Time and Tide

by Thomas Fleming

  Most of the big shots and reporters were clustered around Mayer and Mickey Rooney on the terrace. No doubt Uncle Mort would tell his nephew he had been included in this Toast to the Heroes party only through his good offices. But it was still pretty galling to be invited and then ignored by everyone above the associate producer level. He remarked this wryly to Ina Severn as he led her to the bar and ordered a Pimm's Cup for her. Again, all he got was that cool enigmatic smile.

  One of his old girlfriends, red-haired Helena Hopkins, rushed up to him. "Oh, Monty," she said in her breathy way, "is it true what I hear? You're coming back as a star?"

  “I thought he was a star," Ina Severn said.

  Helena gave her a baffled glare and returned to the arm of Lieutenant Robert Mullenoe, who no longer seemed to regard West as the carrier of an obscure Asiatic disease. "Great party, West," he said.

  "Well," Ina Severn said, after a sip of her Pimm's Cup. "Tell me all about your heroic deeds on the high seas."

  "There's not much to tell," he said. "We have met the enemy, but they are definitely not ours. They put a shell into our midsection and we reeled back here for repairs."

  "That script will never make it through the front office," Ina said in her wry English comedienne manner. Without any warning her tone changed. "How terribly discouraging. Did you lose any men?"

  "Fifteen in my division," West said. "About fifty all told."

  "Oh."

  Montgomery West was amazed. She seemed genuinely distressed. Did Ina Severn have emotions, after all?

  "Hey, Lieutenant," said a deep hearty voice. "How about passing some of that glamour around?"

  Daniel Boone Parker, the executive officer of the USS Jefferson City, beamed at Ina. He patted his big belly like a benevolent paterfamilias.

  "Commander, I'd like you to meet Ina Severn, one of the best actresses in Hollywood."

  "I saw you in Two's a Crowd in London when I was with the embassy as a naval aide," Parker said.

  "Why don't they give you that kind of comedy part here?"

  "One of the many mysteries of Hollywood," Ina said.

  Across the lawn strolled Louella Parsons, gossip columnist supreme, and one of her favorite sources, a sour-mouthed character actor named Jack O'Rourke. He had played the villain in a hundred B movies. He was one of Uncle Mort's closest friends.

  "Monty darling," Lolly said, with a smile that belonged on the face of a werewolf, "I've been looking in every nook and cranny for you. I want to be the first to break the story."

  "What story?"

  "It’s all over town. How you were the officer of the deck when a man fell overboard and you personally jumped in to rescue him."

  "Not really. I ... wanted to rescue him, but the captain thought otherwise. There were submarines reported in the area. So ... we kept going."

  "Oh?" Lolly said. "That's not very heroic, is it?"

  "You started the story at the wrong end, Lolly," Jack O'Rourke said. "What you really want to know is how many ships Monty sank off Guadalcanal. I understand it was four Jap cruisers."

  Was someone trying to make him look like a fool by spreading these stories around? West wondered. Lie ransacked his list of enemies and could not imagine how any of them knew enough to ask these nasty questions. It had to be someone aboard the Jefferson City.

  "I'm afraid that's another rumor," he said. "I wasn't even on the bridge when we —"

  "What?" Lolly said. "If it's top secret darling, I swear I won't print it. But I'm dying to know."

  She looked giddily around the circle of sycophants who had gravitated toward her like moths to a destructive flame. Everyone was cringingly nice to Lolly; a single puff of her angry breath could wither a career.

  "It would be so thrilling to hear the story of an action at sea from your lips. We poor ignorant civilians on the home front need to know more about your heroism. We need hope, faith. The enemy seem to be winning everywhere."

  Montgomery West glanced uneasily at Commander Parker. "I think you ought to answer that, Commander. I don't want to give away any secrets."

  Daniel Parker took a long swallow of his drink. "Do you know where Savo Island is, Miss Parsons?"

  "Savo Island?" Lolly said. He might as well have asked her if she knew the location of the after engine room on the Jefferson City.

  "It's a volcano. An extinct volcano off Guadalcanal," Commander Parker said. "At a recent battle around Savo, we took on a Japanese fleet three times our size. When it was over, a half dozen of their destroyers were on the bottom and the rest were running for their lives. Right, West?"

  Monty suddenly remembered the way he had felt the day Uncle Mort had called him to his office and read him his "biography." It told him and the public about his troubled boyhood as the son of a wealthy mother with several divorces, his career as a merchant seaman, gun runner in South American revolutions, and oil prospector in Mexico. West had felt as if someone was turning him inside out and shaking his guts onto the floor. He felt the same way now.

  "Yeah," he said. He was looking away from Parker at Ensign Meade and Lieutenant Mullenoe. There was only one word to describe the expression on their faces: loathing

  "And what did you have to do with it, Monty?"

  "Nothing," West said. "Commander Parker and the captain were on the bridge. I was in main forward—the main battery control station—dialing in ranges. I mean ... the machines do all the work."

  "As the daughter of a British naval officer, Ina, what do you think of all this?" Jack O'Rourke asked.

  West was astounded by this revelation about Ina's parentage. He was even more astonished by her next words. "I'm awed by the courage of any man who fights on the sea, Jack. It's much more harrowing than being a soldier, in my opinion. On land, if you lose, you can run away. On a ship, the sea is another enemy, waiting to devour you."

  "Are you suggesting Mickey Rooney is not a hero because he joined the Army?" Lolly bristled.

  "Really, Miss Severn, I think you're letting your British prejudices run away with you. In America we regard the Army and the Navy as equals in heroism!"

  "I agree, of course," Ina said, wide-eyed at such brainlessness on the loose.

  "Now, Monty, there's one more rumor I want to check out, as a good reporter," Louella said. "Is it true that you're leaving the USS Jefferson City to serve as the naval adviser for a series of pictures being planned at M-G-M?"

  "That's more than a rumor," Jack O'Rourke said. "I was talking to one of the top executives yesterday. He said the contract was all drawn up. All they need is the okay from the Navy Department."

  "I can't think of a better man for the job — except myself," Commander Parker said.

  It was Uncle Mort. This was his cute-vicious way of rescuing him from death and simultaneously re-launching his career. Montgomery West looked around him at his, fellow officers, at Ensign Meade and Lieutenant Mullenoe and two or three other Annapolis types. In the distance he glimpsed Herman Kruger talking to a B-picture director. Nearby was the gunnery officer, Commander Moss, and his pickle-puss wife. The quintessential WASP couple. They were looking down their snooty noses at the vulgar people swirling around them. On the faces of those near enough to hear the conversation with Louella Parsons, West saw a range of expressions, from glum envy to wry cynicism. They all assumed Montgomery West was going to take this offer. At Savo Island he had discovered the war was for real. Anyone, even a Hollywood star, could get killed in the South Pacific. He was jumping ship, like the phony he was, having acquired an ersatz battle star.

  "Is that rumor true, Monty?" Ina Severn said.

  Incredible, the sadness in her voice, her eyes. Did only he hear it? On her face was a wisp of that enigmatic smile.

  Montgomery West shook his head. "When the Jefferson City sails in two weeks, I'm going to be aboard," he said.

  For a moment he could not decide which he liked more, the admiration in Ina's eyes or the amazement on the faces of his fellow officers. Mullenoe looked pa
rticularly astonished. On Jack O'Rourke's face was something almost as satisfying, dismay at the thought of what Mort was going to say to him when he failed to return with West's name on that contract.

  "I've heard of headstrong actors, but this tops them all," O'Rourke said.

  Those glum words jerked Montgomery West back to reality. He stood there dazed, appalled at what he had just done. Ina Severn had extracted that answer from him. She and those arrogant Annapolis bastards like Mullenoe. For a moment he felt nothing but rage. What did this English bitch in her gold lame dress know about staying at General Quarters for thirty-six-hours, staring into the sun and the darkness until your eyelids felt like they were peeling off? Why did he give a damn about the opinion of these professional sailors with their ridiculous rules and regulations, which did nothing to prevent a man from getting incinerated or drowned?

  A big arm circled his shoulder. It belonged to Lieutenant Robert Mullenoe, Annapolis 1931. "West," he said, "I can't believe it. You're turning into a goddamn Navy man."

  "Don't pay any attention to these birds," Lieutenant Andrew Jackson said, casually peeling a redheaded starlet off the arm of a Jefferson City turret officer. "They can't see beyond the horizon. We're the guys who tell'm what they're shooting at."

  "Exactly," Ensign Donald Schnable said, performing the same operation on an engineering officer's sloe-eyed brunette.

  "You're fliers," the brunette said, woozily running a finger over the gold wings on Sehnable's chest.

  "Were you at the battle of Midway?"

  "Were we at the battle of Midway? What a question," Lieutenant Jackson said.

  "Let us answer that question," said the turret officer, regaining his redhead. The brunette was similarly reclaimed.

  "No respect, that's the problem of the Navy Air Corps when you're stuck on a goddamn cruiser," Andrew Jackson said. "Good thing we found the bar," Schnable said. They were drinking straight Scotch in water glasses.

  "This stuff isn't bad."

  "It's older'n you are," the bartender said.

  A stentorian voice reached them across the lawn. Admiral Tomlinson, the commander of the Navy Yard, was talking to the Jefferson City's executive officer. "The Marine sentry gave me a very good description of them," he roared. "I'm certain they're here. He said they wore wings. I'll put angels' wings on them before I'm through with them.”

  "Jesus," Ensign Schnable said. They retreated into the depths of the mansion, where they found a magnificent buffet and several dozen people sitting at tables feasting on roast beef, turkey and innumerable side dishes. "Need some food if we got to retreat," Lieutenant Jackson said. "My granddaddy fought with Stonewall, you know. That was one thing he learned. Always raid the hencoop.”

  He tucked the entire turkey under his arm. Ensign Schnable seized two drumsticks, which had already been detached. They wandered through the dining room, smiling and nodding to all sorts of familiar faces. "He hasn't got a leg to stand on," Minable said, gesturing with the drumsticks.

  Lieutenant Jackson paused to examine the food on the plate of a woman who had an incredible resemblance to Bette Davis. "Is that caviar?" he said, dipping his finger in a black sauce. "Really," she cried and stormed out of the room.

  Sitting at the table was a guy who was a dead ringer for William Powell. "Hey, buddy," Schnable said. "Where did you ditch Myrna Loy?"

  Both fliers thought this was hysterical until the guy replied, "She's home with the flu."

  "You mean that really was Bette Davis?" Jackson said.

  "Here she comes with Mr. Mayer," Powell said. "I suggest you go that way. Mingle in the crowd around the pool."

  He pointed to a side door. As they exited at top speed they caught a glimpse of a short man with a politician's paunch and a wide unpleasant mouth shouting, "You! You two schlemiels! Stop!"

  "Schlemiels," Jackson said as they paused in a drawing room to wipe their hands on the furniture and down a few chunks of turkey. "What the hell does that mean?"

  "Trouble," Schnable said, glancing nervously over his shoulder as Mayer kicked the door they had locked.

  "I'm going to report you to the admiral for insulting my guests," yelled their host.

  Andrew Jackson chomped a final hunk of turkey and gulped his drink. "Let's find us a nice little cloud of fluff and hide in it for a while, Ensign."

  "Roger, Lieutenant."

  They climed out a window and rejoined the crowd around the pool. This time they gathered an appreciative audience of starlets, who listened raptly to their dive-bombing exploits at Midway. Without warning, Mayer burst into their coterie. "You two have to leave," he said. "You may be heroes, but drunk and disorderly heroes I won’t stand for in my own house.”

  “Sir,” Jackson said. “Do you know you have an uncanny resemblance to Admiral Yamamoto? When my buddy and I see a picture of him we go berserk. Right, Ensign Schnable?”

  “Right.”

  Jackson seized Mayer under the right arm, Schnable under the left. Before the Cominch of Hollywood could do more than squawk, he was lifted off his feet and landed on his back in the swimming pool.

  "Man overboard!" howled Jackson.

  "Away the motor whaleboat," whooped Schnable.

  Floundering in his water-soaked silk suit, Mayer started to gurgle. A half dozen producers, vice presidents, directors leaped into the pool to rescue their leader.

  "Good Christ!"

  The Jefferson City's air corps turned to confront an aghast Montgomery West. "You crazy bastards have just sunk my career," he said.

  "Best thing that ever happened to you, West," Jackson said. "You're a lousy fucking actor anyway."

  Commander Edwin Moss was fiddly. He walked very carefully through the lobby of the Coronado Hotel, determined to conceal his condition from the public. How had it happened? He suspected Robert Mullenoe, his air defense officer. He had offered to get Eleanor a refill of her Coke, and Moss had asked him to refill his as well. He must have spiked it with rum. Mullenoe was capable of such a thing. He was one of the wild men who had resisted every attempt to discipline them at Annapolis. Moss had been his company commander when he was a first classman and Mullenoe a plebe. He saw at a glance that he was going to be a demerit collector, a rule breaker.

  "I'm so dizzy," Eleanor said, beside him. "I'd almost swear I had something serious to drink."

  That was a dig. She did not approve of his Presbyterian refusal to drink liquor. Her mother was Irish-American. They always had liquor in the house.

  "I hope they court-martial those flyboys," he said as they went up in the elevator. "Their conduct was outrageous."

  "I agree," Eleanor said. "But it was pretty funny, the way those other people practically drowned Mr. Mayer trying to be the first to rescue him."

  "It's the Navy's reputation I'm thinking of. M-G-M's never going to make any pictures that give the Navy a fair shake unless we make an example of those two roughnecks. Thank God neither of them are Academy graduates."

  "Oh, heaven forbid," Eleanor said.

  In the bedroom, Eleanor sat down in a chair with a funny plop. "You know what's wrong with you, Edwin?" she said.

  "What?"

  "You're too good for your own good. But I love you."

  He did not know what to make of this outburst. "You sound as if you were thinking of changing your mind."

  "You have. I can tell. I don't know what to do about it."

  "I don't either," he said.

  "Let's do something daring."

  "What?"

  "Order drinks from the bar."

  "Then what?"

  "Maybe you'll find a girl who's willing to take a chance with a sailor without consulting that goddamn thermometer."

  Ina Severn drove a soused Montgomery West home to his deserted house in the Hollywood hills, where the B-picture stars lived. She had a house of her own on the next block. "I'll never come down off the hill now," he said, using the standard Hollywood expression for making it into the big time.


  "You can never tell. That awful old man may not be running everything after the war," Ina said.

  "Would you be willing to have a nightcap with a pariah?" he said.

  "Why not?" Ina said.

  His romantic hopes were as awash as his career. Ina would not dare to begin a public attachment with a man whose friends had just thrown Louis B. Mayer into his own swimming pool.

  Ina stretched herself on the couch, her gold lame evening dress draped around her so that the outline of her slim body was visible under its folds. "Your Commander Parker is a baddy," she said as West handed her a Scotch and soda. "There's one in every Navy. Pa used to say, Watch out for the ones with too much black in their eyes. There's black in their hearts too."

  "What's your father's rank?"

  "Gunner's mate first class."

  "I thought he was an officer."

  "That's just some of your Uncle Mort's bull."

  "Is he still in the Navy?"

  "He went down with the Prince of Wales.”

  She said it in a perfectly matter-of-fact voice. For a moment Montgomery West thought she meant the son of the King of England and wondered if she was talking about kinky sex. Then he remembered that the Prince of Wales was a British battleship that Japanese torpedo planes had sunk in the China Sea a few days after Pearl Harbor.

  Ina swung her feet off the couch and sat up. "If you tell that to your goddamned uncle so he can use it in a press release, I'll never speak to you again."

  "Don't worry," Montgomery West said.

  It was amazing. He was completely sober. He no longer felt sorry for himself.

  "I wanted to go to bed with you the first time I saw you," Ina Severn said. "But I was damned if I was going to let you know about it. You would have put me on that list of poor little tail waggers who think your uncle can make them stars with a press release."

  "No I wouldn't," West said. The words were automatic. He realized he did not know what he might have done.

  Suddenly Ina was looking away from him, and he realized she was fighting tears. "I know I taunted you into joining the Navy. I wanted to get rid of you. You were mixing me up. All my life I've been determined not to act like a sailor's daughter. That was the one thing Pa asked of me.