Cross Current - Kling Christine - Страница 59
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I let the cast net fall to the deck, and I knelt down next to her. How on earth did she get on the Bimini Express? Her snuffling grew louder, and I tried to comfort her so the men above couldn’t hear us. I could tell from their voices that the two black men were Bahamians, and they shouted to someone as a vehicle approached on the dock. I could see all the way forward along the starboard side of the vessel, and to my surprise I saw motion up on the starboard ladder to the bridge. A deckhand had been sleeping on a pile of lines about twenty feet from us. It was a wonder he hadn’t heard me when I cried out. He passed around the aft end of the deckhouse and headed for the stern. If he was headed aft to throw off the dock lines, then we had better get the hell off this ship.
The approaching vehicle sounded like a truck. It stopped on the dock, and I wanted to see who or what was being delivered. The ship’s engines, which had been turning over at a very gentle idle, now revved up and smoke billowed out of the stacks above the wheelhouse. I heard voices over by the gangway and held my finger to my lips so Solange would know to be quiet. Then I loosened her arms from around me and pushed her back into the shadows of the crane’s machinery. I slipped over to the end of the containers to try to see across to the other side of the boat. What I saw made my stomach threaten to eject the dinner I’d eaten at Tugboat Annie’s. Climbing the stairs to the bridge deck, dressed all in black and wearing wraparound shades, was Joslin Malheur. He began slapping the Bahamians on the back like they were old friends. Gil was nowhere in sight.
It was then that the deck beneath my feet began to shudder as the screws bit into the water.
I’d waited too long. The two deckhands threw off the lines, the gangway clattered aboard, and the Bimini Express slowly eased her way forward. The gap between the ship and the dock was widening, already too far to jump. If I didn’t do something fast, Solange and I would be on our way to the Bahamas.
Now was the time. The ship would soon be reversing her screws to pivot around, and the prop wash would suck in whatever I threw down there.
“Stay here,” I whispered, my lips close to her ear, and I again motioned with my finger to my lips for her to be quiet.
Keeping my body low between the piles of cargo, I huddled down over the net, which I had balled up in front of my body. I hurried toward the transom.
The crewmen were gone, so I quickly divided the net weights and threw half of the bulk over my shoulder. Bright lights shone from the bridge onto the aft deck, and I wondered if anyone was watching me as I stood and ran to the rail. Bending down as I’d seen the surf fishermen do, I made ready to cast the net.
Even over the noise of the roaring engines and the churning water, I heard her scream. I turned back, and though I could make out only his silhouette, I knew that the man standing there, his right elbow askew as if he were holding a weapon against Solange’s body, was Malheur.
I moved my head off to one side and squinted into the brilliant light. “Leave her alone. Please. Don’t hurt her.”
He laughed. It was a big, loud, booming laugh, and I heard Solange take two quick sharp gulps of air. She knew to be terrified of that sound.
Another man materialized out of the darkness and grabbed my upper arm, squeezing so tight that the folds of my sweatshirt cut into my skin. I let out an involuntary cry. Malheur said something to him in Creole, and both men laughed. I shaded my eyes with my free hand, and I was surprised to see that the man gripping my arm was Gilbert Lynch.
The Bimini Express had made her turn and the small ship was starting down the Dania Cut-off Canal. We would be passing Tugboat Annie’s in a few minutes—my last chance to attract Rusty’s attention. If only I could break Gil’s grip, I might be able to run and jump over the side. But then I immediately dismissed that thought. I couldn’t leave Solange behind. I flashed on the image of Margot on the cement floor at the Swap Shop. I could not leave Solange alone with Le Capitaine.
Malheur spoke again in Creole, and Gil pushed me forward, up the starboard side, just as the lights and music from Tugboat Annie’s started to spill over the little ship. Although I could see people sitting at tables, they weren’t looking up or paying any attention to the ship passing on the canal. For a moment, I thought I saw Rusty standing at the hostess station, talking into the phone, and I raised my free hand, tried to shout and wave. But the words strangled in my throat when Gil slapped me open-handed on the side of my head and dragged me forward, then shoved me down between two stacks of plywood. He held me down and mumbled something unintelligible. We were now amidships in the shadow of the upper deck, and I could see Malheur, his skin so dark I could barely make out his features. The white skulls on the sides of his sunglasses reflected the light from the floods on the aft deck. He was wearing a tight-fitting black T-shirt, and around his elbow and upper right arm were white bandages, evidence that Jeannie’s shotgun had inflicted some damage. The weapon he held across Solange’s chest was a machete with a long shiny blade, narrow at the hilt but broadening out to four inches of steel at the tip.
Malheur lowered the machete and pushed Solange over to Gil, who pulled me to my feet. I stood facing Malheur, staring at the black lenses that covered his eyes. He brought the tip of his machete up under my chin and pressed the sharp end against the soft place at the top of my throat. I stopped breathing, though the steel barely touched my skin.
Malheur smiled broadly and began to raise his other arm. I thought he was going to hit me, kill me, but I was determined not to let him see me flinch. He took hold of the zipper on my sweatshirt and began to draw it down, slowly. I could feel the vibration as the slider passed over each metal tooth. His knuckles pressed into the flesh of my breast and then my belly as he dropped his hand lower.
He wouldn’t have to hit me. I was going to kill myself if I didn’t breathe. I swallowed and felt a sharp stab of pain as my muscles pressed against the blade at my throat. I felt sick with shame. I was letting him humiliate me. That tiny touch of cold steel had turned me into a victim.
When I couldn’t take it any longer, I looked away and found Solange’s frightened eyes, her features otherwise calm.
I knew I had to make him stop. So I lied.
“You don’t scare me,” I said. My voice trembled and my chin quivered, but I never again took my eyes off those shades.
Malheur threw back his head and laughed, then spoke for what seemed like forever in Creole—either to me or to Gil, I couldn’t be sure—all the while still holding the machete to my throat. In midsentence, he lowered the machete and turned, grabbing Solange. He headed for the door that led into the crew’s quarters. I dropped my head and inhaled a deep lungful of air, and though it was scented with diesel exhaust, it tasted sweet to me.
Malheur turned and spat some words at Gil, and I thought I understood the words gros kochon—in French class we’d giggled over the phrase that meant “fat pig.”
Gil grabbed my arm even harder, scowled at Malheur’s back, and pushed me to follow them. Malheur held Solange’s arm so high in the air that her feet barely skimmed the ground, and he lifted her into the air to get her over the steel threshold of the watertight bulkhead door. When I came out from behind the stack of plywood, I tried to look for Rusty on shore, but Gil grunted and pushed me through the door. I tripped and almost went down, slamming my head and shoulder into the steel bulkhead inside the dark companionway. My vision blurred while I struggled to remain standing, and tears began to fill my eyes. I was reaching up to feel if there was any blood in my hair when he shoved me again, through another door. This time I did trip—my feet got tangled up and I fell—and while it occurred to me as I was going down that I needed to protect my head this time, something hard and cold came out of the darkness all too soon.
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