“You open for business?” he asked.
Connerly looked up. He was a young boy with a wild spatter of freckles across his nose and cheeks. He had bright green eyes, and he widened them now and said, “Jesus, you again?”
“I don’t feel good,” he answered.
“You never do,” Connerly said. “You spend more time in the hospital than the medics do.”
“If you chancre mechanics did it right the first time,” he cracked, “I wouldn’t be coming back so often.”
“Yeah, yeah. What is it now?” Connerly stood and dumped the comic book onto one of the racks. “You get a dose or something?”
“Don’t get smart, Connerly. I think I’ve got a fever.”
“Well, we’ll find out,” Connerly said wearily. He took a thermometer from where it stood in a jar of alcohol. He wiped the bulb clean with a wad of absorbent cotton.
“You see the lists they posted?”
“What lists?” Connerly asked.
“Amidships. Leave and promotions. Both. Maybe you hit the jackpot, boy.”
“No joke? You’re not snowing me?”
“No joke,” he said. “Go take a look.”
“Sure. Here, boy, stick this in your mouth. Three minutes. I’ll be back before then. Leaves and promotions, huh? Man!”
Connerly handed him the thermometer and then left the compartment. He waited until Connerly was well out of sight and then he held the thermometer in the palm of his hand and watched the rising silver line of mercury. He took the book of matches from his shirt pocket then, struck one, and held it beneath the bulb of the thermometer. He let the mercury go up to 103 degrees, and then blew out the match. It would probably go down some before Connerly came back. Maybe he should have brought it up to 104. Hell, no. A man’s probably dead at 104.
He allowed the bulb to cool slightly, and then put the thermometer back into his mouth. He had it there for thirty seconds when Connerly burst into the compartment.
“Christ, mate!” he said in delight. “I hit second class! And I’m up for leave in two weeks. Brother, how’s that?”
He nodded at Connerly, and the pharmacist’s mate seemed to remember the thermometer abruptly. He crossed the deck, took the slender glass rod between his thumb and forefinger, and then looked at it carefully.
“Boy,” he said. “Boy.”
“What is it?”
“A hundred and two point eight,” Connerly said. “I guess you really are sick.”
“You think I’d snow you?”
“I guess not. We’ll get you over to the hospital. It’s probably cat fever or some damn thing.”
“The hospital again,” he complained. “Jesus, a man can’t—”
“Second class!” Connerly said, still not able to believe it. “And a leave in two weeks.” He paused and turned suddenly. “Hey, how’d you make out?”
“All right. Listen, if I’m going to the hospital, let’s get started. I feel like hell.”
“Sure. Sure. I’ll talk to the Chief. You can walk, can’t you? I mean, we don’t need a stretcher or an ambulance?”
“Go talk to the Chief,” he said.
That evening, on his way to the quarter-deck and his date with Jean Dvorak, Masters passed through the midships passageway. He saw the posted lists standing side by side on the bulletin board, and he went over for a closer look. His eyes scanned first one list and then the other.
Jones had made radarman second class. He nodded, remembering approving the promotion a long while ago. He looked for Daniels’ name on the promotion sheet. It was not there. The yeoman had not advanced.
On the leave schedule, Daniels was up for a leave in three weeks.
Jones’s name was not on the leave schedule at all.
Eight
There was a moon that night, and it put long yellow fingers of wavering light on the waters of Chesapeake Bay. They stood at the rail of the boat, looking out over the water, hearing the gentle lapping of the waves against the sides of the boat, hearing the sullen swish-swish of the old-fashioned paddle wheels in their circular housings.
“This is what I call a real busman’s holiday,” Masters said.
“It’s very nice, though,” Jean said. “It’s better than a stuffy old movie, isn’t it?”
“Immeasurably,” Masters agreed. “Moonlight becomes you.”
“From the song of the same name,” she said.
“Yes, isn’t it terrible the way popular songs have made clichés of sincere sentiments? Oh, well.”
They were silent for several moments, watching the moonlight, listening to the water.
“How’d you drift into the Navy, Jean?” he asked.
“I thought we weren’t going to discuss the Navy tonight,” she said.
“How’d you drift into the unmentionable?” he asked.
“You sound like Hemingway.”
“Why, thanks. But how?”
“I liked nursing. And the Navy needed nurses. So here I am.”
“In Norfolk.” Masters shook his head sadly. “They should have sent you to a better town.”
“Norfolk isn’t bad,” she said.
“No, but it isn’t good. That’s the big difference.” He paused. “Of course, I’m glad they sent you to Norfolk.”
“You are?”
“I wouldn’t have met you if they hadn’t sent you here.” He saw her embarrassment and added, “I’m sorry. I keep forgetting that compliments fluster you.”
“No, it isn’t that,” she said.
“What then?”
“Nothing.” She lifted her eyes suddenly. “How’d you get into the Navy, Chuck?”
“I thought all red-blooded American boys went into the Navy sooner or later.”
“No, seriously.”
“I think I had some idea that it was a worth-while career,” he said.
“And you don’t have that idea any more?”
“I’m not sure any more,” he said seriously. “Not after what happened with—”
“Ah-ah,” she cautioned. “No talking about that, remember?”
“Oh, sure,” he said. “Sorry.”
“Do you really feel an injustice was done?” she asked after a moment.
“I thought we weren’t going to talk about it.”
“Why does it bother you so much, Chuck?”
“I don’t know. I guess I’m schizophrenic. One half of me says, ‘Forget it.’ The other half says, ‘Two people were killed, and the murderer’s loose.’ Which half am I supposed to listen to?”
“Do you really believe Schaefer’s death was a murder?”
“Yes.”
“And you still think one of those two men did it? What were their names?”
“Daniels and Jones. Perry Daniels and Alfred Jones.”
“You think one of them is guilty?”
“Yes.”
“I mean, there’s no doubt in your mind? You really believe this?”
“Yes.”
“Then follow it through,” she said.
“It’s going to be a little tough to do that,” he said. “I’m leaving for New Jersey in the morning.”
“Oh?”
“Radar school,” he said.
“Oh,” she said again, disappointed.
“And the Old Man’s on my back to forget it, and the Exec, and oh, what the hell’s the use of shoveling manure against the tide? Why don’t I just let it rest? Except... except...”
“What, Chuck?”
“Did Claire ever mention anything about her secret date being a married man?”
“Married? No, not that I can remember. Why?”
“Well, Perry Daniels is married, according to his records. He told me he was single. Now, why the hell would he do that, unless he had something to conceal? I mean, it adds a new reason for keeping the whole thing secret — aside from the obvious officer-enlisted-man angle. You see, it might provide a possible motive. A married man has much more to lose than a single man. I mean, if his sweetheart suddenly decided to get balky. Do you see what I’m driving at?”