Chapter Twenty-five
Dan wiped his forehead and squinted at the sand. He could see that Ned had stopped, not far ahead, with a swarm of sand flies playing around his head.
‘Little c—ts,’ he growled, scratching his head with a cigarette tight between his lips. ‘They feel like lice.’
Dan removed his straw hat and Ned slapped his neck. He began walking on ahead, his bare feet slapping across the sand.
It was low tide and the sea floor was exposed, flat and featureless as a saltpan. The Pacific Ocean, barely discernible a kilometre away, seemed higher than the sand. Dan glanced back at their footprints zigzagging towards the timber.
‘Come on, Revvy,’ Ned said, adjusting his sunglasses. ‘The f—king thing’s gettin’ away.’ Ned sighed and bent over, scooped something out of a puddle and tossed it into Dan’s bucket. The yabbie, the length and width of a middle finger, swam at once to the bucket wall and tried to burrow into the plastic. Dan could feel the vibrations of its futile digging through the handle.
Ned pressed ahead, wielding the yabbie pump like a nightstick. The chromed tube flashed in the sun as he halted at a pin-sized hole in the sand and positioned the nozzle. Beads of sweat twinkled like diamonds in his beard and he dispensed the sand onto the beach. A yabbie wriggled free from the slush and scurried towards a puddle. It slid in, leaving left a thin trail of marl in the water.
‘Come on, Danny, you old coot,’ Ned said. ‘Hurry up.’
Dan wedged his fingers in under the yabbie and dropped it into the bucket.
‘Try not to pick up half the beach,’ Ned said. ‘You need the water clean to catch them again.’
Dan removed his hat and fanned his face. Ned’s invitation to go fishing had evoked concerns, but over the past hour, as they talked, he had slowly lost his suspicion. In fact, Ned had been somewhat accommodating and Dan slowly but surely suspected a connection – whether it be one of guilt or something else – with Jay. Ultimately, Dan knew he was moving in a direction he wanted. He was closer to Ned, his only source of information.
‘Come on, pop,’ Ned said. ‘We’ve got enough. Let’s get to the boat.’
Dan looked up and could see the dinghy in the distance, out of the water. The incoming tide was sparkling over the sand and the aluminium hull suddenly flashed as the water started passing under it. It began gently tugging at the anchor chain. The men went ahead, their toes soon meeting the incoming water, passing over their feet clear and clean as a mountain stream. Dan shuffled alongside the dinghy and, through the clear Pacific water, saw the steep bank of plummeting into the channel. He got into the hull, held onto the sides, smelling the old bait and fuel. Ned retrieved the finned sand anchor from the bar and dropped it noisily into the nose. He reached under the bow and lifted, and Dan felt the sudden silkiness of the boat glided out at first. It was instantly deep and clear like a swimming pool. Heavy Ned jumped in, lowered the outboard, and pulled the starter. He throttled on, the bow rose and they headed out to sea.
They rode far out into open water then minutes later Ned eased off. Dan looked over the side and saw small fish darting away across the sandy floor. The boat taxied towards a sandbar then Ned killed the engine and it fell absolutely quiet.
Ned’s voice was loud. ‘Listen, Revvy,’ he said, ‘just follow what I do.’ He removed a fibreglass rod from under his seat and unhooked the line from the runner. ‘There’s yours,’ he said, pointing to another rod. He put his hand into the bucket and removed a large yabbie, flapping its fanned tail and with its giant claw trying to reach back and nip his finger. ‘I’ll show ya how,’ he said and threaded the yabbie onto the long-shank hook. He released the bail arm and the bait dropped into the aquarium.
Dan leaned over and watched the sinker plummet. It hit the bottom and kicked up a plume of sand.
Ned locked the bail arm and the line went taut. ‘We’re drifting,’ he said. ‘So the bait will drag.’ The tip of his rod began dipping in regular rhythmic beats. ‘They’re not bites,’ he said, ‘that’s the bottom.’
The incoming tide gently acted on the hull and they began slowly drifting back towards the estuary, a kilometre away. A submerged bar passed beneath and Dan questioned if Ned knew how to fish – the sand was dry only an hour ago. Dan took a dead yabbie from the bucket and, after piercing its soft shell, dropped his rig into the water and watched it slowly sink. He locked the bail arm and, moments later, felt the pull, pull, pull of the seafloor’s corrugations.
‘So, Ned, what are we chasing?’ he asked.
‘Whiting or flounder,’ Ned mumbled. ‘Anything that comes our way.’ His rod trembled and he flicked it back then slowly shook his head. ‘Missed ’im,’ he said. ‘Just a tiddler.’
Ned leaned forward between the seats and opened a small icebox. He reached in and fumbled around with his paunch hanging out from his shirt. He removed a bottle of beer and closed the esky. ‘You don’t drink, do ya, Amos?’ he said.
‘I don’t have it in the house,’ Dan said, ‘but I’ll drink sherry or port.’
‘He-he!’ Ned laughed. ‘How could you not drink beer in the tropics?’
Suddenly, Ned’s rod tip shuddered and he grabbed the butt and flicked back. ‘Got ’im,’ he said. He had a fish alright and put his beer down between his legs. Soon the sinker was slapping against the outside of the hull. He pulled the fish high out of the water and it started wriggling frantically like an angry snake. ‘A good-sized whiting,’ he said. It flashed the sun across Ned’s face and flicked water across the boat. He gripped its narrow body, carefully removed the hook and placed the fish into a netted bag. He dropped the bag over the side and tied it to the outboard.
Half an hour passed before Dan looked up at Ned again. There wasn’t much to think or talk about and he stared at him a long time. Ned had taken an occasional nip of beer but, for the most part, had barely moved and seemed a little bored. Then, as Dan watched, he now slowly reached into his rucksack and removed something. It was a paperback novel and must have been Lermontov – the one he had talked about. The pages were bent and worn and he began slowly thumbing them back. An air of calmness seemed to be overcoming him. He rested the rod in the crook of his arm, laid the book down in his lap and began to read. It was interesting to watch. Moments later, he removed a pen from the rucksack and slowly underlined something. Then, he looked up and gazed at the water. Dan reckoned he wouldn’t question him yet about his use of the pen.
‘What are you thinking about?’ Dan asked quietly.
Ned looked at him. He waited then slowly looked back at the water. He turned the handle of his reel and it clicked quietly. ‘Sometimes,’ he said, almost inaudibly, ‘I wish I could just take this boat and keep on going, you know?’ He paused and looked at Dan. ‘You know what I mean?’ A light breeze picked up and started fanning his beard and there was silence for a long time. He had a real softness about him all of a sudden and it was weird to see. ‘Tell ya what,’ he said, his voice loud in the silence, ‘I’ll mix you a shandy. You’ll drink that, wont you?’ He produced a plastic cup from the bag and filled it half with beer from his bottle. He then opened the ice box and added lemonade from a can. ‘There ya go, preacher,’ he said, reaching across the boat. ‘I can’t drink on me own.’
Dan reached out and took it – he hated the drink but it was a nice thought. He looked into the cup then raised it to his lips and carefully sipped. He winced like a child tasting medicine and placed the drink down on the seat.
More time passed and Dan rubbed his eyes. What was he doing here? Just passing time, really – it seemed nothing would be gained. He could see Fraser Island half a kilometre away and a freshwater creek breaking from the jungle, running down the beach. He blinked and began to reel in. The boat’s shadow was passing over the sand and he took the opportunity to look over the side, feeling the gentle slap of the water against the hull. There was a lot of glare in the boat and his face was sunburnt under his hat. He slowly looked at Ned, who had stopped reading. He lifted his ro
d and started to wind in very slowly. Eventually, the sinker broke the surface and rings began running outwards from the line. He gazed at his rig and began bobbing the sinker in and out of the water. He quietly exhaled and raised the rod and Dan could hear him breathing. No one had spoken for half an hour and the silence seemed to have gummed up their jaws.
Ned picked up his book and began reading again. He read a page for almost ten minutes, seemingly lingering on each sentence. Dan had never seen a book read that slowly. At one point he picked up a pen and carefully wrote something in a margin. He did it very carefully like a child learning to write. Dan could see many circled words and underlined sentences. Ned raised his face and looked up at the horizon.
‘You OK?’ Dan asked.
Ned looked at him. ‘Sure,’ he said quietly.
‘Thinking?’
Ned seemed to ponder for a while. ‘At the moment, you know, it’s like I don’t have a problem in the world.’
Dan hesitated. ‘Ned?’ he said, ‘Can I ask you why you write on your pages?’
Perhaps due to their shared sense of hypnosis, Ned gave in easily. ‘If I think a sentence is clever I mark it so I can go back later and analyse it. I wanna understand how it works.’
Dan had sensed his determination under the house. ‘That’s very interesting,’ he said.
‘Yeah,’ Ned said. ‘Sometimes, a sentence just jumps out at me.’
‘I see.’
There you go, Dan thought.
The breeze began rippling the surface of the water.
‘I never paid attention at school,’ Ned said quietly. He looked down and began playing with the pages. ‘But now I have a plan. It might sound stupid, but I think I’m really gonna achieve something.’
Dan didn’t quite know what he meant but the sentiment was growing familiar to him and he nodded. He was slowly getting closer to Ned and perhaps to something he deeply needed to understand.
Ned rested his rod on his legs and looked out at the water. The bay, drained hours ago, was full to the brim with water. ‘Writing is like my boat out of here,’ Ned said. ‘Gee, me mates are gonna be surprised when I get published.’
Dan stared at him – Ned was starting to lose his grip.
‘You said you’d never fished before?’ Ned said.
Dan shrugged. ‘Not really.’
‘What do ya do in your spare time?’
Dan glanced up at the sky and pondered. ‘I love to cook. And I work in the garden.’
Ned pouted. ‘The garden’s all right, I guess. Every person needs a little hobby like that.’
‘Yes,’ Dan said. ‘I guess they do.’
Over a fifteen minute period the boat seemed to slow and Dan soon realised they were motionless. The tide was on the turn and the bay was still like a pond. He saw Ned’s bait slowly stop dragging along the sea floor, far away from the boat. The wind blew and he gazed at the water rippling in the breeze. Suddenly, under the water, something the size of a fence paling burst from the sea floor. In a predator’s leap, it fell upon Ned’s bait and pulled at the line in a violent, tail-wriggling fish strike.
‘Wow!’ Dan said.
Ned’s rod sprung from his lap and his book fell into the hull.
He pulled back and the line went tight like a guitar string. ‘Holy sh—t!’
‘I can see it!’ Dan said. The fish u-turned, its black tail spreading wide like a hand fan. It started pulling away from the boat and Dan felt its quick thudding tail beating through the hull. Ned reduced the drag, the ratchet buzzed and the line began feeding freely from the spool. The fish disappeared in the deep emerald water at full speed, at least fifty metres from the boat, trying to make it out to sea.
Ned’s lips tightened and Dan could see the line on the spool was almost gone. The heavy fish was thinking – pulling and sounding. The line was at risk of snapping then, suddenly, Dan saw it coming towards the boat, down deep, black and long like a small torpedo.
‘Here he comes,’ Ned said. ‘A flathead!’ The fish swept in under the hull the size of a small shark and its shovel-shaped head appeared on the other side. Dan saw the bone-coloured flecks along its flanks. To his surprise the old fish seemed to tire easily and conceded. Ned wound in and within a few short minutes it was within touching distance from the hull. Its mouth fell open and Dan saw the tiny red flowers of its gills.
‘The landing net, mate!’ Ned said.
Dan fumbled around under the seat and found the hoop with the green netting. Ned slowly arched back, brought the dead weight to the hull, and Dan dug the net deep into the water.
‘Danny, don’t touch the line with that net – at this strain it’ll snap.’
But, unexpectedly, the fish turned and dived down towards the bar. Suddenly, the line sang a high-pitched note like a plucked guitar string. But it was its final run. The fish slowly ascended in a long spiral and moments later was just under the surface – proud but still defiant.
‘Quick,’ Ned said, ‘on my count, slip the net under. One, two, three...’
Dan reached down deep and lifted, and the large fish fell between the hoop.
‘Got him!’ Dan said, pulling the catch in over the side. The fish fell heavily into the hull, its tail whipping powerfully. There was an almighty commotion in the boat, its gyrating head flinging the sinker against the hull like a shot musket ball, again and again. Ned threw a rag over its head and the boat fell silent.
‘Good job, Danny!’ Ned said, ‘Good job!’ Ned was like a big kid. He placed his foot on the rag and began removing the hook, laughing without restraint. He glanced up at the preacher and showed his crooked teeth. ‘We’ll cook this with coriander and butter,’ he said. ‘We’ll eat tonight out on my balcony!’
‘Sure,’ Dan said. Things were getting close and very quickly and Dan couldn’t help smiling. He reached down, retrieved a bottle of water from the esky and took a swig.
‘Good job, old fella,’ Ned said, watching Dan drink.
Dan regarded Ned through the upturned bottle and saw that his sunglass-clad, bearded face was warped and even uglier then ever. But it seemed he had had developed a sudden and powerful bond with Ned.
Lord, Dan thought, Ned Col was almost human.
He was confident that it was only a matter of time before he got the answers that he so desperately yearned.