The Passion and the Glory

by Christopher Nicole

  ‘They’ve gone back to picking up survivors,’ Phillips said. ‘I guess we’ll let them get on with it. Course is zero one three.’

  Straight back out to sea. ‘Stand down,’ Walt said, and went aft.

  ‘I guess it’s home to Pearl,’ Phillips said. ‘And a replenishment. You got a girl in Pearl, Walt?’

  ‘No, sir,’ Walt said.

  ‘Well, I guess you sure as hell can pick one up. At least a wahine. We need an engine overhaul, Chief Brent tells me. We could be there a week.’

  A week, Walt thought. They’d only spent two days in harbour at the end of their first sortie, back in June. He hadn’t left the base; he’d found a newspaper which had told him that Mrs Linda O’Malley had given birth to a son two days before Sea Lion had docked. So what concern of his was that? If only she hadn’t uttered those last few words. She still loved him, he was sure. And he was sure she wasn’t too happy with O’Malley; the way she was drinking indicated that. But she was married to the guy.

  So what the hell was he going to do about that? He had sent her flowers, and brooded.

  So what was he going to do this time? Anything would be even more criminal than before. But to spend a week in Pearl and not attempt to see her would drive him out of his mind.

  *

  ‘Yes?’ The voice on the telephone was low.

  ‘Mrs O’Malley?’ He hadn’t spoken on the phone to her since 7 December 1941.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Walt.’

  There was a moment’s silence. Then she said, ‘Thank you for the flowers.’

  He’d waited until mid morning to call, but he still had to ask, ‘Is O’Malley in?’

  ‘No.’ Another brief silence. ‘But you can’t come here,’ she said. ‘We have neighbours.’

  His heart did an enormous leap. If they hadn’t had neighbours … ? ‘I guess not,’ he agreed. ‘But you can go out, can’t you?’

  ‘I have a baby.’

  ‘Congratulations. How is he?’

  ‘Walter O’Malley is just fine,’ she said carefully.

  ‘Walter … you darling girl. Linda … I have a week, starting today. A week.’

  She didn’t speak.

  ‘Heck, Linda, if we could just meet, and talk … ’

  ‘About what?’

  ‘You and me.’

  ‘That’s a non-subject, Walt. Now.’

  ‘At least let me look at you, Linda.’

  She sighed down the phone. ‘You are asking me to do something terrible.’

  ‘I love you.’

  Another silence. But she was still listening. Perhaps she could hear his heart pounding.

  ‘I thought I’d go out to the bungalow for the furlough,’ he said. ‘Get right away from the Navy for a few days.’

  Another silence.

  ‘You know where it is,’ he said.

  ‘Jordan goes to Hawaii on Wednesday,’ she said. ‘He’s working on a site over there. He’ll be gone two days.’

  ‘Oh, Jesus! Linda … ’

  ‘I’ve a girl friend I could visit,’ she said. ‘If I didn’t want to stay in the house on my own. We’ve discussed it.’

  ‘A girl friend. But … ’

  ‘I can trust her, Walt.’

  ‘Wednesday,’ he said. ‘What time?’

  ‘Well … I guess late afternoon. I’d have to be back here Friday morning.’

  Two nights, and a whole day! ‘How about transport?’

  ‘I’ll be driving Jordan’s car. Can I garage it?’

  ‘Oh, sure. No one will know where you are. Linda, I love you.’

  ‘You are a shit,’ she told him. ‘I’ll have baby with me.’

  ‘Baby?’

  ‘I’m still feeding, Walt. Didn’t you realise that? Anyway, a baby isn’t something you just park when it’s inconvenient to tote it. Not my baby.’

  ‘I look forward to meeting him,’ he said.

  *

  He went shopping, bought all the food he could think of, plus champagne and vodka and vermouth, just in case she was still drinking. He was at the bungalow on Tuesday evening, and told the gardener to take the next three days off. Presumably the man knew what he was at, but he grinned and touched his hat. Walt opened all the windows to air the place, made the beds, including the two in the spare room, dusted and swept like any housewife. Actually, as a maid came in every Wednesday, the house was quite clean, and when she did arrive the following morning she was disgusted that he hadn’t waited for her to do the work. But she finished the place off, so that it looked lived in and cared for.

  ‘Is your Daddy and Mummy coming back?’ she asked.

  ‘Not for a while,’ he told her. ‘I just thought I’d live like a civilian for a couple of days.’

  She looked through the door at the spare room beds. ‘You going to sleep in a different bed each night,’ she remarked.

  ‘I might. Would you mind?’

  She shrugged. ‘It’ll give me something to do, next week. Just don’t muss it up, too much. But you relax, Lieutenant.’

  That was not possible. He had slept soundly the previous night, but after the maid had gone, and he had washed up the lunch plates, the afternoon seemed to hang as heavily as ever sitting on the bottom waiting for an enemy destroyer to go away.

  He roamed the house, looking at framed photographs, taking books out of the shelves and flicking the pages before putting them back again. He even found an old photograph album, but he abandoned that very quickly. The war had had too savage an effect on the McGann family for him to wish to recall their prewar fun and games, parties and sight-seeing trips. Principally because one of those holidays had been in Japan itself.

  Now … Joan was dead, killed by the Japanese. And Clive was dead, almost likely killed by the Japanese. According to the communique, his plane had gone missing over the Indian Ocean, en route to Ceylon. It could have been engine failure. But it had very probably been a squadron of Zeros. He was glad they had had that brief get together in Brisbane before that catastrophe. Big brother Clive, giving him advice on how to handle women. He wondered what Clive would say about what he was doing now.

  He hadn’t seen Joan since well before the war. Since her wedding, indeed, as he had already been studying for Annapolis and she had immediately gone off with her Royal Navy husband to various far flung posts of the empire. Poor old Joan.

  But she too would certainly condemn what he was doing now, no less than Father, if Father were to find out. Because what he was doing now was utterly reprehensible. He was seducing another man’s wife. Who was also a nursing mother. It didn’t matter that they were lovers, or that she seemed to want to be seduced. In the eyes of conventional morality, they were both damned. Yet nothing was going to stop them. His heart leapt every time he heard a car engine.

  Five o’clock. Now other doubts began to creep into his mind. That she might have changed her mind. That O’Malley might have changed his mind, and not gone to Hawaii after all. That the baby might be sick.

  He picked up the phone, called her number. And waited while the phone rang several times. She was out. But there could be a hundred reasons for that, too.

  An engine in the drive. He replaced the phone and ran to the door, opened it as the car stopped, watched her open the automobile door and bend over the seat beside her. She wore slacks and a loose blouse, sandals; it was a warm August evening. And she had cut her hair.

  She straightened, the baby in her arms, in some kind of harness. ‘You said we could lose the automobile,’ she said.

  ‘I’ll do it. Make yourself at home.’ He went down the steps, and she waited at the foot. They looked at each other. Then she went up and into the house. She was as uncertain as he. But she was here. For two whole nights.

  He sat behind the wheel, drove the car into the double garage, parked it beside his father’s Chrysler. Then he carefully locked the doors, returned to the house, and locked that door also. No one was leaving this house, and no one was entering it,
either, until Friday morning.

  He went into the lounge, checked. Linda sat on the settee, the baby on her lap. She had unbuttoned her blouse, and unfastened her brassiere, which apparently could be done from the front. The baby had her left teat in his mouth and was sucking noisily.

  She raised her head. ‘It’s six o’clock,’ she explained. ‘I did warn you.’

  ‘I think that is the most beautiful sight in the world,’ he said.

  ‘So I guess you were bottle fed.’

  ‘I was. My mother didn’t have much time for babies, even her own.’

  ‘That might explain a lot.’ She eased the nipple out of little Walter’s mouth, dried it with a tissue. Walter immediately began to cry. She turned him round, exposed the other breast, and allowed him to suck again. ‘He’s a hungry little beggar.’ She gave a half smile. ‘Maybe he means to be as big as his namesake.’

  Walt felt utterly superfluous. ‘Drink?’ he asked.

  She made a moue. ‘I’m trying to give it up. Makes him kind of runny.’

  ‘Well … there’s juice … ‘

  ‘He can stand one, I guess.’

  ‘Vodka martini, or champagne?’

  ‘Anyone would think you’re trying to seduce me,’ she said.

  ‘Anyone,’ he agreed.

  ‘I think champagne would be better for Walter.’

  ‘You got it.’ He opened the bottle, filled two flutes, handed her one. ‘Here’s to us.’

  She sipped, placed it on the table beside her, then dried the second nipple in turn. Walter commenced to belch, and she stood up with him half across her shoulder while she patted his back. Immediately he vomited down her back.

  ‘Good lord,’ Walt said.

  ‘Par,’ she told him. ‘I forgot to ask you to bring in my case. It’s in the boot.’

  ‘Oh. Right, I’ll get it.’ He unlocked the doors, hurried, returned with the weekend bag. Linda had walked into the bedroom, and then into the spare room. ‘You didn’t manage a cot.’

  ‘A cot? I never thought of it.’

  ‘That figures. Okay, will you bring some chairs in and put them either side of the bed so he can’t roll out.’

  ‘Sure.’ He began shifting furniture while she laid the baby down, took off her sodden blouse and bra, then picked Walter up again and hugged him against her naked flesh. Her breasts were even bigger than he remembered them, and even more erect. So were the nipples.

  ‘Christ!’ Walt said. ‘When you do that … ’

  ‘Keep your fingers crossed,’ she suggested, and went into the bathroom. He finished rearranging the furniture — which left both lounge and diner a little bare, but he hoped they weren’t going to spend too much time in there — then stood in the bathroom doorway and watched her powdering the baby after his bath before pinning his nappies into place.

  ‘Do those things come naturally to a woman, or do you have to be taught?’

  ‘We’re taught. But it comes naturally too, I guess.’ She carried Walter into the spare room, carefully tucked him beneath the sheet, inspected the chair arrangement. ‘It’ll do.’ She kissed her son, while Walt again had a sensation of superfluity. Then she switched out the light, but left the door slightly ajar. ‘Just in case he wakes up. Now, where’s that drink?’

  She had not yet replaced her top. Walt caught her arm as she made to step past him, and turned her into his embrace. She looked up at him. ‘Give me time, Walt.’

  He kissed her mouth, lightly, then released her. She went into the master bedroom, where he had placed the case, opened it, took out another blouse. ‘I go through a lot of these.’ She put it on, but did not bother with a bra. She looked more entrancing every second.

  He followed her into the lounge, watched her sip champagne, drank his own. In an odd fashion he felt in the presence of a stranger, and yet one he knew very well. Like a girl he had watched going to school every day when he had been a kid. He had fallen in love with that girl although he did not know her, had never spoken to her. He had given her an imaginary character, based on how he wanted her to be, had never known if she would really have been like that or not. A year ago Linda had revealed, in this very room, the imaginary character he had given her, and sent him over the moon. Now he didn’t know if she still had that character.

  She sat down, crossed her knees. ‘So … have you been sinking a lot of Jap ships?’

  ‘A few.’

  His tunic was hanging over the back of the chair nearest her. She leaned forward to touch the medal ribbon. ‘I never congratulated you. I guess it didn’t really register. I apologise.’

  ‘You had a lot on your mind.’

  ‘Yes.’ She finished her champagne, and he refilled her glass. ‘Want to talk about it?’

  She leaned back, the glass resting on her stomach, held by both hands. The stomach itself was as flat as it had been the last time she had sat there. He wondered if it would have changed in some other way. ‘Do you?’

  ‘I want to … get to know you all over again, I guess. Would you object to that?’

  ‘No.’

  He sat beside her. ‘I adore you.’

  ‘That’s not knowing me.’

  ‘Tell me about O’Malley.’

  ‘He’s a rough, tough Irishman.’

  ‘That’s what they say about the McGanns.’

  Her eyes came up to look at him. ‘He’s not quite in your league, Walt.’

  He kissed her mouth, and she rolled against him. The champagne glass fell on to the settee and liquid trickled down the cushion. He reflected that the maid wouldn’t be too pleased. But his hands were inside her blouse, and holding her breasts — and becoming damp. She moved her mouth for a moment, ‘If you squeeze too hard you’ll have cream for tea.’

  He kissed her again, and found the waistband of her slacks. He released it and slid his hands inside to hold her buttocks and turn her on top of him as he lay back. She lifted her head again and stared at him from a distance of perhaps six inches. ‘God, you do something to me.’

  ‘I’d like to do a lot more.’

  She slid down his body and stood up while she took off her blouse and then pushed slacks and knickers down past her knees, stepped out of them; she had already kicked off her sandals. He looked at the beauty he remembered, only slightly disturbed by the little brown marks above each thigh. ‘Walt was an eight and a half pound baby,’ she explained.

  Then she took of his pants, with some difficulty; he had never wanted sex more in his life. ‘I want to do something for you, too,’ she said.

  *

  Fingers of dawn crept through the window, and Linda stirred. Walt was already awake; he had not slept since little Walter’s four o’clock feed. Because it was Friday morning.

  Linda made a little grunting noise, and then sat up, with the suddenness which characterised all her movements, all her decisions. The sheet fell away from her, and he put his arms round her waist to nuzzle her. ‘What time do you have to go?’

  ‘Right after breakfast. Jordan’s on an early flight.’

  She ran into the bathroom, and he followed more slowly, watched her as she sat and then showered. ‘He’ll be hungry, after three days away from you.’

  ‘Yes.’ She towelled. ‘I guess that makes you mad.’

  ‘I guess it does.’ They hadn’t talked about O’Malley throughout the two days; he had wanted to, but she had refused to be drawn. ‘What are you going to do about it?’

  Carefully she hung the towel on the rail. ‘Lie on my back with my legs apart,’ she said. ‘He’s a very conservative man.’ Because she hadn’t done that once with him, Walt thought; she had wanted to be entered from every conceivable angle but that.

  ‘You don’t love him.’

  She shrugged as she brushed her hair. ‘He’s my husband.’

  ‘That’s what you said the last time.’

  ‘Well, it happens to be true.’ She made to pass him to regain the bedroom and he held her to kiss her, let his hands wander all
over her body. ‘Oh, God, Walt,’ she begged. ‘Don’t get me going again. I don’t have the time.’

  He kissed her once more. ‘I love you, Linda. And you love me. I can’t let you go.’

  ‘Walt, I have a child. If I run off, I lose Walter. You can’t ask me to do that.’

  He sighed. ‘So I call you again when next I’m in Pearl.’

  ‘If you want to. I don’t know we’ll be as lucky the next time.’ He let her go, followed her into the bedroom to watch her dress. ‘Mightn’t it be possible to do a deal with him?’

  ‘What kind of a deal?’

  ‘Well … does he love you?’

  ‘He loves my body. So do you. Heck, so do I.’ She wore bra and knickers, sat before the mirror to apply lipstick.

  ‘I wish to God you’d be serious.’

  She pursed her lips, added a shade more. ‘Maybe I am serious.’

  ‘So you’re up for sale. I can outbid O’Malley.’

  She turned her head. ‘A lieutenant in the navy? He’s a very successful man.’

  ‘My mother was a pound millionairess. Money, like mud, sticks, if you don’t spend it. I haven’t had mine yet. I get it when I’m twenty one, next year. And my brother and sister are both dead, so it all comes to me.’

  ‘You mean she didn’t leave it to your father?’

  ‘He didn’t want it.’

  She gazed at him, then got up and put on her blouse and slacks.

  ‘Do you want me to come along and see O’Malley?’ Walt asked.

  ‘And ask him to put a price on his wife? And son?’

  ‘We could phrase it a little more diplomatically.’

  She stood against him. ‘Have you any idea of the scandal there’d be?’

  ‘I’d have you, and nothing else would matter.’

  ‘Do you know, when you talk like that, I almost believe you.’

  ‘It happens to be the truth.’

  She gazed into his eyes, so intently he wondered if she was trying to see into his brain.

  ‘So, do I?’

  ‘No,’ she said. ‘Not now. I have to think, Walt. You have to think. We have to be certain sure.’

  ‘I am. But you’re not.’

  ‘Please. You’ll be back in another couple of months, won’t you?’