Sinbad and Me

by Kin Platt

  I didn’t have the heart to tell her it was just one of those silly superstitions. “But he didn’t know Murdock,” I said. “And he even might have been dead himself by then. Wasn’t this kum an old man?”

  “Even when kum die his curse still finds you. Besides, what difference? He not ever know my man, Teska. Him die too, like in curse. Everything my kum say come true,” she said, her head bowed, her shoulders slumped. “Everything, so far.”

  “Boy,” I said, getting mad, “he sounds like a real creep. Couldn’t anybody talk him out of it?”

  She shook her head. “Is all my fault. Me strong girl. Me very pretty girl, too. I love this boy Mirko. No old man tell Anna Myszka who to marry. I say I not afraid of him.”

  She made four scratches on the ground with her cane. Then she rubbed each of them out with the rubber tip.

  “Urosh Blagojek show me pretty dam’ quick what he can do.” Her expression was bleak. She looked at the sky and then down at the tombstones around us. She shuddered like she had a chill even on this warm day. “I tell kum I leaving for new country. No marry his no good son. His face becomes black. His voice is very angry. ‘May sorrow await you for your life,’ he says. ‘May your happiness change to mourning,’ he says.”

  “Boy, what a sorehead,” I said.

  She continued as if she didn’t hear me and was still listening to that mean guy over there. “Kum say, ‘Whatever man you love, he die. Whatever you love, it is taken from you. Five people you love will die!’”

  I tried to figure. “Where’s the five?”

  “Not yet five,” she said. “So far is four. Mirko is first to die. Teska last. So far anyways.”

  “You said four.”

  She looked at me queerly. “Murdock. Big strong man. He die too. Then other nice man. That good friend. He die—”

  “What other man?” I asked.

  She didn’t answer but her breathing came fast and she was making a strange sound in her throat. Like she couldn’t swallow or breathe. Even while I looked, her face seemed to change. It was like she was putting on a mask and turning into a different woman. Her features got mean. She seemed to grow taller. Even stronger. She raised her thick cane. The silver head glittered in the sun.

  Then she brought it whistling down on me with all her might.

  My reflexes are fast so I had turned slightly away at the last second, and caught the brunt of the blow along my left arm and shoulder, I staggered back. My neck was on fire. My whole arm from shoulder to fingertips was aching and numb. I rubbed it but couldn’t get any feeling into it. My mouth must have gaped open like a fish. I couldn’t say a word.

  She had both her arms outstretched, talking to the sky again. “See, great kum,” she said. “I not like this person. Him nothing to me. I no like this boy.” Her eyes were large and shining. Her mouth was all twisted as she gasped, “You stay away now. You no come Mrs. Teska’s store no more. We no more friends.”

  I thought I had an idea what she was trying to do.

  “Oh, come on, Mrs. Teska,” I said. “You don’t want to believe in that junk.”

  “Curse of kum no junk,” she shrilled. Then as I took a step forward she raised her cane again. “You stay away from this old lady. No talk. No more talk.”

  I took the step anyway. “Oh, come on,” I said. “It’s okay. I don’t blame you for hitting me. But who’s going to take care of you?”

  She smiled darkly. “Never mind,” she said. “Pretty soon quick is all over. Only one more to die makes five. Then curse of kum no hurt anybody.”

  I shook my head stubbornly. “You shouldn’t believe in that stuff,” I said, reaching for her arm. “Come on. I’ll take you home.”

  She jerked away, raised the cane and hit me again. I just stood there. She kept hitting me. I could take it a little better now. The tears in my eyes weren’t because of the beating. It was so crazy. She was trying to show that kum of hers that she didn’t like me. To protect me.

  I noticed tears streaming down her face too.

  “It’s okay, Mrs. Teska,” I said. “Honest. It’s okay.”

  She stopped and turned and walked slowly away. I let her go. Her arms hung straight down. The rubber tip of the cane dragged along the ground, a dead thing to her now.

  I guess she had the taxi waiting. I heard the door slam and the gears change and the tires screech as it took off. Then the humming sound of the tires faded and all I heard was my own breathing.

  I was shaking so hard I had to sit down. It was the first time in my life I had ever been beaten. I didn’t realize until I sat down how much a beating can take out of you. I felt as weak as a kitten. Then I started bawling like a baby.

  CHAPTER 25

  Mystery Of The Man In White

  A half hour later I was on the stone quay under Captain Billy’s castle looking down at the green water of Jonah’s Bay, about to shove off for Dead Man’s Cove in the same little white dinghy. Don’t ask me what I expected to find there this time. I couldn’t tell you. All I knew was I had to do something. Anything.

  My left arm was still there, only it didn’t feel much like an arm now. It felt like a piece of dead meat hanging there.

  I remembered what Mrs. Teska had prayed when she arrived at Captain Billy’s grave. “No take this little boy,” she had pled. “Please no take this little boy!”

  I knew now that little boy was me, number five of the people she liked. I was supposed to be next on that kum’s list!

  Maybe that was what finally decided me.

  I found, as soon as I started rowing, that I had about as much strength in my left arm as I might need to crush a marshmallow. I had to work twice as hard with my right. Naturally I couldn’t hold to a true course.

  The current was running strong, the wind coming from the southwest about five knots, a comfortable light breeze, just enough to ripple the sea. The sky was blue and the big white clouds behind me were scattered and billowy. I knew as long as they didn’t start getting together I wouldn’t have to worry about getting caught in a storm.

  It was time for the spring tides to start coming in but the water off the rocks didn’t seem high. Anyway, I didn’t expect to stay long. The trip was more in the nature of a quick reconnoitering. Just in case I’d missed anything at that cave the last time.

  I still didn’t know how I was going to navigate those five big black jagged rocks that guarded the entrance. I figured I’d worry about that when I got there.

  I’d come around the rocky promontory that encloses the cove and stayed close to it. Because of my weak left arm I’d decided to approach from a closer angle this time, and slip past the big rocks by riding the current here. There were only two left to pass when I heard the chug chug of an outboard.

  The boat heading dead for the cave was about a fifteen footer, it was coming from the opposite direction, north-northeast, on a line crossing my bow. The black lettering on its bow said Lucky Double O. The man sitting aft holding the tiller had the deep tan that you get if you follow the sea all your life. He was dressed all in white, skipper’s cap, tee shirt, and coveralls. For all I know he might have had on white socks and white sneakers.

  He stayed straight on the course for the cave. His boat handled the small waves easily and he came fast like he was late for an appointment. When he cut his motor he was about fifty yards off and coasted in.

  He didn’t see me because I’d grabbed on to the big rock guarding the west side of the entrance and held on. It was big enough to hide me and the little dinghy.

  He was less then twenty yards away when he went past and I got a good look at him. The tide was high enough now to carry him right into the cave. If my arm had been okay I might have been able to beat him into it but I was more interested in what he was doing there. Not only interested, I was practically dying of curiosity. I couldn’t see a thing from the dinghy so I lashed it to the rock. I figured if I got on top of the rock I would have a better angle. I was about to step out when a wave hit me.<
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  I had to decide in a split second whether to stay with the boat or keep going. With those great reflexes I told you I have, I kept going. All I had to do was grab for the rock and secure a good footing. As it turned out I didn’t do either.

  My bad left arm crumpled under me as I put my weight on it. I tried flinging myself forward with my right side, but my foot slipped and I grabbed the rock with my head instead. I hit that rock so hard I saw stars. Then a big blinding searchlight was turned on in my head. After that I didn’t feel a thing.

  When I came to, I felt that I had two separate heads instead of one. There was a big bump on one of them over my ear. It was wet and sticky. Water lapped around me and it was easy to figure out why all the rest of me felt so wet and cold. I was half in the water. I guess if the little boat hadn’t kept me propped up, a lot more of me would have been in the water.

  I couldn’t figure out how long I’d been knocked out, nor how much higher the water was because the rock had been wet completely to start with.

  Then I heard a resounding chug chug explode in the cave. I grabbed the rock and pulled myself up to see. The white boat came out, with the same fellow in the white outfit sitting in it.

  White paint was spattered all over his white sailing cap and coveralls. It was on his hands and streaked the tan of his face. From my better angle now I could see several paint and turp cans stowed near feet that were wearing white shoes, at that. A large tarpaulin folded near the cans was paint-spattered too, and a long-handled brush lying inside the rail, about ten feet long, had bristles that were white also.

  The man set his course for north-northeast, the wake churning in a neat curving foamy crescent as he headed out to sea.

  Though I felt weak and dizzy, I couldn’t wait to get the dinghy off the rock and let myself into it. The tide and current carried me right into the cave as if they knew exactly what I wanted. I was hardly inside the mouth before I saw why the man in the boat was wearing all that white.

  The roof of the cave was bright and shining, like the stars were out. Only instead of stars it was those big crosses and mysterious circles.

  They had all just been freshly painted. White.

  CHAPTER 26

  Mystery Of The Dope In Captain Billy’s Cave At High Tide

  I didn’t know who the man from that Lucky Double O was or why he apparently painted those symbols. I didn’t actually see him do it according to the sheriff I can’t say he did. Maybe he was hired. Maybe he liked to paint crosses and circles. Maybe he liked riding a small boat across a choppy open bay ten miles to have fun cave painting. Maybe you got some better ideas.

  Everything seemed the same. The same sequence. The same 37 circles and 18 crosses. The only thing added was the fresh white paint.

  I let the incoming tide carry me toward the head of the cave working slowly so I wouldn’t miss anything. The skeleton was still there. Nobody had painted a moustache on it.

  It was easier to see now, standing in the boat, grabbing at the slippery walls and easing inward. I got all the way back to the head of the cave. It was like a basin half full of water, the lower part slanting back sharply, reminding me somewhat of the grinning jaws of the skeleton. I looked real hard but didn’t see any new codes or riddles or secret ciphers.

  The water was slapping and the boat rocking. As I sat down I noticed I was a lot closer to the roof of the cave than I’d been a little while before. That reminded me the tide was coming in and I’d better stop all this reconnoitering and start rowing.

  I thought I could scull out but I found out different. The tide was coming in too strong for me to make any headway. I got the boat around and rowed, putting my back into it. It was like going the wrong way on a conveyor belt.

  My back was to the mouth of the cave now and my eyes fixed dead ahead on the rear slanting wall. The deep furrows of the clefts there reminded me of jaws again. With the boat rocking up and down, I had the illusion they were chewing. All of a sudden I knew why I was thinking of jaws. That tracing on the back of Captain Billy’s tombstone: Jonah Jaws.

  All I could think of was Jonah being swallowed by the whale. I didn’t want that cave to swallow me.

  I rowed harder. The water got higher. My little boat was being knocked about. I’d make some headway and then I’d be lifted and thrown for a loss. I didn’t know how high the tide rose in this cave. The upslope of the shingle at the entrance couldn’t have been more than a two-foot rise.

  I forgot about my lame dead arm, bit my lip and rowed and rowed. While putting my all into it I had a little time to wonder how I could have been such a dope as to come into this cave without checking the tide first. The moon had been full the night before so I should have known the tide would be running high.

  Among the other important things I should have known was that the breakwater of Dead Man’s Cove served as a funnel in the bay and the water had to go someplace.

  It was too bad they didn’t have the TV cameras on me because right then I was a perfect subject for that sneaky-looking Rick Battle’s “Aqua Man” series. In fact I was just as dumb as those little kids in the show I’d watched the other night with Sinbad. Where they got themselves trapped in the cave and that one brave kid, Tommy, had to swim out for help.

  I didn’t feel as brave as Tommy. I didn’t even feel like swimming. But I didn’t feel like drowning either.

  If the tide ran three hours, as it certainly could, that cave would be full of water. And old Mrs. Teska would go on thinking that kum of hers put the evil eye on me, when actually I did it to myself by being such an ignorant dope about almost everything but old houses. I went into the cave to help her but it wasn’t working out that way.

  I wished I had Sinbad along. Somehow just thinking of how strong he was and how he never gave up did something to me. I stopped complaining and finding excuses and decided I just had to fight my way out and that was all there was to it.

  The next time a wave lifted me I found a better way of moving. I put the oars down and grabbed the rock wall of the cave and just hand-hauled myself along.

  Then a strange thing happened. There was a deafening roar from the rear of the cave, like an explosion. I thought the whole roof would come down. It was a good thing I was holding on to the walls so tightly. The water seemed to rush with renewed force, lifting my boat and dashing it against the side of the cave. There was a loud churning noise like thunder. Then the water suddenly dropped. Almost a foot. Almost as if that cave suddenly decided to swallow a lot of water. If I’d heard a gulp, I’d have been sure.

  I was near the mouth when this happened. I didn’t waste any time checking but set the end of an oar against the wall and pushed off with all my strength. The oar didn’t break or splinter and suddenly I was in bright blinding sunlight and out of the cave.

  I slipped past the first big rock sentinel. I got past the second. Now I was getting good and tired as the current seemed to guess, trying to sweep me up on the big jagged rocks of the jetty, the jutting horned rim of Dead Man’s Cove.

  It was like a crazy mad dream. Every time I seemed to do something right, it worked out wrong. The wind was stronger now. It had shifted around and was at my back. There wasn’t supposed to be any strong current that close to shoal, or on the inside of a bend.

  I tried to stay as close to the jetty rocks as I could while still staying off them. I didn’t want to take any chances of being carried back into the cave again. With not much more than thirty yards to go before clearing the point, I hit a big swell the wrong way. The boat lifted and headed for the rocks. I tried to lean the other way. Then I was in the water and wondering again if this trip was really necessary.

  By this time I’d had it. I never would have thought so many different things could happen to one person on a single day. I wanted this day over and done with.

  But I still had one more surprise.

  When I came up I automatically looked at the sun. It was almost half way across. That made it between three and four o’
clock. I shook my head to clear it of water and it nearly came off. That reminded me of what rotten shape I was in, if I had to be reminded. My skull hurt, my head was throbbing, my left arm was killing me, I was soaking wet and chilled to the bone, and I couldn’t wait to get home. I had a lot to tell Sinbad.

  It wasn’t a question of swimming for my life any more. I was too close to the rocks and I’m a good swimmer. So I started to tow the dinghy. But the swells kept banging it against me and the line was too short to give me enough room for clearance so I got behind the stern and pushed, guiding it slowly, kicking a steady crawl beat, and working my way up toward the point.

  The only thing I was worried about now was breaking my foot or a toe or something against some hidden rock. I never expected to kick Mr. Snowden.

  Here’s how that happened. Kicking carefully to make sure I wasn’t pressing my luck, I alternated a scissors kick with the crawl, or flutter kick. Then I felt my foot strike something. It was hard but not as hard as a rock. I saw the water break behind me. Then this head came up slowly. Wearing a mask.

  I didn’t faint or scream. I know a skin-diving mask when I see one. Then a brown wet hand came up out of the water and flipped the goggles back.

  Mr. Snowden looked just as surprised as I guess I did. I said, “Hi.”

  He hesitated only a second. Then he said, “Hi,” too.

  I wasn’t in the mood for any big discussions about what I was doing out there with a blood-soaked skull pushing a boat. So I just waved farewell and kept on going. He didn’t try to follow me or ask any dumb questions. He just stayed there treading water.

  I reached the end of the rock jetty. I pushed the boat around the point of the cove and looked back. Mr. Snowden was still there watching me.

  I figured him being a science teacher and all, he would have enough brains not to let himself get caught in Captain Billy’s cave. Like some other dopes I could mention.