Silver Tower

CHAPTER 4

The crack of the bat reverberated through the stadium like a shot from a high-powered rifle. It was one of those unmistakable, instantly recognizable sounds — a good, solid, snapping thwack that even those who didn't follow baseball knew meant "home run." The left fielder did not even bother looking up for the ball, merely hung his head in disbelief, spit on the turf and punched a fist into his glove as he watched four men orbit the bases and stomp on home plate. Twenty thousand fans in the Oakland-Alameda County Coliseum groaned as Reggie Jackson, manager of the Oakland A's, headed for the moufid to give the pitcher the hook and put in the fourth A's reliever of the game. "It's about time Jackson took that guy out," veteran battleship commander Captain Matthew Page, age fifty, said, his face a deep crimson. "Three innings, five earned runs. Great. Just great." He took a gulp of beer.

His wife shook her head at him. "Matt, your blood pressure… "

"My blood pressure would be a damn sight better if Jackson would learn how to tell when a reliever is starting to miss the strike zone. Kelly has a split-finger, a curve, and a slider. In the sixth inning he came out and pitched ninety percent split-fingers. His one slider went straight in the dirt. The man was in trouble. In the seventh he shook his right arm before he went into his motion and everyone was surprised when he walked two guys and allowed two base hits. Now Wade Boggs… God, isn't that guy ever going to retire?… Nails a half-assed curve for a grand slam. I would've had a guy warming up in the bullpen the minute I saw—"

Captain Page's daughter, Ann, reached over to her right and picked up the wall phone in the U.S. Navy's officer's Coliseum skybox and handed the receiver to her father. "What's this?"

"It's for you." The other navy commanders and their families in the skybox. strained to listen. "It's Reggie Jackson. He wants you to be quiet and stop annoying your family."

Captain Page's ears reddened beneath his sandy salt-and-pepper hair. "You're right about his blood pressure, Mother," Ann said, tweaking one of the battleship commander's ears. "He looks like he's ready to pop any second."

Amanda Page couldn't suppress a smile. "Very damn funny, missy," Page said, but he allowed a smile through the gruffness. He leaned over his daughter. "Big deal, Spaceman — oh, I'm sorry, Spaceperson. Well, you're not so fancy your old man can't still pop you one."

Ann held up her fists in mock-defense as the other navy men cheered her on. As the action on the field resumed, however, her father ruled himself the winner and ordered Ann to get him another beer.

On her way back from the skybox wet bar, sixteen-ounce beer in hand, Ann caught a glimpse of her mother gloomily leaning on the concourse railing. "Mom? Everything okay?"

"Of course, sure, dear," Amanda Page said, the tone of her voice denying the words.

Ann moved closer to her mother, who was staring out beyond the Coliseum Auditorium and across to San Francisco Bay and the hazy San Francisco skyline. Ann followed her gaze. One of the hundreds of towers, cranes, buildings, and other structures along the waterfront, Ann knew, was the massive gray steel superstructure of the USS California, secured at the Oakland-Alameda Naval Station. The eleven thousand ton nuclear-powered guided missile cruiser was the main escort ship in the fifteen-ship carrier battle group of the USS Nimitz, which would pass under the Golden Gate Bridge in four days to begin an eight-month cruise to the Indian Ocean.

Ann touched her mother's arm. "You still have three days with him…"

Amanda shook her head. "He's already gone, Ann. He's been gone for a week now. "

She turned to her daughter. "Can't you see it? You've been home for a week now. He may be on terra firma but his mind, his heart, has been on the bridge of the California for days. That skybox is the ship's wardroom. Officer's country. He's listening to the game on Armed Forces Radio or on the TV rebroadcast from Manila, surrounded by his senior officers." She managed a strained laugh. "I don't know why it should bother me so. After all, I've been a navy wife for twenty-one years. This is your father's twelfth cruise. It's just… well, all that news about Iran, the counterrevolution business, the Persian Gulf—"

"Dad isn't going to the Persian Gulf, he's going to the Philippines. "

"I don't think so," Amanda said quietly. I overheard a conversation last week. I think they might be sending the Nimitz to the Persian Gulf."

"If all these rumors were true, Mom, the Persian Gulf would be clogged with U.S. ships. You can't make yourself crazy over Officer's Wives Club gossip."

"That's not it." She paused, looking for the words. "It's just that… it's different this time. It's not only your father leaving … it's you, too… "

"Me? Mom, I haven't been home in eleven years. You've been by yourself—"

"For too damn long, for too damn long. But that's not the problem. You've been away but at least I've known where you were — Harvard, MIT, Stanford, Houston. I knew if something… happened to your father that you'd be back and we'd be together no matter how far away you were." She turned back to the railing. "I can look out there and see your father's ship and I know that he's surrounded and protected by the best men and the best equipment in the world. But when I think of where you're going and the risks you'll be taking, well, it's hard for me even to comprehend it. I don't think I've ever felt this scared before. I admit it…"

Ann didn't have an answer, and now it was Amanda trying to reassure her daughter, which she did by giving her a quick hug. "I'm sorry, Mom. I guess I've been so wrapped up in this thing, so preoccupied with my research that I never thought about how it would affect you."

Amanda shook her head. "Nor should you. You're like your father. He's said how sorry he is to be leaving me alone hundreds of times but it would take the guns of all his battleships to keep him from going. I admire you both so much; I wish I had more of your drive… I wish there was more time for the dime of us to be together. Years pass quicker than any of us realize, you know. It's easy to take things for granted-not to mention feel sorry for myself. I'm sorry…"

Ann held her mother close, then lifted the cup of beer she was holding in her hands. "The captain will be getting powerfully parched," she said.

Her mother gave her a knowing smile. "I heard some more Officer's Wives Club gossip," she said as they walked past two young boys selling Oakland A's pennants. "About that space station, Silver Tower… and how the Russians hate it. And how vulnerable it is. But I suppose I'm being an alarmist about that, too?"

Ann was about to reply but stopped abruptly. What could she say that would really help? As a diversion, a welcome one, she pointed to a man with a portable video camera standing in front of the officers in the skybox. She guided her mother back to the box, where they took their seats at either side of Captain Page. "Smile," the cameraman said. "You're on Diamond Vision!"

The family surrounded by the other men and their families waved at the camera. As they did, Ann glanced at the huge scoreboard in center field: Her father's image was flashed, displaying his gold-trimmed hat with the words "CGN-36 USS CALIFORNIA" on the peak and his Oakland A's T-shirt. A caption under his picture on the full-color scoreboard screen read "Captain Matt Page, Commander, USS California." Ann's picture was on the screen too: "Dr. Ann Page, Mission Specialist, Space Shuttle Enterprise," the legend underneath it read. A ripple of applause came from the crowd. "We're famous, babe!" Matt Page said to his wife, hugging her close. Amanda Page looked at her daughter, forced a smile, waving with restraint into the camera.

It turned out the only possible way to stay clear of the dozens of sailors tramping in and out of the bridge of the USS California was to stand behind the captain's high-backed seat, which was what Ann Page found herself doing one week after the baseball game. On the bridge was sheer bedlam: volleys of shouted orders, ringing phones, and a hodgepodge of engine and equipment sounds.

Through it all, Ann noticed, Captain Page was very much in control. No comparison to the overaged boy at the ballgame.

It was actually exhilarating to watch. He seemed to know just when a man would be in arm's reach or earshot when he needed him. The phone mystically stopped ringing when he needed to use it. His coffee mug never grew cold or was less than half full — in spite of the activity, a steward would somehow make his way to the captain's chair to refill the short, stubby mug labeled "The Boss of the Boat," and of course it never dared slide down a table or spill one drop onto the boss' plywood-starched khakis. "Are you sure it's okay for me to be here?" Ann asked at a relatively quiet moment. Her father waved his coffee mug around the bridge. "Of course it is." He turned to a young officer. "Dammit, Cogley, out of the way, if you please. I'm trying to talk to my daughter… No, I'm glad you wanted to come aboard. Your mother, as you know, doesn't feel right coming on board before a cruise. She never has, not in all our years of marriage. Not once. She stays on the dock until the ship passes under the Golden Gate or wherever, but she never comes on board."

"Yes, I know." Half her response was blocked out by a thick clipboard of papers that Cogley had thrust between her and the captain, every sheet of which Page impatiently initialed at the corner. "Okay, now weigh anchor, Cogley… I'm sorry, Ann. No, your mother doesn't seem to like it on board the California. "

Ann tried to tell him he must know why, but a horn blaring from just outside the bridge drowned out her words, followed by "All ashore, all guests ashore."

"I've got to go, Dad," Ann said, but he didn't hear, his attention elsewhere. She followed the outstretched arm of a gray-and-blue-uniformed Marine escort and headed for the exit.

She had just reached the top of the steel ladder that led down to the main deck when she felt a hand on her shoulder, turned and found her father standing in front of her. "You weren't going to leave without saying good-bye, were you?"

"I didn't know if I'd get a chance, and I really think I'm in the way."

The harried petty officer, Cogley, came up to the captain with still another clipboard. "Excuse me, sir—"

"Cogley, dammit, shove off with that stuff. Tell the officer of the dock to stand by until I'm ready."

Cogley hurried off. "You're convincing me," Ann said, "that that guy's name is 'Cogley Dammit' or 'Dammit Cogley.' "

"I know, I know…" Matthew Page steered his daughter away from the head of the stairway. "Listen, honey, I wanted you to come with me on board so we could have a little chat—"

"About what?"

"About you. Your shuttle flight." He paused. "I still can't believe it. My daughter, a shuttle astronaut—"

"C'mon, Dad… "

"No, now wait a minute. I'm not going to get all gushy over you. I just want to—"

"Yes?"

"Ann, I've heard things. There's real concern about your mission, about this Skybolt laser you're working on."

"I really can't talk too much about Skybolt, Dad. Not even to you. You can understand—"

"I know, I know, but dammit, you know I've never been too happy about your decision to fly to this Space Command station. The dangers are—"

"Keep 'em barefoot and pregnant?"

"Ann, honey, you're not listening."

"I'm sorry, that was a cheap shot, I know you don't go for that male chauvinist stuff. But, face it, if you were talking to a son…"

"I'd still be damned worried. This space station project of yours is dangerous. Things are happening, weird things. I just wish you'd—"

"Stay on the ground? Safe from the action. Away from my work." Ann shook her head. "Whatever you say, you still think it's okay for men to go off and face whatever's out there, but not women—"

He looked at her. "Could be, honey. I guess I am a bit old-fashioned."

"You're a damn sight better than most, but you have tended to put Mom and me on a pedestal. We're not china dolls. We won't break. I'm a scientist. Mom is your wife. We're both pretty tough. No kidding."

Her father shrugged, knew she was right even if he couldn't buy all of it.

"And Dad, I know about the dangers. We get briefings, too."

The loudspeaker gave another warning for visitors to clear the ship. Ann took her father's hands. "I'll. be thinking of you up there," he said. "And I still wish you weren't going."

"And I wish you weren't going on this cruise… to the Persian Gulf." The mention of the California's classified destination startled him. "How…"

"It doesn't matter," she said quickly. "But you have about as much chance of keeping me from going on the Enterprise as I have of dragging you off your ship… Now" — she stood on tiptoes and kissed her father on the cheek — have a safe cruise and hurry home."

He straightened, hugged her. "And success and a safe trip to you, Ann."

The Marine escort guided her to the wide covered main gangplank on the California's starboard gunwale. A small knot of reporters were waiting for her when she stepped off the platform onto the dock but she ignored them and quickly found her mother standing near the raised officer's wives' railed greeting area. "He'll be all right," Ann said quietly. Her mother's eyes never left the bridge as the USS California began slowly to slide away from its mooring toward the Golden Gate.