The Soldier Spies (Men at War 3)

In other words, what does the DCNO want to know?

“The admiral will come to your office, Commander,” the aide-de-camp to the DCNO said. He then apparently consulted his watch. “It is 1455. The admiral will expect to be received by Admiral Hawley at 1525. Thank you very much, Commander.”

The phone went dead.

Bitter cocked his head in curiosity, then stood up from his desk and walked to Admiral Hawley’s open office door. The office was neither large nor elegantly furnished. The desk was wood, but it was scarred, and utilitarian rather than ornamental. An American flag and a blue flag with the three silver stars of a Vice Admiral hung limply from poles against the wall. On the desk were In and Out boxes and three telephones, and an old Underwood typewriter was on a fold-out shelf. Bitter knocked at the door.

Admiral Hawley, a silver-haired man in his late forties, glanced up and made a “come in” gesture with his hand. Then, as Bitter walked into the room, he returned his attention to the stack of papers on his desk, reaching several times from them to punch buttons on his Monroe Comptometer, then waiting with impatience as the automatic calculator clicked and spun through its computation process.

Finally, he looked up at Lt. Commander Bitter.

“Admiral, DCNO will be here at 1525. His aide just telephoned.”

"Here?” Admiral Hawley asked, demanding confirmation.

“Yes, sir,” Bitter said. “I told him that I was sure you could be in his office in thirty minutes, and he said DCNO would come here.”

Admiral Hawley made a strange noise, half grunt, half snort.

“Is the Chief still here?” he asked.

“No, sir. I gave him liberty,” Bitter said.

“Then I suppose you had better make a fresh pot of coffee,” the admiral said.

“Yes, sir.”

“Is there anything stronger around?”

“There is the emergency supply, Admiral,” Bitter said.

“This may qualify—I am presuming, Ed, if you knew what he wants, you would have told me—as an emergency.”

“I asked,” Bitter said. “He avoided the question.”

Admiral Hawley nodded.

“Make sure it’s available, and ice and glasses and soda, but don’t bring it out until I tell you to. The only reason I can imagine why he’s coming here is that he’s so ticked off at me that he doesn’t want to wait until I could get over there.”

“I’m sure it’s nothing like that, Admiral,” Bitter said.

“Then you enlighten me, Ed,” Admiral Hawley said.

Bitter thought about it and finally shrugged. He then went to prepare the coffee and to make sure the Chief had not made a midnight requisition upon the bottle of Scotch and the bottle of bourbon, the emergency rations, in the filing cabinet behind his desk.

Admiral Hawley stood up, pulled a thick woolen V-necked sweater off over his head, stuffed it in a cabinet drawer, and then put on his uniform blouse. After that, he made an attempt to make his desk look more shipshape than it did.

And then he stopped.

To hell with it. If I’ve done something wrong, it was an honest mistake, and I’ll take the rap for it. I am no longer a bushy-tailed ensign. For that matter, no longer a bushy-tailed captain. If the DCNO didn’t understand that my desk is crowded with stacks of paper and a clerk’s comptometer because I’m working, fuck him.

The door from the corridor was opened at 1523 hours by the DCNO’s aide-de-camp. The DCNO marched in.

“Good afternoon, Commander,” he said, and quite unnecessarily identified himself. He was a large man, tanned, who looked like—and indeed was—an ex-football player.

“Good afternoon, Admiral,” Bitter said. “Admiral Hawley expects you, sir, and has asked me to show you right in.”

The DCNO’s aide-de-camp, a full commander who looked like a younger version of his boss, nodded at Bitter, and Bitter nodded back.