“There’s somebody living on the key,” Ara said. “I see smoke.”
“Right,” said Willie. “It’s on the leeward side and the wind is carrying it to the west.”
“The smoke is about at the center of where the beach should be,” Gil said.
“Can you see a mast?”
“No mast,” Gil said.
“They could step the goddam mast daytimes,” Willie said.
“Go to your stations,” Thomas Hudson said. “Ara, you stay here with me. Willie, tell Peters to get hooked up to talk whether anybody can hear him or not.”
“What do you think?” Ara asked when the others were gone.
“I think if I were fishing and drying fish that I would have come off here from Guillermo when the calms came and brought the mosquitoes.”
“Me, too.”
“They aren’t burning any charcoal on this key and the smoke is small. So it must be a fresh fire.”
“Unless it is the end of a bigger one.”
“I thought of that.”
“Then we’ll see in five minutes.”
They rounded the wreck, which had another booby bird sitting on it, and Thomas Hudson thought, our allies are checking in fast. Then they were coming up into the lee of the key and Thomas Hudson saw the sand beach, the green behind it, and a shack with smoke coming from it.
“Thank God,” he said.
“Equally,” Ara said. “I was afraid of the other thing, too.”
There was no sign of any boats.
“We’re really close to them, I think. Get in fast with Antonio and tell me what you find. I’ll lay her in right along the bank. Tell them to stay at their stations and act natural.”
The dinghy spun and moved in to the beach. Thomas Hudson watched Antonio and Ara walking toward the thatched shack. They were moving as fast as they could without running. They called to the shack and a woman came out. She was dark as a sea Indian and was barefooted and her long hair hung down almost to her waist. While she talked, another woman came out. She was dark, too, and long-haired and she carried a baby. As soon as she finished speaking, Ara and Antonio shook hands with the two women and came back to the dinghy. They shoved off and started the motor and came out.
Antonio and Ara came up onto the flying bridge while the dinghy was being hoisted aboard.
“There were two women,” Antonio said. “The men are outside fishing. The woman with the baby saw a turtle boat go into the channel that goes inside. It went in when this breeze came up.”
“That would be about an hour and a half ago,” Thomas Hudson said. “With the tide falling now.”
“Very strong,” Antonio said. “It is dropping very fast, Tom.”
“When she is down, there is not enough water to carry us through there.”
“No.”
“What do you think?”
“It’s your ship.”
Thomas Hudson swung the helm hard over and put in both motors up to twenty-seven hundred revolutions and headed for the point of the key.
“They may run aground themselves,” he said. “The hell with it.”
“We can anchor if it gets too bad,” Antonio said. “It’s a marl bottom if we run aground. Marl and mud.”
“And rocky spots,” Thomas Hudson said. “Get Gil up here for me to watch for the stakes. Ara, you and Willie check all the weapons. Stay up here, please, Antonio.”
“The channel is a bastard,” Antonio said. “But it is not impossible.”
“She is impossible in low water. But maybe the other son of a bitch will ground, too, or maybe the wind will fail.”
“The wind won’t fail, Tom,” Antonio said. “It’s firm and solid now for the trade wind.”
Thomas Hudson looked at the sky and saw the long white hackles of clouds of the east wind. Then he looked ahead at the point of the main key, at the spot of key and the flats that were beginning to show. There he knew his trouble would start. Then he looked at the mess of keys ahead that showed like green spots on the water.
“Can you pick up the stake yet, Gil?” he asked.