Caine Mutiny, The - Herman Wouk [178]
“Go to hell,” muttered Willie, taking his hand.
Whittaker came to the doorway. “Meetin’ fo’ all officers, Mistah Keith, suh-”
The wardroom was crowded with officers, chiefs, and first-class petty officers ranged around the table, most of them standing. Queeg, at the head, was rolling the balls, smoking, and silently studying several red-crayon diagrams spread before him on the table. Ducely threaded through the crowd unnoticed, and went out. Queeg began to outline his search plan. He had worked up a scheme for herding the men topside, stripping and searching them by groups, and returning them below to spaces that had meantime been searched. The point of the arrangement was that at no time could the missing key be moved from an unsearched to a searched space; and in this respect, Willie perceived, the plan was ingenious and effective. He felt a little sorry for Queeg. The captain was transformed with pleasant excitement; he seemed genuinely happy for the first time in many months; and it was pathetic to consider that the whole explosive burst of energy was for nothing. When the meeting adjourned Willie tapped Maryk’s shoulder. “Got to talk to you, Steve.” They went into the exec’s room, and Willie told him Ducely’s story.
“Good Christ,” said Maryk, resting his head wearily against his fist. “So that’s it, after all-the mess boys-”
“Going to tell the old man?”
“Well, of course, right away. Why turn the whole ship upside down now? I’m sorry for the boys, but they’ll have to take the consequences. They had no right to eat the damn strawberries-”
Maryk went up to the captain’s cabin. Keys were still heaped in thousands in boxes on the deck. The captain was in his swivel chair, idly playing with the padlock. He was dressed in new clothes, and shaved, and his shoes were brightly shined. “Hello, Steve. Ready to let her roll? I want you to run it, of course, but I’ll be supervising pretty closely. Any time you say-”
“Captain, something has come up.” Maryk repeated Ducely’s information. As Queeg gathered the import his head began to sink between his shoulders and the old angry glare at nothing appeared in his eyes.
“Let’s get this straight. Ducely told Keith, and Keith told you. Ducely’s supposed to be the one who saw it, and he’s gone. Right?”
“Yes, sir.”
“And how do we know either Ducely or Keith is telling the truth?”
“Captain, they’re both naval officers-”
“Oh, don’t give me that poppycock.” Queeg took a pair of steel balls from the bowl on his desk. “Ducely’s capable of a parting prank, he’s perfectly irresponsible, and anyway, we don’t even know he said it. Keith picked a mighty convenient time to tell us about it-after Ducely left-”
“Sir, Ducely made him promise-”
“I know, you said that. Well, I could take good care of Mr. Ducely if I didn’t have other fish to fry. He thinks he’s escaped, does he? Well, I could summon him back from the beach as a material witness-his plane isn’t gone yet-and keep him here till hell froze over. But as I say, Keith may have made up the whole thing, so-”
“Sir, why on earth would Willie do that-”
“How do I know who he’s trying to protect?” said Queeg. “His loyalty upward is zero, that’s for sure. Maybe it extends downward in some peculiar direction. Anyway, I’m not going to sit here psychoanalyzing Mr. Keith, when we’ve got important business to do.”
Maryk said after a small silence, “Sir, you want to go ahead with the search?”
“Why not? Neither Mr. Ducely nor Mr. Keith produced the key, which is all that interests me-”
“Captain ... Captain, there is no key, if the mess boys ate the strawberries. Are you going to assume that two of your officers have lied to you?”
“I’m not assuming a goddamned thing,” Queeg exclaimed through his nose, “and that’s exactly why we’re going to look for that key. Nobody’s going to kid me into assuming it doesn’t exist. Now let’s get going!”
Heavy swells were rolling into the harbor from the storm on the open sea. The Caine and the Harte, plunging and rubbing and rolling