“Now that’s what I call class, lady,” he said with a grin. “The girl comes out of the shower covered up. Any other woman as beautiful as you are would be sitting here drinking coffee in the raw.”
“My mother brought me up to be a lady,” she said with a wicked grin. “And one of the things she taught me was to never take my clothes off in front of a sailor. All sailors are sex maniacs, thank God for that!” He drained his coffee cup and stood up and she let out a small shriek.
“My God, man, you were sitting there starkers! Talk about class! You have no class at all, you darlin’ man! Get your fanny into that shower while I get dressed and then we’ll go down and have some breakfast.”
“Well, it’s over,” she said as she mopped up the last of the syrup on her plate with a forkful of wheat cake. “Today is a free day and tomorrow we go back to Washington. You are scheduled to see the President and the Secretary of the Navy the day after, at ten in the morning.” She looked up as the hotel manager walked up to their table.
“You’ll pardon me, Captain, Lieutenant,” the man said. “This telegram, priority delivery, came for you sir.”
“Thank you,” Hinman said. “Won’t you have a cup of coffee with us? I want to tell you what a fine hotel you have here.”
“Well, that’s very nice of you,” the hotel manager said. “If you’ll excuse me while I take care of one small matter. Be right back.”
Hinman ripped open the telegram envelope and read the page swiftly. Then he read it again, slowly. He looked at Joan, his face beaming.
“It’s from Bob Rudd, Commander Rudd in Pearl Harbor. No, by God, he signs himself Captain Rudd! Must have got his fourth stripe! He says orders have been cut for me and I’ll pick them up in Washington. I’m to return to Pearl as soon as possible! That means I’m going to get a ship, Joan! I’ll have another submarine!”
“But you won’t have the thirty days’ leave they promised you,” she said. “Is that what that means?”
“I’m afraid so.”
“Well,” she said with a small shrug. “That’s the way of a sailor with a girl. It’s off to sea again while the shy maiden sits at home and wonders about all the other women the sailor is romancing in all the other ports.”
“Maybe you wouldn’t wonder about things like that if you were Mrs. Arthur Hinman,” he said. She looked at him, her eyes widening.
“Oh, damn it! I bungled it!” he blurted. “I wanted to do it the right way, get down on one knee and ask for your hand in marriage and now I’ve ruined it!” He hung his head.
She sat without moving, her eyes closed.
“You left something out,” she said in a half whisper. “You left out something you’ve been saying the last few nights in such a low voice that a girl strains her eardrums to hear you. Now say it out loud!”
“I love you,” he said. “Yes! I love you!”
“That’s better! I’ll marry you! But when? We’d have to get a license, maybe, blood tests. Those things take time.”
“I’ve learned a few things from you,” he said. He stood up as the hotel manager approached.
“Sit down, sir,” Hinman said. “I apologize, I don’t know your name, sir.”
“No reason you should, Captain. A good hotel manager is never heard and seldom seen. I’m Steve Lewis and we’re honored to have you with us.”
“Well, Mr. Lewis, it’s been wonderful for us. You run a very efficient hotel. Your people have made us very comfortable.” He poured coffee from the carafe.
“I hate to impose on you for anything more but we need some information. I just hate to ask you for any more favors.”
Lewis looked at him and smiled. “I was in Los Angeles the other night, Captain. I was invited to that dinner and I accepted because I was tied up here and wouldn’t be able to hear you when you were speaking this week. I don’t think you can ask me for any favor that would be too large.”
“I’m ordered back to sea,” Hinman said, “and Joan, Lieutenant Richards here, and I want to get married. Time is so crucial, sir, I thought, hoped, that maybe you could give us a suggestion as to how we could get around the formalities of license, the waiting period I mean. Is there any way around that?”
The hotel manager smiled. “If I may suggest it, sir, the Mayor has the power to perform marriages and if you don’t object, our hotel lobby would be a rather nice setting for your marriage. I personally extend my invitation to you to accept the hotel’s offer to be your host at your wedding supper this evening.”
“I wouldn’t put you to that trouble,” Hinman said slowly. The manager rose.
“Trouble, Captain? No trouble at all. Please check with me after lunch. By then I will have everything arranged.” He was almost trotting when he left their table.
“You’ve learned a few things about public relations, haven’t you?” Joan said with a wide grin. “You wouldn’t know that an event like this will put this hotel on the front page of every newspaper in the country or at worst, on page three. You wouldn’t know that the Mayor of San Francisco loves good publicity. You wouldn’t know anything about things like that, would you!”
“Oh, I’ve learned a few things about public relations from you,” he said airily. “Learned a few things about pubic relations, as well.”
“Not half of what you’re going to learn,” she said. “Now let’s get out of here and go and do whatever soon-to-be-married couples do while they’re waiting for the knot to be tied.”
“Go to bed?” he asked innocently.
“Save it! I’m a hellion on a wedding night!”
The scheduled half-hour with President Roosevelt and the Secretary of the Navy, Frank Knox, a Chicago newspaper publisher, lengthened into an hour. Knox, a big, bluff, jovial man shook his thick forefinger at Joan.
“When I knew you in Chicago, young lady, you never gave any sign of having this much sense! When this war is over you bring this man of yours to me and we’ll find some work for him to do so he can support you in a style you’d like to get used to.”
“When this war is over she’ll probably go with him to some God-forsaken submarine base out in the Pacific,” the President said. “You keep your hands off my officers, Frank! I don’t want you seducing them with offers of good jobs!”
Later, at the Navy Department, a gray-haired Chief Yeoman, who wore the silver dolphins of the qualified submarine man on the breast of his jacket, took them into his small office and seated them in hard chairs in front of his desk. Hinman noted the six diagonal gold stripes on his left sleeve, “hash marks,” each standing for four years of honorable service. He made a guess that the Chief was on shore duty because of his age and length of service.
The Chief Yeoman was succinct. No, Lieutenant Richards now Lieutenant Hinman, could not be assigned to Pearl Harbor in any capacity. WAVES did not serve outside of the continental limit of the United States. Sorry about that, sir.
Yes, Lieutenant Commander Hinman’s promised thirty-day leave had been canceled. Captain Rudd’s orders were quite specific: Lieut. Comdr. Arthur Hinman would report to Pearl Harbor at once for reassignment. And then the Chief Yeoman had turned and looked out of his office window for a long moment.
“Sir,” he said, turning back to face Hinman and Joan, “as of today the aircraft assigned to you for the War Bond tour has been returned to regular duty.
“I can offer you a courier flight to the West Coast where you will have to wait seven days for a flight out to Pearl. I cannot offer that to Lieutenant Hinman, sir, there is no room on this flight, which leaves in one hour from now.
“Or, if you have to see other people here at the Navy Department and cannot make that flight all I can do is to offer you a courier flight to Chicago that leaves at fifteen hundred hours this afternoon. You will have to find something to do in Chicago for six days, sir; a courier flight will leave from Chicago six days from now for the West Coast, arriving in time to connect with the flight to Pearl.” He looked down at his desk. “There is room on that flight for Lieutenant Hinman, who will be assigned to duty from Mare Island Navy Yard, sir.” He looked away again, his hand resting lightly on Joan Richards’ service jacket, which was lying on his desk.