Fellow passengers relaxed in Anchorage with drinks and long conversations. Hank waited with little patience, his machinery geared for motion and his wallet almost empty. He ate sparsely, slept on an airport bench, and hitchhiked into town. The town failed to satisfy his image of Alaska despite a few rugged-looking people on the streets. The wide streets and nondescript square buildings could have been Kansas. And they all faced away from the water: he had never seen a seaport less oriented toward its waterfront. In one of the many Fourth Avenue bars he nursed a beer and watched a poker game, but failed to start more than a desultory talk with any of the bearded sourdough types. They appeared willing to talk only among themselves.
Everyone cheered when the plane bounced down on the Kodiak runway. The pilot had announced they might have to turn back, and the fog opening he found left small margin for error. Only the bases of mountains showed. The rest disappeared into fog. The growth on the slopes was thick and green. Hank checked at once with the charter service to reach his cannery on the other side of the island. Not until the ceiling lifted, since it was no emergency. The Kodiak airport was as bare as a bus stop, so he checked his bags and thumbed into town.
Kodiak was bleak and wet. People strode along the few paved streets in boots caked with mud from other roads. The main street, its wooden fronts weathered by rain, began and petered out before reaching any vestige of urban climax. There was a store with rope coils and raincoats in the window, another with guns, a grocery, a couple of eateries, several dark and noisy bars. Beyond Main, where the mud began, small wooden houses ranged up over a hill, dominated by an old white frame church with peeling blue onion domes.
The harbor was close to it all, with a wharf from which a ramp led down to floats. Several fishermen in oilskins mended nets on the wharf despite the weather. Masts rose close against each other, and men moved over the cramped decks shouting jokes and instructions. Hank stood a long time watching, hands in his pockets. Several fishermen passed him. The memory of his two previous summers crossed his mind like smoke—the ocean beaches back in Maryland, short-ordering hamburgers by day, attending beer parties on the sand at night. He thought of the bright leafy campus where he had stretched in the sun just a week ago. It all seemed vapid, compared to the nets and activity in front of him.
After two nights on benches, washing with paper towels and liquid soap in the airport restroom, he felt both unrested and sticky. His remaining cash for expenses: six dollars. Probably could wire home for more. But they had predicted disaster too heartily from the start. He glanced at the boats once more, then found a beanery.
On the griddle were slabs of salmon and steak, but he studied the menu to find the cheapest filler. “Okay, pea soup, please,” he said to the waitress, and smiled at her warmly to show that this was his preference above steak.
Her hair was grabbed in a knot in back and her expression was grim despite an interesting wide mouth. She didn’t increase her attractiveness by staring through him, or by banging the bowl hard enough to slop some of the soup onto the counter.
“Well, you squared away?” It was a red-haired guy who had also waited out the plane in Anchorage. He still wore dungarees as before (it surprised Hank that anyone would travel so informally) but the watch cap, slicker jacket, and boots indicated he had already gone home somewhere to change. He was wiry and short: probably if he had been more a conventional burly type Hank would have sought him out in hopes of meeting an Alaskan his own age headed for the same kind of work. Now he turned to him gratefully, and said he was waiting for a flight to the other side of the island.
“Hey, you got a boat over there?”
An hour earlier he would have said with more enthusiasm: “Job in a cannery.”
“Uh.” The guy turned to the steak on his plate, spearing big dripping chunks of it into his mouth. He appeared to pay Hank no more attention as he said to the waitress through his food: “Beef sauce, Jody.” She turned from a coffee urn several seats away and sailed a bottle of catsup along the counter toward him. He sailed it back. “Beefsteak sauce, not catsup.” She sent the correct bottle so hard it smacked his hand as he caught it. “Thanks, Jody. You’re sweet.” He turned to Hank and winked.
Hank cleared his throat. “I hear canneries work lots of overtime. I came up here to make the bucks.”
“Yeh, you’ll work some hours for Swede Scorden.”
“He’s the man I wrote to. You know him?”
“Just by reputation. Jody! Cup of coffee.”
“You see where it is,” she snapped in passing. The guy drew mugs of it for both himself and Hank.
Hank thought of the extra cost and tried to reject it with a stammered excuse. The cup remained midway between them. He needed more food to satisfy a hunger that had become ravenous from the odors of meat. “Could I have another soup, please?” She gave no indication she heard. He eased a basket of crackers close and ate them one by one, pretending to be absent-minded about it.
The red-haired guy turned to him again. “Well, I did that cannery gig here last summer. Never again. Going for the humpies.”
“Is humpie a fish?” asked Hank, and regretted it at once.
The guy’s laugh included the waitress, who stood with arms folded waiting for the cook to fill a plate. “Is it a fish? Oh, man, you’ll be living ass deep in humpies. They’re pinks. It’s another name for pink salmon. Then you’ve got sockeyes, dogs, silvers, and chinooks, all different kinds of salmon you’d better learn to keep straight.” He picked a last French fry from his plate and chewed it slowly.
“I guess you’ve grown up with all that, living around here.”
“Me? I’m from Spokane. Never saw Kodiak before last summer.” The waitress, in passing, left another bowl of soup. Hank started to eat it at once.
The red-haired guy rose. “Wish me luck, buddy.”
“Sure. What for?”
“Going down to find my berth.”
“You’re on a boat!”
A toothpick moved lazily in his mouth. “I will be, once I’ve asked around. You slit the fish bellies. This year I’ll do the catching.”
Hank hunched over his soup. Two in the afternoon. “Excuse me, do you have a phone?”
“Use your eyes,” said the waitress.
A phone hung on the wall by the window. With an act of busy concern he called the bush airline, to learn he’d be lucky if the present weather lifted day after tomorrow. Through the window, which had a DISHWASHER WANTED sign, he watched the encounter of two men dressed like fishermen. They were his own age, but both were weathered and confident far beyond him. Another man joined the two, and they sauntered across the street to a bar. He watched them wistfully, then returned to the counter.
Not that Hank felt sorry for himself. Just that the experience of being nearly broke in a strange place was new. He was nineteen, a sophomore, not bad-looking—heavy brown hair that tumbled into place, athletic body with a square well-drawn face to match, playful blue eyes and ready grin that he sometimes used to advantage with girls—aspirant to varsity lacrosse, content in B grades and a social life of long weekend parties and agreeable friends, his own person within a secure context. By fall he would have to decide on a major in political science or economics. Neither repelled him. Sometimes, when he read a book like On the Road or joined a rally for civil rights, he felt calls that stirred him, but to work the summer in an Alaskan cannery might be his biggest adventure before settling down. His parents, to whom he felt no need to answer even though they still paid most of his expenses as a matter of course, had thought a summer in Europe might have been better for his development, since such opportunities only come when you’re young and footloose. The secret he nursed would surprise them: to make enough money to go on his own. As he sat nursing the remains of the bowl of pea soup, it seemed a distant hope for the gamble of all that airfare. “You drinking this coffee or not?”
He looked up into her detached face. It would be at least twenty cents more, and an extra
nickel tip, even though he wanted it. “I don’t . . . The other guy got it, I don’t drink the stuff.” They stared at each other. “I don’t mind paying for it, I guess, since...”
“Your friend already paid.” She scooped up the cup and emptied it.
Outside, a chilly wind blew droplets in his face. His oxfords had absorbed enough water to wet his socks. Total cash besides airfare was now four seventy-five and some pennies. He returned to the harbor. No sign of the red-haired guy. He walked casually to a man mending net on the wharf. The thick white needle laced cord into torn sections, and under the man’s sure tugs and twists new meshes were formed. Hank watched and watched. When the man glanced up, they exchanged nods. His face was young but full of creases around the eyes.
“You sure know how to work that needle.”
“Ja? Veil, it’s the vay she’s done.”
Suddenly Hank asked, with an intensity that surprised him, “You know any boat that needs somebody?”
“Ohhh.” Pause, then “Nooo,” as if it were out of the question. Just as Hank started to leave with hands dug in his pockets, the man said, “Maybe they let you sleep in jailhouse if you broke.”
Hank wanted to rush and shake his hand. “Thanks!”
All at once he felt lighthearted, liberated. Within an hour the sergeant at the police building had told him to leave his gear, and he had been hired at the beanery to wash dishes until his plane could fly. He thumbed back to the airport, unchecked his knapsack and changed to work clothes, and returned to town. By evening he wore a smudged apron and rubber gloves, hot suds clung to his elbows, and the flavor of a steak lingered in his mouth. A half-drained can of beer stood beside him on the sink. He whistled one exuberant tune after another, as high on good feeling as if he had been given his choice of fishing berths.
Jody the waitress had begun to tolerate him. Mike the cook, who owned the place, motioned him over occasionally to try something new, like octopus or halibut cheeks. From the sink he could watch the passage of customers. Already he saw faces he recognized, including the Norwegian net-mender, with whom he exchanged grave nods.
It was eight-thirty, with closing time near, when he saw the redhaired guy slowly spooning a bowl of soup and filling it out with crackers. Hank caught his eye and motioned him back. After the preliminary joke about his new career Hank asked the important question.
“Salmon boats are on strike, and for king crab, never seen so many goddam full crews. You need a helper?”
Hank laughed in his turn as he lifted a stack of thick beanery plates from the rinse. “When my plane goes, take the whole empire.” He felt relieved, even superior, and disappointed.
The guys name was Pete Nicholson. Hank bummed something for him to eat. They swept down the place together as Jody straightened the tables. Jody remained aloof without being snappish as before. A tap came on the window and a heavy-lidded, bearded man motioned with his head, then walked into the bar across the street. Jody smiled for the first time. A few minutes later, with her coat on, she said to Hank, “Come back in the morning at six if you want to work.” She was about to leave when she turned, “You need your money tonight?”
“No,” said Hank. “Thanks anyhow.”
After Hank and Pete finished cleaning and turned off the front lights, they sat in back with their feet on a table, eating crab legs that Mike had left them and drinking the last cans from the six-pack that Hank had bought himself. The crab legs were unbelievably big. Hank had never seen anything like them before. The meat came out in tubes. A single leg yielded all he needed, but the creamy taste of the meat and warm juice made him crave more. “Our crab on the Chesapeake Bay are dwarfs compared to these,” he declared. “I don’t know which I like better, but with Bay crabs you have to eat a half dozen just to start filling your stomach.”
Pete was glad to share some of his Kodiak wisdom. “Take Jody, for instance,” he said. “Think she’d give you the time of day if you weren’t a fisherman? In this town you’re on a boat, or forget it, man.”
Hank in his turn described his previous summer and the lazy beach life. “At night, I don’t know which was thicker, mosquitoes or girls. I’d sometimes slap a chick and kiss a mosquito by mistake. Take your pick.”
“Jesus, you got in every night!”
Hank offered no contradiction, although his one nervous seduction on the blankets had been a mighty occasion. He looked at his watch. The jailer had told him to get in by eleven. When he told of his sleeping arrangements, Pete gave a hoot. He’d probably see the lockup without an appointment if he stayed around Kodiak long enough, Pete declared. Come on to the barracks instead. It seems there was a house that the owner had converted to sleeping quarters, nothing else. Some kids had cots, some spread sleeping bags on the floor. Depended on what you paid and what was available. Pete had paid twenty dollars for two weeks on a couch and the use of the kitchen and a locked closet. It was the place to flop while you looked for a boat, or if you worked in one of the canneries.
“Well, look ... I don’t have a sleeping bag, and I left my knapsack ...” The idea of spending his first night in jail appealed greatly.
But as he left Pete on the darkening street and bent alone into a cold drizzle, he began to doubt his decision. At the jail, the desk cop opened the barred door. There were several cells in a block. One was locked, and a man inside stood calmly at the bars, smoking. “What you want to do,” said the cop, “is take any one that’s open. Okay?” And the barred door clanged shut behind him.
“You’re locking me in?” asked Hank, suddenly disturbed.
“No point in a jailhouse that don’t get locked.”
“I’m supposed to go to work at six tomorrow morning. I thought I’d just be able to wake up and...”
“Oh, we’ll get you out.” The man started to stroll away, then came back. “Nobody says you got to stay. Just don’t change your mind after I’m sacked in.”
Hank looked around him dubiously. A voice crackled on the police radio around the comer, and the man looked impatiently toward it. “I guess I’ll stay. Thanks.” The man was already on his way. “You’re sure I can get out by six?” No answer.
Hank went to the far cell, avoiding the gaze of the single prisoner, which he was sure followed him. The cell had a toilet bowl without a seat, a washbasin, and tiered steel cots that lowered from the wall. No mattress or bedding, no chair. There were smells of both urine and disinfectant. He glanced at the prisoner, who was indeed watching him. A big, rough-looking fellow. “Hi,” said Hank cautiously.
“Yep.”
Hank laid coat, sweaters, long underwear along the steel cot as padding. No way to block out the bare bulb lights except with a sleeve over his eyes. As he lay back waiting for sleep, the smells became stronger. He placed a loose leg of underwear across his nose.
“Guess you didn’t bring no bottle?”
“No, sorry.”
“What are you, broke?”
“Yes, until I get paid.”
“Shit but I need a drink. You sure you don’t have some in that bag?”
“I’d sure give it to you if I had.”
“Then get over here and let me beat your ass at two-hand.”
“I ought to sleep. And I don’t have any money.”
“You afraid to play with matchsticks?”
What the hell. Soon Hank sat crosslegged on the low bunk of the adjacent cell, passing cards back and forth through the bars. The big man’s name was Steve Kariguk. He was doing three days for disorderly, and he had enough cuts and bruises around his face to prove the fight had been a good one, although he couldn’t remember the reason any more. Hank watched Steve’s pawlike hands with bright scabs on the knuckles, dealing the cards. Hard to believe how recently he had spent the night in his parents’ house four thousand miles away.
And harder to believe as the night progressed. The desk man and another cop brought in a pair with lumps and blood-streaming noses. Steve addressed them all by first name, includ
ing the desk cop, and directed that his buddy Ivan be placed with him, and Chip be put in number three cell “since Hank here’s got number four, and we got a game in two.” The cops were willing enough. Their main interest was how badly Steve was taking Hank at cards. The two new prisoners roared insults at each other, accompanied by exuberant goading from Steve. When Chip started to vomit, his face pressed against the bars, Hank found himself serving as mop and bucket man.
The game and noise subsided around three in the morning. At five, the desk cop shook Hank awake. Chip sprawled snoring on the floor in the adjacent cell, and Steve and Ivan lay in their bunks with arms and legs dangling. “What you want to do before you go is, grab your mop again and give this whole place a good soogie. Be sure the waters hot, and put in plenty ammonia. Yell when you’re through.” And the barred door clanged shut again.
Hank cursed to himself as he worked, but it lacked venom. Kodiak was okay. Did he really want to fly off to some deserted cannery for the summer?
CHAPTER 3
Whale Pass
TWO days later, Hank almost made it across the island. The little plane flew over a wilderness of green mountains out by blue finger-like bays. The valleys they passed were filled higher and higher with fog, until fog covered all but snatches of bare rocks on the high mountaintops. “Not going to land in this,” declared the pilot, and returned to Kodiak. Hank shouldered his gear with no great distress and walked whistling to the barracks, where he had joined Pete after the night in jail. Danny was the only one in the main room, sitting on the floor amid jumbled clothes and sleeping bags as he plunked a guitar.
“Didn’t make it? Pull a brew off the porch and bring me one too.”
Hank complied. “Did Pete take my job?”
Danny strummed a few notes. “May be. Said he’d do anything to more cannery.”
At the beanery, Jody raised an eyebrow. “Couldn’t stay away?” She was becoming actually tolerable, considering this along with “Take care of yourself’ when he’d thought he was saying goodbye the night before.
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