“I guess it’s just a matter of taste. I suspect some people have never eaten a real soft crab, only papershells. Papershells are crisper and sometimes pretty chewy, like nibbling on fried patent leather.”
“Yuck!”
“Well, in texture only. They still taste like crabs, not like plastic. But a true softie is a delight to eat. A delight to your tongue. No worry about getting any papershell splinters.”
“Fred, you know what?” asked Charles.
“What?”
“You’re really a weird gourmet,” said Charles with a grin.
“Probably. I just know what tastes good to me,” said Fred with an even wider grin. “Anyway, I wouldn’t talk about weird gourmets. I remember someone who ate cicadas dipped in chocolate.” He reminded Charles of the “Cicada Sunrise” stand he and Max had opened last summer, featuring cicadas fried, baked and even dipped in chocolate.
“I really got sick of cicadas—even chocolate-dipped ones,” said Charles with a frown.
“So don’t talk to me about my strange gourmet eating habits,” Fred said. “Ok, I better get this little guy back on ice.” Fred handed the net over to Charles. “Then I better help Max look at those strings. Check to see if we have any nibbles on our bait.” He started wading back with the softie in his hand and a little sea grass to keep it cool.
“Why not just put him in the basket I have tied to me?” asked Charles.
“Because if he stays in seawater, he’ll harden up completely until he’s not fit as a softie anymore. And he’s no good as a hard crab either because he’ll have burned up all his fat supply.”
“Huh?”
“Before a crab becomes a buster, he stores up lots of fat because when he’s soft or a papershell, he can’t eat. If you get a crab like this and he becomes a hardshell, you might as well throw him back.”
“You sure know a lot about crabs, Fred,” said Charles.
“Comes with the living, I guess,” said Fred, heading back to the shore.
“Max,” he called, not seeing the boy by the bulkhead.
“Over here,” called Max. “I’m visiting Cinderella.” Max was lying on his stomach looking in through the slats in the basket.
“See her?” asked Fred as he walked by.
“Yep. I’m eyeball to eyeball with her. What big eyes you have, me dear. Yellow eyes, how weird. She’s trying to stare me down,” he said to Fred.
“Just so she doesn’t give you a nose job,” said Fred, opening the cooler.
“What are you doing?” asked Max, looking away from the basket and the beautiful turtle princess it held.
“Putting this softie in the cooler. But I need some paper bags or something to put on top of the ice. I don’t want to put the crab directly on the ice that we may be using later for sodas.”
“Fred, you say the most disgusting things!” said Max, getting up and brushing the sand off of himself.
“Just trying to let you boys experience the whole world of crabbing,” said Fred. He placed a bag on top of the ice, the softie on top of the bag, some sea grass on top of the softie, then closed the cooler.
“Thanks,” said Max.
“Ok, so how are things on the lines?” asked Fred.
“In the world of necks and feet. In the places of grease and stink,” rhymed Max.
“Very poetic,” quipped Fred.
“Yes, yes, a touch of the poet, so to speak,” grinned Max. “Only thing is, this poet hasn’t touched the lines yet to see if the crabs are nibbling in perfect iambic pentameter…”
“Or AA/BB/CC/DD/EE rhymes?” said Fred.
“Ahhh, no rhymed couplets do I feel,” continued Max, playing off of Fred’s language arts routine, a blend of nonsense and learning that sometimes happens when your stepfather is an English professor.
“Grab ye the net, Shakespeare, and let us wander over to yonder bulkhead to check for the slightest gentle impulse of fin, a quiver of claw, or a…”
“Ok, ok, ok, enough of this ‘rot’,” laughed Max. “Let’s go.”
“Great! I give you the fine speech of Elizabethan England and you throw back a bit of Dickens dialect. I should call you Oliver,” laughed Fred.
“If you do, I might be tempted to call you Fagin.”
“Just so long as you don’t cast me as that villain Bill Sikes,” added Fred.
They were at the line now. Five long strings tied to the bulkhead and slipping down into the water like fallen clotheslines. Small waves made them vibrate softly.
“How do you know when a crab is there?” asked Max.
“You can feel him knocking against the string—like a fish when he’s nibbling at bait on a hook. A slight nudging. Let’s see if we can find anybody at home. I’ll let you feel in a minute.” He gently took a line in his hand, then he was silent, letting the string rest across his palm. “Nope, nobody there. Let’s try this one next.” He walked over to the next string and took it as he had done the first.
“Anybody there?” asked Max.
“Nope.”
“Well, number three could be the lucky one,” said Max, following Fred over to the third string.
“So they say,” said Fred. “But of course it depends on who it is who’s trying to be lucky.”
“Huh?”
“Well, lucky for you if there’s a crab on the line. Not so lucky for the crab if I catch him,” said Fred.
“The key word in that last statement, folks”—said Max in his best game show host voice—“is if!”
“Well, it will be more a battle of wits if it’s me hauling him in than you,” teased Fred. He took the line carefully in his hand and listened. “Uh oh!”
“What?” said Max, hurrying closer to Fred’s side.
“We have a customer.”
“We do?”
“Yep.”
“Great,” whispered Max. “Now what?”
“The net.”
“The net?”
“Yep.”
“Oh, gosh.”
“Why, where is it?” said Fred, glancing over at Max.
“It’s back at the truck.”
“Well, it’s not going to help us bring in blue fins over there,” said Fred. “Hurry up and get it while I try not to spook him away.”
“Sorry, Fred,” called Max over his shoulder as he ran to get the net.
“That’s ok, just hurry, there’s no telling how long the bait will last.”
Max flew to the truck and back again.
Charles looked up from his underwater exploration just in time to see Max’s mad dash.
“What’s up?” he called.
“Possibly dinner!” yelled Max.
“Great. Hope it’s fatter than the one I hauled in,” quipped Charles.
“That would be nice.”
Max arrived, out of breath. “Is…he…still there?”
“Yep, want to feel?” asked Fred, holding the line out toward Max.
“Think there’s still time?”
“Maybe a second, if you’re fast.”
Max carefully took the line from Fred. He rested it across his palm, as he had seen Fred do.
“Wow! I can feel him. Boy, is he vicious. He’s really going after that chicken bait.”
“Yeah, hungry,” said Fred.
“Kind of like a fish, just like you said.”
“But a fish nibbles politely. A crab pulls and yanks and is much more demanding,” said Fred.
“Now what?”
“Now, the hard part: bringing him up without his knowing it. We have to ease the line ever so gently as if the tide were moving it. Up, up and as soon as we have him where we can see him, then we get the net under and scoop.” Fred continued to slowly pull the line up.
“What’s that?” asked Max suddenly as a white-gray-pink jelly mess came up with the line.
“Jellyfish. Have to watch out for them, they sting a little. One of the hazards of crabbing or swimming in these waters.” Fred continued to pull and the jellyfi
sh dribbled off the line like egg white, gooily dripping into the water.
“Yuck!”
“Yep.” Fred pulled on the line. Suddenly he stopped. “Look, can you see?” He tilted his head toward the line.
“The crab! Huge!” whispered Max.
“Actually, two crabs and they’re battling over the bait. That may be to our advantage. They’ll be so busy trying to keep the chicken away from each other that they won’t notice the net—maybe. Here, you hold the line. Don’t pull it. I think I can dip them in just the way it stands right how.”
“Think so?”
“We can hope,” said Fred as he shifted the line into Max’s hands and took the net.
The net had a long wooden handle, maybe six feet long. At the end, the net itself was a loop of wire about nine or ten inches in diameter with white string tied in two-inch squares. It was heavy and awkward, but Fred handled it as if it were the size of a tennis racket: his movements were quiet and controlled.
Fred slowly eased the net into the water until it was about a foot from the crabs. He was careful to keep his shadow and the shadow of the net away from the crabs. He didn’t want to spook them.
“Ready!” said Fred. “Just keep the line as you have it.”
“Ok,” said Max.
Fred quickly scooped the net under the crabs, slicing the water with hardly any splash. Then up, up he lifted them with the chicken caught in their claws. The crabs crawled frantically, their claws attaching themselves to anything that came near them. They grabbed at each other, they held onto the chicken and scrambled to escape, but Fred kept bouncing the net, jerking them back deeper into the snarling mesh of string and farther away from freedom.
“Wow, look how huge they are,” yelled Max.
“Yeah, I think we have two keepers,” said Fred with a slow smile. He carried the net away from the water and up onto the small beach. “Now, the tricky part will be getting them out without losing claws or getting nipped.”
Max looked at the crabs for a minute. They were now firmly grasped to the wires and completed enmeshed in the net. “I’m not putting my hands in there on a bet.”
“No, I’d never suggest that,” said Fred.
“We brought tongs, how about them?”
“We could, but let’s try another way. My experience with tongs has always been to end up with their teeth caught up in the mesh net, too.”
“So how…”
“Let’s take them up on shore a bit further, safely away from the water. These little guys can really hustle when they want to.”
Fred carried the net and crabs up to where the long, wild grasses grew along the shore.
“Ok, now let’s turn the net inside out on them.” He turned the net over as he spoke. The crabs were now free to fall out onto the sand…only they didn’t. Like kittens balled up in yarn, they were firmly caught, claws clinging tightly and all their fins sticking out through the holes in the net.
“Caught like flies in a spider’s web, aren’t they,” said Fred.
“What a mess.” Max shook his head. “How do we get them out?”
“Well, we could take them back to the water. As soon as their little fins feel the salty Bay, they’d plop in, but we’d have a bit of trouble catching them again. Sometimes shaking helps.” Fred shook the net. The crabs clung even tighter. “Then again, sometimes we need to carefully unlace them. Here, hold the handle, while I do the dirty work. If I get nipped, well, my fingers are tougher than yours.”
Max took the handle of the net and slowly, carefully Fred began to pull the string of the net free from each claw and fin. The crabs looked on with wild eyes, their long tentacles moving back and forth. They kept their strong hold on the rim of the net.
“There,” said Fred after a few moments. “Nothing between them and a short free fall down to the ground. All they have to do is let go.”
“But they won’t,” said Max, looking at the two fierce warriors.
“So they need a little encouragement,” said Fred. He took the handle of the net from Max and began to shake it.
“Look! He’s losing it!” exclaimed Max, as one crab let go, hung claw to claw to the other, dangling free from the net. Still, the other crab held onto the wire rim.
“Boy, what a fighter!” exclaimed Fred. He shook the net with all his 180-pound might and suddenly the crab gave up. Still clinging to the other, both fell. On impact, they immediately let go and started to scurry, in opposite directions but both toward the water. Fred and Max were faster. Their tennis shoes gently coming down on top of the greenish-brown, diamond-shaped shells, and stopping the freedom-fighting crustaceans from obtaining their ultimate goal.
“Wow!” said Max.
“Real sport!” said Fred, breathless from the shaking.
“Now what?” asked Max, looking down to his foot where a crab was slowly continuing to struggle.
“Pick him up, of course,” said Fred, with another one of his slow smiles.
“Sure!”
“Well, you can’t stay like that forever.”
“But how do I pick him up?”
“You could try with your hands, but it is safer with the tongs,” said Fred.
“Oh, sure,” said Max. “And how are we supposed to angle down and use the tongs when their handles are almost two feet long?”
“Want to try?” asked Fred.
“For the sake of education, sure, but it’s a course I’ll flunk,” said Max, taking the tongs which, fortunately, were close by. He tried to open and maneuver them just so between his legs, but as he had suspected, the angle was all off and he couldn’t get their open claws anywhere near to his foot and the captured crab.
“Ok, before you crunch him, let me have the tongs,” said Fred.
“Gladly,” said Max, handing them over.
Fred eased the tongs open and reached over to Max’s shoe. “Ok, when I say ‘lift,’ pick your foot up and I’ll nab him,” said Fred.
He positioned the tongs, open like a scoop on a bulldozer and aimed right for Max’s foot.
“Ready, set, lift!”
Max lifted his foot and Fred scooped the crab. With legs dangling and claws open, ready to take hold of a new target, the crab was lifted into the air.
“Go get the basket,” said Fred.
Max ran and retrieved the basket. Fred let the tongs open, only a few inches from the bottom of the basket, and the crab fell noisily in. The scrape of shell on worn wood made a soft sound, like autumn leaves when they skip on cement pavement. On impact, the crab scurried to the side of the basket with claws up like a boxer and eyes staring at the enemy.
“You want me to catch the one that’s under your foot?” asked Max.
“Do you think you can?” asked Fred.
“I’d like to try,” said Max.
“Then go for it,” encouraged Fred.
Carefully, Max did as Fred had done, positioning the tongs, claws open and ready to scoop. On command, Fred lifted his foot. The free crab began to sashay away, only to be caught in the tongs and held high into the air, then back down, a slight drop, and into the basket. Immediately, the two warrior crustaceans were after each other in a scrambling battle, as if each were blaming the other for “the fine fix you’ve gotten us into now!”
“Good show!” said Fred, patting Max on the back.
“If I were to say, ‘Oh, it weren’t nothing,’ that would be a lie,” said Max.
“Bad grammar, too,” quipped Fred.
“Yep!” laughed Max.
“So, that’s how it’s done when crabbing by the chicken neck and line method,” said Fred.
“Real work, but real sport, too,” said Max.
“Yes, you’re up against a very wily creature when attempting to catch a blue fin.”
“Not like a dumb fish who takes a bit of bait and runs with it. With the crab, it’s more like a battle of wits.”
“So they say,” said Fred.
“Hey Fred! Hey Max! You got to see
what I see!” yelled Charles. “There must be six crabs playing ring-a-around-the-rosy over here, just like the 12 that Ham said he saw! What do I do?”
“Scoop up as many as you can. Zero in. Concentrate!” yelled Fred.
“Here goes!” shouted Charles.
A tremendous splash, down went Charles, up went the net, and clinging, scrambling, falling out came crab after crab.
“Oh! Oh! Oh!” yelled Charles.
“Try to hang on to at least one of them!”
“Oh! Oh! Oh!” yelled Charles. “Darn! Darn! Beaver dam!” He came up soaked.
“Get any?” yelled Max.
“Two!” Charles shouted back.
“That’s good. Great job!” laughed Fred. “Come on in and take a breather. Drink a Coke and relax. You’ve just played ring-around-the-rosy with six crabs, and even though you only caught two, you’re a winner!”
The wet but smiling Charles waded back to shore, with eel grass hanging from his left ear, down his shoulder and even snarling through the belt loops on his shorts.
It was time for a break. They had caught four hard crabs and a soft one and only an hour had passed!
CHAPTER 7
“FIVE O’CLOCK,” yelled Fred. “Quitting time.”
They had managed to catch two dozen hard crabs. They had found another softie and two papershells soft enough to be keepers. The turtle, Cinderella, was still angry and healthy, snapping whenever they looked in on her, lunging at them with all her gray weight. Both boys were as salty as pretzels and nobody wanted to be downwind from a very sweaty Fred.
A successful day.
“Now,” said Fred, after crabs, equipment, Cinderella, and boys were all arranged in their appropriate or chosen spots. “Suppose we tour the island a little bit more, go back to Vienna, check into our night’s lodging, then get a bite to eat?”
“Where are we going to stay in Vienna? I didn’t see a motel there,” said Max.
“We’ll be staying in an inn called the Vienna Inn. It’s the best that the town has to offer,” said Fred with a smile. “Your mother and I stayed there while we were on our honeymoon. Great little place, plenty of atmosphere,” he continued in a dreamy sort of voice.
“Romantic and all that stuff, yuck!” cringed Charles.
“Romantic, yes, but I think you guys will like it,” said Fred.
The Great Snapping Turtle Adventure Page 4