AT THREE O’CLOCK of a hot afternoon destroyer Termagant shoved her nose into the brown mouth of the Brisbane River and began her twisting course upriver.
Nothing official had been said about, nor had there been any repercussions from, the mess-deck fight. Yet Lieutenant Wouk knew.
He knew because it was his business to know most of what went on beyond the visual sight of Authority. A witness had mentioned the fight to a leading seaman; he had told the captain of his top; from that source the chief bosun’s mate was brought into the picture; and from him coxswain, and in due course the first-lieutenant.
The efficient running of the ship had not been impaired, and so Wouk did nothing about his knowledge. The net result of the grape-vine’s operation was that, unknown to Meredith, his stocks in the first-lieutenant’s eyes went up a fraction. Not much, but a little; certainly not enough to affect Meredith’s recommend. It had been a long time since an officer’s ability to command and lead men stemmed from the dynamite in his brine-hardened fists ...
It was too early yet to fall-in for entering harbour. But the ship was prepared for her berthing, and Meredith and Splinter stood idly by the motor-cutter, watching the grassy river banks flow smoothly by.
“That’s the sewerage works over there,” Meredith commented, pointing to a smoke-stacked brick building, “we’ll be up to the submarine boom in a jiffy. It’s not long then to Hamilton and New Farm.”
“You been swottin’ up on the chart?” Splinter glanced at him curiously, “We’ve never been in Brisbane before.”
“Not H.M.A. Destroyer Termagant,” Meredith agreed lightly, “but the restriction doesn’t apply to me.”
“You mean,” Splinter said pointedly, “that you’ve been here before.”
“We’re bright this bright morning,” Meredith grinned, “yes, you skinny fathom of misery, I’ve been here before—lived here, born here.”
“This is your home port?” Splinter was incredulous.
“It certainly is—fulla.”
“But you never told me ...”
“I haven’t told you I have a birthmark under my starb’d armpit, either.”
Splinter thought about that, while the vessel guarding the boom came steadily towards them.
“That’s right, you ain’t,” he decided at last. “What you mean,” he went on solemnly, “is that I don’t know every think about you.”
Meredith smiled, his eyes on the scattered timber houses now beginning to edge the banks.
“It also means,” the long fellow continued, “that you can show a fulla a handy time ashore in this dump.”
“Now,” Meredith slapped his shoulder, “we come to the crux of my disclosure! In the words of our late and unlamented comrades in Manus, I sure can show you a time! Without, thank God, jungle-juice.”
“And hand-grenades ...”
“Ah ... yes.”
That wiped the happy grin, Splinter thought, without malice. Hand-grenade ... Cahill. I’ve learnt more about you in those couple of days at Manus than since you first came aboard. Maybe there’s more surprises in store in this dump—pleasant ones ...
“What’s the drill?” he asked, and sounded almost eager, “we step off first boat—what then?”
“We fix the dust in a little hostelry.”
“Nice, nice ...”
“And then we go home for dinner.”
No complimentary words of approval. Meredith looked at him.
“Ah, Dickie boy,” Splinter answered the look, “don’t go gettin’ orf your high-horse, but I reckon I’ll meet you again after you see your family.”
“Like hell you will! You’re coming home to dinner—I’ve already told them about you.”
He stared at his friend in defensive defiance.
“You skinny old clot,” Meredith said affectionately, “what do you think my family are? Ogres? I’m afraid I’m a fair representative of the lot of ’em. And you eat with me, don’t you?”
“That’s different.”
“And how! There’ll be a white table-cloth—cloth, I said!—more than one fork, no cracked cups, and the food won’t have been cooked two hours beforehand. You’ll certainly find it different.”
“And how …” Splinter repeated in a low and resigned voice.
The bosun’s mate piped:
“Hands fall-in for entering harbour.”
The iron-deckmen fell-in in their appointed position near the torpedo-tubes—no shorts and sandals now, but clean khaki tropical rig, with long stockings and shoes and blancoed caps. Scores of warships sailed into the Brisbane River every month, and Termagant was hardly noticed, but Lieutenant Wouk was not concerned about that. This was his ship, and his men in their dress and bearing would give nothing away to predecessors.
“How long since you’ve been here?” Meredith asked Splinter beside him.
“Well before the war.”
“The old town’s changed a bit, then?”
“Uh huh.” Splinter, not especially interested in the changed city skyline, squinted against the sun through the steely tracery of the Storey Bridge.
“See that new building almost dead ahead?” Meredith asked.
“I see a million of ’em.”
“The big one—looks like grey granite.”
“I see it.” His tone added, “So what?”
“What do you think of it?”
“It’s a building.”
Meredith grinned.
“I must tell the old boy that.”
“The skipper? What in hell are you gabbin’ about?”
“No, my Dad. It’s his pride and joy.”
“Strike me—he’s a builder?”
“Not quite. Architect.”
“For that ...? Strike me,” Splinter invited again, wonderingly.
He stared now at the lofty pile with interest. He had no idea of an architect’s percentage, whether it was half or two per cent: but any share of the cost of that rearing structure would be a bit more than beer money, he judged glumly. And tonight he was going to dine with dough like that ...!
“Ah well,” he sighed, half-audibly, “Peter the Greek’s always was a bit sloppy.” And the bosun’s mate piped:
“Stand-by wires and fenders.”
THE FOUR OF them—Pudden and Thunderguts temporarily in the party—had crossed in the ferry and walked into the dim coolness of the long arcade leading to the saloon bar of the Royal opposite the post-office.
Experienced sailors, they had long ago reached the correct conclusion that the girls of Australia could more than hold their own with what was offering in Malta, or Alexandria, or Athens, or Capetown; and Brisbane on this bright hot afternoon, with its feminine element attractive in light cotton frocks, had done nothing to alter their opinion.
So the subject as they disposed of the second round of tonsils lubricant was a common and favourite one.
“I reckon,” Pudden stated pontifically, “the best way is to bowl straight up and ask ’em. Straight out, no bullin’ around.”
“And get a dong on the snots,” Splinter gloomed.
“Yeah?” Pudden grinned, “but you get more do’s than you get dongs!”
Cleary belched.
“Pudden’s right,” he nodded, and included the barman in his head movement, shoving his glass forward, “you oughta see that boy in action. ’Course he’s built like a lower-deck boom—they just can’t resist him.”
“Or it ...” Splinter growled, and paid for the round.
“I get the name,” Pudden smiled modestly, “but not the game.”
“No?” Cleary snorted, “what about that mulatto dame in the Seychelles? She was all over you like a rash. I saw it, back of the football field. Somethin’ white in the moonlight, like a half-moon,” he chuckled, and went on with the intimate details.
“She was a menace,” Pudden decided ruminatively, “I cut the painter from that sheila, fast.”
“I don’t blame yer,” Splinter growled, “I saw her, too—she had a face like a drip-pan.”
“That’s where you blokes make your mistake,” Pudden advised them, “you don’t worry about the face. The more doggo they are the more eager they are. It’s a matter of supply and demand, sorta. See?”
Leaning against the mahogany bar, Meredith listened, smiling, to the talk. You mightn’t know Shakespeare from salami, he thought, but you’re a damned fine bunch.
Briefly he wondered if he would find officers the same—if there would be the same firm camaraderie behind their higher-class social entertainment.
Lieutenant Wouk, he thought, seemed as if he might be able to give it a hefty sort of nudge at a party. A movement caught his eye. He looked up and saw the frame of Wouk looming in the passage.
Meredith’s reaction at sight of his officer was as automatic as it was here needless.
“U-boat!” he muttered, and in instant and also automatic response his companions straightened themselves and tilted their caps on straight.
Wouk saw this as he stepped into the saloon bar, the navigator close behind him. Laughter twisted in his stomach, but his face was composed in its normal mask of calm strength as he came up to them.
“Afternoon,” he nodded in recognition of their respectful attitude. He stood before the bar, his thumbs beneath the edge and his fingers spread out on its surface, tapping gently.
“Scotch, please,” he ordered to the barman, and then, “All right, just whisky.”
The barman eased the practised and apologetic smile from his face and turned to his duty. Wouk turned to the silent group nearby.
“Enjoying your leave?”
“Yes, sir,” they chorused dutifully, and Wouk’s stomach enjoyed its sub-surface grin again as he thought that they’d enjoy it a damn sight more if he cleared out to a lounge bar somewhere.
His eyes ran over them casually—Mann, McCabe, Cleary and Meredith he noted. Four go-ashore friends. The information he gained was perhaps trivial, but he was used to storing little things like that away in his memory: some time, maybe, the knowledge would come in handy if he had to judge an adrift-from-leave case. It helped also sometimes in assessing a man’s fitness for a recommend for higher rate—these four were all solid workers, dependable seamen, and it was natural that they flocked together. He’d like to know, he thought idly, who Able-Seaman Cahill was ashore with ...
He took up his whisky glass and passed the other to the navigator. He drank, watching his reflection in the long mirror, then lowered his drink and said pleasantly:
“Mess-deck door, Meredith?”
“Not quite, sir,” Meredith answered at once, and easily, “bathroom door. The thing swung with the rolling of the ship.”
“That’s interesting,” Wouk smiled, and his eyes locked for a moment with the seaman’s, “considering bathroom doors slide …”
“Figuratively speaking, sir …” Meredith murmured.
“Quite. Anyhow …” taking up his glass, “I hope your bruises don’t affect your chances ashore tonight.”
“I’m not worried, sir. Being a native here I’ll be home.”
“I see. Then perhaps you can tell me where the Union Club is?”
“Yes, sir—half-way along Gresham Street, left-hand side going towards the river.”
“M’m. We’re due there for a cocktail do tonight. Hosted, by the way, by a namesake of yours. No relation, I imagine?”
“Meredith is a common name, sir.”
“I suppose it is. Well, pilot, sink that and we’ll sample the next pub.”
He grinned openly this time, conscious of their stiff attitudes before this casual, but still official, conversation. Meredith said, suddenly:
“Would you care for a drink with us, sir?”
Wouk was a destroyer man. He knew the character of these men, and he did not hesitate.
“Thank you, yes. But just one—we have a deal to do.”
Meredith ordered the round, and his friends hurriedly downed their beer, thus hiding their surprise at his easy invitation to a senior officer. The sub-lieutenant, perhaps, or the gunner, they could understand—but Wouk himself ...
“And what,” Wouk asked, smiling, “do sailors do on a night like this?”
“They don’t shut till ten up here, sir,” McCabe grinned.
Wouk glanced at Splinter’s permanently sour face. Splinter interpreted the look as an order.
“I’m feedin’ out home with Meredith, sir.”
“I doubt that will keep you out of trouble. Well ... skoll.”
They drank—as though, Meredith smiled to himself, they were drilling by numbers.
All this time the navigating-officer had not spoken; apart from a general nod when he had come to the bar he had remained as aloof as an officer should in the presence of junior ratings.
Wouk placed his glass on the bar and made a negative gesture to the man behind it.
“That was nice,” he said to Meredith, “right, pilot?”
They turned to face him as he walked past; respectful, stiff, hiding their relief that he was leaving. And then the navigator, abreast them, turned his face. A brief and knowing grin flashed at them.
“Keep it clean,” he muttered, the traditional adjuration.
Then the two uniformed figures were receding down the gloom of the passage.
On the seamen those three words had a quite remarkable effect. In one instant their knowingness and understanding wiped out the officer’s aloofness.
“I’ll be buggered!” Pudden said wonderingly. “That boy’s really clued-up. And I thought he was a bit of a poonce.”
They laughed, paradoxically pleased now that they had had the brief distinction of drinking with both officers. All except Splinter ...
“Well, Mudguts,” Pudden asked, looking at him, “what are you all brassed-off about?”
Splinter slowly pushed his empty glass across the bar. He caught the barman’s eye, and deliberately withdrew his hand. Then he turned and looked at Meredith.
“Don’t you ever,” he warned, “do that again.”
“Why?” Meredith smiled, and the others chiacked him, “are you afraid of being tabbed a crawler?”
“No, I ain’t frightened of bein’ thought a crawler,” Splinter said slowly, “but they belong down aft and we belong up forrard, and it oughta be kept that way.”
“But why? Surely you don’t imagine discipline’s suffered?”
“Discipline!” Splinter snorted. “Who gives a brass razoo about discipline? What I mean is this—you can’t trust ’em.”
“What—Wouk and the pilot?”
“Any of ’em. Once a pig, allus a pig. You can’t trust ’em,” he repeated lugubriously.
“Oh, what rot!”
“Rot is it?” Splinter licked furiously the paper of the cigarette he was rolling, his head moving in sharp sideways jerks. “Lissen to me! Say we roll back bolo on board tonight, or adrift over leave tomorrer. We see The Bloke. D’yer think he’s gonna be nice an’ chummy becos we had a spot with him here? Wake up, fulla! Becos he did sink one with us he’s gonna think we expect special treatment. And we’ll get it, all right! The mongrel’ll slam down on us like a ton of bricks, that’s what he’ll do. Just to show he’s still the Jimmy, grog or no grog. You mark my words,” he ended darkly.
“The original rainbow,” Meredith grinned.
Born and raised in Sydney’s Newtown, Splinter got out of the cab with Meredith and stared at the one storey house. It was long and low, ranch-style, lightened by windows which were many and large, and he could see past one end of it that a heavy stretch reached right down to the river bank. Also at the end of that lawn he could see a white-painted pier, with moored alongside it a big cabin-cruiser—obviously the property of the house.
Set well back from the tree-edged street, the house was separated from it by a profusion of tropical shrubs—poinsettia, banana, tetras, hibiscus, their foliage lushly green, a pretty match for the white-painted house. At either end of the long front lawn reached up, vivid green umbrellas, two giant poinciana trees. They were in red flower, and he had never seen anything quite so lovely.
“Jeez,” he breathed.
“Like it?”
Bewildered, he looked at his friend. Then he started walking towards the gate with an air of let’s-get-it-over-with about his subdued face.
They were barely inside the gate, headed up the path of staggered sandstone blocks, when the front door opened. A woman emerged and she called:
“It’s you at last—we heard the car.”
It must be admitted that Splinter heard the words, but his attention at that moment was otherwise engaged—he was thinking as he looked at Meredith’s mother, with completely decent fervour, that she must have been a real humdinger of a beauty twenty years ago.
“Now I know where you get yer pretty-boy looks,” he thought inconsequentially, and turned decorously away to stare at the poincianas while mother and son completed their natural greetings.
“This, Mother,” Meredith’s voice brought his head and attention back, “is my mess-mate Able-Seaman Mann—he answers to nothing but Splinter.”
“What a quaint name,” Mrs. Meredith smiled, and held out her hand. It was brown and cool, and Splinter took it clumsily.
“G’day, Mrs. Meredith. How are yer?”
“Wonderful, Splinter—now.” The quaint name sounded naturally on her lips. Her hand rubbed gently up Meredith’s forearm. “Come on in now—Dad got home early.”
There was no reproach in her tone, but Meredith answered the words.
“I’ll bet he did. I would have been home two hours ago only this booze-artist kept me in the pub.”
Splinter gaped—in a flash of memory he saw his own mother, tired and bedraggled after a hot day, berating him for arriving home late for tea, accusing him of taking after his father ... Now he looked apprehensively at this mother.
“Obviously,” she smiled, holding back the fly-proof door, “Splinter is perfectly sober. Just as obviously your breath ... phew!”
“Ah well, old girl,” Meredith hugged her, “it’s been a long time without it.”
They walked into a huge living-room, and Splinter, in his involuntary contrasting of this woman with his own mother felt an odd and paradoxical yearning and sympathy for the work-wearied occupant of that narrow terrace house in Newtown.
But he had no time to digest this strange and novel feeling. A man was pushing himself up from a divan. He came towards them smiling, a paper dangling from one hand. He held out the other to Meredith.
“Hullo, Richard.”
His voice was easy, but Splinter recognised the underlying pleasure in it.
“How are you, Dad? Oh—this is my friend, Splinter Mann.”
“Nice to have you with us—may I call you Splinter too?”
“He wouldn’t answer you if you didn’t,” Meredith grinned, “but his real name is Aloysius.”
“Like hell, it is!” Splinter ejaculated, and instantly coloured. “Me name,” he went on in a subdued voice, “is Bob.”
“Righto Splinter,” Mr. Meredith said cheerfully, “come over here and take the weight off. It’ll be some time before dinner—this house has been in a flap all day. One guess why.”
“It’s not every day a war hero comes rolling home,” Meredith laughed, and threw his cap on to the piano.
“Rolling’s right,” his father observed shrewdly, “I see you’ve learned more than rope-splicing in your new profession.”
“Anthony,” said Mrs. Meredith warningly, and “That’s right, Mother,” her son grinned, “I’m a big boy now.”
“I see,” his father grunted, “then I suppose I’ll have to lose some of this Scotch.”
He shifted his own glass on the occasional table and took up a cut-glass decanter. Over his shoulder he asked:
“Scotch, Splinter?”
“Ah ...” said Splinter.
“Thank heavens for that,” Mr. Meredith answered, not too quickly, “I’d much prefer a cold beer myself. Will you join me?”
“I’d like a beer, yes sir,” Splinter said thankfully—he was as used to whisky as he was to caviar.
“Make it three, Dad,” Meredith suggested. He looked at his mother. “Where’s the kid?”
“Down at the boat, dear. But she’ll be up shortly.”
“I bet. Dinner’s due. Is she still a gannet for the scran?”
“I beg your pardon?”
“Ah ...” He laughed. “Does she still love her food?”
“Richard,” his mother said, “you have been away almost a year. Your sister has changed a little. Grown up.”
“Someone else has changed,” observed Mr. Meredith, reappearing with a frosted bottle, “I heard a mention of ‘gannet’ and ‘scran.’ Is that sort of thing really necessary?”
Meredith laughed. He was about to say something, then decided against it. Splinter, in his own way no mental slouch, said it for him.
“When in Rome ...” he lifted his lip, and took the glass from his host.
Both son and father shot him a quick and surprised glance. Then Meredith took his glass, and somewhere in the back of the house a door slammed.
Meredith lifted his glass and lied traditionally, “First today.” Splinter put his to his ready mouth, and over its edge saw a girl appear in the doorway.
No wordy tribute to eyes or hair or mouth or legs could hope to approach that paid by Splinter. He had a glow up, he was thirsty, the evening was hot, he had a full glass of ice-cold beer at his lips, and he lowered the glass without sampling.
She came into the room, she was smiling delightedly, she made straight for her brother, he kissed her casually on one soft brown cheek, and Splinter was thinking:
“Now I know how his Mum must’ve looked ...”
“You’ve put on weight,” she decided, leaning back to look at him. Meredith nodded, grinning, and drank some more, and Splinter could not at first understand how he could look back into her face with such calm casualness—until the realisation slipped into his own admiring mind that perhaps brother eyes saw differently to those of a forcedly celibate sailor like himself.
“This is my friend Splinter Mann. Sister Beth, Happy.”
She turned to him, and the full effulgence of her smile and dancing eyes was laid disturbingly upon him.
“How are yer?” he gulped.
“Hello Splinter.” Her voice was friendly and easy. “I’m so glad you could come tonight—Richard’s often spoken of you in his letters.”
“Relax,” Meredith laughed at his look, “there’s a moral censor as well as the security boy. You’re safe.” Now Splinter remembered his beer. Mr. Meredith said:
“You people may have all night ... I’ve work to do in the City. Let’s start dinner.”
The two women moved into the dining-room and Meredith, beside his father, said in a low voice:
“I like your idea of ‘work’. Grogging up with a bunch of dehydrated naval officers.”
“How the devil did you know?”
“The Admiral and I ... you know?” He crossed his fingers.
“That’s very interesting. I want a talk with you before I leave, young fellow.”
“About the Admiral?”
“About officers in general ... You know what I mean?”
“I know what you mean. I suppose it had to come sooner or later.”
Mr. Meredith nodded, a little grimly. He pulled out his chair and he was thinking that the Service has done something for the young beggar, at any rate—he would never have answered him so easily and self-assuredly a year ago ...
SPLINTER, MEREDITH HAD to admit an hour later, could put a nice spin on a yam.
Partly because he was in the mood himself, partly to render his messmate insensible to worry about the etiquette requirements of this upper-class table, he had fed Splinter continuously with beer throughout the meal. Splinter had first relaxed—though there was no evidence of this in his permanently morose facade—when Beth had asked:
“You and Richard, Splinter ...? What do you do in the ship? Do you fight together?”
“Fight?” Splinter answered unguardedly, his brain fumy, “he couldn’t fight his way out of a light fog.”
The girl’s laughter came out high and clear and catching. Splinter lifted his lip. Any second now, Meredith wondered, that’s going to grow into a smile. But it would take more than a lovely girl’s laugh to make Splinter Mann break faith with his nature.
“Yeah,” he went on, long-faced, “we fight together. Ah ...” he glanced sideways at his friend, “Richard an’ me are on B-gun.”
The girl leaned forward, her face alight.
“I will bet,” she pronounced, “you have never before called him ‘Richard’ in your life!”
Unblinded now by her radiance, safe behind the fume-screen of many beers, Splinter answered at once: “‘Richard’? I don’t think I ever heard the name. We call him ‘Baron’!”
Meredith knew that Splinter was enjoying their approbation because he lifted his glass several times, quickly, up to his downcast face. He knew also that his father was pleased with the lower deck’s perspicacity in pinning that name on his son. For a brief moment he wondered at his own enlarged sense of perspicacity—he had never thought about his father objectively before—and then he leaned back to listen. Splinter was off.
“We two is go-ashore oppos, yer know. That means ...” a shy glance at the girl, “we go ashore together. Well, we did just that in Alex. Alex,” he explained, “is Alexandria—that’s in Egypt. Where Cleo hung out. Though I didn’t see no Cleos, that’s for sure! The squaries there don’t wash—they just pour the scent all over theirselves every Friday night. Talk about pong ...! Anyway,” he went on a little hurriedly, and forgetting to intersperse explanations, “we got mixed up in a few things and before we know it we are absent over leave. Leave’s up at midnight and we’re still ashore at one. The Baron here first cottoned on to it we was adrift, and we beat it down to the wharf like a coupla bunker cats outa hell.
“There was a felucca waitin’, and in we hopped. I was laughin’ like a chief stoker—I don’t think! I couldn’t remember who was officer of the day. If it was the Jimmy ...! You don’t cross old Wouk’s bows and get away with it. A man was likely to dip a badge. This is war-time, see? Old Wouk’s a holy terrer—he invented discipline. Every hair a rope-yarn, every finger a marlin-spike, every drop of blood Stockholm tar. Youse get what I mean?”
They got what he meant. Meredith glanced at his mother and saw her face fascinated. Quietly he topped up Splinter’s glass. Splinter negatived his effort with a quick gulp and went on:
“It’s no good tryin’ to act green with old Wouk—that’s boy’s tough enough to make hard-boiled look like underdone. Ain’t he, Baron? Anyway, we come alongside in this felucca and we have to pay the thievin’ swine coxin’ it five piastres more’n we should have becos we can’t afford no noise, you understand? Up we go up the ladder and who should be officer of the day but the old Gunner.
“Now the Gunner’s a nice fulla. Taut hand, too—he’s got D.S.O.’s stockin’ out of his ears. I begins to see a bit of a faint glimmer of hope. The Gunner stands there lookin’ us over and we look back at him, tryin’ not to fall flat on our puss. Things was a bit touchy for them few seconds. I sorta got the idea that he didn’t want to dob us in, that he was lookin’ for some way out of it—there was no one else on the quarterdeck at that time, all hands was in the old banana-bedstead.
“The Gunner starts to frown and I think ‘Oh well, it was a good run, even if we do cop the whole flamin’ book.’ Then the Baron here takes one pace forward. I’m ready to pick ’im up if he keels over, but he straightens up and says: ‘Sir, I know we is adrift over leave but we has an excuse, sir.’ The Gunner says: ‘I’d be very interested to hear it,’ somethin’ like that, an’ I don’t like his tone, if you know what I mean?
“The Baron says, in that voice that makes you think it’s the flamin’ Ole Man hisself talkin’, he says: ‘Sir, Splinter here ...’ He don’t call me ‘Splinter,’ of course ... he says: “Sir, Able-Seaman Mann here, sir, was pullin’ back in that felucca. His rowin’ was awful, sir. He caught a crab with his starb’d oar, sir, an’ so I made him pull round the Fleet for punishment, sir.’
“Well, y’know of course that that’s an ole naval sayin’, as it were. You catch a crab an’ you pull round the Fleet for punishment. Mind you, I don’t think the Gunner believed him ... But you could see he was tryin’ not to grin, and when a Gunner even tries not to grin you know he’s bustin’ inside with laughter. What I’m tryin’ to say is that Gunners is a pretty sour breed, never seen one of ’em laugh in me life. Can’t understand it. Even a chief stoker sometimes smiles ... Though I’d like to see a grin on the face of old Wouk—it’d crack him athwartships. Anyhow, this bird starts to grin ... Well,” and Splinter felt for his glass, “that was that.”
He drank copiously, and watched solemnly while Meredith replaced the subtraction.
“But what happened?” Mrs. Meredith asked, after a pause, “did Richard ... were you punished?”
Splinter looked at her meditatively. He put his glass down.
“I thought I mentioned it—once a Gunner starts to grin ...”
“When a Gunner starts to grin,” Beth put in quickly, “God’s in His heaven and all’s right with the world.”
“Somethin’ like that,” Splinter said doubtfully, “what I really mean is,” he ended definitely, “we got away with it.”
“I see,” Mrs. Meredith murmured. It seemed she was not sure if she should be pleased at this evidence of her son’s cleverness, and the circumstances in which it had been displayed.
“Great Scott!” Mr. Meredith ejaculated, looking at his watch, “I should be in town by now.” He got up from his chair. “Ah ... Richard, a word with you?” Meredith followed his father from the room.
“Now, Richard,” Mr. Meredith started, taking up his hat from the hall-stand. “I haven’t much time, you know.”
“Yes, Dad. Then why not shove off? Your naval guests, you know ...”
“That’s what I want to talk about. The club, I mean. You should be there with them.”
“Yes, Dad.”
“Damn it all, boy, stop grinning! I mean it. Here I am off for a night of entertaining visiting naval officers in the club and I can’t entertain my own son there—”
“Why don’t you?”
“You know perfectly well the secretary, old Burns, is a retired captain. You know he wouldn’t like it.”
“Too bad.”
“Richard ...!”
Meredith saw the hurt in the older man’s face. He said:
“I’m sorry, Dad, but if that’s the way it is, I can’t do anything about it. I’m an able-seaman, and that’s that.”
His father looked shrewdly into his face—it was sober enough now.
“You’re having trouble with your commission?” he asked quietly.
“Not trouble ... no. It just takes time to come through, that’s all.”
“To come through who? Who says yes or no?”
“Well—old Wouk, who Splinter was talking about. He’s a rather hard bird to get past.”
“Wouk? Unusual name. Who is he?”
“He’s an unusual man. You’ll be meeting him tonight.”
“At the club?”
“Don’t you know your own guests?”
“Of course not. Not yet. I sent out a general invitation. Someone from the club does it whenever a warship comes in. Naturally I wanted to entertain your officers.”
“Naturally, Dad.” Meredith’s voice was faintly bitter. “You couldn’t have entertained the men, my messmates, home here?”
“That,” his father answered calmly, “is a damned foolish thing to say. You know perfectly well you can have a party for your friends from here whenever you want to. And I shall be surprised if you don’t.”
“Sorry,” Meredith said contritely, “I guess ...” and he looked squarely into his father’s face, “I’m a bit browned-off about my recommend not coming through.” His father put his hat on, running his fingers round the brim.
“We might be able to do something about that tonight,” he said.
Meredith’s hand landed firmly on his forearm.
“You won’t say a word to Wouk! Not a word ...!” Mr. Meredith looked down at his arm, then with more thoughtfulness than surprise up into his son’s tight face.
“Is there a reason why I shouldn’t, Richard?” Meredith controlled his exasperation.
“There’s nothing like that, no. No trouble. But we’re dealing with the Navy. You ... you just can’t deal with a first-lieutenant like you would a builder. Favour for favour doesn’t apply in my outfit.”
“I see,” his father said slowly, “yes. I see that. But what I don’t see is why you haven’t been given a commission.” He held up his hand in a small gesture of denial to the words forming on his son’s lips. “I don’t know much about your Navy, but I’ve seen some of your junior officers, I’ve talked with them, and I don’t have to be an Admiral to realise that you’re fitted for a commission.”
He heard his father’s vehement voice and his mind flashed back to an afternoon in Manus, painting the ship’s side with Splinter—the lanky seaman’s homely philosophy and reasoning was still clear in his memory. They don’t trust you, Splinter had told him, you’re right out of their experience ...
It would be too difficult to explain that to his father, to a civilian—even if Splinter were right. He said:
“Maybe it’s a matter of experience.”
“But how the devil are you to gain experience as an officer if you aren’t one? The Navy can’t be that much different to any normal business undertaking! Ashore a promising young man’s future is decided upon—then he’s promoted, given responsibility, taken along the paths of experience. Surely that’s sensible enough?”
“Yes, Dad,” Meredith said resignedly. He wanted to finish this. Already he suspected that the one thing holding his recommend back was Wouk’s opinion of his power of command, or lack of it. But how to explain a complex faculty like power of command to his civilian father?
He decided against trying, and in that he made a serious mistake. Power of command is by no means limited to the fighting Services, and Meredith senior possessed more than a fair share of the commodity, and knew its value.
“Let’s drop it, Dad. It will come through sooner or later. And you’ll be late to hell.”
“All right, lad.” A hand patted his arm, fatherly, understanding.
Meredith watched the car move off, listening to the diminishing sound in the quietness of the warm scented night. His burned, finely-cut face was thoughtful.
His mind went back over the old reasonings and wonderings, stimulated by retrospection by his father’s questions. Why? What was it holding him back? He thought he might have the answer—insufficient power of command. Not that he doubted his power to lead, but that Wouk doubted he had it.
And now as he stood there on the porch, the leaves of the poinciana reflecting the street light, shimmering and twisting in the breeze, he felt a sense of embarrassment, shame almost, that his captain and first-lieutenant considered him unfit for a commission.
Beth’s laughter, abrupt and spontaneous, cut out into the night and shovelled his sombre thoughts into the background. His earlier alcoholic happiness, repressed in the past few minutes, swam forward again to colour his attitude. He was smiling when he walked back into the dining-room.
The smile contracted a little when his mother greeted him with:
“There you are, Richard. Now we can get on with the washing-up. I’ve always wanted to see how the Navy goes about it.”
“Washing-up? Where’s Gladys? Not her night-off tonight, surely?”
“Gladys, my wandering hero, is now in the Waafs,” Beth told him, “and in any case it’s considered almost unpatriotic to own a servant these days. So you’re it.”
“What’s wrong with your lily-white hands?”
“That’s just it,” she smiled sweetly.
“That’s just what?”
“They’re lily-white—and they’re going to stay that way.”
“Your sister,” Mrs. Meredith interrupted this scintillating conversation, “has an important job tomorrow morning.”
Meredith looked at them.
“Someone around here is nuts. There is, I suppose, some relationship between washing-up tonight in New Farm and a job in the city tomorrow, but I’m damned if I can see it.”
“Haven’t you been reading the papers?” Beth asked pointedly.
“Oh yes—we get the Courier-Mail just before breakfast every morning. Delivered by rocket.”
Beth had risen from the table.
“Look,” she said, and held out a paper. It was folded at the fourth page.
Meredith looked. Splinter ambled round behind him. He made the first comment.
“Jeez!” he said in a wondering sort of voice.
“This ... this is you!” Meredith accused, and looked up at his sister, then back to the half-page advertisement.
“That’s right. How do you like it?”
Meredith stared at the page. It showed his sister leaning back against the mast of a yacht. But his interest was not in the seamanlike rigging revealed to his gaze. It was in the shapely symmetry of his sister’s form revealed by the scantiest of bathing suits.
“My God,” he said, “so you did go on with it.”
“Of course. You scoffed when I wrote that I was taking on modelling. Now—if I may say so in all modesty—I’m one of the most successful in town.”
“Modesty ...! Mother,” turning on her, “you allow this sort of thing?”
“I don’t see why not, Richard. I admit I was a little—startled at first, but as Beth pointed out, you can see hundreds of girls like that any day on the beach.”
“Not like that,” Splinter murmured.
“So you see I can’t wash-up tonight. Tomorrow my hands will be holding a cake of Smoothie soap. And you wouldn’t want me to look all chapped, would you?”
Meredith stared at her.
Beth pouted, her eyes dancing. “Come now, Splinter, don’t you think it’s a good ad?”
“Ah ... it’s a beaut bathin’ suit ...”
“There you are! Splinter’s not blind to quality goods.”
“You can,” Meredith grunted, “say that again! Here give me that—your eyes’ll bore through the paper.”
He snatched the paper from his friend. Splinter’s eye-tooth showed briefly. Meredith shook the crumpled paper in his face.
“If you breathe a word about this on board,” he threatened, “you’ve had the prong. Understand?”
“Do you think I’m good enough for a sailor’s pin-up girl?” Beth asked mischievously.
Meredith stared at her, his forehead corrugated.
“Give him time,” his mother said consolingly, “he’ll get used to it. I had to, remember?”
“Let’s get washed-up,” Meredith growled.