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doctor, "that we're on our way again. "The O.O.M. says go, we go."
"My patient, or is it star boarder, tells me it's God's will. You tell me it's the Admiral's." He held
up a ham-dramatic finger and mugged astonishment. "Or perhaps they're the same after all."
"Don't be irreverent," said Cathy.
"To which one of 'em, girl? And what, may I ask, makes me so fortunate this morning?" He
looked at the torpedoman and then at the girl. "My, business is brisk."
"She came down the conning tower without using the ladder. But gracefully," added the Captain.
"I was not graceful," Cathy pouted. "The Captain dropped me in like a sack of coal."
"Let's see it. Oh my. You did give that a wringing out, didn't you?" he turned to the torpedoman.
"And what's with you, Berky?"
"I'm all right now, sir," said Berkowitz shakily. "I thought I had a furlough and they pulled it out
from under me and I kind of blew my stack. Admiral Nelson told me to come to you and get quieted
down."
Jamieson bent over him, took his wrist, looked closely at his eyes. "All right. You seem okay
now. I don't know really if the God's will hypothesis holds water or not, but I can tell you one thing
for sure: For enlisted personnel, practically anybody's will take precedence over the e.m.'s."
"Y-yes sir." Berkowitz almost smiled.
"And take this doctor's advice," added Jamieson. "Don't argue with admirals."
"I won't, sir."
Jamieson stood up and waved him out. When he had gone, he said, "Nelson give him some
lumps?"
The Captain told him what had happened. The doctor shrugged. "Rough. But then, this is likely
to be a rough trip all around. You straighten 'em out or you throw 'em over the wall. If a man's going
to have the miseries, he'd best not be corked up in a bottle with a bunch of others. The Admiral
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doesn't have to be nice. He doesn't have to be kind. He just has to be right." He turned to Cathy.
"Get that shoe and stocking off."
"I'll go forward," said the Captain, rising.
"She'll be all right," said the doctor. "Nothing busted. And you know the compression bandages
we have nowadays. She'll walk out of here. Only," he said sternly to Cathy, "no dancing on no
chopping blocks for a while."
Cathy and the Captain laughed. "Oh, you heard about that."
"It didn't get lost in the flurry of news we've been having."
The inner door swung open and the Captain, in the very act of stepping over the high-stilled out
door, swung around and his jaw dropped. "What the devil are you doing here?"
"Now that is what I call a warm and welcoming statement," smiled Dr. Susan Hiller.
"Sue!" cried Cathy.
"Hello, honey. What happened to you?"
"Used a steel deck for a trampoline," said the doctor.
"Dr. Hiller, I thought I told you to go ashore."
"I thought you told me I could go ashore."
"I remember what I said."
"Oh... Lee," Cathy chided.
"I'll carry my weight," said Susan Hiller.
Jamieson, who had never lost the gloss of his admiration of Dr. Hiller, said gently, "Cap'n isn't
the discussion academic at this point?"
Without answering him, Crane fixed Dr. Hiller with a cold eye. "You chose to stay aboard,
then."
A smile twitched the corners of her carven mouth. "I came aboard to study men under stress
conditions," she reminded him.
"There'll be plenty of that ashore."
"My present project was to study them here." Suddenly she smiled. The effect, as always, was
like throwing back heavy drapes on a sunny day. "I'd like to stop fencing with you, Captain. I was
going to request permission to stay aboard anyway. Days ago I took the trouble to find out if my extra
mouth would burden your stores, or even your oxygen supply. I checked on the available space. I
wouldn't think of doing it if I'd be in the way. And I'm not just supercargo. I think I can help."
"Let me underline that," pleaded Jamieson. "God knows what we're in for now. Dr. Hiller's a
specialist in something we're going to get a lot of. I'm supposed to handle these stress cases along with
everything else: Dr. Hiller's being here is a gift from God."
"God seems to be taking a special interest in this project," said the Captain, but he had relaxed;
he was kidding; it was all right.
Dr. Hiller, sensing it immediately, said, "Thank you, Captain."
Crane saluted and went out.
"And thank you," said Dr. Jamieson to the psychiatrist.
"Don't," she said. "People are always attaching nobility to the simple matter of doing a job. I
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know what I have to do here," she added with a sudden profound gravity, "I know what I must
do, and I know I'm equipped to do it. I had no choice; the choice made itself." Abruptly businesslike,
she changed her voice and the subject and demanded, "What was the matter with Berkowitz?"
Jamieson, getting to work on Cathy's ankle, said, "The poor kid. His wife's expecting a baby
about now. He doesn't know if the baby's alive or dead or his wife either. He got a little hysterical."
"A lot hysterical," Cathy amended. "I was there, and I don't blame him a bit. But he didn't help
himself by taking off on the Admiral."
"What happened?"
"The O.O.M. pinned his ears back clear to the sacroiliac, which he then, in a manner of speaking,
kicked.... I told Lee it was equivalent to slapping a hysterical patient. Was I right?"
"You could be. It depends. Slapping a hysterical patient can be beneficial if the slap is
administered by a friend or a stranger, but not by an enemy."
"Oh, the Admiral's not his enemy!"
"No? Ah... tell me; how did he deliver this figurative slap?"
"First he told Berkowitz he would let him get ashore and then he said it was because he wouldn't
have the likes of him aboard; 'I hate a weeper,' is what he said."
"Pick 'em up and slam 'em down hard," said Jamieson.
"A little harder than hysteria called for, perhaps. That sounds inimical enough to me."
"Oh, Sue, you just don't understand the military situation," said Cathy ardently. "The man in
command can't have an ordinary set of values. I've thought a lot about this I had to  I'm marrying
one of the monsters. The commanding officer, however decent and kind a man he might be, has to
replace a lot of ordinary standards. (Ouch! You're putting on that bandage awful tight.) 'Right' and
'wrong' can be completely different things when you look at them in terms of a military operation.
Admiral Nelson's heart might bleed for Berkowitz and very probably does, but the welfare of his ship,
his mission and his crew have to come first. And though I hate to say it, a hysterical sailor with
primary concerns different from the ship's is an enemy."
Susan Hiller smiled a small eloquent smile, nodded a tiny, significant nod. "Absolutely all I
suggested was that the Admiral treated him like an enemy."
"Oh," said Cathy. "Oh dear."
"Which saves the ship and destroys the man. Which creates stress conditions on military-type
missions, especially submarines. Which explains again why I decided to stay."
"Now hear this!" clattered the annunciator. "Torpedoman Berkowitz. Lay forward to Main
Control, on the double."
The three in the sick bay looked at one another. "Excuse me," said Susan Hiller quietly, and went
out.
"Berkowitz," said Jamieson, his eyes on his bandaging job, "is now tried and sentenced.
Execution of sentence follows." [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]