“Aye, aye, Chief,” Wilson said quickly before Slater could reply.
“And don’t get underfoot,” the chief continued. He went down the passageway and disappeared through a bulkhead at the far end.
Slater glared after him. “What’s the matter with
“Shape up,” Wilson warned. “Our travel orders list us as technical personnel, and old line Navy chiefs don’t think too much of ratings who haven’t earned their rank on sea duty.” He opened his white canvas seabag and pulled out the dungarees Erikson had rolled up for us in neat Navy style.
We all changed. “I’m goin’ on deck,” Slater declared when he had stowed his whites. “This place gives me the gallopin’ jumps.”
I was glad when Wilson raised no objection. The cell-like confinement in the crew’s quarters raised my own hackles. I followed Slater and Wilson topside. I thought the decks would be crowded with sailors, but they were bare. I realized that each crew member undoubtedly had a duty station during the initial getting-under-way maneuvers.
I looked back over the stern. Key West was only a blue blur on the horizon. The sky had a brassy look. There was an oily-looking swell, but the destroyer knifed through it with only a slight increase in the yawing motion. Wilson moved to the rail and stood staring out over the water toward the descending sun. Slater selected a loading hatch amidships and seated himself on the gray-painted canvas cover. The cool sea breeze felt welcome on my perspiring features.
I wondered what lay ahead of us on Guantanamo. Although Erikson had been specific about most other aspects of the job, he had shrugged off questions about the naval base. “Just do as you’re told when we get there,” was the sum total of his replies. I hoped he wasn’t playing it by ear. Everything I’d read about Guantanamo indicated that it was a fortress, and it wouldn’t make much difference that we were trying to get out rather than in.
A movement by Slater caught my eye. He had drawn a flat, pint bottle from the waistband of his fatigues. The bottle’s contents glinted amber. Slater glanced up and down the deck, then tilted the bottle quickly. He swallowed twice before recapping it and shoving it back inside his waistband.
I sidled over to him. “That’s stupid, Slater. You want to blow the whole bit?”
His frown drove his heavy brows into a shallow V. “Bug off,” he warned. As if to show me he meant business, he jerked the bottle out again, slipped the cap, and let half a dozen ounces gurgle down his throat. I moved closer, trying to shield him.
“SLATER!!” It was a full-throated roar from above us in Erikson’s brass-bellow. Both our heads swiveled upward. Erikson was standing against the rail on an upper deck just below the bridge, staring down at us. He disappeared only to show up seconds later right beside us. “Give me that!” he demanded peremptorily. “And get on your feet when an officer addresses you!”
“Stuff it!” Slater rasped. His eyes were bloodshot, and I wondered how long he’d been sucking on the bottle before I noticed him.
Erikson grabbed for the bottle, which was partially concealed in Slater’s hand. Slater wrenched his hand away. All we needed was for the booze to smash on the deck. Then Slater’s seabag would be turned inside out, and liquor would be the least of the incriminating evidence found.
Erikson snatched the bottle from Slater on his second lunge. He handed it to me just as the same chief who had dressed us down below appeared. “Trouble, sir?” the chief asked Erikson.
“No trouble, Chief,” Erikson said. “Except that this man isn’t feeling well. I think he ought to go below and remain in his bunk.”
“Yes, sir,” the CPO said blandly. “He’s one of your detachment, isn’t he, sir? If you like, I can arrange to have him admitted to sick bay.”
Slater hadn’t seen where the bottle went. He thought Erikson still had it. While talking to the chief, Erikson had positioned himself so that his body shielded Slater from the chief’s eyes. Slater seized Erikson’s arm and spun him into the chief. “You give that back to me!” he shouted. “Goddamn it, I’ll—”
“Watch your language when you’re speaking to an officer!” The chief’s foghorn voice drowned out Slater’s. I held my breath as I saw Slater gather himself. The chief saw it, too. “Ten-shun!” he barked.
Slater left-hooked the chief at the beltline. The stocky CPO sank slowly to his knees. His bulging eyes expressed incredulity that a rating with as many years service as Slater presumably had could react in such a manner.
It seemed to me that the chief’s knees no sooner hit the deck than we were surrounded by young sailors. Bursting through them came a slender officer with two stripes on his sleeve and a blue band around his upper arm with the white initials O.D. on it. “Break it up!” he ordered the sailors briskly. “Back to duty stations!” They melted away. “I’ll handle this, Commander,” the officer continued to Erikson. He raised a hand, and two burly-looking sailors appeared out of nowhere. They each took an arm of Slater and unceremoniously dragged him away. I was relieved to see that he wasn’t fighting them much. Evidently the shock of what he’d done had finally reached his liquor-fired brain.
While Erikson was helping the chief to his feet with the assistance of the O.D., I edged to the rail and dropped the almost empty pint bottle over the side. “Either one of you can prefer charges,” the O.D. was saying crisply. “The simplest way would be for me to take a statement from Chief McMillan here and have it sent to the provost marshal at the base for further action.”
“I’m sorry this incident occurred, Lieutenant,” Erikson apologized. “Especially since this man is in my charge. He was assigned to me only a week ago, and I didn’t realize he was so unstable. You can be sure that I’ll follow up with the proper course of action.”
The O.D. saluted smartly and went back amidships. The chief walked away, still slightly doubled over but ignoring proffered assistance from Erikson. Chico Wilson had been hovering unobtrusively in the background, and Erikson motioned for him to join us. I had never seen Wilson look so upset. “You think it’s smart to stand out here an’ talk?” he asked.
I had almost asked the same question myself. I felt as though a hundred pairs of unseen eyes were upon us, all disapproving.
“It would look more odd if I didn’t speak to you after what happened,” Erikson said tightly. “You men are under my jurisdiction, and for the next five minutes anyone watching us will naturally assume I’m giving you the rules of the road regarding your future conduct aboard ship. So look alert. Pull back those shoulders.”
We both straightened self-consciously. “What’s gonna happen to ol’ Slater now?” Wilson asked uneasily.
“If he weren’t absolutely necessary to us, I’d let him rot in the Gitmo brig,” Erikson said angrily. “The chief gunner’s mate handles disciplinary problems on a ship this size. Those were two of his men, muscled-up ammunition handlers, probably, who lugged Slater away. They’ll throw him into the food locker, since the destroyer has no brig as such, and if he gives them a hard time, they’ll handcuff him to a stanchion.”
Erikson looked at me. “Getting rid of that bottle really helped. If they figure Slater as blowing his stack rather than liquored up, there’s less chance his seabag will be confiscated. The Cuban uniforms aren’t in his bag, but there’s enough of an unexplainable nature to keep us answering questions for the next forty-five years.”
“What do we do now?” I asked.
“Slater will be confined in the food locker for the balance of this cruise,” Erikson said in the tone of a man thinking out loud. “And I don’t want either of you to try to see him. Let him sweat it out. Under normal procedure, he’ll be transferred from the ship to the Gitmo brig under armed guard. The trouble is that once he’s in custody on the base, only a military court can move him out.”
Erikson frowned, considering. “If he’d taken a swing at me, I could elect not to press charges. The minute he laid a hand on the chief, though, he scuttled himself. What I believe I’ll do is ask the chief to let me be the accuser. I’ll agree to press charges, but if this destroyer doesn’t remain more than overnight at Gitmo, I can always change my mind and decide to drop the charges after it sails. Then I might be able to get Slater released to my custody.”
“Goddamn that knothead,” Wilson muttered. “Four million bucks may be down the drain over a swig of rotgut whiskey.”
“There’s one good thing that will come of this,” Erikson added. “No one will bother you two now. No ship’s personnel is going to become too chummy with a couple of sailors whose buddy clobbered their chief.”
