At the Midway (71 page)

A sharp toot from the
Iroquois
caused the men abovedecks to look up.  Amos Macklin stepped out of the pilothouse and pointed at the second barge, drifting sluggishly towards the reef.  It still might be saved.

"Good God, one of the Coloreds is piloting the tug," said the first lieutenant.  But he lifted his megaphone and shouted, "We're secure over here!  See if you can swing out and recover the other barge!"

The marines still on the tug milled dubiously in the waist for a moment, then resignedly cast off.  Amos brought the tug about.  The barge lashed to the
Florida
rocked in the sea tug's wake as its powerful twin screws bit into the ocean.

0740 Hours

Amos did not feel like a brave man.  Courage meant facing something comprehensibly dangerous.  The beast was certainly dangerous, but there was nothing else comprehensible about it.  It was an exaggerated nightmare, a mammoth spook from the dark depths.  Everything every boy had ever feared on the other side of the covers, outside the door, down the road, inside the black cave.  A part of him resisted as he veered hard to starboard.  His muscles strained, as if he was maneuvering an ocean liner instead of a tug.  He wondered if the Japanese below would have stopped feeding coal to the boiler if they knew he was leaving the relative safety of the battleship.

But the
Florida
herself was starved for coal.  A pittance would not do, either for battle or escape.  The single barge would supply no more than half a day's life for the ship.

On the second barge, at the summit of the coal heap, Garrett stood facing away from the
Iroquois
.  His arms were draped at his side, as if he had no energy left to lift them.  Amos threw a guilty glance at the marines behind him.  They had not been able to see the far side of the barge when they cut her loose.  When the creature's head disappeared behind the coal, they assumed Garrett was done for.  In a kind of frantic communal inquiry, Amos and the marines had decided to cut the cables and their losses.  From the bridge of the
Florida
they could see Garrett moving on the barge, but no one had thought to tell the men on the tug about it.

Count on Garrett to come back and haunt them.

About a hundred yards beyond the barge, the creature swept through the remains of the motor launch, leaving a sinuous wake.  Every man on the tug now knew how deceptive the distance was.  The serpent could cover a hundred yards in less time than a goldfish crossing a tub.  The marines manned the unlimbered and unwheeled fieldpieces.

In the opposite direction they saw the ship's surviving motor launch racing towards the
Florida
.  Amos thought he saw bundled forms on stretchers.  This was truly an act of faith that the battleship would win the fight against the beast and that the wounded from Midway could be better tended on board.

Oddly, in spite of his gut
-
ache fear, Amos found himself wondering about the last time he'd had sole command of a vessel
-
-
although he was skipper only in the barest sense.  It was while rowing up that Virginia creek to the tiny settlement where he met Methuselah.  So close and hot.  But that small trickle fed the James River.  The James fed the Chesapeake.  The Chesapeake, the Atlantic.  And the Atlantic was but a limb of the ocean body, all feeding and all fed.  The serpent was part of the uninterrupted skin and being of water.  The horror of Midway would be considered the terror of Tanner Creek or the pond that fed the creek or the clouds above that rained down.  An interconnected system of fear and wonder.

And it was then Amos realized why he was so drawn to Methuselah.  The old man was a reminder of what no man should ever forget.  Everyone was a part of the sea
.  And God said, Let there be a firmament in the midst of the waters; and let it divide the waters from the waters
.  Only later in Genesis did the land appear.  The way men like Singleton were talking these days, life was first bred in the sea.  And while Amos held no truck with that, he knew the connection was vital.  Methuselah was a not
-
so
-
diplomatic reminder that no matter how far inland one went, one was still a part of the spume and lower depths.

And a simple creek could lead you to monstrous things.  Amos squinted through the wheelhouse window.  He could see Garrett, still on top of the heap.  Although the barge was behaving sluggishly, she seemed to have stopped sinking.  Perhaps the damage had been minor.  If so, it was possible the coal had shifted over and was actually plugging the leak.  Such freak salvation would not last long, once the coal itself began absorbing water in quantity.  Slowly, Amos approached, gauging the spot where the fenders would brush.

The ensign's back was still to the tug.  He was watching the creature as it sculled in aimless circles at the edge of the reef, its great animal mass causing the waves to boom twice their normal height against the exposed coral. Amos was astonished to see Garrett stuff his hands casually into his pockets, as if he was at a zoo watching the chimps instead of facing death without protective bars.  Then he heard the tug approaching and turned around.  Amos eased closer.  There was only a hundred feet between them.  He felt a peculiar motion underneath.  The tug had begun drifting at the stern as it lost way.  Unfamiliar with the craft, Amos was afraid to ring for more speed.  He had visions of ramming the barge accidentally and sending it lock, stock and ensign to the bottom.  He glanced up, half hoping Garrett would mime instructions to him.

He was miming, all right. Garrett's hands were out of his pockets now and on his hips.  His gaze was focused directly on the wheelhouse and his expression was undisguised disgust.  There was no mistaking the gesture: 
The nigger's come to save me, ho
-
ho
-
ho
.

"The bastard!"

A marine popped his head into the wheelhouse.  "Bring her up slow!  We might still can save her.  Least, we can get the ensign off."

"Yeah!" Amos yelled, then reached for the engine room telegraph and rang 'ahead one third.'  He began swinging to port
-
-
away from the barge.

"What're you doin"?"

"Trying another angle."

Garrett's reaction was everything Amos could have hoped for.  His mouth shot open in an idiotic gawk.  With his bruises still shiny, he looked like a silly Halloween mask.

"'Nuther angle hell!  You're movin' away!"

"Aw, fat off a hog.  Don't fret.  Just want to get abaft her some."  He turned the wheel hard over and came up on the starboard side.  To the marines on board it looked as if Amos had purposefully put the tug between the barge and the creature, so as to protect the coal.  They would have preferred a little less audacity, although they admired the intent.

Garrett knew better, because Amos told him.  His broad grin was as unmistakable as a trumpet blast in the ensign's ear.

"Catch the line!" one of the marines yelled.

At first, Garrett did not move.  He gave Amos a long, deadly look that promised things to come.  He seemed disposed to let the tug slip by without taking hold of the hawsers
-
-
until a shout caused him to look past the
Iroquois
.

The creature was moving away from the reef.

"Throw it!  Throw it!" he screeched, scrambling down the coal heap.  He caught the messenger-tipped rope and quickly had the hawser in his hands.  The water near the reef was choppy.  The cocoa
-
mat fenders banged perilously.  In his haste to make fast the line Garrett nearly fell between the barge and tug.  Amos discerned a frantic volley of oaths.  He shouted some oaths of his own in return.

Lifting up its tall neck into the intensely bright sky, the creature paused between the lagoon entrance and the tug.  It seemed undecided.

On the Cliffs of Time

No one could have known that the mother was indeed puzzled.  All the violence of the day and the night preceding had taken its toll.  Temporarily, she had been confused by the dead Tu
-
nel just outside the channel, at the bottom of the reef.  Sensing death, she angled downward and nibbled gently at the giant corpse.  Not breaking the hide, but goading
-
-
making certain the dead creature could not wake up.  Only after floating overhead several minutes did she remember.  Yes, that was her daughter.  And the dullness of grief put her into a kind of somnolent reverie.

She paused over the body several more times, reinforcing her sorrow.  Each pass, there was a gap between sight and recognition.  Given one more day, she would not see her daughter--only a carcass.  And since the Tu
-
nel were as much scavengers as hunters, she would begin to feed on her offspring.

For now, however, a bitter woefulness settled on her.  Yes, that had been her daughter.  Even the rough groundswell could not flex her heavy, dead limbs.  The mother could not have pinpointed the cause of death, nor the culprits in the stricken battleship.  Yet she sensed the menace, the way hornets can sense the vindictiveness of the boy who put the .22 slug through their nest--and return fire with a vengeance.

There were other targets, as well.  Less noisy and disputatious.  And as she moved away from the barge and tug and shouldered her way through the channel, a fundamental curiosity prompted her.  She had not looked in on Sand Island for some time.  What were the sprawling little men up to?

0800 Hours

The ensign's words had come as a shock:

"No.  You stay here.  Every man has to count, and you'd be no help."

About as succinct and cutting a remark William Pegg had ever felt--and this after having lived on the
Lydia Bailey
with Chandry and the purser.  He stood back, appalled.  His wounded hand suddenly throbbed.  Sympathetic looks from Dr. Singleton did not help.  For the first time, Pegg felt truly mutilated.

What happened afterwards did not help.  A man with a thick German accent came up to him.

"Boy, I need you.  Come this way."

Since it was the only request for help forthcoming, William followed.  His doubts multiplied when the man with the guttural voice said, "I watched over one man dying last night.  I can't find Enderfall and I can't watch over another one.  Here…."  He pointed at a man lying on the sand.  From ten yards William could hear his delirious thrashing.  From ten feet he could smell the wound.  Close up, Sergeant Ziolkowski lay in a block of shade improvised by Lieber.  William wondered if he had also been pulled out of a whaleboat by the crew of the
Florida
.

"Sit with him.  When he wants water, here's the canteen.  When the suns comes around, keep his head in the shade with that."  He nodded at a barrel bracket with canvas slung between its supports.  "You can do that?  You won't up and leave him?"

The boy spent a long moment staring down at the wounded marine, then nodded.  "It wasn't a week past somebody sat next to me when I was like this.  I don't care if…."  He looked out towards the lagoon, a bleak image of Garrett in mind.  No, not all sailors were like the ensign. Just as all mariners were not Lucifer's own carbuncle, like Chandry, or comparative saints, like Lead Foot.  "I had a friend who died on the
Lydia Bailey
.  I wish I could've sat with him."

"Good."

Lieber walked away without another word to William or a glance at Ziolkowski.  It was true.  He was temporarily drained of compassion, after sitting by helplessly as Ace died.  Besides, he had a notion of going aloft again.  If the creatures returned to the island and the wind played fair, he might be able to get right up in the face of one of them.  Ace had shown a good shot could put out one of their eyes.  Two good shots could blind the big one completely.

Pegg had never been on an atoll before.  He was surprised by the sharpness of the coral sand when he sat.  Completely unlike the kind beaches of the East Coast.  He squinted in the direction of the
Florida
but could see nothing beyond the high spume of the breakers.

"That road's infested with Chink bandits, Admiral.  I wouldn't put my trust in
her
escort.  Like my pappy told me, might's well put a gun to your head soon as trust a woman.  That's twice as true with royalty."

"What did you say?" William asked.

"I can scare up some horses from the Legation Guard.  Twenty men.  How's that sound?"

William stared at the marine, fascinated.  The man was somewhere else
-
-
just as William had been while on the whaleboat, holding discourse with gulls and unseen fish.  He looked closely at the sergeant's broken leg and the rude blood
-
soaked bandage that covered the bone that had pierced the skin.  A dreadful sight, but no less awful than Pegg's hand, which had stank to the sky before the surgeon saved it.  He was suddenly angry with the German for assuming the man would die.  He could be saved!  True, the second motor launch had been almost overloaded with wounded, but why in God's name hadn't they taken him out on the tug?