“Here’s where you’ll start your spiel, Ann. All about the Atlantic Ocean, how many miles deep that ocean gets. Water temperature, and oh yeah the pressure. We have it all written out for you, and—shit!”
He stopped.
The bell came to a halt.
Had she reached the bottom? There was only the glow from whatever light sat on top of the bell, pointing down.
But then she felt something else. The bell rocked.
“Hey, Ann—nothing to worry about. But the bell got hooked up on something. Just give me a minute here.”
So she wasn’t all the way down. She looked at the two-way phone again. She should reach for that, ask what was wrong, maybe tell Nadler that she wanted to come up now?
And blow the job.
She chewed her lower lip. A habit she tried to lose. Whenever things happened that made her worry, anything that made her anxious—auditioning for a role, or wondering how she was going to pay rent—for some reason her teeth immediately went to her lower lip.
This was funny. For someone who hated the ocean.
To be underwater, stuck.
Funny.
No. Not funny at all. Scary. The black two-way phone sat there. Useless.
The bell wobbled a bit more, then it seemed to lurch down, dropping.
Fast, maybe too fast. They closed the bell in bad weather for a reason, remember? Maybe the pole shook, making the bell dangerous in water like this.
It stopped sharply—abruptly enough that her chin bumped against the metal lip of the porthole.
“Okay. All set now. Sorry about that, Ann. It must get a little tricky when the waves kick up. Seemed to get stuck. But everything’s okay now. Just got to bring you up.”
Ann felt a vibration. The metal container seemed to shake as the force of the current and the waves jostled it.
How deep was I? Ann thought. Thirty feet? How deep is thirty feet, how far to the surface, if I got out of here?
Of course, that thought meant nothing since there was no door handle on the inside, no way for her to open that door, and—
What? Let the ocean flood in?
Good idea.
Right, a real good idea. But she had to imagine that panic could make her do just that.
“Ann, gonna bring her up now, okay. Little faster than normal since I guess it’s really bad down there, okay?”
Does he want me to answer that? Grab that damn two-way phone and scream like I’ve never screamed before—and would probably never scream again—get me the…hell up!
The bell started up, and that only made the vibration worse, the bell now almost rocking on its pole as it slid up.
God, please make it go fast, please don’t let it get stuck—
She closed her eyes. She couldn’t bear to watch the water slowly change color, too slowly, going from a sick gray, to a deep green, until finally it became pale.
She opened her eyes. And she saw light, air, the timbers of the boardwalk.
Keep going, keep going, keep—
The rain had turned heavier, now a downpour, hammering the bell, making the outside a blur.
But the diving bell continued to rise up.
Until it finally stopped.
The door popped open. Nadler bent over, peering inside.
“Come on, kiddo, I’m getting drenched here!”
Ann lowered her head, and ran out.
And as she did, entering through the twin glass doors, she heard Nadler….
“Bit rough down there, but least you know what it’s like. And hey, congratulations—you’re the newest employee of the world-famous Steel Pier!”
And despite everything, Ann had to smile. She had a job and for now that’s all that mattered.
13
San Francisco Bay
SAM KELLY HOPPED OFF THE training ship—the converted trawler—and ran to the front to grab the rope thrown by DiGiacomo.
“You don’t have to do that, Sam; I got kids who need to learn how to tie a knot.”
Sam grinned as he lashed the front of the trawler to one mooring post, then ran aft to get the other rope being tossed by DiGiacomo. He pulled it hard and then gave it a quick double knot.
“How about a beer?” DiGiacomo asked.
“Love one, but I think I better write up a report on the kid and not make him sound like too much of a—”
Someone tapped his shoulder.
“Lieutenant, CO wants to see you.”
“Now?” Sam looked at DiGiacomo. “Word must travel fast. CO wants a powwow.”
DiGiacomo nodded. Though DiGiacomo outranked Sam, they acted as if they were peers.
But now…now—
Sam saw DiGiacomo lower his head as he checked the ropes and signaled the ensign piloting the boat to cut the engine.
He knows something, Sam thought.
But what?
“I guess…” Sam started…“I better check with the CO, hm?”
“Yeah, Sam. See you later.”
“Right,” Sam said.
So Sam started off toward the administration building, near the entrance to the harbor facility.
“Go right in,” the CO’s secretary said.
Sam smiled, and opened the door with beveled glass, and the gold-lettered name, CAPTAIN ELLIOT BYRNE, USN.
“Afternoon, Captain.”
Byrne looked up from his desk.
“Goddamn it, Kelly. God…damn it.”
Byrne stood up.
“Sir, if it’s about the problem with Hautala, I can tell you that we—”
“What? What the hell you talking about, Lieutenant?”
Sam did a quick step backward. So this was not about the kid’s almost-fatality in the wreck. “Nothing, sir—I just thought…”
“’Kay. Well, there’s nothing else but to give you this.”
Byrne held out some papers.
Sam took a quick glance, and immediately knew what they were.
“Discharge orders?”
“Yeah, I know you had a few more days, but guess what? Now you don’t. And nor for that matter does anyone else here. The whole Navy dive operation here is to be shut down now, today. That’s it.”
“And all the divers?”
“Everyone’s getting the same papers you have. Cost-cutting. Guess they don’t need a West Coast dive operation. At least not this one, here. Cutting expenses throughout the whole damn armed forces. It’s a damn bloodbath. Guess with the Great War under our belt, might as well as shit-can the whole thing, hm? Christ.”
Sam held the papers. He had been only days away from being out anway. But now, like this, so abrupt—it felt wrong. And not only that, he thought of everyone else who worked the training facility.
“The new men?”
“Early discharge. They’ll get about a month’s pay. That’s about it. God knows where I’ll end up.”
Sam looked out the window. It was one of those rare perfect San Francisco afternoons, the sun brilliant, the air dry, the sky deep blue, the water calm.
So it was over?
Just like that, his life in the Navy over. Diving, for now, over.
One thing for sure, Sam knew when he’d need another job.
“Should I pack up today?”
Byrne looked up. “Today, tomorrow. Whenever the hell you’re ready. This place will become like a ghost town. Me, I’ll be gone by midday tomorrow. I can’t stand to watch this much stupidity.”
Was it stupid? Sam knew that there was a big movement to cut the armed forces down, whittle it down to something small. “America First,” the slogan went. No more European wars. Everyone hoped for no more wars at all.
“I’m with you, sir.”
Byrne walked around his desk to Sam.
“You’ve been a great trainer here, Sam; got some great divers, thanks to you. I don’t know what the hell you’re going to do now…what any of us will do. But I can guess one thing. It will be important.”
Sam extended a hand to the captain
.
“Thanks, sir.”
“Yeah, and can the ‘sir.’ You’re practically a civilian, Kelly.”
Sam smiled. Funny when the military decorum of rank, of orders, slipped away. Like it was some kind of game, let’s pretend.
“Guess I better look for a job,” Sam remarked. “Got to be some boat somewhere that needs a diver.”
Byrne stared at Sam.
“Yeah. Sure. There’s gotta be.”
Then Byrne walked back to his desk. He sat down, and started shuffling some papers, but not before a quick glance up, and—
“Good luck, Sam.”
Sam nodded, and with his discharge papers still in his hands, as if in disbelief, he walked out of the office.
And that evening—
Off the base.
It wasn’t a hard decision, now when the facility looked as though it couldn’t close fast enough, as if everyone was deserting the sinking ship.
People would come and mothball the boats, and the diving gear. Like Byrne said earlier, God knows where they’d all end up.
Sam did stop by DiGiacomo and the trawler to say good-bye.
Sam had trouble keeping the disappointment out of his voice. DiGiacomo could have told him, could have given him a heads-up.
So damn military…keeping the secret.
“Hey, Jock—going to miss diving with you.”
“Yeah, me too, Sam.”
DiGiacomo was curling the yards of hose; probably getting everything ready for whoever was going to come and do an accounting for the U.S. government. He looked up. “But you were out anyway, right?”
“Yeah. I was gone.”
“You got plans?”
“Sure. Lot of plans.”
DiGiacomo smiled. “Maybe we can have a beer someday. I mean, if you stick around the Bay Area.”
Sam grinned back, letting the old gob off the hook. “Sounds good to me.”
An awkward pause from both of them, and then Sam gave a final wave. “See you.”
And then walking to the bus stop outside felt like the scariest thing he ever did. Joining the line of other sailors, some smoking and complaining, others quiet in a strange way, all waiting for the green and yellow bus that would take them into the city, take them to whatever would come next.
He had to think…
Do we all wonder what’s next? Every single one of us?
The future…
Damned interesting thing. Interesting, scary, and about the most unknowable thing in the world.
Sam eyed one of the men tapping a Camel out for a pal. Wouldn’t mind one of those, Sam thought, now that my diving is done and who gives a damn about my lungs.
He watched the other sailor, a boy of a sailor, light up the smoke, backlit by the setting sun, the orange at the horizon, the blue sky now deepening to a dark blue, a violet.
Sam made a joke to himself. Made a smile appear on his face.
Stupid little joke.
I know what’s next. Sure I do….
The future. My future.
Coming right the hell up.
14
Baffin Island
CARL DENHAM SCRAMBLED OVER THE rocks, clawing at the jagged chunks, trying not to lodge his leg in the maze of small cracks and crevasses.
But as he neared Herb he heard something, a sound somehow shielded from the beach by this rise and the wind.
The low rumble of animal noises—so many of them, a steady roar.
Denham hurried his climb…until he reached a high point, only yards away from a grinning Herb.
“Holy…mackerel,” Denham said. “Unbelievable!”
Herb’s smile went from ear to ear. “Nobody’s ever seen anything like this Carl. Nobody!”
Denham just wanted to look, to soak in the sight, while he tried to figure out what it was.
On the other side of the rise, around the curve of the bay, sat an army of sea lions, some waddling, some rising up on rocks, all of them making noises.
“Something, hm, Carl?”
“Oh, Herb…you did good. We have to get this.”
“Should I get Tyler, get him in the shot?”
Carl waved it off. “Nah, we get these babies on film, we can cut him in later. I just want to get this down on film. How many are there, God…?”
Preston appeared next to Carl. “Got to be…I don’t know—a couple hundred? Maybe more.”
“They’re like a herd. Wonder why they came here?”
Herb turned back.
“Maybe no Inuits come here? You see the smoke? It’s all gone. They’ve moved on. Could be it’s safe. You see over there?”
Herb pointed to the back of the sea of seals. At first Denham didn’t see anything more than more lumbering, shaking seal bodies jostling for position.
Then he saw them.
“Babies.”
“Right. They must come here, give birth, some kind of seal ritual.”
Denham clapped Herb’s shoulder. “You know, for finding this you deserve a raise.”
“Really?”
“That is, if I had any money for a raise. But our day will come, Herb…our day will come…”
Denham walked with Herb and Preston. In a few minutes, the light had changed, the storm clouds now completely melted away, and now he could look up and see giant blots of blue dotting the white cloud cover.
“How do you think the light is?” Denham said.
Herb looked up at the sky, then the sea.
“Not bad. But—love to shoot them from the other angle.”
“You mean from behind the herd?” Denham could see that the seals went flush to the jagged wall…as if they knew the stone wall gave their pups protection.
“I dunno, Herb. How the hell you going to do that? Let me get some shots here, at least.”
Denham took the camera, and then looked through the viewfinder, first scanning the scene, before starting to turn the crank. Then he began a slow pan.
Though Herb was his operator, Denham only felt like a real filmmaker when he turned the crank himself.
“Beautiful. What a shot. Going to look amazing on the big screen.”
“Carl—”
“What Herb?” Denham said without pausing. “Want to do some of this yourself?”
“I see a way to do it. It can be done.”
“What’s that?” Denham kept on cranking until he had the camera turned nearly one hundred eighty degrees, looking out at the sea, now dappled with glistening foamy spits that caught the sunlight. “Just gorgeous.”
Then Denham stopped and glanced up.
“If I go over there, I could get to that cliff, see where it curves in a bit,” Herb remarked.
“Yeah. But—”
“I think it curves in just enough so that I can get a shot. Light in the back. Looking out at the whole field, the pups in front. Be a great shot, Carl.”
Carl studied the area pointed out by Herb. “You know what—you’re right. Come on, let’s go—”
Herb grabbed his arm. “Hey, Carl. There’s not room for both of us. Going to be tricky going around the herd, getting in here with just me and a camera.”
Carl looked Herb in the eyes. They had had similar discussions before. When there was a shot for one person to get. Denham was the director, Herb the camera operator. Herb was good; he deserved to get this shot. And it could make the film.
Preston, standing a little behind, cleared his throat.
“Isn’t it a little dangerous? All those sea lions…”
Carl turned to him. Preston liked to fret. Always the Ivy League worrier, seeing problems everywhere. Sometimes Denham wondered why he kept the kid around.
“Sea lions, seals, whatever, they look like they’re pretty calm to me. We’re not hunting them. Just shooting a movie.”
“Okay. Just that there’s so many of them.”
Herb tapped Denham’s arm. “Carl, if I’m to try for the shot, I better go now. Every minute we lose more light.”
&nb
sp; “Yeah, go on. We’ll watch from here.”
And he watched Herb pick up the camera, and start cutting, moving away from the sea lions, then around to the cliff, to the curved section…and the shot of a lifetime.
15
Baffin Island
DENHAM WATCHED HERB MOVE ACROSS the rocks. At one point, the cameraman had to cut across a line of brownish-gray sea lions. And though a few raised their snouts and roared at his intrusion, they didn’t move.
“Fat lazy things, hm?” Denham said.
“What are they here for?” Preston said. “Some kind of seal vacation?”
Preston laughed at his joke.
“What the hell is he doing?”
Denham turned to see Hayes standing next to him, rifle in hand.
“Herb? Getting me the shot of a lifetime.”
Hayes scanned the sea of animals that filled the rocky inlet. “Where did you send him?”
“I didn’t send him anywhere, Hayes. See over there? There’s some kind of natural cove there, right where that rock wall begins. He’s going to sneak in, set the camera up, and get a shot looking out over the sea.”
“That’s stupid.”
“What do you mean…that’s stupid?”
Denham looked back to see that Herb was only minutes away, but something in Hayes’s voice made him alarmed.
“Wh-what do you mean?” Denham repeated.
Preston, standing beside Denham, shifted uneasily on his feet.
“Look over there, in the back. All those damn pups.” Hayes was pointing.
“Right, they’ll be in the foreground of the shot—”
“No. Don’t you see how they’re set up? They got the bulls in the outer ring, nasty big guys, watching out, protecting—and there! The females, with the pups to the back.”
Now Hayes tapped Denham’s shoulder.
“It’s all about protection, Denham…protecting the babies. And you sent him over there?”
“I told you, I didn’t send—”
Denham spun around. In a matter of moments, what had been merely the adventure of getting a breathtaking shot turned suddenly nightmarish. And Denham didn’t like fear. No, he was fine as long as everything was under control. But once things turned dangerous—his mouth went dry, his heart raced.
The Island of the Skull Page 6