Maxwell nodded to the terrified woman but said nothing. He swept past her to the closing stateroom door.
Clunk! The door wouldn’t shut. Maxwell’s right foot was inserted in the threshold.
Inside the room, Hozer Miller was seized by a sudden desperation. Clunk! Clunk! Clunk! He kept trying to slam the door.
“Open up, Hozer,” said Maxwell. “It’s come-to-Jesus time.”
Hozer stopped trying. Maxwell heard a long sigh of resignation. The door slowly opened.
Hozer Miller stood in the doorway, barefoot and shirtless. He was wearing his boxer shorts. Miller looked at Maxwell and his shoulders slumped. Life as he knew it was over.
Maxwell glanced back in time to see the back end of Yeoman Grotsky, moving at an unusually brisk pace, disappearing around the corner of the passageway.
He walked past Miller and entered the room. He glanced around at the strewn clothes and rumpled bedding. The place looked like a grenade had gone off. Hozer was your basic slob, Maxwell observed.
“I should have known you’d find a way to get me,” said Hozer bitterly.
Maxwell looked at him. “Why do you think I’d try to get you?”
“Because of the ration of shit I’ve been giving you. You know I’m one of Killer’s guys. And Killer wants you gone.”
Maxwell nodded. At least they could agree on something. “I suppose you know the consequences of fraternizing with an enlisted woman.”
“I have a pretty good idea.”
“It’s a court-martial offense, Hozer. This is the New Navy, and there’s no tolerance. You stand to lose your commission, your wings, everything.”
The life oozed out of Hozer Miller. He slumped into the desk chair. “This is all I ever wanted to be since I was a kid — a fighter pilot on a carrier. Now…” Hozer had to fight back the tears. “Now I’ve blown it.”
Maxwell was seeing a different Hozer Miller. Gone was the old smirk, the mock-respectful manner, the barely concealed insolence. Hozer looked like a beaten animal.
“How long’s it been going on?” Maxwell asked.
“Since Dubai. It’s not her fault. She’s just a kid. She thinks I’m some kind of white knight because I’m an officer.”
Maxwell thought about the plain-faced, plump enlisted woman, whose facial expression never seemed to change. He guessed that Diane Grotsky hadn’t had many boyfriends, at least of the sort who were likely to enhance her self-esteem. She had probably joined the Navy right out of high school, hoping to change her life. A romantic involvement with an officer and a pilot, even a tawdry shipboard affair, must have seemed like a fairy tale.
Maxwell asked, “Who else knows about it?”
“No one.”
“Are you sure?”
Hozer looked up at him. “I may be stupid, XO, but I’m not suicidal. I wouldn’t let anyone know that I was having an affair with an enlisted woman.”
“So you’re willing to tell a court-martial that you accept full responsibility for the affair? That the woman was not at fault?”
Hozer put his face in his hands and said, “Yes, sir.”
“Even though it will be the end of your career? At the very least, you’ll lose your commission and get a dishonorable discharge. Maybe worse.”
Hozer shuddered and said, “I’ll take whatever I’ve got coming.”
Maxwell regarded him carefully. For all his flaws, Hozer Miller was actually showing miniscule traces of being a decent human being.
“You made a stupid choice, Hozer. After Tailhook, the press loves this stuff. This will get the Navy back on Sixty Minutes.”
Hozer slumped farther into his chair, saying nothing.
“You put the careers of yourself and another person and the reputation of a whole squadron at risk.”
Hozer nodded miserably. “Where will they hold the court-martial?”
Maxwell didn’t answer right away. He looked around the room some more, seeing the photo of Miller’s wife and two children on the desk. On the wall was the photo of Hozer receiving his naval aviator’s wings.
Finally, Maxwell said, “This squadron needs fighter pilots. We have a war to fight, and a court-martial at this time will take up valuable resources.” He leveled his eyes at Hozer. “I want your word as an officer that the Grotsky affair is over.”
A look of pure astonishment passed over Hozer Miller. “You mean… I won’t lose my career?”
“I didn’t say that. Give me your word.”
“Yes, sir, you have my word it’s over. I promise you.”
Maxwell continued staring at him. Hozer Miller wore the look of a man who had gotten his first view of death row. “Good. I suggest you clean up this mess and get back to work.”
Outside, in the long starboard passageway, Maxwell stopped and considered what had just happened. He knew it was his responsibility, as a senior officer, to file charges against Miller. The affair would serve as a warning to anyone who considered violating the military’s sacred fraternization rule.
But, he reminded himself, he was the executive officer. It was his call, and in his judgment he had just achieved the best possible result. He had put an end to an illegal and potentially explosive situation. And he had scared the crap out of Hozer Miller.
“Pow-werrrrr!”
Pearly Gates was using his sweetest LSO sugar talk. But it wasn’t working tonight. The Hornet in the groove was settling below the glide path, sinking toward the blunt killer ramp of the landing deck.
“Same damn thing,” he muttered to Chesney, the assistant LSO. “She’s outa here.” He hit the button on his pickle switch, causing the red lights on the Fresnel Lens to flash. “Wave off, wave off!” Pearly barked into his radio.
Twin tails of fire shot from the tailpipes of the Hornet as the engines went to full power and the afterburners ignited. The fighter’s nose pointed upward, back into the night sky.
“I hate this shit,” said Pearly, watching the lights of the jet pass overhead. It was the pilot’s third unsuccessful pass at the deck. Pearly knew he shouldn’t blame himself, but damn! It pissed him off when he couldn’t get one of his pilots aboard.
The sound-powered telephone rang. Pearly knew before he picked it up who it would be.
“Goddammit!” came the voice of CAG Boyce. “What’s the problem out there?”
Holding the handset away from his ear, Pearly gazed up at the red-lighted, glass-paned space in the carrier’s superstructure. He knew Boyce was up there gnawing on his cigar, glowering back at him. “Same as last night, CAG. She’s overcontrolling, not giving me power when I call for it.”
“Can you get her aboard, or do we bingo her?”
“Bingo” meant diverting the fighter to a shore-based airfield instead of landing back aboard the carrier. Sometimes that was safer than letting an unnerved pilot try again for the deck.
“Let me work her one more pass,” said Pearly. “I think I can get her down.”
CAG didn’t answer right away. Pearly knew that Boyce was peering at the Hornet out there in the pattern, thinking of all the consequences. “All right. One more pass. Make sure you take good notes, because if she doesn’t get her shit together, I’m gonna convene a FNAEB on her.”
Like everyone else, Boyce pronounced it “Fee-nab.” A FNAEB — Fleet Naval Aviator Evaluation Board — was appointed whenever a pilot’s flying was erratic or dangerous. The board’s task would be to determine whether the pilot should lose his — or her — wings.
The Hornet was back in the groove. “Hornet ball, Parker, nine-point-two.”
“Roger ball.”
Spam Parker’s Hornet started down the glide path. She had a decent pass going, observed Pearly. This time she was steady in the groove, flying a center ball. So far so good.