Dangerous Tension

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  The captain grunted. “Well I had certainly hoped that no officer would be a party to such a shameful affair. I hope you realise how serious this is now, Kent, and that you’ll turn all your efforts toward solving it. That’s all. Dismissed.”

  The junior officer turned smartly on his heel and marched out. Matthews let himself relax and then followed slowly. He had not remotely enjoyed that. Now that it was over he wondered helplessly if he had been too harsh, yet he knew what he said was true. Ostracism was dangerous. Perhaps if Kent hadn’t been so unmoved he would have been more moderate but it was done now. He hadn’t even blinked; there was no need to worry about him. At that moment he turned casually into a nearby ablutions room and found Kent leaning over a washbasin being violently ill. He backed out hurriedly, unnoticed and strode off briskly, feeling shaken.

  As soon as his superior officers left, the Fifth Lieutenant scuttled out of his alcove and down to the common room. There he found the First and Third lieutenants, Jonson, Hamilton and about ten other men involved in the plot. Still upset by what he had heard it was several minutes before he could settle down enough to tell them what had happened.

  “Listen a minute will you? I’ve just heard the Captain tearing such a strip off Lieutenant Kent it’s a wonder he survived.”

  “What’s that got to do with us?” someone commented uneasily.

  “It’s got everything to do with us! The Captain’s blaming him for the ostracism, said that he was disappointed in him and that either he stopped it or he’d be transferred and lose his rank.” There was an embarrassed shuffling.

  “He also asked him how many were involved, if there were any officers,” he paused and First and Third stiffened immediately. “It’s all right, he lied. He told the Captain that it was only a few men and no officers... and the Captain said,” he swallowed, “said that he hoped no officer would be a party to such a shameful affair... and I do feel ashamed of it, I certainly never meant to get the Lieutenant in trouble. God, you should have seen him, he looked as if—” the young officer stopped, one didn’t say that sort of thing in front of privates.

  Hamilton broke the heavy silence. “Yes, I reckon we made a mistake on that one. If the Captain can’t help what he is, then surely we can see that the Lieutenant can’t help what he is either. I suggest we call the whole thing off.”

  Jonson looked defiant for a minute and then gave in, “Yes Corp, I think you’re right. This thing was mainly my fault so I guess I better go and apologise to the Lieutenant.”

  “Maybe some of us should go with you, Sarge.”

  “No! Didn’t you hear? A whipping seems to be in the air for the ones who started this—well I did and I’ll take the blame and the punishment. Probably he’ll do it private-like,” he added hopefully. “One thing, I sure as hell hope he doesn’t take me before the Captain. That would be a hell of a mess, wouldn’t it?”

  Kent himself was thinking much the same thing, that the whole situation was one hell of a mess. How could he punish a man who was only being loyal to the Captain? He was the one who deserved the flogging. Yet if he didn’t stop the ostracism, Matthews would. He still felt shaky after his reaction and Jonson found him sitting at his desk with his head in his hands.

  “It’s Sergeant Jonson, sir,” he said in answer to the weary, “Come in”.

  Kent looked up with a slight stirring of curiosity. “Yes?”

  “I’ve come to apologise, sir, for setting the men on to shun you. It was my idea and I’m real ashamed of it now, sir, and so is everyone else. We didn’t mean any harm really, sir, we just overreacted because of what we heard about the Captain. That’s one good thing, sir, because of you, everyone has had time to accept it more for real, not just because they think they should. I wish I could say that was my idea when I started this, but it wouldn’t be true. Lieutenant Kent, we never meant the Captain to—” he broke off. He wasn’t supposed to know of that dressing down.

  Kent frowned momentarily but the relief was so great that he didn’t pursue it. He sat silently, trying to absorb the fact that disaster had been averted. After a while, Jonson cleared his throat and asked apprehensively, “Uh... what are you going to do about it, sir?”

  “Do? I’m not going to do anything about it except say thank you, Sergeant. This is the best thing that could have happened.”

  “Yessir!” Jonson saluted smartly and escaped as quickly as he could. “That man’s getting as bad as the Captain,” he told his ex-collaborators ruefully. “There’s nothing more annihilating than a thank you when you expect a punishment.” He paused, “You know, it’s a real shame he’s got something against oms, it must be really tough on him if he feels the same way about the Captain as the rest of us.”

  Captain Matthews soon realised that the ostracism was well and truly finished and he would have been more pleased if he could have discovered why. He had been fully prepared to pass over any signs of a fight or even flogging, yet there was no indication that Kent had had to resort to anything like that. It seemed that he had quelled them verbally, yet if that were so, why hadn’t he done it before? For a while he wondered uneasily if he had retracted whatever he had been ostracised for, but as the men appeared to treat him with respect, he had obviously not lost face. He murmured a quiet word of approval to him, half hoping he would explain, but his Second officer only nodded coolly in acceptance.