Chapter 6

 

            The next day after breakfast, I went into Harvey’s cabin. He was sitting behind his desk, maps spread out all over. A painting of a young red haired man sat in front of him. The man’s hair was trimmed tight to the scalp like his stiff maroon suit.

            “Hey”             

            Harvey shoved all of the maps into his desk. He crumpled up the fine painting and threw it into another drawer.

            “Scott, good morning. Is everything okay on deck?”

            “Yea.”

            I strolled along the roles of antique sculptures, little gold statues, and miniature ships. Dan used to joke about Harvey being a pirate in disguise with all his trophies. Any time he went to a new port, he got one. Sometimes, we’d figure that’s the only reason he sailed.

            I wasn’t there to look at treasure though. I wanted to know about all the weird things: the sand, Dan, and that fine dressed man on the dock. Now I was starting to think that I’d add the maps and picture to the list. There wasn’t reason to waste time.

            “Why is Dan here?” I asked.

            His face tightened up around the eyes.

            “To help, what do you mean?”

            I ran my fingers over a mahogany chair. I sat down.

            “He seemed pretty weird about you asking him to go.”

            “Well, I don’t know what to tell you. If he didn’t wanna come it’s too late to turn back.”

            “No, it’s not that.” I wasn’t getting very far. Maybe I’d learn on the next question.

            “Who was the man you met on the docks?”

            He half smiled. “What is this, some kind of interrogation?”

            “Just curious,” I said. “And tell me why there are bags of sand on board. You’ve always told me to ‘keep her as light as you can.’ And let’s just add the pictures to the list.”

              Harvey crossed his legs under the desk, something he never did. We were silent for a minute, listening to the crew through the roof. Then he laughed.

            He leaned over the desk, arms folded. “Alright, but you can’t tell your Dad or anyone else.”

            “Okay” I slid to the edge of the chair.

            “We’re a smuggling ship. The man in black is our sponsor. The picture’s of the guy we’re meeting. It’s no big deal. Ships do it all the time. Some of the crew felt they wanted to make some extra bills. Can’t say I’m against it.”

            I must have looked shocked because Harvey laughed and told me that it was just some extra money. I couldn’t believe he’d do this. I can even remember him saying that smugglers were heartless b******s. Of course, he said that about everyone.

            “We’re smuggling some rum. It’s pretty dry. Nothing big. It’s in those sand bags.”

            “Wait, why not just put them in crates, or even in barrels? No one else was looking while we were loading.”

            “The loading’s not the problem, it’s when we get on the sea. If patrol ever searched us, they’d find the crates. We needed a way to stop that from happening. It was your brother actually who came up with the idea to put it in sand bags. That way, if we see a patrol ship on the horizon, we can just dump the bags and they’ll sink all the way to the bottom and stay there. Once the patrol’s gone, all we have to do is go back and retrieve some.”

            We talked for a while longer and then I went back up on deck to see if anyone needed a hand. Satisfaction swelled in my heart, pushing confidence through my veins. Harvey trusted me enough to tell. Dad and Dan were too cowardly to admit what they were doing. But not Harvey. Sometimes I wished that he was more than my uncle. Maybe even my father.

            Up on deck, the crew was at work. I helped with sanding and cleaning the deck. It was around noon when the fight started. Harvey put Dan and Dad on the job of pulling the sail. It was a terrible thing to do. At first, they had this silence barrier going between them. Neither of them would talk or even look at each other. Then that stopped, and it turned to dirty looks an occasional swear when one didn’t pull hard enough. This went on most of the day.

            Every hour, Dan would leave the deck to go downstairs. No one knew what he was doing. He said he was going to the bathroom, but no one believed him. Finally, around late noon, Dad blew up.

            “Dammnit Dan, I’m pulling this all by my self. You shirk work here just like you did at home. Leaving early. You don’t leave till the job’s done and that’s when Harvey tells you to.”

            Dan tried to keep his calm. “I must have had some bad food and got diarrhea. Sorry. If I was still with you I wouldn’t be having any food. It’s a miracle Scott stayed with you. Mom would be rolling over in her grave.”

            With that, Dad socked him in the jaw. Dan stumbled backwards onto the deck. The rest of the pulling crew grabbed Dad, pulling him down. The sail swung around madly, a steed out of control. I caught the sail rope, pulling it from the pulley to tighten the sail. Harvey came on to the scene.

            “Jesus. If either one of you does something like that again, you’ll both be overboard. I don’t want to hear another word out of either you. You’ll each get half the ration of dinner, and no ale. Get back to work.”

            Dan pulled himself off the ground. “Good work Scott,” Harvey said. Dan shot a glance at me. Wrinkles ran down his long, pale nose. I stepped backwards, hitting the railing.

            As quickly as it happened, Dan’s face turned back to clay. He sat on the railing, taking in deep breaths. It scared me how he acted, but I knew he’d never really hurt me. He’d taken care of me almost all my life. That was stronger than his anger.

            I went over and sat on the railing with him. He looked at me.         

            “Hey,” he said.

            “Hey.”

            “You okay?” I asked.

            “Yea. I can’t believe Dad’s still the same.”

            “People like him don’t seem to change, for the better at least.”       

            “I figured that after going away for so long, he’d change.” Dan looked out into the ocean. “He hasn’t changed a bit.”

            “He’s missed you Dan. I can tell.”

            “Yea, about as much as he misses his life when he’s drowned in the bottle.”

            I tried to change the subject. “Well, what were you doing while you were away.”

He sighed, “I told you, I just went to different towns. I couldn’t stand being with him any more. And besides, I’d looked after you for a long while. We both needed some space to grow.”

“I didn’t want any space.”

That made him laugh. “Yea but sometimes big brothers have to get away.”

“Why were you off deck so much?” He grinned. “Nothing, just had to go to the bathroom.”

Dad was giving Dan evil looks again, so he went back to work. The crew didn’t need me much so I went down to read the book.

On the way down the stairs, I heard laughing from the kitchen. I went to see what was happening. Zheng was preparing dinner while the others laughed and joked about him. Zheng tasted the soup.

“Look at that standing cow. No wonder he’s a chef. Gets to taste food all day long while we work hard, sweatin under the sun.”

“Yea, but he don’t taste nothing else. He only drinks tea and eats lettuce while we eat. Guess eating grass is how the cows got fat, so it worked for him.”

“He thinks he’s too good to eat meat. Don’t you china man?”

Zheng just kept on preparing the meal without a change in his composure.

“Cmon let’s go.” The men left. Zheng kept his head down, staring into the soup.

“Zheng?”

His body jolted, startled to see me.

“Hello Scott,” he said.

“Why were they doing that? They were your friends last night.”

“Yes, they were, when boredom hadn’t taken hold. The easiest way to have some fun is to pick on the nearest person, me.”

“Why you. You’ve got a nose, ears, and lips like everyone else. You’ve got eyes like everyone else. Maybe they’re a bit slanty, but they’re still eyes.”

He kneeled down. His eyes were level with mine. “Children sometimes see things more clearly than us adults. They don’t judge because the world hasn’t left their mark on them yet. And if they do judge, it’s because the world has got them.”

Zheng told me to leave him alone because he needed to finish making dinner. I said I would and went back to the cabin. I picked up Suzie’s book and began reading. The book went on with the man’s life. His wife left when she learned the stone brought him more happiness than her. She took the child with her. The man grew old and even more careless with his money. Instead of sending his daughter to school or giving money to help raise it, he just spent it on more parties. He was always drunk and about with a different group of friends. Banks were willing to grant him loans because they figured he was as rich as the gods. The truth was that he’d spent most of the money. Debt was piling over his head, driving him into the earth. My reading ended with the wife saying that he let the small sin that lives in every man grow into his entire self.

I had to put the book down then to eat dinner. There wasn’t any work for me to do after that. I felt like the unused hammer. The used ones get to go to bed feeling like they’ve done some good. The ones still shining, awaiting the nail, go to bed feeling empty and useless. And that’s exactly how I felt when I crept into bed that night. The hammer that wasn’t even touched.

I was about to close my eyes when a bell rung on the main deck. Outside my door, I could hear tables being moved and poker chips falling onto the floor. Someone came in my room. It was my brother.

“There’s trouble.”

            Dan went to the closet and flung the door open. My heart flew up into my throat. Not into my throat, past it up into the sky. Just when I’d thought Dan couldn’t get his boots stuck any deeper in s**t, he sunk up to his waist. Rose sat on the closet floor between coats, hands clamped around her bare legs. She had on a baggy white shirt that reached down to her thighs. Her skin was a sickly pale and black hair was in tangles. A drenched white dress was spread out on the closet floor.

            “S**t Dan, what’s she doing here?” I said.

            He pulled her out of the closet.

            “Stay with Scott, Rose,” he said.

            He turned to me.

            “She wouldn’t let me go if I didn’t let her come. She said she’d tell her parents.”

            Rose smiled weakly.

            Then, he ran out of the room. I looked at her, then the door. She stood, swaying back and forth, knees pressed together. Each wave made her wince.

            I couldn’t baby sit her. They needed my help. I ran to the door.

            “Scott no!”

            I didn’t stop. Water splashed down the steps like a series of waterfalls. Up on deck, havoc raged.

            Jesus, I hadn’t realized how much time had passed. Night stretched across the sky, except it was a gray night.

            “Everyone, get ready to jib…Now!”

            The sea had a different look. It was sick grey. I looked around. Any way I turned looked the same. Steel sky and water. A wave suddenly hit the boat and my feet slipped from under me. Water spewed onto the boat, coating the deck in a glass thin poison. The sail swung across the boat. I ducked just in time.

            “Hold on men! Mr. Davis, get some rope!” Harvey rapped.

            Robert jumped down the stairs to find rope.

            “Pull that sail tight!” Harvey yelled.

            The sail was flapping in the wind. It’s once greatness was now shriveled into a wet bat wing. I stood up, holding the back of my head. Suddenly, I was being carried down the stairs. It was Dad. He pushed me into my cabin and locked the door.

            “Hey! Let me out!” I yelled, but he had already run back upstairs.

            The boat rumbled and shuddered with each wave. I braced myself against a wall. The roof was thin, so I could hear everyone up top yelling.

            “Mr. Davis, tie that tighter.”

            “Dan get down stairs with your brother!”

            “No, I’m not a boy anymore!”

            “Hold on men were gonna get out of this.”

            Rose put her arm around me, pressing my face against her dirty shirt.

            All the voices mixed with the storm in a horrific symphony. Another wave crashed against the boat and I went flying across the room. I managed to grab the bed post so only slid onto the ground. Rose was crawling on the floor, trying to get back to the bed. Everything was spinning. I couldn’t tell who was talking any more. I clutched Suzy’s book in my bone white fingers.

            “Help!”

            “Man overboard!”

            “Get the sail tight!”

            All of a sudden, there was a great cracking. Creaking struck through the air of the storm. There was a huge thump and the roof shuddered. I heard swearing and people reciting prayers. Suddenly, the boat was tossed over and I landed on the roof. Water leaked in at my feet. Then a huge gush exploded from the floor, sending me flying backwards. Water rushed into the cabin. I struggled to swim to the top, but it kept filling. The cabin was entirely submerged. Coldness bit at my cheeks. I opened my eyes.

            Everything was blurry, but I could see a dark opening in the cabin. I grabbed Roses hand and pushed off towards it. The ridge around the hole was sharp and scraped my shoulder as I tried to pry myself out. A sudden coldness surrounded my bones. All around me was void, empty.

            I kept pedaling upwards. Water pushed down at my face, but I kept going. Rose had a death grip on my hand. We fought the sea together. Right when I thought my lungs would burst and sea take me, we reached the top. It was like an explosion of energy. Air rushed down my throat. Thunder pounded in my ears. The waves whipped me about. Streaks of lightening scratched against the chalkboard black sky.

            I spotted a piece of wood. Instantly everything became fixed on it. I swam over and stretched out on the piece of hull. Rose slung herself on top of me. The waves drove us further away from the sinking ship until it was only a speck.

            I hugged the wood and Suzie’s book with all my might, determined not to let them go. We moved into the darkness of the night. Rose took the knives of the storm. Her cold body wrapped around mine. Hours passed. My fingers grew cold, my eyes were clamped shut. I couldn’t feel the wood underneath me any more. I couldn’t feel anything, I was so cold. A muted yell sounded in my ears, “No! Scott, wake up, no!”

Suddenly, all the feeling had come back to me. I looked up. The storm had receded. Night stretched across the sky. Rose was still on top of me, sleeping away. Everything was fine, more than fine. The warm breeze felt good after so much cold. I closed my eyes, and joined the sleep world like Rose.