning. People who are forced into these shelters by sudden attack, are automatically provided with food, water and equable temperature, by a process which provides these necessities as separate exudations from the inner walls of the bombproofs!
"Some fear was expressed, in the midst of the tests," said the announcer, "that there were traitors even among the carefully screened technicians—for despite orders, for a period of three days not only English but many other languages, including the secret dialect used by the technicians, were heard in their intercoms!"
I shivered at that, remembering how, for three days, we had tried every tongue of which we could think. Gradually a picture was beginning to emerge.