Agreement to Kill
Page 17
“Heavens,” said the clerk, “how big is this box?”
“Like a telephone booth. No. Bigger. Like two.”
“Jet engine,” said the clerk. “I’ve seen those crates when the company had me in Egypt.”
“They — don’t — stink!” yelled the captain.
“Of course. Or glow in the dark.”
But the clerk saw now how the siesta was being wasted. With the gin wearing off on him under the heavy sun he got a feeling of waste and uselessness, always there when the gin wore off; when this happened he would take the other way he knew for combating these feelings, these really cosmic ones, in his experience, and he became indifferent.
“Very well,” he said. “Lower away, if you wish. Gently,” and with the last word he again and for a moment found his own dreaminess back. He smiled at nothing past the captain’s left ear, and then up at the ship where a box would soon be swinging over. For a moment, inconsequentially, he thought of a childhood time in a London mews; it was so clear and still, and he saw himself walking there, eyes up and watching his green balloon. How it floated.
All this went by when the captain roared suddenly, giving the clerk a start of fright and alertness. Someone roared back from the high deck of the tramper and then the winch started screeching.
“What was it this time?” said the clerk.
“The papers,” said the captain. “We need a bill of lading and so forth. Someone will bring them.”
“Ah,” said the clerk. “I should think so.”
The winch started up again but because of the strain on it the sound was now different. It mostly hummed. From the pier they could see the black line of the gunwale above, and the boom over the hold, the boom holding very still while the humming went on. The clerk, for no reason at all, felt suddenly hot.
“I’ll be glad,” said the captain, “to weigh anchor tonight.”
“Of course.”
“Load, unload, go. Nothing else here.”
“In Okar?” said the clerk, feeling absent-minded.
“What else is here?”
“I don’t know,” said the clerk. “I don’t even know what is here.”
It’s the heat, thought the captain, which makes everything sound like nonsense, and when a seaman came off the ship, bringing a clipboard with papers, the captain grabbed for it as he might for the coattails of fleeing sanity.
“Where did you load this thing?” asked the clerk.
“New York.” The captain kept flipping papers. “And your route?”
“Tel Aviv, Alexandria, Madagascar, New York.”
“Find the destination of your thing yet?” The clerk looked up at the sky where the boom was, swaying a little now and all stiff and black against the white sky. Then the box showed.
“Just a minute,” said the captain and licked his finger. The box also looked black, because of the white sky. It was very large, and swayed.
“Where to?” the clerk asked again.
“New York. Un — ”
The boom swung around now and the black load hung over the pier.
“New York is port of origin,” said the clerk. “You mentioned that earlier.”
“Just a minute — ”
When the box was lowered the winch made a different sound once again, a give and then hold sound, a give then hold, a sagging feeling inside the intestines, thought the clerk as he watched the box come down. It grew bigger.
“New York,” said the captain.
“My dear captain. All I’ve asked…”
“Destination New York!” said the captain. “Here. Look at it!”
The clerk looked and said, “Queer, isn’t it. Port of origin, New York. Destination, New York.”
They both looked up at the box which swung very slowly.
“What’s in it?” asked the clerk.
“What’s in it. One moment now. Ah: PERISHABLES. NOTE: IMPERATIVE, KEEP VENTILATED.”
The clerk made a sound in his throat, somewhat like the captain’s rumble, though it did not rumble when the clerk made the sound but was more like a polite knock on a private door.
“That’s a very queer entry, captain. They do have regulations over there, you know, about proper entries.”
The captain did not answer and kept riffling the papers. The box was low now and really big. It no longer looked black, being away from the sky, but quite stained.
“And you know something else?” said the captain and suddenly slapped his hand on the clipboard. “There’s no customs notation here anywhere!”
Now the winchman above kept watching the seaman who stood on the pier. The seaman made slow signals with wrists and hands to show when the box would set down. He is an artist, thought the clerk, watching the seaman. Sometimes he only uses his fingers.
There were also two dark-looking Arabs who stood on the pier and waited. One held a crowbar, resting the thing like a lance. The other one had an axe.
The box touched, not too gently, but well enough. It just creaked once. A pine box, large and sturdy, with legends on the outside to show which side should be up. The side panels, close to the top, had slits. The top panel was crashed down at one end.
“It does smell, doesn’t it?” said the clerk.
“Christus — ” said the captain.
The seaman by the box undid the hook from the lashing, fumbling with haste because he was holding his breath. When the hook swung free the seaman ran away from the box.
“Look at those Arabs,” said the clerk. “Standing there and not moving a muscle.”
“And in the lee of that thing yet,” said the captain.
Then the hook went up and the winch made its high sound. No one really wanted to move. The clerk felt the heat very much and the bareness of everything; he thought that the box looked very ugly. Siesta gone for that ugly box. It doesn’t even belong here. That thing belongs nowhere. Like the winch sound, the screech of it, which doesn’t belong in siesta silence.
Both Arabs, at that moment, gave a start.
“What?” said the captain.
The winch stopped because the hook was all the way up. The boom swung back but that made no sound.
“What?” said the captain again. He sounded angry. “What was that?”
But the Arabs did not answer. They looked at each other and then they shrugged. One of them grinned and rubbed his hand up and down on the crowbar.
“Goddamn this heat,” said the captain.
“Sirocco coming,” said the clerk.
They stood a moment longer while the captain said again that he had to be out of here by this night, but mostly there was the silence of heat everywhere on the pier. And whatever spoiled in the box there, spoiled a little bit more.
“Open it!” said the captain.
Read more of The Box
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Copyright © 1957 by Fawcett Publications, Inc.
Renewal Copyright © 1985 by Peter Rabe
All rights reserved.
This is a work of fiction.
Names, characters, corporations, institutions, organizations, events, or locales in this novel are either the product of the author’s imagination or, if real, used fictitiously. The resemblance of any character to actual persons (living or dead) is entirely coincidental.
eISBN 10: 1-4405-4000-4
eISBN 13: 978-1-4405-4000-4
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