Authors: Sloan Wilson

Voyage to Somewhere (30 page)

“It's too bad this didn't happen on the way up,” I started to say. “We had a whole cargo of burial supplies.” Instead, I said nothing.

“Do you hear me?” the doctor asked.

“Yes,” I said. “Do you know how to hold a burial service at sea? I never held one before.”

“I don't know,” the doctor said. “You put the body on a platform and slide it over. I guess you read a burial service.”

“Sure,” I said. I got up and went out on the fantail. Six bodies lay wrapped in blankets there. Boats was already rigging a slide over the rail.

“Call me when you get it done, Boats,” I said. “Line up all hands back here and we'll hold a service.”

“It'll be just a minute, sir,” Boats replied.

I walked back toward my cabin, then realized that my cabin had become a hospital. I paused, bewildered. Suddenly I began to worry about what I would say at the burial service. I couldn't think of anything I had heard about burials at sea. Remembering that Mr. Rudd had had a Bible, I went to his stateroom. The Bible was in the desk drawer. A wounded man was in Mr. Rudd's bunk. I didn't notice him when I came in. Just when I opened the Bible the wounded man gave a low groan. I started. Sitting down on the desk chair, I leafed through the Bible. I thought there would be some sort of a formal burial service there, but I could find nothing under that name. Only the Old and New Testaments. I stared at them stupidly. There was a knock at the door. It was Boats.

“Everything is ready, sir,” he said.

Carrying the Bible, I went aft to the fantail. The whole crew was there. The men stood rigidly at attention. Their caps were off. I noticed that Wortly had a burn across his cheek and White's face was either bruised or still stained with soot. Boats had placed a body on the slide and covered it with a large American flag. I wondered who it was we were going to bury first, but with all the men standing there it seemed silly to ask. Boats stood by the slide, and I noticed that he was holding a lanyard in his handâsome sort of a releasing mechanism. I walked over and stood before the men. Opening the Bible I stood for a moment turning the pages. Still I did not know what I should read. Suddenly a marked passage met my eye. Automatically I started to read, but my eyes went ahead of my voice and I saw, “An altar of earth thou shalt make unto me, and shall sacrifice thereon thy burnt offerings, and thy peace offerings â¦”

I shuddered and snapped the Bible shut. Looking up, I saw the men standing before me expectantly.

“I have no burial service aboard,” I said lamely. Suddenly an idea came to me. “Let us repeat the Lord's Prayer,” I continued. “Our Father Who art in Heaven â¦”

The men repeated the prayer with me, and when we were through I looked up and said, “Commit the body to the deep.”

Boats pulled the lanyard and the body slid off. White stepped forward and he and Boats lifted another body to the slide. My knees felt weak under me. All the men were waiting for something. There was something I should say. Suddenly a wave of dizziness enveloped me. I knew I was falling. Hands gripped me around the shoulders. I heard Boats say, “Easy now! Carry him up to the forecastle!” After that I remembered no more for a long time. When I awoke a day later, Mr. Crane had finished the burials.

CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

T
HE
destroyer dropped us in Manila harbor, and we anchored inside the breakwater. The SV-126 was strained, burned, beaten, spent. The authorities ashore said we would have to wait at least two months to go in dry dock. We lived abroard the dead hull and waited. I spent most of my time in my cabin. I didn't think much. Even when the atom bomb was dropped and Russia came into the war, it didn't mean much to me. I listened to the news come over the radio and returned to my bunk. On August 15 somebody said the war was over.

“Probably a rumor,” I said.

Suddenly a blended cacophony of ships' whistles burst the air. Rushing on deck, I looked across Manila harbor and saw what looked like an air raid. From every ship red and orange tracer bullets shot into the air. Red smoke bombs spilled ruddy clouds over the water. Distress rockets shot up from the ships. And everywhere there was the all encompassing scream of the ships' whistles. The big Liberty ships gave a deep-throated roar. A destroyer beside us emitted a shrill screech and her sirens coasted up and down the scale. Some of the ships jerked their whistle cords every ten or twenty seconds; others lashed their whistle cords down until the ship sounded as though she were running out of breath. Through the din we could hear church bells ringing ashore.

“It's over!” someone beside me yelled. I turned and saw our whole crew standing by the rail. Flags ran to the bridge, and a moment later our whistle joined the others.

Still suspicious, I ran to the radio shack. Sparks was sitting there with his earphones on. The whole radio shack was vibrating from the noise of our whistle. I hit Sparks on the shoulder.

“What's the story?” I asked.

“Can't hear a damn thing!” he shouted.

Going to the bridge, I told Flags to let up on the whistle until we heard the news. Then I went back to the radio shack. The noise from the other ships in the harbor still made reception difficult. Sparks kept his earphones on. I sat beside him. Looking up, I saw the whole crew gathered outside the door to the radio shack. They stood there seriously, without excitement. Finally Sparks put the earphones down.

“It's not official yet,” he said, “but the Japs have asked for peace. It sounds like the real thing.”

As soon as he spoke Flags ran up and lashed our whistle cord down again.

“How about liberty?” White asked. “How about setting a security watch and letting the rest of us go ashore?”

“If you want to stay aboard,” I said, “I have a few bottles of gin. I'll give them to the cook and he'll make up a punch for all hands. You'd have a pretty tough time getting any decent liquor ashore.”

“All right,” White said. “That will be swell.”

I went down to my cabin and took from a drawer five bottles of gin. I had found them in Mr. Rudd's stateroom while packing his personal effects. I gave the bottles of gin to the cook. He poured them into a tremendous mixing bowl and added some cans of orange juice. The full bowl he put out on the well deck and surrounded it with cups. The crew gathered around and began to drink. Mr. Crane and I joined them. At first we drank seriously, almost as a duty. Gradually the liquor began to warm us up.

“How about a song?” White asked.

The men gathered and sang.

“San Francisco here I come,

Right back where I started from â¦”

For a few moments I sang with them, then wandered off by myself to the flying bridge. I had a full cup with me and sat up there sipping it.

“Well, it's all over,” I thought. “This is the date. My children will memorize this date â¦”

Already I could see the brown bound book, the
History of World War II
, with dates and summaries for cramming. Probably in the schools it would be known as a pretty hard course. Lots of dates to memorize. On what day did Germany invade Poland? When was Midway? When was Stalingrad?

I would fail the history examination.

Down on the well deck the men had changed their song to “Bless 'em All.” I listened to them.

“Now when finally the war is all over,

The bastards who stayed home through all,

Will be kissed on the street by each girl that they meet,

I still say, my lads, bless 'em all!”.

They sang on and began to substitute an obscene word for the word “bless.”

Yes, this is the date, I thought. My children will study all the causes of the war. They'll read about it with sad, questioning eyes. They'll see monuments and drive past them wondering where they can buy a Coca Cola. I hope they won't be cynical about the war.

On deck the men had stopped singing, and I heard someone arguing. Looking down, I saw Wortly step up to Boats.

“I never have liked you, Boats!” Wortly said. “You've been throwing your weight around here too God damn much. Now the war's over, I'm going to tell you what a bastard I think you are!”

Boats put a huge hand on Wortly's chest and sent him spinning backward. Wortly landed sitting on deck. Everybody laughed.

“Cut it out, fellows, let's sing!” White said. By himself in his beautiful clear voice, he began to sing.

“Oh, I once knew a girl from Rhode Island,

She was the belle of the ball;

She asked me to be hers only,

But I said that I must bless them all.”

The others joined him and their voices rose in harmony. I relaxed in my chair on the flying bridge. Maybe when my children were taking the history course they would ask me what the war had been like. After all, I'd been through the warâI ought to be able to tell them all about it. For a long while I sat there trying to think exactly what I would say. I couldn't make up my mind. I had been through the war, but I felt as though I had been on a night train, and on waking in the morning had been told that I had been through Arizona.

About the Author

Sloan Wilson (1920â2003) was born in Norwalk, Connecticut, and graduated from Harvard University. An avid sailor, he joined the US Coast Guard shortly after Pearl Harbor, and during World War II commanded a naval trawler on the Greenland Patrol and an army supply ship in the South Pacific. Wilson earned a battle star for his role in an attack by Japanese aircraft, and based his first novel,
Voyage to Somewhere
, and two of his later books,
Ice Brothers
and
Pacific Interlude
, on his wartime experiences. In 1955 Wilson published
The Man in the Gray Flannel Suit
, a classic portrait of suburban ennui heralded by the
Atlantic
as “one of the great artifacts of popular culture in the 50's.” It was adapted into a successful film, as was its bestselling follow-up,
A Summer Place
.

An author of fifteen books, Wilson was living with his wife of forty years, Betty, on a boat in Colonial Beach, Virginia, at the time of his death.

All rights reserved, including without limitation the right to reproduce this ebook or any portion thereof in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of the publisher.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, events, and incidents either are the product of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

Cover design by Jamie Keenan

ISBN: 978-1-4976-8960-2

This edition published in 2014 by Open Road Integrated Media, Inc.

345 Hudson Street

New York, NY 10014

www.openroadmedia.com