They drank up, left a large tip, and moved out with a backslap and thanks to the buyers as they passed. It was the Sleepthief crew from the Uganik grounds who called merrily, “You birds going to need charity, fishin’ under a dame.”
Ham stiffened. Terry pushed him along, and called back lightly: “You’re the ones going to need the luck. We’re hot.” Outside, he muttered, “Pricks. Shouldn’t’ve drunk their beer.”
The air was sweet after the smoky bar. They both stretched and drew breaths. A single dark figure stumbled across the square facing the harbormaster’s office and the boats, and entered one of the other bars among darkened shops. “I don’t know,” mused Terry. “We might look into Solly’s, I guess.” As he thought about it, just what was their gripe with the Hinda Bee? “Saturday night after a week’s fishing and it’s already near morning? By now everybody’s too shitfaced to talk sense even if we find them.”
A boat, traced by its lights, was moving from the canneries and around the breakwater to the floats. Terry cupped his hands like binoculars and peered. “Yeah, that’s our Adele H. I thought we’d parked over there for the night but Seth or Hank must have decided—or Jody. We’d better go catch her lines.”
“Forget Hinda Bee?”
“Find ’em tomorrow.”
A taxicab careened to a stop and three men whooped out to head past them toward Solly’s. They staggered enough to bump against Terry and Ham. The tallest muttered, “Sorry,” and the shortest, “Who moved the fuckin’ phone pole?” It was Bud, Zack, and Alec of the Hinda Bee.
Ham, on eye level with Zack, the tallest, blocked the entrance. “Wanna talk to you guys.”
Alec—the shortest, but built like a table—halted swaying and adjusted the bill of his cap. “Heyyy. Company. This calls for a drink.”
“Who are you guys?” Bud flopped his chin over Alec’s shoulder and winked. “Feelin’ rich, don’t know why. Maybe ‘cause we won a bet today and got money to burn.” He giggled. “Do we know you?”
“Why’s because you cheated,” growled Ham.
“Ohhh, now I rek’nize you,” continued Bud, his chin still on the shoulder. “Sore losers. Work for some lady.”
“Watch it, fellah,” said Ham.
“Cheat? Where?” Zack looked around elaborately as he eased in front of his two crewmates. “Let me handle this, since I did law school almost a whole year once in Florida.” He walked ceremoniously around Ham, shook Terry’s hand, and, in a voice rolling and formal, declared: “We thank you.” He was slim, but Terry had seen him working out and knew a bed of muscles lay beneath the jacket. He also knew Zack to be an easy guy who liked to play-act for fun. Zack now sounded like a lawyer in some movie. “What you did for us today, harrumph, yesterday, maybe— how time flies—was pretty good, and done even with a woman in charge at that. So I’m here to tell you tonight that the bet you lost—call it wager to jack it up—you can take your time to pay it. Harrumph.”
Terry wanted to laugh. It was a good act.
“You making fun of us?” Ham advanced.
“Take you on any day,” declared Bud, waving his arms but with chin still on Alec’s shoulder. Alec, legs planted firmly, swayed as he nodded agreement.
“Easy, easy,” said both Terry and Zack separately.
Ham held his ground. “We saved your ass and then you beat us to town. Which you wouldn’t’ve done if we hadn’t saved your ass. That’s what we need to settle here.”
Zack went to Ham and shook his hand. “We owe you. But we’d have done the same, thrown you a line.” He returned to Terry. “Then, when we left Whale Pass, we started even again. And we beat you fair since we were faster. That’s one bet down for us whether you pay or not. Tomorrow we compare fish tickets, and who delivered most wins bet number two. Bet three hangs loose till our skippers count tickets for the whole opening. Do you see cheating anywhere there?”
Terry nodded and tried to appear wise. In truth, he realized, all he’d wanted was a thanks. “Sure, we’re going to pay. It’s okay, Ham. Let’s go to the boat.”
Zack’s hand pounded his shoulder. “Not until we buy your ass a drink! Yo! Inside!”
There was nothing for it but to follow. Solly’s was brighter than Tony’s, and less smoky, with a dining room removed from the bar. The jukebox, though loud, blasted at a lower decibel level than at Tony’s, so conversation was possible. Full bar. They crowded around a table against the wall.
“Double scotch all around,” called Zack, and the bartender acknowledged.
Terry didn’t want it but he shrugged.
When the drinks arrived, Zack held up his glass. “To women. In bed, or in the wheelhouse.”
Ham glanced at Terry, uncertain. Terry debated quickly, then said, “I guess we’ll drink to that.”
With friends and booze it was soon easy to go mellow. Even jokes about a lady skipper were acceptable among friends. After Bud told of how old Gus got so excited he had to take a pill when the net wound in the prop, Terry volunteered that Jody sometimes got carried away. The incident of nearly running down the Lady West’s skiff became hilarious. “You’d like to seen Hank’s face. I thought he’d explode.” They all laughed and laughed.
Terry, to preserve the reputation of the Adele H, ordered another double round even though the stuff had begun to taste like brass in his mouth.
Much later, light hurt Terry’s eyes, and memory was hazy, but “tastes like dog shit” defined the mess in his mouth. Somewhere along the way another crew—Lady West maybe, or Sleepthief, maybe both?—had started ragging about a woman skipper. What did it was when one of them called Jody a cunt, that much was remembered. All at once chairs were swinging in defense of Jody. Image of Ham’s fist socko into some face. Now this floor was concrete and cool. Had nothing to do with chairs. Was that his own puke smell or somebody else’s?
“Up, men, up.” A foot prodded his leg. “Time for the judge or you stay to Monday. Wash over there if you want.” It was the big cop Randy, had kids and a garden on the edge of town, standing over him tall as a pole. Now that Terry needed to open his eyes, he recognized from talk the long bare room they called the tank or something.
“Ohhh, Mother o’ God, I’m sick,” moaned a voice; Bud’s, it sounded like.
Funny, thought Terry. Can’t remember whether I’m supposed to be pissed or good with Bud. The picture of last night cleared only in patches, like the ocean in fog. Hadn’t maybe Bud stopped something coming toward them, chair or something? That’s right. Bud and the other Hinda Bee guys, pricks maybe once about something—oh, the bets, they shouldn’t have taken advantage after Whale Pass—but the Hinda Bee guys had helped defend Jody’s honor. That’s right. Side by side. Really too bad then if Bud felt sick.
“Terry, you alive, man?” came Ham’s gruff, anxious voice.
He found his own voice speaking for him, but each word took effort. “Yeah. I guess. But. . . dog shit.”
A while later—time went on and on while dying would have been nice—they muttered and wiped and leaned on each other, Adele H and Hinda Bee men together, keeping apart from the Sleepthief and Lady West men as much as possible, though all crowded around the same washbasin. Then Officer Randy marched the lot of them into a room, this one not concrete but wood. Benches, high desk, flag. Terry straightened and nudged Ham to do the same. There sat Hank, he saw with a rush of gratitude. And old Gus of the Hinda Bee sternly beside him. No Jody, glad of that.
The judge hurried in, dressed in black like for an execution. Somebody whispered he’d come straight from church. “A sorry sight,” he declared of them all as he adjusted his glasses.
Randy the cop testified that around 4 AM his car had received a call of a disturbance, and he drove straight to the square to join other policemen on duty. “There was plenty of noise, Your Honor. These three . . .”— he indicated Ham and two of the Sleepthief crewmen—”were punching it out on the sidewalk outside Solly’s. It was two against the big guy, but he was holding his own when
we stopped it. Inside it was mostly chairs thrown and yelling. This man . . .”—he indicated Terry—”was on top of this man . . .”—he pointed to Joe Pone of the Lady West—”and had him down. We broke it up without much trouble, Your Honor. They were all pretty drunk.”
The judge asked if the defendants had anything to say. Zack, the one-year lawyer from the Hinda Bee, raised his hand and stepped forward. He brushed a shock of black hair from his eyes, straightened, looked around, then lost his nerve.
“Yes? Speak up, speak up. Our dinner’s waiting at home.”
“Nothing, Your Honor.” Zack stepped back into the security of the group.
The bar owner testified that four hundred dollars’ worth of glassware and two chairs had been broken. “But the boys are all good customers. I don’t need to press charges.”
“Yes, yes, yes,” snapped the judge. He divided damages evenly “among the participants,” added individual fines and court costs, and was about to gavel a finish, when the back door flew open and banged against the wall.
“John! Two of those men are mine and I need them for my boat, so don’t you dare send them to jail!” It was Adele Henry.
“You’re interrupting this court, madam. Sit down and be silent or you’ll be escorted out. Sit down, Adele. And shut up.”
She sat with a thump.
It took a while to sort out the fines and charges. The crews of the four boats were left standing together. Now that they knew the worst that would happen, they settled into a graveyard kind of cheer. Soon they began to compare notes on the fight, combatant to combatant without heat, and to examine the cuts and bruises they had inflicted on each other.
Hank had encountered Gus Rosvic as they entered the police building, after he had delivered the children to Jody. The two men nodded, then looked away, but they walked together since neither would have delayed and trailed the other. The courtroom was still locked, so they needed to stand together. Hank determined on silence. This was no place to start an argument.
“Your boys in trouble too?” Gus ventured at last.
“Appears so.”
“Wish I never had to make town during season. Always trouble.” After another silence, “Who was in charge yesterday at Whale, you or your wife?”
“She was,” he lied.
“Then tell her thanks.”
Hank debated saying “Tell her yourself,” and settled for “I will.”
“And tell her if she needs anything out on the grounds, call me.”
“I’ll do that. Thanks.” On impulse he started to slap Gus’s back.
Gus’s eyes flashed up. “But tell your wife never to set foot on my boat.” Hank stayed his arm. “And saying I’m there to help don’t mean it’s right for her to run Jones Henry’s boat or any other. You ought to know better, Hank, to let it happen. Jones Henry’s legs must be rolled off in his grave by now, to watch what that woman of his is doing to the boat that was his blood and bones.”
“It’s happened, Gus. Live with it.” Hank tried to say it mildly, but his voice had an edge.
Gus flared. “You’ll see when she gets into trouble. And don’t think your men is going to win any of the bets with my men if I can help it, because that would make it seem right, which it ain’t. None of this is right. If you don’t see it you’re not as savvy as they say you are.”
“Our guys have one bet finished now,” said Hank coldly. “Don’t worry. Yours won, mine’ll pay up. And after this court business we’ll compare fish tickets and settle the next.”
The courtroom door opened. Hank and Rosvic looked toward separate sides of the small room but, neither willing to deviate, grimly moved in a straight line and sat together.
Try once more, thought Hank. “If bets are what our men were fighting each other about, we’d better be sensible and damp it down or we’ll both lose the season.”
“That’s one piece of sense.”
They both leaned forward when the dog-eared fighters shuffled in. Eleven in all, more than just their own. None seemed in worse condition than shaggy hangovers. Hank quickly noted a purple swelling on Terry’s cheek and a cut on Ham’s mouth, but as best he could see, knuckles were only reddened—not swollen—so their hands were not damaged for work. With his own men assessed, he could be relaxed over the injuries to others. Plenty of purple, some cuts. Gus’s man Bud had a fat lip, probably served him right. Confusing, though, that Terry and Ham seemed to hang together with the Hinda Bee men as if they were buddies.
When Randy the cop described the fight the sides became clear, but still not the motive. Adele Henry came in mouthing off. Hank hunched and lowered his head, ashamed but hoping she wouldn’t see him and sit alongside. He glanced and wanted to laugh. Gus at his elbow was doing the same.
But the calculation of charges took time and left the few spectators free to move. Adele Henry plumped down beside him. “They ought to be ashamed of themselves,” she declared. “I won’t have scrapping hooligans on my boat, although I certainly intend to see that Terry and Ham don’t go to jail. But they’re going to get the lecture of their lives. And did you hear how John Flaxen treated me just now? As if he wasn’t a neighbor whom I see every day! Judges get a swelled head, I think.” She leaned across Hank to Rosvic. “Gus! I’m shocked at your boys. You and my dear late Jones were such devoted friends, and since Daddy never permitted his men to carry on when they had to fish and stay healthy, I’d have thought that you, too—”
Gus edged away as best he could. “Not the place here, Adele. I uh . . . Hope you’re staying well.”
“Of course I’m well, as much as a grieving widow can be.”
“Sorry. I mean, glad to hear it.”
Jeff Mathews, skipper of the Sleepthief Two, sauntered over. “Seems our guys were in this together, Hank. Can you figure it?”
Hank and Rosvic both welcomed the interruption. “Not a clue,” said Hank.
“You can be sure we will find out,” snapped Adele.
The fines and costs totaled seventy-one dollars per man. Adele elaborately peeled off three fifty-dollar bills and demanded a receipt along with change. “This is going to be collected, boys,” she told Terry and Ham sternly. “And we’re going home this minute to have quite a talk.”
Yes, ma am.
Only the skipper of the Lady West had not come to bail out his men. Hank wrote a check to cover their fines.
Nick the skiff man pumped his hand. “Don’t worry, we’ll pay you back.”
“Forget it. We don’t run over your skiff every day.”
“Ahhh . . . Nobody hurt.”
“All right, you birds,” said Jeff of the Sleepthief. “What happened?” One of his men started to speak.
“Nothing,” interrupted Terry firmly. “Nothin’ we didn’t handle among ourselves.” He looked at Ham and the others sternly.
“‘Nothing’ is not going to do it when we get to the house, young man,” declared Adele.
Leave it alone, woman, thought Hank. No wonder Jones turned crabby. He told Adele, “I need to take them right away, back to the Jody Dawn. We’ve got all kinds of work, after the time we took off to set up your boat, before I can release them.” Sleep was what they needed. And their privacy. Terry and Ham both regarded him gratefully.
Joe Pone of the Lady West, who had a black eye, went up to Terry and shook his hand. “You made your point, man. Nobody rags you anymore, about working for a woman. From here on, Jody’s okay.”
“Oh my God, so that was it,” exclaimed Adele. She hugged Terry, then Ham, and burst into tears.
PART II
Rules of the New Game
MID-AUGUST TO SEPTEMBER 1982
JAPAN, ALASKA
7
RISING SUN
KODIAK, MID-AUGUST 1982
It turned out that the men of the Hinda Bee won all three sets of wagers. They spent much of the winnings on a steak and booze bash with their new buddies on the Adele H, all to ritual insults given and taken. None of this, of course
, affected their now-sworn rivalry on the grounds.
Hank yearned more than ever to keep seining for salmon in Kodiak bays under snow-draped mountains with Jody at hand and the kids safely close in town. But such an oasis was a mirage now that the Japanese waited. Their money had enabled him to keep the Jody Dawn after crabbing collapsed and other skippers lost million-plus-dollar boats to the banks. If the Japanese now held him truly in their pocket, as Jones Henry had accused, then he needed to face them and accommodate them until he could find a way out. If they were giving him the opportunity of his life, then it was time to grab and benefit from it.
The days ticked on to the time when the Jody Dawn would be fit for the trip to Seattle and gear conversion to longlining. (If Jody hadn’t tied herself to the damned Adele H, Hank fretted, Seattle could have been an all-family vacation.) At least the delay allowed them time in Kodiak. Once the cast was removed from Hank’s shoulder, Jody massaged it often, easing the ache and restoring mobility. Her skill had been acquired from living among men in an injury-prone occupation. Hank pretended jealousy over this, Jody teased, and it became a tender time together. When the children were elsewhere they ended up in bed laughing, with Hank’s Jody no longer a skipper barking orders.
And daily he stood beside his sleek-hulled Jody Dawn, now dry and vulnerable on the shipyard ways. He’d even helped rivet her, planned her inch by inch until the very groan of her metal was part of him. The boat’s design was adapted to many of the sea’s changing fortunes, but not gracefully, he fretted, to this conversion the Japanese felt they needed. The Tsurifunes, father and son, had money enough. But judgment? The Jody Dawns work deck lay astern for crab pots or trawl, while longline needed a work deck forward where the skipper, at the controls, could watch down directly and maneuver. He’d told them. Not the boat for longline without moving the whole cabin structure and desecrating the boat’s integrity. They were impervious to all but getting his boat online before the bureaucrats locked boundaries and quotas. Understood. It was an exciting game of opportunity. Yet, whenever immediate action stopped to leave time for thought, Jones Henry’s disapproving shadow invaded his mind.
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