by Lou Cameron
Captain Gringo said, “Good thinking. It shouldn’t take me more than half an hour.”
As he crossed the deck to the gangway, little Atanua intercepted him to ask. if he wanted to make more nukinuki with her now that things were calming down aboard the schooner. He laughed and said, “Another time. But you could do me another favor, Honey. I need someone from your crew who speaks both English and your own lingo, in case I need a translator.”
Atanua said, “You gottem, Sweet Haole. Me talkee good as me fuckem.”
“I doubt that very much. I had a Kanaka boy in mind, Atanua.”
She giggled and asked, “You likee boy better than vahine, you naughty-naughty? Me talkee Haole more better than any boy aboard except skipper, and I no think Kuruhai takem in he ass!”
Captain Gringo couldn’t tell if she was fibbing. There wasn’t time to argue about it. He nodded and said, “Okay, stick around. I have to get a couple of other vahines we’ll be bringing along. This sure is shaping up to be a silly combat patrol.”
“You wanna makem nukinuki along three vahines at once, big crazy cock?”
He laughed again, patted her bare brown hide fondly, and said, “Sure. A crowded stinky fishing boat is just the place to stage an orgy.” Then he was on his way before she could ask how come. Atanua might or might not come in handy if they got a chance to talk to any of the captives. But a sense of humor didn’t seem to be her strong point.
He made it to Mamma Rosa’s through the dark side streets of Puntarenas without getting in any trouble. Because he wanted to keep it that way, he circled to enter via the back door of the posada. The door was locked but not barred, so he picked the lock with the leather punchblade of his all-purpose pocketknife. As he moved quietly toward the front along the dark corridor, he was glad he hadn’t knocked. He heard guttural voices muttering from somewhere up front. He didn’t understand enough German to matter, but he knew few of the working-class guests of Mamma Rosa spoke it conversationally!
Drawing his .38, the big Yank eased his way to the front vestibule. It was blacked out. But a sliver of lamplight striped the tile floor, coming from the front door to Mamma Rosa’s quarters. The landlady’s door was barely ajar. The object peeking out of the slit to cover the front entrance didn’t look like a cuckoo. It looked more like the muzzle of a twelve-gauge.
The shotgun was covering the front door with Captain Gringo’s unexpected angle of approach blind to the idiot holding it. So Captain Gringo eased silently over to the same wall and then oozed like lava toward the ambush on the balls of his softly booted feet. Inside, someone was muttering in German again; and the guy nearer the door, with the scatter-gun, apparently was telling him to calm down and shut up. That made sense. Should anyone they didn’t want to murder open the front door, they just had to lie doggo in Mamma Rosa’s room until the guest went on upstairs. They were old pros, even if one of them seemed a little nervous this evening.
Captain Gringo eased to the angle the crude wrought iron hinges made with the rough stucco he was sliding along. The larger slit that the guy with the gun was peering out wasn’t the only one, thanks to the way the door was hung. Captain Gringo’s wary eye was invisible to those inside as he peeked over the top of a hinge strap.
He liked what he saw. Mamma Rosa lay on the floor in a far corner, bound and gagged. A white-clad thug across the room had his back to everyone as he peered out at the street approach through a slit in the wooden shutters. The one training the twelve-gauge on the inside of the front entrance was, of course, almost smack against the door. So Captain Gringo couldn’t see much of him. But he didn’t have to. He knew he’d just have to move fast as hell.
He did. He grabbed the latch with his left hand, planted the toe of his right boot against the bottom of the door so it could neither open nor shut without his permission, and simply fired three rounds through the planking for openers!
The gunman inside howled in anguish as hot lead and oak splinters tore through his startled flesh. By then Captain Gringo had hauled the door open and grabbed the barrel of the twelve-gauge out of thin air as the first victim fell.
It turned out to be a wise move. Like most men who carried six-shooters through a life filled with surprises, Captain Gringo always packed his with one empty chamber under the hammer. So he only had two rounds left for the bozo by the window, and while he nailed him nicely twice as he whirled from the shutters, gun in hand, neither round hit anything vital and the guy was tough enough to raise his own weapon—albeit too confused, or hurt, to hit Captain Gringo with his first wild shot.
He didn’t get to fire again. Twirling the captured shotgun like a drum major, Captain Gringo fired it like a pistol, left-handed, to blow the already shot-up sneak’s head half off with a blast of number-nine buck!
Then he moved all the way in, slammed the door after him, and dropped the scatter-gun between the sprawled bodies to kneel and get to work on Mamma Rosa’s gag and bonds, with his empty .38 on the tiles between them.
He removed her gag first. She gasped, “Oh Ricardo, I was so afraid they would kill you and then kill me before they left!”
He said, “I noticed. Nothing happened here just now, should anyone ask. Got that?”
“Si, I run a most respectable posada. The shots I just heard must have come from some rougher part of the neighborhood.”
He chuckled and went to work on her wrists. The sons of bitches had tied them with a knot he wasn’t familiar with. So he was still working on it when a voice from outside called through the shutters, “Hey Rosa, it’s me, Patrolman Vegas. Are you all right?”
From the floor, the landlady called back, “Si, but I am not dressed. What is going on out there? I was just awakened by the sound of gunplay, I think.”
The cop called back, “Go back to sleep. Let La Policia worry about such matters, Rosa!”
As he tore off down the calle, tweeting his whistle for help or just to make noise, Captain Gringo got her wrists free and went to work on her ankles, saying, “I’m sure glad you know how to stay so respectable. Are those two German girls I brought here earlier still upstairs, Mamma Rosa?”
“Where else would they be? I do not think these ladrónes were after any of my other guests. I don’t think they even knew those girls were here. I certainly never told them! They said but a few words to me in Spanish as they bound and gagged me just now. But though I understood nothing of their barbarian language, I do not think ‘Gringo’ can mean anything but you, in German, no?”
“I doubt they were laying for Santa Claus. I’ll worry later about how they figured I was on my way here. Do you really need help getting rid of their cadavers? I’m really in a hell of a hurry, Mamma Rosa!”
“Go with God, then, Ricardo mio. I know some enterprising youths who will help me clean up for their expensive shoes alone. What may be in their pockets is of course mine, for the rent they owe me, no?”
He laughed, but patted both stiffs down for ID anyway, explaining she was welcome to their goodies but that he’d still like to know who the hell they might have been. He found neither one had been thoughtful to carry his passport to work with him that evening. He grunted and told Mamma Rosa, “They’re all yours. I might have seen this one bozo in the railroad depot up at San José. It’s kind of hard to tell what he looked like, now.”
Mamma Rosa said something about getting a mop as he helped her to her feet. He didn’t hang around to watch. He ducked out and headed upstairs, loading his .38 as he did so.
Hilda opened up on his third knock, her big blue eyes wider than the door as she asked, “Ach, Dick, what has been downstairs going on? We just heard what like a war sounded, und so frightened we are!”
He stepped in, shut the door after him, and saw they were both in the same mumus. Alffieda was on the bed across the room, looking even more upset. He soothed them. “Nobody seems to have been after you. But tell me something: Did you come straight here from the schooner? No side trips to your hotel to pick something up?�
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Hilda sighed and said, “We would have if we had known what kind of soap down the hall they had. But, nein, straight here we came like you told us to. Und now, will you please tell us what ist going on, Dick?”
“On the way back to the schooner. On the double. The back way ought to still be safe.”
The blonde didn’t argue, but her redheaded sister who didn’t speak English kept asking dumb questions in German along the way until Captain Gringo told Hilda to tell her to shut up, adding, “People in this neck of the woods notice unusual voices, thank god.”
So they were moving silently as he smuggled them across the dimly lit quay and back aboard the Orotiki. He sat them on a hatch cover and told them to keep up the good work while he checked with Gaston.
For once, things seemed to be going right. Gaston introduced him to a husky Costa Rican called Alberto, who said last names were not important between men of the world and added that the Maxim was already aboard a vessel they could call La Paloma for this trip.
Captain Gringo moved to the starboard rail to stare down over the side before he said, “Bueno.” The two-masted lugger was a lot smaller than the schooner, of course, but larger than he’d expected. She was decked from mainmast forward, with a fair-size cabin amidships and the forepeak clear save for a small chain-locker hatch. He asked Alberto how fast the rather beamy boat could sail down the trades, and her skipper said, “Five, maybe six knots. Beating our way back, against the winds, will of course take us longer. But, on the other hand, La Paloma sails faster with the winds abeam, if we are talking about outrunning anyone.”
Gaston started to mutter something about steam-driven gunboats. But Captain Gringo kicked his shin and told Alberto, “We’d better get started, then. Has my friend here issued you your front money and new rifles?”
“Si, that gives us eight armed men aboard, aside from you and me, Captain Gringo. Nine Krags and a machine gun ought to keep the sharks at bay, no?”
“That’s all the men you have, Skipper?”
“That’s all the room we have. Naturally, men planning to be away from home at least forty-eight hours, maybe even longer, could hardly be expected to leave their mujeres behind.”
“Jesus, we’ve got eight women on board, aside from the three I have to bring with me?”
“No, Captain Gringo. We have nine Costa Rican girls aboard. Do I look like a man who plays with himself?” Captain Gringo knew better than to argue. Like other sane men, regular Hispanic merchant seamen of course had to sail stag. But guys; used to putting out to sea for only a day’s fishing at a time naturally expected to get laid every night. He turned to Gaston and said, “Okay, we’d better break out nine more rifles, just in case.”
Gaston grinned and said, “I already have, knowing how you feel about unarmed baggage just being in the way in a firefight. What about the Kanaka translator and the two fräuleins?”
“Negative. All three are sort of feminine above and beyond the call of duty, and I mean to keep them below decks if there’s any trouble.”
“Unless, of course, you get sunk?”
“What can I tell you? How far could any dame swim with an eight-pound rifle? Let’s get the show on the road, Alberto. At five or six knots we’re timing it about right if we shove off right now.”
The Costa Rican swung over the side to drop into La Paloma and take command as Captain Gringo gathered the mumu-clad German girls and the nearly naked Atanua. As he helped them down into the lugger, Hilda asked how long they’d be on the sort of stinky thing, and he said, “About eighteen to twenty hours, getting out there. Don’t ask when we’ll be coming back.”
“Such long to sail, Dick? Ist only a hundred nautical miles about, nicht wahr?”
“Yeah, well, the yacht you hired may have made better than five knots. But add it up and you’ll see it takes twenty hours to sail a hundred at five. Look on the bright side. We’ll be sighting the Guardian Bank’s rocks and reefs just after sunset tomorrow night. That sure beats sailing in by broad-ass daylight, until we have an educated guess about what’s out there!”
*
By the time La Paloma stood well out to sea, apparently having left Puntarenas unobserved, Captain Gringo and Alberto had organized at least a little order out of the general chaos aboard the crowded little lugger.
The skipper’s own stuff, a pretty but hard-looking mestiza called Beatriz, manned the helm as Gringo and Alberto crouched in the bow. Captain Gringo asked what was in the chain locker under them, and Alberto said, “Nada. Is empty. As you see, La Paloma rides easier with her bows light, and we usually tie her up each night in any case. So for why should we carry anchor chains? And for why should this be of importance to you, Captain Gringo?”
The American rapped the solid decking with his knuckles before he replied, “I may have to drive some nails in your deck here. Permiso?”
“Si, if you have a good reason.”
“I have. It’s tedious as hell to have one’s machine-gun tripod washed overboard by an unexpected swell. I want to mount the Maxim here on the peak. If I have to cover our stem unexpectedly, I can always fire free-hand over the transom. But the unused chain locker makes a handy machine-gun nest up here where there’s no other cover for me.”
Alberto opened the small hatch and folded it back against the cabin bulkhead, saying, “Help yourself. You will find hammer and nails in the ship’s carpenter chest under my chart table when you need them. I am the ship’s carpenter as well as skipper. So you do not have to explain to anyone.”
Captain Gringo nodded, let himself down into the chain locker, and struck a match. It was clean, at least, and the triangular space, while small, was large enough for what he had in mind. He climbed back out and told Alberto, “If I could have some matting and bedding, the three mujeres with me might be more out of the way up here.”
The Costa Rican grinned and said, “We have heard you are quite a man, Captain Gringo, but … all three of them?”
Captain Gringo laughed at the ridiculous picture and said, “As a matter of fact, I may need a chaperone or more for at least one of them. Actually, I want them all in one place where I can keep an eye on them if things get exciting. None of them speak Spanish, and we already have a large-enough female crowd aboard for more milling around than I like to think about, if things get too exciting!”
Alberto looked a little worried as he said, “Most of our mujeres have been out to sea before. The Frenchman assured us we would only be called on for to snoop about out there, not for to engage in a sea battle. One hopes he was not selling us the brick of gold?”
Captain Gringo tried to sound surer than he really felt. “The deal you made still stands, Alberto. All we have to do is pinpoint the exact islet those kidnapped pearl divers are being held on. Once we do, we’ve got a bigger vessel and a bigger gang to hit them with. Do I look like the kind of idiot who’d attack an armed camp with a handful of fisherfolk?”
Alberto sighed and said, “I don’t know. My Beatriz said she served as an adelita under you one time, and that you were a most aggressive guerrilla leader!”
Captain Gringo frowned thoughtfully at Alberto in the darkness as he tried to picture the tough little mutt at the helm again. He didn’t recall ever laying her, and she was pretty enough to remember. But one heart-shaped brown mestiza face looked much like any other amid a gaggle of camp followers. He asked cautiously, “Where did she say all this was going on?”
Alberto said, “A few months ago, down along the border. The soldado whose adelita she was at the time was killed in that fight you had with the Colombians. Beatriz said she did not think you would remember her even though, she says, you were very kind to all your people.” Captain Gringo shrugged and said, “It’s a small world. I remember the battle. I guess you don’t want me remembering your woman any better, eh?”
The skipper chuckled and said, “Es verdad. She says you screwed hell out of half the adelitas in camp down that way.”
“Oh, she�
��s just telling war stories. I never touched anything like half the girls in that guerrilla crew. I was leading a goddam battalio!”
The dirty conversation had restored Alberto’s humor by the time they made it aft. The skipper twitted his girl at the helm about her famous Captain Gringo not remembering her; and from the way she scowled by the light of the rising moon, she didn’t enjoy being teased. So Captain Gringo nodded at her and said, “Buen’noches, Beatriz, I thought I recognized you from the old outfit, but that fisherman’s sweater threw me off.”
The pretty little mestiza stuck her tongue out at Alberto and said, “You see?” So the skipper laughed easily and replied, “In god’s truth, querida, you are not as easy to recognize when your tits don’t show.”
Inside the overcrowded cabin, the mood was less jolly. The German redhead, Alfrieda, was seasick; and while she didn’t understand the growling Spanish around her, it was obvious someone was going to do something just awful if she threw up in there.
Captain Gringo told Hilda to get her outside as he, in turn, wedged himself through the crowd to get the machine gun, along with its tripod and ammo.
A fisherman cursed him as he had to move his butt off an ammo case. Little Atanua, wedged in a corner, asked if there was anything she could do to help. He told her to get the carpenter’s chest and follow him. She did, as he climbed over people getting back out.
When he did, Alfrieda was puking over the stem as, at the helm, Beatriz suggested sweetly that when she tasted hair she should swallow, lest she puke her own asshole. Fortunately, the German girl didn’t understand, so she didn’t have the rough sea girl’s humor to cope with. She had enough to worry about, even with her sister comforting her.
He left them to that problem as, once Atanua joined him, he led her forward. They dropped their load in the peak, and he told her to hang on to everything as the lugger took another sea swell under her buff stem and threatened to bury her bows in green water. She said, “Yes, my word, these people don’t know shit about makem friends with Kai.”