“They’re coming in with the dinghy,” Antonio said.
“I’ll get Ara and the necessary and get over there,” Willie said.
“Don’t blow yourself up.”
“Don’t think too much,” Willie said. “Get some rest, Tom. You’re going to be up all night.”
“So are you.”
“The hell I am. When you want me they can wake me.”
“I’ll take the watch,” Thomas Hudson said to Antonio. “When does our tide turn?”
“It’s turned already but it is fighting with the current that the strong east wind blows out from the bay.”
“Put Gil on the .50’s and give George a break. Tell everybody to get a rest for the night.”
“Why don’t you take a drink, Tom?”
“I don’t want one. What are you giving them to eat tonight?”
“A big piece of that wahoo boiled with Spanish sauce and black beans and rice. There aren’t any more canned fruits.”
“There were some on the list at Confites.”
“Yes. But they were crossed off.”
“Do you have any dried fruits?”
“Apricots.”
“Soak some tonight and give them to them for breakfast.”
“Henry won’t eat them for breakfast.”
“Well, give them to him the first meal he eats well. Have you plenty of soup?”
“Plenty.”
“How is ice?”
“We have plenty for a week if we don’t use too much on Peters. Why don’t you bury him at sea, Tom?”
“Maybe I will,” Thomas Hudson said. “He always said he’d like it.”
“He said so many things.”
“Yeah.”
“Tom, why don’t you take a drink?”
“All right,” said Thomas Hudson. “Do you have any gin left?”
“Your bottle is in the locker.”
“Do you have any water coconuts?”
“Yes.”
“Make me a gin and coconut water with some lime in it. If we have limes.”
“We have plenty of limes. Peters has some Scotch of his hidden if I can find it. Would you rather have that?”
“No. Find it and lock it up. We might need it.”
“I’ll make yours and hand it up.”
“Thank you. Maybe we’ll have good luck and they will come out tonight.”
“I can’t believe they will. I am of the school of Willie. But they might.”
“We look awfully tempting. And they need some sort of craft.”
“Yes, Tom. But they are not fools. You would not have been able to think in their heads if they were fools.”
“OK. Get the drink.” Thomas Hudson was glassing the keys with the big binoculars. “I’ll try to think in their heads some more.”
But he did not have any luck thinking in their heads. He was not thinking very well at all. He watched the dinghy, Ara in the stern and Willie out of sight, round the point of the key. He watched the flock of willet fly up finally and turn and head for one of the outer keys. Then he was alone and he sipped the drink that Antonio had made.
He thought how he had promised himself that he would not drink this trip, not even the cool one in the evening, so that he would not think of anything but work. He thought how he had planned to drive himself so he would sleep completely exhausted. But he made no excuses for this drink nor for the broken promise.
I drove myself, he thought. I did that all right. Now I might as well have this drink and think about something besides those other people. If they come out tonight we’ll have everything set for them. If they do not come out, I will go in after them tomorrow morning on the high tide.
So he sipped the drink, which was cold and clean-tasting, and he watched the broken line of the keys straight ahead and to the westward. A drink always unlocked his memory that he kept locked so carefully now and the keys reminded him of the days when they used to troll for tarpon when young Tom was a small boy. Those were different keys and the channels were wider.
There were no flamingoes but the other birds had been nearly all the same except for the flocks of big golden plover. He remembered the seasons when the plover were gray and the others when the black feathers had the golden tinge and he remembered young Tom’s pride at the first one he had ever brought home when he had his first single barrel twenty-gauge. He remembered how Tom had stroked the plump white breast and touched the lovely black under-markings and how he had found the boy asleep that night in his bed with his arms around the bird. He had taken the bird away very softly hoping he would not wake the boy. The boy did not wake. His arms just closed up tightly and he rolled onto his back.