V.

"Yardbirds are the same all over," Pappy said. He and Clyde took their time. The dock workers fled by, jostling them: ragged, gray. By the time Pappy and Clyde reached the stone gateway, they'd all gone. Waiting for them were only two old nuns who sat to either side of the gate, holding little straw collection baskets in their laps and black umbrellas over their heads. Bottoms of the baskets were barely covered with sixpences and a shilling or two. Clyde came up with a crown; Pappy, who hadn't been over to exchange any currency, dropped a dollar in the other basket. The nuns smiled briefly and resumed their vigil.

"What was that," Pappy smiled to nobody. "Admission charge?"

Towered over by ruins, they walked up a hill, around a great curve in the road and through a tunnel. At the other end of the tunnel was a bus stop: threepence into Valletta, as far as the Phoenicia Hotel. When the bus arrived they got on with a few straggling yardbirds and many Scaffold sailors, who sat in the back and sang. "Pappy," Fat Clyde began, "I know it's no business of mine, but -"

"Driver," came a yell from in back. "Hey driver. Stop the bus. I got to take a leak."

Pappy slumped lower in his seat; tilted the white hat down over his eyes. "Teledu," he muttered. "That will be Teledu."

"Driver," said Teledu of the A gang. "If you don't stop the bus I will have to piss out the window." Despite himself Pappy turned around to watch. A number of snipes were endeavoring to pull Teledu away from the window. The driver drove on grimly. The yardbirds weren't talking, but watched closely. Scaffold sailors were singing:

"Let's all go down and piss on the Forrestal

Till the damn thing floats away, …"

which went to the tune of The Old Gray Mare and had started at Gitmo Bay in the winter of '55.

"Once he has got an idea in his head," said Pappy, "he won't let go. So if they don't let him piss out the window, he will probably -"

"Look, look," said Fat Clyde. A yellow river of urine was advancing up the center aisle. Teledu was just zipping up.

"A fun-loving good will ambassador," somebody remarked, "is all Teledu is." As the river crept forward sailors and yardbirds hurriedly covered it with the leaves of a few morning newspapers, left lying on the seats. Teledu's comrades applauded.

"Pappy," Fat Clyde said, "you intending to go out and get juiced tonight?"

"I was thinking about it," said Pappy.

"That's what I was afraid of. Look, I know I'm out of line -"

Ho was interrupted by a burst of merriment from the back of the bus. Teledu's friend Lazar, whom Fat Clyde had last seen sweeping water off the 01 deck, had succeeded now in setting fire to the newspapers on the floor of the bus. Smoke billowed up and with a most horrible smell. Yardbirds began to mutter among themselves. "I should of saved some," crowed Teledu, "to put it out with."

"Oh God," said Pappy. A couple-three of Teledu's fellow snipes were stomping around trying to put out the fire. The bus driver was cursing audibly.

They pulled up to the Phoenicia Hotel at last: smoke still leaking from the windows. Night had fallen. Raucous with song, the men of the Scaffold boat descended on Valletta.

Clyde and Pappy were last to get out. They apologized to the driver. Palm leaves in front of the hotel chattered in the wind. It seemed Pappy was hanging back.

"Why don't we go to a movie," Clyde said, a little desperate. Pappy wasn't listening. They walked under an arch and into Kingsway.

"Tomorrow is Hallowe'en," said Pappy, "and they better put those idiots in a strait jacket."

"They never made one to hold old Lazar. Hot damn, it's crowded in here."

Kingsway seethed. There was this sense of containment, like a sound stage. As an indication of the military buildup in Malta since the beginning of the Suez crisis, there overflowed into the street a choppy sea of green Commando berets, laced with the white and blue of naval uniforms. The Ark Royal was in, and corvettes, and troop carriers to take the Marines to Egypt to occupy and hold.

"Now I was on an AKA during the war," observed Pappy as they elbowed their way along Kingsway, "and just before D-day it was like this."

"Oh they was getting drunk in Yoko too, back during Korea," said Clyde, defensive.

"Not like that was, or like this either. The Limeys have a way of getting drunk just before they have to go off and fight. Not like we get drunk. All we do is puke, or break furniture. But the Limeys show imagination. Listen."

All it was, was an English ruddy-faced jarhead and his Maltese girl, standing in the entrance to a men's clothing store and looking at silk scarves. But they were singing "People Will Say We're In Love," from Oklahoma.

Overhead, bombers screamed away toward Egypt. On some street corners trinket-stalls were set up, and doing a peak trade in good-luck charms and Maltese lace.

"Lace," said Fat Clyde. "What is it about lace."