Ed McBain - The Last Brief

‘We were just having a little coffee, sir. We...’

‘What is this, the Automat? Where’d you get that pie?’

I looked to Parson, and Parson said, ‘One of the cooks, sir. He...’

‘That’s against my orders, Parson,’ the skipper bellowed. “I don’t like thieves aboard my...’

“Hell, sir, I didn’t steal...’

‘And I don’t like profanity, either. Who’s on watch here?’

‘I am, sir,’ I said.

‘Where are you supposed to be, Parson?’

‘Next door, sir. In the radio...”

‘Am I to understand that you’re supposed to be standing a radio watch at this time, Parson?’

‘Yes, sir, but...’

‘Then what the hell arc you doing in here?’ the Old Man roared.

‘I thought I’d...’

‘Get down to the OD, Parson. Tell him I’ve put you on report. This’ll mean a Captain’s Mast for you, sailor.’

‘Sir,’ I said, ‘he was only...’

‘You shut up, Peters! I see you still haven’t got that haircut.’

‘We were out with the drone, sir. I couldn’t...’

‘Get it first thing tomorrow,’ he said, ignoring the fact that we’d be out with the cruiser tomorrow. ‘And now you can dump that coffee pot over the side, and I want that sugar and milk returned to the mess hall.’

‘I’m on watch, sir,’ I said coldly.

‘Do it when you’re relieved, Peters.’ He stood glaring at me, and then asked, ‘Were there any important messages, or were you too busy dining?’

‘None, sir,’ I said.

“All right. I’m going out to the boat deck now to get those men below. I don’t like my ship looking like a garbage scow. Men aren’t supposed to sleep abovedecks.’

‘Yes, sir,’ I said.

‘I’ll be there if anything conies for me. When I come back, you’ll hear me going up the ladder outside. I’ll be in my cabin then. Is that clear?’

‘Yes, sir,’ I said tightly.

‘All right.’ He walked out, and Parson watched him go and then said, ‘Someday that man’s gonna get it, Dave. Someday.’

I didn’t say anything. I watched Parson go down to the OD, and I thought: Not someday. Now.

I heard the Old Man yelling out on the boat deck, and then I heard the grumbling as the guys out there stirred and began packing their mattresses and gear. I was sweating very heavily, and I didn’t think it was from the heat this time. I could feel the hard outline of the .45 against my belly, and I wanted to rip the gun out and just run out onto the boatdeck and pump the bastard full of holes, but that wasn’t the smart way.

The smart way was to be in a spot where I could dump the gun over the side. I stepped out of the radar shack and looked down the passageway to where the skipper was waving his arms and ranting on the boatdeck. There was a gun mount tacked to the side of the ship just outside the passageway and the radar shack. The hatch was closed, and I undid the dogs on it, and shoved it out, and then stepped outside, stationing myself near the magazine box alongside the 20mm mount. I could see the ladder leading up to the bridge and the captain’s cabin from where I was standing. My idea was to plug the captain, dump the gun, and then rush inside, as if I was just coming out of the radar shack after hearing the shot.

I could hear the captain ending his tirade, and I thought to myself that it was the last time he’d chew anybody out. I thought everybody was going to be real tickled about this. Hell, I’d probably get a medal from the crew. It was all over out there on the boat deck now, and I pecked into the passageway and saw the Old Man step through the hatch and glance briefly into the radio shack.

I pulled the .45 out of my shirt.

The gun was very heavy and very hot. My hand slipped on the walnut grip, and I shifted hands and wiped the sweat off on the back of my dungarees. I took a firmer grip on the gun, with the sweat running down my face and over my neck and trickling down my back, sticky and warm. I thumbed off the safety, and the Old Man passed the radar shack and didn’t even look in, and I sucked in a deep breath and waited.

And then he was starting up the ladder, and I thought, Now, you louse, now! and I sighted the gun at the back of his neck.

I squeezed the trigger.

There was a dull click and nothing else, and I was shocked for a second, but I squeezed off again, and there was another dull click, and the Old Man was already halfway up the steps, and he still hadn’t turned. I squeezed the trigger twice more, but I got empty clicks both times, and then the Old Man was out of sight, heading toward his cabin.

I looked down at the gun in my hand, realising it was empty, realising there was no clip in it. I remembered the captain’s orders about no magazines allowed in sidearms or pieces, and I remembered that Ferguson had gone to the gun locker to get a clip for his own empty .45.

I was still sweating, and the hand holding the gun was trembling now, as if I was just realising what I’d almost done, just realising that I’d almost killed a man.

I felt kind of foolish. Maybe an empty gun makes you feel that way. Or maybe the anger had burned itself out when I’d heard those stupid empty clicks. Maybe that, and maybe I was a little glad the gun had been empty, because chewing out a man is one thing, but killing a man is another. He chewed everybody out, when you got down to it, and nobody had gunned him down yet. Just me, who would have already committed murder if it hadn’t been for an order the captain had issued a long time ago. Me, from Red Bank, New Jersey — a murderer.

I dumped the gun over the side, and I heard the small splash when it hit the water, and then I heard the speaker in the radar shack calling, ‘Cavalcade, Cavalcade...’

I ran in and began copying down the weather forecast for Guantanamo Bay, and the weather forecast said there would be rain tonight, and all at once I felt a lot cooler.

It was just a routine call. I remember I was sitting around with Ed, talking about a movie we’d both seen, when Marelli walked in, a sheet of paper in his hand.

‘You want to take this, Art?’

I looked up, pulled a face, and said, ‘Who stabbed who now?’

‘This is an easy one,’ Marelli said, smiling. He smoothed his moustache in an unconscious gesture and added, ‘Accidental shooting.’

‘Then why bother Homicide?’

‘Accidental shooting resulting in death,’ Marelli said.

I got up, hitched up my trousers, and sighed. ‘They always pick the coldest goddamn days of the year to play with war souvenirs.’ I looked at the frost edging the windows and then turned back to Marelli. ‘It was a war souvenir, wasn’t it?’

‘A Luger,’ Marelli said. ‘9mm with a 3⅝ inch barrel. The man on the beat checked it.’

‘Was it registered?’

‘You tell me.’

“Stupid characters,’ I said. ‘You’d think the law wasn’t for their own protection.’ I sighed again and looked over to where Ed was trying to make himself small. ‘Come on. Ed, time to work.’

Ed shuffled to his feet. He was a big man with bright red hair, and a nose broken by an escaped con back in ‘45. It happened that the con was a little runt, about five feet high in his Adler elevators, and Ed had taken a lot of ribbing about that broken nose — even though we all knew the con had used a lead pipe.

‘Trouble with you, Marelli,’ he said in his deep voice, ‘you take your job too seriously.’

Marelli looked shocked. ‘Is it my fault some kid accidentally plugs his brother?’

‘What?’ I asked. I had taken my overcoat from the peg and was shrugging into it now. ‘What was that, Marelli?’

‘It was a kid,’ Marelli said. ‘Ten years old. He was showing his younger brother the Luger when it went off. Hell, you know these things.’