Troubled Water

by Gregory A. Freeman

  Keel thought it sounded like the XO was in a panic. So did Mason. So did Young. They all found Cloud’s announcement to be unnerving. They were troubled by what seemed a lack of control by the ship’s top officers. The whole military structure is premised on the guys at the bottom of the ladder being able to trust that their leaders will look out for them as long as they follow orders and do their jobs. The white sailors, for the most part, were not fighting back and trusted that the top brass would take care of the situation, that they would be protected. The XO’s announcement and the lack of any other good information made them doubt whether that was true. The paucity of information and orders created a vacuum for the sailors, and into that vacuum were swept all the fears and anxieties of young men left on their own.

  Why is this thing being allowed to continue for so long? Mason wondered. And where the hell is the captain?

  Young tried to piece together what the XO’s message meant. Clearly Cloud was taking over command of the ship. He was a black man. Black sailors were taking over the ship, and then the black XO comes on the horn to say he’s got the ship. What was the crew supposed to think?

  This is it. They’ve killed the captain, Young thought. The white guys are going to have to jump overboard before the Navy nukes this carrier. There’s no way they’re going to let this carrier get anywhere near a Navy base with these guys in control.

  After the announcement, many of the white sailors just dug in, staying in their compartments to see what would happen next, wondering when the next mob would attack. Young went to the fire station in his berthing area and took the canvas hose off the reel. He opened the valve all the way so that the high-pressure hose was fully charged, then took the heavy metal nozzle end back to his bunk. He lay down, wrapped his arms around the charged hose, and turned on his side so he could watch the hatch. If anyone came through, Young was willing to blow them off their damn feet.

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  “CAPTAIN, I AM SCARED TO DEATH”

  The captain, meanwhile, was in hangar bay 2, searching for any signs of sabotage—still his primary concern. He was perfectly safe, uninjured, and pretty much by himself. He had contacted the bridge since the frantic calls for him to check in, but there was still a complete lack of communication between him and Cloud.

  The crowd of angry blacks had moved on, and it was just Townsend with a few sailors going about their jobs and others passing through. Townsend was reassured by the fact that the hangar bay had not suffered much actual damage, and there did not appear to be any effort to sabotage the multimillion-dollar planes parked there. He was starting to make his way through the hangar bay to exit when he heard the 1MC come to life. When his XO’s voice boomed and echoed through the huge hangar bay, Townsend stopped and just stood there, listening, hardly able to believe what he was hearing.

  “Do not listen to what anybody else tells you,” Cloud called out in a shaky voice. “I want you to do exactly as I tell you. I ask you, I implore you, I order you, to stop what you are doing! All black brothers proceed immediately to the after mess deck. Every member of the United States Marine Corps proceed to the forecastle immediately. This is an emergency!”

  What the …? Good god, what is the XO doing?

  How could his XO make such an inflammatory address to the crew? What the hell is he trying to do, get the whole ship whipped into a frenzy?

  Townsend was bothered as much by the XO’s tone as by his words. He was dumbfounded by the message. And appalled.

  Why is the XO taking over the ship? he wondered. But then he thought back to what he had seen earlier, with Cloud appeasing the rioters and giving black power salutes, calling them “brothers.” I guess I was right to be worried about what I saw. His actions up to this point amounted to pretty much trying to take over the ship anyway.

  Townsend was furious, and concerned that Cloud’s announcement would worsen the immediate trouble and further degrade his own authority. He couldn’t let this continue a minute more. He raced to the end of the hangar bay, out the hatch, and toward damage control, where he could get on the 1MC himself. His immediate concern was to countermand Cloud’s order. As far as he knew, the Marines already had been told to stay in their berthing area, and he didn’t want them piling out to comply with Cloud’s order. Surely that would just cause the Marines to run into groups of black sailors again, and Townsend knew that would spark more violence. He wanted the Marines to stay in quarters, damn it, where he could control them. Why the hell was Cloud trying to roust them?

  The captain thought the executive officer was overreacting. And he kept worrying that Cloud really was on the side of the black rioters. Does my XO really want this riot to end? Or is he just encouraging it because he feels an allegiance to the black sailors? But that couldn’t really be true, could it? No matter what the motivation, Townsend thought his XO was handling this all wrong.

  If the man is going to panic like that and just make things worse, maybe he should go to his quarters and let somebody else handle the problem.

  Townsend made it to damage control in no time, sped along by the fury that was coursing through him and his fear that Cloud’s announcement was about to put a match to the Kitty Hawk powder keg. As he came around a corner toward damage control, he ran into Charles M. Johnson, the white legal officer who had been in Cloud’s stateroom with the black sailor in handcuffs. Johnson had escaped from the crowd of angry black sailors by leaving his prisoner with them, then he made his way back to the legal office, which was near damage control. He had encountered other groups of marauding black sailors along the way, armed with broken broomsticks and dogging wrenches, but he managed not to get beaten again. He was relieved to see the captain was safe. Recognizing Johnson as a chief who worked closely with the XO, Townsend curtly asked where Cloud had made the 1MC announcement from. Johnson said that damage control was the best guess.

  Townsend found Cloud exiting damage control. The XO was still deeply concerned with how to stop the riot from escalating, his mind racing with possibilities and trying to figure out how to find the captain. He thought he might be in charge of the carrier, an incredible obligation to have land in your lap. Cloud was intending to head toward the aft mess deck to meet with the black sailors again. Townsend and Cloud paused and looked at each other, but with very different expressions. Cloud was relieved to see the captain, happy that he was uninjured and still in command.

  “Captain, I got word you had been hurt, maybe worse,” Cloud told him.

  “I’m not,” Townsend responded tersely. He didn’t say anything else but shot a look that told Cloud everything he needed to know about what the captain was thinking.

  Townsend was full of anger for the man he thought was trying to take over the ship, the officer who was sounding like he didn’t want this disturbance to end. As Townsend stood there, he seriously considered firing Cloud on the spot, telling him to go to his quarters and wait for disciplinary action. But the captain held off, thinking it better to remain calm and not escalate the situation. God only knew how news that he had fired the black XO would be received by the crew.

  Cloud told the captain where he was heading. Townsend hesitated, on the verge of delivering a dressing down the likes of which have rarely been heard. Instead, he gritted his teeth and said, “If anybody ever writes a book about this ship, this is going to be the most fucked-up chapter!”

  He meant it as a way to defuse the tension, opting for levity instead of an angry outburst, but Townsend knew that this was not a shining moment for the Kitty Hawk.

  Cloud muttered his agreement and Townsend continued on into damage control. The engineering officer and the sailors working there were relieved to see him, that the reports of his death had been greatly exaggerated. Townsend had no time for pleasantries or status updates. Instead, he strode directly to the 1MC microphone, as Cloud had done a few minutes earlier.

  “This is the captain. Disregard what the XO just said,” Townsend announced, the annoyance clear in
his voice. “The XO’s words were premature and based on erroneous information he received. He thought the situation was more serious than it really is. Do not go to places. Blacks are not to proceed to the after mess deck. Marines are not to go to the forecastle. That’s the last thing we want to do, to segregate into two separate camps. I do not want any gatherings of anyone.

  “Everybody go about your normal business. Cool it, everyone. Break up peacefully and proceed back to your spaces. The Marines will not use any weapons and will leave you alone. There will be no weapons used unless I call for it on the box.

  “Those of you who have grievances I will meet with you right now on the forecastle. The rest of you I want to cool it. Knock off this senseless behavior before more of your shipmates are seriously injured. I know everybody is hot under the collar. I know you are disappointed at not going home as planned. So am I. But we’ve got to live with it, so cool it.

  “I’m okay and the XO is all right. I repeat, I’m heading for the forecastle now and will meet with anyone and try to work out your grievances. But for God’s sake, the rest of you cool it and go back to your spaces.”

  As Townsend was making his announcement, Cloud waited in the passageway outside damage control with Johnson and two Marines. The XO wasn’t pleased to hear Townsend countermand his order and, in the process, make him look foolish to the crew. More important, though, he still thought it was right to send the Marines and black sailors to opposite ends of the ship. It was the captain’s call to countermand that order, but Cloud disagreed.

  Townsend stayed in damage control long enough to receive reports on the ship’s status. The engineering officer reported that from a mechanical and operational standpoint, the Kitty Hawk was doing just fine. There was no serious damage or sabotage anywhere. Most of the violence seemed to be confined to the second deck, so Townsend left, intending to take a look there. As he stepped out, Johnson, Cloud, and the Marines all looked at him expectantly.

  After hearing both addresses from the ship’s leaders, and after his own frightening experiences that day, Johnson’s emotions were close to the surface.

  “Captain, I am scared to death,” he blurted out.

  Johnson meant that he was scared for the ship, that he feared something truly terrible was building among the crew. He was worried that Townsend and Cloud were no longer in control of the Kitty Hawk crew. But as soon as he said the words, he realized that they sounded whiny and that the captain probably thought he meant he was scared for his own safety. It hadn’t come out right, and Johnson regretted giving the captain the impression that he was buckling in a crisis. He already regretted not telling the XO about the threats he had heard before the riot started, and now he had told the captain he was scared. He started to say more, to try to explain what he really meant, but the captain cut him off.

  “Chief, I want you to stop in the legal office and I will speak to you,” Townsend told him, sounding calm and paternal, as if he were trying to reassure Johnson. The captain was doing his best to project a composed demeanor. This damn panic is their worst enemy, he thought.

  Chastened by Townsend’s countermanding his orders and realizing that the captain interpreted his announcement as a challenge to his authority, Cloud too tried to explain himself.

  “Captain, I didn’t know where you were, and the last time I saw you, you were with that group that looked pretty hostile. Then I got word that you had been killed or injured, so I had to act.”

  “I understand that,” Townsend said, but Cloud could tell he was still angry. The captain stared intently at his second-in-command. Then he said, “You jumped the gun, XO.”

  “Captain, this thing is getting out of hand,” Cloud said, moving past his own defense and trying to convey a sense of urgency. “A great number of our crew do not believe me, do not believe you, and they don’t believe our sincerity, primarily because we told them they would be all right and they’re not. After that first meeting on the mess deck we told them there would be no problem with the Marines, and look what happened.”

  Townsend gritted his teeth and let out a deep breath. “You got this thing off track with the way you were talking to them up there. It’s your job to stop this mess, and you were up there being conciliatory and placating those men. I saw what you did.”

  Cloud knew that Townsend was talking about his efforts to bond with the black crewmen and convince them that he understood their plight. And he realized the captain must have seen his black power salute. Cloud could see a distrust and wariness in the captain’s eyes that wasn’t there before, and he could understand it. From the captain’s perspective, Cloud had to admit, things looked suspicious.

  “Captain, I’m not trying to placate anybody or polarize the crew between black and white,” he said. “I assure you that’s not my intent. We’ve got to put this thing down or else it’s going to blow up even more.”

  Cloud realized he wasn’t making any progress with Townsend. At that moment, about twenty black sailors came rushing down the passageway, screaming “Get them!” and “Kill them!” To Cloud, it looked like the crowd was just trying to stir up trouble and find a good target for some abuse. Both he and the captain moved to stop the men. Among the group was Terry Avinger, the troubled young man who kept swinging wildly from troublemaker to reformed optimist. He was one of the angriest black men on the Kitty Hawk now. Townsend saw Avinger and felt a mix of anger and disappointment, realizing that his efforts to rehabilitate the young man had been for naught.

  Cloud stepped into their path and raised up his hands, shouting “Stop!” The mob didn’t slow. Instead, those in the front ran right through the XO, knocking him to the deck. Townsend took off after the group with the two Marines close behind. After a few steps, Townsend stopped and turned to look back at Johnson.

  “Go to your quarters!” he barked.

  Cloud scrambled to his feet and held up his hands to slow down five black sailors, including Avinger, at the tail end of the crowd, making them pause long enough to hear him out.

  “You men are doing it the wrong way!” he cried. “Give me your weapons and get on with it!”

  A couple of the men handed over their weapons but others refused, then all moved on to catch up with the group. Avinger lingered long enough to talk to Cloud, moving closer to the XO’s face and speaking plainly. Calmly, but defiantly.

  “You know your way won’t work,” he said. “You told us the Marines would not hurt us, would not bother us, and they were out there beating us up just like they had been told. You are no better than the others. We don’t believe you. You are a liar. You are just as bad as all the rest.”

  Avinger pushed past the XO, but Cloud grabbed him by the arm and tried to restrain him. If he could just talk to Avinger, he could convince the man to stop what he was doing. The sailor would not be held and broke away.

  “Stop!” Cloud shouted. “I order you to come with me!”

  Avinger never stopped but turned his head to shout back at the XO.

  “I am not going to obey you! You’re just as bad as all the rest.”

  Dejected but still determined, Cloud followed Avinger, both men running to catch up with the now-departing mob. The XO considered trying to physically detain Avinger but figured the mob might just turn on him. In the confusion of trying to catch up with the crowd, the captain and the XO became separated again. Having lost the mob they were chasing, Cloud continued to look for trouble spots as he moved aft. Black sailors were continuing to beat white sailors in passageways, pulling them out of bunks and work areas. As Cloud intervened, trying to pull sailors apart and wrestle their weapons away, the sound of Townsend’s voice on the 1MC still echoed in his mind.

  The public exchange between the XO and the captain left most of the crew on the Kitty Hawk even more worried and confused. First they hear calls from the bridge looking for the captain, then the XO’s message gets them concerned that the ship is going to hell in a hurry. And then the captain comes on right after and slap
s down his own XO. Many of the sailors wondered which was worse: a ship in serious trouble but led by two competent officers working in concert, or a ship in some kind of trouble but without any unified command at the top. This type of uncertainty, this confused chain of command, was exactly the opposite of how they’d been taught the ship should operate in a crisis. Like pack animals that don’t care so much which dog is the leader so much as that they’re being led by somebody, the crew was discomfited to hear such a public display of disagreement. Is anybody really looking out for us? Is anybody really in charge?

  Cloud was stinging from the public rebuke. He realized the captain’s misgivings, but now he was caught between his white boss and his black sailors, with neither completely trusting him. Cloud hadn’t been aboard the Kitty Hawk long enough for the black sailors to develop any faith in him, and his position as XO prompted a certain amount of skepticism from blacks who distrusted authority figures. Some of the events of the evening had not helped shore up his credibility with them. The captain, however, had started the day with complete faith in his XO, a faith that was shaken when he saw Cloud raise his fist in a black power salute and then try to take over the ship with his crazy announcement. Cloud, realizing that he was operating pretty much without the captain’s support, could have gone back to his quarters and let things play out under Townsend’s command. The captain probably wouldn’t mind, he figured. He didn’t know that Townsend had nearly ordered him to do that anyway. But the XO was too much of a team player and felt obligated to do his job. Hurt feelings or regrets about his actions that night were not going to get him down. (By now he was recognizing that his urgent address on the 1MC might have been wrong—not his strategy in separating the crew, but perhaps his haste in believing the reports of Townsend’s death.) Cloud still thought he was the one who really saw the big picture— what caused the violence and where it still could lead—and he was still desperately trying to prevent a disaster. Maybe the captain thought he could just tell everyone to knock it off and that would be enough, but Cloud had seen enough violence that night to convince him otherwise.