It was raining in Portland, but Beth didn’t care, crying uncontrollably though she knew it was very “un-navy.” Both of them explained to the children, albeit gently, that being proud of their dad was okay but not to get any swelled heads.
“Oh, Daddy,” said Jeannie, bursting with pride. The sad note in their reunion was Beth’s report that the newspapers were listing Melissa Lange — David’s old flame, Beth remembered — as one of those killed in the Russian ICBM attacks against SAC in Omaha, and that their officers’ quarters house in Seattle was presumably “gone,” like so many others. Meanwhile they would have to remain billeted in the Marriot Hotel, which the children thought was “great!” Ray’s dad was on the line from New York, though it had taken him over an hour to get through.
“Well, son,” he said, voice tight with emotion. “Well done. Well done. Well done.”
“Oh, John!” It was Ray’s mom on the extension. “Sounds like you’re ordering a steak! Let me speak to him. Ray — I’m so proud. I’m just so—”
“Now, Mother,” began John, but his wife, Catherine, took no notice, her joy unreined after hearing from the Pentagon that David, though wounded, and Robert had survived the war. The War Office had seen no point in raising the question of Robert’s radiation dosage. This was something that the navy thought would best be kept under wraps for a while, largely in an effort to dampen public concern over the number of “Chernobyls,” or downed subs, which now lay littered about the ocean’s floor and which would seriously affect the food chain for some time to come. The navy also justified its position by pointing out, correctly, that the effect of an individual’s radiation dosage could vary widely and in any case was something best left for those affected to discuss with their families as they saw fit.
When David arrived at Heathrow in the Red Cross ambulance, his stretcher wheeled into the army waiting hall, where the other seven survivors of the SAS raid were still being debriefed after exhaustive medical examination, he was conscious, but the painkilling shots he’d received on the flight had made him dopey, putting him temporarily at peace as they readied him for transfer for the operation to remove two 7.62-millimeter bullets from his thigh. As his stretcher passed by, it was the first time David had ever seen the Australian genuinely shocked. “Struth!”
“What’s up with Aussie?” David asked Choir Williams groggily.
“Oh,” explained the Welshman in his basso profundo, “‘e’s lost a bloody fortune, that fellow has. Bet a packet on you, he did — that you wouldn’t make it back. Or that Laylor chappie from Troop A. Very depressed, Aussie is.”
“Sorry to disappoint him,” said David croakily, his throat parched from the morphine.
“Oh,” said Choir philosophically, “I wouldn’t worry about ‘im, sir. ‘E’s probably taking bets from some poor sod that the surrender won’t hold or t’ sun won’t come up in the morning.”
“Almost didn’t,” said David.
Choir Williams shook his head as David’s stretcher passed on, and looked over at Williams A. “You know, Williams, that Yank’s a nice fellow. But terrible morbid sometimes.”
“Listen,” said Aussie, wandering up to Choir. “Five to one Davey boy comes through the whole operation with flying colors. Dollars! U.S.!”
“Go away,” said Choir.
“Yes,” said Williams A. “Go home, you terrible man.”
“All right, all right,” said Aussie. “Yen. How about yen?”