Far Tortuga (10 page)
Authors: Peter Matthiessen
As Raib laughs, a wave catches the rudder, twisting the wheel from Vemon’s grasp. The ship yaws around into a trench, falling broadside to the seas; she is smacked hard—
whump
!—before she rights herself, and the men bawl as a wall of spray crashes across them.
Vemon!
The ship pitches down the face of the next wave, roaring propellers hoisted clear out of the water. The old ropes that secure the boom part under the strain of the ship’s labor, and before the leaping figures can secure it, the boom crashes back and forth over the deck amidships, and the block-and-tackle flying at its tip cracks the wood framing that supports the upright exhaust stack on the port engine. When the unsupported weight of the long stack breaks it loose from its elbow at the manifold, the engine room fills suddenly with smoke.
Figures surround the engine hatch. Below, Brown’s form moves through the gloom, in a bad light. As the ship rolls, and the open manifold pours smoke into the hold, Brown fits and tinkers.
Dat what I call a
engineer
, mon—how he
stay
down dere?
Look like he in hell!
Byrum stares out at the ocean dark, quickly turns back again.
We could be dere, too, pretty domn quick—no goddom fire equipment. Oh, dis a
bad
trip, mon!
Dat is some hombre, dat is! Don’t even shut de motor off! Hondle dat hot pipe dat way, and eat dat smoke!
Maybe it all dat diesel in de food—got so he
need
it!
Well, he finished—look at dat! Come up, den, Brownie!
Startled, the engineer looks up at the faces that ring the engine hatch. He stands there a moment, angling his sombrero, then goes
slowly to the ladder and climbs out. He accompanies the men to the galley, where he accepts a plate of food and begins to eat. When his mouth is full, he looks up, smiles, and suddenly stops smiling. He has a round head and tawny eyes that search the other faces for a clue.
You from Sponnish Honduras, huh?
No, mon. Woman dere.
Where you home den?
La casa?
(
shrugs
) Barranquilla?
Well, what you do down dere in Roatán? You engineer? Do any farmin like Speedy do?
I no farmer,
hombre
! (
spits
) No, mon.
Pescador
. Little bit mechanic work. Little bit common labor. Little bit everything:
chiclero
. Little bit barberin. (
pause
) Little bit soldierin. (
grins suddenly
)
La Violencia!
Where was dat?
Brown nods toward the south.
Colombia.
Dat where your people at? Colombia? You from Old Providence or de mainland?
Brown says nothing. As he chews, a bean works its way out of his mouth and falls to the deck between his broken shoes.
You gone to go back dere to Roatán?
Es posible. Es
January
ahora
, no?
April.
April?
Brown stops chewing and looks suspiciously from face to face.
Entonces—abril, mayo, julio, septiembre
. Dat three month? I go back over dere three month.
A silence.
Will? Give us dat tale about de
Majestic
and Copm Steadman.
No, mon. Dat de back time now, I tryin to forget dat.
Will? You
shamed
of dat some way?
Will gazes awhile at Athens.
Well, I know
you
never be ashamed. But I thinks about de shipmates dat we left behind onto dat vessel, and dere faces lookin out at us over de rail dere. I tell you something, I gone to remember dat right to my grave. Every man of dem was silent; nobody said a word. But dere was one boy dere dat give us a kind of wave …
Will raises his hand vaguely, still looking at the deck, then raises his head to gaze at the men’s faces.
I gone to have dat boy’s wave with me on de day I die.
5
A.M
.
Black waves, turning gray.
Wodie, at the wheel, stops humming and clears his throat. He pitches his voice low.
Copm? I seein lights dere, Copm. Off de starb’d beam.
How you know I was awake?
Raib appears in yellowed undershirt, scratching his crotch. He considers Wodie, then turns toward the dark horizon.
Ain’t no beacons in dis ocean—dem is runnin lights. Vessel must be comin out de back of Alligator. No turtle dere, nothin but sharks, so dat must be Desmond, sneakin around. (
spits over the rail
) You head west, hit de banks about daylight, we be just right.
The
Eden
turns downwind, toward the southeast edge of Gorda Bank. At sunrise she is on the banks again, running south-southwest toward the northern edge of Alargate Reef.
Raib replaces the canvas-and-lard baits with strips of flying fish. The silvery fish, attracted by the naked light over the engine hatch, have come aboard during the night. Squatting at the taffrail, he sews strips of fish to hooks with a sail needle, notching the baits to make them tail more naturally in the water. His thick hard lumpy fisherman’s hands move gently, and though it is dead, he talks softly to the wild-eyed fish as if to calm it.
Fly too high, darlin, you fly too high.
He laughs his deep accumulating laugh, and his broad back quakes beneath the weathered shirt.
The
Eden
rides easily on the following wind, her jib and foresail taut. The trolling lines, hitched to the stanchions, sail out over the wake, and the baits, flashing at the surface, dart and hurry in the morning sea. Soon the fish rise; both lines go taut with a small
thump
and are hauled in hand over hand, skidding and cutting across the wake as the fish run.
Three kingfish, a Spanish mackerel, four barracuda fly up out of the sea; they slap and skitter on the deck. A barra with black spots and a black dorsal snaps at the bare legs and Athens smacks it with a marlin spike across the head. A glaze on the gelatin eyes: the pupil dims.
The barracuda shivers and lies still.
Blood all over de deck! Hit dat fish cross de top of de head, mon, not in de gill part! Even de boy know better den dat!
Will, I gone get dat bastard fore he get me, dass
my
policy!
Well, grob a bucket den and swab dat gurry off fore it get sticky!
Listen to dis fella! Soon de Coptin out of sight, he show us who de boss!
I de mate, mon! You don’t believe dat, den wait see who get de mate’s half-share!
Nemmine, Will, you a good fella. Dem as say you so stubborn and stupid don’t know you as good as we do.
We gone eat dat barra with de spots? Dey say dem spots is poisonous.
Me, I eats de spots, throw away de rest. Next to stripes, de thing I like de best in life is
spots
.
Laughing, Athens tosses a fresh bait to the sea.
Well, Athens, a mon get domn sick on poison fish!
It de fishenin ground, not de fish. Dere dat famous place long by West Bay Beach, where de fish poisonous—not only de barra. De jack and de rockfish and all of dem.
No, mon. De only where dere is poison fish is on dat bank eight, nine miles west de island—
dat
is de famous place. Something dat dey eat dere turn de jack a bad-lookin black color. Dem few poison fish at West Bay Beach and over dere at Northwest Point is drifted in off de Cayman Banks. Dat right, Copm Raib?
So you say, den. But one time goin along dere I see pompano close inshore, so I toss dem a bait, pick up five, six. Dat were de worst job I ever done—near killed half of de whole family.
Mon, you should had
tested
dem. Throw a piece on de ant hill, see if de ants grob it. If ants walks away from a piece of fish, den you best walk away yourself, cause de ants
know
.
Another way, you boil de fish, den you put a piece of silver into de meat. If dat coin turn to black,
den
you know something wrong.
Mon, you know something goddom wrong
already!
Dem dass rollin on de floor, dey don’t need no goddom old ants to tell dem dat dey eat poison fish!
I sayin now, if you was
suspicious
of dat fish, den you …
Brown squats on a blue fuel drum. His knees are level with his ears, and the tips of his rawhide chin strap dangle down over the drum rim. He is picking his gold teeth, eye rolling.
Near the scuppers, Speedy guts the kingfish. He too is squatting on his heels; the black muscles of his calves and forearms bunch and ravel. With one quick slash he splits the fish from gills to vent, then hacks the head off, chattering rapidly to himself.
Speedy can
cut
, mon! If he can’t do nothin else dis boy can
cut
!
He holds up a fistful of bright guts and laughs.
Oh, Speedy a
hard
nigger, mon.
The silver fish have turned gray-white.
Speedy lops the pectoral fins with quick deft flicks. Running the knife point along under the spine, he scrapes out the air sac, then sloshes a bucket of salt water into the cavity; the water floods across the deck, carrying the gurry toward the scuppers. He rests a moment, running his hand down the long gleaming flanks of mother-of-pearl, then skins the fish, paring scales and skin together in small silver sections.
