It had made her even more worried about Ray. Apparently he’d gone into a funk until some admiral from La Jolla had visited him and told him straight that if he was going to go into a damn sulk over it and not see his kids, he might as well make himself useful — OD and clear the bed for somebody who needed it.
Some of the fighter pilots, she said, who were coming in were experiencing what they call “electronics burn” the result of an intense spitting kind of fire that came from all the high-tech, lightweight, but highly inflammable consoles they’d stuffed into the cockpits. Anyway, apparently Ray had had his sixth plastic surgery operation and had seen the kids. Everyone had a good cry, “according to Mom,” and Ray had started to make noises about sea duty, though that would certainly be a long way off if not out of the question. Maybe some form of support ship, a tender, spare parts or something. Mom was all in a flap because she’d just heard that young David was in for some kind of decoration.
Lana didn’t know, though, whether it was such a good idea for Ray to try and get back in the navy. “Knowing Ray,” she’d written, “he’ll probably be worse than—” she couldn’t think of the name “—the man played by James Cagney in ‘Mr. Roberts’—you know, the old grump who kept losing his palm trees.”
“Anyway, Bob,” she ended, “if there’s one thing I’ve learned in the last two years, from Hong Kong to this godforsaken rock, it’s that love is all that matters and you should give it wherever you can. Hopefully you’ll get some back before we’re all blown to Kingdom Come.”
Robert Brentwood had read all the letters at Holy Loch and, as per her instructions, had run the tape forward a little so Mr. and Mrs. Spence wouldn’t fret about not hearing anything for the first few minutes. Robert had waited to push the “stop” button, not wanting to intrude in any way on the boy’s private thoughts to his family. But the tape was silent. It had come via fleet mail quickly enough, and Brentwood guessed the security and bomb people had done their job — the package going through X ray, and with it, the dead boy’s last message to his folks.
Under the circumstances, and seeing that he had two weeks to fill, Robert thought that the least he could do was visit the boy’s folks. Before going to Waterloo and catching a train down to Surrey, he had called into Marriage’s bookstore. The same manager in Harris tweed who had taken his order several months before had just finished serving a customer when he looked up and saw Brentwood walking in. The manager beamed. “Welcome back, Captain.”
Suddenly throughout the whole store, from the paperback section atop the old spiral iron staircase down to the hardcovers on the main floor, the staff and customers broke into applause. Brentwood looked around to see who they were all clapping for, and blushed like an afterburner when he realized it was him. It was the convoys — they were starting to get through, the convoys without which the British would die, let alone Europe, and the guardians of the convoys were in good standing with the people of Britain.
The manager, Mr. Harris, was quite definite about refusing payment, handing Brentwood a mint-new copy of Bing.
“No, look, I’d like to—” protested Brentwood.
“No, old man. Least we can do.” Everyone from assistants to the unloading clerk had gathered to welcome the American captain.
“Have you time for tea, Captain?” someone asked.
“Why — er — I’ve got to be getting up to Oxshott.”
The manager was so tickled by the occasion, he couldn’t bring himself to correct the American, but he did ring British Rail and ask them what time the next train down to Oxshott was. Eleven p.m.
While they were having tea and biscuits, someone brought in a dolly with a carton of at least fifty paperbacks for the officers and crew of Brentwood’s ship. The manager saw the captain of the most deadly armed ship in history looking rather nonplussed.
“Not to worry, Captain. We’ll have them sent to your ship. You won’t have to carry them about.” There were a few giggles and polite laughs. “If you’ll just give me an address?”
Robert, as security demanded, gave him the U.S. naval P.O. box in Glasgow. Overcome by the warmth, especially after he’d been told so much about the reserved British manner, Brentwood almost forgot to take Bing with him.
After tea, there was a pub dinner: pickles, Scotch eggs, and several pints of black Guiness, their brown, creamy heads flowing like velvet down the captain’s dry throat. Another pint later, Brentwood asked, “Mr. Harris — can I ask you a straight question?”
“Fire away, old boy.”
“This gal — young lady, young British lady — was rather upset with me at a party. Said I was ‘worse than Bing Crosby.’ You know what she meant?”
“Hmm,” said Harris, who was swirling the final ration of Guiness. “Weren’t singing, were you?”
“No,” answered Robert. “No, I wasn’t.”
“Romancing then, was it?”
“No — well, I mean, she was kind of annoyed that I wouldn’t—”
“Ah—” Harris leaned over to the barman. “Fred — haven’t any of the rough red left, have you?”
“ ‘Fraid not, Mr.’Arris. I’ve got a liter of Old Espagnol, though.”
“Dry, is it?” Harris inquired about the sherry, Brentwood thinking he’d forgotten completely about his question.
“Mr. ‘Arris,” said the barman, “if this stuff was any drier, it’d make your ‘air fall out — eyebrows, too, most likely.”
“How much?” asked Harris, forehead furrowed, ready for a shock. He got it.
“A century.”
“Oooh—” said Harris, his head coming back from the bar. “Oh dear—”
“Best I can do, Squire,” said the barman. “Rationing and all.”
“Oh, quite, quite. Quite all right, Fred.”
“You’re welcome, Mr. Harris.”
Brentwood Lifted the last of his Guiness and savored it as it went down. “I like that,” he said.
“I think, old man, she was saying you were rather bourgeois.”
“Straitlaced,” cut in the barman, his hand rocking from side to side. “You know—’long the straight and narrow. No ‘anky-panky.”
“Well,” said Harris, “I have to spend a penny. Then I ‘m off, I’m afraid. I’ll take you to the station.”
“Going to the loo,” explained the barman as Harris made off, a little unsteadily, through the gray-blue haze of cigarette smoke, something you saw much more often these days since the war had begun.
“Straitlaced, eh?” Brentwood said to the barman.
“Yeah. ‘Cor, my dad. ‘E loved Crosby. Bit of a crooner himself. Always hummin’ round the ‘ouse. Then I’d be on listenin’ to the Who. Drive me mum nuts. Battle royal over that, I can tell you.”
“Uh-huh,” said Brentwood — it was like listening to a new code.
When Harris returned, they walked out into the chilly night air. They could see the searchlights all around London, in constant crisscrossing, interplaying patterns, reaching thousands of feet and reflecting off the stratus.
“Do no good at all, I’m told,” said Harris, looking up at them. “Is that true?”
“More or less,” agreed Robert, a cold, bracing breeze coming up from the Embankment. “It’s a war of invisible beams,” he explained to Harris. “But I guess searchlights give comfort to a lot of folks. Something you can see.”
Harris had hailed a cab for Waterloo Station, its headlights two yellow slits. “What you think our chances are? Look here— I don’t want to pry — classified stuff or anything like that.”
“I don’t know,” said Brentwood. “Far as I can tell, the experts don’t know either.”
They got into the back of the taxi.