“I don’t even need to anchor.”
“You’ve got plenty of strong-backed people to get anchors up.”
“Send up Ara and Willie if they’ve eaten. Nothing should show here this close to the light and you can’t see a damned thing looking into the sun. But send up George and Henry, too. We might as well do it right.”
“Remember the rocks make right up to your blue water here, Tom.”
“I remember and I can see them.”
“Do you want your tea cold?”
“Please. And a sandwich. Send the men up first.”
“They’ll be right up. I’ll send the tea up and have everything ready to go ashore.”
“Be careful how you talk to them.”
“That’s why I am going in.”
“Put out a couple of lines, too. It will look better coming in on the light.”
“Yes,” his mate said. “We might get something we could give them at the light.”
The four came up and took their usual posts and Henry said, “Did you see anything, Tom?”
“One turtle with a sea gull flying around him. I thought he was going to perch on his back. But he didn’t.”
“Mi capitán,” said George, who was a taller Basque than Ara and a good athlete and fine seaman, but not nearly as strong as Ara in many ways.
“Mi señor obispo,” said Thomas Hudson.
“OK, Tom,” George said. “If I see any really big submarines do you want me to tell you?”
“If you see one as big as you saw that one time keep it to yourself.”
“I dream about her nights,” George said.
“Don’t talk about her,” Willie said. “I just ate breakfast.”
“When we closed I could feel my cajones going up like an elevator,” Ara said. “How did you really feel, Tom?”
“Scared.”
“I saw her come up,” Ara said. “And the next thing I heard Henry say, ‘She’s an aircraft carrier, Tom.’ ”
“That’s what she looked like,” Henry said. “I can’t help it. I’d say the same thing again.”
“She spoiled my life,” Willie said. “I’ve never been the same since. For a nickel I’d have never gone to sea again.”
“Here,” said Henry. “Take twenty cents and get off at Paredón Grande. Maybe they’ll give you change.”
“I don’t want change. I’ll take a transfer.”
“Would you really?” Henry asked. There had been a certain amount of bad blood between them since the last two times they had been in Havana.
“Listen, expensive,” Willie said. “We’re not fighting submarines or you wouldn’t have come up without sneaking a quick one. We’re only chasing Krauts to kill them in a decked-over half-open boat. Even you ought to be able to do that.”
“Take the twenty cents anyway,” Henry said. “You’ll need it some day.”
“To stick up—”
“Cut it out the two of you. Cut it out,” Thomas Hudson said. He looked at both of them.
“I’m sorry, Tom,” Henry said.
“I’m not sorry,” Willie said. “But I apologize.”
“Look, Tom,” said Ara. “Almost abeam inshore.”
“That’s the rock that’s just awash,” Thomas Hudson said. “It shows further to the eastward on the chart.”
“No. I mean further in about a half a mile.”
“That’s a man crawfishing or hauling fish traps.”
“Do you think we ought to speak to him?”
“He’s from the light and Antonio’s going in to talk with them at the light.”
“Feesh! Feesh!” his mate called and Henry asked, “May I take him, Tom?”
“Sure. Send Gil up.”
Henry went down and in a little while the fish jumped and showed he was a barracuda. Then, a little later, he heard Antonio grunt as he hit him with the gaff and then he heard the thunking knocks of the club on its head. He waited for the splash of the fish being thrown back and looked at the wake to see his size. There was no splash and he remembered that barracuda were good to eat on this stretch of the coast and Antonio was saving him to take in to the light. Just then he heard the double shout of “Feesh!” and this time there was no jumping and the line was singing out. He turned out further into the blue water and slowed down both engines. Then as the line kept going out he threw out one motor and made a half-turn toward the fish.
“Wahoo,” his mate called up. “Big one.”
Henry brought the fish in and they looked down over the stern and saw him long and oddly pointed, his stripes showing clearly in the blueness of the deep water. When he was nearly within reach of the gaff he turned his head and made another fast deep run that took him out of sight in the clear water in less time than a man could snap his fingers.
“They always have that one run,” Ara said. “It goes like a bullet.”
Henry brought him in fast and they watched over the stern as he was gaffed and brought aboard rigid and trembling. His stripes showed a bright blue and his jaws, that could cut like razors, opened and closed with spasmodic uselessness. Antonio laid him in the stern and his tail beat against the deck.
“¡Qué peto más hermoso!” Ara said.
“He’s a beautiful wahoo,” Thomas Hudson agreed. “But we’ll be out here all morning if this keeps up. Leave out the lines but take the leaders off,” he said to his mate. He steered for just outside the light on its high point of rock and tried to make up the time they had lost and still act as though they were fishing. The friction of the lines in the water bent the rods.
Henry came up and said, “He was a beautiful fish, wasn’t he? I’d love to have had him on light tackle. Don’t they have an extraordinarily shaped head?”
“What will he weigh?” Willie asked.
“Antonio said he’d weigh about sixty, Willie. I was sorry I didn’t have time to call you. He really should have been yours.”
“That’s all right,” Willie said. “You caught him faster than I could and we have to get the hell along. I bet we could catch plenty good fish all along here.”
“We’ll come sometime after the war.”
“I’ll bet,” said Willie. “After the war I’m going to be in Hollywood and be a technical adviser on how to be a horse’s ass at sea.”
“You’ll be good at it.”
“I ought to be. I’ve been studying it now for over a year to train me for my career.”
“What the hell have you got so much black ass about today, Willie?” Thomas Hudson asked.
“I don’t know. I woke up with it.”
“Well, go down to the galley and see if that bottle of tea is cold and bring it up. Antonio’s butchering the fish. So make a sandwich will you, please?”
“Sure. What kind of sandwich?”
“Peanut butter and onion if there’s plenty of onion.”
“Peanut butter and onion it is, sir.”
“And try to get rid of your black ass.”
“Yes sir. Black ass gone, sir.”
When he was gone Thomas Hudson said, “You take it easy with him, Henry. I need the son of a bitch and he’s good at his stuff. He’s just got black ass.”
“I try to be good with him. But he’s difficult.”
“Well try a little harder. You were needling hurt about the twenty cents.”
Thomas Hudson looked ahead at the smooth sea and the innocent-looking deadliness of the reef off his port bow. He loved to run just off a bad reef with the light behind him. It made up for the times when he had to steer into the sun and it made up for several other things.
“I’m sorry, Tom,” Henry said. “I’ll watch what I say and what I think.”