She eyed Julian with surprise. “Why, Jule, what are you doing up and around?”
He stuttered a bit and managed to say, “I… I was just going up to the bridge, Mama. Uh, to see if the captain would let me steer.”
She looked at him. “Well, run along. I’ll be up for breakfast a little later.”
When he got back up to the sundeck, he was still terribly shaken. They were entering the beautiful Nassau harbor, heading for the Prince George Wharf. He had been to Nassau once before and knew the routine. The captain would be on the bridge now, directing the docking, asking for port instructions on the FM-UHF marine radio, handling the wheel himself. He would have no time for little Julian, who would only be in the way. Julian remained where he was, watching.
A docking always fascinated him. Jack was up forward and the other crewman in the stern, both with coils of rope in their hands. As they came in slowly, neatly, to within a few yards of the dock, the crewmen heaved their lines and the shore hands on the dock grabbed them up and dropped the loops over the iron bollards. The deck winches grumbled and took in the slack of the lines and slowly snubbed the length of the yacht against the wharf. More lines went out. The deep groaning of the engines stopped. The two crewmen hurried midship and shortly the gangplank was swung out and latched.
His father joined him. He was scowling, obviously still irritated. And Jules knew the reason. He was dressed in yachting clothing, including an officer’s cap.
He asked, “Have you had breakfast, Jule?”
“No, Daddy.”
“Don’t call me Daddy, for Christ’s sake, it makes me feel old. Call me Father. Come along, we’ll get something to eat and then go ashore. I have some things to do before it gets too goddamned hot.”
They went into the small dining room, across from the galley, and the cook himself served them.
“Where in the hell’s that stupid bastard Edward?” Barry West demanded.
“I don’t know, sir,” the cook told him.
Julian suspected that Edward was keeping as far away from his father as possible, hoping the ship’s owner would cool off.
Barry West at the age of thirty was a handsome man, although there was a somewhat petulant quality about his mouth. However, when he had a hangover, or was more than ordinarily upset about something, young Julian hated to look at him. He was capable of bad tempers and on the few occasions he had physically punished his son, it had been more violent than the size of the boy warranted.
They ate their breakfast in silence, except for Barry West’s comment, “I don’t know why in the hell I’m letting you tag along. I suppose it won’t do you any harm to stretch your legs a bit.”
Julian didn’t say anything to that. He would just as well not have accompanied his parent, but he was afraid to say so for fear of irritating the other still further.
Ashore, they headed down the wharf and in the direction of Bay Street. The last time they had been in Nassau, it was his mother who had taken Julian ashore. She had had some shopping to do and his father had been too drunk to accompany them. In fact, he hadn’t gone ashore for the full time they had been on the island of New Providence.
The souvenir and other stores fascinated Julian. They had touristy names, and merchandise to go with them. The Trade Winds, the Island Shop, the English China House, Solomon’s Mines, the Nassau Shop, the John Bull. The bars had names such as Blackbeard’s Tavern and Dirty Dick’s. The souvenirs consisted of lots of straw things, hats, dolls, postcards, pillows with
His father had him by the hand, hurrying him along through the pedestrians, impatient with the boy’s attempt to look at the store displays.
Then he stopped abruptly. “What in the hell are you doing off the yacht?”
It was Edward, a look of consternation on his face. He was carrying two packages.
He said, “The captain gave me permission, Mr. West. I had promised my wife I’d pick up a souvenir for her and one for my little girl.”
“Oh, he did, eh? Well, listen here, Mr. Peeping Tom, you can just go back to the ship and pack your things and get the hell off. Get what pay’s coming to you from Captain Fielding, but be the hell off the yacht by the time I get back.”
The other, a tremble in his voice, pleaded, “Sir, please. I need the job. I’ve been with you for a long time. Jobs aren’t the easiest thing in the world to get these days. Especially at my age.”
“My heart is bleeding for you,” Barry West snarled. “Get your pay and get off the ship.”
“Mr. West, the amount of pay I have coming isn’t even enough to get me back to Miami and my family.”
“That’s no damned skin off my nose,” Julian’s father said. “Come on, Jule.” He pulled the boy by the hand.
Julian looked back over his shoulder in despair.
His friend said, “Good-bye, Julian.”
“Good-bye, Edward,” Julian responded miserably.
“Shut up and keep moving,” said his father.
It was then the dream ended. With the realization that he did not like his father and mother, Julian woke up.
Chapter Eighteen
I pray that the imagination we uncloak for defense and arms and outer space may yet be uncloaked as well for grace and beauty in our daily lives. As an economy, we need it. As a society, we shall perish without it.
Revolutions are not made; they come. A revolution is as natural a growth as an oak. It comes out of the past. Its foundations are laid far back.
He was not in the usual sweat brought on by the nightmares filled with memories of blood and horror and human suffering, but he was quite distressed.
Edith, her head on the pillow next to him, asked, “What’s wrong, Jule?”
“Bit of a nightmare, I guess,” he told her. “Nothing.”
“Nothing? You mean to tell me you have upsetting dreams?”
“’Upsetting dreams’ is a gentle way of putting it. I’ve had them all my life, these nightmares. They’re evidently more vivid than most people’s from what all the headshrinkers have told me.”
She sat up in bed. She hadn’t bothered to put on a nightgown before they fell asleep. Her body was superb, but right now he was in no mood for sex.
She said, “We must go and see Father immediately!”
“Why?”
But she had already hurried from the bed in the direction of the apartment’s order box to send for clothing. She said over her shoulder, “To tell him about your dreams.”
He shrugged, but got himself up and went into the bath. He in no way wanted to discuss his nightmares with Dr. Leete, but he supposed there was no choice. Supposedly he was still under medical care.
Dressed, they didn’t take their breakfast in his apartment but headed immediately down the hall to the Leete quarters. He hadn’t the vaguest idea what Edith’s father and mother thought about his relationship with their
