“Y’know, Commodore,” observed the skipper; “in a way, I think it’s a good thing to have these Russian snoopers hanging around.”
“How the hell do you figure that?”
“Well, ... when they get back home, there’s only one thing in the world they can report - those guys are big leaguers, and they’re damn good.”
“Maybe you’ve got something there,” laughed the Commodore. “I’ll tell that to the Admiral next time I see him. He’ll I get a kick out of it.”
“By the way,” said the skipper, “I see by the radio press news where the amphibs are getting into the Vietnam war in a big way. It looks like they’ll be in it more and more from now on.”
“Yeah. I saw that item in the press. They’re cooking up a regular gunboat Navy for the river war out there. The amphibs are going to be in it up to their ears from now on. By God, that’s where I’d like to be - instead of fooling around here playing games. I’d swap this Commodore job right now for command of a ship out there on the firing line.”
“I’d rather be out there, too,” said the skipper. “These make-believe battles around here don’t get you any combat stars in your service ribbon. But I see by the dispatches where there’s trouble brewing between the Israelis and the Arabs. We’ll be right in the middle of it if that breaks.”
“Nothing will come of that,” said the Commodore pontifically. “Nasser has got all the Arabs lined up behind him now. I see where Jordan and Syria just fell in line. He’s got pretty near forty million Arabs on his side against two and a half million Israelis. Those Jews have got a pretty good little army and air force. But they’re too smart to start a shooting war against odds like that.”
“I guess you’re right, Commodore,” said the skipper. “I ...”
At this point a messenger entered and handed a dispatch board to the Captain. The Captain scanned the message, initialed it, and handed it to the Commodore.
“Change in our supply schedule,” he observed. “The Sylvania is being diverted. Instead of coming here, she’s going back to the States. She has fifty tons of stores for us that she’s going to leave in Malta. We can pick it up after our visit to Athens.”
“Hell,” growled the Commodore, “Some of that stuff is for me. And I want it before we go to Athens. My official car is in it. I’ve been pulling wires to get that car for six months, and I want to have it in Athens. Those two deep freeze lockers they mention are for me, too ... special for my mess, including six dozen king crabs that old Blubber Ass Davis is sending all the way from Sitka ... Nuts!”
The skipper saw a chance to make character for himself with the Commodore - as up and coming skippers are always alert to do. “I can get that stuff here for you, Commodore, before we go to Athens,” he said.
“I will consider you a great naval strategist if you do,” said the Commodore. “How?”
“This little game we’re playing here is going to last a week. My LCU has nothing to do but just sit there on the beach till we take the troops back aboard. She can make it to Malta and back in five days and can easily handle fifty tons - I can send her off tomorrow, if you say so.”
“Sa-a-a-ay! That’s an idea,” said the Commodore. “You sure she can make it there and back? After all, those LCUs aren’t meant to get out of sight of their own ship.”
“This one is special, Commodore. Her skipper is that boatswains mate with two Navy Crosses - the same one that got us that letter of commendation for helping to get the A-bomb off the bottom near Spain. I’ll bet he could take her clear to Norfolk and back if you told him to.”
“Hunh!” observed the Commodore, skeptically. “Well, Columbus made it over and back in a bucket only half as big. After all, it’s your LCU. If you say he can do it - it’s okay with me.”
Soon a blinker message went in from the Alamo to the Marine signal station on the beach. An orderly took it down the beach to LCU 1124 and handed it to Fatso, just as they finished counting the swag from the evening’s work. It said, COME ALONGSIDE 0600 TOMORROW.
“Okay,” announced Fatso. “Plan of the Day for tomorrow is - Reveille 0530. Underway 0545. We will get breakfast on the Alamo.”
Next morning, came the dawn and found Melambo Beach as peaceful as a country churchyard. The eternal stars still peered down quietly from the west as the golden glow of the sun began lighting up the east. The new day spreading west across the world found no sign of the turmoil and trouble that afflict this earth. Nobody was up yet.
A few early birds napped lazily along the shoreline. Perhaps they were doves, confident that no hawks would molest them here.
The peace and quiet was broken only by the gentle swish of small swells washing ashore - and by the snores of the Marine sentries asleep at their posts, their weapons loaded, cocked, and ready.
At 0530 the anchor watch on LCU 1124 made three hells. He did this by tapping twice on the ship’s bell, waiting two seconds, hitting one more lick. Then he flipped a switch. The silence of Melambo Beach was shattered by Toscanini’s symphony orchestra blasting out Stars and Stripes Forever on Fatso’s hi-fi record player with the volume turned up to war emergency power.
This was regular daily routine on LCU 1124 when they were not embarked in the mother ship. For a short while it had been on the mother ship too - until the Captain made Fatso knock it off. Even though the officers’ quarters are forward and the LCU berthed aft, the Alamo’s officers claimed it blasted them right out of their bunks.
Martial music was Fatso’s idea of how to start the day off right. It also helped him to check on the military character of new men trying out for his crew. Any sailor who could stay in his bunk while Toscanini was belting out Stars and Stripes obviously was not the sort of man that Fatso wanted to take into battle with him.
At 0545, with a seaman at the wheel and Fatso looking on, LCU 1124 took a strain on the kedge line, backed full, and came off the beach. Ten minutes later she eased into the well deck of the Alamo with only a foot in spare on each side, and tied up.
A few minutes later, Fatso was in the cabin getting his orders from the Captain.
“Gioninni,” said the skipper, “I want you to go to Malta and pick up some freight.” He handed Fatso the message from the Sylvania.
“Malta?” said Fatso. “Aye aye, sir. No strain.”
“You can draw any charts you need from the navigator.”
“Don’t need any, Cap’n. I’ve got a complete set of the whole Med - just in case.”
“Okay,” said the Captain. “We’re due to leave here a week from today for Athens. I’ll expect you back in five days.”
The first few days of LCU 1124’s voyage to Malta were quiet and uneventful. That is, they were for LCU 1124. But they were far from it for the Middle East.
The Arab-Israeli hassle suddenly went critical and threatened to fission. Nasser said “Boo” to the United Nations, which promptly yanked its peace-keeping force out of the Gaza Strip. The Arabs and Israelis rushed troops up to the border to fill the void. Nasser blockaded the Gulf of Aqaba. The Israelis made belligerent noises about this. In Jerusalem and Cairo, derogatory comments were voiced about each other’s armies, and each side officially notified the other that if they didn’t watch out, they would get their goddamned block knocked off. Nasser got ready to close the Suez Canal.
While these international courtesies were being exchanged, Commander Sixth Fleet got an urgent message from CNO. It said that more amphibious craft were needed in Vietnam, and those in the Sixth Fleet could get there quicker than any others as long as Suez was open. So CNO directed Sixth Fleet to send most of their amphibious forces to Vietnam, right now.
This, of course, stopped the landing exercise. There was a mad scramble to get the Marines and their gear off the beach and get the ships started on their way to war in Vietnam.
On the Alamo, the skipper and Commodore had their heads together. The skipper was saying, “We can’t possibly get our LCU back in less than seventy-two hours, Commodore. We
can’t reach him by radio. We’d have to send a message to Malta, and it would take at least three days to get him back.”
“All right,” said the Commodore. “We’ve got to leave him behind. They need these ships real bad in Vietnam, and I’m not going to miss a chance to get in that war by having the canal closed on us while we’re waiting. They’ve probably got plenty of LCUs out there anyway. Send word to Malta to have your man go up to Naples and check in with HQ there.”
“Aye aye, sir,” said the skipper. “There’s a whirlybird coming in soon from one of the carriers to pick up the mail. I’ll put the records and pay accounts of the crew aboard with a letter to the Carrier Division Commander asking him to have Malta send her up to Naples.”
“Okay,” said the Commodore. “That ought to take care of it.”
It would have, too. Except that on the way back to the carrier that morning a little thing-um-a-jig in the transmission joint of the whirlybird’s rotor began working loose. A mile from the carrier, it came off altogether. This caused one rotor blade to fly off and dumped the whirlybird into the drink with a hell of a splash.
The pilot and his two crewmen were lucky to get out of it and got picked up by the plane guard destroyer. The whirlybird, and the mail, of course, wound up on the bottom in a thousand fathoms of water.
Meantime, the USS Alamo and others were high-tailing it for Suez, and LCU 1124 was plugging along toward Malta.
Soon after Fatso’s interview with the Captain of the Alamo, LCU 1124 squared away on her course to Malta and set the cruising watch. The watch consisted of the Officer of the Deck, the helmsman, the lookout, Boatswain’s Mate, Signalman, and OOD’s messenger. They were all the same guy, of course. With only six men in the crew you have to stretch duties a bit.
As skipper, Fatso was, of course, on duty at all times. So was Scuttlebutt, although he didn’t spend much time below in his engine room. If anything started to go wrong down there, Scuttlebutt knew it before the engines did. His ears told him how his engines were running just as well as an array of gauges could. And he felt any strange vibration the way a seismograph picks up a small earthquake thousands of miles away.
As Crete dropped below the horizon astern, Fatso and Scuttlebutt were leaning on the rail of the bridge discussing matters that interest seafaring men.
“You got any good numbers in Athens?” asked Scuttlebutt.
“Sure,” said Fatso. “What kind you want - blondes of brunettes?”
“Friendly ones.”
“They’re all as friendly as you want, so long as your money holds out ... some of ‘em even after that, if you’re polite to them,” said Fatso reminiscently. “I remember ...”
“Sail ho! Cap’n,” came a hail from Satchmo, who was at the wheel.
“Where away?” demanded Fatso.
“Two points faw-ahd of de port beam,” intoned Satchmo.
“Can you make her out,” yelled Fatso.
“Jes a mast on de horizon, Cap’n.”
This ritual for a sighting by the lookout goes back to the days of sail. It is fast being forgotten now that radar dishes are replacing the Mark I eyeball of the lookouts. But Fatso insisted on keeping it alive on his ship.
Fatso and Scuttlebutt swung their glasses around to the bearing indicated and found the top of a mast sticking up over the horizon.
“That’s what I call eagle eyes,” observed Scuttlebutt.
“Good work, Satchmo!” called Fatso.
Five minutes later more of the ship’s upper works, including the tops of two smokestacks, had come up over the horizon. The bearing remained unchanged.
“She’s comin’ up fast,” observed Scuttlebutt. “Must be a destroyer.”
“Yeah,” said Fatso. “Bearing isn’t changing, so we’ll pass close aboard and get a good look at her.”
For the next five minutes, more and more of the ship came into sight, and finally the bow wave broke over the horizon and you could see the whole ship.
“It’s a Russian,” observed Scuttlebutt. “Must be making about thirty knots.”
“Yeah,” said Fatso. “Bearing hasn’t changed a bit ... What are you gonna do about that guy?” yelled Fatso at the pilot house.
“Ah ain’t gonna do nuthin’, Cap’n,” replied Satchmo. “Ah’s got de right of way, so I must hold mah course and speed.”
“Right,” replied Fatso. “He should be changing course any minute now to pass astern of you.”
“I’ll bet he don’t,” said Scuttlebutt.
Fatso walked into the charthouse and came out a minute later with a Very’s pistol. The range was down to three miles now and closing rapidly.
Fatso yelled at the pilot house, “If he doesn’t make his move in another minute, give him one long blast.”
“Aye aye, Cap’n,” replied Satchmo, his hand on the whistle control.
“Looks like he wants to play a game of chicken with you,” observed Scuttlebutt.
“Uh huh,” said Fatso. “And he’s got us over a barrel if he does. We ain’t allowed to change course or speed until just before it’s too late.”
Pretty soon Satchmo let out one long blast on his whistle. Fatso and Scuttlebutt focused their glasses on the destroyer’s forward stack to watch for the answering whistle blast confirming that the rules of the road would be observed. You can see the plume of steam from a whistle before you can hear it. Another minute went by with no sign from the destroyer that she had heard Satchmo’s blast or that she saw the LCU or intended to avoid it.
Fatso raised the Very pistol and fired a red star up in the air. Still nothing happened. When the range got down to one mile, Fatso strode into the pilot house, took station behind Satchmo, and said, “Okay, Satch - I’ve got the conn.”
By now the destroyer was looming up fast, and it was clear that if neither ship did anything there would be a collision. Fatso held on to the last possible instant. Had he kept going, he would have hit the destroyer smack amidships. The big bow wave of the destroyer swept by and tossed the LCU in the air as it rolled past. The small craft came down behind it with a great splash.
“All engines back full speed,” said Fatso.
As Satchmo threw his engines in reverse, Fatso blew a series of sharp blasts on the whistle - as required by the rules of the road when the ship with the right of way changes course or speed.
“Left full rudder,” said Fatso.
Satchmo threw the wheel hard over and LCU 1124 swung left and paralleled the destroyer on opposite course. The big ship swept past at express train speed, towering over the little one only twenty feet away. The Russians ignored the small ship, except for a short fat little officer who leaned over the rail of the bridge and focused his binoculars on her. Three gold stripes on his sleeve showed that he was the skipper.
Fatso ran over to the starboard wing of the bridge, shaking his fist at the Russian’s bridge, and cut loose with a string of free-wheeling opinions about her skipper. The Chief of Naval Operations might have deplored his choice of words in spots. His language was not the kind usually employed in international intercourse. It was a blast of purple obscenity that would have shocked even a bunch of boot Marines.
By this time, all hands in Fatso’s crew were on deck. Fatso yelled at a signalman, “Put your light on them and see if they answer.”
The signalman swung his searchlight around and started blinking A-A-A at the Russian. Soon answering blinks came back.
“Okay,” said Fatso. “Now just send them one word - Z-V-O-L-O-C-H.”
The signalman started blinking the letters.
“What the hell does that mean?” asked Scuttlebutt.
“I dunno,” said Fatso. “But it must be pretty awful. I learned it from a Russian countess. She said it’s an insult and a curse rolled into one, and there’s no such word in English. She said it’s the worst thing you can call a Russian.”
“How come a countess was teaching you words like that?”
“She ran the biggest cat house i
n Hong Kong,” said Fatso. “And I heard her call it to a Russian sailor after he tried to rape one of her gals.”
“Rape? In a cat house?” asked Scuttlebutt, incredulously.’
“Well,” said Fatso, “she caught him trying to sneak out without paying, and she claimed it was the same thing. Anyway, the guy she called it to was a stinking louse, but he got awful insulted about it.”
“Message sent, Cap’n,” yelled the signalman. “No reply - and they didn’t receipt for it, either.”
“I wonder where the hell he’s going in such a hurry,” said Scuttlebutt, as the Russian was dropping under the horizon to the north.
“From the way he’s heading, I’d say he’s bound for the Gulf of Laconia at the south end of Greece,” said Fatso.
“What’s up there?” asked Scuttlebutt.
“They got a sort of half-assed fleet base there,” said Fatso. “They keep a couple of supply ships, tenders, and tankers anchored all the time, just outside the Greek territorial waters where they’re in pretty good lee. Their cruisers, destroyers, and submarines go in there for supplies and for repair jobs that a tender can do. There’s always a bunch of them in there. It saves them a long trip back to their regular bases in the Black Sea.”
That evening one item in the radio news made Fatso prick up his ears and take notice. It said that Rear Admiral Hughes had just been promoted to Vice Admiral. “Well I’ll be damn,” said Fatso. “Old ‘Hotshot’ Hughes gets three stars! Whaddya know?”
“You know him?” asked the Professor.
“Well - sort of,” said Fatso. “We first met about twenty years ago, the day the Lexington got sunk. He was a brand new Ensign in the air group then. I drug him out of a burning plane on the flight deck and swum around holding him up for a couple of hours after the ship went down. He was real nice about it afterwards. Claimed I saved him from drowning and recommended me for a Navy Cross. Admiral Halsey just loved to hand out medals - so he gave it to me.”
“I guess you’re entitled to say you know him,” conceded the Professor. “Ever serve with him later?”
Cap'n Fatso Page 3