by Herman Wouk
The captain’s voice was mocking and cruel. It filled Willie with rage. What right had De Vriess to be so damned red hot? De Vriess was the man who permitted all the filth and sloth of the Caine, for which he deserved a court-martial. He seemed to reserve all his energies for baiting ensigns. Willie’s accumulated resentment, weariness, and disgust coagulated at that moment into hatred of Captain de Vriess. The ship was the measure of the commanding officer. He had fallen into the hands of a bullying stupid sloven. He gritted his teeth, and as soon as De Vriess was gone he pulled himself erect and resumed decoding with new energy released by hate.
There was an enormous pile-up of coding traffic. He had to keep working until lunch time, and then for an hour after that. At last it was done. He dropped the decodes on Keefer’s cluttered desk, went aft to the clipping shack, and fell asleep instantaneously.
It was Adams again who shook him awake. “Keith, you have visitors in the wardroom-”
“Huh-visitors?”
“Keefer’s brother, and two of the prettiest nurses I’ve ever seen. Lucky boy-”
Willie, sat up, suddenly refreshed. “Thank you, sir. Sir, what’s the procedure for getting off the ship?”
“You check out with the senior watch officer-me.”
“Thank you, sir. I’d like to check out.” Willie reached for his clothes.
“Sure. Just let me have the assignment.”
Willie had to search his memory. Through the cloud of recent happenings came a dim recollection of the officers’ qualification course. “I haven’t had time to touch it, sir.”
“Sorry, Keith. Better clear with the skipper, then. Orders are that assignments must be up to date prior to any shore leave.”
Willie dressed and went down to the wardroom. He found the captain, in smart tropical khakis festooned with campaign ribbons, chatting with the nurses and the Keefer brothers. He disliked begging permission like a schoolboy in the presence of the girls, but there was no help for it.
“Pardon me, Captain.”
“Yes, Keith?”
“I request permission to go ashore.”
“Of course. I wouldn’t think of depriving you of such charming company,” said the captain with elephantine gallantry. The nurses giggled. Miss Jones said, “Hi, Keither.”
“Thank you, sir.”
“I presume you’ve checked out with Adams?”
“Well, that’s it, sir. That’s why I’m checking with you.” The captain gave him a quizzical look. “See, there’s an assignment in my qualification course I haven’t completed. It was handed to me yesterday and I’ve been on the go every second since and-”
“Every second? Seems to me I’ve seen you at rest once or twice. What were you doing just now?”
“I-I plead guilty to about three hours of sleep in the past forty-eight, sir-”
“Well, why don’t you sit down and bat that assignment out now? It won’t take long. The girls will wait. I’ll do my best to amuse them.”
“The sadist,” said Willie to himself. Aloud, “Thank you, Captain, but-”
“I’ll give you a ti-ip,” said De Vriess, in a teasing singsong. “The sketches you need are right up there in the ship’s organization book. All you have to do is trace them. That’s all I did in my day.” He resumed his chitchat with the girls, who seemed fascinated by him.
Willie took down the book and found the sketches. He calculated that it would require three quarters of an hour to trace the diagrams and copy the names of the spaces.
“Pardon me, Captain.”
“Yes?” said De Vriess pleasantly.
“This being a purely mechanical chore, as you say, would it be acceptable to you if I promise to turn it in prior to 0800 tomorrow? I can do it tonight.”
“No telling what shape you’ll be in tonight, Keith. Better do it now.”
The nurses laughed, and Miss Jones said, “Poor Keither.”
“Use my room, Keith,” said the communicator. “There’s a ruler and tracing paper in my upper right-hand drawer.”
Blushing, seething, Willie bolted from the wardroom. “War is hell,” he heard the captain say, and the girls gurgled. Willie made the sketches in twenty minutes, grinding his teeth each time he heard feminine laughter from the wardroom. With the papers in his hand he climbed up on deck through a scuttle to avoid the captain and the girls, and went looking for Adams. But the senior watch officer had left the ship. There was no help for it; Willie had to go below and, his cheeks flaming, hand the sketches to the captain. De Vriess inspected them carefully while the girls cooed and whispered. “Very nice,” he said after a long, humiliating pause. “A little hasty, but under the circumstances, very nice.”
Brief giggle by Nurse Carter.
“May I go now, sir?”
“Why not?” said the captain magnanimously. He rose. “May I give you people a lift? I have a station wagon.”
“No, thank you, sir,” Willie growled.
The captain raised his eyebrows. “No? Too bad. Good-by, Miss Carter-Miss Jones. Very pleasant having you aboard.” He walked out, putting on his hat with a self-satisfied tilt.
The party that followed was a dampened one. Willie covered his fury with a dull silence. The girls found little to say. In Honolulu they picked up a third nurse earmarked for Tom Keefer, an extravagantly stupid, beautiful blonde. She displayed a marked and instant liking for Roland. Tom retreated into long drunken quotations from Paradise Lost and the poems of T. S. Eliot and Gerard Manley Hopkins while Roland and the blonde carried on a boisterous flirtation. This was during dinner at a Chinese restaurant. Willie drank more than he ever had in his life. They went on to a Danny Kaye movie at CincPac, which he saw blurrily, as through a rainy window. He fell sound asleep in the middle of it; and never really woke, though he walked obediently wherever he was led, until he found himself riding in a taxi with Tom Keefer.
“Where are we? What time is it? Where are the others?” he grumbled. His mouth tasted sickeningly of rum and Chinese food.
“We’re on the way home, Willie. Home to the Caine. Party’s over.”
“The Caine. The Caine and De Vriess-”
“Afraid so.”
“Mr. Keefer, am I wrong, or is De Vriess a complete lout and moron?”
“Your estimate is a little generous, otherwise correct.”
“How does such a man get command of a ship?”
“He isn’t commanding a ship. He’s commanding the Caine.”
“He’s made the Caine what it is.”
“Very likely.”
“Say, where’s Roland?”
“Out getting married to the blonde. I hope so, anyway. He ought to make an honest woman of her after what they were doing at that movie.”
“He sure cut in on you.”
“Roland isn’t responsible,” said Keefer, “for the deeds that his thyroid puts him up to. It’s a classic instance of what Kant calls arbitrium brutum. You recall the passage, no doubt.”
“Of course,” said Willie, and fell asleep again.
Keefer led him aboard the Caine and dumped him into the clipping shack. Willie was only half aware of what was happening. An hour later he was being shaken out of his sleep. He opened his eyes and looked into the face of Paynter. “Whassamatter now?” he mumbled.
“Message to be broken, Keith.”
“What time is it?”
“Quarter past three.”
“Jesus, can’t it wait till morning?”
“Nope. Caine is information addressee. Any message where we’re an addressee is busted at once. Captain De Vriess’s orders.”
“De Vriess,” snarled Willie. “De Vriess. Why doesn’t the Navy send him back to high school to mature?”
“Come on, Keith.”
“Pal, let someone else break it. I’m too tired to see.”
“Assistant communicator always handles these night breaks,” said Paynter, “as I know only too goddamn well. Come on, Keith, I’ve got to get back to the gangway
.”
Willie slid out of the bunk and descended to the wardroom, leaning heavily on bulkheads and railings. He propped his spinning head on one arm and set about decoding. The message was addressed to the aircraft carrier Brandywine Creek for action. Halfway through the message Willie jumped up and uttered a cry of joy. He poured himself a cup of sludgy coffee, drained it, and raced through the rest of the decoding. With the penciled message he ran up to the quarterdeck, threw his arms around Paynter, and kissed him. The dour engineer pushed him away in distaste. “What the hell?”
“Look, friend, look. Tidings of comfort and joy.”
Paynter took the slip of paper to the light over the desk. Shielding it from the side glances of the watch, he read: Lieutenant Commander Philip F. Queeg USN detached. Proceed to Anti-submarine Warfare School San Francisco for training. Upon completion proceed to relieve Commanding Officer Caine DMS 22.
Paynter looked mildly pleased.
“Well,” said Willie in a low tone, standing beside him, “aren’t you going to kiss me back?”
“I’ll wait,” said Paynter, “until I see this Queeg.”
“When you’re at the bottom, there’s no place to go but up,” said Willie. “Can you imagine anyone worse than De Vriess?”
“Well, it’s conceivable. I’ll take this in to the skipper-”
“No, no, allow me that luxury.”
Willie ran down the ladder to the wardroom and rapped at the captain’s door.
“Come in-”
“Good news, Captain,” cried Willie, as he opened the door. The captain snapped on his bed light and squinted at the message, leaning on an elbow, his face streaked with red marks from the creases of his pillow.
“Well, well,” he said, with a small wry smile. “Call that good news, do you Keith?”
“I guess it is for you, sir, after six years. You’ll probably get a new destroyer. Maybe shore duty.”
“You’re all for shore duty, eh, Keith? That’s a thoroughly salty viewpoint. You’ve picked it up real quickly.”
“Why, I sort of think you rate it, sir, that’s all.”
“Well, I hope the Bureau agrees with you. Thanks, Keith. Good night.”
Willie left with a feeling that his sarcasm had somehow bounced off the captain’s hide. But he didn’t care. He could suffer through the next weeks on the Caine gladly now. Deliverance was on the way, in the person of Lieutenant Commander Philip F. Queeg.
CHAPTER 9
First Day at Sea
After four days of repairs, the Caine was ordered to sea, for minesweeping exercises in waters near Oahu. “Well, well,” said Captain De Vriess, when Willie brought him the decoded message, “minesweeping, eh? Looks like our friend Queeg will be relieving me just in time.”
“Does that mean we’re going to minesweep for real in-in the near future, sir?”
“Could be.”
“Has the Caine ever done any sweeping, sir?”
“Sure, dummy mines by the hundreds. Never in any operation, thank God.” De Vriess climbed out of his bunk and reached for his trousers. “I’ll like minesweeping, Keith, when they figure out one simple problem.”
“What’s that, sir?”
“Who sweeps ahead of the minesweepers- Well, tell Steve Maryk to come in here, will you? And tell Whittaker I’d like some coffee.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Not the black tar that’s been cooking down since this morning. Fresh.”
“Yes, sir.”
Roland Keefer came aboard that evening for dinner, bringing a batch of mail for Willie from the BOQ. As usual, Willie ripped open May’s letter first. She had returned to college for the autumn session. It was a sacrifice, for during the summer Marty Rubin had obtained a midday radio booking for her, and she might have continued on it. The pay was a hundred dollars a week.
But I don’t care, dear. The more I read and study, the less ambitious I become. Last year I was sure I wanted nothing in life but a top salary as a top singer. I despised the girls I met in Hunter at first because they couldn’t earn a nickel. But I’m beginning to wonder whether it’s sensible to give up all my days and nights for a salary. I love to sing, I guess I always will. As long as I have to earn money I’m glad I can do it at a fair rate in work I enjoy rather than as a typist in some stale office. But I know I’ll never be a first-rate singer-haven’t the voice, haven’t the style, haven’t the looks (no, I haven’t, dear). What I want now, I think, is to trap some kindhearted sugar daddy who will help me have a couple of babies and otherwise let me read in peace.
Score one for you, my love. Dickens is terrif. Sat up all night reading Dombey and Son-for a book report, mind you, that isn’t due till next week-and now have huge black bags under my eyes. Glad you can’t see me.
What a lie that last sentence is. Are you ever coming home? When is this war going to end? I thought after Italy surrendered that I’d be seeing you any day. But it seems to be bogging down for another long stretch. The European news is usually good but I’m afraid I care mostly about the Pacific. And it may be unpatriotic, but I’m awfully glad you haven’t caught the Caine yet.
I love you.
MAY
“Well,” said Roland as they sat down to dinner, “looks like I’ll be saying good-by to you all for a while. Staff’s piling aboard the Yorktown tomorrow. Guess the admiral wants some sea pay.”
Tom Keefer’s face darkened. He threw down his knife and fork. “Wouldn’t you know. A new flattop.”
“That hurts, doesn’t it, Tom?” said De Vriess, grinning.
“What’s the matter, Tom?” said Maryk. “Don’t you like minesweeping?” All the officers laughed at the standard joke about the communicator.
“Hell, I just want to see some war, as long as my sands are running out uselessly-”
“You came aboard too late,” said Adams. “We saw plenty of war before-”
“You saw some errand-boy duty,” said Keefer. “I’m interested in essences, not accidents. The nub of this Pacific war is the duel of flying machines. Everything else is as routine as the work of milkmen and filing clerks. All uncertainty and all decision rides with the carriers.”
“I’ve got some friends on the Saratoga,” said the captain. “Pretty routine life aboard her, too, Tom.”
“War is ninety-nine per cent routine-routine that trained monkeys could perform,” said Keefer. “But the one per cent of chance and creative action on which the history of the world is hanging right now you’ll find on carriers. That’s what I want to be part of. So my dear brother, who would like nothing better than to rest his duff in Hawaii for the rest of the war-”
“Tom, you are but so right,” threw in Roland cheerfully. “-gets carted aboard a carrier on a silver charger, and I ride the Caine.”
“Have some more liver, Tom,” said Maryk. The first lieutenant, who resembled a prize fighter or drill sergeant with his bullet head, short wide nose, and close-clipped hair, had a surprisingly innocent, affectionate smile which changed his whole appearance.
“Why don’t you send in another transfer request, Tom?” said the captain. “I’ll approve it again.”
“I’ve given up. This ship is an outcast, mantled by outcasts, and named for the great outcast of mankind. My destiny is the Caine. It’s the purgatory for my sins.”
“Any interesting sins, Tom? Tell us about ‘em,” said Gorton, leering over a heavy forkful of liver.
“Sins that would make even the naked whores in your picture collection blush, Burt,” said Keefer, raising a hoot of laughter at the exec.
The captain regarded Keefer admiringly. “That’s the literary mind for you. I never thought of Caine being a symbolic name-”
“The extra e threw you off, Captain. God always likes to veil his symbols a bit, being, among His other attributes, the perfect literary artist.”
“Well, I’m glad I stayed aboard for dinner,” said Maryk. “You haven’t opened up for a long while, Tom. Been off your form.”
“He just got tired of casting his pearls before swine,” said the captain. “Let’s have the ice cream, Whittaker.”
Willie had noticed a curious mixture of respect and satire in the captain’s attitude toward Tom Keefer. He was beginning to realize that the wardroom was a tangle of subtle, complex evaluations by the officers of each other, knotting centrally, as it were, in the person and attitudes of the captain. It seemed to him that De Vriess must have an insoluble difficulty in facing a subordinate so much more cultured and gifted than himself. Yet somehow De Vriess struck a note with Keefer that enabled him to use an amiable condescension, where he had no right to condescend.
Harding broke his accustomed silence to remark, “Friend of mine was sent to a destroyer called the Abel. Wonder what you’d say if you were aboard her, Mr. Keefer?”
“I’d probably say that I was sacrificing my first fruits aboard her, as God knows I am here, and had some hope they’d be acceptable,” rejoined Keefer.
“What first fruits, Tom?” said Gorton.
“My young years, my early vigor, the time in which Sheridan produced The Rivals, and Dickens, Pickwick, and Meredith, Richard Feverel. What am I producing? A lot of decodes and registered pub inventories. My freshness is spending its wavering shower in the dust. At least if I were on a carrier-”
“You stole that line,” said Willie proudly, “from Francis Thompson.”
“Christ,” exploded the captain, “this ship is becoming a damned literary society. I’m glad I’m getting off.”
“Well, it seems to me, Mr. Keefer,” said Harding, “that you can twist any ship’s name into a symbolical meaning. Caine, Abel-”
“The world is an endless treasury of symbols,” said Keefer. “That’s grade-school theology.”
“I think Harding means that you’re an endless treasury of plays on words,” said Willie.
“Salvo for the junior ensign,” cried Gorton, signaling with a fat forefinger for a third helping of ice cream.
“All intelligent conversation is playing on words,” said Keefer. “The rest is definitions and instructions.”