Chapter Nine
The sun is blinding and you blink at the white spots bouncing off the water leaving holes in your eyes and feel how the seas have fallen and the ship is moving smoothly with you riding its back as it flows into the harbor and you see the pilot boat[96] chugging out with a man dressing in black with a little cap on his head, he’s the pilot and the first Spanish man you will ever see.
You shift the clipboard to your other hand and reach up and pull your cap down on your head, pulling the visor down low against the top of your glasses and the bridge bites into your nose, smelling the salt air and the smells of the brown land rising up from the sea, with low hills and a small white town in the curve of the harbor as the ship slows and the pilot boat comes along side.
You move to the edge of the bridge wing and hear the 1MC call to the deck guys on the quarterdeck to prepare to receive the pilot and then call to the ship to man the sea and anchor detail and now you are on duty so you take your clipboard into the suddenly dark bridge and get the log from the quartermaster and snap the clip over it and find your pencil and hear the orders to the helm and carefully, slowly write it down, ahead one-third, as the helmsman reaches forward to the brass lever and pulls it back one click, the signal reaching down to the engine room where some guy will adjust a valve and then the pointer on the dial clicks back one stop, Aye aye sir, he understands and will obey.
You wait and then wait until the pilot comes on to the bridge, a small, brown man with a moustache and small quick hands and dark eyes, with black pants and shirt and a white cap with Spanish on it and the Skipper talks to him while you stand across the bridge at the chart table and the Gator talks to the Skipper and the pilot and you wait and then wait until the pilot comes over to the chart table and then you can see that his skin is pocked with marks and that his arms are covered with dark hairs and then he says something low and quiet to the Gator.
Then the Gator calls out loudly attention in the pilothouse I have the conn[97] and then captain recommend rudder left ten degrees new course zero four five ahead two thirds, speed twelve knots and the Skipper calls back very well and then the Gator repeats left ten degrees rudder come to new course zero four five ahead two thirds make turns for twelve knots and the helmsman spins his wheel and catches it and calls sir my rudder is left ten degrees coming to new course zero four five and the Gator says very well and the helmsman pushes the lever on the lee helm forward two clicks and calls ahead two-thirds making turns for twelve knots and your look at the clock and on your piece of paper you write down in all caps 1425 RUDDER LEFT 10 AHEAD 2/3 as the helmsman calls out passing nine zero and the Gator says very well.
And then the helmsman says passing zero eight zero and the Gator calls out belay your headings and the helmsman says aye aye sir and focuses on the big flat compass in front of him and you watch the pointer swing to zero seven zero, zero six zero, zero five zero, and then the helmsman spins his wheel back the other way to five degrees right and the pointer slows down and edges toward zero four five and then the helmsman brings the wheel and the rudder back to center and the pointer slows and stops on zero four four and so he brings the wheel back right and the pointer nudges finally on to zero four five and he says steady on new course zero four five and the Gator says very well and you understand that you understand all of this and you jot down 1438 COURSE 045 on the log[98].
You remember how the Skipper was dead on about pulling out on time and how the day you left for workups for this deployment he ordered the boat backwards out from the piers into the Norfolk shipping channel at exactly 0800 even though this huge container ship was bearing down and you looked aft and calculated in your head that these two boats might smash into each other with an almighty crash and the container boat laid on its horn and you whispered to the OOD and asked him what the log entry was for collision at sea you are a real wise-ass sometimes.
And it goes on like that as the afternoon sun dips below the edge of the bridge windows and then is behind the ship, casting tall skinny shadows of helicopters and flight deck tractors and antennas and masts and men down the flight deck ahead of you, and the pilot whispers and the Gator calls out and the captain confirms and the helmsman obeys, and the rudder orders ring down the wire 300 feet to aft steering where two men read them and turn the levers that move the rudder left and right and the engine orders sing down the wire eight or ten decks to main control where a chief reads them and his men adjust the flow of live steam into the turbines and the shaft turns slower and faster and below the fantail the huge fucking propeller beats the sea into a froth.
And the tugs come out, three in a neat vee, and they spin off and make fast to the bow to the stern and amidships starboard and the ship begins its surrender as the pilot sits up and pulls a radio from his belt and walks out on the bridge wing and calls to them to slow the ship and push its bow around, and the Skipper gets up from his chair and goes out the hatch to him, and listens to the commands scrambled in Spanish and all the sudden you know that there are Spanish guys on the tugs and Spanish guys on the pier waiting the catch the lines and Spanish guys in town – Spanish kids and taxi drivers and office workers and housewives and teachers and fire men and policemen and women and then you look up and see that you are at least four orders behind and you look at the chart and figure out what they must have been and jot down your best guesses while the Spanish people come closer and closer.
You are secured from sea and anchor detail and you put the clipboard on the chart table and go below, down the ladder to the flight deck and you walk all the way out on the port elevator, out over the pier where you can look down and watch a crane lift the brow off the pier and swing it over and set it down on the quarterdeck and a slight of steel stairs and watch the deck guys tie it down and the Bo’sun looks up and see you standing there and gives you the finger.
You salute him just to piss him off and then go forward to a ladder than drops you down on the catwalk, and then cut into the hull into a flight deck shelter, through a Marine berthing where the jarheads are grab-assing and getting dressed for liberty, and then aft to a ladder and you drop down to the hangar bay and then down to the second deck and then down another ladder to Deck berthing.
You Are Free Page 9