But Karrie wasn’t listening. Instead she fanned herself off, eyes dreamy. Finally she whistled in admiration at the vision in her mind. Laureen seemed to share Karrie’s reverie, saying, “Wish he’d tear into me.”
“He could reprimand me all day,” Karrie said.
“And all night!” Laureen agreed. “He’s so damn gorgeous.”
“I wish he was our horny gorilla,” Karrie continued.
Laureen slapped her thigh and cried, “Call me Faye Ray: he could carry me off any time!”
“Will you two stop?” I pleaded.
“Oh, like you didn’t notice,” Laureen said. “Certainly he noticed you.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“We overheard him in the hallway,” Karrie said brightly, raising her eyebrows suggestively.
“And boy oh boy, does he like you,” Laureen finished.
“The hotel manager?” I asked. “You mean he’s gay, then?”
Laureen sighed and said wistfully, “All the good ones are.”
“Ah, now I get it!” I said, understanding blossoming. “Alanis said something about the Flaming Dutchman. The hotel manager’s name is Van Den Hoffer. She didn’t seem to get along with him too well.”
“You won’t have that problem,” Karrie said helpfully. “I think he was just playing hard to get with you this morning.”
“All right all right,” I said. “Enough of all that. It’s flattering, but I’ve got work to do. Before you leave, I have a quick question for you both. My handover notes say you helped with paperwork, but don’t mention any payroll for art movers. Who did Alanis have move her art onto the block?”
The girls frowned in unison. “Block?”
“Yeah, you know. The easel at the front of the crowd.”
“Crowd?”
I frowned at them, suddenly nervous. “You do know what auctions are...?”
“Oh, she never had enough people for an auction!” Karrie said.
3
The next day my auction could have been considered a disaster. Only a dozen people showed up, after all. But these weren’t just warm bodies filling chairs: these were imminently qualified art enthusiasts. I operated the auction like a gallery sale. It was a huge success. The goals for my two week cruise were entirely met by tea time!
The next cruise, things were even easier.
At the end of my third cruise on Mariner—having once again cleared all my goals within the first days—I learned something profound.
The anatomy of a conch is a curious and unnerving thing.
“Yeah, mon,” said the Bahamian in the conch shack by the sea. “Take da skin and eyes right off, den trow dem in da water. Dey live by demselves for two more days.”
“Donny,” Laureen chided with her best gruff voice. “You pullin’ my leg?”
Laureen leaned over the counter to get a better look inside the shack. In Donny’s hands was a large conch shell and a knife. Between his legs was a five-gallon bucket filled with seawater.
“No, uh, gills or organs or anything?” I asked, leaning forward beside her. “Just the skin? Living?”
“Yeah, mon.”
“Lemme see!” Karrie called from behind us. She unsuccessfully hopped to see over us.
Before our astonished eyes, Donny demonstrated. Experienced fingers pulled from the shell a floppy, purplish alien-slug-thing. Using his knife, he expertly cut something slimy off of something else slimy—conch skin and eyes from conch body, presumably—which he then tossed over his shoulder. Through the open rear of the shack it flew, to plop back into the Caribbean Sea.
Donny was a thick man of middle years. The majority of his hair was going grey, and the majority of his teeth were going away. He and his wife, Monique, were proprietors of The Burning Spot, one of a long row of conch shacks lining a pier nestled beneath the huge bridge leading to Paradise Island.
The Burning Spot was a fascinating study. The shack was the size of a regular garden shed, though the entire back was open to the sea. From the ceiling dangled all sorts of oddities mixed in with daily use items. Funky ornaments made of seashells swung in the breeze, bumping into grill brushes and spatter guards. Painted carvings of fish and sharks swirled through wriggling lengths of plants that drooped from hanging pots, making the interior look like some sort of underwater diorama filled with litter.
The front wall of the shack folded into a counter, over which Laureen and I draped ourselves, beside a pile of conch shells strung together and heaped several feet high. As we watched Donny continue to intimately manipulate the conch, I pressed into the stack of conch shells.
“Gaaaaah!” I suddenly bellowed, stumbling backwards into Karrie and nearly knocking her off her feet.
“Hey!” she cried. “Watch it, cowboy!”
“Some cowboy,” Laureen laughed huskily. She poked me, teasing with a voice usually reserved for small children, “Was it all slimy and icky, Bri Bri?”
“I-I just got tentacled!” I protested. “These things are still alive!”
Donny and Monique laughed hysterically. Monique buried her face into his broad shoulder, overcome with mirth.
“If their skin can stay alive for two days,” Laureen observed haughtily, “Whatcha think a whole one can do?”
“I thought they were just shells,” I muttered. “For decoration.”
“Decoration’s over dere, mon,” Donny said, gesturing above him with his dripping knife.
In the sheltered corner hung an old and tired pom pom, heavy and limp, some strands stuck to a cast iron pan. There was obviously a story there, but I wasn’t sure I wanted to hear it. Watching Donny laugh maniacally holding a sharp knife in one hand, and a slain alien in the other, brought to mind all sorts of B-rated horror movie imagery.
“Donny catch dem every mornin’,” Monique said, popping open our bottles of beer.
“Cheerleaders?”
Monique laughed heartily. She had huge, brilliant teeth and a wonderful laugh. “He wish! He jump right off de back here before sunup. Dey come to de pier every day, like de cruise ships.”
“And people order lunch when they’re sticking things out of their shells and wriggling at them?”
“You did,” Monique answered.
“She did,” I corrected, returning Laureen’s poke.
Drinking a Vitamalt—the sweet unfermented beer-like beverage that was all the rage in the Bahamas—we watched Donny’s progress. He was freakin’ me out. From the bodies of the conchs he pulled weird, half toothpick-sized slivers of what looked like gelatin. Each such find brought delight, and he promptly popped them in his mouth. He loved ‘em. I didn’t have the stomach to ask if they were conch anatomy or parasites.
Yet despite the grisly performance, the results were worthy. We took our three bowls of chilled conch salad to a crooked wooden table in front of the shack, and readily devoured the contents. The conch salad was delicious. The minutes-fresh meat was firm and bright. Mixed in were chopped tomatoes, onions, and peppers, the whole doused in copious amounts of freshly squeezed lime juice, then a pinch of salt and pepper. We snarfed it down in a blink, then had a hearty debate about ordering more of the same or something different. Variety won, and we ordered some grilled snapper, which was also caught that morning.
While we waited, debating the merits of Vitamalt, Karrie noticed a guitar hanging from the ceiling.
“Donny!” she called. “Gimme that guitar and let’s get this party started!”
And so the party started. Karrie strummed the old, beaten guitar, and the two girls sang song after song. Everyone was having such a good time that other customers began leaving the other conch shacks in favor of The Burning Spot. Donny and Monique were flooded with extra business, but certainly didn’t let the long lines increase their speed. That would have been most un-Caribbean.
The weather was warm but not hot, the breeze lively but not gusty. We were in the Caribbean dream. When Karrie began taking requests from the small crowd, Lauree
n and I hung back and sipped our Vitamalts.
“I am tempted to say it,” I commented hesitantly. ‘I really am, but don’t want to screw things up.”
Laureen brightened in faux-joy, clasped her hands over her heart, and fluttered her eyelashes melodramatically.
“Oh, Brian!” she gushed, “I love you, too!”
I chuckled, but that was more of a stall. Finally I blurted it all out, lightning-fast, “I think I’m being rewarded for all my hard work!”
I squeezed my eyes shut and tensed, waiting for reality to crush me.
“I’m still here?” I asked, peeling an eye open and peering about. “I wasn’t struck by lightning or anything?”
“This is the life,” Laureen laughed. “You’re not going to jinx yourself. You’re not dreaming.”
“It’s just so hard to believe,” I explained. “After storming through so many ships—let’s see: Majesty of the Seas, Carnival Conquest, Carnival Ecstasy, Carnival Sensation, and now Radisson Seven Seas Mariner—I guess I had just gotten used to worst-case scenarios. But this is the end of our third two-week cruise. We cleared my goals in, what, the first three days of each? Amazing! One more cruise like this, and I’ll finally be able to bring my girlfriend aboard. It just doesn’t seem real, you know?”
“We all feel that way when we get on Mariner the first time,” Laureen said.
“I mean, I actually swam in the Panama Canal!” I continued. “These ports are unbelievably awesome, and too small for the big ships to reach. And every night getting to paid to drink and socialize with two pretty ladies? This is too good to be true.”
“Relax, mister,” Laureen said. “Sounds to me like you’ve earned a rest and a little success.”
“Maybe you’re right,” I said. “Years at sea have gotten me looking over my shoulder for disaster. But I’m still haunted by what was said on my first night.”
“That your ex-wife drooled a lot?”
“No,” I laughed. “That life at sea isn’t fair. Something’s gotta balance the scales.”
4
And something did indeed balance the scales. My life was a slice of fried gold, but Bianca’s was a fruitcake—one of those nasty Christmas ones:
“Here I am, my love, in sunny Jamaica. I was supposed to go to the beach today, but there is some kind of new disease on the ships, so we had to do a hell of a special cleaning, washing and sanitizing everything in both dining rooms. Jesus Gras! Two more hours of fun, taking everything off the tables and carrying to the dishwasher. And we have to check in for dinner one hour earlier, too, to set the stations back up. This nightmare will last at least until the end of the week. Me go now to feed the beasts.”
“It’s now an official epidemic of I don't know what disease, called "Northwalk" or something like this, which screwed our asses big time. Apparently one bastard who ate raw oysters in New Orleans brought it on the ship, resulting in over 150 cases of sick people, crew members and guests, which means emergency. Every damn day special cleaning, and crew not allowed into ports. We were making plans, the Romanian geese, to go out in Cozumel but had lousy lunch in the crew mess instead. Then back to dining rooms to turn them upside down again. Every day this cruise we double clean everything in the dining rooms, and check in early for extra work on top. This evening again special cleaning after dinner, and tomorrow US inspectors will be on top of us, to decide if we can sail or not.”
“God, how I need to talk to you! I can't use the computer as long as I would like, because there are only 3 of them working and the line is long. I love you and your messages. I still clean dining rooms and cabins, lots of people sick, I don't know what the hell is going on, I heard we'll skip Cozumel and sail back to New Orleans where we'll stay two days to clean over and over again. I just finished to sanitize my cabin again, after yesterday they kicked us out from the cabins to sanitize. I'm sick and tired of this nightmare, believe me, darling. I got to go now. I miss you like crazy!”
“I was pretty low spirited today, because I was tired and lovesick and homesick and sick and tired, but I'm tough, my love, don't worry about me, I had harder times than this.”
“I don’t know what to do. I need to find a replacement hand cream with antibiotics, because my hands are very spoiled. I hope I'll find the way to cure, otherwise I'll be forced to take an unpaid work break and risk not being hired back. I almost can't use my right hand anymore. The hard water and powder kill me. Me go. Why the hell I love you so much, you handsome dimple-cheeks bastard?”
Reading about Bianca’s life was almost physically painful. I wanted to bring her to Mariner immediately, but she kept citing our agreed-upon two months of success before leaping. How could she be so stubborn in the face of all this? I wanted to shout at her through the email!
But I only needed one more successful cruise to meet our self-imposed conditions, and then it would be dry dock. From there, we would finalize the paperwork for her to leave Carnival and become my partner. After so long, Bianca was so close that I could almost smell her perfume!
Chapter 20. Bahama Boom
1
Participating in the dry docking of a cruise liner was a rare opportunity, a part of the nautical lifecycle few could ever see. Thus Seven Seas Mariner’s dry dock in the Bahamas promised to be a great experience. It wasn’t. Well, maybe it was, but all I could think about was my approaching rendezvous with Bianca.
After dropping off all the passengers in Miami, Mariner sailed to Grand Bahama Isle, then moved into a labyrinthine, natural breakwater outside of Freeport. The shore was sandy and extremely pale, with several finger-like berths jutting into bright, healthy blue water. A huge cruise ship from Royal Caribbean filled the largest berth, its exposed hull the smooth, dull white of bleached bone. The entire site was industrial, with rusted steel and debris rising up from the crystalline waters and welding sparks dropping down into it. It was unpleasant seeing such Caribbean perfection being marred.
Mariner pulled into a tight berth, entering steel walls with the same ease as parking a car between painted lines. I sat on my balcony during the whole process, smoked a cigar, and watched the action. There was little enough of it. Because my balcony was on deck four, the top of the wall was my height, nary eight feet away. A crane, on rails atop the wall, rolled noisily back and forth, finally stopping directly before my balcony to drop me in shadow. The noise of the shipyard was unbearable, with the crashing of metal on metal, of heavy machinery, craning, and welding.
I wanted to see the water drain from around the ship, but after hours of waiting in vain, the sun set. Orange lights snapped into life, turning the rusted metal walls to maroon and giving the pale sand outside an eerie glow. In the distance, rain freshened the salt of the Caribbean. Lightning flashed along the deep, dark horizon. It was a beautiful, silent display of nature that helped take my mind off the noisome work of man.
In the morning, Seven Seas Mariner was high and dry. The floor beneath the ship had been submerged upon our arrival, but had of course been firmly attached to the two metal walls. The giant U-shaped berth had risen, over the course of many hours, by the release of seawater ballast from tanks within the structure. Once the berth’s floor met the hull of Mariner, the two rose together. There was nothing exciting about any of it, though later, while standing beneath the hull and seeing 48,000 tons balanced perfectly upon the slender keel, my heart went pitter-pat. Had Mariner lost her balance, my hard hat wouldn’t have helped much.
Power onboard was minimal, and the air conditioner was shut down. Fortunately, most of the crew had signed off. Alas, I had to remain in order to secure several million dollars worth of art onboard. The empty, dark corridors were like a ghost ship. The few of us remaining scurried about the dark like rats too stupid to abandon ship, but then pleasantly surprised that it hadn’t sunk after all.
The entire first day I worked at removing all the paintings and prints displayed on the walls of Mariner and locking them in a specially designated holding area. The h
otel director, Van den Hoffer, ‘supervised’ a bit more than he had to—whether he was interested in the art or in me was difficult to surmise. Though only hovering in the periphery, he was most distracting. He was the most beautiful man I had ever seen. Why, even I couldn’t stop looking at him. No wonder the girls were so gaga.
After securing the art was complete, there was nothing for me to do but stay out of the way. Dozens of men worked on dozens of projects simultaneously, from carpenters redesigning rooms to upholsterers redesigning furniture. Just about the only place I wasn’t in harm’s way was in my cabin.
My first visit to the beach left me so badly sunburned that I couldn’t go outside for a week. Day after day for two weeks I paced in my cabin, feeling trapped, thinking I would have actually slit my wrists had I been stuck in a crew cabin in the bowels of the ship. The heat was stifling, but whether amplified by sunlight through the glass balcony doors or the surrounding acres of steel in the Caribbean, I couldn’t tell. Despite the temperature, I had to keep the balcony door shut in order to dull the harsh sounds of construction. I felt sorry for the crew, who were forced to sleep on the pool deck in lounge chairs and listen to that racket all night.
Trapped in my metal hell, I feverishly anticipated my and Bianca’s imminent rendezvous. Her ship Valor was docking for just one day in nearby Nassau—near the very end of the dry dock—but one day with Bianca was worth a year’s wait. I knew that all too well!
Unsinkable Mister Brown (Cruise Confidential 3) Page 33