Drive to the East

Somewhere out in the North Atlantic, such things probably were happening to several submarines from both sides right this minute. Sam hoped no enemy boats were within a hundred miles. Then he hoped no U.S. boats were within a hundred miles, either. You were just as dead if your own side sank you as you were any other way. And in weather like this, mistakes were too simple.

Things only got worse. Snow and sleet blew down out of the north, coating the Josephus Daniels’ deck and lines and railings with ice. Sam ordered everyone who had to go up on deck to wear a lifeline. Ice made slipping even easier than it had been before.

After leaving the bridge, Sam went down to the wireless shack. One of the yeomen there was telling the other a dirty story. He broke off when his pal hissed. Both ratings sprang to attention.

“As you were,” Sam said. “You can finish that joke if you want to, Hrolfson. Don’t mind me if I don’t laugh real hard-I’ve heard it.”

“It’s all right, sir,” Petty Officer Hrolfson said, not relaxing from his stiff brace. “It’ll keep. What can we do for you, sir?”

“What’s the last weather forecast?” Sam asked.

“Ours or theirs?” Hrolfson said. The USA and the UK both sent predictions to their ships. The United States had broken the British weather code. The limeys had likely broken the American code, too; it wasn’t a tough cipher. Both sides had weather stations in Greenland and Newfoundland and Labrador and Baffin Island to keep an eye on conditions as they developed. Sam had heard quiet, deadly warfare went on up there in the northernmost reaches of the world.

“Whatever you’ve got,” he said now.

“Well, sir, the limeys figure the storm’s good for about another three days. Our guys figure it’ll blow out sooner than that,” Hrolfson said.

Sam grunted. “I’d bet on the Englishmen.” He usually did when their reports disagreed with the ones from the Navy Department. And the blow he was in now felt strong enough to last a long time.

“We’ve got more stations up there than they do,” Hrolfson said. “How come their forecasts are better than ours?”

“More experience, I guess,” Sam answered. “They’ve been doing this a long time, and we didn’t get serious about it till the war.” The ship plunged down into a trough. He steadied himself without even knowing he’d done it. “What else have we got besides the weather reports?”

“Well, the BBC says England won a big battle against the Germans in the North Sea,” Hrolfson told him. “The Kaiser’s English-language news station says Churchill’s full of shit.”

Sam sighed. “That figures, I guess. Nobody who wasn’t there will really know what’s what-and the people who were there won’t be sure, either. I still couldn’t tell you who won the Battle of the Three Navies.”

“You were there, sir?” said the other yeoman, whose name was Lopatinsky. “My uncle was there, too. He used to say the same thing. He was in the Dakota when the hits jammed her steering and she made that circle through the fleet.”

“Son of a-gun!” Sam said. “I was in the Dakota, too. What’s your uncle’s name?”

“Kruk, sir,” Lopatinsky answered. “Jerzy Kruk-people call him Jerry most of the time.”

“Son of a bitch!” This time, Sam didn’t sanitize it. “I knew him. Kind of a big gut, eyes green like a cat’s, ears that stuck out, and a go-to-hell grin. He fought one of the one-pounders topside, right?”

“That’s him,” Lopatinsky said. “His gut’s even bigger nowadays, but he’s still got that damn grin.”

“What’s he doing these days?” Carsten asked.

“Coal miner. We’re a family of miners, down in West Virginia,” Lopatinsky said. “I went down below myself for a couple of years, but I figured there’s got to be a better way to make a living.”

“That’s how I got off the farm,” Sam said. “Take it all together and I expect I was right.”

“I feel the same way, sir,” the yeoman said. “Yeah, we get shot at, but so what? At least we can shoot back. The roof comes down or the mine floods, what can you do about it? Not much.”

“Here’s something, sir.” Hrolfson had been listening intently to whatever was coming in through his earphones. “Our wireless says we’ve sent the Confederates in Pittsburgh a messenger under flag of truce. He’s asking for their surrender.”

“That is good news,” Sam said. “What are the Confederates doing?”

Hrolfson listened for a little while longer before shrugging. “They don’t say anything about that, sir.”

“Ha!” Lopatinsky said. “That means the Confederates told ’em to fold it till it was all corners.” Carsten nodded. That was his guess, too. If you listened to the wireless much these days, you had to learn to sift through the crap to get at the few nuggets of truth the broadcasters were, as likely as not, trying to hide.

“If they don’t give up pretty soon, we’ll kill all of them.” Hrolfson sounded as if he looked forward to it.

So did Sam. Even so, he said, “Depends on how many of our guys they can take out before they go down. If they hurt us bad enough, then it’s not a bad bargain for them even if they do buy a plot.”

“Think they can do that, sir?” Lopatinsky asked anxiously.

“I hope not, and that’s the best answer I can give you.” Sam tapped the two broad gold stripes on his sleeve. He was proud he’d got them. He hadn’t dreamt of coming so far when he scrambled up the hawse hole into officers’ country. “I know a little something about what we do on the water. Land fighting-the only thing I know is, I’m glad I’m not in it. It’s a nasty, bloody business. When we go into action here, it’s usually over in a hurry, anyhow.”

“Yes, sir,” Lopatinsky said. “How long did we need to knock that limey out?”

“I didn’t look at my watch, but it wasn’t long.” Sam let it go at that. If one of the Karlskrona’s big shells had hit the Josephus Daniels, the fight might have been over even quicker, with the wrong side wi

“Could she have sunk us if she hit us?” Hrolfson asked, proving ignorance could be bliss.

“You bet your sweet ass she could,” Sam blurted. Hrolfson and Lopatinsky both stared at him. He laughed self-consciously. “You wanted a straight answer. You got one.”

“You usually give ’em, Skipper. That’s good,” Lopatinsky said. Hrolfson nodded. They made Sam almost as proud as knocking out the Karlskrona had done.

XX

On the women’s side again. In a way, Hipolito Rodriguez had to be more careful there than he did on the other side of Camp Determination. He knew in his gut that the black men were dangerous. With the women, he and the other men in gray could let down their guard. They could regret it if they did, too.

The women tried to make the men set over them let down their guard. They dressed provocatively, and acted provocative. And it wasn’t just an act-a lot of them would deliver. They wanted more food, better food, better quarters. They wanted to stay out of the bathhouses. They hadn’t needed long to realize those were news as bad as it got. The trucks, by contrast, nobody seemed to mind. The mallates knew they would be leaving Camp Determination in them, so didn’t worry about climbing aboard. That the trips had no destination, they hadn’t figured out.

“Hello, Mistuh Sergeant, suh.” The black woman who spoke to Rodriguez was falling out of her blouse. “You takes care o’ me, I takes care o’ you. I takes care o’ you real good.” She had only her body to get what she wanted. She used what she had, striking a pose that would have got her arrested on any street corner in the CSA.

Rodriguez just kept walking. He’d found that worked best. If you stopped to talk it over and argue with every colored woman who made advances, you’d never go anywhere and you’d never get anything done all day.