The Waterman: A Novel of the Chesapeake Bay (31 page)

Clay was taken aback. “Byron. Hold on.”

“Bullshit. You don't need my help. And I ain't goin' back out there to load our pots and run. Period.” He turned and started walking.

“Where are you going?”

Byron stopped. “I want a drink.”

“A drink?”

“My fuckin' life, partner. Find me in the bar when you're done.”

Clay watched Byron walk away. Of all things, he didn't see this coming. He heard Calvin calling from behind him. Marine police would come by later to look things over. But he needed to move his workboat, to make room for the others coming in. Clay turned. He had to move the bateau. It would take him longer to
finish, that was all. He went back to the
Miss Sarah
. Calvin again said he was sorry. Clay pushed off. The wind hadn't slackened. It was in his face going out. He thought of his cut pots, sitting on the river bottom, filling with crabs, no way to find them. He thought of Kate. He breathed deep and filled his lungs with the brackish wind that blew off the wave crests. “Christ,” he muttered. “Christ, what's happening?” And then he headed out to the bank off the East River.

When he came back into the creek and approached the wharf, the
Miss Sarah
filled with pots, he saw Kate in the parking lot, pacing in front of her car. She saw him and began to wave. He looked for Byron's pickup, but it was gone. As he pulled up to the loading dock, he motioned for her to wait. He sold the additional crabs he had picked up to one of Calvin's hands and then backed the
Miss Sarah
around to the slip. Kate jumped on board and helped him tie her down. Then she came to him and held him. He told her what had happened and asked her if she had seen Byron. She had not.

She helped him unload the pots from the bateau onto the edge of the parking lot. He wrapped a warp line around them to hold them against the wind. Then they checked the bar and restaurant for Byron, but he was not there. Clay had wanted to go back out and pull his last lay, north of the point, but he was worried about Byron. He had Kate drive him over to Pepper Creek. Byron's pickup was not there, either. Clay looked and saw a single workboat, the
Vena Lee,
tied against the bulkhead. There was no one on her. Kate backed slowly out of the parking lot.

“Where to, now?” he said, half to himself.

“I'm taking you home,” Kate answered. She put her hand to his cheek. “If Byron needs us, he can find us there.”

Kate took him back and up into her bed. They lay in the summer heat, in the translucent, wavering light, with the sound of children playing, far off, filtering through the screened windows. Clay forgot and forgave the world, and wondered at the rapture. It made him afraid, afraid that nothing real could feel this good, that it could never last. And knowing that in all this there was Matty, and Byron somewhere, and complications he could not fathom, still, there was no end to the flood that had opened inside his heart.

She lay on top of his back and whispered to him the ways she had imagined him making love to her, so he took her again. She dried his shoulders with a towel, and then she pushed him over and dried his front. She brought him orange slices and then rested her head on his shoulder until he shut his eyes.

His dream was about Sarah. In that green light of summer. Because she had forgotten to shift, straining the old Rambler in second gear, her face wan, her heart bursting inside her, and he not knowing, there in the car, in the road, the sun washing
through the leaves of the tall maples that lined the road, and then grabbing at the wheel, pushing across his young mother for the brake pedal, not understanding she was dying. Sarah reaching for him, tearing at her blouse for air, not speaking, her eyes beseeching him, afraid, and he trying to help, not knowing what to do to help, holding her, holding her tighter, the shaking, the rush of the leaves of the giant maple, a spasm of flesh, until the crash, and the silence, the stillness, and that sound of sirens so separate, so distant, and then gradually louder. Coming closer. Coming to them. A ringing he could hear. Louder and present, in the room.

Ringing . . .

He opened his eyes and tried to focus. Kate was picking up the phone and talking. She said something quietly, hung up, and came over to the bed.

“It's Byron,” she said. “He's been arrested. They said it was assault. He's down at the county jail in Gloucester.”

Kate drove him to Gloucester, holding his hand. Clay couldn't stop shaking his head. “Open your eyes,” he said to himself. “Open your eyes.”

The jail was adjacent to the county seat and courthouse. They walked through the large green double doors. “Byron Steele is in lockup,” the county sheriff told them. He wore a blue uniform with a gray tie. He was older and balding and wore horn-rimmed glasses, but behind them his eyes were alert. “He cracked a man over the head with a bottle. Took stitches. Was drunk. Disorderly. Out of control. Bartender drew down on him with a twelvegauge.”

Clay was still. He had this terrible sense of familiarity.

Kate stepped forward. “How do we get him released?”

“I set a station house bond of a thousand dollars. Judge can change it, if you want to appear in court tomorrow.”

“Thousand dollars.” Clay shifted from one foot to the other. “Kind of heavy, ain't it?”

“He could've killed someone.” The sheriff didn't smile.

“Maybe he had a reason,” Clay said.

The sheriff eyed him. “I could lock you up too. Or maybe I should raise the bond. What reason?”

Clay pondered for a moment. “Nothing,” he answered. “Could you give us a minute?” He took Kate's elbow and they walked out the door to the front steps.

“I could call my father,” she offered. “He would give me the money. We could drive up and get it. We're four hours from Washington.”

“No,” Clay responded quickly. Then he rubbed his eyes with his thumb and forefinger. “I mean, thank you. But I don't want you to do that.”

“What then?”

“I don't know. Let me ask him something.”

They went back in. Clay asked the sheriff if he could speak plainly, and the sheriff said sure. Then he told the sheriff about him and Byron being partners, and about the hurricane and what it did to the upper Bay. He explained that he was a waterman, a crabber, and that he had a thirty-six-foot Bay-built tied up at the end of Davis Creek, and told him why they had come to Virginia. He even mentioned Vietnam. Then he asked if he could put up the title of the
Miss Sarah
as collateral for bail.

Rising from his chair, the sheriff pulled open a drawer and took from it a sheet of paper. He handed it to Clay. “List of bondsmen. You can pay them.” He sat down and watched as Clay took the list. Without reading it, he held it at his side. Kate took it, glanced at it, and handed it back to the sheriff.

“We'd need cash for a bondsman. But that boat means more than money to both of them.” Her words were firm, deliberate.

The sheriff put his feet on his desk and leaned back. He scratched his chin. “All right,” he said finally. “If you're sure. You want to put up title to your boat, I'll take it.” He took his glasses off and wiped them with the edge of his tie. “But your man don't show for court,” he continued, putting his glasses back on, “you lose your boat.”

“What do we need to do?”

“Bring me the title. Sign the papers.”

He and Kate both thanked him.

Kate drove Clay back to the wharf where the
Miss Sarah
was tied. He boarded her and got out the ammunition box, hidden under a floorboard in the cabin locker where he always kept it, and took out the title to the bateau. He paused for a moment and looked at the chart of the spot where his father had discovered the sunken Spanish frigate. He unfolded it and stared at it, tracing the coordinates with his fingertip, wondering what was coming and when—if ever—he might be able to chase that dream. He replaced the chart, shut the box, and returned it to its hiding place. Stepping out of the cabin, he stood in the stern of the
Miss Sarah
. Kate was waiting in the car. He looked over the harbor and down the creek. Along the flats, the spartina glowed orange in the last light. He looked at the shattered windshield on the cabin and then touched the cut cord on the marine radio. Pulling the dock lines to bring her closer to the wharf, he stepped out. On the way back to the jail in Gloucester, he asked Kate what she wanted.

“I want you to stay,” she said. “I want you to want me enough to stay. In my bed. With me.”

“And Matty?”

“I'll tell him. He'll be home tomorrow. I just need to find the right time.” She looked imploringly at Clay. “Give me a few days.”

They bailed Byron out. The pickup, packed with crab pots, had been impounded, and they got it out also. Kate drove Byron back to the Waterman's Hole. Clay followed in the pickup, parking it
over near their slip. They all went in together and ordered dinner. Byron's left eye was blackened. He had found Amos Pickett, he explained. Saw his truck outside the Cattail Lounge out on the highway. Pickett was with several others. Cracked him good. Said the bartender probably saved him, though. The guy's friends were moving in, and he saw Pickett draw some steel when he started to get up. “I should've waited,” Byron finished. “The numbers weren't too much in my favor.”

Clay grunted.

“But I wanted that son of a bitch.” Byron raised up his head. “I just was hasty.”

Clay could find no words. He studied the calluses on his hands. The food came and he watched Byron and Kate eat. He told Byron that he was moving the boat in the morning, after he'd picked up the remaining pots. Byron asked him where to.

“South.”

“Where south?”

“Don't know. Far enough to end all this,” Clay said, motioning with his hand. “And you need to stay out of any kind of trouble. We had to put up the
Miss Sarah
as bond.”

Byron coughed, nearly choking. “You did what?”

“To get you out.”

“Take me back to jail.”

“You can't undo it; it's done.”

Byron was silent. Kate reached for his hand.

“We'll get you a lawyer,” she said.

“It's nothing really. You show up for your court date, I get the title back.”

Byron slowly pulled his hand back. “You shouldn'a.”

“Right. And you wouldn't have done it for me?”

“Hell, no. Not if you were this screwed up.” Byron found a cigarette in his jeans pocket, struck a match, and lit it. He took a pull and exhaled.

“We should get some sleep, Byron. Need to head out early. Long day ahead.”

“I ain't much tired.”

Clay sensed he should keep Byron with him. “I need to go back to the house and pack up.” He left it open ended.

Kate took Clay's arm in her hand and squeezed it gently. “What time do you all want to start out in the morning?” She chose her words carefully.

Byron shrugged.

“Early,” Clay repeated.

“I'll bring you back
early,
” Kate said, following his lead.

“Byron, you come with us,” Clay said.

“It'll be a warm, calm summer night,” Byron answered. “Might get that midsummer night breeze. Moonlit.” He drew the cigarette down. “The river'll be shinin'. A good night to see things that're sometimes not so clear in the day. I for sure ain't going with you two.”

Clay got up, went to the register, and paid the bill. He walked outside ahead of Kate and Byron. The full moon was rising over the inlet and over the adjacent fields abutting Davis Creek. The fields were crisscrossed with light and shadow. The water was silver and the boats in the creek rode high on their moorings, their white paint gleaming.

The other two came up behind him, and they all walked back over to Kate's car.

“We'll leave in the morning,” Clay repeated, speaking to Byron. “You stay put. On the boat. No trouble. I'll take the pickup.” He turned to Kate. “I don't want you getting up at four.”

She started to speak and he held up his hand. “Follow me home?” she asked softly.

They said good night to Byron. Clay rode in the pickup behind Kate.

Inside, standing before him in the living room, Kate asked him if he wanted to undress her. They lay on the couch, tracing their futures on each other's skin. The crickets and cicadas thrust their legs to fill the silence with their rasping music.

It was well past midnight when the ringing of the phone once again rattled the peace. Clay answered it and heard Byron's excited voice on the other end.

“Clay, you ain't goin' to believe what I found.” Byron spoke in a rush.

“What's that.” Clay was short.

“I went out. Feelin' itchy, I guess. Thought I'd raise our last pots. Save us time in the morning. So bright out here. Like day.”

“Can't it wait?” Clay interrupted.

“It's drugs, man. Big time. Coke. Bags of the shit.”

Clay shifted the phone.

“That's what those bogus buoys were about. Get it?”

“Whoa, Byron. Get what?”

Byron took a breath. “Okay. I'm out there driftin'. Watchin' the
moon. No lights. But I'm against the bank. Blendin' in, I guess, hard to see. I've loaded up our pots, there on deck, when I spot this ocean trawler coming at the mouth of Mobjack from out of the Bay. And it's where it don't belong. Goin' slow, watchin' the channel like. And it goes up to where those black and reds were clustered—over the channel edge, where you said it was too deep, remember?—and drops several new pots right there and picks up some old ones.”

Clay listened, a knot forming in his throat.

“But you know what, Clay? No lights on the fucker. No lights.”

“Byron, what about the dope?” Clay spoke in a whisper.