Caine Mutiny, The - Herman Wouk [278]
So again the old minesweeper swung at anchor in the bay, accumulating rust and barnacles. Willie had plenty of time to worry about May, and he began to be very nervous. Six weeks had passed since he had sent off the proposal. In the interim he had written several times to his mother, and she had answered the letters. He comforted himself with the usual seasonings of men overseas. His letter or May’s had gone astray in a Navy foul-up. A typhoon had damaged the ship carrying the mail. May wasn’t in New York. Wartime postal service was erratic at best-and so forth and so forth. None of these thoughts cheered him much because he knew how fast and reliable the armed forces mail really was. Two weeks to twenty days sufficed in Okinawa for a letter and a reply. The men were writing hundreds of letters, having nothing better to do, and Willie was very familiar with the mechanics of delivery. He grew gloomier with every day that passed. Three times he wrote passionate pleading letters and then tore them up because he felt like a fool when he read them over.
One afternoon he came into his room and saw on his desk a fat envelope addressed in a feminine handwriting-not his mother’s rounded slope, May’s spiky vertical hand, he thought in an electrifying instant, and fell on the letter. He tore it open frantically. It was from Lieutenant (jg) Ducely. A large folded newspaper page fell out of the envelope to the floor.
DEAR WILLIE,
I thought you and whoever’s left on the old hell ship would get a bang out of the enclosed. I’m back in Public Relations-90 Church, thank God just a stone’s throw from my favorite bars-and this thing passed across my desk yesterday afternoon. I’m supposed to file it but I wrote for another copy, and am sending this on. I guess Old Yellowstain has been put out to pasture for good, which ought to please you. Stuber Forks, Iowa! I die laughing just saying that over and over to myself. Well, he can’t run a supply depot up on a reef, anyway.
We have heard all kinds of vague stories about the great “Caine mutiny” back here. It’s become a kind of legend, though nobody knows what really happened except that Maryk got acquitted. Well, wouldn’t you know, with my two battle stars and actually having been on the fabulous Caine and all I am the grizzled sea warrior around here, and of course it just murders me, but naturally I play it big. I could have a harem of Waves, if I cared for big behinds and hairy legs, but I guess I am a little fussy. Especially as I am practically engaged. This will probably kill you. When I got back-you remember all those letters I wrote home about that girl in the New Yorker ad-well, a pal of mine in Batten, Barton, Durstine and Osborne actually tracked her down for me, and she is probably the most beautiful girl in New York, Crystal Gayes (her real name is a Polish jawbreaker) a very well-known model, and a really sweet kid. I have had a lot of Stork Club duty in the past six months, and my boy, believe it or not, it beats the dear old Caine. By the way I saw your inamorata May Wynn singing at some club and she looked mighty fetching but I didn’t get a chance to talk to her.
Well, Willie, I hope you’ve forgiven me for all the times I threw you. I am not made of your stern stuff. I never told you how terrifically I admired you for standing up under Old Yellowstain’s persecution, though I know most of it was my fault. I am just a grasshopper, I guess, but you, my boy, are a cross between John Paul Jones and a Christian martyr.
Well, if you ever get home, look me up in the phone book. My mother is Agnes B. Ducely. Best regards to the boys, and stay away from those Kamikazes.
Sincerely,
ALFRED
P. S. Note that O.Y. is still lieutenant commander. His AlNav came out in March, so I guess he was passed over, and that is curtains, of course. Hooray.
Willie picked up the newspaper sheet. It was the front page of the Stuber Forks, Iowa, Journal. A feature story at the bottom was ringed