Oh, mon! Anytime you see de wind go to de northwest in de month of September anywheres out around de tropics, you doesn’t stop to ask if a hurricane is approachin!
If he had left Friday evenin instead of stayin at Serrarers, even if the weather had got bad Friday night, he would have made it into Miskita Cay Sat’day mornin early, and been in safety. And every mon would have been saved. But if we had reached Alligator Cay on Friday, and had pick up dose last rangers, and gone on, we would had been at sea when dat hurricane come down upon us, and I would not be here right now tellin de tale.
Athens stretches his arms over his head and yawns.
Maybe if all dose men stood by him, Copm Steadman could have saved his vessel.
Raib opens his eyes to study Will’s expression.
Nemmine, Will. (in a different voice) Yah, mon! (laughs) Copm Steadman told de men dat mornin dat he had fifty-four years of sea experience. And by noon he had had a sea experience dat were not much use to him, cause he were dead.
The sun has not yet risen, and the reef is dark.
Raib’s voice is quiet: he is pointing at the sky.
Any mon see dat star? Buddy, you never seen it? After all de times I tellin you to watch de weather? (voice rising) Dat star went straight cross de horizon. Now dat is true sign! Sign of wind! (gasps) I tellin you fellas now, if dis were not de month of April, I would be lookin for sign of hurricane!
April Fool Day, mon.
Dis is de worst April dat I remember! De worst one! I never see such a April, with dis wind gone crazy every day. Take a fool to be a turtler!
April Fool Day, mon.
Dass exactly how I would express it—Fool Day! Every goddom day is Fool Day!
April Fool, mon.
Brown and Speedy go with Raib in the starboard catboat. Brown’s hands are still swollen, and he sits sullen, half asleep, sombrero tilted low over his eyes. Careless, he drops a kelleck close to Raib’s bare foot.
You fella Brown! Don’t lay dat kelleck dere!
When Brown mutters, the Captain, who has turned away, whirls back. Speedy stops whistling.
How dat go? Speak out, mon!
Brown say dis be no use to him in life.
So he say, den. But no mon gone to come into dis boat dat ain’t willin to learn!
We got to be willin in our mind, Brownie. Maybe we come turtlin again and maybe not, but now we can go home to Roatán and pick up a few turtle if we lucky.
I no pick up shit! I a engineer and den a singer!
So you say, den.
The catboat slides from net to net. There are few turtles. In the gray dawn, the oars thump dully on the gunwales, and the new turtles sigh.
You ain’t got de theory into it yet! Turn dat oar over—you can’t row like dat!
Dass de way you understand it, Doddy, but my hand don’t understand it dat way.
Okay, den, Speedy, I agree—do as your hand say in dis motter.
A wash of sea as the boat rolls; hard flippers on wood and calipee. The slap of bare feet on the thwarts.
We comin up, now—you, Brown, grob de net!
Aw, shit—I miss it.
Okay, Doddy, Speedy got it! You a nice boy, Speedy! Just like school days, Speedy!
Goddom it, Speedy, lay dem oars right in de boat!
Okay, Doddy!
Easy, Brownie! Pull best, Speedy!
Pull best, Speedy! Dass you, Speedy! Speedy-Boy, you doin fine!
Sunrise: stars rising in the day. A sudden sweet whiff of the tropics from the coast thirty miles away.
Mon! Smell de land! Gone to give up de sea, go back to de land! Go back to dat sweet land of Roatán!
I no work more in dis fuckin boat.
You can say dat again, darlin. No mon gone to come—
Copm? Let Buddy come into dis boat, place of Brownie.
Buddy? He can’t pull dat oar when dere is wind.
I pull strong enough for two. I strong, mon, I one strong nigger. And dis way dat boy gone learn something about turtlin; he won’t learn nothin settin by de galley.
The Captain grunts.
Ever since he were a frock-tail boy, Buddy want be a turtler, cause he daddy and he gran’daddy and he uncles, every one of dem, all de way back, dey turtlers; he want be a turtler so he can hang around with me. But he ain’t a turtler, no more’n de rest of dem boys I got; dey like de big ships better. I brought dem down to de cays and trained dem good, and now dey ain’t one of dem turtlin, not one: dey all abondonin dere home, dey livin up dere in Tampa and Miami. Can’t work with me, dey said! (quietly) I tellin you now, Speedy, cause you a good mon, you de onliest one of all dese fellas dat might amount to anything, I tellin you now, boy, dat I bitter. Dere are days when I very, very bitter. Cause I wore myself out to get to de place where I de best dey is in de main fishery of de island, and now dat fishery don’t mean nothin. No, mon. De schooners all gone and de green turtle goin. I got to set back and watch dem ones grow big on de Yankee tourist trade dat would not have amounted to a pile of hen shit in times gone back. I got to swaller dat.
Modern time, mon.
Buddy dere, he stubborn, y’know: he take after Copm Andrew dat way. Except he no domn good, and he not strong, and he get seasick every day he on de water, and still he say, Let me go in de boat. Dat be a very mysterious thing. Sometimes I think he must be some kind of idiot, but in de school he very clever, so it can’t be dat. Dey some way he an idiot, okay, but I can’t figure out which way it is.
Old-fashion boy, mon. He love his doddy. Ain’t many today dat knows which one dere doddy is, but dis one know.
Dass it. (laughs) He love his doddy, dat were his mistake in life!
Raib stops laughing. As if listening, he looks all around the skyline. The wavelets slap the hull. Then he speaks quietly, avoiding Speedy’s gaze.
Dis mornin sea tryin to tell me something, Speedy. It so old, mon. Make me wonder what I doin way out here on dese reefs, all de days of my life. (sighs) Life has got away from me, some way—I just goin through de motions.
Get dem boats aboard! We take advantage of dis wind to go to Miskita Cay, crawl dese few turtle, den go dere to Bragman’s to register. After dat, full moon be nearly past, and we gets fair weather, we go offshore dere to Misteriosa and cotch dem on dere way south to de Bogue.
Hear dat? You hear me tellin him de other day dat comin to Cape Bank were de wrong direction? Now he tellin us!
Well, where in de hell is Misteriosa?
Way out dere. Out Queena way.
Never been dere, mon.
Nobody know dat place. Dat why dey calls it Misteriosa.
Just so long’s de turtle know about it, dass de main thing.
The ship weighs anchor; the crew come to the galley for their breakfast.
Eighteen turtle altogether. By Jesus, dat is poor!
Seventeen, Copm. Cause one died.
In de sailin days, I were afraid of de full moon in May time, cause after de full you would have a calm. For maybe a week, wherever de current carried you, you went. But since I got motors into her, de goddom wind never stop blowin!
Oh, mon! I know something about wind myself. One time comin from Swan Island we dismasted in de Jemsons, right in sight of de island. In a hurricane. And we drift from dere and we went back over to de Hobbies. Dat is how many hundred mile? And from de Hobbies Cays we come back pretty near to Cayman, and den we got corried down again pretty near over to Sennillas. And den de hurricane swung from de south and landed us right back on de east side of de Old Rock. Wherever de breeze took us, we went, and dat where she left us, right back in Cayman! Seven days in a hurricane! Dismasted seven days!
Raib contemplates Will, amused.
Hear dis fella? Since he told us dat tale of de Majestic, he can’t stop talkin! (shakes his head) Dey many’s de times you got to dismast de vessel yourself—
Oh, yes! One time dere on de—
Well, de story about dat: I left home in 1939, on de nineteenth day of October,
nineteenth day of October in 1939. And I sailed out here to de cays to get some guano, to fertilize—
Bird shit.
Bird shit. Dass good enough. So I went out to de cays and loaded up dis bird shit manure, got de vessel about two-thirds loaded. De crew wanted to take some more, but—
You had more bird shit den you know what to do with.
Yah. (laughter) Didn’t want to overload de vessel, cause it were in de hurricane time of de year. Anyway, I left dis place in de mornin, and I seen a real horrible roll of sea, a ugly-lookin roll of sea. Nice weather, y’know, but a heavy roll of sea, and down around sout’-sou’west was awful coward overcast, all from de horizon, a very heavy-lookin mass of sky. So I told de fellas dat could be was a hurricane approachin, cause de barometer was fallin in de time of her risin, and we would try to scud along to de northward, Cuba way—
Give me some more dat gray stuff, Athens, just so I fill my gut.
Gray stuff? Know what dat is?
Nemmine tellin me. I just tryin to keep it down
standin up to de wheel, and he sung out, Land o’er! Yes! We was all de way northward to Caymans! And us only abidin and not sailin, we was layin her by! Seen dat land o’er and sung away as we was scuddin her into de broad day!
Restless, the Captain stands, then sits again.
Well, we got up under de island some ways, in sight of Georgetown. I put out two anchors at de same time, and neither one of dem two anchors held her. All two dragged, and she went off into de deep. And de first puff out of dat hurricane struck her, and it nigh blowed de blocks and rope off her. (laughs uneasily) Blowed every fraction of dat canvas away. She had started den to fall into de water, y’know, her gunwale was down into de water on de lee side. And I saw dat de two masts was gone to turn her over, so I took de ax and I started to chop de mast. But when I chopped de lanyards loose, de mast was decayed at de deck, and instead of it breaking off above de deck, it breaked onto de edge of de deck, and tore up dat side of de vessel …
Oh, mon!
Oh, mon, dass it! (leans toward galley door) Give dese fellas johnnycake, den, Athens! (sits back again) Well, dass about it. Dat load of bird shit were blown all de way from Georgetown to Bragman’s, and I never got home till January.
white sail
white clouds
white morning sky
He’s dead, Papa!
Raib’s cuffs hang, and his dry brown feet are scaly in the ocean sun.
He ain’t dead, Copm Raib. No, mon. I gettin sign!
Wodie!
The old man’s head is sunk onto his chest, the white hair blowing. Raib removes the thatch hat and stares at the papery scalp. Slowly he removes his own hat, standing there before his father. Behind him, Buddy removes his cap as the other men come forward.
Pity ye wouldn’t eat.
He tries to cross the old man’s hands, but they are hooked hard to the conch shell.
Papa? Is he dead?
Boy, death had to come to Copm Andrew more sooner den later, cause he past de age of eighty. He just dried up and blowed away.
Raib turns the white head by the chin; the eyes are clear. Frowning, he pauses, then presses his ear to his father’s heart. He leaps backward, wide-mouthed.
Jesus! Why de hell you ain’t spoke before!
He never spoke, Papa! I standin right here—
He spoke, I sayin! Right into my ear!
Raib replaces his father’s hat, then his own; shaking his head in wonder, he begins to laugh.
Not yet! He say it slow like dat—Not … yet!
All but Wodie watch the Captain’s dance of glee. Wodie climbs to the galley roof and lies down on his back, shielding his eyes. His mirror glints.
The Captain throws his arms wide to the sky.
NOT … YET!
The Eden’s course is south by east, 165 degrees, down the Main Cape Channel. Off to windward is the line of reefs: Half Moon Cay, Bobel, Hall Rocks, Cock Rocks, Edinburgh Reef, Cayo Muerto, known to turtlers as Dead Man Bar.
… forward of de cobberknife it tapers off. Dass where you shoot him, on de fall, just over de forward edge of his jalousies. One bullet dere kill a shark dead; eitherwise he don’t pay much attention. So dis tiger took dat bullet and head straight down and bury his head so deep in dat sand dat he were standin straight up, and his tail stickin out de water so you could snare it without ever thinkin about gettin wet. And dis were in ten feet of water.
Now dem big sharks dat you seen dere at Edinburgh Reef, dat is de turtle enemy. Big turtle now, shark got to bite him right to get him, and de turtle is very fast, so de shark try to dismantle him so he can go to work on him. Take a fin off or go for de head. But I seen many times dat when de shark bite de head off of de turtle, he give up den and go away. And dat is cause in my opinion dat turtle head is still openin and closin inside of de shark, de way de turtle do when you chop his head off.
Make him uneasy.
Make him uneasy, and he abondon dat turtle.
Byrum best remember dat on de day dat big shark come for him. Just keep dat big mouth workin when he bite your head off, Byrum, and maybe he leave de rest of you alone.
Dass a very good plan, Athens. Thank you.
Rolling southward.
Lone white bird.
No, dat not a sprat bird—dat is a egg bird! Look something like a nightingale! De sprat bird has yellow bill and yellow feet!
You thinkin about de bos’n bird!
No, mon! Sprat bird! Dat one dere is called de egg bird cause dem goddom Jamaicans theft de eggs of it.
The northeasterly trades continue, bearing away heat and humidity in a hard breeze; as the day wears on, the wind increases.
See dat? Comin back at us again! I hoped dat wind were done with us, but when I seen dat star, I knew dat it were not!
The men stare somberly at the green seas and the white sky of spring. The world is empty.
Look at dat! Call hisself a seaman, and he pissin on de weather side de ship.
Who dat?
Athens! De cook dere! (grunts) I can cook better’n dat. I can cook, mon. I shipped as cook once, and I know how to cook good. I ain’t shamed of it like some of dem; a mon can be proud of anything he know how to do.
Cook for us, den—we half starved, eatin dat shit.
Ain’t got time to cook! If de coptin got to do dis mon’s job and dat mon’s job and de next mon’s job, and watchin dem and carpin at dem—he can’t do dat. But dat de way it is dese days, de crew you gets. And I hungry as hell myself.
Can’t keep no steady crew, de way he treat dem. If he had a steady crew, he would had a first-class pilot in de port boat and den a first-class cook, like dey got on de Adams. Dem fellas on de Adams, de most of dem have been aboard a good while, and dey know dere jobs. Aboard of de Adams, a mon eat very good.
We all hungry, Copm Raib! Copm Raib?
De galley’s gettin in a terrible shape. Nasty! And I got dem so much dishrags and soap and fresh water and all so forth—puddin pans. And dey take dat old salt water dere to wash de turtle grease off de pots! Jesus! Never take de time to do it right! But dat de kind of crew you get dese days. When all de boats was under sail, a mon had to be a sailor to get his job, but now any kind of half-ass fella call hisself a seaman! (pause) Dat Athens, dass a pretty one. I made a bad mistake when I sign him on. Dat were a very poor job I done.
Fuck’m. If de Adams still at Miskita Cay, I sailin home on her. I had enough of dis wind coptin. No equipment—I don’t work dat way. No ’commodations. I worried about my baby—can’t get he breath. Like me. He can’t keep me aboard of here if my baby dyin, he got to sign me off.
A lot of de coptins now, dey have de same opinions of dere crews dat I haves, but dey scared to open dere mouth.
Dat one thing you not scared of, dat right, Copm Raib? I can hear you good all de way over here!
Dass okay, Athens, won’t do you any hurt! Might learn something! It always best to speak de truth, like Speedy say!
Well, dey are times—
No! A mon got to have de guts of his opinion! And my opinion is, dey too many fellas like some dat I got aboard of dis vessel dat don’t know nothin and don’t care—no self-respect! Dass what it is—self-respect! Used to be dat in Caymans a mon respect hisself. He done his job, took care of his family, all of dat. He had his land and his own provision ground; he built his own catboat and hung his own nets. Things like dat. But now dey all gettin like de cook dere, like dat engineer I got—don’t motter what de color is no more, dey all actin like colored people!
Colored people okay, Doddy. It us niggers dat takes hondlin.
Okay, den, Speedy, I be honest with you! You a very good mon, and I done a very good job dere when I sign you on down in Honduras! But I don’t disagree entirely with discrimination! You know yourself dat colored people always kept dereselves in such a poor way, dey don’t know to keep dereselves decent. We almost need some discrimination, we almost need some! When people comes around so goddom sloppy, hondlin de food like Athens dere with dem dirty shirt sleeves lickin down into de food—like dat engineer I got dere. Dass another one. Used to be de only place you see fellas like dis was in jail. Now dey all over de Caribbean Sea!
Athens, squatting, cap askew, eye squinted in the smoke of the damp cigarette hung from his mouth, is slicing turtle meat. His ragged arms move back and forth between his ragged knees. The big hickory-handled knife slides silently, twisting and winnowing. Despite the heat, Athens still wears his undershirt; its front is stained with turtle blood because his outer shirt, with only the top button fastened, is flying on the wind.