He worked the tiller, traced curves. Now faster. Quoyle laughed like a dog in the back of a pickup. Why had he feared boats?
There was an offshore breeze and the waves slapped the boat bottom as he sped at them. A sharp turn and he felt the boat skid. Pushed the throttle back. The stern wave roared up behind him and sloshed over the transom, swirled around his ankles and spread out in the boat. He pulled at the throttle again and the boat leapt forward, but sluggishly, and the water on the floor rushed toward the stern, adding its weight to Quoyle’s. He looked for something to bail out the water; nothing. Turned very carefully toward the dock. The boat was vague and unwilling, for the water had altered the trim. Yet he moved forward, not afraid of sinking only two hundred feet from the dock.
As he approached he jerked back on the throttle again, and again the stern wave sloshed over the transom. But close enough to cut the motor and let the boat grind against the dock. He threw his mooring lines over the piles and went up to the house for a coffee can bail.
Back on the water again, he played the throttle delicately, turning with care, wary of the stern wave. There had to be a way to keep the water out when you slowed down.
“Of course there is,” said Nutbeem. “Your transom’s cut too low. What you need is a motor well, a bulkhead as high as the sides of the boat forward of the motor, with self-bailing drains in each corner. Build one in an hour. I’m flabbergasted they registered it the way it is.”
“It’s not registered,” said Quoyle.
“You’d better hop on down to the Coast Guard and do it,” said Nutbeem. “You get caught without a registration, without a motor well, without the proper lights and flotation devices they’ll fine your ass off. I suppose you have an anchor?”
“No,” said Quoyle.
“Oars? Something to bail with? Distress flares? Do you have a safety chain for your motor?”
“No, no,” said Quoyle. “I was just trying it out.”
On a Saturday Dennis and Quoyle hauled the boat out of the water. Bunny on the dock, throwing stones.
“She’s a rough bugger,” said Dennis. “In fact, you might burn her and start over.”
“I can’t afford to. Can’t we put in a motor well? When I tried it out last week it went right along. It was fine until the water came in. I just want to get back and forth across the bay with it.”
“I’ll put in a bulkhead and give you some advice-only take this thing out on quiet days. If it looks rough better get a ride with your aunt or drive your wagon. It isn’t fit, you get in a hard nip.”
Quoyle stared at his boat.
“Look at it,” said Dennis. “It’s just a few planks bunged together. The boy that built it deserves a whack of shot in the backside.”
Quoyle’s hand went up to his chin.
“Dad,” said Bunny, crouched on the pebbles, ramming a stick into the sand. “I want to go in the boat.”
Dennis clicked his tongue as though he’d heard her say a dirty word.
“Talk to Alvin Yark. See if he’d make you something. He makes good boats. I’d make something for you, but he’ll do it quicker and it’ll cost you less. I’ll put a bulkhead in, long as nobody sees me doing it, touching this thing, but you better talk with Alvin. You got to have a boat. That’s certain.”
Bunny ran up to the house, thumb and forefinger pinched together.
“Aunt, the sky is the biggest thing in the world. Guess what’s the littlest?”
“I don’t know, my dear. What?”
“This.” And extended her finger to show a minute grain of sand.
“I want to see.” Sunshine charged up and the particle of sand was lost in a hurricane of breath.
“No, no, no,” said the aunt, seizing Bunny’s balled fist. “There’s more without number. There’s enough sand for everybody.”
13 The Dutch Cringle
“A cringle will make an excellent emergency handle
for a suitcase.”
THE ASHLEY BOOK OF KNOTS
“BOY, there’s a sight down here to the wharf. Never the like of it in these waters.” The booming voice rattled out of the wire and into Quoyle’s ear. “With the smell of evil on it. I wouldn’t put to sea in it for all the cod in the world. Better take a look, boy. You’ll never see anything like it again.”
“What is it, Mr. Shovel? The flagship of the Spanish Armada?”
“No, boy. But you bring your pencil and your camera. I think you can write more than arrival and departure times.” He hung up.
Quoyle was not glad. A gusting rain fell at a hard angle, rattling the windowpanes, drumming on the roof. The wind bucked and buffeted. It was comfortable leaning his elbow on the desk and rewriting a Los Angeles wreck story Nutbeem had pulled off the radio. An elderly man stripped naked by barroom toughs, blindfolded and shoved into freeway traffic. The man had just left the hospital after visiting a relative, had gone into a nearby bar for a glass of beer when five men with blue-painted heads seized him. Tert Card said it showed the demented style of life in the States. A favorite story with Gammy Bird readers, the lunacy of those from away. Quoyle called back.
“Mr. Shovel, I sort of hate to drop what I’m doing.”
“Tell you, it’s Hitler’s boat. A pleasure boat built for Hitler. A Dutch barge. You never seen anything like it. The owner’s on board. They says the paper’s welcome to look her over.”
“My god. Be there in about half an hour.”
Billy Pretty stared at Quoyle. “What’s he got, then?” he whispered.
“He says there’s a Dutch boat that belonged to Hitler down at the public wharf.”
“Naw!” said Billy, “I’d like to see that. Those old days, boy, we had the Germans prowling up and down this coast, torpedoed ships they did right up there in the straits. The Allies got a submarine, captured a German sub. Took it down to St. John’s.
“We had spies. Oh, some clever! This one, a woman, I can see her now in a old duckety-mud coat, used to pedal her squeaky old bike up the coast once a week from Rough Shop Harbor to Killick-Claw, then go back down the ferry. I forget what she gave out for a story why she had to do all that bikin’, but come to find out she was a German spy, countin’ the boats all up and down, and she’d radio the information out to German subs lurking offshore.”
“Get your slicker then and come on.”
“We always heard they shot her. Just didn’t show up one week. They said she was caught down at Rough Shop Harbor and executed. Said she dodged her bike through the paths, screaming like a crazy thing, the men after her, run like engines before they run her down.”
Quoyle made a sucking noise with the side of his mouth. He did not believe a word.
There was a hole in the station wagon’s floor and through it spurted occasional geysers of dirty rainwater. Quoyle thought enviously of the aunt’s pickup. He couldn’t afford a new truck. Frightening how fast the insurance money was going. He didn’t know where the aunt got it. She’d paid for all the house repairs, put in her share for groceries. He’d paid for the road, the new dock. For the girls’ beds, clothes, the motel bill, gas for the station wagon. And the new transmission.
“Wish I’d worn me logans,” shouted Billy Pretty. “Didn’t know the bottom half of your car was missin’.”