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"Goddamn you!" she had screamed.

"This is obscene. You're not going t die, and I'm not going to marry Jimmy. Jimmy's a kid."

"There is only three years' difference--" "Four," she had snapped.

"Four years," he'd said. They had looked at each other for a moment, be foil he went on, "Presumably, you meant it when you said you didn't want my wi( to ever find out about us."

"The way I put it was "I'd rather die than have her find out,"" Cynthia h said.

"Yes, of course I meant it."

"The reality of our situation is that you are as poor as a church mouse, Chesty had said.

"And what do you think she would think if I made provisiOi for you in my will? In addition to her many other virtues, she is intelligent an perceptive."

"Then don't 'make provision' for me," Cynthia had said.

"I love you," he'd said.

"I could not not do that."

"And the convenient way to do it is to marry me off to Jimmy? Damn yol Chesty."

"Jimmy stopped off here on his way to Randolph Field," Chesty Whittake had said.

"He said that it was his intention, when he graduated, to ask you t marry him, and what did I think of that?"

"What did you say?" she'd asked.

"I told him I thought it was a splendid idea," Chesty'd said.

"Actually, what I said making my little joke, was 'name the first son after me."" "Oh, damn you!" she'd said, and she'd started to cry, and he'd held her.

Three months after that happened, Chesty Haywood Whittaker had dropped dead. And he had not made provision for her in his will, and she was as poor as a church mouse.

Cynthia decided not to make an issue of the Theodore Roosevelt Suite. It would be pointless to protest, for one thing, and for another, it wasn't as if there was a suggestion he would share it with her. He had just made a generous gesture. In the family tradition, she thought. In many ways, Jimmy reminded her of Chesty.

The Navy sent a Plymouth staff car to carry them from the Mark Hopkins to Mare Island. Waiting for them in a hangar there, guarded by a platoon of Marines under a gunnery sergeant, was a five-foot-high stack of wooden crates that would at 0500 the next morning be loaded aboard the Naval Air Transport Service Douglas C-54 that would carry them to Pearl Harbor in the Hawaiian Islands.

Jimmy, very seriously, ordered Radioman Second Class Joe Garvey to take charge of the guard detail. Cynthia had to restrain a smile at the slight sailor's obvious feeling of importance at being given the responsibility.

Garvey's status was still undecided. Since he had correctly deduced that Whittaker and Hammersmith were going into the Philippines, he could not be simply returned to duty. But on the other hand, it had not been decided that he would go with Whittaker and Hammersmith. For the meantime, taking him with them to San Francisco and Hawaii would serve two purposes. An extra hand was going to be helpful, and he already knew what was going on. And if he was with them, he was considered to be secure. He could, at any point, be put on ice if it was ultimately decided not to take him to Mindanao.

They then went to the Mare Island Officers' Club for dinner. Whittaker ordered a steak dinner with all the trimmings to go, and sent their Navy driver t

o the hangar to deliver it to Garvey.

There was an orchestra in the club. After dinner, after first, with great mock courtesy, asking Whittaker's permission, Greg asked Cynthia to dance.

Whittaker graciously gave his permission, then rose and gave a little bow as cg led her off to the dance floor.

Then it was Jimmy's turn to dance with her. Thirty seconds after he had put his arms around her, she had felt his erection stabbing at her stomach. He didn't grab her and press her close or try to move his hands so they would come against her breasts, but he had an erection, and it was obvious that he was not only not embarrassed by it, but seemed pleased that she had no choice but to be aware of it.

And since she had learned in a class euphemistically called "Human Hygiene" in college that the male erection was an "involuntary vascular reaction," she had not been able to tell him to "stop that."

He held her hand as they returned to the table.

Jimmy picked up his glass and, smiling, looked over the rim of it at Greg.