Spartina Page 12

  “Let’s just find your damn boat.”

  Parker faced forward again. Dick heard him cackle. Parker looked over his shoulder. “You know what? Right now this little-bitty skiff with this little-bitty basket is worth more than Mamzelle.”

  Dick wondered if Parker understood the problem. Dick wondered if Parker might be crazy. Dick yelled up at him, “I’ll tell you a know-what. There may not be enough gas to get back to shore. Then your goddamn basket is worth zero.”

  In the dark, with the skiff bobbing, Dick found it hard to tell the difference between sea and sky. There were some stars at the top of the sky, but just above the horizon it was pretty well clouded in. He also began to worry that, if he’d made one degree of compass error and Keith got off a degree or two the other way, they might have gone by each other. He started scanning all around, but he got a little sloppy about steering. He yelled to Parker to turn around and look astern.

  Parker said, “Problem is, did we get served up by name or was it just a vague kind of thing? Hey, boys, somebody’s coming in somewhere in South County. It makes a difference, you know. Makes a difference in what we do next.”

  Dick was afraid Parker really was crazy. He checked himself. Mamzelle making, say, six knots. Three miles out, three miles back. Even Keith couldn’t get off a whole mile. Dick was pretty sure he’d be able to see a light up to a mile off. So where in hell was she?

  “Hey, Parker. What exactly did you say to your college boy?”

  “I told him go out southeast, do a one-eighty, go a half-hour at one-half throttle. Then do another one-eighty, and so on. Out and back.”

  “Did you tell him a number or did you say southeast?”

  “I said both. Southeast, a hundred and thirty-five degrees.”

  It occurred to Dick that the kid might have subtracted 135 from 180 instead of adding 180 to 135. That’s what Charlie did once when Dick was teaching him. So what would that give him? Forty-five. Northeast. Jesus. Then what would he do? If the kid caught himself would he be able to figure where he’d got to? And then would he be able to retrace his course and get back where he was supposed to be?

  Dick could imagine the kid in the dark, with only the binnacle light on, just doing it by the numbers, by what he thought was the numbers. Not paying attention to which way the wind was blowing, which way the sea was running. On board the Mamzelle, inside the wheelhouse, it wouldn’t be so damn obvious as it was in a skiff.

  Dick imagined Keith steering, getting a little bored, checking his watch. Would he get bored enough to take a fix? Dick saw him drawing in the lines on the transparent overlay. Looking at the X. Goddamn, must be wrong. Do it again. Uh oh. Fucked up good.

  “Hey, Parker. Did you draw in the line on the kid’s chart? You know, the three-mile track he was supposed to keep his train on?”

  Parker thought. “I believe I did. Yeah. Drew it on the overlay for him.”

  Dick checked his watch. Another twenty minutes at four and a half knots would take the skiff pretty near the southeast end of the three-mile track. Eight miles out to sea.

  “Hey, Parker. I’m going to row for a while. Save a little gas. Get warm.”

  Dick rowed for ten minutes, felt better. He let Parker take a turn. Dick sat on the bow thwart, facing forward. After ten minutes they switched again. Dick figured they were making under three knots rowing. He was recalculating their position when he saw a white light way off to port, almost due north. The skiff rose on a wave, and under the white light he made out a red running light. Then the shaded white stern light.

  Dick cranked up the motor and swung the skiff round. Parker looked back at him, Dick could just see his mouth open. Dick yelled, “Dead ahead.” Parker’s face disappeared as he swung forward to look. It reappeared. Parker said, “Suppose it ain’t Mamzelle?”

  Maybe Parker wasn’t crazy.

  “Better find out.”

  The problem was to catch the damn boat. The skiff now had a following sea on her port quarter. Dick had to take it easy going down the front of the waves to keep from plowing into the trough. He gave her more speed climbing the back of a wave, eased up as the skiff surfed a little past the crest, went skiing down the front.

  It took them another twenty minutes to get near enough to get a close look at her. Dick peered at her. What he could see beneath the red running light looked like it might be the right color, dirty green. He let her pass by, and then he cut across her stern. Mamzelle.

  Parker yelled, “Keith! Hey! Keith!” Dick ran the skiff under Mamzelle’s lee, was able to speed up enough to get past the wheelhouse. Parker blinked his flashlight and shouted. The kid must be deaf and blind. Then Mamzelle’s engine cut back, clanked into neutral.

  The kid came out. In the green-and-white glow from the running light and the masthead light, Dick saw the kid wave uncertainly. He looked dazed. Parker laughed. Dick was in a rage.

  They got the basket of whelks and the skiff on board. The kid started to stow the basket in the hold. Dick said, “Better keep that right nearby. In case you have to dump it.”

  The kid looked at Parker. Parker said, “Yeah, okay. In the wheelhouse.” He turned to Dick and said, “Well, well, here we are back on board Mamzelle. What say the captain orders grog for all hands. Give me a cigarette, Keith. The smoking lamp is lit.” He pulled off his one boot. “Do me a favor, Dick. Throw that overboard.” He held out the boot to Dick. “Then old Captain Parker’ll make sure his crew get all warm and toasty.” Dick took the boot and tossed it over the side.

  Parker said, “Goodbye, Jorge. We commend your body to the deep.” Keith laughed.

  Dick said, “You take a little detour, kid? You take the scenic route?”

  Keith stopped laughing. Looked at Parker again. Parker said to Dick, “I’ll work that out. You go get some dry clothes. Keith’ll fix some coffee. Then we’ll look into my crystal ball.”

  Dick said, “Jesus, Parker.”

  “Yeah, that’s right. I guess you don’t have to call me Captain.”

  They didn’t look into Parker’s crystal ball that night or have a little talk. Dick sacked out. The kid got him up after four hours to take the wheel. A red smoky dawn. Headed at two-thirds speed for the lobster pots they’d set.

  Parker got up a couple of hours later. The kid stayed in his bunk. Parker brought Dick some coffee but didn’t offer to relieve him.

  Dick waited.

  Parker said, “Well, we can’t stay out here forever.”

  Dick didn’t say anything.

  “But, then, we have certain problems about going in.”

  Dick said, “I’d like to get in. I got to work on my boat. Put my five thousand to work.”

  “Dick. Dick, old buddy. That run wasn’t what you would call a complete run.”

  “I took you in. I goddamn saved your ass getting out.”

  “You saved my ass. You saved your ass. You saved our ass. We saved our ass. Our ass got saved.”

  “You said flat fee, Parker.”

  “Tell you what, Dick. Here’s your five thousand right here.” Parker held up one of the whelks, nudged Dick’s elbow with it. “Here go, Dick.” Dick looked down at it, looked ahead again.

  Parker said, “See what I mean?”

  After a while Dick said, “I see it’s worth about as much as your word.”

  “You are an unreasonable son of a bitch. First you’re all worried about your cherry, you say, ‘Oh no, oh oh, I couldn’t do that!’ Next thing I know you want to get paid—before you’ve turned the trick. And what do we do with our little bundle? I just know what you’d like. ‘Dump it.’ But you still want your five thousand.” Parker snorted.

  Dick said, “Flat fee.”

  “For a completed run,” Parker said. “I’m not going back on my word. We ain’t through yet. It’s real clear to me. You can see it my way, or you can go fuck yourself.”

  Dick thought again of getting in the skiff. Going in by himself. Not enough gas. He’d goddamn row in. And say wha
t when he got stopped? No matter what he’d say, it would be the same as fingering Parker.

  He wouldn’t do that.

  Dick could see the newspaper story. He’d seen stories like it, the Providence Journal was full of them. So-and-so, age such-and-such, stopped in his pickup on Route 1. Dick Pierce, age forty-three, of Matunuck; five to ten years. Next thing Dick imagined was Charlie pasting the newspaper story in his scrapbook. Parker was right about one thing. If it was up to him, he’d dump the whole basket.

  By the time they got to the lobster pots it was blowing. A real smoky southwester. They spent so much time just holding on that it was well after dark before they got the pots hauled. It struck Parker as funny that they didn’t do too bad, pretty near filled one well.

  It was Keith who said, “Let’s just go right in. Hose the whelks down so they’re real slimy-looking. Play it straight up. Just do it.”

  All three of them were in the wheelhouse. Keith at the wheel, Parker and Dick drinking soup with one hand, holding on with the other.

  Dick didn’t like it, but he didn’t say anything. Parker finished his cup of soup and said, “I thought of that. I don’t say no. My idea was maybe take the basket in the skiff at night, find an empty beach, bury the shells in a hole. Then just wait.”

  Keith laughed and said, “ ‘Yo ho ho and a bottle of rum.’ ”

  Parker said, “ ‘Cute, real cute.’ ”

  “There’s a lot of problems,” Dick said. “Where you going to find an empty beach this time of summer? A boat the size of Mamzelle laying offshore is a big radar blip. And there’s no shovel.”

  Parker said, “Use the oars, use our hands.…”

  “And we’d have a great big wet spot on the hole, a bunch of footprints. And on top of all that you’d have to go in and do it all over again to get the stuff back. And where are you? Right where we are now.”

  Keith said, “So what’s your idea?”

  Parker looked at Dick and said, “Yeah.”

  Dick said, “Let’s put the whelks in lobster pots. Set them.”

  Parker laughed. “How many pots you lose a year?”

  “It depends,” Dick said.

  “That’s right,” Parker said. “They work up against a rock, get the warp snagged. Storm works the buoy loose. Fishing boat runs over the line. I mean, I like that you’re making a contribution, but this just sounds like a nicer way of saying dump them. We’ve lost pots this summer in flat calm.” Parker pointed his thumb over his shoulder. “What’s that out there? I wouldn’t call it calm.”

  Keith said, “Look. This is all bullshit. Do it my way. It’ll work. If you guys are nervous about it, I’ll be the one carries them ashore. I’ll put them in my car, drive off. If I get caught, I take the whole rap. If I don’t, I get half.”

  Parker laughed. “Hoo boy! And a mighty hi-yo Silver! Away!”

  Keith looked over his shoulder.

  Parker said, “Don’t talk that way, don’t even think that way about my piggy bank, son. Not to mention Dick and me spent some time laying down in that swamp, spent some more time trying to find you wandering around out here. We don’t want you doing any more wandering.”

  After a while Parker said, “We go in the way Keith says. If they’ve been told my name, then they’re going to look and look until I’m gone. Maybe plant some if they can’t find it. So it don’t matter how long we wait. On the other hand, if all they got was just a date and a place, then we’re just another boat and those whelks look pretty much like whelks. Tell you what though, Keith. You pour a bucket of old bait juice all over them. You know? In case they got a dog. Then we leave them sit right there on deck while we sell the lobster. I’ll drive my station wagon up. No rush. Put in some stuff, you know—my sea bag, a couple of lobster, and my basket of scungilli. Be casual. If you can’t be casual, be busy.”

  As Mamzelle docked at the lobster wharf, Dick saw the green Natural Resources jeep. He kept busy.

  It turned out it wasn’t Natural Resources who came aboard. A plainclothes cop. Very polite. Showed Parker his ID. Asked permission to come aboard. Parker was just as polite. “You don’t mind if my crew unloads the lobster?” The cop and his assistant watched the baskets come up. The assistant was the dog handler.

  They went into the wheelhouse. Dick couldn’t decide if he should watch them or not. Be busy. Dick got the lobster weighed in. When he came out with the money, the cop was just coming up from the hold. The dog handler struggled to lift the dog up from behind. The dog got his forepaws on deck, scrabbled up. Parker was smoking a cigarette, pointing with the hand with the cigarette to something he was telling Keith to take care of. Not a flicker. Keeping Keith busy. The basket of whelks on deck.

  Parker said to the cop, “We got to hose down the deck, flush out the well. If you’re all through down there …”

  Keith swung the sea bags onto the dockside, swung the basket of whelks up alongside them. Then a bucket with three lobster in it, his foul-weather gear.

  Dick went forward to check his harpoons, get a chance to take a deep breath. The cop strolled up behind him. Dick didn’t think he could talk normal to him. He told himself the slow way this guy moved around was most likely boredom—a slow day on the docks stretching out in front of him.

  The cop ran his hand along the metal harpoon shaft, gave it a rap. He said, “Thought they fired these things out of guns nowadays.”

  “You’re thinking about whales,” Dick said. “These are for swordfish.”

  The cop wanted to hear about sticking swordfish. Dick told him. The cop took it in absentmindedly. When Dick got to the part about the beer keg, the cop gave the beer keg a tap. Looked it over.

  The cop said, “Didn’t get any this trip, huh?”

  “No.”

  The cop yawned, ran his hand through his hair.

  Keith got through hosing down the deck, and the cop made his way aft, stepping carefully. A bored little man in a suit and city shoes. He climbed back onto the dockside, looked around for his number-two man. Gave a start when he found the guy right next to him. The dog was back in the wired-off backseat of their car.

  Parker started the engine. Keith cast off the stern line. Parker backed her, swinging the stern away from the dock while Dick held the bow line around a bollard. Parker nodded, and Dick let go, retrieved the line.

  Parker headed Mamzelle out to her slip, between the last set of piles in the row. Dick looked back at the heap of gear, the basket of whelks, the two cops.

  Parker backed her in. Dick made the two bow lines fast, Keith the stern lines. Parker and Keith climbed up onto the gray planking of the pier. Keith started off briskly. Parker stopped him, told him to set a spring line, and ambled off. Dick followed Parker, staying behind him, looking at his feet.

  Keith passed him, picked up his sea bag, foul-weather gear, and the bucket of lobster, leaving two sea bags and the basket of whelks. The cop was still standing there. The dog handler was walking back to his car. Dick looked around for Parker, saw him starting his beat-up VW station wagon. Dick saw the dog handler was getting the dog out again.

  Parker slowly backed toward the basket, stopped to let the guy with the dog get by. Dick leaned down to pick up the basket. The cop turned to him.

  “What are those things? Conchs or something?”

  “Whelks.”

  “Jesus, they stink.”

  Dick said, “Italians eat ’em.”

  Parker stopped. The dog rubbed her cheek and shoulder against the basket. The head cop said, “Hey. Keep her out of that shit, she’ll stink up the car.” The cop with the dog put his foot against her chest. The dog licked it and then sat.

  Dick heard a boat coming up to the dock. The cop reached in his coat pocket and took out his badge holder. Dick swung the basket of whelks in the VW, then Parker’s sea bag and his. Parker slammed the back down. Dick got in the passenger seat and said, “Charlie’s got my truck.” Parker started the car and pulled off.

  When they got onto the
road Parker started laughing. “ ‘Italians eat ’em.’ That’s my boy, Dick. Says to Detective-Sergeant Russo, ‘Italians eat ’em!’ Italians eat that shit. I love it!”

  “The cop was named Russo? Jesus.”

  “No, you don’t get it. I love it. It was great.” Parker did a bongo beat on the steering wheel with his fingers. “You know, one of those things you can’t rehearse. If that dog had gone in nose first, instead of trying to roll in that shit. Where’s a gas station around here? I got to make a phone call.”

  It began to rain again. Dick kept the window open while Parker phoned. The basket was stinking up the whole car.

  By the time they got to Route 1 the rain stopped. It was like that with a smoky southwester, on and off. Parker swung the VW into the Sawtooth Point gate. “It’ll just take a minute. I got a real bright idea.” Dick was too dazed to get worried over what Parker was up to.

  There were a half-dozen new cottages visible from the drive. They looked nearly done, at least the roofs were shingled. A lot of planting going on too. They’d left all the old locust trees around the Buttrick house, but they’d torn up the drainage system. Between the Buttrick house and the Wedding Cake there was a pair of new bright-green tennis courts alongside the old clay one. Dick remembered when the Buttricks put it in. The chicken wire was torn off, and the old posts and the backboard were fresh-painted. The bushes around the outside were full of raspberries.

  Parker drove right up to the Wedding Cake. The door was open. There were several crates and pieces of furniture on the porch, and a U-Haul truck was backed up to it with its tailgate down. No people.

  Parker walked in and shouted, “Hey, Schuyler!” Schuyler appeared in the open doorway on the pond side. He’d just been for a swim. He had a towel round his neck and there were wet curls on his forehead. Otherwise he was naked.

  “Hello there, Captain Parker. Want to go for a dip? Hello there, Dick, come in.”

  The hallway was empty. Through the open double doors Dick saw the main room was empty except for a record player and bottles and glasses.