“Oh, nothing important.” He knew the lie was transparent. “Just trying to figure where my own career is going, that’s all. I met a girl. . . .”
“Yeah?”
“TV news-type person. Met her in Bangkok during all the excitement there. I … I’m in love with her. . . .” ‘ “But there’re the old questions about whether love and salt
water mix, hey?”
%. “Something like that.” Tombstone grinned suddenly. “You
i know the old saying. ‘If the Navy wanted you to have a wife,
they’d have issued you one with your seabag.’ ” He looked at
•;; his watch, “Shit. I gotta go.”
I•’. “Hey, wait.”
:, But Tombstone didn’t want to talk about it, not now. He
f stood, picking up the tray with his unfinished supper. “Catch
‘<*:' you later, Coyote." - ... "Yeah. Later." Why was he telling Coyote his problems? He shook his head as he returned the tray to die galley window and shoved it through. The Coyote had it made, excited about his career, '. about flying . . . and a smart and pretty woman waiting for .:• him back in the World. :• He sure as hell wouldn't understand. Tombstone knew he was going to have to face his problems with Pamela alone. CHAPTER 12 1810 hours, 25 March Bridge, U.S.S. Thomas Jefferson "Now hear this," the 1-MC speaker on the bulkhead intoned. "Now hear this. Commence fuel transfer operations. The smoking lamp is out throughout the ship." Captain Fitzgerald scarcely heard the announcement. His attention was fixed on the activity to starboard. Jefferson rode the heavy seas at reduced speed, her massive bows rising and plunging with each wave. Sliding along in her shadow one hundred feet to starboard, dwarfed by the supercarrier's bulk, the U.S.S. Amarillo paced her larger consort, matching her plunge for plunge. Jefferson's three starboard flight deck elevators had been lowered to the hangar deck level, giving men of the deck division places to stand as fuel hoses from the AOE were snaked across along span wires stretched from Amarillo1 s topping lifts to pelican hooks secured to Jefferson's side. Red flags, warning of the fire hazard, snapped in the breeze on both ships as deckhands secured the hoses. Suspended from the span wires by sliding pulleys called trolleys, ttie hoses were draped in a series of deep loops between the vessels, allowing plenty of give and slack as the ships went their separate up-and-down ways. The carrier's two Westinghouse A4W nuclear reactors could keep Jefferson steaming for thirteen years without refueling, but she still carried over two million gallons of JP-5 in her aviation fuel compartments. During typical peacetime operations, fifty or sixty planes were flown off a carrier twice daily, each mission consuming two to three thousand gallons of fuel, 127 128 Keith Douglass and at-sea replenishment was scheduled about every two weeks. During the Vietnam War when fuel expenditures were much higher, reprovisioning at sea had taken place as often as once every three or four days. Jefferson's last UNREP—Underway Replenishment—had been carried out ten days earlier, in die waters north of Diego Garcia. Captain Fitzgerald looked down on the Amarillo from his vantage point on the supercarrier's bridge and wondered how soon he could expect the next resuppiy. UNREP ships were limited, and they had a long way to steam to reach CBG-14 in the isolated vasmess of the Arabian Sea. The Amarillo's 194,000 barrels of fuel translated as over seven and a half million gallons, most of it JP-5 destined for Jefferson's air wing. Normally, that was enough for six weeks of air operations—ASW patrols and CAPs, as well as daily proficiency flights as the aviators logged in their hours aloft. The AOR Peoria, a second UNREP vessel, carried petroleum for the rest of the battle group, 160,000 barrels of it, enough for over a month of cruising for the CBG's non-nuclear vessels. But if the tense political situation turned into outright war, fuel use would go up dramatically as the carrier's aircraft tripled or quadrupled consumption, and the non-nuclear vessels were forced to travel farther and faster each day. A worst-case scenario could see the Peoria and the Amarillo both emptied by the battle group's maneuvers within the next week.