Rick Boyer: Billingsgate Shoal

She sat down next to me on the old stone quay. We watched the boats sway slowly around on their mooring cables. Mary said she'd been unable to find Sarah Hart at her home even though she'd driven by several times. We decided she was with her doctor or a close friend.

"It's almost dark, Charlie."

"I just can't help thinking that if I hadn't asked him to swim out there-"

"Dammit, Charlie, stop it! You'll drive yourself crazy. Why don't you find the boat's owner and talk to him? He probably never laid eyes on Allan."

"That's what I'm thinking; that's what makes me feel so bad about it. Here's Allan swimming around underneath the boat and the guy probably started the propeller. Remember how fast that engine was revving, pumping out all that water? Well if the screw started suddenly the propwash could've sucked Allan right into it-"

"Good Christ-"

"And one of the blades could have nicked him on the head-remember the article did say there was evidence of a head injury-knocked him cold and his mouthpiece slipped out. There was a lot of air left in the tank."

She tugged at my elbow and led me back to the cars.

"I don't see Bill Larson in his shack. Tomorrow morning I'm coming back here and get the name of the boat's owner. I think if I just get a chance to phone him I'll feel better. Maybe they saw Allan swim out past the boat, in which case I'll feel a little better. Not much, but a little."

After dinner we located the funeral director who told us that Sarah Hart was temporarily in her doctor's care. Her husband had died eight years previous and Allan had been her only child. Good God. I tossed and turned far into the night thinking about the boy swimming out to the big green boat. I knew it would never leave me alone until I laid to rest at least little of the guilt that gnawed at me.

On my way to the harbor next day, weary and edgy from almost no sleep, I stopped by the Eastham police station and talked to the desk sergeant. The story was exactly as the papers had reported it. A lobsterman had seen the body in the shallows off Lieutenant's Island in early evening. The body wasn't floating because of the heavy gear and weight belt. There was a deep bruise on the head that had no doubt resulted in unconsciousness, and eventual drowning. I asked the sergeant if the diving hood had been torn, and the nature and extent of the head injuries. He replied that he didn't know; he wasn't that familiar with the details.

"Can you tell me if there are any theories as to how the injury occurred?" I asked.

"I'm not sure, but I think the assumption is that he hit his head while diving, maybe on the breakwater."

"People in scuba gear don't dive into the water headfirst. They fall backward into it to avoid damaging their equipment. Besides, I saw Allan enter the water."

He told me to leave my name and number and a certain Lieutenant Disbrow would be in touch with me. I thanked him and proceeded on to the harbor. I headed over to Bill Larson's little shack. He's the official harbormaster of Wellfleet and also operates a small emporium selling marine paints, hemp and nylon lines, caulking compound, basic marine hardware in brass, aluminum, bronze, and the like. I asked him who owned the green dragger that had pulled in two days previous.

"Didn't think to get his name, Doc. I was about to head out to her in my skiff to see what the trouble was but they beat me to it-came right up here in a little boat and asked me where the nearest weld shop was."

"Yeah I saw it. What happened to her?"

"Said an old seam had worked loose between a coupla plates. She'd been shipping water since she left Boston so they thought they'd better stop and have her sewed up. Seems to me they didn't stop any too soon either."

"Did you know they were out on Billingsgate at dawn?"

"Hmmmp! Well whaddayuh know-"

"Where was the repair made? I'd like to get the owner's name if possible."

"Right over there. Reliable. See it?"

"Oh yeah. Did they say anything else, like having seen a guy in scuba gear?" ·

"Oh you mean the Hart boy? Too bad, eh? Nope. Didn't say anything about that."

He worked at an eye splice with his big wooden fid. "I'm sure they got the owner's name because they did the repair."

I entered the barnlike structure from the street side and looked into the gloomy cavernous interior. Straight ahead of me was a set of railroad tracks that led down into the water. Winched halfway up this tracks was a big cradle, empty.

"Help you sompin?" asked the bearded old man at the workbench. He was busy fitting a new head gasket to a long marine engine that stood near the bench, hung in a frame made of giant I-beams. I counted six huge holes in the block. A straight six, and each of the cylinders seemed big enough to hold a bowling ball. That's what gave the draggers their spunk. I described the boat that had visited them.

"Oh yeah. Gash in the starboard side just forward of the beam. 'Bout as big as a cigar box, only longer."

It didn't sound like a weld seam working loose. But I decided to keep this tidbit to myself.

"Was it high up, or toward the keel?"

"Pretty high up, Just below the waterline. Wish you could talk to Sonny. He's not here now though. Sonny did the job, less than forty-five minutes."

"That seems mighty quick for a weld job that big. Sonny must a run a good bead."

The old man nodded triumphantly.

"Yup! Good bead all right. Real good bead."

He reached around behind the bench and pulled out what looked like a giant Fourth of July sparkler.

"Uses these certanium production rods. Best welding electrode made. He can run a bead three yards long without a rod freezing. He had a good teacher. Me. I'm Sonny's daddy, mister. Who in hell are you?"

I explained that I was an interested bystander.

"You seem to know welding, mister. Ever done it?"

I answered that I once worked a summer in Peoria as a welder at the Caterpillar Company. I said that welding was one of the very last Skilled Occupations. That a good welder was worth his weight in gold ingots. This seemed to please the old man, who grew talkative.

"But what was odd, mister, was this: that boat was pretty tore up, but her skipper didn't want nothing but a fix-it job. You know, enough to get her back home. All Sonny did was slap a sheet of quarter-inch plate over that hole, then run his bead around the edge. Slick as a wink, you know? We charged him ninety-nine dollars and ninety-five cents, you see?"

"No I don't see."

"Well by the law any damage to a vessel over a hundred dollars must be reported to the Coast Guard. It's just like a car accident. Well, a lot of skippers don't want the hassle, so we just charge ninety-nine ninety-five."

"That's a nice cheap fee."

"Well sure," he cackled, "but the hauling charge makes up for that. You see we charge a fee for hauling the vessel out so we can work on her; Hauling fee is a hundred bucks. But that's like a tow truck: ain't got, anything to do with the damage, you see?"

"Ah, now I see…"

"But strange thing was, mister, this boat dint want no decent job. Just what we call a jury-rig-like I said, enough to get back home on."

"Which was Boston?"

"Don't know."

"Well it said Boston under her name."

"What was her name?"

"Penelope."

"So you know her name and port, so why'd ya ask, mister?"

"I'd like to get the owner's name. Call him. You know that kid who drowned? Well I want to know if anybody on the boat saw him; I think he might have gotten swept up in the propwash. Can I have his name? Would you mind?"

"Don't have it."

"Well didn't you till out a work order'?"

"Naw. The guy showed us his money and we went to work. What makes you think the boy got in trouble with her?"

"I'm not sure. I just want to check. I want to reassure myself he didn't get in trouble under her."