man, taking a nap.
She jumped in her seat when the general quarters alarm gargled its insistent cry, and when she looked back at Matt, she saw his smiling green eyes.
“Good day, m’dear,” he said. “Help me with my shoes, wilya?”
“Of course, Matthew.”
“What have we got?” Matt demanded before Minnie could announce him.
“Smoke, Skipper,” Spanky replied. “Sorry to bug you, but the lookout in the crow’s nest is pretty sure he seen smoke due north in the Formosa Strait.” Spanky scratched an ear. “Kid must have freaky-good eyes to spot gray smoke against all that gray out there, but I believe him.” He looked thoughtful. “I guess it could be one of our guys, but I don’t think so.”
“Me either,” Matt agreed. “All our steamers are supposed to have cleared the area.” He looked at Spanky with a predatory grin. “I think we’ve caught our Japs, Mr. McFarlane.”
Spanky nodded. “Looks like. Or they’ve caught us.”
Matt didn’t reply. He looked at the diminutive talker. “Ask the lookout if he could determine anything about range, course, and speed.”
“Ay, ay, Cap-i-taan,” Minnie said in her small voice. She spoke into her microphone. “Nothing yet, Skipper. Jus’ smoke bearing tree fi oh. A blue-gray smear at angle to horizon.”
Matt rubbed his forehead above his eyes. “Very well. Let’s go have a look, Mr. McFarlane.”
“Aye, aye, sir. Helm, make your course three two zero. If they’re steaming southeast, we’ll have to meet ’em. Lee helm,” he said to the ’Cat on the engine-room telegraph. “All ahead two-thirds.”
“Making my course three two zero,” replied Chief Quartermaster Paddy Rosen.
“All ahead two-thirds,” announced the ’Cat as the engine room pointer advanced from STANDARD to match his TWO — THIRDS, and the old destroyer reluctantly surged against the sharply corrugated swells. Once, standard would have signified twenty knots, but it meant closer to fifteen now. Less, in these seas. Two-thirds would take Walker churning through the rough waves at a touch over twenty. Matt looked at his watch. “You still have the deck, Spanky. I’ll be back in half an hour. Call me when we get a positive ID, or if anything breaks.”
“Aye, aye, Skipper. Uh, you gonna get some more rest?”
Matt shook his head. “No, I think the surgeon and I will take a walk around the ship.” He looked at Sandra. “If you like?”
“Sure.”
“Okay,” said Spanky, “but use the damn hand ropes!” he warned. “The old gal’s still hoppin’ around like a ca-” He caught himself and looked around. “Like a rabbit on hot asphalt!”
The whole crew was still at general quarters, and Matt wanted to see them there. He couldn’t roam the ship as often as he liked, but he always tried to see his people at times like this. Everyone knew they’d seen something, and there wasn’t much doubt among the crew that it was the murderous Japanese. They’d all seen a lot of action now, but only about half the ship’s complement had faced a “modern” enemy, either aboard Walker or Mahan. Amagi had been infinitely larger and more powerful than their present quarry, but they had essentially mousetrapped the great battle cruiser. A lot went wrong and a lot went amazingly right, but they’d still sunk her almost by accident. Few retained any illusions that their upcoming fight would be a cakewalk. Even the newest hands no longer believed Walker was invincible. She’d taken too much damage from relatively primitive enemies to think that way anymore. And if anyone forgot how fragile she really was, she reminded them herself with her groans and rattles, her deep, painful shudders, and the running rust sores the long voyage had given her.
Matt knew enough about Hidoiame to fear her; he’d seen earlier versions of her Kagero class. He was pretty sure they’d fought some on their run out of Surabaya. They’d been faster and more heavily armed than Walker even then. He knew from what the crazy cook had told Okada that this specimen had only two twin five-inch mounts instead of three; one forward and one aft, but an augmented battery of 25 mm guns like the two mounts Walker had taken from Amagi had been added. Apparently, surface actions had grown less common in that other war, and clusters of twenty-fives were better against aircraft. Enough of those things could shred his ship by themselves, despite what Spanky or the Bosun thought of the weapons individually. Campeti had grown to like them-and if he liked them, they were bad news.
We’ll have to keep our distance, Matt thought as he and Sandra descended the companionway and went forward to the wardroom.
“Boats!” he exclaimed when he saw Chief Gray sitting on a chair beside a clearly miserable Diania. He’d wondered where the Super Bosun was. Gray looked up, probably horrified he’d been caught like this. One hand was holding a bucket, the other tentatively patting the sick girl’s back. Diania’s face was in the bucket, her trembling hands holding wet, dark hair out of the way.
“Oh, you poor dear!” Sandra exclaimed, rushing forward. She looked at her pharmacist’s mates. “I thought she was doing better!”
“She was,” one said, but then gestured around. Diania wasn’t the only human female puking in the wardroom. “I guess it come and go,” the ’Cat said with a slightly superior air. Sandra was annoyed. All the ’Cats had been just as sick the first time they rode Walker in a storm. She knelt in front of Diania.
“Are you all right?” What a stupid question.
“Aye’m,” came a muffled croak from within the bucket. “I’ll be back tae me duties soon enu…” The bucket thundered.
“Boats,” Matt said softly, “you’re damage-control officer. You need to be… You’ve got other duties.”
“Aye, sir,” Gray grumbled. “An’ I was doin’ ’em too, when I came through here an’ seen this. I ain’t never seen so many broads… blowin’ tubes, as it were, all at once. It was… terrible! I had to do somethin’ to stop the leaks.”
Sandra snapped her fingers at a PM. “You! Relieve Mr. Gray this instant! He does have other duties, and right now, this is yours!”
Gratefully, Gray surrendered the bucket, but paused, electrocuted, when Diania grabbed his hand.
“Thankee,” she mumbled, her red-rimmed eyes peering up at him. “Ye’re not sich a beast as ye make out. I’ll nae fergit!”
Gray retrieved his scalded hand.
“I’ll, uh, get on down to, ah… make sure…”
Matt shooed him off. When Sandra was sure Diania and the others were receiving proper care, they got the coffee they’d come for and headed aft.
“Chief Gray seems almost scared of Diania,” Sandra said as they neared the airlock to the forward fireroom. She’d rarely been in there before.
“Can you blame him?” Matt asked. “He was married once, you know, and it didn’t go well. They had a kid, but he was probably lost on Oklahoma, last we heard. At Pearl.” Matt frowned. “All Gray’s ever had out of… obligated relationships is pain. He never even shacked up with a Filipino gal. I’m sure he’s visited his share of… professional ladies over the years, some just as young as Diania, but that’s not what she is, and he doesn’t know how to handle it. He won’t take advantage, but with her stalking him like the hunting dame her name sounds like-” He snorted. “I’d be scared too. He’s old enough to be her grandpa!”
“You really think she’s stalking him?” Sandra asked, amused.
“Don’t you?”
“Maybe. I know she admires him. I also know age shouldn’t matter, not here-certainly not with them. Consider their respective backgrounds; both somewhat monastic, and Diania never expected the opportunity for an ‘obligated’ relationship of any sort, other than practical slavery.” Sandra smiled. “Diania’s an adult, over twenty, I’m sure, even if she doesn’t know exactly. Mr. Gray obviously cares for her. I think they’d be good for each other.”
They cycled through into the forward fireroom and passed between the large bunkers that filled the space where the number one boiler used to be.
“’Ten-shun!!” cried a Lemurian snipe.
Matt quickly called, “As you were!” before he could disrupt anything. “Lieutenant,” he greeted Tabby when she appeared before him.
“Skipper,” she said. “We fixin’ to get them damn Japs?”
“I hope so. Any serious problems?” Matt knew better than to ask if there were any problems at all. There
