Zzzzzt.
It’s knocker intermittently whacked the bell. But the bell had been painted over so many times that its sound was softly muted. There was a brass label as well, but it too, had long ago been painted over. An ancient Navy maxim: If it doesn’t move, paint it.
“Leo. It’s that one. Scrape the label and see what it says,” said Ingram.
“Sir.” Seltzer flipped open his bosun’s knife which was half buoy knife, half stiletto, and scraped on the label next to the ringing bell. “Can you hold that light closer, Sir?”
“Sure.”
“Okay.” Seltzer scraped, then drew a sharp breath.
“What?” barked Ingram. He was tired and irritable.
“Jesus, Sir. It says ‘magazine fire and sprinkler alarm.’“
Good God! “Which one?”
Seltzer’s scraped frantically. “Forward!”
Braced on his hands, Ensign Peterson peered under the chart table. “Does that mean there’s a fire in the magazine? We could blow up!”
It could mean a number of things, young man, thought Ingram. None of them good. He whacked the ensign on the leg. “Sound General Quarters, Mr. Peterson.”
Peterson hit the gong lever. Seltzer crawled out, stood at the 1 MC, flipped all the switches, and said sharply, “Now general quarters. General quarters. Man your Battle Stations. This is no drill.”
As he stood, Ingram imagined the Hitchcock’s sailors, incredulous after only a half-hour of desperate sleep, blinking open their red-rimmed eyes, rousing from their bunks, cursing, and pulling on their pants. But rouse they did, the ship coming alive as two hundred and fifty-five tired and grumbling men rushed about, manning their battle and damage control stations. Ingram moved out to starboard bridgewing as the general quarters team rushed in to relieve the regular watch. As soon as Seltzer took the sound powered phones and reported damage control central manned and ready, Ingram called for inspection of all magazines, particularly the forward one.
“...vat is it?” A hatless Roland De Reuter lumbered onto the bridgewing. Bare spindly legs and shower sandals stuck from underneath his heavy Navy topcoat.
Ingram waited for Peterson, the officer of the deck, to report to his Captain. But his mouth quivered and he was rooted to the spot.
“Vat?” Demanded de Reuter.
“Magazine sprinkler alarm, Captain, forward magazine,” said Ingram.
De Reuter slapped his forehead. “Mine Gott.”
Seltzer keyed his mike and said, “Bridge Aye.” Then he turned to De Reuter and said, “Repair One is at the forward magazine, Captain. Starboard bulkhead is red-hot. They request permission to flood.”
“Awww, shit,” said Peterson.
Ingram growled through clenched teeth. “Stow it, Ensign.” Then the visage of the Barber ripping apart jumped into his mind with a blinding flash. Men and five inch gun barrels and wreckage twirled hundreds of feet into the air over the Kula Gulf. His adrenalin thumped as if his bloodstream was under 3,000 pounds of pressure. A glance at De Reuter told him nothing; the man’s face was cloaked in darkness.
Half-panicked men jostled around them, and Ingram found himself pressed against the bridge bulwark, facing outboard. Pools of brilliant turquoise luminescence bounced up and down the bow wake. The water looked inviting, safe, comforting; something he needed right now. He braced his foot on a bracket. Go! Jump! He pushed, knowing the sea would be a more friendly place than the white-hot explosion that would soon kill everyone aboard the Hitchcock.
His foot slipped.
Again!
He pushed once more. But something held him down.
“Mister Ingram. Do ve flood?” It was De Reuter, standing in the pilothouse hatchway. He was partially obscured by shocked sailors, their eyes darting in their sockets like half-panicked cows in the Chicago stockyards. It seemed they hoped for De Reuter to pass the word to abandon ship. Peterson hadn’t helped things, and for the moment, Ingram would like to have wrung the little bastard’s neck for getting the crew all worked up.
Ingram tried again to push off again but someone...it was Seltzer, held onto his shirt tail.
“How we doin’ Skipper?” whispered Seltzer.
“Verdammit!” De Reuter shoved his way through to Ingram. “Vot should ve do? I want you to recommend something.”
Too late now. Ingram eased his foot off the bracket. “Sir. Have the fire party enter and investigate the compartment. If there is a fire, then they should attempt to extinguish or suppress it with fire retardant. If it’s really bad, then we should flood. If there is no fire, they should search for the cause of the red-hot bulkhead.”
Seltzer stood close to Ingram, his vice-like grip still holding a handful of Ingram’s khaki shirttail
“Let go, damnit,” Ingram muttered to Seltzer.
“Vat?” said De Reuter.
Think. “Uhhh-the fire crew should be in asbestos suits, Sir,” said Ingram.
“Goot.” De Reuter nodded to Seltzer. “Make it so. Report as soon as possible.”
Standing between the two, Seltzer pushed his talk button to relay the order while still holding onto Ingram’s shirt with his other hand.
“Now, ve vait.” De Reuter looked down and studied the deck, his hands on his hips. Peterson re-joined the group, sensing some sort of bizarre salvation among them. The rest of the chalk-faced bridge crew stared at the four men, their eyes focused on De Reuter and Ingram, as the U.S.S. Hitchcock steamed on a calm, blissful night off San Clemente Island.
Seltzer whipped a hand to his ear. The others watched closely, as the boatswain’s mate listened and nodded. At length he said, “Repair One reports all secure, Sir. There was no fire. The bulkhead turned red-hot from an overhead power cable to the compartment light. The ammo handlers forgot to turn off the light after GQ. Apparently it was corroded and parted from the light fixture after they secured from tonight’s shoot. It worked loose and swung down and grounded against the bulkhead, which made it turn red-hot. Power’s been shut off, repairs to the cable are now underway.” Seltzer gave a thin smile and stepped away saying, “Captain.” Then he let go of Ingram’s shirt.
De Reuter shook his head. “These old damned ships. Poof. We coulda gone up like the Juneau.” Last October, the cruiser U.S.S. Juneau inexplicably exploded a day after retiring from fierce night fighting off Guadalcanal. All, except three of her crew of 700, perished, including the five Sullivan brothers. “This is cowshit, these old ships. This one shoulda been shot up for target practice years ago.”
De Reuter punched Ingram lightly on the shoulder. “Not bad for the real thing. Not bad. Combat experience shows. Another of Boom Boom Landa’s boys hast chust come through.” Then he spun, walked back into his sea cabin and shut the door.
During the excitement, a half moon had risen, casting a silvery glow in the eastern sky. Ingram hardly noticed, while pleading with his heart to stop thumping wildly.
Seltzer, still standing by his side surrendered his sound powered phones to the regular watch-stander. After the man moved off, Seltzer said in a low voice, “Guess what, Sir?”
Ingram turned, to look at this man who had kept him from making a fool of himself. He almost asked, ‘Why didn’t you let me jump?’ Instead, he said, “Yes?”
“Freddie Lang, the chief in charge of the repair party is an old friend, Sir.”
“Come on, Leo, I’m tired.”
“He let me in on it.”
“On what?”
Seltzer looked from side to side then said quietly, “It’s a set-up. They do it every time. Captain De Reuter has a hand-picked crew of fifteen trained guerillas. They worked like hell to empty the magazine in ten minutes flat. After that, they fire up the bulkhead.”
It hit Ingram what Seltzer was telling him. No ammunition in the magazine meant the ship couldn’t possibly have exploded. “De Reuter was pulling our chains?”
“Pretty slick, huh?” Seltzer’s faced glowed in the soft moonlight.
“I’
ll be damned.” Ingram looked aft to the Hitchcock’s wake. He would be about six or seven miles straight back if he’d had his way. Then he wondered if Seltzer knew about this before or after the drill. “Leo?”
Ingram turned but Seltzer was gone.
CHAPTER TWENTY FOUR
28 March, 1943
San Pedro, California
“He’s a good boy, Mr. Ingram.” Mrs. Peabody reached over to scratch the grey tabby cat behind its ears, “except...”
Ingram sat in a wicker chair on the front porch. It was still warm, and the Western sky flared with amazing reds and pinks as the sun dipped behind the hill. Fred lay stretched in his lap, sleeping. “Except what, Mrs. Peabody?”
Mrs. Peabody was a widow with grey-hair tied in a bun, She wore a polka-dot dress, was a bit portly, had rimless spectacles, and layer upon layer of laugh lines ranged around her thin lips and droopy eyes. She leaned down and whispered sotto voce for the second time -- the first time was to complain about old Mr. Templeton across the street and his organ music. As she did, Ingram swore he smelled beer on Mrs. Peabody’s breath. He knew she canned preserves, and Ingram would have laid odds that she brewed her own beer.
She braced her hands on her knees, “Well, Fred snores...and...and...”
“And what?”
Her mouth spread into a wide grin. “He drinks from the toilet.” She leaned back and gave a guffaw, which sounded like a hand-me-down from the now departed Mr. Peabody, a railroad engineer who had been with the Southern Pacific for thirty-five years. “I can’t break him. Maybe you can figure something out?”
Ingram scratched. Fred raised his head, blinked, and fell back to sleep. “I’ll do my best. Maybe set out a bowl of water...”
Mrs. Peabody looked up.
“Yes?” Ingram asked.
“Think I hear my phone. Excuse me.” She hurried next door to her home. It was no wonder Ingram hadn’t heard the phone’s ringing. With five-inch guns cracking in his ears for two weeks, it was a miracle he could hear at all. Friday evening he had done some grocery shopping, cooked himself a meal, and sat in the living room, falling asleep with the radio going. He slept until ten on Saturday morning and, after a big breakfast, phoned his parents in Echo, Oregon, saying he would try to get up there before he shipped out. He wasn’t sure if he could do it, but he vowed to try. Then he tromped into the back yard, dug the soil and planted his victory garden.
Mrs. Peabody didn’t have to return Fred. He sort of delivered himself, ambling onto the Victory garden, as Ingram hoed a row for carrots. After watching for a while, Fred dug in the freshly cultivated soil and pooped while Ingram glowered.
With the exercise, Ingram easily collapsed Saturday night, sleeping eleven hours. He went to church Sunday morning, then came home, mowed the front lawn, trimmed the bushes, and watered. Now, in the early evening, he took a deep breath, leaned back, and languished in the chair. One could say, he had everything: a house, three square meals, Helen’s cat, Helen’s lingering perfume scent -- everything but Helen. In a way it was too much. Without Helen, it meant nothing. He wondered if he should just pack it up, head for the base, and stay in the BOQ until they gave him orders to a ship. Also. He felt guilty about not getting up to Oregon but the railroads were jammed. He wasn’t sure if he could get back on time.
The horizon had turned a dark crimson, becoming a cobalt-blue as the first stars popped out. The Kraft Music Hall with Bing Crosby was on the radio tonight, Helen’s favorite show. But that was in an hour or so. What to--
“Mr. Ingram! Mr. Ingram!” Mrs. Peabody shouted from her porch. Then she started running, almost tripping over her boxwood hedge. Her arms flailed in front of her as she waddled up the walk.
“What?”
Mrs. Peabody heaved great gulps of air and her face was flushed.
Ingram jumped to his feet.
“...telephone...” She pointed inside his house.
“Yes, telephone?”
After another gasp she managed, “...that was Mrs. Ingram on my phone. She’s calling from some, place,” she wheezed. “South America. She didn’t know you were home. She...”
The phone rang in Ingram’s house. He looked at her.
“Yes, yes. Go.” She nodded quickly, her hand clamped to her chest.
Ingram dashed in the house and yanked the phone off the cradle. “Hello!”
Static ranged on the line. Then he heard a string of Spanish. No it wasn’t Spanish. Portuguese?
He shouted, “Hello!”
“Todd. My God.”
“Helen. You sound beautiful. Where are you?” He sat heavily on the couch.
“Todd, my God,” she laughed.
“Helen, enough of the ‘My Gods.’ Where are you?”
“Natal, Brazil. Waiting for a hop over to Dakar.”
“Dakar? That’s Africa.” Ingram felt as if the phone in his hand had turned to ice.
“Yes.” They listened to static for a moment then she said, “What are you doing home?”
Ingram relayed a quick sanitized version of the Howell, then said, “So I just finished two weeks of prospective commanding officer training. They called yesterday saying I’m fully qualified for command. They’re giving me a ship.”
“...wonderful”
Todd sensed the connection going sour. Quickly, he said, “I love you so damned much, honey.”
“...me too.. When do you...”
The line crackled loudly and he had to hold the phone from his ear. Then he heard of string of Portuguese. Suddenly, the line was clear. An operator said, “Hello Natal? This is the United States calling. Hello?”
Silence.
“Hello. California?”
“Yes.”
“Sir, I’m sorry. The connection is lost.”
“Can you try again?”
“Sorry. I don’t have the number.”
“Oh...thank you.” Ingram hung up.
Fred jumped in his lap and Ingram scratched his ears. After a minute or so, he heard a foot scrape on the porch. He walked out to find Mrs. Peabody pacing. “Mrs. Peabody, I can’t thank you enough.”
“How did she sound?”
Rather than sugar-coat it, Ingram relayed what happened. “...so then the U.S. operator came on the line and that was it. The connection went dead. We really didn’t get to talk that much.”
“Oh, my. Did she say anymore about where she was.”
“Natal, Brazil. That’s a jumping off place for Dakar, Africa. What did she tell you?”
“Well, she told me she was still sending letters to you to,” she swept a hand, “you know, out there. She asked about Fred and the house. I’m afraid I blurted something about the stranger last Thursday night. Then I told her about you and to call home. That’s when---“
“Stranger? What stranger?”
“Didn’t I tell you?”
“No.” Ingram offered Mrs. Peabody a wicker chair.
“No, thank you. I have go back. But yes, it was a little after ten. I swear I saw an officer, you know, a Navy officer, on your property.”
“Doing what?”
“Well, Fred jumped up to my front window and started scratching up a storm. So I peeked out and there he was, ringing your doorbell. With your house being dark and all that, he walked around the side. After a few moments, I walked out to see what was going on. I’ll tell you, I let the screen door squeak when I opened it. Then I slammed it behind me. Almost right away, he walked out the sideyard and down the street and around the corner.”
“A Navy officer?”
“Well, I think so. He had a white officer’s cap, a dark uniform and...you know...gold rings on his sleeves.”
“How many?”
She rubbed her ample chin. “Don’t know, two, maybe three.”
“Did you see his face?”
“Dark hair. That’s all I remember.”
They talked for a while longer with Ingram promising to tell Mrs. Peabody if he heard again from Helen.
F
red jumped on his chest and started prancing up and down. “Wha...?” Ingram checked his alarm clock: It was ten after three.
Now the cat jumped off the bed, ran out to the living room then skittered back in, sliding under the bed.
Ingram sat on the bed’s edge, scratched his head and yawned. Then he turned on the bedside light.
Tap. Tap.
He jumped. Looking out the window, he saw Mrs. Peabody’s porch light flip on.
Tap. Tap. It came from the front porch. Ingram walked to the doorway and peeked around the door jam into the living room. A shadowy figure was framed in the front door window. He was clad in black with a white combination cap. Mrs. Peabody’s Navy officer! The figure must have seen him, for now he knocked.
Ingram strode across the living room and flipped on the porch light. It was a Navy officer. The man looked up. Startled.
Landa!
“I’ll be damned,” said Ingram, a smile on his face. He undid the chain, flipped open the lock and opened the door. “Jerry?”
“Todd, mind if I come in?”
“Sure.” Ingram opened the door and stood aside to let Landa pass. That’s when Landa hauled off and threw a right cross, solidly connecting to Ingram’s cheek. He fell backward against the door and sank to the floor...
He came to on the bathroom floor. After blinking at the ceiling for a moment, he heard voices. One said, “Are you sure he’s okay?”
“He’s fine.” It was Landa. “He just went in the head for a moment.” Then Landa and Mrs. Peabody started arguing.
“Uhhh.” Ingram rose to a sitting position.
Heavy footsteps approached the bathroom door. Someone knocked and called, “Hello? Mr. Ingram?”
“Yes?” Ingram rose, his legs wobbly. After finding his balance, he felt his cheek, and looked in the mirror. Swollen. Maybe a black eye tomorrow.
“Open up, please.” Footsteps shuffled at the door.
“Who’s there?”
“Officer Bullard. San Pedro Police.”
Good God! Ingram opened the door to find a police officer standing before him, wearing a leather jacket, and knee-high motorcycle boots, his cap tucked under his arm. Another motorcycle officer stood near the front door between a bug-eyed Mrs. Peabody and Jerry Landa. Ingram remembered he wore only skivvies and instinctively crossed his hands over his crotch.
WHEN DUTY WHISPERS LOW (The Todd Ingram Series Book 3) Page 21