Caine Mutiny, The - Herman Wouk [223]
“I don’t know, May. What do you think of it? What shall I do? What’s going to happen?”
She heaved a long sigh. “Is that why you came tonight? To tell me about that?”
“I wanted you to know about it.”
“Willie, I don’t know much about the Navy. But it doesn’t seem to me you have to do anything. The Navy is a pretty smart outfit. They won’t condemn any of you for trying to save your ship. At worst, you made a well-meaning mistake of judgment. That isn’t a crime-”
“It was mutiny, May-”
“Oh, hell. Who do you think you are, Fletcher Christian? Did you chain Queeg up and set him adrift in a boat? Did you pull knives and guns on him? I think he was crazy, whatever the doctors say-nutty as a fruitcake. Willie dear, you couldn’t mutiny-not even against your mother, let alone a ship’s captain-”
They both laughed a little. Though May’s verdict was the same as his mother’s, it filled Willie with hope and good cheer, whereas Mrs. Keith’s opinion had seemed emotional and stupid. “Okay, May. I don’t know why I had to load you down with my miseries- Thanks.”
“When are you leaving?”
“Seven o’clock in the morning.”
May rose, and slipped the bolt on her door. “Nosiest musicians in the world work here.” She came to Willie and put her arms around him. They exchanged a fearfully long, blind wild kiss. “That’s all,” May said, pushing herself out of his arms. “Remember it the rest of your life. You’ll have to go. I find it hurts to have you around.” She opened the door; Willie walked out and threaded through the jostling dancers to the street.
He still had not the slightest understanding of why he had really come; he blamed himself for a late flare of desire crudely masked as a need for advice. He had no way of recognizing the very common impulse of a husband to talk things over with his wife.
Next day his plane left on schedule, in a sunny morning. His mother waved bravely from the sight-seer’s boardwalk as the plane took to the air. Willie stared down at the buildings of Manhattan, trying to find the Hotel Woodley; but it was lost among the dingy piles of midtown.
CHAPTER 33
The Court-Martial-First Day
Naval Courts and Boards opens with a melancholy section entitled “Charges and Specifications.” It is only a hundred twenty-three pages long; not half as long as a twenty-five-cent mystery novel; and within that small compass the Navy has discussed all the worst errors, vices, follies, and crimes into which men may fall. It begins with Making a Mutiny and ends with Unlawful Use of a Distilling Apparatus. In between are such bloody offenses as Adultery, Murder, Rape, and Maiming, and also such nasty peccadilloes as Exhibiting an Obscene Photograph. These are sad, wearying, grisly pages, the more so for their matter-of-fact, systematic tone.
This shopper’s list of crime, however, did not provide a charge or specification for the peculiar offense of Lieutenant Stephen Maryk. Captain Breakstone had quickly perceived that, though the affair was more like a mutiny than anything else, Maryk’s invoking of Article 184 and his subsequent legalistic conduct made a conviction for mutiny unlikely. It was the queerest sort of twilight situation. In the end he fixed on the catch-all charge provided for rare or complicated offenses, “Conduct to the Prejudice of Good Order and Discipline,” and with much care he drew up the following specification:
In that Lieutenant Stephen Maryk, USNR, on or about December 18, 1944, aboard the U.S.S. Caine, willfully, without proper authority, and without justifiable cause, did relieve from his duty as commanding officer Lieutenant Commander Philip Francis Queeg, USN, the duly assigned commanding officer of said ship, who was then and there in lawful exercise of his command, the United States then being in a state of war.
The judge advocate, Lieutenant Commander Challee, expected no difficulty at all in proving this specification. He was an earnest, bright young officer, holding his high rank on a temporary war promotion. A slight undercurrent of guilt was running through his