The Galloping Ghost by Carl P. LaVO

fetus and mother was too great. And it was because of this that she wrote to Gene that marriage to the ensign wouldn’t be a good thing.
    Marjorie mailed her letter in care of the Nevada , then had second thoughts and wrote a second letter. “Last night I stayed awake from eleven when I went to bed till 3:45 am thinking of you and wondering what you were going to think of me when you get the letter I wrote on Saturday. I nearly sent a telegram asking you not to open it. I practically bared my soul to you and hon, it’s almost like standing naked before someone. You don’t think me awful, truthfully, do you?”
    Quite the contrary—the revelations only deepened Ensign Fluckey’s feelings for her. He wrote of his undying devotion, that having children didn’t matter to him, that it was his love of her that mattered. On leave a few weeks later, Fluckey went to Marjorie’s house and the couple announced their engagement.
    Marriage under normal circumstances would have been possible within a short time. But in the mid-1930s the Navy frowned mightily on any of its ensigns getting married. War was coming and the Navy was determined to hang onto them for as long as possible. Rules were adopted to prohibit them from marrying until a full two years after graduation from the academy. Anyone who violated the directive was subject to immediate dismissal from the service.
    Gene and Marjorie contemplated getting hitched secretly, perhaps in Mexico. But in the end they decided not to flaunt the regulation, though it meant no marriage until at least June 1937—a year-and-a-half away. They both were young and willing to wait. They could still see each other whenever the Fleet was in port, and when away steady correspondence—each letter numbered in a countdown to 6 June 1937—kept the flame burning. So absorbed was Ensign Fluckey in writing letters to Marjorie in his off-duty hours oneday that while giving his messboy orders, he called him “honey.” “That damn message has been laughing about that ever since,” he wrote Marjorie.
    Every week at sea Fluckey arranged for forget-me-not flowers to be delivered to his fiancée. Through daily correspondence, the couple exchanged poetry, thoughts about popular tunes, sometimes lapsed into French, and professed deep love for one another that at times was tested. In March 1936, for instance, the Nevada embarked for the Bremerton, Washington, Navy Yard for a month-long refit. On leave at the time, Fluckey took the train from Long Beach to rejoin the battleship at the shipyard. There he received a letter from Marjorie describing an encounter with a married aide to Fleet Admiral Reeves at a dinner party she was requested to attend as the aide’s escort. “He was old enough to be my father,” she wrote. “Franny [the hostess] warned me not to get cornered alone anywhere with him as he’s very amorous. He has a ’36 Buick sedan that’s a honey but even that couldn’t intrigue me. We all went to the Biltmore after dinner and had a very enjoyable time but when we arrived home he wouldn’t let me out of the car. Gave me quite a fight until I told him I’m very much in love with someone and that I detested people who had no regard for other’s feelings. After that speech he let me go. He said he’d like to call again but I told mother that I’m out if he does.”
    Fluckey started counting down the hours in his letters until the Nevada was back in Long Beach. There Marjorie noticed in a city newspaper that Gene was being transferred to the destroyer USS McCormick (DD-223), based in San Diego. “Your letter gave me the worst fright of my life,” he replied. “I spent the whole afternoon running around the communication offices of the Nevada, Maryland and New York reading over all orders sent out in the last two weeks—my name didn’t appear. I even went to the newspaper