The Voice of the Night (13 page)

“They keep a .38 revolver aboard just for killing sharks,” his father said.

Irv returned with the gun. “It’s loaded.”

Frank took it and stood by the railing.

Colin wanted to put his fingers in his ears, but he didn’t dare. The men would laugh at him, and his father would be angry.

“Can’t see either of the critters yet,” Frank said.

The fishermen’s hard bodies glistened with sweat.

Each rod appeared to be bent far beyond its breaking point, as if it were held together by nothing more than the indomitable will of the man who controlled it.

Suddenly Frank said, “You’ve almost got yours, Rex! I can see him.”

“He’s an ugly son-of-a-bitch,” Pete said.

Someone else said, “He looks like Pete.”

“He’s right on the surface,” Frank said. “He doesn’t have enough line to run deep again. He looks beat.”

“So am I,” Rex said. “So will you for God’s sake shoot the bastard?”

“Bring him a bit closer.”

“What the hell do you want? You want me to make him stand up against a wall and wear a blindfold?”

Everyone laughed.

Colin saw the slick, gray, torpedolike creature only twenty or thirty feet from the stem. It was riding just under the waves, dark fin protruding into the air. For a moment it was very still; then it began to pitch and toss and twist wildly, trying to free itself from the hook.

“Jesus!” Rex said. “It’ll tear my arms right out of their sockets.”

As the fish was drawn nearer in spite of its violent struggle, it rolled from side to side, writhing on the hook, willing to tear its own mouth to shreds in hope of getting loose, but succeeding only in setting the barbed hook even deeper. Its flat, malevolent head rose from the sea as it rolled, and for an instant Colin was staring into a bright and very alien eye that shone with a fierce inner light and seemed to radiate pure fury.

Frank Jacobs fired the .38 revolver.

Colin saw the hole open a few inches behind the shark’s head. Blood and flesh sprayed across the water.

Everyone cheered.

Frank fired again. The second shot entered a couple of inches back of the first.

The shark should have been dead, but instead it seemed to take a new life from the bullets.

“Look at the bastard kick!”

“He doesn’t like that lead.”

“Shoot him again, Frank.”

“Get him square in the head.”

“Shoot him in the head.”

“You got to get a shark in the head.”

“Between the eyes, Frank!”

“Kill it, Frank!”

“Kill it!”

The foam that sloshed around the fish had once been white. Now it was pink.

Colin’s father squeezed the trigger twice. The big gun bucked in his hands. One shot missed, but the other took the prey squarely in the head.

The shark leaped convulsively, as if trying to heave itself aboard the boat, and everyone on the
Erica Lynn
cried out in surprise; but then it fell back into the water and was absolutely still.

A second later Mike brought his catch to the surface, within striking distance, and Frank fired at it. This time his aim was perfect, and he finished the shark with the first shot.

The sea foam was crimson.

Irv rushed forward with a tackle knife and severed both lines.

Rex and Mike collapsed in their chairs, relieved and surely aching from head to foot.

Colin watched the dead fish drifting belly-up on the waves.

Without warning the sea began to boil as if a great flame had been applied beneath it. Fins appeared everywhere, converging on a small area immediately aft of the
Erica Lynn:
a dozen... two dozen... fifty sharks or more. They slashed viciously at their dead comrades, ripped and tore at meat like their very own meat, smashed into one another, fought over every morsel, soaring and diving and striking in a mindless, savage feeding frenzy.

Frank emptied the revolver into the turmoil. He must have hit at least one of the monsters, for the commotion grew considerably worse than it had been.

Colin wished he could look away from the slaughter. But he couldn’t. Something held him.

“They’re cannibals,” one of the men said.

“Sharks will eat anything.”

“They’re worse than goats.”

“Fishermen have found some pretty strange things in sharks’ stomachs.”

“Yeah. I know a guy who found a wristwatch.”

“I heard of someone finding a wedding ring.”

“A cigar case full of water-logged stogies.”

“False teeth.”

“A rare coin worth a small fortune.”

“Anything indigestible that the victim was wearing or carrying, it stays right there in the shark’s gut.”

“Why don’t we haul in one of these mothers and see what it’s keeping in its belly?”

“Hey, that might be interesting.”

“Cut it open right here on the deck.”

“Might find a rare coin and get rich.”

“Probably just find a lot of freshly eaten shark meat.”

“Maybe, maybe not.”

“At least it’s something to do.”

“You’re right. It’s been one hell of a day.”

“Irv, better rig one of those rods again.”

They started drinking whiskey and beer again.

Colin watched.

Jack took the chair, and two minutes later he had a bite. By the time he’d brought the shark alongside, the feeding frenzy had ended; the pack had moved away. But the frenzy aboard the
Erica Lynn
had just begun.

Colin’s father reloaded the .38. He leaned over the railing and pumped two bullets into the huge fish.

“Right in the head.”

“Scrambled his fuckin’ brains a little.”

“Shark’s got a brain like a pea.”

“Same as yours?”

“That thing dead?”

“Ain’t movin‘.”

“Bring it up.”

“Let’s have a look inside.”

“Find that rare coin.”

“Or the false teeth.”

Whiskey and beer.

Jack reeled in as much line as he could. The dead shark was bumping against the side of the boat.

“Damn thing’s ten feet long.”

“Nobody’s going to haul that baby up with just a gaff.”

“They have a winch.”

“It’s going to be a messy job.”

“Might be worth it if we find that rare coin.”

“We’re more likely to find a coin in your stomach.”

With five men, two ropes, three gaffs, and a power winch, they managed to hoist the shark out of the sea and over the stem railing, and then lost control of it a second before it was down, so that it crashed onto the deck, whereupon it came back to life unexpectedly, or half life anyway, for the bullets had hurt it and stunned it, but they had not killed it, and the beast thrashed on the deck, and everyone jumped back, and Pete grabbed a gaff and swung and slammed the hook into the shark’s head, spraying blood on several people, and the mighty jaws snapped, trying to get at Pete, and another man rushed forward with another gaff and embedded the long point in one of the shark’s eyes, and a third gaff found its way into one of the bullet wounds, and there was blood everywhere, so that Colin thought of the Kingman killings, and all the men in their swimsuits were spotted and streaked with blood, and Colin’s father yelled for everyone to stand back, and although Irv told him not to fire toward the deck, Colin’s father put one more round in the shark’s brain, and finally it stopped moving, and everyone was
very
excited, talking and shouting at once, and they got down in the blood and rolled the shark over and tore at its belly with the gutting knife, and the white flesh resisted for a moment but then gave, and out of the long rent spilled a putrid, slimy mass of guts and half-digested fish, and those still standing cheered while those on their knees pawed through the disgusting muck, looking for the mythical rare coin, the wedding ring, the cigar case, or the false teeth, laughing and joking, even tossing handfuls of gore at one another.

Suddenly Colin found the strength to move. He bolted toward the front of the boat, slipped in blood, stumbled, almost fell, regained his balance. When he had gone as far from the revelers and as far forward as he could, he leaned through the railing and vomited over the side.

By the time Colin finished, his father was there, towering over him, the very image of savagery, skin painted with blood, hair matted with blood, eyes wild. His voice was soft but intense. “What’s wrong with you?”

“I was sick,” Colin said weakly. “Just sick. It’s over now.”

“What the hell is wrong with you?”

“I’m okay now.”

“Do you try to embarrass me?”

“Huh?”

“In front of my friends like this?”

Colin stared, unable to comprehend.

“They’re making jokes about you.”

“Well...”

“They’re making fun of you.”

Colin was dizzy.

“Sometimes I wonder about you,” his father said.

“I couldn’t help it. I threw up. There wasn’t anything I could do to stop it.”

“Sometimes I wonder if you
are
my son.”

“I am. Of course I am.”

His father leaned close and studied him, as if searching for the telltale features of an old friend or milkman. His breath was foul.

Whiskey and beer.

And blood.

“Sometimes you don’t act like a boy at all. Sometimes you don’t look like you’ll ever make a man,” his father said quietly but urgently.

“I’m trying.”

“Are you?”

“I really am,” Colin said despairingly.

“Sometimes you act like a pansy.”

“I’m sorry.”

“Sometimes you act like a goddamned queer.”

“I didn’t mean to embarrass you.”

“Do you want to pull yourself together?”

“Yeah.”

“Can you pull yourself together?”

“Yeah.”

“Can you?”

“Sure I can.”

“Will you?”

“Sure.”

“Do it.”

“I need a couple of minutes—”

“Now! Do it now!”

“Okay.”

“Pull yourself together”

“Okay. I’m okay.”

“You’re shaking.”

“No I’m not.”

“You going to come back with me?”

“All right.”

“Show those guys whose son you are.”

“I’m your son.”

“You’ve got to prove it, Junior.”

“I will.”

“You’ve got to show me proof.”

“Can I have a beer?”

“What?”

“I think maybe it would help.”

“Help what?”

“It might make me feel better.”

“You want a beer?”

“Yeah.”

“Now, that’s more like it!”

Frank Jacobs grinned and mussed his son’s hair with one bloody hand.

Colin sat on a bench by the cabin wall, sipped his cold beer, and wondered what would happen next.

Having found nothing of interest in the shark’s stomach, they heaved the dead beast over the side. It floated for a moment, then suddenly sank or was dragged under by something with a big appetite.

The blood-drenched men lined up along the starboard rail while Irv hosed them down with sea water. They stripped out of their swimsuits, which had to be thrown away, and they lathered up with bars of grainy, yellow soap, all the while making jokes about one another’s genitalia. Each received one bucket of fresh water with which to rinse. While they went below to dry off and change into their street clothes, Irv sluiced the deck, washing the last traces of blood into the scuppers.

Later, the men did some skeet shooting. Charlie and Irv always carried two shotguns and a target launcher aboard the
Erica Lynn,
to entertain customers when the fish weren’t biting. The men drank whiskey and beer, blasted away at the whirling discs, and forgot all about fishing.

At first Colin winced each time the guns boomed, but after a while the explosions didn’t bother him.

Later still, when the men became bored with shooting clay pigeons, they opened up on the sea gulls that were diving for small fish not far from the
Erica Lynn.
The birds did not react to the roar of the shotguns; they continued to feed and to issue their strange shrill cries, apparently unaware that they were being cut down one by one.

The slaughter did not sicken Colin, as it once would have done, nor did it appeal to him. He felt nothing at all as he watched the birds being blown away, and he wondered about his inability to respond. He felt cool and perfectly still inside.

The guns fired, and the gulls burst apart in the sky. Thousands of tiny droplets of blood sprayed up like beads of molten copper in the golden air.

At seven-thirty they said good-bye to Charlie and Irv, and they went to a harbor restaurant for a steak-and-lobster dinner. Colin was starved. He greedily devoured everything on his plate, without a thought about the disemboweled shark or the gulls.