"Lieutenant, I really think we should investigate this."
"Dear Babyface, will you please get something through your head? The Navy doesn't like people who investigate things. You and your fellow robot Mullenoe thought Captain McKay was going to investigate the daylights out of this ship. You imagined him scourging the evildoers and creating virtue with the crack of a court-martial gavel. Has he done any such thing? Of course not. Captain McKay is a realist."
"All hell could break loose when this kid's mother reads this letter. She'll be writing her congressman and both senators and the President."
"Tear it up."
"Tear it up?"
Lieutenant MacComber yanked Semple's letter out of Ensign Meade's hand and ripped it to pieces. He dropped the shreds in an ashtray and rang for a steward. Almost instantly, Willard Otis, also from Georgia, arrived with a wide smile on his round black face. Meade was always amazed by the servility MacComber inspired in the mess stewards.
"Yes, Lieutenant MacComber?"
"Take this garbage away. And bring me some ice."
"Right away, Mr. MacComber."
"Care to join me for a nightcap? I shipped some marvelous bourbon in Long Beach. My Kentucky cousin's private stock."
"I've got another twenty letters to read," Ensign Meade said. He plodded back to the stateroom he shared with two other ensigns. The hell with it, he thought. Maybe his father was right about the Navy. Maybe it was just as full of cynics and hustlers as Wall Street. They just didn't get paid as much money. Maybe the trick was to rack up a good record and get out as fast as possible.
Somehow that conclusion did not jibe with the pride he had felt when Gunnery Officer Moss switched him to turret one in the main battery. Moss did not tell him why, but Johnny Chase said it had to be for the good job he had done in five-inch mount one. Meade had made damn sure there were no: more dented powder cans or loose shells in the handling room. They had checked 1,600 cans of powder in their magazine and stayed up half the night passing dummy shells.
Maybe pride had nothing to do with the problem in Semple's letter. Maybe the captain and everybody else did not give a damn about that kind of right and wrong. They were not in the idealism business; they were in the killing business. Maybe that was why his father had not objected to his going to Annapolis.
Where did honor fit into it? That was what his mother said she wanted him to learn at Annapolis. Honor meant a lot of things: courage, honesty, responsibility. An officer was responsible for his men. That was what had sent Ensign Babyface to MacComber. Now he no longer felt proud of himself or the Navy.
Maybe there would be other times; other chances, to live honor to the hilt. To feel completely proud. Meanwhile, Semple was on his own.
"She's got all kinds of quotes from the Bible to back her up. I was hoping you could give me some to refute her."
Frank Flanagan sat in the chaplain's office talking to him about Teresa Brownlow. It sounded ridiculous by the time he finished trying to explain it. But Flanagan did not care. He wanted someone with a knowledge of the Bible to help him rescue Teresa from her bizarre creed. He would do it considerately. He would try to make amends for the rotten letter he had sent her.
Chaplain Bushnell had deep lines in his face, running from the edges of his lips to his jaw line. Other lines descended from his nose making him look strangely like a ventriloquist's dummy. Several times, an odd smirky smile played across his mouth, which made Flanagan wonder if he was making a fool of himself. But the chaplain's eyes never smirked. They remained intelligent and kind.
Now he leaned back in his chair and sighed. "You say you're a Catholic?"
"Yes."
"You have encountered what your priests would call a heresy. It's one of the oldest tendencies in the history of Christianity— antinomianism."
"What does that mean?"
"The literal meaning is from the Greek, anti, 'against,' nomos, 'law.' The antinomians maintain that Jesus's resurrection abolished the rule of law. There is no such thing as sin. Faith is all you need to be saved. It's an idea that has always had great appeal to Americans. It broke loose before the Revolution in what was called the Great Awakening. There were churches in Connecticut where every imaginable passion ran wild. My great-grandfather had a church in Redding where a veritable sexual explosion took place. I have his diary of the whole affair. Fascinating reading. The next outbreak occurred in the Southern back country after the Revolution. Nancy Hanks, Lincoln's mother, was a devotee, according to one of my historian friends. She and her sisters were much sought after for revivals. If the Hanks girls were going to be there, men came from all parts of Kentucky."
Flanagan listened openmouthed. Lincoln's mother!
"They had a hymn they used to sing. It went something like this.
"Come to Jesus, come to Jesus, Sinful woman, sinful man.
His love's as sweet as wild honey,
As fine as sugared ham.
"Isn't that marvelous?" Chaplain Bushnell said.
Flanagan nodded numbly. "How would you refute someone who has this ... belief?"
"I don't believe in refuting anyone's faith. That's where I differ with your Jesuits. Experience is the only way someone finds their way into — or out of — a faith."
"You mean — you approve of this kind of thing?" Flanagan said. "Would you want your wife or daughter to practice antinomianism?
The chaplain smiled wanly. "I don't have a daughter. My ex-wife, I regret to admit, embraced the twentieth-century version of antinomianism some time ago — the doctrine of free love. The practitioners of that creed are ananomians without theology. Instead of the grace of Jesus in their souls, they look for sincerity. I can't say I approved of her conduct. It caused me a good deal of embarrassment. But I couldn't in conscience object to her free choice — or choices, to be more exact. So we arranged an amicable divorce."
Totally bewildered now, Flanagan could only murmur, "I see." He took a deep breath. "What exactly is your faith, Chaplain?"
"It would be difficult to sum up in a few words. I've found a great many articles of the Christian creed difficult to accept. The divinity of Jesus, for instance. But I still believe in the power of faith, in the seeking spirit. We're all embarked on a spiritual voyage to eternity."
"You don't think Jesus was God?" Flanagan said, totally astonished now
"Neither did. George Washington, Thomas Jefferson or Benjamin Franklin. Or my grandfather's good friend, after whom I'm named, Ralph Waldo Emerson. In its founding traditions, America is no more Christian than ancient Rome. Let me assure you I did not give up such a fundamental opinion without a struggle. But when I read Schleiermacher, and this more recent German, Albert Schweitzer, I had no choice. Schweitzer's book The Quest of the Historical Jesus proves rather conclusively, I fear, that-the most we can accept is a kind of Platonic noumenon, consecrated by history."
Consecrated by history. The phrase burned through Flanagan's eighteen-year-old brain. This conversation with Chaplain Bushnell was his first encounter with the modern American mind. He had grown up in New York City inside an Irish-Catholic ghetto. The world he had inherited from that ghetto was essentially no different from the one his Irish ancestors had acquired from St. Patrick in the fifth century.
"Do you have a copy of that book on Jesus?" he said.
"I'd be delighted to loan it to you."
Flanagan stumbled out onto the main deck of the USS Jefferson City with The Quest of the Historical Jesus in his hand. He stared up at the immense canopy of stars in the Pacific sky.
Consecrated by history. Was that enough to live by? What did it really mean? He thought of Teresa singing "Every Day With Jesus." He thought of Nancy Hanks in the Kentucky hills a century ago believing and living the same wild creed.
History. Flanagan had never thought of it as something people lived on his modest level of life. History was grandiose thoughts and ambitions pursued by kings and prime ministers and presidents. History. He walked to the ste
rn, where two lookouts scanned the dark sea. He stared at the shimmering mile-long phosphorescent track of the ship's wake. It seemed to stretch over the horizon to the United States of America, his country. Suddenly all the familiar phrases, words he had read a thousand times without thinking about them, began taking on weight, solidity in Flanagan's mind.
Faith. Country History.
Had history, not his dilemma with his mother and Father Callow, brought him here, as part of his voyage to eternity? In these oddly named islands they were approaching, the Solomons, would they consecrate this history? The words of the Mass spoke in Flanagan's mind. For this is the chalice of my blood of the new and eternal testament . . . which shall be shed for you, and for many . . . Was that how history was consecrated?
War Zone
In the headquarters of Squadron One, in reality the stateroom of Lieutenant Junior Grade Andrew Jackson, Montgomery West was having drinks with the lieutenant and his partner in crime, Ensign Donald Schnable. The ensign's round freckled face was flushed; his thick-lipped mouth wore a consciously reckless grin. Jackson's rawboned hillbilly face retained its usual deadpan. He made a point of never laughing at Schnable's antics, even when they amused him.
West had been spending a lot of his off-duty hours with these two demolishers of his movie career. Part of the reason was a letter he had received from Uncle Mort, denouncing him and the cloddish Navy roughnecks he had chosen for his friends aboard the Jefferson City. West had replied that he preferred their company to the sniveling asskissers with whom Louis B. Mayer surrounded himself. Drinking with Schnable and Jackson reinforced that salty declaration of independence. Besides, he admired the bravado with which they casually risked their lives each day, blasting into the sky from the Jefferson City's catapult in their fragile fabric planes. It made his daily descent into main plot a little easier to handle, although his heart still pounded and his breath still came in shallow gulps.
Schnable drained his second bourbon and pointed on the map to the narrow waterways of the cluster of islands called the Solomons. They stretched southeasterly from New Guinea like a fleet of ships protecting the Jap base at Rabaul. "God damn," Schnable said. "Maybe we can pick off a Jap destroyer in those canals. No room for them to maneuver. From now on I'm takin' up our bomb load, Lieutenant."
"Don't rush things," Jackson said. "We're headin' for Noumea first, to check in with COMSOPAC. That's a thousand miles south of the Solomons. The less we fly off them catapults with an extra eight hundred pounds in them rubber-band specials, the better."
"Good Christ, am I hearing things? Is Lieutenant Jackson afraid of getting killed?" Schnable said, refilling his glass. "No, just gettin' killed unnecessarily," Jackson said.
"He's right," West said. "It makes you feel a lot better when you get killed necessarily."
"See?" Schnable said. "West thinks you're chicken too."
"By the time you finish that third drink, you're goin' to be shitfaced, Ensign," Jackson said.
"Anybody flies them planes armed, he's gotta be sober. I'm not thrilled with the liftoff we're gettin' from that catapult. It ain't as good as it was before them Long Beach yardbirds worked it over."
"Aw, Lieutenant," Schnable said. "Just because a flying fish jumped into the cockpit yesterday, that's nothing to worry about."
"It's an order, Ensign."
"Yes, sir," Schnable said, giving him a mock salute.
Jackson left them to get some fresh air on deck. Schnable fumed and poured himself a fourth drink. "West," he said, "what would you do if you were the hero of the picture and someone impugned your reputation that way?"
"Calm down, Schnable. Jackson's right. You better make that your last drink or you won't get your plane in the air with or without bombs in her."
"I'm gonna be the first SOC pilot to get himself a sub," Schnable said. "My radioman's got a buddy in Radio Central who'll give him the word if the cans pick up another contact. I'll come down right after they drop their depth charges and get him as he surfaces."
"I've got the watch," West said. "Drink plenty of coffee at lunch, Schnable."
"Glom my stuff on your radar screen, West. First a blip, then a blop. Sighted sub, sank same."
"Just make sure it isn't one of our destroyers."
"You're as bad as Jackson. No confidence in me," Schnable said, pouring himself another drink.
Schnable made West wonder if having liquor available on board ship was such a hot idea. The ensign did not handle booze well, and when he drank, his macho rivalry with Jackson became less than amusing. West had been attracted to these flyboys because he thought their courage was authentic. Now he was beginning to think, in Schnable's case at least, it was as manufactured as his own.
On the bridge, West relieved Lieutenant Wilson Selvage MacComber in the usual routine. The DOD's messenger brought up the crew's dinner—soggy pork chops and mashed potatoes. West ate it to eliminate the slight dizziness he felt from the liquor in his bloodstream.
A half hour later, Captain McKay came on the bridge and ordered him to head into the wind while they launched a plane. They were about to begin the afternoon's drills.
"Pilot requests permission to arm the plane," the telephone talker said.
"Is that all right, Captain?" West said.
"Why not? They better get some practice flying with a full load," Captain McKay said.
West knew the pilot was Schnable. He knew he had probably had another drink before lunch. He knew Jackson was serious about the danger of catapulting with a bomb load. Yet it was not exactly his responsibility to tell that to the captain. The chain of command between McKay and Schnable did not run through Montgomery West. Schnable would call him an ass-kissing creep. Mullenoe's inclination to treat West like a human being might vanish. The captain himself, having tolerated liquor aboard, probably did not want to be told officially on the bridge that one of his officers was drinking too much. As far as West could see, McKay did not seem to give much of a damn for the Jefferson City's problems. The court-martials Mullenoe and others had predicted at Pearl Harbor had never taken place.
West decided to say nothing about Schnable.
"Affirmative. Arm the plane."
"Ready to launch," the telephone talker said about two minutes later.
"Launch," West said.
He had given the order a dozen times since they had left Long Beach and nothing bad had happened. Why should anything go wrong now? Schnable regularly flew after several drinks. West waited for the distant bang of the gunpowder in the catapult, almost five hundred feet astern. Bak. The ship jolted slightly. A moment, no — less than a moment — a milli-moment later there was an explosion. It sounded like two five-inch mounts had gone off at once.
"Oh my God," Captain McKay said.
"Left full rudder," West said.
The ship swung sharply into the Williamson turn.
"The plane is in the water burning," the telephone talker said. "No sign of survivors."
In a few minutes the wreckage was visible ahead of them. Bits and pieces of the plane and flickers of flame on the surface of the sea. West's heart pounded, his stomach churned. Was it his fault? Who or what could help him control his fear in main plot now?
"God damn it," the helmsman muttered. "We really are jinxed."
"Okay, wise guy," growled the convict with a face like a graveyard skull. "We're gonna teach you a lesson in who runs this place."
Everybody on the hangar deck howled with laughter at the flickering figures on the screen. It was not supposed to be funny. The movie was about a prison and what happens to a young man who gets railroaded into it. Everybody was laughing because the young man was Lieutenant Montgomery West.
"You'll never break me. You know why?" West said. "Because I'm innocent!"
"Tell it to the Marines," the snarling older convict said as he advanced on West with a carving knife. That drew another howl.
The warden's wife rescued West just in time. She helped him prove his i
nnocence. The ending left everyone feeling that justice had triumphed.
Harold Semple trudged wearily back to the First Division's compartment. He was exhausted from the endless gunnery drills, the constant working parties to bring up more ammunition from the magazines, more food from the holds. Plus the perpetual insistence on cleaning, scrubbing, shining every square inch of this metal monster. Semple planned to grab his blanket and sleep topside. That was what everybody was doing while the vile smell of paint remover filled the ship. Semple decided he would do it all the time from now on. It would help him avoid Wilkinson.
As Semple picked up his blanket, Wilkinson's hulking follower, Kraus, emerged from the shadows. "Where the hell have you been?" he snarled. "Wilkinson wants to see you. He says that handling room looks like a fucking pen in the Chicago stockyards."
"I swabbed it down before supper."
"Well you're gonna swab it down again. Get your ass up there."
His blanket under his arm, Semple trudged forward to mount one's handling room. Wilkinson stood in the center of the oval steel capsule, glaring at him. "Look at this flicking mess," he shouted, pointing at long black streaks and a half dozen heelprints on the deck.
"It wasn't there when I left," Semple protested.
"Yeah? And these weren't either? He pointed to a half dozen greasy smears on the bulkheads.
"No."
"Well they sure as hell ain't gonna be here when you leave this time. Get yourself a bucket and brush and scrub every fuckin' inch of this place. Then shine it with a dry rag. I wanta be able to see my face in that fuckin' deck."
"Can't I do it tomorrow? I'm tired. We were in here all day. It was so hot"
It seemed even hotter now. Sweat streamed down Semple's neck and chest. The air was thick with paint remover. Wilkinson loomed over him. He was so big he seemed to fill the handling room. There was a new expression on his face. The disgust, the anger seemed to dissolve.
Time and Tide Page 25
