Hunting the Dragon (3 page)

Billy gasped as he saw the shredded, semifrozen remains of a Fijian. The dead man’s skin was lacerated as if raked by jagged meat hooks. One leg was missing at the knee, and the other had been sliced open to the bone. The cadaver looked shrunken and Billy guessed that the man had died from loss of blood, traumatic shock, massive internal hemorrhaging—the works. He shuddered, realizing what had caused the man’s death. He turned to the impassive mate and asked, “Shark?”

The man shrugged. “It happens.”

As the black-suited attendants hurried to pick up the body, the first mate said, “Collect your gear and report to Captain Gandara.” He scratched his bald head as if trying to remember what else needed to be said. “Oh, yeah, welcome aboard
Lucky Dragon
.”

W
ith his surfboard under one arm, Billy gripped the gangplank railing and bounded up the steep walkway. He was excited and apprehensive. When he reached the main deck he paused and looked about.
Which way to the bridge? And what did the mate say the captain’s name was? Gandara. Yeah. Captain Gandara. Sounds Spanish, or Portuguese.

At the top of the walkway he maneuvered his board so it wouldn’t hit the railing. The brittle fiberglass covering the foam core was as fragile as an eggshell. The nine-foot Becker, handcrafted by one of surfdom’s great shapers, had saved his life once, and Billy treated the board with respect.

He walked along the hot steel deck toward the bow. It was time to meet the captain and ensure himself a berth aboard
Lucky Dragon
.

He stuck his head in an open door and discovered the crew’s mess. Several weathered men sat on benches before varnished plywood-topped dining tables drinking beer, coffee, and soda pop. Some read paperbacks with lurid covers that Billy noted had Spanish titles. As he stepped inside and out of the searing heat, his eyes quickly adapted to the dimness. Crewmen gaped at him. A few made little mouth movements that suggested a smile. Most stared blankly. He forced a grin and said, “I’m supposed to report to the captain.”

The fishermen sat uncomprehending until Billy asked in halting high school Spanish,
“¿Dónde está el capitán?”

A thin young man, about Billy’s age, stood and moved to face him. He had long, wavy dark hair tied in a ponytail, and wore tight black jeans and a startling white T-shirt with the Grateful Dead rock band logo silk-screened across the chest. He stopped a foot in front of Billy and looked him up and down. He answered with deliberate cool and a challenging grin, “He’s on the bridge. You a surfer, dude?”

“I ride some waves.”

“Awesome!” he said, mimicking surfer slang.

As Billy turned to leave he gave the Latino kid a raised thumb-and-pinky surfer’s shaka salute. Continuing the game, he said, “Thanks, bro.”

He climbed the exterior companionway to the wide bridge that projected forward of the enclosed wheelhouse. He saw a deckhand installing huge twenty-power spotting binoculars on a gimbaled mount. Billy walked up to him and said, “I’m to report to Captain Gandara.”

The man pointed inside the wheelhouse. Billy carefully placed his surfboard on the deck, and carrying his gear, he entered. Beside the huge first mate stood a bearded man, obviously the captain. He was as tall as Santos but thinner. He had the lean, tense-muscled body of an Olympic fencer. Billy noticed his dark, carefully trimmed beard first. The man’s facial hairs were so tightly curled they reminded him of coarse steel wool. As an artist, Billy realized it was the blackness about his lips and chin that made his teeth appear so white. His eyes, in contrast, were light green, almost like a cat’s. He wore sharply creased chino trousers, a starched blue work shirt with epaulettes, and low-cut white leather tennis shoes. His nose was sharp and aristocratic. The captain’s hands held a parallel rule on a nautical chart. They were large and powerful. Billy imagined them gripping a saber.

Gandara looked up from the map and stared at the new crewman. Then his attention returned to the chart. Billy knew he was facing a man who would take no disrespect from another. Here was a man who had earned, with knife, pistol, and cunning, the right to command
Lucky Dragon
.

As Billy waited, he gazed about the bridge. He was impressed with the vast array of modern electronic gear—GPS receivers, color side-scanning fish-finding sonars, depth sounders, single sideband radios, autopilot, the latest Furuno radar scope, and a weather satellite fax machine. There were more marvels, but Billy’s limited experience with large-ship marine electronics kept him from comprehending their purpose. His eyes held on an old magnetic compass in its teak box, mounted before the helmsman’s wheel; an archaic reminder that the forces of nature could still be depended on.

The captain stuck a drafting pencil in an electric sharpener, ground a fine point, and drew a precise line along the rule plotting a course on the chart. He replaced the pencil in the sharpener, turned to the mate, and said, “We’ll head northeast out of Suva to here.”

Again he honed the pencil point and added a dot on the chart. “About here, we’ll send Mr. Lessing aloft for a look-see. It’s unlikely he’ll spot dolphins this far to the west, but we’ve been lucky before.”

The mate nodded his understanding. With an abrupt movement the captain turned to face Billy.

“Let me have your passport, and then open your pack on the deck,” he commanded.

Billy placed his gear on the floor, zipped open the getaway bag, and handed the captain his identification. As the tall man studied the passport, Billy pulled back the flap of his pack. He felt self-conscious about the dirty laundry. To distract the captain he said, “I’m not carrying drugs.”

The captain ignored his comment and continued to study the blue passport. He closed the cover and remarked drily, “You have traveled far for one so young. What are you running from?”

“I like to surf. I go where the waves are big.”

“So, on your endless summer odyssey.”

He touched the pack with the toe of a white tennis shoe, “Everything out.”

“Hey, I told you I don’t carry drugs,” Billy insisted.

Billy saw the mate’s scowl and hurried to empty his pack and getaway bag. The captain remarked, “He’s an eighteen-year-old innocent, Santos. Forgive him.”

The captain scanned Billy’s belongings with the detached expression of a man performing a boring duty. Then Gandara’s foot moved to Billy’s sketch book. “Hand me that.”

Billy picked up the book and offered it to the captain. He turned the pages slowly, inspecting each of the drawings. Billy held his breath, experiencing the same insecurity he had felt when Miss Graham, his art teacher, had critiqued his first portfolio.

“You’re a gifted primitive. You should acquire some training,” he said softly.

Billy sensed a note of interest that suggested the man might be human after all. “I like to draw. I studied art in high school.”

“He’s not only innocent, he’s educated,” the mate said drily.

Gandara’s attention returned to the sketch pad. “You have a certain technical skill—keep working at it.”

He handed the pad to Billy. “Now, put that small bag on the chart table.” He placed his getaway bag before the captain and unloaded the contents. Gandara’s long fingers tapped over the compass, granola bars, fishing lures, sunblock, swim fins and mask, signal mirror, and a tiny digital still camera.

“And all this…?”

“My survival gear. I had a boat sink on me once, and had to paddle awhile before I was rescued.”

The captain look distressed and said quickly, “No more talk of sinking. It’s bad luck.”

Gandara tapped the center of the chart with the pencil. “You’ll do no swimming or paddling out here. Where I fish, sharks gather.”

The captain turned and opened a drawer below the chart table. He put Billy’s little camera inside and said evenly, “This will be returned to you when you leave the ship.”

Billy knew it would be stupid to protest and only nodded. Gandara turned to the mate. “Santos, he’ll work the seine skiff with Rocha. Now, find Mr. Lessing and have him give our young artist a tour of the ship. And tell Mr. Lessing to explain the rules.”

Billy repacked his gear and the captain turned away to open a door at the rear of the bridge. As Gandara stepped through, Billy glanced into the captain’s cabin and saw a small dining table set for one with gleaming silver, a crystal wine glass, and a vase of fresh flowers. Against the far wall stood a locked gun rack holding ten automatic assault rifles. On a shelf below the weapons lay dozens of cartridge magazines packed in cloth bandoliers.

As Billy stared at the rifles, Gandara turned and looked at him for a long moment. The younger man wanted to run, but the captain’s green eyes held him. “I can feel it when you stare at me from behind my back. Remember that,
niño
, and remember the captain of this ship is your protector and master. If you work hard, and follow orders, your voyage will be uneventful.”

Billy was stunned by the man’s intensity. For the first time in many years he answered subserviently, “Yes, sir.”

The mate led him outside and Billy slowed to run a hand over the spotting binoculars. “Steiners, from Germany. Good optics.”

“The best. We have the best of everything. The captain knows quality. He liked your drawings, you could see that.”

“Want to buy one?”

The mate’s frown shut Billy up, and he followed Santos along the side of the bridge. They stopped where a ladder led upward to the Hughes 300 helicopter strapped to the top of the wheelhouse. Santos bellowed at a small man standing on a red toolbox peering into the open hatch of the engine housing. “Mr. Lessing, the captain wants you to show this kid the boat. You know, fill him in about everything. He’ll bunk with you. He’s an American, so you can bullshit with him.”

Before Santos turned away he grabbed Billy’s shoulders. He squeezed hard to make a point and said, “The captain likes you; do not do anything to dishonor him.”

“Sure, he’s the captain.”

“He is our father, and
Lucky Dragon
is our home. You will respect him and work hard.”

Billy sensed the mate’s intense loyalty and knew any back talk would bring his fist crashing down. He said with a nod that was supposed to convey his sincerity, “I’ll pull my share.”

“And more,
niño
. You must be prepared to give your life for him. Without the captain, we are nothing.”

A voice came down from the helicopter carrying a tone of weary sarcasm, “Ah, come on, Santos. Save your sermon for the Catholics.”

The mate looked up at Mr. Lessing and gave him a threatening scowl. The pilot peered down at them and said pleasantly, “Treat me right, Santos, or I might get drunk, crash this beat-up chopper, and miss spotting a pod.”

“And you, Mr. Lessing, may a shark piss on your lips.”

Santos turned away and walked aft as if he was king of the deck. Billy watched his muscled bulk vanish and thought, That is one tough dude. No way am I ever going to back talk to him.

“So where are you from, kid?” came a voice from under the helicopter’s engine cowling.

“Mostly the Southern California beach scene, but now, nowhere, really.”

“Join the club. Come on up.”

The pilot closed the engine compartment and reached into a cooler. He handed Billy a sweating can of Coke and popped the top off a beer for himself. “The name’s Arnold.”

“I’m Billy Crawford. How come the captain and mate call you ‘Mr. Lessing’?”

“Gandara honors me as a fellow officer. In the old days I was a captain in the army of the U.S.A.”

“And the old days were where?”

He saw Arnold’s face cloud. “That’s classified.”

“Maybe this is an okay question. Why did Gandara go through my gear like a customs inspector?”

“He doesn’t allow cameras—still, video, or movie—aboard.”

“And he took mine. How come?” Billy asked.

“It’s his ship,” Lessing added with a cautionary note that chopped Billy’s question right there.

Billy took a long pull on the can. “That Gandara, he’s an intense guy.”

“You might say that.”

He sensed that Arnold played it close to the vest and switched the subject. “Must be a real chore keeping a chopper running out here, with the salt corrosion and everything.”

The pilot placed a hand on the helicopter’s blue-gray cabin siding. The man’s touch was one of loving respect for the machine he flew. Billy saw that Arnold’s hair was thinning, his hands had a slight tremor, and that there was an eruption of reddish scar tissue around the back of the pilot’s neck that the man’s sweat-stained T-shirt failed to hide. Then he faced Billy and said, “Damn salt spray eats right through the aluminum if you don’t keep after it. And I got no crew chief to pull maintenance. Not like the old days when I only had to fly these birds.”

Arnold lashed a canvas cover over the helicopter’s forward windshield, and with surprising agility dropped down the ladder to the deck without touching his feet to the rungs. “Let’s take a walk, kid.”

Billy followed him aft and the pilot remarked, “In port we don’t stand watches, except for an engine room guy, the mess crew, and one of the mates. In port he goes easy. At sea, it’s different. He’s a mean bastard then, and you’d better believe it.”

On the way aft the pilot paused below the mainmast that sprouted half a dozen antennae and two radars housed in plastic covers. He pointed up at the enclosed crow’s nest and said, “Best place to stay cool in the ship, and about the only place for a little privacy, if you meditate or stuff like that.”

“How about all those automatic rifles in the captain’s cabin?”

The pilot had had enough of Billy’s persistent questions and gruffly answered, “Pirates, Billy, big-time down here.”

Arnold indicated the long, thick boom of a crane that was fixed to the mast, which now lay on the deck. He led Billy to the end of the boom where a giant hydraulic-driven motorized pulley was attached to the top. “That’s the power block. It pulls the net out of the water and over the stern so the catch can be untangled and loaded into the freezers. That sucker’s so powerful it can haul in a thirty-ton load of tuna, and it has more than once.”

They continued aft to pause before a small mountain of red nylon netting. “How long’s the net?” Billy asked.

“A little over a mile, and it hangs down from the corkline some three hundred feet deep. It’s called a purse seine, because after the catch is encircled, we pull a line that closes the bottom, like closing a string purse.”

They climbed the nylon mountain and saw Rocha sitting in the seine skiff with his back to them. The boatman was staring at the sea, unaware of their approach. Arnold went on explaining, “When Gandara orders a set, the skiff drops off the stern and hauls the net out in a circle to trap the tuna. Anyway, Rocha will tell you all about it. His job’s running the skiff.”