Sailors aboard the O'Brien threw lines to waiting longshoremen, who made the destroyer fast to the quay. "Welcome!" one of the longshoremen called in a musical brogue. "I'll be glad to buy some of you boys a pint of Guinness, that I will."

"What's Guinness?" Hirskowitz asked Carsten.

"It's what they make in Ireland instead of beer," Sam said helpfully. "It's black as fuel oil, and almost as thick. Tastes kind of burnt till you get used to it. After that, it's not so bad."

"Oh." Hirskowitz weighed that. "Well, I'll see. They make real beer, too?"

"Some. And whiskey. Got some good whiskey the last couple of times I was here."

"When was that, sir?"

"Once during the war," Carsten answered. "We were running guns to the micks to help 'em give the limeys hell. They paid us back in booze." He smacked his lips at the memory. "And then again in Remembrance afterwards, when we were helping the Republic put down the limeys and their pals up in the north."

The captain of the O'Brien, an improbably young lieutenant commander named Marsden, assembled the crew on the foredeck and said, "I'm pleased to grant you men liberty-this is a friendly port, and everybody has gone out of his way to make sure we're welcome. I know you'll want to drink a little and have a good time."

Sailors nudged one another and grinned. Somebody behind Sam said, "Skipper's all right, ain't he?" Carsten frowned. He knew boys would be boys, too, but that didn't mean an officer was supposed to encourage them. He wouldn't have done that as a petty officer, and he wouldn't do it now.

But then Marsden stiffened and seemed to grow taller. His voice went hard as armor plate as he continued, "Having a good time doesn't mean brawling. It especially doesn't mean brawling with the Kaiser's sailors. We're on the same side, us and the Germans. Anybody who's stupid enough to quarrel with them will have the book thrown at him, and that's a promise. Everybody understand?"