“Nylon rope very modern.”
“Oh yes. Fah true, fah true.”
“Nylon rope very modem, nah true?”
“Oh yes.”
“Hempen rope, w’old style, nah true?”
“Oh yes. Time of my great-gron-fahder, he hahv sailing-ship go four time ah year fah Cuba, fah Jamaica: use hempen rope. ”
“De Mexicans punishing, so many people buy nylon, not buy hemp. Mexican grow hemp, not nylon.”
“Nylon rope lahst much lahng-ah.”
“Oh yes. Eet sleek, some.”
“What you say?”
“Nylon rope very sleek. Sleep t’rough you hond. Sleep de knots, you know.”
“Well, dot ee's true. Nylon rope very sleepery. Muss use cleats.”
“Cleats cahst mon-ey, mon. Nah true?”
“Fah true, fah true. Nylon rope cahst mah dan hemp, mottah ahv fock.”
“Oh yes. Me no want buy eet.”
“Me no want buy eet. Sleep de knots, cahn’t get greep on eet, requiah cleats, cahst too much.”
“Fah true, fah true.”
“Yes, mon Fah true. ”
So much for nylon rope, then, at Commeal Wharf. And, for that matter, on the sloop Saccharissa, Jno. L. Limekiller, owner and master.
Who sniffed. “Ah, the sweet salt air!”
“A contradiction in terms, surely?”
‘“Do I contradict myself? Very well, then, I contradict myself.’”
“Yes, I know. You are vast, you contain multitudes.”
He wondered if he should swagger on this; decided that he would not. Instead, he said, “Sweet to me, anyway. - Gallards Point Caye, ho!”
“Gallzards.”
“Gal-lards.”
“The map —”
“The chart —“
They laughed. They laughed a lot when they were together. She went and got both chart and map. Maps. She looked. She looked triumphant. Then she saluted, pouted. Laughed again. “Both right. Chart says Gal-lards, map says Gallzards — Oh. Well, poot! The big map says Galliards, the little map says Gallants.”
He shrugged. “Can’t spell for sour owl stools, some of them down here.” She said, Look who was talking. He asked, surprised, What was wrong with his spelling. She said, Anyone who would spell Labor Department with a u — He said, quickly, defensively, That was the way all British countries spelled it. She asked, with the u before the o? He thought it best to ignore this cavil, gestured off to starboard. “Can you say what those are?” Those being some greenerv-brownery blurs. ‘I mean, find them on the chart…?”
“I already know. The Duck and Ducklings — oops!”
They laughed again, together, at her error. That tiny archipelago was called The Goose and Goslings. By and by they came close enough to observe the shack of the aged light-keeper. No doubt that was the aged light-keeper himself, standing and waving. And. what was that?
Answering Felix’s question, Jack said that That was the Union Jack. “Of course the country does have its own flag now, but not all of these old-timers, you know — “
“I can tell that That’s the Union Jack, but I mean. That — underneath it. Is he surrendering? Or what?”
Jack took a closer squint, but she, on the spy-glass, was already answering her own question. “Oh for goodness sake! That’s not a white flag, that’s his shirt! Just like in a cartoon. ”
She looked at him, questioningly.
He grunted. “Means he wants something. Custom says we have to go see what it is. And, ah. ”
“'Help him out,’ yes.” She was already picking up the local idiom. Can you help me out for a pint, Sir? (“- of rum,” being understood.) Can you help me out, gi’ me a borrow of t’ree shilling? Me truck bruck down, could you help me out with a drop to de garage, mon?
The Goose was of course the biggest, but Captain Barber kept his light on the South Gosling, which long experience had shown was just that much higher as to make a difference in anything short of a hurricane. There was no lighthouse, the old man just lit his lamp and hoisted it on high; his lamp, he had to supply it himself, Government from early days having felt that this would make whoever kept the light keep it more carefully. Government however did supply the oil, plus a minuscule stipend on which he was not expected to live. On what did he live? Menander said that we live as we may and not as we would; there was fish, was there not? Conch. Turtle. He sent, old Captain Barber, now and then a load of red mangrove bark to King Town for Lemuel the tanner there; a stinking trade, but money has no odor. He had some coconut, too. And, also, once a month, from that ancient bequest called Lady Bucknam’s Bountv he had once a month a barrel of biscuit. And a bottle of wine.
In a country where prematurely grey meant grey at sixty, Captain Barber’s hair was quite white; but he was straightbacked or all of that. He had, on realizing that Felix, dungaree trousers or not, was a woman, gone back into his lee’ house and put on his “next” shirt. Now he gave her a courtly bow and a grave, rather shy smile. “Well, Captain,” Jack said, “what’s this I heard not long ago in Town: you found the iron chest at last?” For this was, after all, probably the real reason for his isolated existence, and not alone a desire for solitude. The iron chest. Every stretch of Caribbean coastline has its own iron chest for which men seek and women vearn, full of gold and silver and precious stones; the stranger does right to be often skeptical, but he would do wrong to be always skeptical, for — every now and then — the iron chest is found. and, sometimes, at least, is found full of gold and silver and precious stones. Who put it there? Who knows? Who cares? Sometimes the breath of Hurikan, the old Arawack god of winds and storms. Sometimes the reefs and shoals. Sometimes enemy cannon-shot. And sometimes, of course, of course: Captain Edward England. Major Stede Bonnet. Calico Jack Rackam. Terrible Tom Tew. Horrible Ben Hornigold. Unwomanlv Annv Bonnv. William Kidd, who “murdered Billy More/And laid him in his gore,/Not many miles from shore,/When he sailed. ” And maybe even Flint, he of the impeccable taste in rum. Even thinking of this made Jack Limekiller hear in his inner ear the parrot screaming.
Pieces of eight! Pieces of eight!
Heat or no heat, timbers or no timbers, Limekiller shivered.
“Well, sir. Yes, sir. Oi did foind an oiron chist. For true, sir. and mistress. But not the righteous one. No. Emp-ty. ”
“Oh,” Felix gave a sympathetic and quite sincere sigh.
Barber’s smile, which had ebbed, renewed itself. “But Oi niver fret nor poine about that, mistress. Ah no. Where there is a one oiron chist, bound to be a next one.” His tone did not exactly drop off, and they waited for him to explain his reasons. But he did not do so: useless, clearly, to dawdle in hopes of details as to which stretches of beach or bog or mangrove bluff he went a-prowling and a-probing with his long iron rod, on which bay or bight or cove or creek his dor}’ glided over of nights — if not with its oarlocks muffled, at least with his grapples not assisted by lamplight —