ACKNOWLEDGMENTS A CRUEL SEA ONE August 13--Seattle, Washington Elizabeth drained the last sip of her coffee and quickly washed the mug, drying it with a dish towel and placing it carefully back among the ordered rows in the cabinet beside the sink. The kitchen clock read 6:45 A.M. "Ready, shipmate?" she called. A meow answered her from the living room. Liz was dressed for work: a dark blue shirt and matching pants with the cuffs tucked into black boots. The name over her shirt pocket read KIDD in black letters. At fifty, she was trim and lean, a runner who worked to keep herself fit, something she was finding more difficult as the years rolled on.
Still, she didn''t suffer from the loose skin at the throat-- turkey neck , people called it--many women her age developed. She was toned, her skin weathered by sun and elements, with deepening crow''s-feet at the corners of her eyes. Those eyes were dark and clear and, other than reading glasses, required no correction. Liz looked forward to passing her annual physical fitness qualifications with ease. She pulled a dark blue baseball cap down over a bristle of short hair the color of steel. Most people, she knew, assumed that she didn''t care for having men in her personal life. The hair, her profession, the absence of a husband, and even the cat contributed to the stereotype. Those people were wrong, and she had even been married briefly, it just hadn''t worked.
She had a spouse nonetheless, an incredibly demanding one, and to which she was utterly devoted. "Okay," she said, crouching in front of a pet carrier and sticking her fingers through the grille. "Ready to go for a ride? You need to be a good boy while Mommy''s gone." A black-and-gray-striped cat pushed its head against the fingers and meowed. Liz slung a black nylon laptop bag across her chest, then picked up a heavy blue sea bag in one hand and the cat carrier in the other. Outside, she set her load down long enough to lock the front door, and then put her gear into a dark gray Camry. The cat carrier went onto the passenger seat, where she strapped it in tightly with the seat belt''s shoulder harness. She loved this town, and had lived here three different times in nearly thirty years, and it would be where she retired.
Her tidy little house with its immaculate lawn sat in the suburbs of Rainier Valley, south of Seattle. Bright blue skies and clouds still tinged pink from the sunrise soared overhead. Though she didn''t yet know it, the world was already ending this glorious summer morning, and she would never see her little house again. Liz backed into the street and in her side mirror saw one of her neighbors, a young woman, out for a morning jog along the sidewalk. At the house next door, Mr. Fulton, in pajamas, a robe, and bare feet, lurched down his driveway toward his morning paper. The man suffered from both gout and a heart condition, and the way he moved told Liz he was having a particularly difficult morning. Liz threw them both a wave--the jogger returned it, Mr.
Fulton did not, as he was a consummate grump--and pulled away, headed to work. She had already turned the corner and so couldn''t see the jogger and Mr. Fulton reach the end of the old man''s driveway at the same time. She also didn''t see Mr. Fulton wrestle the jogger to the ground, rip out her throat with fingernails and teeth, and begin to feed. * * * As the Camry made its way west, winding out of residential neighborhoods and heading toward the more built-up section of the city near the water, the cat in the carrier beside her settled in and quieted. He was used to this routine. Liz wished she could take him with her, but that just wasn''t possible.
She would have preferred leaving him home where he was comfortable, but that wasn''t possible either. Chick, who lived in the small basement apartment of her little house, wouldn''t feed him. He wouldn''t water plants or do yard work, either, and she had to employ a landscaping company to keep her lawn and shrubs squared away during her prolonged absences. No, Charlie "Chick" Kidd wasn''t one for domestic responsibility. But he was her brother, her only sibling, and despite his many flaws she loved him and was happy he had accepted her offer to share the house. Chick was coming home today after being out for three weeks, and though her own job would keep her extremely busy, she hoped they could make time to see each other for dinner before she had to leave. The lights and blare of a siren came on fast as an ambulance raced toward her. Liz pulled quickly to the shoulder, and as the vehicle passed, a string of unhappy yowls came from the cat carrier.
"Steady," Liz said, "it''s just a medic." Before she could pull back into the road, a squad car appeared, screaming after the emergency medical vehicle. The cat was not pleased, and let her know it. Liz reached across and put her fingers through the grille of the cat carrier. "It''s okay, kitty, Mommy''s right here." The cat ignored the fingers and made a noise that was more groan than meow. The quickest way to work at this early hour would have taken her up onto I-5 near Seattle-Tacoma International Airport. As she approached, however, she saw the flashing blue and red lights of police and fire vehicles, so many that it indicated a major accident.
A river of stopped motorists was stacked up behind it with car doors standing open and people moving slowly through the traffic jam. Liz bypassed the on-ramp before she could become stuck herself and took an alternate route. She cut left, then right, and passed under the freeway, traveling across the industrial district before turning north on Route 99, also called Alaskan Way. She could follow it all the way to work, and the many traffic lights were still preferable to sitting still for who knew how long while the accident was cleared. The day was bright and clear, a contradiction to what most people believed about Seattle: that it poured every day. The heaviest precipitation ran from November to January, and although it was usually cloudy and did experience frequent mist and light rain, August was typically warm and dry, just like today. In her rearview mirror, Mount Rainier--simply called The Mountain by locals--dominated the southeastern horizon. Through her windshield, Seattle''s skyline rose with the iconic Space Needle standing against a bright blue background.
It was a beautiful day to be a Seattleite. She continued north, passing the Pacific Maritime Institute on her left. A block farther on, she slowed and came to a stop behind several cars lined up behind a tractor-trailer standing in the road. Its emergency flashers were blinking, and the cab''s driver door stood open. After a few moments the cars ahead of her eased around it and continued on their way. Liz did the same, and as she passed she saw the cab was empty, the driver nowhere in sight. "Hell of a place to break down," she said. The cat meowed its agreement.
She arrived at her turn and made a left. The view ahead made her catch her breath and smile. There it was, Joshua James , its snowy white hull brilliant in the morning light, black masts and antennae towering above. Although it had yet to receive its markings and have the big 754 painted on its bow, the vessel was more beautiful than any she had ever seen. It would be her last sea command, and what a way to finish a nearly thirty-year career of serving aboard cutters. There was still some debate about whether the ship would remain here in Seattle after commissioning or report to a new home in Charleston, South Carolina. Certainly Liz preferred it remain here, but she wouldn''t complain about relocating to Charleston for a few years. She wasn''t part of the decision-making process; the Coast Guard would cut her orders, and she would report wherever they sent her without complaint.
Liz slowed as she reached the base gate and a young man armed and wearing camouflage stepped out of the gatehouse with a clipboard. The striped barrier was down and a red and white sign set in the clipped grass off to the right read MARSEC LEVEL 1 --out of three--with the words SIGNIFICANT RISK beneath it. The sign had displayed this message for some time as a response to recent threats from foreign terrorist groups. Guarding against those threats was, to a great extent, Liz''s responsibility, and the reason Joshua James and her sister ships had been built. As Liz brought the Camry to a stop and rolled down her window, the sentry looked at the base pass in the windshield, checked his clipboard, then snapped off a crisp salute. "Good morning, Captain." "Petty Officer," she said, giving him a nod. When the sentry stooped to look inside the vehicle, Liz patted the pet carrier.
"House cat, one each," she said. The sentry allowed a trace of a smile and looked again at his clipboard. "Ma''am, I have orders to direct you to the base commander''s office immediately upon your arrival." "Very well," she said, and the sentry saluted again as the barrier rose and the Camry pulled through. He watched her car for a moment, then stepped back into the guardhouse and picked up the phone. Half an hour later, the young sentry squinted at something out in the road in front of the guardhouse. He lifted a pair of binoculars for a closer look. "Holy shit," he whispered, reaching for the phone again.
Every line was already lit. * * * Liz parked the Camry in a visitor''s space in front of the base administration building, then grabbed the cat carrier from the front seat. On the way up the steps, she returned the salutes of two enlisted men exiting t.