John Casey - Spartina

Dick thought, I didn’t miss. I should have practiced some, but I didn’t miss.

He said to Parker, “Skilley.”

Parker didn’t mind. Schuyler stopped shooting, made his way forward. “What did you say?”

“Skilley. Black marlin. Tastes as good as swordfish, but they don’t buy ’em.”

“What’s the point, then? Just fun?”

“Good meat. If we get him, we’ll cut some steaks. You’ll see.”

The keg dipped out of sight, came back up. Dipped again, popped up.

“See there,” Dick said. “He’s trying to get down.”

Schuyler said, “Get down and boogie,” his eye still glued to the viewfinder.

Dick hoped the lily was in good. It had felt right, but he couldn’t remember. Dick pointed again and Parker nodded. Dick let Parker follow the fish. Dick went to check the gaff, make sure the wire noose ran smooth. They seemed to gain some on the keg. It was still pushing up water like a nun in a strong tide, but it was slowing, definitely slowing.

He took a deep breath and made fists to steady the flutter in his forearms. They were coming up on the keg. Dick got the boathook. He didn’t want to pick up the keg if the fish had another run in him. The line was still taut, the yard or so he could see giving off a green shimmer through the top water.

Parker came up on the keg, kept it alongside. Dick saw the line go slack, tighten again, go slack. He waited until the line went really lazy. He put the hook under it, slowly raised an arc of it. He took in some line. Got the keg up. He glanced up at Parker to make sure he was with him. They slowly moved up the line, Dick coiling it in. And there was the fish. Dick saw the pale belly, then the bill, the mouth agape, the gills flaring slowly, the fins and tail still. No trouble slipping the noose over the tail and then tight. The fish tried to swim, but he was in air. Swung him right in. Felt like eighty, eighty-five pounds. Dick saw the lily, buttonholed in so he was amazed the fish had got as far as he did. A pretty fish, every line swept back for speed. The slender bill wasn’t as long as Dick’s arm. Dick got his foot on it, felt it stir under the sole of his boot, heard the tail slap once just before he clubbed the head. Once was enough.

He kept his foot on the bill anyway as he ran his knife from anus to throat. The stomach was full of bait fish. He gathered the innards in both hands and dumped them. Dipped the fish once to clean the blood out of the cavity. Took it below to put it on ice. Sloshed a bucket of water across the deck and scrubbed off the slick.

Parker slipped the two hoops of inner tube onto the wheel spokes and came aft to give him five. Then back to work.

The plane showed up, but didn’t spot anything during the morning run. The plane went home for lunch when the tide began to run hard. Dick took a two-hour nap.

When he woke up, the boat was rolling more. The southwest wind had picked up, and there was some sea running but not too much chop. In the crow’s nest he could feel the motion amplified. She was not an easy boat. Two-foot seas and she was a goddamn barge. Elsie came up. Dick sent her back down when he saw she was holding on for dear life.

Dick could hear the plane, sneaked a look at it every so often. He climbed down at five. The plane could see better than him anyway.

He drowsed on deck. Parker had got Schuyler to take the wheel. Parker had left the channel open but the squelch up in case the spotter had anything to say; the crackle blended into Dick’s nap.

They’d been moving east in slow zigzags. At seven-thirty the plane wagged his wings and left. Parker got Elsie to fix canned soup with hot dogs cut up in it.

They ate in silence, were through in a few minutes. Dick said, “Better juice it on out and pull some pots. We want to be back here by morning.”

Parker said, “You want to look for a while longer? Just on the way.”

The wind had dropped, so it was a bit more comfortable aloft. Elsie came up. She didn’t say a word. After twenty minutes Dick looked at her. Even in the rich light of the late sun she looked green.

“You better go down,” he said.

Elsie didn’t say anything for a bit. Then, “On deck I can smell the bait.”

Dick had to lean near to hear. He said, “Better lie down on your bunk.”

Elsie made a face. Dick was watching her now, in between looks at the water. She suddenly leaned away from him, bent at the waist over the rail, and vomited. The pea soup and hot dogs carried on the wind, trailed across the windshield of the wheelhouse. Dick grabbed her as she retched again. She was bent over so far he was afraid she’d fall. He got his right hand on her right hip, groped for her belt. Got his other hand on her left shoulder.

She moaned weakly. He moved his left hand down onto her belt. “I got you,” he said. “Go on, just let go.”

“Oh no,” she said. “Oh shit.” She sounded terrible.

“You through?” he said. “If you’re through, I’ll get you down.” She didn’t say anything. He waited a bit, then got her onto the ladder. His feet a rung below hers, his hands on the ladder, his arms under her armpits.

When he got her down, she sagged back against him. He felt sharp tenderness for her, as though she was a little kid. He was also embarrassed by how aroused he was. He looked into the wheelhouse. Parker was laughing his head off. Pointed at the streaks on the glass. Dick shook his head at him, and turned Elsie forward.

He sat her down on the foredeck. He got her duffel from the cabin and spread some clothes under her. She curled up against the low rail. Dick put a line around her and made the other end fast.

By the time he got a bucket of water and sloshed it across the window, got a life jacket under Elsie’s head, and found her a Dramamine, the sun was too low to look anymore.

He turned in. Parker got him up at midnight. Dick woke Schuyler up, asked him how he felt. Schuyler said “Fine.” Dick got him on deck to help bait the pots. Parker took a sounding and a fix. Dick put the first line of pots over. By 2:00 a.m. they’d set the pots and headed back. Schuyler and Parker turned in, and Dick took the wheel.

Dick could just make out Elsie, curled up on her side. The boat was rolling some, but not so bad. The moon came down off the starboard bow, made a long sheen across the easy swell. The light was always there, glistening, fading, glistening, no matter how fast it seemed to be racing past.

Dick thought of how his boat would feel, deeper and steadier. He thought of how she would sound, the engine lower, the creak of the timbers less abrupt than this set of nervous hummings and clanks.

He kept coming back to Elsie. He should have thought to get some of those new anti-seasick tapes. The Fishermen’s Co-op had them — you stuck one behind your ear, instant sea-legs.

He saw her stir. Sit up. Discover the line on her belt. Rummage through her bag. She pulled on a sweater, stretched her arms. He could tell she felt better. She pulled her hands back through her hair and sank down again all in one motion, graceful as a passing wave. Her hand appeared and fumbled for the edge of her yellow slicker, found it, and pulled it over her shoulders.

He looked down at the compass and got back on course. There was a good reason for leaving women onshore. Being at sea opened you up. And if you wanted to do things right, you had to use all that opening up for what you were doing, for where you were, for what was going to happen.

Dick notched the engine up. He’d been lucky not to miss the skilley. He felt certain they’d see a fish tomorrow. He thought he should probably get Schuyler up to take the wheel the last hour before light, get himself a nap for an hour or so. He’d better use the wood shaft if the fish wasn’t too deep. He’d been lucky.