"I don't know, Amy, it's kind of early in the morning-"
"Ah, here we are! Quick, Captain, champagne for my dear friend."
Out of a hatchway climbed a very big red-faced man in a yachting cap, a tailored white long-sleeved shirt, white duck trousers, and canvas shoes. "Hey, Mr. Paperman!" The man threw his arms wide and brandished two frosty bottles of champagne like Indian clubs. "I got it! Vat you tink? I got my boad!"
His costume was such a change that Norman did not recognize Thor until he spoke.
"My boat, lambie, my boat," cried Mrs. Ball, snuggling up to the bartender, putting an arm around him, and looking dewily into his face.
"I'm de captain, by God!" roared Thor, pulling the cork out of a bottle with a gunshot sound and a spill of foam, "Captain of Moonglow, finest tarn boad in de islands! And today ve sail for Panama! Panama, by God! Dat vas my port before I got wrecked, and dat's my port now! Mr. Paperman, I owe it to you! Here, champagne!"
Stunned, Paperman took the glass, raised it, and managed a smile. "Lycka till, Thor," he said. "Is that right?"
"Hey, Amy, you hear dat! Lycka till, you betcha, dat's right, Mr. Paperman. By God, I drink vit you, you're a man."
The three of them drank. Mrs. Ball then glued a kiss on Thor's lips, cleaving to him like a bride, an impatient amorous bride, unsteady after a long wet wedding breakfast. Thor submitted to the kiss, glancing slantwise at Paperman. "Amy, I tink I see de governor come aboard," he said, as soon as he could disengage his mouth.
"The governor! Come, bring a bottle and a glass, lamb." Mrs. Ball made off through the crowd like a quarterback. Thor followed in her wake, giving Norman a sardonic man-to-man grin.
"Paperman, you look kind of put out." Tom Tilson was at his elbow, scooping up caviar with a cracker. His red freckled face, all cords and bones, was wrinkled at Norman in crafty appraisal.
"I'm surprised."
"You had no warning?"
"Not a word."
Tilson gulped the caviar, and shook his knobby stick at Paperman. "I tried to tip you off, you know, about Thor. At Hogan's Fancy. I couldn't say much more than I did, with Collins sitting right there. I knew about it. Moonglow's my boat. Amy's been blowing hot and cold about buying it for a year. I thought it was just talk to keep Thor happy, but by Jesus yesterday afternoon she did it. Damn fool, if you ask me. As long as she didn't buy it, she had him. Now he's got her."
"I gather they're very good friends-as one might say."
Tilson uttered a lecherous hoarse giggle. "Them? Mister, since the day he piled up on Cockroach Rock a year and a half ago. If you ask me, all he's been doing since then is working up to this moment. Amy doesn't know boat people. I do. She'll find out."
"Well," said Norman with a heavy sigh, "it seems that I don't have a manager."
"You sure do," said Tilson. "Name of Paperman."
The deck rocked and vibrated. "What the devil!" Norman exclaimed. 'We're moving." The boat was, in fact, powering away from the pier. "How crazy is he? Are we all off to Panama?"
Tilson laughed. "Just to the waterfront. That gondola is a hell of a bore. As you'll soon discover." The old man squinted at him. "I'm afraid you're in for a rough time."
He swallowed another immense gob of caviar and stumped away.
Thor came shouldering along the deck, bawling orders at a black boy in the cockpit. Seeing Paperman he stopped, looked abashed, threw his head back in a savage laugh, and wrapped an arm around his shoulders. "I tell you, Mr. Paperman, 1 feel kind of bad, you know?"
"Why? You said you'd stay till you got a boat. You've got a boat."
"De books are hunnert per cent, right up to last night, joost like I showed you. It's a easy system, you catch on fast. Don't hoross yourself, like dey say. Gilbert can run de bar. I been breaking him in. He mixes good drinks. I showed Gilbert de main water valves, and de fuse boxes, and all dose tings. You be okay."
"Who's Gilbert?"
"De boat boy. He honest and he not so tarn stupid, only you better watch him till he get used to de job, you know? All you got to do is keep de books and handle de reservations. Dere be no problem. Sheila run de kitchen fine, she de best tarn cook in Kinja."
"Thor, I don't know much about keeping books."
"Ha! I know less dan you ven I come. You pick it up fast. You call Neville Wills, tell him come in every day for a veek or so, check tings over. He de only good accountant on dis island. -Hey, Artur! Slow down, you vant to run dis tarn boad up on de beach?" Thor held out his hand. "No hard feelings? I like you, Mr. Paperman, honest. De only ting is, I'm a sailing man."
Paperman accepted the powerful handshake. Thor hustled forward. "Stand by! Clear de starboard rail!"
The hill crowd disembarked on the waterfront, Norman among them, and stood in a huddle, shouting farewells, many still holding highballs in paper cups. A strong breeze was blowing across the harbor, and Thor at once hoisted sail, disdaining to clear the channel under power. Moonglow looked brave and lovely, falling away from the bulkhead, slowly gathering way and dipping her scarlet hull as one and then another white sail ran up flapping and caught the wind. The hill crowd began to sing Auld Lang Syne. Amy Ball stood in the stern with her arm around a shroud, swaying and waving, and laughing through streams of tears. Moonglow had to maneuver to avoid an ugly vessel that was bearing down on her, an enormous flat chugging thing, solid rust from its square bow to the small iron deckhouse at the stern. Thor cleared this ungainly scow by a foot or two, and the onlookers cheered.
Paperman observed that the big rustpot was flying a French tricolor. It occurred to him that this could only be the water barge from Guadeloupe. It was already passing the Gull Reef pier, and nobody was there to wave! He started running up and down the waterfront, sawing both arms in the air and screaming at the oncoming barge, "No, no. Non, non. Stop! Stop! Arretez-vousl" He made a megaphone of his hands and howled, capering here and there, "Arretez-vousll A-RRRRETEZ-VOUS!" The barge moved steadily on. There was nobody on deck. The enormous old contraption was coming in with snorts and clanks; the Frenchman in the wheelhouse, directly over the engines, could not possibly hear him.
Paperman suddenly ceased his dancing and screeching, aware that the entire hill crowd was staring at him in silent amazement. The waterfront strolling and bargaining had also stopped dead, and perhaps forty Kinjans were goggling at the berserk white man, not very surprised, but willing to be entertained.
Paperman put his hands in his pockets and sauntered along the Waterfront, whistling, trying to look sane. The barge came alongside, and stopped. A fat mustached old man in white trousers, a peaked cap, and an incredibly shabby brass-buttoned blue jacket limped out of the deckhouse, threw two thick manila lines on the waterfront pavement, and went back inside. Two burly Negroes, stripped to the waist, tied the lines to bollards and climbed aboard the barge, dragging a thick black hose.
Norman jumped up on the low deck, the iron plating of which felt fiery through his rubber soles. At the open door of the deckhouse, he knocked. The barge captain sat inside at a little table, pouring himself pink wine from a half-gallon jug. He had a drooping big belly, and his thick mustache was streaked pink from the wine, and yellow from an old pipe lying on the table in a spill of ash. Ignoring the knock, he drank half the glass of wine and stared straight ahead out of far-off, filmy eyes.
Paperman thought that the man might be deafened by his own engines. "Monsieur le capitainel" he bellowed.
The Frenchman pulled open a drawer, took out a greasy green record book, laid it open before Paperman, and lapsed back into his melancholy trance. The open pages showed columns and columns of numbers entered in brown ink. Paperman explained at the top of his voice, in a tumble of agitated French, that he did not want to see the book, that he was not an official, that he was le nouveau proprietaire of the Gull Reef Club, and that he needed water. The captain only stared straight ahead, once or twice groaning in a heartbroken way, as though seeing phantom German columns marching down the Champs-Elysees. When Paperman paused he looked up and spoke several hoarse hostile sentences in strange French, waving his arms stiffly with palms upward. Then he poured more wine and sighed, and stared, and drank. Nothing Paperman said after that had the slightest effect on him.
Norman went forward to the two Negroes, who squatted beside the thumping, pulsing hose. "Can you tell me where Senator Pullman's bar is?" he said.
The men shifted their eyes at each other.
"You know who Senator Pullman is, don't you?"
There was a full minute of silence. "Senatuh Pull-mon?" said one, with an air of repeating a phrase in Chinese.
Beside himself, Paperman jumped off the barge. In all his life he had never been confronted with a shortage of water. To his New York mind, water was something that flowed from taps. The supply was instant, limitless, and as certain as air to breathe. There were thirty-eight people registered at the hotel and in the cottages, only six under capacity. All those taps running dry at once; all those toilets ceasing to flush-!
In the arcade of shops opposite the fort, leading off Queen's Row, he saw a small hanging sign in red, white, and blue, Peace and Prosperity Bar. Surely on this little island, he thought, the barkeepers knew each other. He ran across the cobbled square. There were several Negro and white drinkers in the Peace and Prosperity Bar, but he saw no bartender. Leaning in the doorway was a moon-faced, short young Negro in a light blue drip-dry suit and a black knitted tie, smoking a cigar with a sensuous rounding of his mouth. Paperman said to him, "I beg your pardon. Do you happen to know where I can find Senator Pullman's bar?"
"I'm Senator Pullman. This is my establishment. Can I be of any assistance to you?" said the Negro, in clear mainland accents.
Paperman threw his arms around him. "Senator Pullman! Thank God!"
The senator, surprised and amused, endured the hug and asked what the trouble was. Paperman poured out his tale.
"Well, well, so you're Mr. Paperman. Lorna was telling me about you. You're just as handsome as she said, too. Welcome to Kinja."
"Thank you. Do you know French? Can you talk to the barge man?"
"About what?"
"About the water! Tell him to save some for the Club."
Senator Pullman wrinkled his nose and his brows, and looked much older and shrewder. "Well, you see, he's commenced pumping into the municipal system now, and he's got to discharge his entire capacity." When the senator used long words, a slight beat on the last syllables disclosed his island origins.
"But we're down to one day's supply. One day! All those people, Senator."
"Yes, it would be a definite health hazard." Pullman looked up at the cloudless sky, screwing one eye shut. "I do think we're going to get some rain. The Club has a very expansive roof, and you can catch a week's supply from one generous precipitation."
"Supposing it doesn't rain?"
"That's a prudent question, but you needn't worry. In that case talk to Lorna. She'll tell you how to get emergency water. Incidentally, if you encounter any electrical problems, I have a degree in electrical engineering. In our community a liquor license is more remunerative, so-" He winked at Paperman and went behind the bar.
Paperman hurried off down the square to the landing. The gondola was tied to a cleat, the boat boy was gone, and a knot of white people stood there muttering and arguing. Several of them were tourists in heavy dark clothes, with luggage heaped around them. A guest who recognized Norman told him that there had been no boat service for an hour. The gondola had been tied empty at the pier across the water until a few minutes ago, when some guests had rowed over and left it.
Paperman had no choice. "New arrivals first, please, get in and I'll take you across," he said. This occasioned a jostling rush into the craft, very nearly overturning it. Then he had to swing a number of heavy suitcases onto a rack at the bow. This exertion in the vertical noon sun, followed by the effort of rowing the laden, unsteady boat three hundred yards, plus the job of tying up the boat and helping out the passengers, put Paperman in a drenching sweat. He ran up the lawn to the main house, and through the lobby to the bar.
There, sure enough, was the boat boy, in ragged blue shorts and shirt, new and obviously slashed up by a knife. Still wearing his gondolier's hat, he was rattling a shaker with a look of exalted pride all different from his usual veiled sullen glare. Paperman paused. There were about thirty people drinking in the bar, and on the beach. This was revenue.
"Gilbert, please give me that hat."
"Dis my hat, suh," said Gilbert, looking hurt. "Mistress Ball she did give me dis hat."
"A bartender doesn't wear a hat. Only a boat boy wears a hat."
"Oh! Dat right?" Gilbert at once removed the hat, grimaced at it, and passed it to Norman.
