Voyage to Somewhere (12 page)

“You look like a Chinaman,” they'd say accusingly to each other, and the stock reply was, “
I
look like a Chinaman! Hell, you look like a Chinaman who's been taking atabrin!”

Some of the men, probably in the normal course of events, began to lose their hair. As baldness crept upon them they examined themselves in the mirrors of the crowded forecastle head, and cursed New Guinea.

“I'll look old when I get back,” they said. “Hell, my wife won't know me.”

Gradually a sort of mass hypochondria seemed to slip over the ship. Sick call became so popular that it finally became necessary to say that those too sick to work were too sick to go on liberty. This had little effect for there was no place to go on liberty anyway. Still the men lined up each morning when we were in port. They complained of backaches, headaches, insomnia, indigestion, diarrhea, and when they came back from the doctor's they took powders and pills for a few days, then put them away and pronounced themselves cured. The next time we were in a new port, however, they were at sick call again with variations of the same complaint. They were not goldbricking, and no one accused them of it. When they were pinned down they admitted that they weren't really sick—they just didn't feel good. The fact that we had no doctor nor even a pharmacist's mate aboard bothered them a good deal.

“What would happen if I got appendicitis at sea?” they asked.

When we were in port they sometimes asked to go ashore “just for a check-up.” They came back relieved for a little while and went back to their reading, their sleeping, and their work.

When we returned to Milne Bay there was more mail for us, and the men were cheered for a little while. This time, however, the mail brought more trouble than benefit. Mr. Warren got no letters at all from or concerning his wife, Rachel. The cook heard that his mother was sick.

“Hell,” said Mr. Rudd, “if they sent all the doctors home and quit sending us mail we might have time to fight a war.”

While we were in Milne Bay we cracked a cylinder head and the ship was rendered inoperative until we could get a new one. They had none ashore. We were told that they would have to send for one from Australia, or from the States.

All day long we lay at anchor. Mr. Crane had the deck force start chipping and painting the hull from bow to stern, but it was the rainy season, and most days there was nothing for the men to do but lie in their bunks. They joked about it a lot.

“When I get back to civilian life,” they said, “I won't be able to stay on my feet eight hours a day. Do they have any jobs you can do lying down?”

The officers reacted to the idleness in different ways. Mr. Crane spent all his time working around the ship. He rearranged the filing system, he drew up a new watch and quarter bill, and he started an inventory of all the equipment aboard. Mr. Warren spent a great deal of his time ashore in vain attempts to get supplies. In the evenings he wrote long letters to his wife. The envelopes were so full that he could hardly seal them. I was exceedingly glad that I did not have to censor them.

Mr. Rudd spent most of his time in his stateroom reading. He had taken aboard with him a huge wooden box full of books. These books were taken one by one from the box, and each was replaced in it when Mr. Rudd had finished it, so it was a long while before I knew what kind of books he had. From time to time, however, he came into my cabin with a book he thought I might like. Once he lent me the collected novels of Dostoevski. Another time he brought me Ruth Benedict's “Race, Science and Politics.” A collection of Thomas Hardy followed and a book of verses translated from Heinrich Heine.

“You seem awfully literary for a dyed-in-the-wool Regular,” I said to him once. “You ought to join the Reserves.”

“I do not believe that is a necessary corollary,” he replied with some dignity. I noticed he did not take my remark as a joke.

Gradually my curiosity about Mr. Rudd deepened. Since I had known him he had never talked of his personal affairs. In the forward part of the ship's log the names of the officers were written down, followed by their addresses in the States and the names of their wives. Mr. Crane had written that he came from Chicago and his wife's name was Ethel. Mr. Warren had written that he came from New York and that his wife's name was Rachel. Mr. Rudd, however, had written in the space reserved for his address the single word “Aboard.” Nothing followed.

One particularly trying day while we were waiting for repairs in Milne Bay, Mr. Rudd and I decided to go to the officers' club ashore. We had the boat set us on the nearest wharf and hitch-hiked down the muddy roads to the club for shore-based officers. Once inside we found a table in the corner and began to drink beer. We sat quietly in the heat of the afternoon. I found myself musing about Mr. Rudd's past. Deciding it was idle to conjecture while the man was sitting right across from me, I put my glass of beer down on the table and suddenly asked, “Mr. Rudd, where the hell do you come from? I've sailed with you over six months now, and I still don't know where you come from.”

“I was born in Stoneham,” he said. “Stoneham, Massachusetts.”

“A New Englander!” I said. “I never would have known it!”

Mr. Rudd laughed. “With good reason,” he said. “I left there when I was fourteen.”

“Where did you go then?” I asked.

Mr. Rudd peered at me over his beer glass. “Look,” he said, “what you want is a life history. Well, I'll tell it to you, only buy me a whisky first. You can't tell life histories over beer. I'm like an old whore; if you want to hear my life history you've got to buy me a drink.”

“All right.” I said, “I'll buy you a drink.”

The whiskies arrived, and Mr. Rudd lit a cigar.

“I was born in Stoneham, Massachusetts,” he said. “That was a small town—not over five thousand people. My father was the minister there. Episcopalian. I had an older brother and the two of us were given what is known as a decent bringing up. On the record we were told that we should consecrate our lives to God, turn the other cheek and love all men because they were our brothers. Off the record we were not told, but we were led to understand pretty definitely that no one without a big white house and plenty of money was worth a damn, that you had to get out and beat the other fellow to get those things, and that because we were Episcopalians we were of course better than Baptists, Catholics, Jews, and niggers.”

“It sounds like a happy childhood,” I said.

“Of course it was happy,” said Mr. Rudd. “Now if you want to hear my life story keep quiet and let me talk. When I got to be fourteen I met a lot of people around the town and I found that I liked most of those I wasn't supposed to like and I disliked most of those I was supposed to like. As a result I ran away to Boston. My father, I learned later, said I was in the hands of God. He didn't make any attempt to recover me.”

“Were you?” I asked.

“Was I what?” said Mr. Rudd.

“Were you in the hands of God?”

“Now damn it, don't make foolish remarks,” said Mr. Rudd, “but as a matter of fact, since you asked, my father was right. I was in the hands of God, that is in a manner of speaking. I got a job cleaning up in a chemical laboratory, and I supported myself while I went through high school.”

“That's quite an achievement,” I said.

“Stop making condescending remarks and listen,” replied Mr. Rudd. “As I say, I worked my way through high school. After that I worked my way through M.I.T. It took me six years and I ruined my health doing it. Don't congratulate me, because I wish the hell I hadn't done it. Anyway, when I got through I was a graduate chemist. I suppose I still am.”

“Well, I'll be damned!” I said. “You a graduate chemist!”

“You needn't act so surprised,” answered Mr. Rudd. “What an awful thing when people act surprised!”

“I'm sorry,” I said, “I don't know why I'm surprised. I just am. You've never acted the part. I've always figured you were an old service man who had worked his way up from apprentice seaman.”

“I am and I did,” replied Mr. Rudd. “When we get some more drinks I'll tell you about it.”

I went to the bar and came back with two double whiskies. Mr. Rudd drained his with frightening suddenness. He lit another cigar.

“I don't know why I'm telling you all this,” he said, and then stopped. “Yes, I do too,” he continued, “I'm drunk and I haven't talked about it in a long while. Anyway, when I got through M.I.T., I got a good job as a research chemist. In those days I loved chemistry. I thought that everything could be figured out by it. If I had enough time, I figured, I could find the secret to everything. I worked all day and half the night. The other half of the night I spent drinking and raising hell. It just seemed that I had to celebrate figuring everything out. After a year I was sick and had to spend a month in the hospital. During that month I got to thinking and wondering about my mother and father. As soon as I got out of the hospital I went right down to Stoneham.”

He paused and tilted his empty glass to his lips. A little unsteadily he got to his feet, extracted his huge belly from under the table, and lumbered over to the bar. When he came back he sat down heavily and pushed a drink toward me.

“In Stoneham,” he continued, “I found my father and mother all right. They were overjoyed to see me. The prodigal son returned, only I wasn't prodigal because I had graduated from M.I.T. My father called and checked with the alumni office just to make sure. When he found out that I was actually listed he came and congratulated me again.”

“Mr. Rudd!” a voice called from the door. I turned and saw a warrant machinist, tall and worn as a limbless tree. A thin scar ran down his face and across one side of his mouth.

“Why, Ben Everett!” Mr. Rudd shouted, and got to his feet.

“The last time I saw you was when I left the old
Barret Wood
,” said Ben Everett.

Mr. Rudd turned to me. “Let me introduce an old shipmate of mine,” he said. “Ben, this is Mr. Barton, the skipper of my ship.”

I said how-do-you-do, but neither of them really heard me. Ben had already unknowingly slipped into my place across the table from Mr. Rudd, and they were talking loud and fast.

“That was down in South America,” I heard Mr. Rudd say. “Venezuela, I think. Yes, sir, the old
Barret Wood
was quite a ship. Remember that old bastard that was chief machinist's mate on her?”

“Yes, sir!” replied Ben Everett. “He's a lieutenant commander now, and still a bastard, only more so. I heard from Pete Rogers a couple of weeks ago …”

I walked away without disturbing them. My capacity for liquor was somewhat less than that of Mr. Rudd, and I had already reached it. Instead of hitchhiking I walked all the way back to the wharf, signaled for our boat and rode happily out to the ship. After a hasty dinner I retired to my cabin. In the morning I remembered all that Mr. Rudd had told me of his life, but when I saw him he appeared a little cold, so I made no mention of it. After breakfast he asked to see me in my cabin, but it was only to give me a list of engine parts that he said we needed.

“You know we won't be able to get them,” I said.

He turned and gave me one of his sardonic grins. “It is the duty of the engineering officer to acquaint the commanding officer with his needs,” he said. “I have done so.”

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

O
N THE
first of November we were still lying in Milne Bay waiting for a new cylinder head. The first of each month was always welcomed, for we could say that one more month had gone and there remained one less ahead of us. Calendars all over the ship were joyfully marked or torn. After I had ripped October from the calendar in my cabin, I sat down on my desk and conjectured where we would be at the end of each following month. If we didn't get a cylinder head, I reflected gloomily, we would still be lying in Milne Bay in the rain.

My thoughts were interrupted by a knock at the door. I called. Guns stepped in. His fine, angular face was tanned and yellow around the forehead and nose, but his cheeks and chin were covered with a thick, black beard.

“Sir,” he asked, “do you think we really are going to the Philippines?”

“If we get a cylinder head,” I replied.

“Well, I've been thinking,” said Guns. “We don't really have anything to shoot with. Have you tried to get any more guns mounted?”

“Yes,” I said, “I've tried almost everywhere we've been. I've seen colonels and commanders and captains, but they all tell me one thing—no more guns are authorized for this ship.”

“Don't you think that is a mistake, sir?” asked Guns. “I mean, don't you think it's wrong to send a ship into almost certain action when she has nothing but peashooters?”

“Yes,” I replied, “I think it is wrong. But there's nothing I can do about it.”

Guns made no answer, but he looked as though he had something important on his mind. He made no move to go.

“You see, Guns,” I said, “all we can do is take what they give us and do the best we can.”

“Yes, sir,” said Guns, “but that wouldn't be much with just two fifty-calibres that will shoot only over the stern.”

“No,” I said, “it wouldn't be much.”

“I was wondering,” Guns said, “if you'd be willing to do something about it. You see, I have a friend ashore here, a sergeant in an Army anti-aircraft unit. I've been telling him about our armament, and he says there's a lot of guns rusting around the base here. He's a pretty good egg. He says he could get a truck and some welders …”

“You mean he'll steal some guns for us?” I asked.

“Well, yes, sir, in a manner of speaking,” answered Guns. “Actually it would mean taking guns that aren't being used and putting them where they can be used.”