Slote signalled at a passing taxicab. “Good luck.”
Natalie was astonished at the small size of the submarine, at its ugliness, and at its rustiness. “Good heavens!” she shouted over the clanks and squeals of the crane moving overhead, as they got out of the cab. “Is
“He’s never stayed awake long enough to find out,” said Aster. They were walking toward a gangway that was only a couple of planks nailed together. Sailors lounged on the low flat black forecastle, staring at the girl in white, with an armful of roses. “One day when we’re submerged he’ll open his eyes and begin screaming.”
“I don’t mind anything but the low company,” said Byron, “and the body odors. It’s especially marked among the senior officers. When I sleep I don’t notice it.”
A young tousle-headed sailor at the gangway, wearing a gun slung low on his hip, saluted Aster, gave Natalie a yearning respectful glance, and said, “Cap’n wants you-all to wait for him on the dock, sir.”
“Very well.”
Soon a figure in a blue uniform, with the gold stripes of a lieutenant, emerged from the rust-streaked black sail — the housing that rose amidships over the conning tower — and crossed the gangplank to the dock. The captain was shaped rather like his submarine, clumsily thick in the middle and tapering abruptly to either end. He had big brown eyes, a broad nose, and a surprisingly boyish face.
“Captain Caruso, this is my wife,” said Byron, jolting Natalie with the word.
Caruso took her hand in a white fat paw. “Well congratulations! Byron’s a good lad, in his short conscious intervals.”
“Do you really sleep that much?” Natalie laughed at Byron.
“It’s pure slander. I seldom close my eyes on this boat,” said Byron, “except to meditate on my folly in going to sub school. That I admit I do very frequently.”
“Eighteen hours at a stretch, he can meditate,” said Aster. “That’s solid gold meditating.”
Two sailors in dungarees came up out of an open hatch on the forecastle and crossed the gangway, one carrying a bottle of champagne in an ice bucket, the other a tray of water glasses.
“Ah, here we go. Navy Regs don’t allow us to consume spirituous liquors on board, Mrs. Henry,” said the captain, and again she felt the little joyous jolt. He popped the cork and ceremoniously poured as the sailor held out one glass after another.
“To your happiness,” he shouted, as the crane went by overhead with a wild clanging. “To you, God bless you,” yelled Natalie, “for bringing him here.”
“To number two engine,” bellowed Lady Aster, “to the evaporators, the exhaust system, and the forward battery. Never has there been such a massive breakdown on a naval vessel.”
Byron silently lifted his glass to his captain and executive officer.
They drank. The crane rumbled away.
“Captain,” said Lady Aster, as Caruso refilled the glasses, “do you think that picture in Byron’s room does Natalie justice?”
“Not in the least,” said the captain, looking at her with liquid woman-loving Italian eyes. “It doesn’t begin to.”
“That’s how I feel. Now that you’ve actually seen her, sir, don’t you agree with me that what has to be done in Lisbon may take at least five days?”
“Three,” snapped Captain Caruso, the dreamy look vanishing. “Exactly seventy-two hours.”
“Aye aye, sir.”
“And you’d better produce some damned convincing malfunction reports, Lady.” The captain tossed off his wine and smiled at Natalie. “Now, can I offer you the hospitality of the boat for a little while?”
She followed the officers into the rusty sail and down a hatch. The ladder was cold and greasy, with narrow slippery rungs that caught at Natalie’s high heels. She had to lower herself through a second round hatch and down another ladder into a tiny room full of machinery strongly conscious of her exposed legs and glad that they were pretty and that her skirt was narrow.
“This is the control room,” Byron said, helping her down. “Up above was the conning tower.”
Natalie looked around at solemn-faced sailors in dungarees, and at the valves, knobs, dials, handles, big wheels, twisted cables, and panels of lights filling all the green-painted bulkheads. Despite a humming exhaust blower, the close, warm air smelled sourly of machinery, cooking, old cigars, and unwashed men. “Briny, do you really know what all these things are?”
“He’s learning,” said Lady Aster. “Between hibernations.”
They stepped through an open watertight door to the tiny wardroom, where Natalie met two more young officers. On the table stood a heart-shaped white cake, iced in blue with a submarine, cupids, and Mr. and Mrs. Byron Henry. She squeezed herself into the place of honor at the head of the table, opposite the captain. Byron and Lady Aster sat crouched against the bulkhead, to avoid a bunk folded back over their heads. Somebody produced a sword, Natalie cut up the cake, and the captain sent what was left to the crew’s quarters. The two glasses of champagne were going to Natalie’s head. She was half-dizzy anyway from the rush of events and the longing that blazed at her from the young men’s eyes. Over the coffee and cake she laughed and laughed at Lady Aster’s jokes, and decided that the old submarine, for all its cramped squalor, its reek of machinery and male bodies, was a mighty jolly vessel. Byron looked more desirable to her by the minute, and she kissed him often.
Before they left the
“The alternative might be more frightful,” said Lady Aster, over Natalie’s shoulder. “Like staying awake.”
When Natalie and Byron came out on deck into cool fresh air, crewmen on the forecastle waved and cheered. Natalie waved back and some bold sailors whistled. The taxicab, called by the gangway watch for them, started off with a great clatter. The driver jammed on his brakes, jumped out, and soon Natalie and Byron heard him cursing in Portuguese as he threw aside shoes and tin cans. The crew laughed and yelled until the cab drove away.
“I daresay poor Slote’s left the hotel by now.” Natalie snuggled against her husband. “We’ll collect my bags and go there, right? Wait till you see it. It was terrible of me to jump at it like that, but honestly, Briny, it’s the royal suite.”
In Natalie’s room, in a boardinghouse on a side street, an old woman snored in an iron bed. “Well, Slote’s place must be better than this.” Byron whispered, glancing at the cracked ceiling and at the roaches on the peeling wallpaper, scurrying to hide from the electric light. Natalie swiftly gathered her things and left a note with her key on the table. At the door she turned to look at Mrs. Rosen, lying on her back, jaw hanging open, gray hair tumbled on the pillow. What kind of wedding night had Mrs. Rosen had, she thought, with the husband whose silver-framed face smiled brownly on her bedside table, her one memento of the wretched man dragged off a French train by Germans? Natalie shivered and closed the door.
The desk clerk at the Palace Hotel evidently had been informed and tipped by Slote, for he yielded up the key to Byron with a greasy grin. The newlyweds had to give him their passports. Natalie felt a touch of fear, handing over the maroon American booklet that set her off from Lisbon’s forty thousand other Jews.
“I just thought of something,” she said in the elevator. “How did you register?”
“Mr. and Mrs., naturally. Big thrill.”
“I’m still Natalie Jastrow on that passport.”
“So you are.” The elevator stopped. He took her arm. “I wouldn’t worry about it.”
“But maybe you should go back and explain.”
“Let them ask a question first.”
As the bellboy opened the door to the suite, Natalie felt herself whisked off her feet. “Oh, Byron, stop this nonsense. I’m monstrously heavy. You’ll slip a disk.” But she clung to his neck with one hand and clutched her skirt with other, excited by his surprising lean strength.
“Hey!” he said, carrying her inside. “I see what you meant. Royal suite is right.”
When he put her down she darted ahead into the room. Natalie had a slight nag of worry about the negligee
