Herman Wouk - The Winds of War

Janice was awakened by the sound of a shower starting full force. Her luminous bed clock read five minutes past five. She showered too, put on a housecoat, and combed her hair. In the living room Victor Henry sat buttoned up in white and gold, reading Navy correspondence by lamplight. His close-shaved face was ashen, which she more or less expected, after his dispatching a quart of brandy and passing sixteen hours in a stupor. Pencilling a note on a letter, he cleared his throat and said placidly, “Good morning, Jan. Did I disturb you? Sorry.”

“Morning, Dad. No, Vic often gets me up around now. Is it too early for some bacon and eggs?”

“Matter of fact, that sounds pretty good. Warren get back last night?”

“Yes. He’s in there.” Janice wanted to tell him about the loss of the Devilfish, but he scared her, sitting there livid and cool in his starched uniform. He would find out, she thought, soon enough. She made coffee, fed the baby, and started breakfast. As usual, the smell of frying bacon brought Warren out, humming and brushing his hair, dressed in a khaki uniform. He grinned at his father, and Janice realized that he was putting on an act and would not disclose the Devilfish news. “Hi, Dad. How’re you doing?”

“Not badly — all things considered.” Brushing a fist against his forehead, Pug smiled ruefully. “I seem to have slept around the clock.”

“Yes. Well, travel will do that to a fellow.”

“Exactly. Funny effect travel has. Did I empty the bottle?”

Warren laughed. “Bone dry.”

“I only remember drinking the first half.”

“Dad, it was just what the doctor ordered. How about a hair of the dog?”

Pug raised a hand. “That’s the road to perdition. This coffee’s excellent.”

Pouring himself a cup, Warren said, “You picked a good day to sleep through. Lots of news, none of it good.”

“For instance?”

“Hitler and Mussolini declared war on us.”

“They did? Then the lineup’s complete. They’re fools, making it easier for the President. Is that the worst of it?”

“Before you sacked out, had you heard about the Prince of Wales and the Repulse ? The Japs got them both off Singapore.”

“What!”

“Air attack. Battleships versus airplanes again, Dad, and they sank ‘em both.”

“God in heaven, Warren, they got the Prince of Wales? Did the British confirm that?”

“And the Repulse . Churchill admitted it. The Limeys are through in this ocean, right at the start. Australia’s naked. Looks like it’s all up to us out here.”

Victor Henry half buried his face in a hand. That great ship in its splashy camouflage, he thought, that dark elegant wardroom, those tired, gallant officers and sailors, that deck where Winston Churchill and Franklin Roosevelt had sung hymns under the guns — gone, gone, sunk in the far Pacific! He said in a low mournful tone, “The changing of the guard.”

“That’s about the size of it.”

“Have they hit the Philippines yet?”

Warren took a moment to sip coffee. He knew little about Clark Field; the American command in Luzon was muffling information that might panic the people. Even the official account of the Cavite raid had been skimpy. He had picked up the

Devilfish

news from a secret dispatch, and he was hoping the report might prove wrong; or if not, that a later dispatch would at least show Byron among the survivors.

“Well, they sort of plastered Cavite.”

“Oh, they did?”

“Yes.”

Staring at his son, Pug said, “Any dope?”

“Not much. They apparently went for the shore installations.”

“The Devilfish was alongside.”

“So you told me.”

Warren was relieved when Janice called them to the table. Pug picked at the food. It was embarrassing, with son and daughter-in-law eating heartily, but his throat was almost shut, and he had to force down the mouthfuls he ate.

“What’s the plan of the day, Dad?” Warren said, as lack of talk grew awkward.

“Huh? Oh, I thought I might scare up a tennis game at the club.”

“ Tennis? Are you serious?”

“Why not? Start getting back in some kind of shape.”

“What about going down to Cincpac Personnel?”

“Well, I’ll tell you, Warren, I’ve been wondering about that. At this point a thousand officers are looking for new assignments. Every Tom, Dick, and Harry of the battleship force must be warming chairs down at Personnel. The Navy will find work for me in due course, and maybe at this point I’d just better take what comes.”

“You’re dead wrong.” In his life Warren had never heard his father talk this way, and he reacted immediately and forcibly. “You’ve had a bad break, but you’re not Tom, Dick, or Harry. You’re entitled to the best ship command they’ve got left in this fleet. You’ve already lost a day. The Navy’s not going to come looking for you, Dad. You play tennis for a few days and you’ll end up back in War Plans. Is that what you want?”

Warren’s energetic tone and thinking, so much like his own younger self, drew a smile from Pug. “Jan, hand me the Cincpac roster. It’s there on top of that pile of mail.”

She passed him the mimeographed sheets and he leafed through them. “Hm. Interesting. ‘Personnel Section — Captain Theodore Prentice Larkin, II.’”

“Know him?” Warren asked.

“Jocko Larkin? Biggest boozer in my Academy class. I pulled him out of the Severn once when he fell off a sailboat dead drunk. Quite a wingding — Thanksgiving, I think — and I was the only sober one aboard. I didn’t drink then.”

“Dad, our squadron’s got an officers’ meeting at 0700. I’ll drop you off at Cincpac. Let’s go.”

“Well, okay. Jocko sure won’t throw me out.”

At the overlook point where Janice had watched the Japanese onslaught, Warren halted the car. The sun had not yet risen. In the grayish-pink morning light far down in the harbor, there lay the incredible picture: seven United States battleships in a double row, canted, sunk, or turned turtle. Smoke rising from the wrecks still drifted heavily over the black flat oily water.

Bitterly Victor Henry muttered, looking out through the windshield, “The game board after the game.”

“After the first move,” Warren retorted. “Have you heard what Halsey said when they told him aboard the Enterprise about the attack? ‘Before we’re through with them, the Japanese Language will be spoken only in hell! ’’”

With a cynical grunt Pug asked, “Did that impress you?”

“It gave the crew a big charge. Everyone was quoting it.”

“Yes. Good talk for sailors. Beating the Japanese now is a tough battle problem. Especially with a bigger war on our hands in Europe.”

“Dad, we ought to do it handily, with the stuff we’ve got building.”

“Pug said, “Maybe. Meantime we’re in for a rugged couple of years. How much stomach do the people back home have for defeat? Because they’re going to take plenty in this ocean. Maybe they’ll pressure the President to quit and make a deal. They don’t really give a damn about Asia, they never have.”

Warren started the car. His father’s low mood disturbed him. “They won’t quit. Not now. Not after this. Let’s get you down to Cincpac.”

He drove in his usual breakneck fashion. His father appeared to take no notice. Neither spoke. In this lame silence they arrived at the Cincpac building and pulled into a parking space.

“Well!” Pug Henry roused himself from a listless abstraction. “Here we are. Now, what about you? Will I be seeing you again?”