“If I decide to take the gold you’ll have a lot of other things to worry about if the Old Man makes you the Chief of the Boat,” Rhodes said. Ginty whirled around and stared.
“That’s the last fucking thing I want! I ain’t no Dusty Rhodes, mother hen to all the fucking chickens!
“I’m Arnold Samuel Ginch Ginty of the Asiatic Submarines! The Old Man gives me your job and I’ll go ashore and that red-head will hide me where no Shore Patrol will ever find me. She already told me that!”
“No profit in thinking like that,” Rhodes said. “But you’re putting the Old Man in a bind. He’s been thinking about putting DeLucia in charge of both rooms.” He let his voice trail off.
“The Old Man wants his torpedo rooms run right, he wants fish that run hot, straight and normal every damned time, tell him to put me in charge!” Ginty’s voice was belligerent. “I ain’t taking nothin’ away from Mike DeLucia. He’s a damned good torpedoman. One of the best. But he ain’t as good as I am just like I’m not as good as you are.
“DeLucia wants to be Chief of the Boat, for Chrissakes! He studied you all last run, you know what? When you cracked a whip on someone he’d go around day or so later and try to find out how the people felt who got nicked by the whip. Shit, he pure wants that nose-wipin’ job! He ain’t gonna be one, two, three after you but I’ll help him out all I can!”
“I’ll suggest that to the Old Man,” Rhodes said. Ginty caught his arm in an iron grip.
“Chief, Mr. Rhodes, dammit it’s hard to say that! You do more than suggest it! You tell him this is the way it has to be! He’ll listen to you, he always listens to you. You do this for me, you hear?”
Rhodes went into the Wardroom where Captain Hinman sat with Pete Simms.
“If you get Ginty and DeLucia in here for a talk, sir,” he said, “if you suggest to Ginty that you need the best man you can get to take charge of both Torpedo Rooms, put that first, sir, he’ll jump at the chance to do that rather than be Chief of the Boat. DeLucia will do a good job as Chief of the Boat and Ginty will help him all he can. But you’ll save face for Ginty and Mike if you work it so Ginty thinks he should be in charge of both rooms.” Hinman grinned and nodded his head.
“I’d appreciate it, Dusty,” he said, “if you’d talk with Barber about your own situation. I hate to crowd you but if you both decide to refuse the commissions I’m going to need all the time I can get to get you transferred back aboard.
“The trouble is, the Staff doesn’t like Pearl Harbor boats or captains. And they might cross me by letting you stay Chief and putting both of you in the relief crews. I don’t think either of you want that.”
“I’ll let you know in half an hour, Sir,” Rhodes said and went in search of Barber.
He found the balding man sitting on a bollard on the dock, morosely watching the men he had been in charge of rig the fuel oil lines to fill Mako’s fuel oil tanks with 125,000 gallons of fuel oil.
“They doing it right, John?”
“Of course,” Barber answered. “I taught them how to do it. Dusty, I don’t much like this idea of taking the gold. How do you feel about it?”
“I didn’t think about it too much at Quarters,” Rhodes said. “It was too much of a shock. Since then I’ve been thinking a lot about it. I don’t much like the idea. All I ever wanted out of this Navy was to be Chief and to do a good job and get my twenty in and then get a good job in the Yard, so I could put the boys through college and so I could be with June all the time. This doesn’t change things all that much, we’ll both revert back to Chief when the war’s over and this means we’d both be home every night in Pearl.”
“Means we’d be moving into Officers’ Country to live,” Barber said. “A lot of officers got no use for a Reserve, got no use for a Mustang who’s come up out of the ranks. Got to think of that, got to think about a lot of things. They don’t give you enough time for the thinking.”
“As long as we’re chewing things over.” Rhodes said. “If we say no we might be going back to sea with Pete Simms in Sirocco’s job. That doesn’t make me turn somersaults with joy.”
“The son of a bitch has got a screw loose, somewhere,” Barber growled. “Old Man came to me before the start of this patrol. You know that Mealey told the Old Man to get rid of Simms? Thought you did. Old Man says he wants to keep him aboard, this was in Pearl, because he said Pete Simms had good stuff in him and that he’d been kicked in the balls by his wife and needed another chance. Shit, the only kick in the balls he’s had is the one old Hindu gave him in that head back in the Maneuvering Room!”
“Maybe the Old Man was right,” Rhodes said slowly. “Simms did a pretty good job this patrol. He didn’t fuck up any.”
“How could he fuck up? The engines ran good. Hindu takes care of the electrical stuff like it was a baby. We didn’t have any hard things to get over. Outside of Grabby Grabnas gettin’ killed and Tommy takin’ that slug through the neck in that silly damned deck gun action we didn’t have a tough patrol.”
“But the whole idea of taking the gold doesn’t sit right, does it?” Rhodes said softly. “It doesn’t sit right because it doesn’t feel right. It isn’t something we wanted. I was up in the Forward Room, talking with Ginty a while ago and that feeling was nagging me when Ginty apologized for calling me Chief. And then I remembered this.” He took out his wallet and pulled out a slip of paper and unfolded it.
“Remember this? I showed it to you on patrol. The paper June gave me.” He squatted beside Barber and read the words on the paper aloud in a soft voice.
“Accept what is offered even though it is not wanted.”
“I remember that,” Barber said. “You think what she wrote down was meant for something like this?”
“All she told me was that it would mean something at the right time and I should follow it, that I’d know when the right time was,” Rhodes said slowly. “I keep getting a feeling that this is the time her old gods told her about. “
“Well, if you take the gold then I’ll take it,” Barber grunted. They both turned as they heard footsteps.
“How about getting your flat asses up to Ship’s Service on the tender and buying yourselves some collar bars and hats so I can take you to lunch at the Officers’ Club downtown?” Joe Sirocco said.
“That is, if you don’t mind eating in the presence of some people who are pretty stupid, as a rule. Not like the Chiefs’ Club, I’m told.”
“Heard that the food isn’t that good, either,” Barber said. “When we get back to Pearl you come out to my house for dinner. That Dottie of mine puts out a meal would make a professional cook in a fancy hotel go and slit his throat!”
“It’ll have to be eat and run,” Sirocco said. “I think I’ll only be in Pearl for a few days.”
“Sir,” Rhodes said, eyeing the big officer, “let me ask you something straight out. No offense in the asking. None taken if you’ tell me to mind my own business.”
“Go ahead,” Sirocco said, grinning.
“You’re not a regular officer,” Rhodes said slowly. “You might be a Reserve, you might not. But there’s something different about you. I’d like to know what it is.”
“What gave you that idea?” Sirocco said. He was still smiling.
“Ginty noticed it first, I think,” Rhodes said slowly. “The way Captain Mealey treated you. Captain Mealey doesn’t like any Reserves. He’s Old Navy. You know that.
“Putting you aboard as Exec when Pete Simms rated the job on the basis of his patrol runs, his time in rank. To quote Ginty: You’re too smart for a Reserve, too smart for a regular Navy officer. Too many people higher than you in rank treated you with too much respect. For my own part, I like the way you operate. You’re one hell of a man.”