“Recruit them from where, sir?” asked the Chief. A good question. Most of the crew was too old to begin officer training.”We have teens among the passengers. Several of them.
And what about Ricky?”
“Are you asking my opinion, sir?”
“Yes.”
“Then, no. We’ve gone too much against custom as it is.
It’s legal to recruit from the passengers, but highly irregular.
Admiralty might view it as, ah, presumptuous.” He was right. On the other hand, Admiralty wasn’t shorthanded, nine light-years from nowhere, trying to sail a starship.
“Well, just a thought. Mr. Wilsky, isn’t that screen clean enough?”
“Yes, sir. I mean, no, sir. I mean, aye aye, sir!” Sandy jumped back quickly, blushing deep red. Sandy was too nice a joey to enjoy teasing for long. But still...
“When you’re done with it, would you kindly polish mine?”
“Aye aye, sir.”He looked up cautiously, beginning to suspect he was being twitted. Slowly he relaxed.
“Permission to enter bridge, sir?”
I looked around. Vax waited at attention in the corridor.
“Granted.”
He marched in. “Midshipman Holser reporting for personal inspection, sir!” Well, if I was to do it at all, better do it right. I got up, made a show of inspecting his clean, freshly ironed uniform, his belt buckles, his shine. Naturally I passed him. Vax was ready, and even if not I wasn’t about to notice anything wrong.
“Satisfactory, Mr. Holser. Bring me your written report no later than tomorrow. Dismissed.” He saluted and left the bridge. Chief McAndrews said nothing, his face a mask. I understood; it wasn’t up to him to comment on how the Captain treated his middies. But I wondered about his thoughts.
I leaned back in my chair. I should have played chess with Darla. Instead, I dozed, which was worse. Lieutenant Cousins would have had me over the barrel.
I entered the safe combination, reading from the paper in my hand. A click, and the door released. I looked inside. A class ring: Academy, class of 2162. It must be Captain Haag’s. Apparently Captain Malstrom hadn’t bothered to clean out the cabin safe after Mr. Haag’s death. A leather folder. It held pictures of a younger Captain Haag, a pretty woman at his side. Hastily I put them away, ashamed at invading his privacy. The mere fact of his death didn’t allow me to do that. A chipcase, with three chips. I set them aside to read later.
I took out an object about the length of my hand. A tube of wood, bored hollow down the middle. It had a wooden cup on one end. The cup was charred. Puzzled, I peered at it from all angles. A primitive piece from Africa? New Zealand folk art? Tourist junk from Caltech Planet? I couldn’t imagine Captain Haag treasuring such an object. I put it aside. The only other item in the safe was an unlabeled canister. I opened it. It was filled with flakes of dull brown substance. Some kind of vegetable matter.
I lay the articles on my bunkside table and sat to contemplate them. I finally gave up and let my mind drift. I recalled an evening we middies spent with the Chief in a cheap Lunapolis bar, one of the rare occasions we socialized with our officers. We were speculating about how the colonies might develop, over time. I mentioned some ancient history I’d seen on a holodrama. It started the Chief on unusual primitive customs.
I sat bolt upright. Now I knew. The thing on the table was a device for burning the vegetable matter. Toccabo. How had the Chief put it? “Before the Reforms of 2024, boy, they were in common use. People filled them up and set them on fire.”
“Then what, Chief?” I asked, knowing I was being played for a fool. “Did they call fire control?”
“No, they sucked until the smoke came through the other end. It was a stimulant.”
We laughed. The liquor had obviously gotten to him. “And then they ate the smoke?” I jeered. I must have been drunk; after all, he was the Chief Engineer and could send me to the barrel.
“No, they breathed it.” He glared, offended by my mockery.
“Chief, you’re making it up,” Alexi said. “Nobody could actually do that.”
“Don’t be sure if you haven’t tried.” The Chief stared him down.
“Have you--I mean, is it legal? Could you still do it?”
“Oh, it’s legal. You can’t advertise the stuff, or sell it for profit. But I hear there are places to obtain it. Of course you couldn’t bring it on ship. It’s contraband, like other drugs.”
I demanded, “If it’s legal, how come I never heard of it?”
The Chief took my question seriously. “With the reforms of 2024, a lot of vices sort of disappeared. For example, women offering publicly to fornicate for money; you ever hear about that one? And cancer was a big problem back then, before the anticars. So they just stopped the smoking. It took a while, because people used it to relax. But after it was
outlawed in public places, it more or less died out. People could grow the plant, but nobody bothered anymore.”
“Hey, Chief, have you tried the stuff?” Sandy Wilsky.
The Chief looked at his watch. “Time to go. Early start tomorrow.” He flipped bills on the table.
Now, in my cabin, I sniffed the cup of the artifact. It smelled of charcoal, and another aroma. The toccabo, perhaps. I was scandalized. Captain Haag, sitting in his cabin secretly breathing contraband out of that fuming menace.
Breaking ship’s regs. How little we knew him. To us he was Lord God, walking the bridge.
Before taking command I’d never seen the inside of his cabin; none of us middies had. Few if any officers were invited into the Captain’s quarters. He must have been a lonely man, with only Chief McAndrews to keep him company. Scuttlebutt had it that on quiet evenings the Chief, an old friend of Mr. Haag, would join him in his cabin. Together they would sit and reminisce, or do whatever old friends did.
I undressed for the night. My pants half off, I stopped short, swearing aloud at my stupidity. The tube in the safe wasn’t for the Captain. Of course not. He’d kept the contraband for his old friend. The Chief faced court-martial if it were found aboard ship, so Captain Haag put it in the only secure place on Hibernia:his own safe. And in the evenings the Chief must have... I tried to imagine him with smoke pouring out his nose and mouth, like a dragon.
I slipped off the rest of my clothes and lay on my bunk.
Back in Lunapolis, the Chief had said, “People used it to relax.” Poor Chief McAndrews. Since the Captain’s death he’d been deprived not only of his friend’s companionship but his favorite relaxation as well. And all the while he didn’t know if the contraband would be discovered and his career endangered.
On the spur of the moment I picked up the caller, dialed the engine room. “Chief Engineer to the Captain’s cabin.” I didn’t wait for an answer. If he wasn’t there, they’d find him.
I threw on my clothes and made my bunk. I put the tube and the canister on the conference table.
The knock came shortly. “Chief McAndrews reporting, sir.”
“Come in, Chief. Sit down.” I wanted to show him it wasn’t a formal occasion.
He sat in the proffered chair next to my table. His eyes flickered to the objects that lay on it. His expression showed nothing.
“I was cleaning out the safe, Chief, and found some odd items. Captain Haag’s album, his ring. And these things, whatever they are.”
“Yes, sir.”
I had to be careful not to force him to admit the artifacts were his. “I’ve been trying to guess what they are, Chief. I think... do they have anything to do with that smoke stimulant you told me about? Toccabo?”
“Tobacco, sir. It looks like they might.”
“I’m fascinated. Why Captain Haag brought them aboard, I can’t imagine.” He made no reply. “To think the Captain used such a thing,” I went on. “I never would have guessed.
Do you think I should try it?”
“It’s forbidden, sir. Aboard ship.” He remained impassive.