“I guess El wouldn’t cheat you, but I’d advise caution.”
“Too late, my dear. I decided yesterday. El’s converting my boat as we speak. Now to the point. I need a crew.”
And how I’d love to do it, thought Hank. Hands-on steamroller fishing straight from the sea like none other. “But with such a short opening, a crew needs to start on the run and be a crack team.”
“Exactly! So I’ve asked myself, who do I know who has a crack team? Hank, dear, those big fish bring over a dollar a pound! It’s money from the sky! Don’t tell me you and Jody don’t need . . . And one lucky halibut load could easily pay my conversion—easily!—and then I’m set. Lord knows salmon aren’t fetching much all of a sudden with that awful botulism scare. I pity those Englishmen who died, of course, but couldn’t they have been more careful? Everybody over there eats canned salmon, they say, and nobody else ever . . . Of course in Paris France you wouldn’t find them eating things from a can since they do all their foods fresh, and you can’t imagine how delicious! . . . Where was I? Oh. Hank. What a crack team like yours could catch in a week! And it’s west of Kodiak only, not on the old traditional Albatross and Portlock banks where the old-timersknow every inch. New ground for everybody. They say the water’s black with halibut. Don’t let’s lose out. I’ll even pay your airfare. Bring your boys, and crew for me.”
“We’ve got other commitments, Adele.”
After a silence: “Oh, Hank. Things used to be so much simpler.”
How well he knew. But that ended it.
Then, amazingly, when he mentioned the conversation casually to Tsurifune father and son, they exchanged glances and spoke together rapidly in Japanese. The old man chuckled, and Mike declared, “Why not? Good entry longline for you and fishing master.” In any case, the shipyard had just detected some weak hull plates on the Puale Bay and consequent water damage. It would delay the final launching.
Mike Tsurifune buzzed for his secretary and snapped orders in Japanese. Then to Hank: “Excuse me, now I must use influence quickly for Kodama-visa USA. Go hurry tell him—no, I shall tell and instruct, please hurry now yourself and prepare.” He buzzed the secretary again to summon Kodama.
Seth’s reaction when Hank phoned with a list of things to be done was: “Fuckin’ time we got back into the real stuff. I guess you don’t know anymore what it’s like to just sit around with a finger up your ass while everybody else hits the fish. And halibut is the deal, everybody’s gearing. Boats are taking six or seven crew for max in the few days. We’re only five. Not many apes left not hired, but I’ll scout the docks.”
“Hold off on that.” Hank hesitated. “I’ve got one new man.”
“Who?”
“I’ve mentioned him before. Kodama.”
Silence, then, “That Jap?”
“You’ll like him. He’s a good man. I’ve got to go.”
“What are you doing to us?”
It’ll work out, Hank reassured himself.
Shoji Tsurifune himself saw them off two days later on a plane leaving Narita. In his presence Kodama turned stiff as a soldier, and his normally stern expression darkened further when the two conversed in Japanese.
No democracy here, Hank concluded as he pretended not to watch. Nothing wrong with management instructing an employee to go out and produce for the company, but he was surprised to see Kodama made so uneasy.
Kodama’s discomfort continued throughout the hours of the Tokyo-Anchorage flight. He sat like a ramrod most of the time with hands clasped on his lap, and spoke only to give monosyllabic answers. He barely touched food, and refused alcohol.
Hank suddenly doubted his decision now that it was too late. Maybe Kodama wasn’t going to fit in, uptight as he was. How indeed would he make out on deck if he was the expert but Seth was the established boss? Seth now echoed Jones Henry’s anti-Japanese hostility more and more. Had Jones by dying passed him the sword? Hank found his own hands seeking each other on his lap.
After clearing customs at the Anchorage airport Hank said, “Come on, Kodama-san. We’ve got two hours before the Kodiak flight. Let’s loosen up. Buy you a drink.”
“No alcohol.”
“Coke, then. Come on.”
People with suitcases hurried by them in the corridor. Kodama instinctively edged so close to Hank that their shoulders touched. “Hoo. Americans are very large.”
“You’ve seen this before. Haven’t you fished in Alaska, and Canada, even Argentina and the Caribbean?”
“Never go ashore. Sometimes in for fuel, of course. But always pier and office.” Suddenly three men with knapsacks and rifle cases strode by talking loudly. Their smudged clothing and unshaven faces made them seem more aggressive than they probably were. Kodama nearly knocked Hank over to crowd against him. “Guns!” he whispered.
“Just hunters. Back from a few days in the bush, probably.”
“Everyone in America necessary must have guns. Oh, I have read this.”
“Come on. Where’s my gun? Do you see any?”
“Not needed in Japan, of course. Here you must have gun to protect. Quickly I must buy gun also.”
Hank laughed it off.
Kodama reluctantly accepted a Coke with a dash of rum when Hank told him this was very American. It did not relax him. He sat tight and silent in the lounge. A voice over the speaker announced that fog in Kodiak would delay the flight. Hank looked around for some diversion. There sat Oddmund Anderson in a dark corner. They nodded. Good. Start Kodama meeting people with an easy one. Hank urged Odds over.
The Aleut and the Japanese shook hands cautiously.
“Odds, Mr. Kodama’s my good friend from Japan. He’s a fisherman. Very skilled in longline. A fishing master, in fact.” No reaction. Hank chattered on, although the two men stared at each other without expression. “And, Kodama-san . . . Odds here, Mr. Oddmund Anderson . . .” Odds started to correct. “Oh, yeah, Nikolai, right?” Odds nodded. “This gentleman’s also a good friend. He too is a fisherman. Once a valuable member of my crew, catching king crab in the Bering Sea. Same waters you once fished. Now he’s an important member of the Kodiak—of one of the Alaska native corporations, directing how to spend native money on things like, uh, fisheries.”
Oddmund cleared his throat. “Longline’s very important now,” he stated in his flat, earnest voice. “Everybody’s going out next week to catch halibut. Longline’s the best way. Everybody who can get on a boat. Since I stopped fishing to work for the corporation, all my brothers and cousins, they’ve filled their boats without me.” A pause. “I’d go too.”
Why not? thought Hank. But he’d first assess manpower with Seth, give Seth the choice. Give Seth something after forcing Kodama down his throat. “Hey, let me order another round.” He regretted as soon as he spoke. Odds had been a problem on the boat when he drank. On the other hand, a test of the present Odds.
“I don’t need more root beer,” said Odds. “This is plenty here in my glass. You go booze all you like if that’s what you want.” His manner implied no judgment.
Kodama also waved aside a refill.
They both seemed content to sit without speaking. Hank excused himself and went to the bar for another scotch. He took as long as he could, and drained most of it while bantering with the bartender, but finally returned to the table. It appeared that neither of the two had spoken, although Kodama seemed finally relaxed.
“Well, Odds. Your work at the native corporation must be pretty interesting. You guys are busy investing, aren’t you? Did I read you’d bought into one of the canneries?”
“Buying?” The serious face turned graver. “I guess you didn’t hear. Somebody in a far-off place got sick with a thing called botulism. Got sick and died. People say from a can of salmon from Alaska. It’s a bad time for canneries. Stores all over don’t want canned salmon.”
“Hey.” Hank made it light. “Good time to buy canneries cheap.” Odds didn’t pick up on the tone. (Why indeed try to joke
with sober ol’ Odds?) He tried to assess Odds’s physical condition through the suit. Had an office left him too soft for heavy fishing? “Do you work out at all? Shoot hoops? Go to the gym?”
“No time for that sort of thing, Hank. I’m very busy.”
“Ever tried judo, Odds? Kodama here could show you a thing or two.” “Fighting’s violent. Almost as bad as drinking booze.”
“Come on,” Hank eased. “Weren’t Aleut people famous fighters long ago? Tough as hell, I’ve heard!”
“If you studied enough, Hank, you’d read that the Haida People and Tlingit People further south, they always made war. My people, well, maybe we’d fight a little over sealing grounds. My people, the Aleut People, we survived in bad weather. On the ocean, in little skin boats, in cold, terrible weather. That’s how we were tough.” Odds sipped his root beer. “Then, two hundred years ago, the Russian fur traders came to the Aleut villages. They gave presents and we trusted them. And then they made us slaves, easy, because they had guns. It wasn’t right. All this country was ours. Then Americans bought Aleut land from the Russians that wasn’t Russians’ to sell. Or Americans’ to buy. That wasn’t right, either.”
Hank regretted what he’d started. He deferred it with, “At least the Russians gave you those beautiful churches.”
It left Odds silent for a minute. Then, “It was God’s way to save my people. But the rest was wrong.”
Suddenly Kodama laughed and drained his glass. “Yes!” he said when Hank offered to bring him another. As Hank left for the bar, Kodama was addressing Odds for the first time: “Hai, injustice. Do they also take away your fish?”
“All the fish used to belong to my people.”
“Oh, boy. Make it stiff,” Hank told the bartender. When he returned, Odds and Kodama had entered an intense conversation. Hank wondered whether to laugh or be annoyed. The Japanese and the Aleut were telling each other how Americans had deprived them of their entitled fish.
By the time the plane was ready—after further delays for bad weather in Kodiak—the rum in Kodama’s drink had not relaxed him as Hank intended, but had instead emboldened him. When the three walked together over the tarmac to the plane, Kodama and Odds continued to talk intensely, ignoring Hank. The Japanese fiercely shook the Aleut’s hand in parting, then joined Hank with an angry look.
Should he tell Kodama to goddamn lighten up, or leave it to circumstance? Hank decided to play it easy. “Soon you’re going to meet the guys you’ll crew with. My crew. They’re good men. And I’ve told them you’re a good man. They’ll be your friends.” He studied the lines that had hardened around Kodama’s mouth. “But it’s important to start by being, uh, positive. Friendly.”
“Of course,” Kodama snapped. His expression still could have faced down an opponent on the judo mat.
Should have kept Kodama sober. One thing for certain, Hank decided. Forget Odds in the halibut crew. There’d be enough friction with sorehead Seth. As the plane circled the hazed Kodiak mountains and bumped to a landing, he braced for the first meeting.
They walked through rain from the plane to the airport terminal. Oddmund drew alongside Hank. “Your friend says you’re going to longline this halibut opening. If you need more crew, Hank . . . I’ve got a meeting tomorrow morning but after that. . . Native corporation don’t pay all that good with three kids and my wife talking college for them all of a sudden, so I’ve thought about also fishing again.”
“I’ll sure keep it in mind, Odds.”
Instead of the crew he’d expected, Jody and the kids met them waving. He’d seldom seen her so clear eyed and confident. It was like old times with her hair neatly back in a ponytail (that couldn’t be a white strand among the brown?) and her wide mouth in a smile. As their kiss and embrace continued little Pete wrapped arms around his leg. Dawn held his hand and looked up to tell everything that had happened since he’d left, while Henny stood gravely apart waiting to be greeted. Hank hugged them each in turn, and kept tousling Henny’s hair.
Hank introduced his new man. Jody greeted Kodama with a spontaneous light kiss. It startled him. He backed away instinctively.
“Your boys are nearly snowed getting ready, but they’ve come to life,” she said gaily. “All those tubs of line and hooks! And Adele everywhere making suggestions, they’re even rolling with that.”
“Even Seth?”
“Seth’s gotten good at being polite while he still does what he’s decided to do. He might make a husband after all.” They strolled across the slippery floor where attendants wheeled in dripping baggage and boxes from the plane.
Hank had paid no attention to others around him until a familiar voice near them grated, “I count seven. Where’s the rest? And the new crankshaft, where’s that?”
“Crankshaft, sir, Joey grabbed it right from the plane and took it to the truck. The peanut butter, you only ordered seven of the big cans. It says right here.”
Hank turned to see Swede Scorden in coveralls with a clipboard, surrounded by crates, boxes, and a new motor scooter. The bill of a red baseball cap shaded his eyes even indoors, and his chin jutted beneath it as always, now with a graying stubble that once had been black. Hank had last seen him in a rare suit and tie at Jones Henry’s funeral.
“Put on glasses. That’s seven teen in my order. Look like a seven to your?”
“Oh. That little stick of a one in front of the seven, it’s all blurred. Shit. Sorry, sir.”
“Sorry enough when those birds gobble their peanut butter and yell for more. Think we’re going to feed ’em fresh crab legs instead? And what kind of grease is that all over my new boat fenders there?”
“I don’t know, sir.”
“Clean those things before they go on the truck. Use your own shirt if you have to, but wipe it.”
“Right, sir.”
“Swede, you pisser,” called Hank.
“Crawford. Back from Japan.” Swede Scorden barely looked up as he spoke. “I want to see you. Soon. At the office.” To his assistant: “See to it.” Swede pushed up the bill of his cap, and his face eased as he walked toward them.
Jody gave Swede another of her light kisses. “Why are you so mean to your kids?”
“Breaks ’em in.” To Kodama: “I’ve heard about you. Scorden here.” He offered his hand. The two men exchanged direct looks. They evidently approved of each other since the handshake, started curtly, ended with (could that be Swede?) clipped ceremonial bows. Swede turned to Hank. “You’re going for halibut. Delivering to me?”
“Depends. You going to cheat me on price?”
“As much as I can.”
“Then I might trust the thief I know.”
“Then come by the office like I said. But keep Adele Henry away from me.”
“Oh? She’s on your tail?”
“No more I guess than on anybody else from canneries and boats.” Swede waved his hand. “Or shipyard, hardware store, gear shed from what I hear. Fishery office, harbormaster’s, town council even. Since Jones died the woman can’t shut up. Ask Jody.” He turned to Kodama with another handshake. “Good luck.” Then he resumed checking his shipments.
After Swede had left, “He’s stopped drinking, you know,” said Jody. “All that boozy haze is gone. I’m so glad.”
Hank started to say that maybe he’d found a way to stop the Japs from screwing him, checked himself in front of Kodama. “Is Adele that bad?”
Jody shrugged in good humor.
On the drive to town, piers they passed swarmed with men carrying boxes of groceries and gear to the boats. Deck lights glistened on wet orange and yellow oilskins. The activity looked even busier than it did during the start of the salmon runs. “Oh, yes,” Jody confirmed. “Everybody has dollar signs for eyes these days.”
At the yard, Hank’s Jody Dawn rode in the water rather than dry on the ways, the repairs to her hull completed. His boat bobbed there deserted. Rails and superstructure showed the scuffs of Bristol Bay, inflicted weeks before wh
en he’d left her abruptly after the storm and Jones’s death. He started toward her at once.
Jody followed and caught his arm. “I know your thinking. But you’ll lose yourself over there. You’ve got short time, and a new man to settle in.” Hank continued toward the Jody Dawn but called back, “Just for a minute, honey. Kodama-san! Follow me. Come see my boat.”
“Hank! You’ll disappear once you go aboard.” Her voice hardened. “Your crew’s waiting on a different boat.”
He started to brush her off with a joke but thought better of it and retraced his steps. She was right. He’d want to check every inch of his Jody Dawn and he could lose himself there.
Kodama watched, shocked. Under the drive of the rain he took a thick black rubber jacket from his bag. The coat added to the darkness of his frown.
The Adele Ifs deck was as busy as the Jody Dawns had been empty. Seth, peeled to the waist with a red cloth looped around his forehead, leaned into the windlass bracing a wrench. The short, grease-caked figure half hidden in the same machinery would be Terry. Up on the mast Mo braced himself with locked knees as he rigged a block. Ham serviced him by rope from the deck below. They all worked despite the rain.
And there beside Ham stood Adele Henry. She wore bulging oilskin pants and a hooded slicker jacket. A bandanna locked down most of her hair. “I think a little bit higher, Mo dear,” she called.
Seth looked up, scanned the mast, met Mo’s glance, and turned down his thumb.
“Yes, ma’am,” said Mo. He shimmied slightly farther up the mast and seemed to place the block a few inches higher, then imperceptibly slipped back to his original position as he readied the brace.
“Yes,” said Adele. “That’s better.” She returned to scrubbing what looked like an old bait box that was white scuffed to gray.
Hank pointed out each crew member to Kodama. “And the lady is Mrs. Henry. She owns the boat.”
Raiders Page 18
