Copyright © by Frank O. Dodge. All rights reserved.
The subway shuttle from Times Square to
Grand Central Station in New York City carries enough people during the day
to populate several small towns. But at one o'clock in the morning ... well
at one o'clock in the morning it can sometimes be pretty spooky. It
was pretty spooky the morning Matson bought a token from a sleepy cashier
and pushed through the turnstile. His heels set echoes bouncing back
and forth between the tile walls of the empty cavern beneath Grand Central.
The totally empty tile-walled cavern. Matson was surprised.
Even at 1 A.M. there were usually half a dozen commuters waiting for
a train. He descended several flights and stood alone on the lowest
level platform.
Harry Matson was forty-seven. He had been born a few days before the
end of the Second World War. His father, James Matson, had died two
months before the birth of his son, when his cargo ship was torpedoed off
the coast of Ireland. Two months and a few days before the end of
hostilities.
Following the war, Harry grew up defending his father, a merchant marine,
against the slurs of boys whose fathers had been 'real fighters', not lousy
merchant sailors.
Harry's mother had explained that if it hadn't been for the courageous seamen
of the merchant fleet, those 'real fighters' would have had to face their
enemies without bullets for their guns, without food for their bellies, without
the tanks, planes, medical supplies, and the thousand other things the 'real
fighters' needed to win the war. She'd pointed out that the merchantmen had
suffered as great a percentage of casualties as the Armed Forces. Harry
had always been proud of the father he had never known and had wanted to
grow up to be as courageous as the man who had given his life in the defense
of his country.
He had been too young for the Korean action, and when Vietnam came along
the Army doctors told him to go home and soak his flat feet. He wanted
so badly to equal the heroism of his father and do his bit in his country's
service, but fate, it seemed, was against him.
All this was, for some reason, on Harry's mind as he descended into the bowels
of the New York City Rapid Transit system. He'd been up in Connecticut,
closing a deal. He supposed he should have waited until tomorrow to
return, but a restless feeling of urgency goaded him into taking the night
train back to the city. So there he was at 1 A.M., waiting on the platform
beneath Grand Central for the shuttle to Times Square, where he'd catch the
express to Brooklyn.
He heard the rumble down in the tunnel, and the train roared into the station
and stopped amid a great hissing of brakes. Harry boarded, but strangely
none of the passengers got off. Harry was surprised at the number of
riders at that time of the morning, and even more surprised at the number
of uniforms. He couldn't recall ever seeing so many soldiers,
sailors and Marines.
The train started with a jolt, and Harry studied the crowd around him.
They were almost all young. Uniforms outnumbered the civilians,
and there was something not-quite-right about the girls. They all wore
dresses. There was not one pair of jeans, not one t-shirt in sight.
There was something different about their hair, their makeup ... the
bright red lipstick, the face powder, the rouge. They all wore high
heels ... not a single pair of designer sneakers among them ...
Then he noticed that not all the uniforms were American. There was
a heavy sprinkling of foreign services represented. He noticed the
shoulder patches. 'Nederlanden'. 'France' with the double-barred
Cross of Lorraine, 'Canada'. 'Denmark'. 'Poland'. 'Australia'.
Two youngsters in the powder blue of the R.A.F....
A poster on the wall at one end of the car caught his eye: LOOSE LIPS SINK
SHIPS. Another: THE ENEMY IS LISTENING. Highly unflattering
caricatures of Hitler, Hirohito, Mussolini.
Harry's head began to swim. He felt dizzy and disoriented. A
baby-faced soldier got up and took his arm. "What's the matter, Pop?
You look sick or something. Here, take my seat. You better
sit down."
The pretty girl who was obviously the soldier's date looked at Harry with
sympathy. "You really do look sick, Mister. Is there anything we can
do?"
Harry got a grip on himself and forced his mind to stop whirling. He
looked up into the concerned young faces. "It's okay, kids. I
just had a little dizzy spell. I'm all right now. Here, soldier,
take your seat."
"Nothing doing, Pop. You still look pretty rocky. You keep the
seat." A few minutes later the train pulled into Times Square, and
the young soldier and his girl disappeared into the crowd, still casting
worried looks in his direction. The underground station was packed
as though it were noon instead of well past midnight, and the prominence
of uniforms still pertained.
Harry pushed his way through the high-spirited mob, fighting back a touch
of panic at what his mind was trying to tell him. No. It can't
be. It's not possible. No....
Instead of heading for the express platform to Brooklyn, Harry went up the
stairs to the street. Times Square was jammed with pretty girls, and
the uniforms of half the armed forces of the world. British sailors
in wide-legged trousers. French sailors with red pom-poms on their
flat white caps. U.S. servicemen from all the branches. Then
he caught sight of the running band of lights around the Times Building that
spelled out the latest news flashes: WAKE ISLAND FALLS TO JAPANESE...
Harry stumbled into the Crossroads Cafe where, 'If you sit here long enough,
everybody you've ever known will pass sooner or later.' He ordered
a double bourbon with a beer chaser. Nineteen forty-one! It
was late December, nineteen forty-one! Wake Island had fallen
just after the beginning of the war. Harry ordered another double
boilermaker. After his third, he was viewing the situation a little
more calmly.
He began to enjoy himself. The frenetic atmosphere of the young warriors,
some of whom had already seen combat, judging by the gaily colored ribbons
on their chests, was contagious. A group of British sailors and American
soldiers in one corner was roaring out the words to 'It's A Long Way To
Tipperary', and at another table the song was 'Bless 'em All'.
Someone jostled Harry's elbow, and he turned to see a youngster in civilian
clothes pushing in to the bar. "Sorry, Mac, didn't mean to shove,"
the young man grinned engagingly, "but it's crowdeder in here than that sardine
can you hear so much about. Let me buy you a drink to apologize."
Harry found himself grinning back. "No harm done, kid. Here,
I'll buy you one." He caught the bartender's eye and signaled for another
round, including his new acquaintance.
The youngster gulped down the whiskey and chug-a-lugged the beer. "Damn!"
he laughed, "After five weeks in the North Atlantic that sure tastes good."
"Five weeks in the North Atlantic?"
"Yeah. Convoy from England. Good trip. Only lost five ships
to the wolf packs."
"You're a Merchant Marine?"
"That's me. Heave-ho for the open sea, and all that stuff." He ordered another
round.
A sudden determination hit Harry. "How do you go about joining the Merchant
Marine?"
"Easy. Just go over to the union hall in Brooklyn and tell 'em you want to
ship out. You don't need any experience to ship ordinary seaman or wiper.
They're taking anybody willing to go. We're that short-handed."
"No kidding? What's a wiper?"
"Low man on the totem pole in the engine room. If you want my advice though,
ship ordinary ... then you're topside if you catch a torpedo." He laughed.
"You don't have to swim up a dozen decks to go over the side."
"Where's the union hall?"
"You serious, Dad?"
"I'm serious."
"Okay then." The youngster fished in his pockets and brought out a card.
"The address is on here. Talk to Tony Abruzzio, and tell him
Jimmy Matson sent you."
"Matson? Jimmy Matson?"
"Yeah. Why?"
Harry fought back a wave of dizziness. No! This couldn't be happening! It
couldn't be.
He heard Jimmy's voice from a long way off. ""Hey, Dad, you okay?"
Harry beat down an hysterical urge to laugh uncontrollably. James Matson
was calling him 'Dad'! The youngster was shaking his arm. "You
okay?"
Harry pulled himself together. "Yeah, I'm okay. Guess I threw that last one
down too fast. I'm okay. It just shook me for a minute."
"What did?"
"Your name. Matson. That's my name too. Harry Matson. Imagine two guys named
Matson running into each other in all this mob!"
Jimmy laughed. "Yeah. That's rich. Maybe we're related."
"Could be."
"Say, Harry, you just got to ship out tomorrow?"
"Not really. Why?"
"I was just thinking. I just got back. What say we bum around
New York for a couple of days, then ship out together?"
Harry closed his eyes and sent up a silent prayer of thanks. Thanks
for the opportunity to have some time with the father he'd never known, no
matter that the situation was all turned around hindside to foremost with
him as the father figure. All that mattered was that they would
have some time together. Almost three years.
Until the Atlantic Maid would be torpedoed off the coast of Ireland.
#
What the hell, thought Harry. Three years could be a
lifetime.
* * * * *