It's a disaster. Cheers." "Cheers. Yes, and it's your disaster. This is a contest now between Germany and the United States. If you lose, God help you and all mankind. We were too slow, too stupid, and too late. But in the end we did our best. You're doing nothing, in the last running." He swallowed his drink and pulled himself to his feet. "We expected more from the United States Navy, anyhow. I'll tell you that." "The United States Navy is ready," Pug shot back. "I've been working like a bastard all day on a general operation order for convoy. When I saw those headlines, it was like my desk blowing up in my face." "Good God, man, can I say that? Can I say that the Navy, before this press conference, was preparing to start convoying?" "Are you crazy? I'll shoot you if you do." "I don't have to quote you. Please." Pug shook his head. "Can I say your Navy is ready to go over to convoy on a twenty-four hours' notice? Is that true?" 'y, of course it's true. We're out there now. We've got the depth charges on ready. All we have to do is uncover and train out the guns." Tudsbury's bulging eyes were alive now and agleam. "Pug, I want to say that." "Say what?" "That the United States Navy is ready to go over to convoy and expects to do it soon." Pug hesitated only a second or two. "Oh, what the hell. Sure, say it! You can hear that from anybody in the service from C.N.O down. Who doesn't know that?" "The British, that's who. You've saved me." Tudsbury rounded on his daughter. "And you told me not to telephone him, you stupid baggage! Blazes, I'm late." The fat man lumbered out. Pug said to Pamela, "That isn't news." "Oh, he has to work himself up. He'll make it sound like something. He's rather clutching at straws." She sat with her back to the window. The sun in her brown hair made an aureole around herpallid sad face. "Why did you tell him not to phone me?" She looked embarrassed. "I know how hard you're working." "Not that hard." "I meant to ring you before I left." She glanced down at her intertwined fingers, and reached him a mimeographed document from the coffee table. "Have you seen this?" It was the British War Office's instructions to civilians for dealing with German invaders. Pug said, leafing through it, 'I read a lot of this stuff last fall. It's pretty nightmarish, when you start picturing the Germans driving through Kent and marching up Trafalgar Square. It won't happen, though." "Are you sure? After that press conference?" Pug turned up both hands. Pamela said, "They've updated that manual since last year. It's calmer, and a lot more realistic. And therefore somehow more depressing. I can just see it all happening. After Crete, I really do think it may." "You're brave to go back, then." "Not in the least. I can't stand it here. I choke on your steaks and your ice cream. I feel so bloody guilty." Pamela wrung her fingers in her lap. "I just can't wait to go. There's this girl in the office-would you like another drink? no?-well, the fool's gone dotty over a married man. An American. And she has a fiance in the R.A.F. She has nobody to talk to. She pours it all out to me. I have to live with all this maudlin agonizing, day in, day out. It's wearing me down." "What does this American do?" "That would be telling." With a little twist of her mouth she added, "He's a civilian. I can't imagine what she sees in him. I once met him. A big thin flabby chap with glasses, a paunch, and a high giggle." They sat in silence. Pug rattled the ice in his glas,-, round and round. "Funny, there's this fellow I know," he spoke up. "Navy fellow. Take him, now. He's been married for a quarter of a century, fine grown family, all that. Well, over in Europe he ran into this girl. On the boat actually, and a few times after that. He can't get her out of his mind. He never does anything about it. His wife is all right, there's nothing wrong with her. Still, he keeps dreaming about this girl. All he does is dream. He wouldn't hurt His wife for the world.
He loves his grown kids. Look at him, and you'd call him the soberest of sober citizens. He has never had anything to do with another woman since he got married. He wouldn p t know how to go about it, and isn't about to try. And that's the story of this fellow. Just as silly as this girlfriend of yours, except that he doesn't talk about it. There are millions of such people." Pamela Tudsbury said, "A naval officer, you say?" "Yes, he's a naval officer." "Sounds like somebody I might like." The girl's voice was grainy and kind. Through the automobile noises outside, a vague sweeter sound drew nearer, and defined itself as a hand or an. "Oh listen!" Pam jumped up and went to the window. "When did you last hear one of those?" "A few of them wander around Washington all the time." He was at her side, looking down five stories to the organ grinder, who was almost hidden in a crowding circle of children. She slipped her hand in his and leaned her head against his shoulder. "Let's go down and watch the monkey. There must be one." "Sure." "First let me kiss you good-bye. On the street, I can't." She put her thin arms around him and kissed his mouth. Far below, the music of the hurdygurdy thumped and jangled. "What is that song?" she said, the breath of her mouth warm on his lips. "I don't recognize it. It's a little like Handel's Messiah." "It's called 'Yes, We Have No Bananas."' "How moving." "I love you," said Victor Henry, considerably surprising himself. She caressed his face, her eyes looking deep into his. "I love you. Come." On the street, in the hot late sunshine, the children were squealing and shouting as a monkey on the end of a light chain, with a red hat stuck fast on its head, turned somersaults. The hurdygurdy was still grinding the same song. The animal ran to Victor Henry, and balancing itself with its long curled tail, took off the hat and held it out. He dropped in a quarter. Taking the coin and biting it, the monkey tipped the hat, somersaulted back to his master, and dropped the coin in a box. It sat on the organ, grinning, chattering, and rapidly tipping the hat. "If that critter could be taught to salute," said Victor Henry, "he might have a hell of a naval career." Pamela looked up in his face and seized his hand. "You're doing as much as anybody I know-anybody, anybody-about this accursed war.""Well, Pam, have a safe trip home." He kissed her hand and walked rapidly off, leaving her among the laughing children. Belu'nd him the barrel organ wheezily started again on "Yes, We Have No Bananas." Acouple of days later, Victor Henry received an order to escort to the Memorial Day parade the oldest naval survivor of the Civil War. This struck him as strange, but he pushed aside a mound of work to obey. He picked the man up at a veterans' home, and drove with him to the reviewing stand on Pennsylvania Avenue. The man wore a threadbare uniform like an old play costume, and the dim eyes in his bony, withered, caved-in face were cunningly alert. President Roosevelt's white linen suit and white straw hat glared in the bright sun, as he sat in his open car beside the stand. He gave the tottering ancient a strong handshake............