Half an hour later we trooped out across the faintly lighted field to the C-54 which stood waiting. Lindbergh, dressed now in the olive-drab uniform of a Naval Technician, preceded us up the steps. There were ten of us in all. With the exception of three leather-cushioned chairs, there were only bucket seats. Craig and I settled ourselves in two of these uninviting hollows and began fumbling clumsily with the seat belts. Seeing that we were having trouble, Lindbergh came over and with a friendly smile asked if he could give us a hand. After deftly adjusting our belts, he returned to one of the cushioned seats across the way. Doors slammed, the engines began to roar and, a few seconds later, we were off. We mounted swiftly into the star-filled sky and, peering out, watched the dark Maryland hills drop away. We dozed despite the discomfort of our bent-over positions and didn’t come to again until the steward roused us several hours later with coffee and sandwiches. Afterward he brought out army cots and motioned to us to set them up if we wanted to stretch out. As soon as we got the cots unfolded and the pegs set in place, he turned out the lights. Craig was dead to the world in a few minutes but I couldn’t get back to sleep. To the accompaniment of the humming motors, the events of the past weeks began to pass in review: that quiet April afternoon at Western Sea Frontier Headquarters in San Francisco when my overseas orders had come through—those orders I had been waiting for so long, more than a year. It was in March of 1944 that I first learned there was a chance of getting a European assignment, to join the group of officers working with our armies in the “protection and salvaging of artistic monuments in war areas.” That was the cumbersome way it was described. The President had appointed a commission with a long name, but it came to be known simply as the Roberts Commission. Justice Roberts of the Supreme Court was the head of it. It was the first time in history that a country had taken such precautions to safeguard cultural monuments lying in the paths of its invading armies. It was the commission’s job to recommend to the War Department servicemen whose professional qualifications fitted them for this work. I had been in the Navy for two years. Before that I had been director of the California Palace of the Legion of Honor, one of San Francisco’s two municipal museums of the fine arts. The commission had recommended me, but it was up to me to obtain my own release. I had been in luck on that score. My commanding officer had agreed to let me go. And more important, my wife had too. Only Francesca had wanted to know why Americans should be meddling with Europe’s art treasures. Weren’t there enough museum directors over there to take care of things? Of course there were in normal times. But now they needed men in uniform—to go in with the armies.