Far Tortuga

by Peter Matthiessen

  Byrum whistles.

  Mon! I never think she come home from Honduras lookin poor as dat!

  You in de modern time, mon: sailin boat a thing of de past.

  Well, all of de same, I be sorry to see dem motors. Dass de last one you lookin at dere. Dass de last of de old-time sailin fleet.

  Mm-hm. I seen her de day she sail down to Honduras. I workin dere in French Harbour, y’know, into de drydock, and I seen her come in dere under sail. In Roatán. In de Bay Islands.

  Well, you know den, Honduras—

  I called Speedy. Cause I fast, mon. Very, very fast.

  Okay den, Speedy, you see for yourself how very bad she look now with de masts half sheared away, and dat goddom deckhouse dat she got dere place of de fo’c’s’le.

  Dass right. Modern time, mon.

  De fashion dat domn thing tacked on dere! Look like a outhouse! Look like a goddom Jamaica boat, and dass de truth. (sighs) How come you sign on, mon? Don’t like drydockin?

  Oh, I like it very fine. But den Old Doddy dere, he kept after me cause he short-handed.

  You gone find out why Raib short-handed!

  Huh! Byrum go crew for Copm Raib cause he got fired off de Adams—

  I go crew cause I gots to eat, same as dis Vemon gots to drink! I a big mon, and I gots to eat! (strokes violently) Down on de banks, may be hard farins, but mostways you haves something to eat, even if it nothin better’n hox-bill or barra!

  Dass it. So one day I say, Speedy-Boy, you best cotch turtles one time in dis life just so you know it.

  Might cotch turtle, but dis ain’t de number one boat. Dey heard about de A.M. Adams down dere in Honduras? (whistles) Sweet Christ, look at dis turtler we got here! Got hisself another bottle!

  What dat you said, Byrum?

  I say I s’prise de old bastard sign you on again, Vemon, must be he desperate! Goddom Raib dere, he do better with dis vessel runnin tourists den sailing away down to de Cays. (shouts) LAST OF DE CAYMAN SCHOONERS! HOPPY SAILS AROUND DE ISLAND! SEE COPM RAIB AVERS AT WEST BAY! But he such a domn stubborn mule, ain’t nothin you can tell him—

  Vemon sits up, spilling rum.

  You watch your mouth! Copm Raib hear you talkin into dat manner, he gone change your speech!

  It your mouth need de watchin, Vemon. All de rum runnin out. (quietly) Dey only de one way de Coptin gone to hear something, and dass when you tell him. And you just de mon to do a job like dat—

  Easy, mon. He only drunk—

  He hidin behind dat. Dis Vemon is a pretty one, y’know—

  I knowed Copm Raib gone forty year, and never a wry word!

  You gone get a wry word, Vemon, you don’t hide dat rum! Dis ain’t no kind of Jamaica boat, mon, ever’body drunk aboard and all of dat! Dis a turtle schooner, mon!

  You tellin me dat, dat help build dat vessel thirty year ago, right dere in de yard of Elroy Arch! Me ’n Elroy ’n Seth ’n Fossie, and Jim Arch!

  I didn’t think you ever be sober enough to ’member so much as dat, Vemon. You quite a fella, Vemon.

  You think you somebody cause you went crew on de A.M. Adams! But I got papers! You can go right up dere to United States and ask if Vemon Dilbert Evers got he seaman’s papers, able-bodied seaman! Ask Copm Gene on de Tropic Breeze! Goddom sonofabitch! I tellin you—

  A silence as Byrum rests his oar; the catboat is gliding up under the hull. Byrum places a big hand on Vemon’s shoulder.

  No, I tellin you: shut dat dirty mouth or you goin over de side!

  Mon, mon. We ain’t even put to sea yet.

  BRING DAT BOAT ABOARD OF HERE! DAT DE LAST BOAT!

  C’mon, Buddy! Throw de line down, boy, we comin up!

  Byrum and Speedy bend a rope sling to the fuel drum, which is hoisted aboard: the pulley is rigged to the end of the foremast boom, and lines of a second pulley are reeved through blocks high on the foremast.

  On the blue morning sky above, a heavy-headed man lays big hands on the rails.

  Come up, den, Vemon! Dese fellas ain’t paid to h’ist you!

  Dass okay, Copm Raib—we got’m.

  Copm Raib? I comin, Copm Raib! You a hard mon, Copm Raib!

  Goddom it to hell, if he too drunk to get hisself aboard of here, den hook dat hook into his pants and hike him up ass foremost, cause dat de way dat fool proceedin through dis life!

  Byrum whistles for the sling, pointing at Vemon, who has folded his arms across his chest.

  What say, Byrum!

  What say, Will! Give us a hand with dis turtler here!

  The men on deck grasp Vemon and haul him aboard; he puts his feet down gingerly on deck, brushing himself off. Now Byrum’s head appears over the rail.

  Dis de right boat? Don’t look like de Eden to me!

  How you been keepin, Byrum?

  Not bad, Will. How yourself?

  Dere he is! Big Byrum! What say, mon!

  What say, Athens! I pleased to meet you again! How you been feelin?

  Well, I feelin, dass about it.

  Byrum, whistling, takes his suitcase aft into the deckhouse.

  The Captain passes a propeller down to Speedy, who is stowing oars under the catboat thwarts.

  You fit dis propeller to de shaft while Will filin de pin!

  Okay, Doddy!

  Raib Avers is a broad strong man in his middle fifties. His iron hair is patched with white, his bare feet are thick and brown, and his bold nose, in a leather face both wide and lean, has the cast of a full-blood Indian. Lines of merriment seam his face, but his eyes, discolored by sea weather, have a mean squint.

  Byrum, hitching at his pants, appears on deck. He has put away his turquoise shirt and now wears khaki. With the Captain, he watches Speedy pull the catboat aft along the hull and tie it to the rudder shaft under the stern.

  See dat black fella, Byrum? I gone make a first-class turtler out dat fella, cause he willin. And he smart. (laughs) Had to go all de way to Honduras to find a fella meets dat description in dese goddom days.

  I seen’m on de quai. Tell me nemmine, he hondle dat oil drum by hisself. Little fella like dat—he strong!

  Dass right. When dat boy say he do something, he do it.

  Beneath the stern, a face bursts from the water. The face contemplates Byrum and the Captain, then disappears again, the black rump rolling on the emerald surface.

  NAME OF VESSEL: LILLIAS EDEN

  BRITISH REGISTRY: 129459

  BUILDER: N. Elroy Arch, Georgetown, Grand Cayman

  RIGGED: Schooner

  STEM: Spoon

  STERN: V

  BUILD: Carvel

  NO. BULKHEADS: 3

  FRAMEWORK AND DESCRIPTION OF VESSEL: Wood Commercial

  LENGTH: 59.6 (from fore part of stem to the aft side of the head of the stern post)

  BREADTH: 18.1

  SHIP’S ARTICLES: LILLIAS EDEN

  Off. No. 129459; Gross 76.84; Net 69.89

  SHIP’S MANIFEST

  The sun is high now, and the day is hot.

  Will is seated on the taffrail, working on a cotter pin with a big rat-tail file. Byrum adjusts the scuttlebutt, a diesel drum laid over on its side; water is dippered through a hole hatchet-hacked in its rusty surface. He lashes the drum to the foot of the mainmast, then turns to help Athens and the boy Buddy, who are stowing salt, sugar, corn meal, flour, beans, coffee, rice in the forward hatch. As the burlap sacks tumble together, motes of dust rise in the sun shaft of the hold.

  … trouble down dere, dat right, Copm?

  Dass what I tell’m, Copm Raib: me and Copm Raib, we ain’t never—

  Get out de way, Vemon! Just cause you went one voyage with me to Honduras don’t mean you know something!

  Under his striped cap, Vemon’s small features are still neat, but he is gaunt, with spindle shanks and the hunch of an old man. His eyes are meat-colored and do not hold, and his teeth are rotted out of his tattered skull. Mouth a black hole, he backs off with a big circular step, bones jerking; regaining his balance, he
salutes.

  … come out of it all right, dat what dey sayin.

  I ain’t owin dem nothin, Byrum!

  No, no, Copm, course not, only just watch out you don’t go dere again or dey shoot you in de back, bein dey so angry with you.

  I ain’t never goin back! In dat country—Sponnish Honduras and den Nicaragua I talkin about—dey don’t care about life!

  Me and de Coptin—

  Goddom it, Vemon, if you sober enough to talk, you sober enough to work! Now dese two guardias, dere was a fight, and one guardia tell de woman of de other one dat he gone slit her throat. So de other one decide he gone ambush dis fella next mornin, by de dock. Right across from where dis vessel were hauled out. So dis mon were called in to get his breakfast, and he shot’m. Once in de shoulder, knock him down into de water, and den he poke his head around under de dock and shoot’m three more time, and de last one get’m in de neck!

  I guess dat scuttled him, okay.

  Well, dat be one hell of a breakfast! (laughs) Dat show you what kind of fella dey have in de lands of de Sponnish, where dey call you in to get your breakfast and den shoot you! I mean to say, dat one hell of a breakfast! Call you in dere …

  Slowly, Raib stops speaking. His smile dies, his eyes tighten to a squint, and a low growl starting in his throat forms gradually into words: God domn!

  A man has emerged from the engine hatch; he glances at the crew, then turns away, as if their work did not concern him. He has the feral air of a bandito, with sideburns, mustachio, bold gold teeth, hide sombrero with rawhide chin strap and rim stitching. He is in rags—torn, oil-soaked T-shirt, torn striped-pajama pants patched with heavier materials than itself, and pointed shoes without laces or socks. One sallow hip protrudes from the torn pants seat, and a brown cigarillo, rolled by hand, sits extinguished in his mouth.

  Dass him! Dass de one! Call hisself Brown, but he one of dem goddom Sponnish! Dat bent shaft, dat were nothin but faulty installation of de port engine by dat hombre dere! Tell me he engineer, and den he go and do a job like dat!

  Though the Captain takes no pains to lower his voice, the man in the sombrero is expressionless; he gazes without interest at the island.

  Dass him! He stupid! Dat de mon! He stupid as a goat!

  Byrum and Athens fit a kerosene light into the binnacle; Vemon bends over them, hands on knees, trying to steady himself. Eventually the wheel is to be placed in the new pilot’s cabin, overlooking engine house, deck and sea, but for the moment it remains in its old position in the stern.

  Now dat is a hell of a arrangement. Dat is a hell of a arrangement, dat is. De mon at de helm cannot even see where de ship goin! On all de boats I ever sailed on, I never seen nothin to beat dat!

  He say he gots to leave it dat way, Byrum, bein he so broke. Spent all his money up down in Honduras, poor fella. Say he got to get a pile of turtle to pay for de next part of de job.

  Well, dat is bullshit, Athens! All de money de mon made smugglin up dere to Cuba, buyin dem Cuban sharkskin? All dem years of runnin guns all over de Caribbean Sea?

  All of de same, we gone make dis voyage with a bent shaft on de port engine, and with no cook, and with dis wheel in dis crazy way where de helmsman can’t see nothin but straight up de bunkey of de fellas layin in dere berths—

  Byrum straightens up.

  No cook?

  ASK ONE OF DEM TO RIG A LANTERN, AND LOOK AT DAT! TWO OF DEM DOIN IT, AND A THIRD ONE LOOKIN ON!

  We tryin to figure dis arrangement you got here, Copm—

  Nemmine dat! It go fine if de mens know dere job! But we ain’t never gone to sail if you fellas hang around back here!

  Propeller done now, Copm!

  The Captain turns to glare at Will.

  Heave up de anchor, den! We don’t get underway, we gone lose a day’s fishenin on de banks, and de season gettin away from us already! Go on dere, Buddy! You fella Brown, turn dem engines over, till we see de vibration! Wait now! Get dat boat aboard of here!

  Speedy has brought the catboat alongside. Pulleys lowered from foremast and boom are hooked to ring bolts in the catboat’s bow and stern; they shriek as the boat is hoisted from the water. Byrum holds her clear of the hull by bracing an oar against the thwarts, careening the boat well over on her side so that her keel is high enough to clear the rails as she is swung inboard and lowered to the deck. The sun glistens on the green algaic slime that fouls her bottom. The boat is lashed down on her side, keel outboard, to conserve deck space.

  Get on dere, Buddy! Get on dat windlass with de rest!

  Copm Raib? Reportin for duty, Copm Raib!

  Whirling, Raib bangs into Vemon, who is pitching up and down the deck. Vemon retreats. The Captain follows.

  I reportin to work here, Copm Raib!

  What you got into dat shirt?

  Raib shoots his hand into Vemon’s shirt and jerks the bottle out; they watch a button roll on edge across the deck.

  Copm Raib—

  Raib hurls the bottle out over the harbor.

  Goddom fool! Ain’t you fool enough already without dat?

  Vemon trembles. Fingering his shirt, he shakes his head violently back and forth, eyes closed.

  No, brother! I goin back ashore! Copm Raib? Now hear me, brother—I needs dat to tide me over! I can’t sail with you! You gots to put me ashore!

  Vemon abandons his shirt; his hands wave, finger bones spread. Raib grasps his scrawny arm and propels him aft down the companionway and into the deckhouse.

  In dis goddom lot I got two drunkards, one thief, and five idiots, dass what I got!

  The crew mutters.

  Well, he lucky he got dat much, flyin up de way he do—

  One of us got to be thief and idiot both, cause countin de boy dey only seven here!

  Got no cook, Athens say—

  The men glance at the Captain’s son, Jim Eden Avers, known as Buddy, a thin-limbed boy of seventeen who wears a long-billed cap on his long head.

  Buddy looks away.

  The windlass is an old-time oak-and-iron barrel drum cranked by hand levers. Byrum and the ragged man called Brown pump the port lever, Speedy and Athens Ebanks the starboard. As the heavy anchor chain clanks aboard, the mate, Will Parchment, rakes it clear of the windlass with an iron hook. In oversized blue pants, Buddy bends forward, as if he were helping, but there is nothing for him to do. His finger trails across the windlass baseplate: LUNENBURG FOUNDRY CO.

  … Lunenburg? De Bluenose, mon! Lunenburg, Novy Scotia! Dat were de home port of de Bluenose!

  Dat be a good name for Vemon—Blue Nose!

  De Bluenose! Dat were de most famous of all de fishin schooners, mon! Won all de races! And dis vessel dat you standin on, she modeled after her! Dis vessel, and de Goldfield, and de Lydia Wilson, and den de A.M. Adams! De spoon bow—

  Will straightens, pointing toward the south shore of the town.

  No, mon. All dem vessels was built by Elroy Arch right dere behind dat grape tree where I pointin at, and dey were modeled after de old Noonan. De Angeline Noonan, dat were brought here in 1932. And de Noonan were a Gloucesterman, off de Grand Banks!

  Will, de Noonan were in de Bluenose style!

  Noonan! Bluenose! Out of Lunenburg!

  Call it Goony Burg, de way dey make dis windlass … fuckin mon-killer.

  The anchor looms and washes free. In the white marl sliding off the fluke, a polychaete worm, transparent, reflects a sun-spot in its blood; at the surface it writhes once and is snatched by a long houndfish, drawn by the roil in the harbor water.

  PUT DEM ENGINES INTO GEAR!

  Oh, de fact dat de Noonan were built after de lines of de Bluenose, and she were American-built, y’know—dat was supposed to mean something. (grunts) In dem days America was so far away dat dey thought it must be something grand. De Noonan sunk six years after she got here, and de Yankee owners seen quite clear dat it were only Cayman care and Cayman knowledge dat was keepin her afloat in dem six years. Dat goddom Yankee oak never sto
od up; her timbers was rotten from her keelson to her waterway! Dat is why de next boat dey had built was built in Cayman. Cayman mahogany. Dey went to work and built a vessel for Caymans dat were very well suited to de purpose of de Grand Banks.

  No good, huh?

  Well, I wouldn’t say dat much, Speedy. De Cayman vessel is built very well. Used mahogany, and den ironwood, fiddlewood, pompero—all dem good old woods dat used to grow right in de island. (suddenly excited) I seen dis vessel slickin along at thirteen knots! Thirteen!

  Ain’t much of a harbor in Cayman, from what I seen. Ain’t like French Harbour. In de Bay Islands.

  In Cayman, Speedy, if a heavy storm strike dere, you be very lucky if you save your vessel. Dat place in de North Sound, dat de only place. Deep water right up to de mangroves. (whistles) Oh, mon. It astonishin to know de quantity of wind dat’s in a hurricane, and what a hurricane can do …

  Athens Ebanks sinks down on the wheel cable housing and takes the spokes of an ancient wooden helm. Like Vemon, he is thin and soiled. He coughs constantly, and sucks cheap cigarettes. The nostrils flare in a nose that looks pushed back; he has buckteeth and a weedy mustache. He wears his cap so that its bill sticks straight out to one side of his head, and his shirt, undershirt, baggy pants all flap and fly, as if he were coming apart—even his shoes flap—but invariably his collar is tight-buttoned, as if this one button held him together. Whenever possible he is asleep, slumped, seated, sprawled, coiled, curled or prone.