When it jumped, I saw that it was probably a shade smaller than the one Jimmy had hooked. As it ran I saw Wolta reeling in rapidly.
Any sailfish could find freedom if it had the sense to run on a straight line, take all the line, break the line at the end of the run. But five hundred yards is a long way to go in a straight line. I stood in front of the chair. When it jumped, I kept the line taut, pulling it off balance, slapping it down against the sea before it could shake its head.
It headed for the Orient; then, as I was getting worried about the line, it began to cut around in a vast circle, and I won back a little line. It stopped jumping. Bringing in the line was the usual tough problem. A hundred yards from the boat and twenty minutes later it walked on its tail for a good dozen yards and then, as I had expected, it sounded. I horsed it up, a few feet at a time. It made one more jump close to the boat and then came in, dog weary. Pedro handled the gaff. The sailor grasped the bill, and Pedro belted it across the back of the neck with the weighted club.
The sail came in over the transom, glistening with a hundred impossibly beautiful irridescent colors. Jimmy squatted and watched the colors slowly fade until the fish became the usual shining gunmetal black of the dead sail. He turned glowing eyes up toward me and said, “That was wonderful!”
“The experts are always wonderful,” Wolta said. He grinned at me. “Do I have your permission to fish?”
He got his line in first. Fresh bait was put on the other line, and Jimmy took his place in the chair. It was not over five minutes later that a sail, without warning, came up from downstairs and slapped Wolta’s bait. I was behind his chair. He waited the proper time until the line straightened and then hit, much too hard. But it didn’t do any harm because he wasn’t hitting against the fish. The sail was waiting longer than usual.
Instinctively I reached down over Wolta’s shoulder and released the drag so the spool would run free, allowing the bait to remain dead on the water.
Wolta pushed my hand away hard, saying in a tight voice, “Catch your own fish, Doc.”
It was a comedy of errors. The fish took the bait, and then Wolta tried to hit it with the drag off and without his thumb on the spool. The spool whined and the line snarled. Pedro came running and grasped the line ahead of the rod and yanked hard three times, setting the hook. The fish went high. It was one fine sail. I guessed it as close to ninety pounds. The world’s record is 106 pounds off Miami in 1929. Pedro managed to click the drag back on and ripped at the snarled line while the sail jumped wildly, lashing, fighting.
With the snarl gone, the fish hit the end of the slack with a jar that made Wolta grunt and yanked his arms straight, yanked the rod tip down. When the fish jumped again, Wolta horsed it so hard that he spun the sail in the air.
I yelled at him, “You’ll bust the line!”
He worked with a tight hard grin on his face. The sail took line on him, but took it with the full drag and with Wolta’s hard thumb on the spool. I don’t know why the line didn’t break. It would test at 96 pounds.
I’ll say this for Wolta. He was a powerful man. Cords like cables stood out on his brown forearms as he horsed the fish toward the boat. Pedro began to look worried. Even boating a tired fish is rugged work. Last year, just as a man reached for the bill, the fish took one more leap, freeing himself of the gaff. The bill entered the brain of the sailor through his left eye. And Pedro saw himself trying to boat a fish that still had a lot of fight left.
Pedro worked the boat, turning it perfectly, keeping it so that Wolta had free play of the fish. The fish made short hard savage lunges close to the boat. Pedro left the wheel, handled the gaff himself, sunk it neatly. The fish gave a convulsive heave that nearly lifted Pedro over the side. The sailor went half over the rail, grasped the bill with his gloved hand, and slammed the fish twice behind the eyes. Pedro heaved it aboard.
The fish lay there. Reflex muscles made it quiver. Wolta grabbed the club from the sailor and hit it again. It was an understandable thing to do. But the way he did it, the way the club smashed against the hard flesh, revealed something savage and soul-naked about the man. Pedro looked disgusted.
Wolta turned to me and said, “I got it in spite of you. Next time keep your damn hands off my rod and reel, mister.”
I said, “Wake up, Wolta. If I hadn’t thrown off the drag, you wouldn’t even have a fish. He didn’t have the bait when you hit him. I let the bait free so that it stayed back there. You kept me from putting the drag back on. That’s why your line snarled.”
He smiled at me. His pale eyes still held anger. “If you say so, expert. Anyway, this one will outweigh yours.” He kicked the dead fish. I didn’t like that, and neither did Pedro. A sail is an honorable opponent, a brave fish, a gentleman of the sea. Even dead he isn’t to be kicked.
“It probably will,” I said.
We had the two flags up for the two sails. I took Wolta’s place while he went inside to have another beer. I had noticed that his thumb was raw where he had pressed it against the escaping line.
Jimmy Gerran dropped his bait back into the water. Wolta hollered out, “Both the men have got a fish, kid. Now let’s see if you can lose another one.” He laughed hugely. Jimmy smiled weakly. I smiled not at all.
We fished without result for over an hour and then we ate. Even without another strike, it would have been a good day. But I was pulling for Jimmy to latch onto one. And I had a hunch that when he did, he’d do a better job than Wolta had. Only Wolta seemed oblivious of the fact that enormous luck had kept his line from snapping.
We were out a good dozen miles, and the sun was almost directly overhead, making a dazzling glare on the blue sea.
The time went by slowly. Wolta said, “Somebody catch something. I want some more fishing.” He waited a few minutes. He said, “Jimmy, if you don’t have anything by three o’clock, I’m taking over.”
I said, “Don’t you think we ought to stick to the rules?”
“Okay, Jimmy?” Wolta said. “Three o’clock?”
Jimmy didn’t look at me. He said, “Sure, Lew.”
The older man had him buffaloed. I knew the signs. I liked Gerran. So all I could do was to think that it was just too bad.
While I was wondering how Gerran got himself tied up with Wolta, Pedro hissed and said in Spanish, “There is a monstrous fish to starboard, senor.”
I searched the sea until I saw it. It was too close. There wasn’t time for me to reel in and change to the boat rod. This fish wasn’t going to be brought in on my tackle.
For a moment I had a yen to try for him, anyway. But I reeled in quickly.
Wolta said, “What’s up? Why’re you reeling in?”
At first the sun was in my eyes. And then I saw him coming in like a freight train. He slapped Jimmy’s bait out of the water. It fell dead, free of the clothespin, and the fish took it. Jimmy hit it perfectly, four times. The huge fish was on his way out to sea when he felt a nasty little jab inside his jaw. He felt a jab and a tugging weight. To free himself of it, he went upstairs. He went up in a shower of spray — five hundred pounds of blue marlin.
Wolta yelled in astonishment. A wide grin split Pedro’s face. The hands gabbled in excitement. There aren’t many fish like that one off Acapulco. Jimmy didn’t give him any slack when he jumped again and again. Then the big blue headed for off and beyond, and the reel sang a high shrill song of irresistible power.
Jimmy should have been using a 30 ounce tip, a 16/0 reel and 54-thread line. In relation to the blue, his tackle was as relatively light as mine was for sail. Jimmy held the rod and gave us one taut, startled look as Pedro and I grabbed the straps and strapped him to the chair.