The Circle (49 page)

“Do you know what's going on here? We're steaming in close formation. There's no radar. Do you know where the carrier is?”

“Sure, man.” The slouched figure gestured vaguely. “Out there.”

“Okay,” Dan said. The dragging, vague voice told him clearly enough what Lassard had been smoking. “That's it, that's enough. I'm through screwing around. You're on report.”

The slow voice became drugged with contempt. “Yeah? You scare me, Lenson. Know that? You really do. Really do … you haven't got a thing on Slick Lassard, man. You're clueless what's going down on this ship. Everybody, they all laugh at you, man. Call you Cadet Cuboid, call you Milk Duds, call you Ensign Fuzz, call you Dudley Dickhead. You're one sorry, lost, lying motherfucker.”

“That's it, Slick. I don't know how you got through that search clean. But this time I'm writing you up myself. I—”

“Go fuck yourself, Officer Pig.”

Dan grabbed a handful of foul-weather jacket and jerked the seaman upright. He shoved him toward the shield and heard binoculars clang against steel. “Do your fucking job!” he shouted.

“You're dead, Lenson. For that, you're a dead man. Slick's friends'll see to that. They'll find you driftin', man. Then we'll all go fuck your slant-eye bitch wife—”

Dan cut him off. He had to leave or he'd hit him, beat his face in, kill him. “We'll talk at captain's mast. Shut your face and stand your watch!”

“Yeah, you and the XO, we'll see you later.”

He was shaking with rage when he got back inside. Evlin was by the radio and the captain had settled into his chair. He listened to them with half his attention. The other half was occupied with Lassard's threat. How had he known about Susan?

“Darn. I forgot my pipe.”

“Why don't you go below and get it, sir?”

“Al, you know as soon as I leave, they'll put a signal in the air for us to take plane guard.”

“Then I'll take us there, sir.”

“Suppose they come around to two-five-zero, two-six-zero, like they did to launch. What'll you do?”

“Same as last time. Come around with ten degrees right rudder. That'll give us a turning circle of twelve hundred yards. Steady on two-six-zero, slow to fifteen knots. I'll wait for
Kennedy
to pass us, then come right and fall in astern.”

“No, damn it. It'll—wait a minute.” Dan heard Packer coughing. “It takes forever that way. No, when she comes around this time I want you to come right to one-three-zero, kick us up to flank, and go down the bird farm's port side. Once you're past, swing hard left and you'll be in the slot.”

“Sir, that'll be faster, but it'll put us a lot closer to the carrier. She'll be turning into us. And we'll be crossing her bow at some point.”

“It's too slow your way. Bring that board over here.”

They conferred for a while. At last Packer swung down. “Captain's off the bridge,” Pettus announced.

“What was that all about?” asked Dan.

“Oh, changing station. I'll go over it with you after we've executed.”

They stood in the dark for some minutes. Then the pritac began muttering again. “Angelcake, this is Beacon. Signal follows, execute to follow. Foxtrot corpen two-six-zero. Foxtrot speed twenty-seven. Over.”

“Well, he called that one,” said Evlin. “Soon as he goes below, things happen.
Kennedy
'll execute in a minute. But he didn't—” Dan heard the rattle of the handset. The transmit light glowed. “Beacon, this is Snowflake. Do you desire us to take Station Two? Over.”

“This is Beacon,” said the speaker faintly. “That is affirmative. Break. All units, turn two-six-zero, speed twenty-seven. I say again, turn two-six-zero, speed twenty-seven. Standby. Execute. Over.”

“Right standard rudder, steady course one-three-zero, engines ahead flank for twenty-seven knots,” said Evlin.

The enlisted men repeated it in bored tones. The telegraph pinged. Dan took a bearing on the carrier. The stern light had disappeared and new ones, a pattern of them, prickled the night. All were fuzzed as if by mist. “She's coming around,” he reported. “Now bears zero-six-three.”

“Very well,” said Evlin. “Bos'n, we're going to plane guard again. Get the boat crew up. Have them make preparations to lower at three minutes' notice.”

“Steady on one-three-zero, sir,” said Coffey from the wheel.

“Very well. Mr. Lenson, bearing to the guide?”

“One-six-five again, sir.”

“One-six-five?”

“I mean, zero-six-five. Sorry, sir.”

“Keep them coming.”

The door opened and someone came on the bridge. Dan could tell by the cavendish scent who it was. He felt a twinge of annoyance. A pipe didn't break blackout, he supposed. But he'd just told the men not to smoke.

“You start the turn, Al?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Where's
Kennedy?
I can't see her.”

“Off the port bow now, Captain.”

Packer crossed the bridge with heavy, dragging steps, and went out onto the wing. Dan saw his face lighted momentarily by the alidade, heard muttered speech. Actually, he thought, there's a little light. He could see better now than when he'd come on. Could see silhouettes, at least.

The captain's bulky shadow came back in and stood looking forward. “Damn it, Al,” he said, sounding irritated. “What are we doing? Come left. Left standard rudder, come to course zero-nine-zero.”

“Left standard rudder, zero-nine-zero,” repeated Coffey in a slightly less bored tone.

“Captain, have you taken the conn?”

“Yeah, I've got the goddamn conn, nobody else up here seems to know what to do with it. What speed are we at?”

“Twenty-seven knots, sir.”

“Let's kick her up. Give me ahead flank, twenty-nine.”

Connolly, the lee helmsman, repeated the order as he racked the handles ahead.

Dan went out on the wing. The alidade was slightly off and he centered it on the carrier. It was dead ahead now and the lights had changed from a line to a cluster. Some were white, some red, some green or greenish white, low in the water. They seemed to be closing; he could see them plainly now without magnification. He couldn't tell what angle he was seeing the other ship from. He went back inside. “Bearing zero-eight-zero,” he said.

“To what?” said the captain. Evlin was bent over the chart table.

“To
Kennedy,
sir.”

“Sir,” said Evlin, “this course puts us only four hundred yards from the carrier's track.”

Packer peered forward. Dan went out on the wing again. The lights ahead were getting brighter. A few seconds went by. He heard Evlin say something else. Almost at once then the captain called out, quite loudly and clearly, “Increase your rudder to left full.”

“Left full, aye,” said Coffey. He sounded alert now.

Dan realized suddenly the carrier was much closer than he'd thought. The small lights were not in her superstructure but at the leading edge of the flight deck. He went inside in time to hear Evlin say, “Sir, we're closing way too fast.”

“Increase rudder to left hard. All engines ahead emergency flank!” shouted the captain. Evlin left the chart table and ran to starboard. Dan followed him.

The lights were bright now, imminent, moving from dead ahead to starboard as the destroyer heeled. Bells rang as Pettus, shoving Connolly aside, cranked the engine-order handles from ahead flank to back full and forward again. Evlin hung in the wing door for a moment, muttered, “My God,” and ran back to the helm.

Dan, left alone on the wing, stood frozen as the silhouette of an aircraft carrier suddenly took shape out of what had a moment before been empty night. Seventy feet high, filling the sky. The lights were steady along the deck edge. The cream of bow wave glowed a lighter black. It could not be more than a hundred yards away, and it was coming directly at him. He gripped the splinter shield, unable to move or breathe. Behind him a cry of “Stand by for collision!” was followed instantly by the electric clang of the alarm.

The carrier's bow tore into them a hundred feet behind the bridge.
Ryan
heeled bodily, knocking him off his feet onto the gratings. A long, terrifyingly loud shriek of tearing steel succeeded the blow. The ship whipped and shuddered under him. He hugged the deck mindlessly, binoculars biting into his stomach. The lights, penumbraed by mist, slid by high above. A scream of rending metal, a roar of escaping steam struggled against the drone of a horn. Something exploded aft, jolting the deck against his cheek and lighting the bridge like instantaneous daylight.

He scrambled up and was propelled by the lean of the deck into the pilothouse, his legs buckling under him.

He blinked flash from his eyes, to find its snug familiarity transformed into something new and terrible. Coffey was still at the wheel. Pettus was shouting into the 1MC, but nothing was audible above the din. The chart table light flickered and went out, as did the binnacle and the pilots on all the radios. Packer was clinging to his chair, staring out to starboard. Dan didn't see Evlin.

He fetched up against the helm and clung to it, looking out. The deck-edge lights were still sliding by above them, like a train on a high trestle. Then they were gone. The deck shuddered. Another explosion came from aft, a deep boom that rattled the windows. The ship swayed back to vertical, then reeled to starboard with sickening ease. The deck took on a backward slant.

“Abandon ship,” Pettus was yelling into the mike. But it was dead.

“Knock that off,” said Dan.

“Sir, we got to get off her—”

He ran to the port side. The carrier loomed abeam of them, a black cliff higher than
Ryan
's mast tops, studded with dim lights. It was moving away. He craned aft over the splinter shield. Kerosene reeked the air. Flames were shooting up, with crackling rapid bangs, all along the Asroc deck and down to the waterline. A black mass loomed astern, not burning, but illuminated by the flames. It took a few seconds before he understood that it was the aft section of the ship.

A door slammed open on the 02 level and men spilled out. Some of them stopped at the life-jacket lockers and began to pull gear from them.

He turned back into the bridge. Packer was on the starboard wing, still looking aft. His pipe was still in his mouth. Evlin was with him, standing straight, hands white on his binoculars. “She's cut in two, sir!” Dan shouted above the rising roar of the fire. The deck lurched again, rising under them, and the slant aft steepened.

“She never responded to the emergency bell,” said Packer hoarsely. His face was bleak and still in the growing firelight.

“She's cut in two aft. Should we pass ‘abandon ship,' sir?”

“Al, what do you think?”

“I'm afraid she's going, sir.”

“All right,” said the captain. “No power to signal with … but I guess the fire'll show everybody where we are. Pass ‘abandon ship' by word of mouth. Try to keep her afloat, and get as many off as we can.”

*   *   *

HE found himself at the bottom of the ladder on the main deck. He didn't recall the process of getting there. He felt disoriented, remote, as if watching a film. His mouth tasted strange, as if he'd been sucking on a knife. Men shoved past him. He saw their faces clearly now in the glare. A man in trousers but naked from there up threw his legs over the lines and dropped, running in the air. “Abandon ship,” Dan shouted, fighting his way aft, in the direction of the fire. He heard them repeating it behind him.

The flames were coming up from the after deckhouse, from what was left of the Dash deck, licking swiftly forward. Their tips fluttered in the wind like bright pennants. They danced on the surface of the hull, and he thought for a confused moment that the metal itself was burning. The smoke was choking and the heat grew as he fought his way aft.

He got abreast of the Asroc launcher before the smoke and heat forced him back. He suddenly realized he was still carrying the binoculars. He tore them off and wedged them carefully behind a standpipe.

He had to think, had to think what to do. Boy's Town was forward of the break. He wanted his books, Susan's picture. He fought his way inside, past the sailors coming out. The stream pushed him back.

One of the men coming out was Norden. His skivvy shirt was torn and he was barefoot. He clutched Dan's arm. “Lenson! What happened? I was below, in my rack, all of a sudden—”

“
Kennedy
hit us.”

“Christ. Christ! And the captain—”

“He said to abandon, Rich. Get as many guys off as we can before she goes.”

The weapons officer stared past him. For an infinitely long, suspended space of time that could have been instants or years, Dan saw the fire reflected in his wide-open eyes, two miniature cones of vivid flame, as if the burning was within him, not around him.

Then Norden was gone, running, headed aft.

Suddenly his disorientation, his remoteness, was replaced by fear. Forget the picture. He had to get a life jacket, get to his raft, get
off.
He was going to die here if he didn't get off. He lurched into a clumsy run, slamming into other men. The deck slanted farther and he dropped to all fours, scrabbling on hands and knees. An animal moan rose in his throat.

Then someone was gripping his arm, calling his name over the growing hissing roar. He tried to pull away. But the hand held fast.

He came back to himself with a rush of shame, straightening and turning, shielding his eyes against the light.

Chief Pedersen and three others were hauling gear out of one of the fire stations. One of them, mustached, thin, grime-faced, let go of Dan's shoulder. He bent, straightened, and his glasses flashed as he tossed the end of a roll of hose over the side.