Captain Gus Lukenbach is a doctor who first joined the Navy as an aviator. He's accustomed to success and hungry for promotion to rear admiral. His next assignment must be a prestigious one if he is to win his star. Senior Medical Officer of an aircraft carrier might do it. But the Bureau of Naval Personnel thinks that medicine and flying don't mix, and Vice Admiral Griffin, head of the Navy's Medical Command, feels Gus hasn't "paid his dues." Griffin can convince the Navy's "barons" to blackball Gus when the selection board meets. Gus goes to billy Caldwell, a retired carrier skipper, for...

The finely braided bullwhip cracks like a shot, sending echoes rattling down the sordid little adobe-walled alley. Luck may have saved his life. If the whorehouse madam hadn't begged him to take it with him, the resentful, drunken troopers might have torn him apart and left him in a dark corner. But hearing the crack of that whip tells them the Lieutenant means business. Grudgingly, a few begin shuffling toward the army transportation they're told awaits them. He swings it overhead again and snaps it hard. It's even louder this time and they move on. Lieutenant Danny Flynn's luck holds long...