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Show Unlike promotions to other ranks, making Admiral, he knew, relied largely on politics and less on record. You had to be strong but not too strong, he told his daughter, smart but not too smart, and you had to know the right people. Or at least he thought that was true. Lately, though, on those afternoons at work when the phone stopped ringing, his mind turned less to the abstract questions of his profession and more toward the maneuvers necessary to achieve Flag. He had aligned himself with Admiral Lyons, "Ace," as he was known to most, a former fly boy who had jetted to the top of the pyramid with his no-nonsense approach to military decision making. Lyons had a mouth like a sewer but his mind was something to behold. Ace had taken him under his wing several years before, moved him to Hawaii to serve as his chief legal advisor, and, therefore, the chief legal advisor for the entire Pacific Fleet, a position that almost assured him of succession. Even with such an apprenticing, though, he knew the leap to Flag was anything but sure. Still, he imagined on those afternoons as he waited for the list to arrive, a list shrouded in mystery and seemed to appear on its own schedule, that he would be selected. As he waited, he speculated with others about who might get their star and who would be passed over. In those conversations, his name was always a sure thing, even though if he were to make Flag that year it would be a year early, the mark of a truly excellent officer. His mind wandered from the briefs in front of him, the letters needing responses, the files awaiting his signature and, looking out the window at the puffy white clouds that so often dot the Hawaiian sky, he visualized reaching the top. Walking home from the office to meet his wife for lunch every day, he would report the latest gossip. Each evening, she would ask about the list again, wondering together how to read the 207 |