A few months later, Worel had been ready to disconnect his phone and return to work as a first mate, humping for tips at forty-six years of age, when a baritone-voiced guy tracked him down on the phone and asked if he was available to head out and scare up some marlin. The man indicated he’d chartered from Worel once before.
Worel remembered him, a gruff son of a bitch, nothing like the usual tourist. The man hadn’t said a word in the eight hours they’d spent on the water when he’d chartered the now-defunct boat that first time out.
“Been running that boat for twenty goddamn years,” Worel said to him over the phone.
“Yeah?”
“Yeah, mon,” Worel said. “Too bad some bastard name of Hugo take it away. There ain’t a single plank o’ wood remainin’.”
The man told Worel thanks anyway and that he was sorry about the boat. A moment of silence played out, neither of them hanging up. Then Cooper said, “You make a living, running a deep-sea charter?”
“Sure you do, mon. Way that happen is, you buy four, five boats, give the fat cats what they really want for the bulk of your business-cushion under their big ass, cooler full of rum and beer. Take ’em out on tours, catch a couple tuna for kicks, and save the deep-sea game for the fellas come down here to do it for real. Keep the boats in different places-that way there ain’t no goddamn storm-ain’t nobody-gonna take all them boats from you. And there somethin’ else too, mon: make sure when you buy them boats, you get yourself an insurance policy. Do that, or do nothin’ at all.”
When Cooper didn’t say anything in response, Worel said, “Yeah, shit, mon, that fucking Hugo,” and hung up the phone.
Two days later, Worel was stepping off the boat of a friend who’d given him a day of first-mate work when he found himself confronted by a short man wearing a navy blue business suit.
“Pardon me,” the man asked, “but would you be Mr. Worel?”
Worel asked him who wanted to know.
“Jacob Bartleby,” said the man.
“Can’t say the name mean anything to me, mon.”
Bartleby nodded his understanding. “Mr. Worel, I’m an attorney representing a Cayman Islands investment firm specializing in resort and recreational properties.”
He handed Worel a slip of paper, which Worel took, examined, and discovered to be a cashier’s check, made out to cash, in the sum of $250,000. Bartleby asked Worel if he would be able to procure four boats for that amount, assuming the inventory of four vessels included both pleasure yachts and deep-sea fishing vessels.
“What the hell you talkin’ ’bout, mon?”
Bartleby said, “Well, I ask because if so, my clients are looking to take a forty-nine percent interest in the boats.”
Worel narrowed his eyes and reached out to return the cashier’s check.
“Seem to me,” he said, “that if them clients can afford to buy ’em, they’d be best served takin’ a hundred percent stake. Also, for that price you probably get five, you know who to call.”
Bartleby explained to Worel that in exchange for the check he’d handed him, his clients would receive a forty-nine percent stake in the fleet of charter boats Worel would procure and manage with the investment capital represented by the amount of the check. He told Worel that he would remain the controlling partner, retaining a fifty-one percent ownership interest in the fleet. Without another word, Worel walked directly across the street to the local savings and loan. Upon hearing that the bank had cleared the check, he hired the best boat builder in the Caribbean to make him five thirty-four-foot boats for $200,000 cash. He used the rest to set up an office with a fax machine, two phone lines, and a voice mail service, and to outfit the pleasure yachts with all the amenities and a killer insurance policy. He even got himself a sonar unit, a fish-finding secret weapon, for the boat he’d use purely as the deep-sea fishing charter.
Six months later, the man with the baritone voice called again and asked Worel whether he had ever been able to replace that smashed-up boat of his.
Worel said, “Just so happen I’ve been able to procure a few of them boats, mon. You looking to do some fishing?”
“I am.”
“Reason I ask,” Worel said, “is if you looking to do some fishin’, we goin’ to do some fishin’. Matter of fact that be the case anytime you call. Anytime you want, we go out. Refreshments on the house. Matter of fact,” Worel told him, “you ever get any idea ’bout payin’ for any of these trips, then you should call somebody else. Seein’ as I’m sure anybody else out there probably be happy to take your money. But not me, mon, no sir. Not me.”
Cooper said that was all right by him and booked an all-day fishing trip for the following week.
There was a tug on the shorter line. Worel spotted it from the bridge, upward of twenty feet away, and eased off on the throttle. Silence flooded the boat with the drone of the engine off a few decibels.
“Look like he coming in again,” Worel said up top, when bang, the tip of the pole shot down toward the water.
Cooper clambered to the chair. The kid took the pole, adjusted the drag, and set the rod in the cup between Cooper’s legs, Cooper now buckled into the chair that always reminded him of the kind they used in prisons to execute convicts. Only this chair was the opposite kind of chair: one built for redemption. A seat in which he could rediscover some of the broken-off pieces of his soul.
He waited for Worel to set the hook, the old man gunning the boat to lock the barb in the fish’s mouth. Then the fish took off, the reel screaming in Cooper’s hands. Cooper knew what was coming, and only a few seconds passed before it did-about a hundred yards away, back behind the boat on the starboard side, there she went. Worel was looking back at her too, the old captain’s outstretched arm pointing out to sea.
It was a marlin, her side bluer than the ocean in the sun as the graceful fish got airborne, reaching skyward, bucking, infuriated at the presence of the hook in her mouth. Cooper knew the fish was sending him a message as clearly as if she had called him to deliver it on his sat phone: Go ahead, try and bring me in, Cooper, you old sack of shit. Look at my lines, a world-class athlete of the deep-go ahead and try to drag me in with that useless rod.
Cooper thinking he was ready, knowing what he had in store for the next four, five, or who knew, maybe eight hours, judging from the size of that bitch offering up her challenge. What he had in store was the chair, the rod, the fish, and pain. Lose your concentration three hours in, let up on the tension, and that marlin would burn you for your moment of weakness. She’d shake the hook and be off for a tuna dinner that didn’t feature a hidden hook in its gut.
Up top, Worel worked the boat backward, chasing the fish as it ran. The kid pulled in the last of the other lines. Chalking up his palms in the attached bin, Cooper settled in for the unique form of bliss he knew he’d find-the physical exhaustion, the sharp pain, muscle failure, dehydration, blood loss, and sunburn, combining to deliver a sensation more liberating than even the purest chemical high. Peaceful, floating nothingness-the ultimate painkiller.
Beginning the cycle, Cooper fell into the rhythm of his own thoughts.
During the past few days, he had found some interesting stories in the seven newspapers Ronnie always delivered to his porch. He probably wouldn’t have given a flying leap about any of these stories had it not been for the whispering prompt from his omnipresent comrade-in-arms, the ghost of Marcel telling him, Regardez-vous, mon ami-there something here I’m thinking you maybe wanna see.