Free Sweet Reason by Robert Littell

Ebersole denied,” the Captain had written in an almost illegible scrawl, “pursuant to BuPers Bravo 3756 Romeo of 21 May 1953, which states that petty officers are to be rotated from sea duty every two years unless (a) such rotation would be detrimental to the war readiness of the ship or (b) except in unusual circumstances.”
    Quinn flew into a rage. “The motherfucker,” he screamed. “I’ll break his balls, I’ll kill him.”
    “Jesus shit, take it easy,” McTigue told Quinn. “Maybe he don’t understand you been here since the ship was commissioned. I’ll talk to the XO. He’ll see things different.”
    The prospect that McTigue, the senior noncommissioned officer in the gunnery department, would intercede on his behalf calmed Quinn for the moment. “He better change that endorsement,” he said. “He fuckin’ well better.”

    Proper Comes Up with a Suspect
    “But you distinctly said tonight, Proper,” fumed Captain Jones. He was sitting on the bunk of his sea cabin aft of the pilot house, spit-shining his Adler elevators. The night reading lamp over his head filled the small, bare room with angular shadows. A flashlight and a worn Mickey Spillane paperback lay on the deck within arm’s reach. “You’ve let me down, Proper, you’ve certainly let me down.”
    “I’m sorry, Captain, but the typewriter thing didn’t work out the way I thought it would. I checked out every single one on board; two in engineering, three in operations, three in supply, two in gunnery, the XO’s, that’s eleven, plus thirteen private portables. That’s twenty-four in all. Not-a-one fitted the type on the fatal leaflet, not-a-one.”
    “Sweet Reason must be hiding his typewriter then.”
    “That’s always a possibility, of course, but I’m beginning to think that your Sweet Reason may have typed these seditious leaflets before we sailed from Norfolk.”
    “But we didn’t know we were going to war when we left Norfolk.” The Captain got a certain amount of satisfaction out of having caught Proper in a slipup.
    “Good point, Captain,” Proper conceded. “You’re certainly right about that. Revise my last to read: he probably typed them up in some port before we arrived in the war zone. And if that’s the case, this may be a one-shot affair.”
    Jones looked relieved — and disappointed. “I don’t mind telling you, Proper, it galls me to think that Sweet Reason can get away with this, can get off scot-free. Not that I want any more of these things to turn up, you understand, but it galls the hell out of me.”
    “Captain, there’s something I’d like to tell you but I’mnot sure how to begin,” Proper said. He stuck his hands in the pockets of his foul-weather jacket and drew his head, turtle-like, back into the neck.
    “Well, speak up, Proper. Don’t worry, my boy. Anything you say here is strictly between us.”
    “Well, Captain, sir, I have a person — that is, I have a suspect who —”
    “A suspect? A sailor you suspect of being Sweet Reason? Why didn’t you say so before?”
    “Not a sailor, Captain.”
    “Not a sailor! What the hell are you talking about, Proper?”
    “My suspect’s an officer, Captain.”
    Jones stared at Proper. “An officer, you say.” He toyed with the idea the way one toys with a loose tooth. “Jesus, I never thought of connecting an officer with Sweet Reason,” he said more to himself. Jones turned on Proper and demanded: “Okay, out with it, my boy, who is it?”
    “I want to stress that he’s only a suspect, Captain. Innocent until proven guilty and all that sort of thing, you get my point?”
    “Yes, yes, I understand. Now who is it?”
    Proper lowered his voice to a whisper. “The Poet, Captain.”
    “The Poet?”
    “That’s Ensign Joyce, Captain. Everyone calls him the Poet, even to his face. He’s the one.”
    “What makes you suspect him, Proper?”
    “Well, sir, there are a couple of things. First off, I found out that Ensign Joyce is