There was Albert on the dock.
“Listen, Harry,” he said. “I wish you’d carry me.”
“What’s the matter with you now?”
“They’re only going to give us three days a week on the relief now. I just heard about it this morning. I got to do something.”
“All right,” said Harry. He had been thinking again. “All right.”
“That’s good,” said Albert. “I was afraid to go home to see my old woman. She gave me hell this noon like it was me had laid off the relief.”
“What’s the matter with your old woman?” asked Harry cheerfully. “Why don’t you smack her?”
“You smack her,” Albert said. “I’d like to hear what she’d say. She’s some old woman to talk.”
“Listen, Al,” Harry told him. “Take my car and this and go around to the Marine Hardware and get six metric plugs like this one. Then go get a 20-cent piece of ice and a half a dozen mullets. Get two cans of coffee, four cans of cornbeef, two loaves of bread, some sugar and two cans of condensed milk. Stop at the Sinclair and tell them to come down here and put in a hundred and fifty gallons.
Get back as soon as you can and change the number two and the number four plugs in the port engine counting back from the flywheel. Tell them I’ll be back to pay for the gas. They can wait or find me at Freddy’s. Can you remember all that? We’re taking a party out tarponing and fishing them tomorrow.”
“It’s too cold for tarpon,” Albert said.
“The party says no,” Harry told him.
“Hadn’t I better get a dozen mullets?” Albert asked. “In case the jacks tear ’em up? There’s plenty jacks now in those channels.”
“Well, make it a dozen. But get back inside an hour and have the gas filled.”
“Why you want to put in so much gas?”
“We may be running early and late and not have time to fill.”
“What’s become of those Cubans that wanted to be carried?”
“Haven’t heard anything more from them.”
“That was a good job.”
“This is a good job too. Come on, get going.”
“What am I going to be working for?”
“Five bucks a day,” said Harry. “If you don’t want it don’t take it.”
“All right,” said Albert. “Which plugs was it?”
“The number two and the number four counting back from the flywheel,” Harry told him. Albert nodded his head. “I guess I can remember,” he said. He got into the car and made a turn in it and went off up the street.
From where Harry stood in the boat he could see the brick and stone building and the front entrance of the First State Trust and Savings Bank. It was just a block down at the foot of the street. He couldn’t see the side entrance. He looked at his watch. It was a little after two o’clock. He shut the engine hatch and climbed up on the dock. Well, now it comes off or it doesn’t, he thought. I’ve done what I can now. I’ll go up and see Freddy and then I’ll come back and wait. He turned to the right as he left the dock and walked down a back street so that he would not pass the bank.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
In at Freddy’s he wanted to tell him about it but he couldn’t. There wasn’t anybody in the bar and he sat on a stool and wanted to tell him, but it was impossible. As he was ready to tell him he knew Freddy would not stand for it. In the old days, maybe, yes, but not now. Maybe not in the old days either. It wasn’t until he thought of telling it to Freddy that he realized how bad it was. I could stay right here, he thought, and there wouldn’t be anything.
I could stay right here and have a few drinks and get hot and I wouldn’t be in it. Except there’s my gun on the boat. But nobody knows it’s mine except the old woman. I got it in Cuba on a trip the time when I peddled those others. Nobody knows I’ve got it. I could stay here now and I’d be out of it. But what the hell would they eat on? Where’s the money coming from to keep Marie and the girls? I’ve got no boat, no cash, I got no education. What can a one-armed man work at? All I’ve got is my cojones to peddle. I could stay right here and have say five more drinks and it would all be over. It would be too late then. I could just let it all slide and do nothing.
“Give me a drink,” he said to Freddy.
“Sure.”
I could sell the house and we could rent until I got some kind of work. What kind of work? No kind of work. I could go down to the bank and squeal now and what would I get? Thanks. Sure. Thanks. One bunch of Cuban government bastards cost me my arm shooting at me with a load when they had no need to and another bunch of U. S. ones took my boat. Now I can give up my home and get thanks. No thanks. The hell with it, he thought. I got no choice in it.
He wanted to tell Freddy so there would be some one knew what he was doing. But he couldn’t tell him because Freddy wouldn’t stand for it. He was making good money now. There was nobody much in the daytime, but every night the place was full until two o’clock. Freddy wasn’t in a jam. He knew he wouldn’t stand for it. I have to do it alone, he thought, with that poor bloody Albert. Christ, he looked hungrier than ever down at the dock. There were Conchs that would starve to death before they’d steal all right. Plenty in this town with their bellies hollering right now. But they’d never make a move. They’d just starve a little every day. They started starving when they were born; some of them.
“Listen, Freddy,” he said. “I want a couple of quarts.”
“Of what?”
“Bacardi.”
“O.K.”
“Pull the corks, will you? You know I wanted to charter her to take some Cubans over.”
“That’s what you said.”
“I don’t know when they’ll be going. Maybe tonight. I haven’t heard.”
“She’s ready to go anytime. You’ve got a nice night if you cross tonight.”
“They said something about going fishing this afternoon.”
“She’s got tackle on board if the pelicans haven’t stole it off her.”
“It’s still there.”
“Well, make a good trip,” Freddy said.
“Thanks. Give me another one, will you?”
“Of what?”
“Whiskey.”
“I thought you were drinking Bacardi.”
“I’ll drink that if I get cold going across.”
“You’ll cross with this breeze astern all the way,” said Freddy. “I’d like to cross tonight.”
“It’ll be a pretty night all right. Let me have another, will you?”
Just then in came the tall tourist and his wife.
“If it isn’t my dream man,” she said, and sat down on the stool beside Harry.
He took one look at her and stood up.
“I’ll be back, Freddy,” he said. “I’m going down to the boat in case that party wants to go fishing.”
“Don’t go,” the wife said. “Please don’t go.”
“You’re comical,” Harry said to her and he went out.
Down the street Richard Gordon was on his way to the Bradleys’ big winter home. He was hoping Mrs. Bradley would be alone. She would be. Mrs. Bradley collected writers as well as their books but Richard Gordon did not know this yet. His own wife was on her way home walking along the beach. She had not run into John MacWalsey. Perhaps he would come by the house.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
Albert was on board the boat and the gas was loaded.
“I’ll start her up and try how those two cylinders hit,” Harry said. “You got the things stowed?”
“Yes.”
“Cut some baits then.”
“You want a wide bait?”
“That’s right. For tarpon.”
Albert was on the stern cutting baits and Harry was at the wheel warming up the motors when he heard a noise like a motor backfiring. He looked down the street and saw a man come out of the bank. He had a gun in his hand and he came running. Then he was out of sight. Two more men came out carrying leather briefcases and guns in their hands and ran in the same direction.
Harry looked at Albert busy cutting baits. The fourth man, the big one, came out of the bank door as he watched, holding a Thompson gun in front of him, and as he backed out of the door the siren in the bank rose in a long breath-holding shriek and Harry saw the gun muzzle jump-jump-jump-jump and heard the bop-bop-bop-bop, small and hollow sounding in the wail of the siren. The man turned and ran, stopping to fire once more at the bank door, and as Albert stood up in the stern saying, “Christ, they’re robbing the bank. Christ, what can we do?” Harry heard the Ford taxi coming out of the side street and saw it careening up onto the dock.
There were three Cubans in the back and one beside the driver.
“Where’s the boat?” yelled one in Spanish.
“There, you fool,” said another.
“That’s not the boat.”
“That’s the captain.”
“Come on. Come on for Christ sake.”
“Get out,” said the Cuban to the driver. “Get your hands up.”
As the driver stood beside the car he put a knife inside his belt and ripping it toward him cut the belt and slit his pants almost to the knee. He yanked the trousers down. “Stand still,” he said. The two Cubans with the valises
