China Sea (20 page)

“Sir, this might interest you. Gentleman here says he has orders to report aboard. This is our CO, Dan Lenson.”

“Lieutenant Commander Dominick Colosimo, sir.”

Dan shook hands, looking Colosimo up and down. He was clean-cut, earnest-looking, fit-looking. “You say you have orders to
Gaddis
, uh, Dominick?”

“Go by Dom, sir. No, sir. Not exactly.”

“What exactly do you have?”

Colosimo produced a folded mass of paper and flashed a pink ID card. Dan took it beneath a deck light as Colosimo explained. “I'm a reservist, out of Cincinnati. My orders are to Exercise Oceanic Prospect II. They don't specify the ship I'm to report aboard, but the ord mod says I meet it in Singapore. This is Singapore, and you're the only U.S. Navy ship here.”

Dan rubbed his face, trying to focus. “Sounds tenable, but we haven't heard of anything by that name. What kind of exercise is it supposed to be?”

“Anti-pirate operations in the South China Sea.”

“Aha,” said Doolan, with great satisfaction. “Tell us more.”

“The conference is tomorrow, at the Hyatt on Scotts Road. I have a copy of the schedule, and the op order.”

“Funny they didn't send us one,” said Chick.

“Yeah, I'm getting the impression we're at the far end of a definite informational bottleneck,” Dan told him. “We didn't get any answer yet from that cable the consul sent, did we?”

“Not that I know of.”

“No response on the sitreps. No orders waiting here. We've got to tap into Fleet Broadcast somehow. I'll just bet somebody at the communications station dicked up and there's fourteen million messages waiting for us we can't get to because we don't have the crypto capability.”

Colosimo bent to his briefcase. “You can copy mine if you want, sir. The operations order, I mean.”

“I might do that. And you're what, a liaison of some kind?”

“Yes, sir; I write the op orders, then go out to help run the exercise. I'm supposed to attach to the foreign flag officer, but I suspect I'll be reporting to you as well. I've done one of these before, last year. Oceanic Prospect I was in the Mosquito Bay area, between Jamaica and Nicaragua.”

Fighting off the urge to fall asleep, Dan went through the op order quickly, picking up the essentials.
Gaddis
was to be part of a multinational task force. The TNTF would rendezvous at such and such a lat and long in the South China Sea and patrol to suppress piracy and conduct such other activities as COMTNTF may direct. “What's
TNTF
stand for?” he asked Colosimo.

“I made that one up. Somebody else asks me, I'd say ‘Territorial Neighbor,' meaning they border on pirate-infested seas. But actually it means ‘Tiny Nation Task Force.'”

“Cute. Chick, we need four copies of this as soon as possible. Me, the XO, you, and a CIC-slash-bridge copy. Welcome aboard, Dominick. How long will you be with us?”

“Just two weeks' active duty, sir.”

“What do you do when you're not Navy Reserving?”

“Well, sir, in real life I do initial public offerings for new companies, selling stock when they go public.”

“Oh, yeah? Mr. Juskoviac will put you in a stateroom. We've got plenty open at the moment. Hope you like standing bridge watches. Chick, what else is going on tonight?”

“Mr. Armey came back and a truck and crew came in from Ban Leong and they're all down there welding the crack and getting the pump back together. Oh, and the local cops called. They picked Pistolesi up down on Pink Street. Said he fit the profile of a drug dealer. I had to make a call to the local hoosegow to spring him. They're bringing him back under guard.”

Dan said fine. He took a quick tour of the decks, paying particular attention to moorings and fenders, then suddenly checked his watch. He did a time-zone calculation in his head and sat down at the phone in the quarterdeck shack. He was out on his feet, but this was the right time for the Far West. It took twenty minutes to find the right combination of numbers and an operator who would take his phone card. But at length it worked, and he got to talk to Nan for three or four minutes before she went to school. He told her about Singapore, that he loved her, that he'd be sending her something. She sounded less than interested, but it was still good hearing her voice. Finally she said she really had to go or she'd miss the bus. He sat looking at the phone for a few seconds, then decided to try for a double.

But all he got at Blair's apartment in D.C. was her answering machine. Her office phone didn't answer at all. He called the apartment again and left his number and his schedule, told her where he was, to call him back. Even held on for a few seconds after that, hoping she'd come out of the shower, or whatever, and pick up. But it didn't happen.

He stood and stretched, his mind illuminating momentarily with the remembered glory of her naked body. But then that memory was replaced, intercut, with a shutter-flicker image of Bobbie Wedlake's, half-glimpsed, half-imagined through the clinging dress. He blinked, confused, then yawned again, so hard his jaw damn near locked open, and with that simple bodily act utter exhaustion sucked the last erg of energy out of him. Sleep dragged his eyes closed at last, irresistible, undeniable. They were in port. They were safe.

He barely made it to his cabin, barely got his clothes off when it struck, sudden and dark and overwhelming as the black bar of a squall to a craft that has been at sea too long.

13

THE fuel agent was still smiling, but another expression was becoming visible beneath it. He held out the bill again. “Someone must pay. Who will pay, Captain?”

“Let me speak to my supply officer,” Dan told him. “Can I get back to you on this? We won't be getting under way today. Hey, we won't run out on you.”

The agent hesitated, obviously unwilling to leave it at that. Finally he said, “I will wait, Captain.” He went out on the starboard wing, stood watching a gray-black wall of squall that moved south toward Sumatra, or Sumatera, as the charts called it. Behind it, apparently undeterred by the just-departed downpour, traffic zipped by on a parkway built across the shallow green sea.

Dan reached Zabounian in the supply office, asked him to come to the bridge. When he got there, he pointed out to the waiting back. “He wants paid. Now.”

Zabounian looked embarrassed. “Well, we got a problem there, Skipper.”

“What's the deal, Dave?”

“The thing is, we're broke. I briefed you on the OPTAR fund status after we got under way from Karachi. I was hoping there'd be something in the mail for us here, but there's zip.”

The OPTAR was the fund for spare parts and supplies, what a ship ran on. The cash came from fleet funds. Normally the squadron commander maintained the account, setting allowances for each of his ships.
Gaddis
had had an account in Staten Island and Philly, when she'd been part of DESRON Twelve, but they'd spent it down to zero before the decommissioning. After that, Khashar had paid
Tughril
's bills from Pakistani accounts.

Now they were back on their own. Dan spread his fingers out on the bulkhead, wishing he'd paid more attention to Zabounian's warnings. The financials were dull, but without them a ship didn't steam. Normally the XO kept his eagle eye on them, but Dan was past expecting much on that score. He grunted, “OK, how are we going to take care of this? The fuel part first; we've got the guy standing here with his hand out.”

The supply officer recapped how things usually worked. Logistics requests went up the chain of command to CTF 73, the Seventh Fleet support entity that coordinated port visits and went through the bid process to select chandlers. He said he'd sent their request from Karachi, and Dan recalled signing it. “But we never got a reply, and now nobody seems to know who we are.”

“What do you mean, nobody knows who we are? We inchopped to Seventh Fleet—”

“We
tried
to. Did you ever see a response? Look; I've been over all this with the NRCC boys here. They say, ‘
Gaddis
is an Atlantic Fleet ship; report your problems to your own squadron.' I say, ‘No, I'm transiting to a PACFLEET area of responsibility, and I need logistic support.' They say, ‘Give us the funding data and we'll provide all the support you want. Otherwise, we can't help you.' End of discussion.”

“This is ludicrous. Did you talk to the man in charge? Tell him we're in Exercise Oceanic Prospect?”

“Right, I did, and they say it's not a Seventh Fleet exercise. I'm telling you, I arm-wrestled this squid all afternoon.”

“So what's the next step?”

“Well, we could use a Gold Ticket. That's a Form Forty-four, emergency procurement. We make it out and give it to the vendor. He takes it to the Contracting Center here in Singapore.”

“So why can't we do that?”

“I don't have a number for the fuel account in this port. We have to have a number, or anybody could come in here and fuel up and say, ‘Charge it to the USN.'

“But Mr. See here comes alongside, says he's our boy, so I told him to go ahead and fill 'er up. But he wants payment now and—” Zabounian's face hardened. “I don't have it, sir, that's all, and we're going to have the same problem with everything else we need. I've been standing steaming watches because you said we needed the bodies. And I'm happy to do it, but we can't neglect proper supply procedure. Or when it comes our turn for an inspection—”

Dan reflected sourly that that was all they needed, an inspection. It would be perfect timing for one. Aloud he said, “I know, and you've done great so far, Dave. But where are we going with this? Can we get under way for this Reluctant Dragon, whatever they call this thing?”

“We're getting critical on parts, tools, and consumables. The low-level alarm's going off on rags and toilet paper. We've got a lot fewer mouths aboard, so our dry stores are still pretty good … but if we want fresh food and milk, we're going to have to pay for those, too.”

“I can't believe this is the first time a Navy ship's ever been in this position, Dave. What's the supply manual say to do, a case like this?”

“Sir, unless it's wartime, I'd say, just sit tight. Let the contact team send a message to Honolulu. Get a firm account number; get some bucks in our billfolds before we poke our nose out of harbor again.”

“You're saying this is a showstopper.”

“You asked for the book solution.”

“I guess I did. But if we're supposed to play in this exercise, I can't see sitting by the pier and saying we can't go because we don't have the right numbers to put on our chits. That isn't the Navy way. What's the non-book solution?”

Zabounian outlined two. He still had, in effect, “checks” from their old DESRON Twelve account. He could charge fuel and consumables to that account and send a message back to Staten Island explaining what they'd done, so the N-4 there could pass the buck up the chain of command to be routed laterally to Pacific Fleet.

“This vendor might not want to take anything billed to somebody he doesn't know.”

“OK, fallback, I fill in a Form Forty-four with numbers out of the air, give it to him, and have him take it over to the contact office. We'll be out of port by that time.”

“You mean like forging a check?”

“Well … not exactly. The Navy'll pay him. But I got to warn you, either way it could get you in trouble, Skipper.”

The fuel agent chose that moment to come in off the wing. Rain roared on the overhead, splattered against the windows, dissolved the world into running streams of liquid light. “Captain, I must go over to the Australian frigate. If you would effect payment now, please.”

Dan rubbed his hand over his forehead. “We've got it straightened out. Lieutenant Zabounian will write you a chit on our squadron account.”

The agent looked around the interior of the bridge, as if appraising the brass and brightwork, the binoculars slotted in their holders, just in case. Then, to Dan's relief, he bowed. “Thank you very much. I look forward to serving you again when you return to Singapore.”

He and Zabounian left. Dan took a short tour around the pilothouse, fighting a gnawing unease as the downpour rose to a hollow roar. Glancing at his watch. He needed to go over to the center tomorrow, get this situation straightened out. This was ridiculous.

The growler. It was Doolan. “Hey, Chick. What you got?”

“Sir, I'm going over to the
Darwin
, see if they got any small-arms ammo. Want to come?”

“Yeah, but we're going to have to head right to the Hyatt after that. I want you to go with me to the presail conference.”

“Trop whites?”

“Whites would probably be best for the conference. Take your rain gear, though; it's coming down hard up here right now.”

Doolan said, “Aye,” and hung up. Dan stood motionless for a moment, then spun on his heel and clattered down to his cabin.

Usmani wasn't there. Dan checked his watch. It would be 8:00
P.M
. in D.C. Maybe Blair would be at her apartment now. A quick change, and he'd try calling again. He was snapping his shoulder boards onto their loops when Juskoviac tapped at his door. Dan said, “Yeah, Greg, what is it? I'm pressed for time right now.”

“A problem with Pistolesi.”

“I heard he got sent back aboard under guard.”

“Right, but just now he's refusing orders.”

“What orders? Whose?”

“Mine. I ordered him to stay aboard.”

“You restricted him to the ship?”

“Uh—that was what I told him. But he says he's not going to.”

Dan started on his ribbons, replacing one that was starting to look grubby. “Well, Greg, you sort of have to impose your will on these guys. One way or the other. I've heard it called leadership.”