He paused at the oars and peered ahead through sunglasses and the low brim of a baseball cap. “We’ll, like, glide up to the rocks very quietly, tie up on a rock, and get out. Then we’ll creep up to a seal, and when I nod, we’ll swing our clubs and totally hit it in the head. Badda-bam! We’ll have to be quick so we don’t scare it away.”
The others nodded. Joy moved her arm slowly and pointed ahead.
“We’re almost there,” she whispered. “We should get out right there between those two rocks.”
“Okay,” Logan said. “We’ll wait till the water is, like, shallow, then we’ll go. Jump out at my command.”
He guided the dinghy between the rocks, and Joy got ready to jump. The boat was just five feet away from dry granite. Logan raised his hand.
“No!” BillFi said to Logan. “Too soon! We’re not—”
“NOW!” Logan whispered. Joy swung her legs over the rail, pushed off, and vanished deep under the water.
On board the Dreadnought, Arthur was watching the action through binoculars. It was all he could do to keep from laughing out loud.
Joy lunged up through the surface, sputtering, and grabbed onto the dinghy’s rail.
“I thought you said to—” she said.
BillFi laughed. “I tried to tell you,” he said. “I tried to tell you. It gets deep really fast here. Really deep. You have to get out on the dry rock, or you could be in twenty feet of water. It gets deep really fast here.”
“Great,” Joy said. “Muchas gracias. Thanks for telling me.”
BillFi looked crestfallen. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I tried. I’m sorry.”
With Joy holding onto the rail, Logan rowed the boat closer to the rocks. Joy tossed her belaying pins onto the granite and scrambled up out of the water.
The seals were gone.
“Oh, shit,” BillFi said, pushing his glasses higher up his nose. “They’re not here. They’re gone. Not here anymore. Let’s go find another rock.”
Logan rowed the hunters a few hundred feet farther into the bay, and they started the drill over again. They kept their heads down, they waited without a sound, and—when the boat was bumping against hard rock—they clambered over the rail.
“Get down!” Logan whispered. They dropped to their bellies. The ashen granite was cool and rough, and it smelled of moss and seagull droppings. The hunters lay low and motionless.
“Okay,” Logan said. “Follow me.” He raised his head slowly. Twenty yards in front of him were a dozen seals, slowly raising their heads. “This way.” He squirmed forward on his stomach, clutching a belaying pin in his right hand. After about ten yards, he stopped. “Lie still,” he wheezed. “Let them, like, calm down. Get used to us.”
The three hunters pressed their cheeks against the ragged rock. They didn’t move. Three minutes went by, then Logan looked up.
Twenty yards in front of him were a dozen seals, watching him closely.
“Shit! They keep moving away,” he said. “Let’s try it again, but stay low this time! Lll–oooooo–www!”
They crawled forward another ten yards. Logan looked up. The seals looked back at him. They were twenty yards away.
“Damn it!” Logan whispered. “Somebody isn’t staying low enough. They totally keep seeing us.”
“Logan,” Joy said. “I have a feeling it doesn’t matter how low we go. Watch this.”
She stood up.
The seals didn’t move.
“Hello, seals,” Joy called out in a loud voice. “Buenas dias. Lovely day, isn’t it? God does good work, wouldn’t you say?”
They didn’t move.
“You can get up now,” Joy said to her friends clinging to the granite at her feet. “We’re not fooling anyone.”
The others stood up and brushed the moss and rock chips off their clothes.
“I don’t think we’re going to catch them,” BillFi said. “I don’t think we’re going to get close enough. I don’t think we’re going to catch them.”
“Yes, we will,” Logan said. “Now that we know we can stand up, it’s, like, that much easier! Get your clubs ready. See that big dark one over there? Seals can’t move very fast on land. When I say ‘Go,’ we’ll all run over to it and totally hit it on the head. It’ll be quick, and we’ll get our seal.”
The seal Logan pointed to was large, fat, and chocolate brown, with white whiskers that stuck out like porcupine quills. It wasn’t looking at them. It was resting in the sun, eyes closed, about ten yards from the water’s edge.
“Get ready,” Logan said.
The hunters turned slowly to face their target.
“Get set.”
The hunters gripped their belaying pins.
“GO!”
The hunters bolted. They dashed across the rock, leaping nimbly over cracks and ridges. In an instant, they were almost upon their prey. They raised their belaying pins, drew in close—and the seal rolled over twice toward the ocean. Logan dove through the air toward it, his belaying pin raised high. He landed with a curse on the rocks, his belaying pin jammed painfully beneath his shoulder. Joy tumbled after the seal, but the seal shifted subtly, and Joy scrambled into waist-deep, chilly water. BillFi tried to anticipate its movements, darting this way and that. The seal anticipated his movements, darted that way and this, and left him standing alone on a rock. Then, apparently bored with the antics, the stout seal yawned, let fly with an audible belch, and flipped into the ocean.
It bobbed to the surface about twenty yards out and watched the three hunters standing still, sunburned and bleeding and hot, their belaying pins drooping downward.
Logan shook his head, wincing as he moved his skinned knees and scraped elbows. “Ham,” he said, flicking his hair away from his face. “I totally like ham. Don’t you like ham? I love ham. Some of my favorite food is ham. Fuck these seals. Let’s get back to the ship.”
The others nodded. The Dreadnought seemed far away, but it also felt like home.
“Muy bueno. We love ham,” Joy said quietly. “Especially that canned kind with that yellow jelly all around the outside. I love that stuff.”
“Shit,” Logan said. He could feel his chance to impress Crystal slipping swiftly away.
Back on the Dreadnought that evening, the other sailors were supportive—at least, as supportive as they could be without laughing. They sat around the dining table, beneath Joy’s latest Bible sign, which read, “With God all things are possible—Matthew 19:26,” eating a delicious ham and potato-au-gratin casserole Dawn had prepared.
“I had a hunch we’d need it,” she said. Logan sighed. No one had any faith in him at all, he thought, and he wasn’t sure they were wrong.
Jesse raised his rum and Tang. As he grinned, the fresh green-and-black tattoos on his jaws stretched outward. “Noble hunters,” he said. “Loyal to the end.”
“To the hunters!” everyone cheered as they toasted their friends. Everyone except for Marietta. She brushed her hair and scowled. “It was a stupid idea,” she said. “You people looked like idiots out there.”
Arthur stood and held up his wine with a flourish. “My friends,” he said, bending his deep voice into something like a British accent, “there comes a time in the history of all great ships when some members of the crew must sacrifice everything—dignity, composure, even grace—in the interest of educating and enlightening the others on board. Our fearless hunters, of course, could have captured a dozen seals easily, but that wouldn’t have served their higher purpose. No, my friends, they were intent on reminding us all that food is not to be taken for granted. They were intent on teaching us of the difficulties and challenges that face those who rely on the earth and sea for sustenance. They were intent on demonstrating for us the staggering odds that hunters must overcome every day. They did not set out to replace our ham, my friends. No! They set out to replace our tired and cynical attitudes. They set out to replace our contempt for ham with appreciation, with admiration, with affection. They accomplish
ed their goal in fine fashion, and we shall be eternally in their debt.”
He drank a swallow of wine and raised his glass again. “And they looked damn silly doing it!” he said.
“Damn silly!” cheered the others.
Logan grinned and shook his head. “Shit,” he said. He raised his glass and drank.
Marietta was at the helm the next day, and Arthur instructed her to keep the ship far away from the seal-covered shoals. “Rocks like that could smash a hole in our hull,” he explained. The wind was strong and stiffening, turning slowly counterclockwise. The Dreadnought heeled sharply and cut through the waves with impressive power, tossing salt spray high into the air.
After lunch, most of the crew lounged on deck, enjoying the breeze and reading paperbacks they had bought in Freeport. Jesse busied himself with the task of tattooing his right calf, weaving increasingly intricate patterns like spider-webs and hedgerows across his skin, while BillFi added swirls and elaborate knots to Jesse’s back. Crystal ripped off an endless string of sit-ups on a vinyl mat on the bow, and Dawn sat with her legs crossed, facing the sun and chanting some mystical mantra over and over again.
But Logan seemed restless. He poked around one hold after another, digging through mildewed life jackets and fraying ropes, fishing out an empty nylon sail bag or a fading windbreaker. Whenever he found something that seemed to satisfy him, he disappeared below and deposited it somewhere. Then he re-emerged and continued his hunt.
“What are you doing?” Marietta asked.
“Just, like, looking for some stuff,” Logan said, arching his eyebrows. “Shhhhhh! It’s for a totally top-secret project I’m working on.”
Marietta scowled. “Well, tell me what you’re doing, or I’ll get Arthur to order you to tell me.”
Logan paused, looked over at her, and then resumed his poking about.
“Did you hear me?” Marietta screeched. “I said, I order you to tell me! Arthur will do what I ask him to. You have to do what I say.”
Logan paused again. Then, with uncharacteristic swiftness, he marched over to Marietta and stood in front of her, his pale face just inches from hers. “Arthur might think he’s the captain here, but he’s not—and I don’t think either one of you should push it,” he said in a barely controlled tone. “In the meantime, just steer the fucking ship.”
Around four o’clock, Logan entered the captain’s quarters and closed the door behind him. The room was cozy and quiet and thick with the power of the imagination.
Logan chuckled to himself. His mother hated to hear him talk like that. “Thick with the power of imagination?” she would say. “Thick with something, anyway.” Then she would snort and give him some task to do, to keep his mind in the real world “where it belonged.”
But his father understood. His father was an actor, a playwright, a dreamer, and a fool. He would leave his briefcase on top of the car when he pulled out of the driveway, scattering papers and turkey sandwiches all over the street as he drove away. He would put his pen in the cup in the bathroom, and then wonder later in the day why he had a toothbrush in his shirt pocket. He would call people on the phone and then forget who he had dialed, engaging the other person in charming conversation until he at last remembered whom he had called and why.
People called him “Loopy.” His real name was Lawrence, but he had long ago acquired that nickname, and it stuck with him wherever he went. Loopy McPhee. People made good-natured fun of him, and he seemed to enjoy the embarrassing attention. But Logan never made fun of him. He loved his father deeply, and he was proud of Loopy’s creativity and passion. Loopy could bang out some words on his old manual typewriter, and a year later audiences would cry at the little boy, or the old woman, or the brave mother who walked across the stage. Or they would laugh at the characters that Loopy invented in his mind and brought to life before their eyes. He created clowns of all kinds. Clowns in business suits. Clowns in prison stripes. Clowns in military uniforms, French-maid costumes, or nothing but their underwear. If Loopy wanted people to laugh, they laughed. If he wanted them to cry, they cried.
Loopy had hated the idea of sending his only child off on a “Leadership Cruise.” Sounded too harsh. Too tough. Too boring. He would have been happier letting Logan spend the summer hitching rides on freight trains or camping on his own in the woods. But Logan’s mother had insisted. “It’ll do him some good,” she said. “Bring him back down to earth, where he belongs.” Loopy was a creative wizard and an absent-minded magician, but he was not the most assertive of men. When his wife insisted, he agreed.
Logan shuffled through the pile of fabric and canvas that sprawled across the Captain’s bed in front of him. He smiled. He was doing this for Loopy, and he could feel his father’s soul and inspiration and genius fill his mind and his fingers. He was ready to make a little magic of his own.
He worked in the captain’s quarters all afternoon. He emerged for dinner, but he refused to tell anyone what he was doing. Once the meal was over, he went back into the captain’s quarters and locked the door.
He stayed in there all night. He came out from time to time, fetching a tall glass of rum or visiting the bathroom, but then he disappeared again behind the wooden door. Arthur, curious and a little put-out, slept in Logan’s bunk that night.
Breakfast was nearly over when Logan came out the next morning. His red hair was straggly, his clothes were rumpled, and he carried a dark green tarp under one arm. He placed his bundle on his bunk and took his place at the head of the table.
He smiled. “I’m totally starving,” he said. “What’s cooking?”
“We were going to ask you that same question,” Arthur said, stretching his lanky frame and stifling a yawn. “Are you going to tell us what this is all about?”
Logan took a bite of the scrambled-egg-and-ham dish BillFi had made. He nodded. “Right after breakfast,” he said. “I’d like the crew to assemble on deck.”
It didn’t take them long. Fired with curiosity, the crew gathered on deck just as soon as the dishes had been gathered and left to soak in the galley. The only straggler was Marietta, who always took her time getting ready to start the day.
When everyone was present, Logan carried his green package to the base of the mainmast. “Sorry for all the secrecy,” he wheezed, “but I didn’t know if this would turn out well or not. If it didn’t, I, like, wasn’t going to say anything to anybody.”
“If what didn’t?” Dawn asked.
“Well,” Logan answered, “I figured that since we were pirates—the Pirates of the Dreadnought, you know, the Plunder Dogs, and stuff—we totally ought to have a flag. A pirate’s flag. ‘Avast, ye maties,’ and all that stuff. Something that would make it clear to other boats that we, like, shouldn’t be messed with. You know, Dread nought, ‘Fear Nothing.’ I wanted a flag that would let the world know we weren’t afraid of anything it could dish out.”
“So you made us a flag?” Arthur asked.
Logan nodded. “A big one,” he said. “It’ll be our symbol, if you like it. Something we can use to show we’re a team.”
“Let’s see it!” Joy said.
Logan carefully unwrapped the bundle. As the green tarp fell away, the crew could see a black background with flashes of color. Logan held the flag by the corners and lifted it high; Dawn grabbed two corners and helped. It was square and big, and across the blackness curved four ragged slashes—gold, green, blue, red.
The crew was silent.
At last, Joy spoke. “Me gusta! I like it!” she said with awe. “Those marks look like dog teeth.”
“Or shark gills,” Dawn added.
“Or bear claws,” Jesse said.
“Or gashes made by bear claws,” Crystal said.
Logan grinned. “Right!” he said. “All of you!” He grinned most at Crystal.
“Dread nought,” Arthur said with a dramatic flourish. “Logan, you did it! With this flag, we fear nothing. Let the Maritimes beware! The Pirates of the Dreadno
ught dare to show their colors! Watch out for the Plunder Dogs!”
Everyone cheered—except for Marietta. “It looks like a rainbow at night,” she muttered as she crept back down below.
No one paid any attention to her. They were busy congratulating Logan for his contribution to the ship and the team.
“But how will we get it up the mast?” Joy asked.
“No fucking problem,” Crystal said with disdain. She took the flag from Logan and tied it around her neck like a cape. Then she kicked off her shoes, jumped up, and grabbed the rigging. With spiderlike swiftness, she scuttled up through the lines and sails to the top of the mast, forty feet in the air. She attached the flag to the highest lines and shinnied back down. Logan vowed to remember forever that image: his flag fluttering in Crystal’s hand.
The flag was magnificent up there. It flapped slowly in the wind, its bright and rich colors commanding attention. It seemed to give the whole ship a center, a focal point under which day-to-day life could be conducted with a constant reminder of the power and responsibility of the ship and its crew.
That night, the pirates talked around the dining table long past sundown. The flag gave them a sense of excitement and identity that they hadn’t realized they lacked, and as the oil lamp flickered and sputtered overhead, they shared fantasies and dreams and confidences that they had, until now, been holding back.
Joy talked about Leo, her boyfriend back in Austin. She showed the others her ring, a thin gold band that glittered with diamond dust. It was a sign, she said, of deep affection, God’s glory, and everlasting love.
“Everlasting love? Give me a fucking break!” Crystal laughed. “No such thing. All there is is shared agendas. Guys aren’t husbands. They’re allies—and alliances end when people change their minds.”
“Maybe for you, but not for me and Leo,” Joy retorted, her chestnut face frowning gently. “We’re in love, and we’re going to stay in love forever. He’s not exactly the latest Hollywood hunk, but he’s sweet, and he’s loyal, and he’s kind, and he’s strong, and he’s—”
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