Avalon

The squat, dark green sedan pulled up in front of Archie's, killing
the six cylinder motor beneath the big, rounded hood. Pushing open the
big, rounded doors, two shore patrolman in black Cracker Jack uniforms
with white piping on the sleeves and the large collar flaps climbed
out. One of them carried a bolt-action, Springfield rifle and the
senior petty officer wore a .45 caliber Colt automatic in a waist
holster. After checking around carefully, they opened the rear door and
allowed Commander McGuiness to get out and they escorted him into the
restaurant. Going through the door, he took off his crisp white
officer's cap and passed it into his hand that was handcuffed to a
leather attache case.

The waitress cheerfully approached the table in her pink uniform. Her
bright red lips contorted and pursed as she noisley smacked bubble gum.
She was not unattractive, just at the age for the first lines to begin
to appear around her mouth and green Irish eyes. Tall, well-shaped with
dark red hair combed into a high hairdo that was razor sharp on the
sides.

"What can I get you fellas?" She snatched her order book from her apron
pocket and found the pen behind her ear. Delicately patting down any
red hairs the move might have pulled loose.

"Bacon and eggs special, please," McGuiness said before she had
finished asking. He asked the shore patrolmen, "You boys want
something? It's on me."

The petty officer looked nervously to his partner, who shrugged,
indifferently. "Yeah, I guess I'll have a coffee, miss."

"Me, too, miss." the other guard parrotted.

"You bet." She singled out the younger guard. "You sure you don't want
a little milk, honey?"

McGuiness and the older guard laughed.

The young man missed it. "No," he replied, weakly, blushing slightly
red as he watched her moving off.

The petty officer, named Brolan, took a seat at one of the empty tables
next to McGuiness, where he could keep an eye on both the door and the
other diners in the restaurant. Hoolihan, the young Irish kid from the
Bronx, followed his superior's lead, and picked out a spot to wait out
the Commander's breakfast. He picked one of the stools at the metal
trimmed formica counter where he could stand the heavy rifle on the
black and white checkerboard tile floor and hold the muzzle between his
knees.

He began to spin the stool to one side and the other, playing a game of
catch with the rifle muzzle between his hands. Looking out the large
windows in the front of the restaurant, he noticed the first few drops
of a morning rainstorm were beginning to land on the dull olive paint
of the sedan. "Should have brought our raingear."

When Brolan did not seem concerned, he asked. "Don't we have to escort
him all the way down the pier?"

"Nope," Brolan sat forward, shooting his eyes at something behind
Hoolihan. He replied, a little louder than necessary. "There's plenty
of cover at the train station."

Hoolihan wrinkled his nose and clinched his teeth, mentally kicking
himself. Glancing over his shoulder, he found himself at point blank
range to the waitress, who was pouring out the two cups of coffee on
the counter. She stopped chewing the gum long enough to give him a
severely disapproving look. She whispered. "Loose lips sink ships,
honey."

He asked her. "You're not a German spy, are you?"

McGuiness and Brolan laughed, turning to watch the waitress's reaction.
Still holding the coffee pot, she stabbed her other hand on her waist
and cocked her hips in indignation. "Listen, honey," she began. "I
don't have to go to spy school to figure out that when Commander
McGuiness comes in here with one of those suitcases on his wrist and a
couple of bozos like you, he ain't goin' to no train station."

She noticed that a few of the other customers had overheard the remark,
and she lowered her voice as she finished filling the second cup. "He's
one of my best tippers. We keep track of gentleman like him."

When she moved off into the kitchen, leaving the servicemen to get
their own coffee, Hoolihan said to Brolan. "I think she likes
me."

"Oh, yeah, kid," Brolan took his coffee cup and returned to his seat.
"Other than the fact you're both as Irish as St. Patrick, she wouldn't
give you the time of day."

Hoolihan went for a second opinion. "What do you think, Mr. McGuiness?"
He asked the officer, who was reading a newspaper that had been left on
the table. "You think I should ask her out?"

"She's just being friendly," McGuiness said, without looking up from
the paper. "It's her job. Every sailor on half the ships in the
Atlantic fleet have been through here thinking the same thing, kid.
Forget it."

"You know her, sir?" Brolan could not resist.

"Just from coming in here." He absently adjusted the handcuff on his
wrist to be more comfortable.

Glancing up from the paper, he checked to be sure the waitress was
still out of earshot. "I think she had an old man who went down on a
ship that got torpedoed." He shrugged. "I dunno, though. Seems like she
would have been more pissed off about the German spy crack."

After making a round with the other customers, pouring coffee warm-ups
and dropping off checks, McGuiness's order came up in the kitchen
window and she brought it over with a smile. "Here you go, Commander.
You can go off to that big train station out there with some of the
best bacon and eggs in Norfolk."

"You're an angel," he pushed the newspaper aside. "Thank you."

She watched him juggling with the briefcase to get it positioned on his
lap to be able to eat with the handcuff and chain on. She offered. "You
want me to take that for you?"

McGuiness laughed. "You'd regret it," he said. "I have to come with
it."

She stripped the bill off her order pad and placed it on the table. As
she turned to leave, she looked at him with an appraising eye. "That
might not be so bad."

Hoolihan watched the exchange with bewilderment. After she had moved
off again, he whispered savagely. "You see that?" He angrily took a sip
of coffee. "Oh, man, they talk about the priveledge of rank."

The commander thought of something funny, and nearly spit out the eggs
he was chewing. He spoke with his mouth full. "I think she's just a spy
who wants my briefcase."

Brolan laughed so suddenly and hard that he pulled a muscle in the
middle of his chest. He rubbed his chest with one hand. "She's in the
kitchen right now," he said, breathlessly. "With Fritz, radioing in our
position."

"All right, you jokers." She appeared at the counter. "What's so funny
out here?"

"Nothing, miss," Brolan straightened up suddenly. "Mr. McGuiness was
just saying he would like to take your cook out to the train station
with him."

"Oh," she eyed them suspiciously. She played along, although she did
not sound convinced. "He's not available. He's too old."

"You, ah," Hoolihan was not sure how to approach the subject. "Do you
have any friends in the service?"

Checking to see if any of the other customers were waiting on her for
service, she leaned her elbows on the counter and laced her fingers
together. Distracted by the question, she gave them all a nice view of
her well-rounded cleavage in the medieval torture contraption of a bra
that made her breasts stand out so well.

She thought for a moment. "Not really. Just the guys that come and go
around here."

McGuiness looked between the cleavage and Hoolihan. He chewed a piece
of bacon, waiting for her to continue.

"A couple of years ago I was seeing a guy in the Merchant Marines. He
was a navigator," she looked out at the rain beginning to fall in the
muggy, Virginia morning. "I don't know what happened. They don't tell
you unless your married or related. But, friends told me that they went
down in a storm off the Avalon Peninsula."

She was attracted by a subconscious nod from McGuiness.

He swallowed his bacon and quickly explained. "It's the southernmost
tip of Newfoundland, in Canada. That's some rough territory up there."
He looked over at Brolan. "The fog hides the thunderstorms, and within
a couple of miles it can go from dead calm to fifty knots with twenty
foot seas."

"I just kind of liked the sound of it," she said, wistfully. "Avalon
Peninsula."

McGuiness smiled politely. Beginning to mop up the last of his egg yoke
with a piece of toast he thought to himself if you were going to buy
it, you might as well buy it near a place with a nice, romantic name.
If he went down on Destroyer escort duty in the North Atlantic, chances
were that the nearest land would be the bottom.

"Well, gentlemen," McGuiness said, with a tone of finality. "I guess
we've got a war to go fight."

The remark snapped the waitress back into action, and she came around
the counter to collect McGuiness's plate and silverware. He left her
two dollars for a $1.25 breakfast. "Thanks, it was great."

"Have a safe trip," she said with a twinge of sadness. "I sure hope
there ain't no train robbers holed up for you somewhere out
there."

"Not much choice," he told her flatly. "I'm the engineer."

"Don't you worry none," Hoolihan held the door open for the officer. He
told her too quietly for anyone else to hear. "Commander McGuiness is a
Scot. He'll kick their cans all over the North Atlantic."

She smiled and nodded in agreement as she watched the glass door ease
itself closed on its hydraulic arm behind them.