Buck
Taylor looked a bit like a mad scientist, he never combed his hair, paint
spotted steel rimmed glasses, ‘Pussers grey’ faded overalls and of course he
was as daft as a brush! Buck lived in a cave under the fo’c’sle, called the
paint shop, only venturing out to get ‘Harry Crappers’. His meals were
usually brought to him, by one of the Junior Seamen, who would push his grub
under the door then leg it, just in case he was invited in. Buck was a great
bloke for a sods opera, first in line for a PU, but did keep himself to himself,
a bit of a loner and he hated brown hatters!
We
thought it a bit strange when Buck was first ashore in New London (Connecticut),
because being the US Navy’s prime submarine base it had a reputation for being
a poofs’ paradise. “ He’s probably gone on a poofter culling run,” said
some smartarse.
Next
day, in the early hours of the morning, Buck arrived or should I say got himself
poured out of a taxi, and was lying unconscious on the jetty, where he was
unfortunately spotted by the Jimmy. We were sure the Jimmy had the gangway wired
up to an alarm in his cabin, he missed nothing! Buck was legless, hatless,
speechless, his breathing was very shallow, so we got Dr Beeching (so called
because he was a train spotter) out of bed, and Buck was duly confined to the
sick bay for rest of the night.
Next day on OOD’s defaulters Buck still couldn’t stand up straight nor could he speak. He muttered something about only 2 pints; some poofter must have spiked his drinks! By the time Buck got to Jimmys’ Defaulters, he was just about back to normal. Which in Buck’s case was quite debatable!
The
Jimmy always wore his steel rimmed glasses at defaulters, this gave him an
extremely menacing appearance, a bit like Josef Göbbels,
in fact, I wonder if they were related?
“Vell (Oops) Mr Taylor”, said the Jimmy, “ I had the misfortune to witness you arriving back on board the other morning, what do you have to say for yourself”?
“I
don’t know sir, I can’t remember, I only had a few pints and my memory is
completely blank as to what happened, until I woke up in the sickbay”,
that’s the truth sir, I haven’t been ashore for weeks since when I left the
last clinic!
“What
were you doing at a Clinic?” said the Jimmy, “You haven’t mentioned this
before”.
“I’m a rare blood group sir, and they pay good money over here”!
“You
mean to tell me Taylor, you gave a pint of blood, then went on the Piss!”
“Oh, no sir, Said Buck”, I gave two pints of blood, at two different places,
they told me to drink plenty of liquid”.
“I’m surprised you are still alive, Taylor”, said the Jimmy, “Good God man, Captain’s Report. Add self inflicted injury to those charges Cox’n”. “I hope you have learned something today, Taylor”.
“Oh,
yes sir” “Wiser and Richer, Wiser and Richer”. Which went right over
Jimmy’s head. When our Jimmy was born, they removed his sense of humour!