A Commodore of Errors (46 page)

Well, two could play that game. The Commodore stepped an inch closer to Tannenbaume—they were now nose-to-nose—and stared deep into his eyes. He would penetrate this man's soul with his gaze, he determined.
We shall see how long he can take it.

But Captain Tannenbaume could take it for a long time.

It was, ultimately, the Commodore who looked away first. And then his knees went the way of his eyes.

The Commodore was not expecting this. He was not expecting this at all. What with Miss Lambright's rudeness, the intrusion of the news reporters, and now this—why, his morning was not going at all as he had planned.

The Commodore broke away and left Captain Tannenbaume without ever having uttered a word.

Captain Tannenbaume walked after him. “I'm Mort Tannenbaume,” he said, to the Commodore's back as the Commodore walked over to the window.

The Commodore ignored him and kept his back to everyone while he stared out the window. A deep breath, as deep a breath as he could muster, made him feel a little better. Looking out the window made him feel better too, the way a seasick sailor feels better when he keeps his eyes glued to the horizon. In the distance, by Eldridge Pool, was the monument, still under wraps, and the white bleachers the groundsmen had set up for the unveiling. The day was bright, the air clean and cloudless with just a hint of a breeze blowing out of the northwest. In his mind's eye, the Commodore envisioned the unveiling. He heard the crowd gasp at the sight of their bronze hero, the way the sun glinted off Edwin's square jaw, the gleam in Edwin's eyes. He had visualized this day for so long now that he knew precisely how it would all turn out.

But he had not foreseen all of these distractions. He had not envisioned this at all. Tannenbaume was certainly not the man he had expected. He had had no idea the man possessed such corporeal superiority. And he also could never have foreseen all of the unwanted attention Tannenbaume would bring with him that morning. Now, instead of a tightly controlled guest list, a slew of unsavory news hacks would also be at the ceremony. Who knew how many people would be there? Their very presence would surely spoil Edwin's big day.

The Commodore resolved that the man would
not
ruin Edwin's day. He would not allow it. He would personally ban Tannenbaume from attending the unveiling. And with no Captain Tannenbaume in attendance, there would be no news reporters—at least not the unwanted ones. No, he had not practiced his speech, had not worked on himself in all areas of self-improvement simply to have Tannenbaume be the center of attention. This was
his
day, not Tannenbaume's. In fact, the Commodore had assiduously planned the day so that it would be all about him. He had choreographed everything, down to arranging for a car service to take Tannenbaume back to his ship after the Commodore revealed to Mogie that the man was a fraud.

The Commodore knew he had to finesse this one, but he was off his game this morning. This Tannenbaume was clearly an arrogant man, and the Commodore knew he had to be careful. Indeed, his instincts told him it was wiser he not talk directly to Tannenbaume right this moment.

“Ms. Paultz.”

Mitzi came to the Commodore's side and soothingly brushed her hand up and down his back.

“Inform Captain Tannenbaume and his mother that a breakfast is being held in their honor at this time in the officers' club. Mayor Mogelefsky is expecting them. Tell them that now, please.”

Mitzi turned around, but Mrs. Tannenbaume cut her off.

“We heard him. Is the big
maccacha
going to join us?”

“Yes,” the Commodore whispered to Mitzi.

“Yes,” Mitzi said. “The Commodore will be joining you.”

“When?” Mrs. Tannenbaume asked.

“Soon,” the Commodore said through Mitzi.

“Soon,” Mitzi relayed to the Tannenbaumes.

The Commodore grabbed Mitzi's arm. “Ms. Paultz.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Please make them go away.”

A CAPTAIN AND HIS
COMELY CADET

I
t didn't take long for the cameraman to convince Miss Lambright to loosen the top button of her blouse. And then the next button. And then the next. Before long all of the newsmen were crowding around Miss Lambright's desk for a better view of her having her “official portrait” taken. So Mogie was able to walk right past Miss Lambright and the newsmen with nobody noticing him. He found the Commodore stretched out on the couch with a cold compress draped over his eyes and Mitzi sitting on the coffee table holding the Commodore's hand.

“A migraine,” the Commodore was saying. “All morning practicing my speech and nothing going right, and now I have a migraine.”

“But I bet your Toe Hang is as impressive as ever.” Mitzi's voice was soothing.

Before Mitzi knew what was happening, Mogie had her by the arm. “You haven't seen him in over a month and the first thing you do is ask him about his Toe Hang?” Mogie tightened his grip on Mitzi's arm. “How long have you two been
schtupping
?”

“Oh gawd, Moges. Me and the Commodore? Get real. Please.”

The Commodore rose off the couch, the compress wrapped around his eyes like a blindfold. Mitzi helped him over to his chair.

“I can assure you, Mayor, I
schtup
no one.”

“Yeah, right. All you WASPs are hornier than a three-balled tomcat. The crack of dawn ain't safe with you people.”

“Don't talk crass in front of the Commodore, Moges. He don't like bad language.”

“Bad language, Mitz? You want to now what bad language is? It's talking in code.” Mogie waved his hand at the Commodore. “Which is all these people do.”

Mogie stuck a cigar in his mouth and circled the room before confronting the Commodore at his desk. “So where's Tannenbaume? What's he got to say for himself? It's all over the news, this accident of his.”

The Commodore slowly removed the compress from his eyes. “I sent him over to the officers' club. I told him we were having a breakfast in his honor.”

“A breakfast? I wasn't invited to any breakfast.”

“There isn't any breakfast. I sent him there so that I could get him out of my office. There is no room for arrogance in this office.”

“You mean no
more
room, don't you, Commodore?” Mogie laughed at his own joke. “Hey, Mitz. That was pretty funny, huh? He means no more room.”

Mitzi ignored Mogie. She had taken the compress from the Commodore and, out of habit, began setting up the Commodore's desk with his phony work papers.

“I can't believe our new admiral just ran into a boat in New York harbor,” Mogie said. “I thought you said we needed a captain who knew how to drive a boat? This guy doesn't know
gunnisch
about driving boats.”

“Ship,” the Commodore said. “It's a ship, not a boat. And Captain Tannenbaume's ship ran out of fuel.”

“How'd he run out of fuel?”

“He didn't want to buy fuel over in Europe because it's too expensive,” Mitzi said, coming to Captain Tannenbaume's defense. “You know, because of the euro.”

“What a schmuck. He wants to save money so he doesn't fill up but then he runs out of gas? He's a schmuck this Tannenbaume.”

“The other ship ran into us,” Mitzi said defensively. “It came out of nowhere.”

“The guy on the news said all Tannenbaume had to do was drop the anchor when he ran out of gas.”

“It all happened so fast, Moges. Morty didn't have time to drop the anchor.”

Mogie was up in Mitzi's face before the words were out of her mouth. “Morty? So you two are on a first-name basis? The two of you on a little boat in a great big ocean. I can just imagine what went on out there.”

The Commodore's migraine was quickly receding now that he realized how easy it was going to be to scuttle Tannenbaume. In fact, it was looking like it would be easier than he had originally presumed. He casually walked over and draped his arm around Mogie's shoulder and pulled him away from Mitzi.

“Now, now, Mr. Mayor. You know the sway the sea holds over a woman. That a tryst occurred between a lonely sea captain and his comely cadet can hardly come as a surprise to you.”

“She didn't deny it, did she?” Mogie said, looking over his shoulder at Mitzi as the Commodore pulled him away. “She didn't deny it.”

The Commodore realized that Mogie had reason enough to get rid of Tannenbaume because of Mitzi alone. The Commodore also surmised that, in Mogie's mind, running out of fuel was a greater indictment of Tannenbaume's character than the fact that he collided with another ship. For the Commodore's part, it never even occurred to him that Tannenbaume's collision would prevent him from becoming admiral. In fact, most, if not all, of the faculty and staff at the United States Merchant Marine Academy had had a serious accident at sea of one sort or another. That was why they were at the academy—they had nowhere else to go in an industry that insisted on competence or, at the very least, no egregious acts of incompetence. So the best course of action to rid himself
of Tannenbaume for good was to make Mogie think that Tannenbaume had serious designs on Mitzi. The Commodore had no idea what actually occurred between Mitzi and Tannenbaume aboard ship, but he guessed that Mogie's suspicion of a tryst was not too far off the mark. After all, there seemed to be no sign of Captain Tannenbaume's wife, not that that surprised the Commodore. knowing what he knew of professional seaman, not to mention professional ladies of the night, he never really expected Captain Tannenbaume's marriage to make it past the long voyage home.

The Commodore pulled Mogie over to his desk and was about to say something regarding Tannenbaume's reputation as a ladies man when he was interrupted by the alarm clock sitting on the coffee table. He had set the alarm to help keep on track that morning, knowing full well that Miss Lambright could never be trusted to do that for him. The alarm alerted that there were only two hours to the unveiling. The shrillness of the alarm's buzzer rattled the Commodore, and he could not bring himself to turn it off. It was Mitzi who finally silenced the alarm.

“What's that for?” she said.

The Commodore did not even hear the question. He was thinking again about who would be in the crowd at the unveiling. If Tannenbaume were present, he was sure—more sure than ever now that he thought about it—that the bleachers would be overrun with reporters there to see Tannenbaume and not him. For months now he had visualized friendly faces in the crowd and now he wondered if he would get nervous when he looked out at the audience and saw nothing but strangers. Wondering whether he would get nervous made him all the more nervous.
Yes, it would be disastrous for me if Tannenbaume attended the unveiling
.

He summoned everything in his being to shrug off the great weight of inertia brought on by his anxiety. He took up where he left off with Mogie, dragging the mayor over to window, out of earshot of Mitzi.

“Mr. Mayor, I have no doubt that Captain Tannenbaume and Mitzi have formed a—how shall we say it?—
bond
of some sort. I suggest we go to the officers' club this moment and inform Captain Tannenbaume that his services will not be needed after all.”

Mogie pulled himself away from the Commodore. He looked over the Commodore's shoulder at Mitzi. “So you think the two of them are
schtupping
?”

The Commodore kept his voice low and discreet. “There is a certain smugness in Ms. Paultz's manner this morning. It is almost as if she knows that she will soon be untouchable, ensconced as the new admiral's concubine. As you yourself said, she hasn't denied it, has she?”

The Commodore studied Mogie's neck vein. It told him all he needed to know.

“Let us allow discretion to be our guide, Mr. Mayor. We ought not to say a word to Mitzi, lest she tip off Captain Tannenbaume of our intentions.”

Mogie was no longer looking at Mitzi. He was staring hard at the Commodore. So hard that the Commodore's mouth went dry. Had he said something to upset Mogie?