“You left out that you’re honest, capable, hard-nosed and very humble,” Butler said. “But not bad to look at, not bad.”
“Ben wanted me to marry him, years ago,” she said, turning to Hinman. “I refused. He’s just too damned bright to talk to at breakfast every morning. You don’t have to return the courtesy of telling me about yourself, Captain. I nosed around in the Navy Department the other day. I think I like you.”
“So far I think I like you,” Hinman said. “But I have to say that gallantry is not my strong suit.”
“Good. Phoniness isn’t something I admire,” she said. “Now should we get down to work?” She opened a briefcase she had brought with her and took out a large ring notebook.
“Your itinerary is on the front page, sir. The advance work has been done on all the stops up to and through Houston. I can do the rest of it while we’re on the first half of the tour. The schedule of appearances and speeches follows the itinerary. With very few exceptions I can tell you in advance who the bastards are. Ben has told me all about what he wants done in that area.
“I’ve gone over the speeches you wrote, Ben. There’s a couple of things I want to change in the speeches aimed directly at the women’s groups he’ll be talking to but we can talk about that.” She gave the book to Captain Hinman, who leafed through it.
“It seems to me to be something like a circus,” he said slowly. “You provide the elephant and I ride on it and smile and wave my hand and make a speech whenever you press my button.”
“It isn’t a circus,” Joan said. “There is no elephant and no one is going to make you say anything you think is wrong. You are scheduled to make twenty-five speeches, sir. I could book you into a hundred and twenty-five without half trying! The people want to see you. They want to hear you. You have to understand that! All I’m here for is to try to make sure you don’t put your foot in your mouth and fall on your ass!”
Hinman looked at her, his hard face beginning to break into a smile.
“I believe you can do that, Lieutenant. I do believe you can do that. Now what do you want me to do now, next?”
“Read that first speech,” she said crisply. “There isn’t one person in a hundred who knows how to read a speech to a live audience. Ben has done a marvelous job with these talks so get up on your feet, sir, and show me how you read. Let me give you one tip, if you don’t mind. An audience is made up of individual people so when you stand up there in front of a sea of faces remember that and talk to someone in the second row for a few minutes and then go back a few rows, maybe shift over to the other side of the group and talk to someone there. Keep doing that every few minutes. It makes it easier for you and it establishes a rapport with the people who are out there listening to you.”
“This isn’t going to be as easy as I thought it would be, Ben,” Hinman said. He held the notebook in his two hands, balancing his weight on the balls of his feet.
“It’s easy now,” Butler said. “Wait until you goof in public and afterward our sweet-tempered angel here gets you alone where no one else can see or hear and reads you off like a longshoreman and then throws her earrings at you. She’s famous for that.”
“The Navy won’t let us wear earrings, Ben dear. I’ll throw my shoes at him!”
“As long as it isn’t your lingerie,” Butler said.
“That’s a bad idea? Look, Ben, our submarine captain is blushing again!”
Chapter 14
Mako eased slowly away from the pier, her screws making a bubbling swirl in the oily water of the Loch. Chief John Barber stuck his head up out of the After Engine Room hatch and waved at his wife and daughter on the pier and then his head disappeared and the heavy black hatch cover came down, its hand wheel whirling as Barber secured the hatch for sea.
Spook Hernandez stood apart from the families of Mako’s crew who had been invited to watch the ship leave on its third war patrol. The blindness brought on by the wood alcohol had passed after four days of hospital treatment. On his right sleeve he wore the insignia of a Second Class Torpedoman. The court-martial Captain Mealey had called for had reduced him one grade in rank, fined him three months’ pay and, acting on Captain Mealey’s harsh demand, had disqualified him for all further submarine service. The reduction in rating didn’t bother Hernandez greatly, he had been broken in rank before and won it back. The disqualification for submarine duty was what made his bile rise in his throat. It meant that he now could serve only on destroyers, a ship he hated, or work in a torpedo shop at Naval Base.
“Fucking near twenty years in the Boats down the drain, you white-mustached son of a bitch!” he muttered to himself as he watched Captain Mealey ease the big submarine away from the pier and turn the ship for its passage down the Southeast Loch and through the harbor. “I hope the fucking Jap sinks you!” He turned away and walked by June Rhodes and her two sons, who were watching Mako leave.
Chief Rhodes walked to the after deck of the Mako as the ship completed its turn and raised his hand to his family. Then he went about his duties, checking each deck hatch to make sure it was secured, leaning his weight on the handles of the ammunition lockers that were built into the Conning Tower, checking the two squat 5.25 deck guns to make sure their barrels were tightly secured in the stands. Both guns were built of stainless steel so no clumsy breech and muzzle covers were needed. Satisfied, he asked for permission to leave the deck and go below. He climbed up on the cigaret deck and went below to begin his rounds of checking everything below decks. When he had finished he drew a cup of coffee from the urn in the Crew’s Mess and sat down at a mess table beside John Barber.
“How’s Simms?” Rhodes asked in a low voice.
“He’s like he always is,” Barber said. “I don’t see any changes. I didn’t like the bastard before, I don’t like him now. Like to drove me crazy last three days with do this and do that and do it yesterday. Dottie tells me he wasn’t at home last eleven, twelve days of the rest period. Where was he, aboard?”
“At the BOQ,” Rhodes said. “Nate Cohen told me that when we went to the ship to meet Captain Mealey, after the other officers had left Simms asked for permission to live aboard, to supervise the overhaul. The Old Man asked him if his family was here on the Base or in town and when he said yes the Old Man cut him off at the knees, told him no. I guess he checked in at the BOQ that day.”
“One of these days Hendershot is going to brain that simple bastard,” Barber said morosely. “If I don’t do it first! He treats us as if we don’t know anything. Hell, Hendershot has forgot more about a submarine than Simms will ever know! That ol’ Kentucky boy is gettin’ hot as hell under the collar. He’s gonna read off Simms one of these days and we both know the Old Man won’t stand for that.”
Rhodes nodded. “I’ll speak to Hindu. You hear where we’re going on this patrol? I asked Grilley but he said only the Old Man and the Exec know but that he thinks the Old Man will give the officers the word after we get clear of the net at the harbor entrance. Hinman used to tell us before we got away from the pier.”
“Nope,” Barber said. “I don’t know. I don’t worry about stuff like that. Wherever we go I ain’t gonna see it from those engine rooms. All I worry about when we start a run is will the damned torpedoes work right.”