The Gulf (48 page)

*   *   *

When the message was in Radio, the ship suddenly became too small to bear. He showered again and put on slacks and an open-necked shirt. Then he went out to the quarterdeck, slinging a sport coat over his shoulder. Lewis, Loamer, and Brocket were there waiting for the water taxi, which was doing one round-trip an hour from the anchorage to the fleet landing.

Most of the officers had had enough Arab food, so they agreed on a French restaurant not far from the Mubarraq causeway. At nine, slightly noisy, they piled into a taxi and headed for the Regency.

The streets of Manama were full of men and boys and a sprinkling of foreigners. The only women were very old and in black
chadors.
The Mercedes, smelling strongly of the driver's imitation Chanel, sped them through streets of clothing stores, perfume shops, jewelry shops, the windows shimmering with gold bangles and bracelets, heavy and gaudy to Western eyes, but not without an exotic charm. Dan leaned his head back on the seat. He was counting minarets. The slender needles were crowded in among new apartment complexes, malls, office buildings, cranes, power lines. As the late dusk fell the call to submission floated on the cooling air. Their driver, who had been pointing out where his friends had been killed trying to make left turns, pulled off the six-lane highway, got out, and unrolled his rug to pray.

The hotel was lit like a cruise ship when they arrived. The lobby was solid with Filipinos, Koreans, technical representatives, oil men. The bar was easy to find. So were
Van Zandt
's officers, even in mufti. He followed the shouts and laughter. The sliding doors were open—with night, the air grew cooler, not a lot, but enough to permit human life—and beyond them palms nodded against the stars. Two European women played in the pool, their bodies outlined by light. The junior officers kept glancing their way.

Shaker had a glass of bourbon in front of him. By his looks, it wasn't his first. Turani was with him, smoking his Camels, and an older man, a Westerner; Dan didn't know him. Guerra, Bonner, Firzhak, and Charaler shoved their chairs together as the second wave hove into sight. Dan grabbed a spare from a nearby table and sat on it backward, across from the captain. A pretty Filipina took his order for orange juice.

The younger pilot was saying, “Another one he used to tell was this story about Adam and Eve. They're in the bushes; they've done it for the first time. Adam comes out and God's standing there. He says, ‘What were the two of you doing in there?' And Adam says, ‘Making love.' God says, ‘Oh yeah? How was it?' And Adam gives him this big grin and says, ‘It was great.' So God says, ‘Where's Eve?' And Adam says, ‘She's down by the river, washing up.' ‘Oh, no,' says God. ‘Now all the fish are going to smell like that forever.'”

Turani laughed harder than the rest of them. Dan saw he was nursing a milky-looking drink. Maybe it
was
milk.

Shaker turned to them. “You guys just get ashore? You got some catching up to do. We're telling Schweinberg stories.”

A moment later, however, he seemed to recall something. He got up, unobtrusively motioning Dan along. Outside, by the pool, he said, “Is everything under control out there?”

“Yes sir. I checked the ground tackle before I came ashore. We're riding well, no vibration, no drift. Al's got the duty section turned to and a watch on the air picture.”

One of the women was floating on her back. Shaker stared at her absently as he said, “Good. Now listen. That porky guy beside me's Commodore Ritchie, Hart's operations deputy. He told me some very interesting things this afternoon after the admiral had to leave.

“For one, that—this is real close-hold, Dan. Remember that last transmission from Two One? Al must have told you about it, what Chunky was screaming as he went down? Well, it looks like
Borinquen
didn't hit a mine. She was hit by a torpedo.”

“A
torpedo?
”

“Keep it down. I gave them the same double take you just gave me. But they had a diver down this morning. The edges of the plates, where the hull was pierced, they're bent outward. Not in. That's what a torp does to a thin-hulled ship. It's just luck it went into an empty tank.”

He could hardly grasp it. “It's too shallow, Ben. What did we have there—thirty meters? Less? A submarine'd be skating along on the bottom half the time.”

“Maybe so. But this could be a 209. Forget I told you this, but we've been looking for the one the Shah bought. They may have gotten it running. And hey, if you're willing to die, what's a little shallow-water work?”

Dan chewed it over, feeling apprehensive. They hadn't picked up a thing on sonar. The AN/SQS-56 was powerful, but built for deep-ocean work. If there
was
a sub loose, it could wreck “Earnest Will,” wreck the whole concept of escorting in the Gulf. No merchant would dare enter the Strait. And there wouldn't be a thing the U.S. Navy could do about it.

It would be the stranglehold the Iranians had always wanted on the West.

“Second thing.” Shaker looked around the pool; the women were at the far end now, pulling themselves gracefully up, reaching for towels. Wet flesh jiggled gently. “The Iranians have started some kind of coordinated offensive.”

Dan felt his stomach tense. It was too close to what he'd just been thinking. “What did they do?”

“Three attacks today. The first two, Boghammers out of Abu Musa. The usual type stuff, hit and run. Two ships hit with rocket grenades. Minor damage, couple of crewmen killed.

“But then something funny happened down south. A Japanese LNG tanker. Liquid natural gas. It was loaded to the gills, going out. There was a French destroyer two miles away. They said there was nothing on radar, no surface contacts, no sign of missiles or aircraft. Just suddenly this tremendous fireball. Ritchie says they could hear the explosion in Dhubai. The Frenchman took heavy topside damage. No survivors from the tanker.”

“My God. No survivors…”

“So now you have the overall picture. Right? Hart's worried. He's sweating to get more antisubmarine assets deployed. He's got P-3s on their way from Sicily and Diego Garcia. He had
Klakring
out on picket duty. Now she's reported generator problems. She's losing power. If they don't get it back up by tomorrow, he's going to have to send somebody out in her place.”

He forestalled Dan's protest with a lifted hand. “I know, I know, we just come off convoy, it's not our turn, all that shit. But it comes down to us or
Gallery.
And they're as tired as we are. So I volunteered us.”

“Okay, sir. I understand.”

He remembered then what he wanted to tell Shaker about. When he got to the details, the captain looked disturbed. He interrupted, “So, what do you want to do?”

“Doc suggested that we bury it at sea next time we got under way.”

“Okay, that might work. Yeah. Let's plan on that, a ceremony. You preside.”

“Me?”

“You. Maybe it'll give you a new attitude toward what we're doing out here.”

“What's that mean, Captain?”

“It means this.” Shaker leaned closer, exuding the sweet, strong smell of bourbon. “Means this. I don't intend to let them bastards push me around anymore. From now on, it's
Van Zandt
that's going to be doing the pushing.”

Shaker waited for a moment or two; then, not getting any response, said, “Well, excuse me, I'm still feelin' sober. What are you drinking, there, XO? Are you into those godawful fruit things?”

“It's orange juice, Captain.”

“OJ and what?”

“Just orange juice.”

“Oh.” He examined Dan with a puzzled expression, then slapped him on the back. “You know what your problem is? You need to bust loose once in a while. Come on, join the human race.” He pulled out a cigarette and strolled away, rolling slightly, not from drink but just from being on solid land again.

When Dan went back, the party was in full swing. Shaker, Ritchie, and the junior officers were playing ship, captain, and crew. The dice skittered across the wet table and came up sixes. Charaler moaned and hauled out his wallet. A dance band began playing in the next room. The waitresses threaded the room, unloading drinks and joining in the song. Turani clapped his hands over his head and began to dance. Firzhak mimicked him.

Dan stood a few steps away, watching. Their faces were red, collars loose; Charaler was guffawing so hard, he couldn't catch his breath. Out of uniform, they could be a group of bankers, salesman, a convention … no. Their haircuts and youth, their trim builds, a certain aggressive boisterousness marked them instantly as military. As did the obvious deference they gave the big man near the window.

No, not deference. And even more than respect. He was the center of the group. Not by any virtue of rank. By something innate.

They deserved to relax. This fourth convoy had been by far the tensest and most dangerous. But he didn't feel like joining them. Shaker was already pressing him to drink, and other things could happen as inhibitions loosened.

He went by them, and found himself in the bar. It was packed with sound and bodies, Italian sailors, civilians, Pakistani and Korean hired workers spending their pay in one of the few places in the country they could get a drink.

He was standing there, thinking about finding a taxi back, when Blair Titus took his arm.

26

Regency Hotel, Bahrain

“YOU'RE Lenson, aren't you? The one I met on the
Borinquen?
”

He looked not down but into a level green gaze. For a moment his mind stalled, confronted with an aquamarine silk blouse, loose, cool-looking linen slacks, and casual braided-leather pumps. It had been on other subjects: body parts, torpedoes, an unexpected patrol against an enemy primed for revenge.

Then he had it. The lingering furnace smell of a sandstorm. And from a lifting helicopter, the wave of a hand.

“Ms. Titus. I didn't expect to see you here.”

Blair still had his arm. Now she dropped it. “I was hoping I'd run into somebody I recognized. I was sitting in my room; I heard the band and thought I'd come down. Get my head out of politics.”

“I'm glad you did.” To be honest, he hadn't thought of her since Terry Pensker had told him 421 had been shot down. But she looked awfully good to a man after months at sea: Shoulder-length blonde hair, tall and slim and clean-looking, with that easy upper-class carriage he'd always admired and wished he had himself. And just now, she was smiling in what looked like amusement—at him.

“You look so surprised. We're not just going to stand here, are we? Where's the party?”

“Oh, there's no party. Just a bunch of us from the ship.”

“Is that where you're headed, so pensive-looking?”

“Actually, I was leaving.”

“That bad?”

“No, no—” He floundered for a moment. “I was just … leaving.”

“I see. Well, want to stay a little longer and join me for a drink?”

“Uh, sure.”

The bar was too noisy with the band and sixty men, and there weren't any seats. He suggested the pool. There were tables under the palms. A Korean waiter took their orders: a strawberry daiquiri and an orange juice and tonic.

Blair let herself down gingerly on the poolside lounger. She sighed, pushed her huaraches off, and wiggled her bare toes. It was warm and breezy, and the stars were an arm's length away. The pool was lit with varicolored lights, an underwater show.

She'd spoken to the Navy officer on impulse, recognizing him as he stood outside the lounge with that lost expression on his face. Now that she had, in essence, picked him up, part of her still wanted to be alone. But then again, part of her didn't. Two hours in her room with Anne Tyler had been about as much reconstructive solitude as she could take. She wanted to talk, dance, have a daiquiri or maybe even two. She wanted to relax and forget the defense of the West. If nothing clicked, there was always Saudi television, reruns of “I Love Lucy” and “Hawaii Five-O.”

The drinks came. She tasted hers and made a face. “Whew!”

“Strong?”

“They meant business when they made this. Don't let me drink more than two or I'll fall over backward.”

Dan decided to let that volley go by. She was damned attractive. He was thirty-five, celibate by circumstance but not by oath. His body wanted her already. But he wasn't sure even now, sitting knee to knee with her in the half-dark, that it would be a good idea. His life was complicated enough with Shaker, Pensker, the Pasdaran, and a shipful of sailors to take care of. Maybe just this—some fresh-squeezed fruit juice, an hour by a pool with someone not Navy, not part of it all—maybe just this was enough. And anyway, he was too bone-grinding tired to stay up much longer.

She didn't insist on an answer. Instead she said, “You don't drink?”

He shook his head.

“Just as well. Too many men where I work—bourbon and power, that's all they're interested in.”

She looked up at the palm trees, remembering one of those men. They could still hear the band—“Take My Breath Away”—but it was muted, distant. The air smelled like spices.

“Did the admiral say you were from Washington?” Lenson said, startling her.

“Uh-huh. That's where I live now, in Alexandria.”

“I was in Arlington for a couple of years. Pentagon, and school.”

“Where'd you go?”

“George Washington. Poli Sci. Part time.”

“You know Dr. Lewis? Dick Kugler? John Logsdon?”

“Yes, I had them.”

“GW has a good rep. I went to Georgetown myself.”

“Blair … I didn't quite get what you did, when Admiral Hart introduced you. You work for Congress, he said?”