Bunder and the engineman helped her out of the bunk, one on each side of her, and then guided her to the ladder. She came up into the wheelhouse and the cockpit, the back of her skirt wet, moving like a ponderous mountain, her size magnified even more by the life jacket she wore over her black smock.
“How do you feel?” Witten asked anxiously, the moment she was on deck.
“Weak,” she answered, and then suddenly clasped her hands over her belly, her face twisting in pain.
“Get her in the launch,” Roxy said. “Hurry it up!”
They lifted her over the side of the boat, three men above her, three men below her, guiding her gently and slowly into the waiting motor launch below. Witten and Gambol kept murmuring assurance to her, kept snapping instructions to the sailors who, for the most part, ignored the two civilians and concentrated on getting the woman into the launch safely and with as little discomfort as possible.
“Can one of us come with you?” Gambol asked.
“Go ahead,” Witten said. “I’ll stay here with the boat.”
“I don’t know,” Roxy said. “What do you think, Doc?”
“Look, let’s just get started, huh?” Bunder said testily. “I mean, let’s not cut this goddamn thing too close, okay, Roxy? If he wants to come, let him come, for Pete’s sake!”
“Hop aboard,” Roxy said, and started the engine. Gambol leaped into the launch. As it pulled away from the cruiser, Witten shouted, “If you can send a machinist over to take a look at the engine, I’d appreciate it.”
“I’ll ask the captain,” Roxy said, and the launch swung out in a wide foaming arc toward the cutter.
“How is she?” Gambol asked.
“I’m all right, Randy,” the woman answered. “Don’t talk about me in the third person. It makes me sound as if I’m dead already.”
“That’s nothing to say, ma’am,” Bunder said, and wiped sweat from his upper lip.
“Oh my God,” the woman said, and clutched her abdomen.
“Annabelle?”
“Shhh, shhh, shhh,” she said, rocking with the pain. “Shhh, shhh, shhh.”
The men fell silent.
The woman’s eyes were closed.
There was only the sound of the launch’s engine, the gentle slapping of waves against the boat’s sides.
“Ma’am?” Bunder said.
“Annabelle?”
“Yes, I’m all right.”
“Sir, what... what is her last name, sir?” Bunder asked.
“Trench,” Gambol said. “Mrs. Trench.”
“Thank you, sir.” Bunder was beginning to feel a little sick. He did not know whether the sickness was caused by the motion of the launch or the certain knowledge that this delivery would necessarily be accompanied by blood and afterbirth. “Mrs. Trench,” he said, “have you... uh... have you ever had a baby before?”
“No,” she answered.
“Oh, then...” he began, and fell silent and tried to control his rising queasiness.
“We’re almost there,” Roxy said.
Aboard the cutter, the p.a. system announced, “All hands not actively on watch lay to the starboard side to pick up the number one boat,” and then repeated the announcement as the launch came closer.
“Stand by,” Roxy said to the line handler.
“Standing by,” the handler answered, and Roxy guided the launch alongside. A line came down almost immediately from the ship to the boat. The handler secured it to a thwart, and the boat rode the sea painter into the ship, coming up gently against the hanging fenders. As the men in the launch and on the ship prepared to hoist the boat aboard, Bunder sat beside Mrs. Trench and timed her labor pains. “Hooked on forward!” someone shouted. He hoped he’d have time to get her ready before they brought her into the, God, would he have to shave her? “Hooked on aft! Heave away together!” and a sudden bowel-trembling fear caught hold of Bunder, chasing away whatever sickness he had been feeling only a moment before.
The boat was leaving the water. The men on the deck responded to each command quickly and efficiently; the boat was coming up higher and higher, “Handsomely now, handsomely.” He would sure as hell have to shave her; should he try the delivery without anesthesia? Weren’t you supposed to leave the woman awake? Wasn’t there something about her being unable to bear down if she was unconscious? “Ohhh! Ohh, you son of a bitch!” the woman said, and clutched her stomach, three minutes on the dot, almost as if the baby were wearing a wristwatch. “Two blocked!” came the order from the deck. “Let’s get her out of here,” Roxy said.
“How is she?” It was Captain Cates.
Bunder nodded. “All right, sir,” he said, and swallowed.
“The wardroom’s ready for you,” Cates said.
“Thank you, sir.”
Two stretcher bearers were waiting on the starboard side. They lifted the woman immediately and started forward with her. Bunder walked alongside the stretcher, his right hand inexplicably twitching at his side.
“One of our cooks has four children,” the captain was saying, “and helped deliver two of them. He’s washing up now.”
“Yes, sir. That’s very good, sir.”
“And I’ve asked both our technicians to assist.”
“Sir?”
“Our electronics technicians,” the captain said.
“Thank you, sir,” Bunder said, and hurried to open the bulkhead door for the stretcher bearers. This is fine, he thought. I’ve got a cook and two electronics technicians to assist me. What the hell does this son of a bitch think we’re doing here? Baking a cake? Fixing a radar set?
“Go right in,” the captain said as they approached his cabin. Bunder threw open the door. “Put her on my bunk there,” the captain said. “I’ll get some brandy.”
The stretcher bearers helped Mrs. Trench into the captain’s bunk. “Thank you,” she murmured.
“Sir, I’ll need a razor,” Bunder said, embarrassed.
“You can use mine,” the captain said as the stretcher bearers went out. “How much time do we have, Bunder?”
“Still... still three minutes apart, sir.”
“Oh?” the captain said, and turned from the chiffonier where he was opening his safe.
“Yes, sir.”
The captain took a two-ounce bottle of medicinal brandy out of his safe and began pouring the contents into a coffee cup.
“Sir?” Bunder said.
“Yes?”
“Sir...” Bunder said, and swallowed. “Sir, could... could I have one of those, sir? I... I think I’m going to need it.”
“Very well,” the captain said, and looked up as a knock sounded on his door. “Come in.”
The door opened. Bunder looked at the man in the doorway and then said, “It’s Mr. Gambol, sir. He’s the lady’s friend, sir.”
“Come in, Mr. Gambol,” the captain said. He handed Bunder a water tumbler partially filled with brandy. “Here you are, Bunder. I haven’t given you much. Do you feel all right?”
“Yes, sir.”
“How is she?” Gambol asked, closing the door behind him and leaning against it.
“She seems all right, Mr. Gambol,” the captain said. He picked up the cup of brandy and carried it to the bunk. Bending, he said, “Madam?”
Bunder was not watching the captain. Bunder was turned slightly away from the bunk, tilting the water tumbler to his lips. But in the silence that followed the captain’s gently spoken “Madam?” he suddenly knew that something was wrong. For a heart-stopping instant he thought, Oh my God, she’s dropped dead, and he turned swiftly, expecting the woman to have gone pale and limp, expecting the captain to be standing beside her with a shocked and numb expression on his face.