Deadman's Cay

by Boyd Craven

  “Did you save anything else of mine?” I asked her.

  “I’ve got a couple of boxes in the storage closet under the stairs in the laundry room. I don’t know if they are yours or mine or both of ours, the apartments fixed the laundry room door, and now my key doesn’t work any more. I keep meaning to go there and get a new laundry door key, but that hasn’t happened yet.”

  “Well, you let me know if it’s mine then. Otherwise… Have a nice life.” I meant that to be my final words to her.

  I got behind the cooler and I started pushing, ignoring her. Ignoring the hurt look on her face, the tears she was fighting back. Something stirred inside of me, and I hated myself for it. I wanted to do nothing more than get out of here before I betrayed myself. I turned back to look anyway. Mina was standing there, crying silently. That was when I saw Carly moving quickly through the small crowds outside the market, headed my way. At first, I was excited, but Mina turned and noticed who was approaching as well.

  I heard her call to Carly, but I was at my boat. I started loading the boxes, then the coolers. By the time I was done with that, I got back on the dock and walked back in their direction. Carly had her arm around Mina’s shoulders, walking away from her parked car toward the market. She turned back once and saw me, Carly’s face a mask of anger. Mina’s upper body was shaking as she sobbed, and Carly just shook her head at me and disappeared into the throng of people.

  “Shit.” I muttered.

  Chapter Thirteen

  After I stored the boxes, I flipped through my dad’s pictures for a little while. It was hot and I was starting to smell from being in the sun all day, and a bit fishy from everything I had handled. My stomach rumbled, which reminded me I had a fish left to cook up. I headed out to the dock where Franklin let me park my boat and hopped in. I had two coolers to clean out, so I lifted them onto the dock and got out, making sure my lines were secured. It would be embarrassing if my boat drifted off on its own or sank.

  I cracked the lid open and pulled the drain plug on the empty one, then did the same with the one that had the Bonito in. I grabbed it by the tail and carried it to the fish cleaning station at the end of the dock while my coolers drained. In the morning, I would rinse them out good, spray them down with a diluted bleach solution, then rinse again. But now… I was hungry. I kept a fillet knife at the cleaning table, along with a short length of hose so I could rinse scales and offal back into the water.

  I got the knife out, testing its edge, then felt under the table for a whetstone. I turned the hose on it, then turned the water off again. Then I started sharpening my knife. It was something Irish John had taught me a couple of days back, and I wanted to try it out for myself. I had known how to do it before my life fell apart, but he had a way of sharpening a knife that really cut well and held an edge better than I had ever been able to do.

  As I filleted the fish, I heard the puttering of a motor. I looked up, surprised to see Irish John headed my way.

  “Big dummy, catch ‘da line!” he shouted.

  I made sure to hose my hands off first and went jogging down the dock just as he cut his motor. I didn’t have to catch the line, he wasn’t on a huge vessel, but I was glad to see him all the same. After Mina and Carly both giving me the stink eye, I could use a friendly face.

  “What are you doing out here?” I asked him.

  “Dat church lady say she be bringing Irish John to ‘da doctor. You ever see man as healthy as Irish John? If you see man more healthy, I’ll shit in his hat and make him eat it,” he punctuated by spitting in the water and jumping on the dock.

  “If that church lady bothers you so badly, why didn’t you just stay on your island?” I asked him.

  “Tony, you know, you really are dummy asshole sometimes,” he said, clapping me on the shoulder.

  I pulled the one line he kept on the front of the boat over a cleat and followed him to the fish cleaning station.

  He looked up at me, grinning. “You catch?”

  “No, I found them floating at the edge of the weeds,” I snapped back.

  “You know that they might not be—”

  “Of course I caught it,” I said grinning.

  “Ahhh, funny man. Make jokes, have laugh at Irish John, eh? Where is your hat boy?”

  We carried on like that back and forth, and at some point, I finished cleaning the fish. Irish gave me pointers on how to cut out all of the bloodline, and I listened. Sometimes I thought his overwhelming need to fill the silence came from not being around a lot of people and having nobody to talk to. Him carrying on like he did didn’t bother me, and I could see right through the old man. He talked tough but had a huge heart. It had taken me a while to figure him out, but I had him dialed in now. A lot of this was an act.

  “Now, how you going to cook?” he asked suddenly as I was rinsing the table and fillets off with the hose.

  “I was going to pan fry them,” I admitted. “How do you want yours?”

  “Oh no, I no eat ‘ere,” he said quickly. “‘Dat church lady would have my balls if I didn’t give her opportunity to fatten up old Irish John, eh?”

  “Oh… well, like I said—”

  “Let’s go cook. I ‘tink she’ll be honking da horn when she gets here.”

  We headed back to my boat, and instead of going in, I brought my white gas stove and a cast iron pan out and started setting it up under the awning at a picnic table I had cobbled together. Irish disappeared into the boat I slept in and came back out a second later with a spatula, some coconut oil, sesame seeds and salt and pepper.

  “You slice pieces so half inch thin. You got it?”

  “Sure,” I said, amused, watching as he expertly got the gas stove lit and started heating the pan.

  I sliced the skipjack fillet as he said, about half an inch thick. The pieces resembled little steaks, and I had an idea of how Irish was about to cook them. We talked about fishing, about Mina and how Carly had walked away with her, giving me the look. What I had said to Mina to deserve it.

  “You were mean to ‘dat lady. Someday, you may want comfort in her arms, and she remembers you shit in her hat and made her eat it!”

  “Oh, come on. Mina is pure evil. She’s the reason I got tossed into prison!”

  “Was she now? You boy, go get plate, fork. Or you want to eat like islander?” He asked, pointing to himself with shockingly white teeth poking through his smile.

  I sputtered and went in for dishes. I brought two sets out, all the while thinking about his words. Was she? Was she really the reason I’d gone to jail? That is what I took it to mean. I didn’t speak as I considered his words. He looked up at me pointing, a smile on his face.

  “Great man once say, ‘dat ‘better to remain silent and be thought a fool than to speak and to remove all doubt’, hah! What you say about ‘dat?!”

  “I think you were trying to tell me something deep, and then threw me totally off with an old Abraham Lincoln quote.”

  “’Tis a quote near ’nuff in bible dat say da same,” he finished, “but in case of your womanz, you should listen to old Irish John. Do not live regretfully in your life.”

  “Is that why you’re complaining about the church ladies, but you always go along with them?” I cracked back, hoping to take the conversation away from Mina and Carly.

  “See, you are listening. Good. Hope for you yet. Now, here,” he said, pushing the fried fish off onto my plate.

  The fish had been coated in sesame seed and fried expertly. It was cooked on the outside, but when I bit into it, it was pink on the inside. My body seemed to convulse in pleasure. If anything in my life was better than it had been five years ago, it would be the food. Never in my life could I have afforded the kind of food I was eating now. I would have never found out I loved seafood as much as I do… I kept shoveling bites in until I heard a horn honk.

  Irish John had been watching me eat, a smile on his face. But when he heard it, he swung his leg over and stood up, his hand held o
ut.

  “That’s some good grub Irish,” I told him, shaking it tightly.

  “Yes it ‘tis. Now, do not do nothing damn foolish while Irish John is away. I come back later on tonight. Want me to bring you a bottle of Johnny Walker, make you forget your lady problems?”

  “You sure it’s me who wants that bottle?” I asked him, already having stashed a dozen pints in my little boat for special occasions.

  “Tell you what,” he said and winced as the horn went off again, “I get a bottle and you and old Irish John drink it until we understand womenz!”

  “I don’t think there’s enough booze in the world for that,” I shot back.

  He busted up laughing and took off at a run for the gate. He was able to squeeze between the two gated panels without undoing the lock, something I noted could only be accomplished by very thin people or maybe young kids. I noticed, and stored the information away for later.

  As it turned out, Irish didn’t stop in for a drink. I woke up hearing his motor kicking to life at the end of the dock. At first, I had worried somebody had stolen my boat, but as I exited my place half naked, I could see he had a headlamp on. He must have heard me almost fall over the clatter of his engine, because he looked over my way, waving. I had hoped he would stick around. He had given me lots of good fishing locations, but without a larger boat, I couldn’t really do much of the deep-sea fishing.

  With that thought, I started thinking about the ladies. I grunted and pulled my phone out, checking on the time. It wasn’t much past ten. I sighed, knowing what I had to do.

  “Hello?” Mina’s voice sounded pinched, like she was waiting for me to tear her down all over again.

  “Hey Mina,” I said softly, “I’ve… What I’m saying is… Listen…”

  “Tony, if you’re calling to yell at me some more—”

  “I’m sorry. No matter what’s happened between us, I shouldn’t have said what I did. That isn’t who I am.”

  I heard murmuring in the background, like she put her hand over the phone. She had company? Good. Maybe she found a new boyfriend. That thought put me at ease.

  “Hello?” I asked after a second.

  There was a noise on the other end, then it sounded like the phone was dropped. I almost hung up.

  “Here you go,” a familiar voice said.

  “Tony, you still there?” Mina asked.

  “Yeah… I said I was sorry for how I acted earlier,” I said, knowing the second voice sounded like Carly.

  “I appreciate you telling me,” she said, her voice full of emotion.

  “Ok, well…” God, this was awkward. I hated apologies. “You have a good one. I need to get going.”

  “Wait… I mean… Thanks again, I think you should call your girlfriend though. She saw the tail end of things at the docks and…”

  “I figured you’d tell her,” I said, “since she’s sitting right next to you. She’s ignored my calls off and on. I figure if she wants to talk, I’ll be more than ready, whenever she wants to.”

  “Tony I—”

  I hung up. I was angry again, angry at the manipulation. Angry that either of the ladies had this effect on my emotions. Angry at them because I was angry. I went back inside my cabin and reached up over top of the cabinets, behind some molding, and found a pint of Jim Beam. Walking back to the picnic table, I cracked the top and took a healthy swallow, then I laid on my back under the awning. Ignoring the mosquitos and the lingering swampy heat, I tried to calm my mind.

  Fishing was getting me good pocket money, I was making new connections, but nothing made me decent money like working for Franklin. I thought about the auction and how, now that I had a small cube van, maybe I could haul parts. I knew the boss wouldn’t mind if I used the tools here and, as long as I fixed, replaced and stocked up on anything I planned on using, he’d find this place in as good a shape as when he left. Maybe I could make enough to put a small payment down on something.

  “Hey, big dummy asshole, why didn’t you share?” somebody asked, poking me.

  I cracked my eye open, my entire body stiff and sore. Irish John was there, back in what I would call his islander look. Barefoot, shorts, no shirt… and his bowling hat.

  “You took off,” I said, wiping my face and sitting up.

  “‘Dat’s ok, I kid. You only drank half. I put the cap back on for you,” he said, holding the bottle out to me.

  I took it, eyeballing the Jim, then handed the bottle his way.

  “No, is not even breakfast time. I need your help. Bring tools,” he said walking away.

  “Do I have time to use the restroom?” I asked him.

  “I load up your boat, you wake up, brush teeth. Rinse yourself off. Mosquitos feasted on big dummy asshole while he slept.”

  I swatted at one absent mindedly and nodded.

  “What do you need help with, Irish?” I called out to him.

  “Somebody parked a big boat by my island, and it’s taking on water.”

  I started running for my cabin, but Irish called to me.

  “It will not sink before this time tomorrow. You have time. No need to make your big head pound worse with worry.”

  I turned and shot him the bird. He laughed and headed into the big rolling doors of the workshop.

  I got my stuff together, then took a quick shower and headed inside the workshop to see Irish struggling with one of the thirty horse outboards. He was healthy, but he wasn’t a large man and that motor probably weighed as much as he did.

  “Irish, I got that, you get a fuel can or something,” I said, crouching, then taking the weight of it from him.

  He looked relieved, breathing heavily, “I have da rest. We take both boats. You have extra gas can in case it takes more than one?”

  “Over in the far-right corner,” I said.

  “Good, load in your boat. Much bigger than Irish’s boat. Then I show you where ‘tings are.”

  With that, he unhooked the lines to his boat, hopped in and started his motor. I did the same, before following.

  Chapter Fourteen

  I could see right away that the boat was taking on water, by the way it leaned to one side more than the other, sitting lower in the water. It had been parked just beyond the channel leading into the river, a thousand yards beyond Deadman’s Cay. Irish was already tying onto one of the cleats on the side and scrambling aboard. I took a little more time, pulling all the way around the boat looking for holes in the hull. When I didn’t see anything immediately wrong, I tied off to the cleat on the other side as well.

  “Irish, what do I need? What we got going on here?” I asked, throwing the first big toolbox over the side.

  The boat appeared to be an old charter boat, kinda like Franklin's. It was a good 45 feet or maybe more, and badly in need of maintenance on the exposed wood. Parts of the fiberglass were cracked under the sun exposure, but oddly enough it smelled faintly of bleach. I knew fishermen use bleach all the time to scrub down their boats after a big day, but the bleach smelled fresh still. If this had been out here for a while, you would think it would’ve dissipated by now.

  “You ‘da mechanic, boss,” he said with a laugh, his hat down low over his eyes.

  The sun had only just started coming up, but out on the water on the West Coast of Florida, it was starting to get bright.

  “You call this into the FWC?” I asked him as he walked over to the side and started unloading things.

  “No, Irish John saw the boat and went out to check on it. Do you think Irish John has a radio or phone on his island? No.”

  “What I do know, is that we can keep it from sinking, but we need to call it in. We don’t want to get in trouble for messing with someone else’s boat. For all we know, this might be a crime scene.”

  “Come look at this, boy.” Irish John motioned me to the hump in the middle of the back of the deck.

  I pushed up on what I thought might be a cooler, but it ended up being an engine cowling. Water sloshed on the bott
om, and I could see just the bottom of the oil pan had been flooded on the big twin diesels.

  “Somebody tried to open the sea cocks,” Irish John said, crawling around and wiggling his way down in there. “When I saw ‘da boat, I come out here and look. I open up discover, and see the sea cock was leaking. Irish John got it closed as good as can, but batteries died on me while trying to get the pumps going.”

  “Can you get down in there, and I'll hand you the larger strap wrench?” I asked him.

  “You read my mind,” Irish said.

  I marveled at that. The boat had been starting to sink, but he’d gone down toward the bottom where the water had been leaking in. I wouldn’t fit in that area to start with, but I didn’t think I’d be brave enough to go into a tight place in the bottom of a sinking boat the way he just had. I went back to the toolbox and started digging through it and pulled out a strap wrench. I walked back over and handed it to him, and he started using it immediately.

  “Hey, big dummy asshole, give me pipe for more leverage.”

  I just shook my head chuckling, feeling my head pound. The half pint of Jim Beam had been enough to give me a hangover, but I was starting to regret not eating breakfast before heading out here. I dug through the tools some more and came up with a piece of one-inch pipe that was about 18 inches long. I worried if I gave him anything longer than that he wouldn’t have room to get it over the pipe wrench down there in the confined space of the engine compartment. I handed it to him, and he grunted and went back to work.

  After about five minutes of cursing and cussing in several different languages, Irish handed the tools back up to me.

  “Now we just have to pump the rest of the water out, and you can get this damn boat off my island.”

  “Irish John, there is no way this boat is on your island. In fact, it looks like somebody parked it here, the anchor’s down. I don’t know if I want to work on it anymore than we already have. It’s not gonna sink now, it’s not taking on any more water. We should just call the authorities and let it go.” I was confused as to why he was wanting me to do this.