Highiliners

by William B. McCloskey Jr.

  Under Ivan’s hosing, the high mound of shrimp was leveled to an even layer over the entire deck, and the mud (which Steve said was green from all the shrimp eggs) had been washed through the scuppers. Steve shoveled through the mass to open a space around a hatch cover. He opened it, slid down through the opening, and beckoned Hank to follow.

  Hank eased through the hole just as a sea broke over the side to wash his face with shrimp and to trickle a volley of cold water down his neck. As his feet landed in ice chips and his head disappeared, Ivan above clanged down the hatch cover and bolted it tight. Hank felt entombed in the sudden dark. The boat continued to roll, and the stuffy air smelled of old seafood and ammonia. He crouched on the ice, unsure where to go as his seasickness returned.

  “Bulb must be broke,” muttered Steve from a distance.

  “Okay to puke on the ice?”

  “You ain’t over that yet? Help yourself. Here, I got her.” A dim light flicked on to show a series of boarded stalls like a horse bam. Steve removed his oilskin jacket and draped it on one of the boards, then pounded overhead with the handle of his shovel. Ivan opened another hatch, which appeared to be close enough against the housing to avoid seawash. “This here’s the good job,” said Steve. “Gets you in from the cold and wet.” The ice was piled high in the center stalls. Steve dug into it to spread some under the hatch. With the scrape of Ivan’s shovel, shrimp started pouring down. Steve layered the ice on top of them steadily. After Hank had vomited he jumped down and helped. Step by step the work appeared easy, but as the shrimp pile mounted it was necessary to hold full shovel loads of ice at head height and throw the contents so that it scattered to the far corners of the bin. When they finished he was panting, his arms ached, and he was ready to rest. But by the time they crawled topside, the next load was ready to be brought aboard.

  When the new shrimp were ready to be hosed, Hank stationed himself to grab the pressure hose when Ivan left to turn it on. The thick tube suddenly stiffened with a hundred-pound weight of seawater and began to beat like an angry creature. As Hank wrapped his arms around it to keep control the boat rolled, and he slid helplessly through ice and slippery shrimp from port to starboard and back again. Jones and Steve stopped to laugh, but Ivan declared gravely, “You got to stay sober to handle the hose.” He himself maneuvered the heavy water flow as if it came from a garden hose.

  There was now no letup in the work, while the weather grew worse. Hank began to regard with apprehension the thickness of each cod end as it came aboard and to wonder when they would stop. Most of it was bull work, with none of the exhilaration that he remembered from seining on the Rondelay. Yet the four-day trip wore its course quickly. Jones and Steve did not ignore his needs as it first appeared they might, but gradually worked him in on the gear until he took Steve’s place for entire sets while Steve stood aside and coached. Even the possessive Ivan volunteered his hose and showed him how to handle its inflexible weight to distribute the shrimp with successive volleys of water. After the seasickness wore off, Jones kept him in the wheelhouse for entire sets to show him how to handle the boat. By the time they docked in Kodiak he had his sealegs, and shrimping was less of a mystery.

  CHAPTER 15

  Norwegian Steam

  BY THE third trip, Hank had toughed in. His muscles stopped jumping and agonizing at night, the cold penetrated less deeply, and he he could skitter across deck without losing his balance.

  Mistakes were the sobering problem. It came to a head toward the end of a rough and icy day, when he lost track of the order of gear and snapped a hook onto the wrong line. But for Ivan’s indignant shout and lunge to grab them back, the bobbins would have dropped overboard and been lost. Soon after, Hank placed himself in front rather than behind the cables he was attaching between the net and the door. Steve saw the error seconds before the cable would have swept him into the water. Finally, he failed during the rush of hauling the bag aboard to secure a swinging chain. It slapped across his face, knocking him dizzy, and left a line of welts from forehead to chin. Jones summoned him to the wheelhouse.

  “Hank, there’s enough happens out there that you can’t predict. Luck don’t leave room for stupid things.”

  Hank forced a laugh. “Won’t happen again. Be my own ass if it does. I’d better get back out there.”

  “Fishing’s teamwork, and wintertime most of all. If you lose an arm you’ll go run a business. Steve and Ivan’s arms are all those fellows have.”

  Hank stared at the rolling water until he could find his voice. “I’ll shovel for the rest of the trip. Then I’ll go my way.”

  “No, Steve and me, we’re going to teach you, if that’s what you want.”

  “I couldn’t live with it, to injure one of you.”

  “Then keep your wits about you.” A silence. “Think her through. Don’t everybody need to be a fisherman. No disgrace in doing something else, you know.”

  Suddenly Jones started to curse. Ahead loomed the huge dark shapes of fishing ships, their sterns truncated to serve as trawl ramps. The two other Kodiak shrimpers within view bobbed like toys, a tenth the size of the steady ships. “Fuckin’ Russians back again, six weeks earlier than last year!” He grabbed the radiophone and started talking angrily with the other skippers, and then trying to reach the Coast Guard or the National Fisheries Service. “Bastards take the whole of our trip in one haul. After a few days there’s nothing left but mop-up. What the fuck do we pay a government for if it don’t protect us?” The voices of the other skippers sputtered over the radio with equal fury and frustration.

  Next day, as Hank worked his share of gear with scrupulous care, the others wasted themselves in cursing the Russian ships. By coincidence, or by cause and effect, the volume of haul indeed dropped. A grim mood settled over the Adele H and over the fleet in general.

  Hank was hosing down at the end of the day while Ivan and Steve each secured an individual door and Jones operated the hydraulics. Suddenly there was a cracking bang, an object shot past, and Ivan’s door clanged loose against the side. The double block raising the seven-hundred-pound door to its gallows had snagged under pressure and shattered without warning, sending shards of wood in all directions. Ivan fell to deck clutching his head.

  Jones throttled full bore for town, several hours away, while he radioed for help or medical advice. Steve and Hank carried the unconscious Ivan to his bunk, then secured the dangerously swinging door as best they could as the boat beat through the water. A wave over the side quickly washed the deck of Ivan s blood.

  The Coast Guard Rescue Center sent a helicopter. As the basket with Ivan tied in swung up under the chopping blades, Steve said in a choked voice, “We ain’t going to fish any more this trip, are we, Boss?”

  “Hell, no, we’re following Ivan.”

  They arrived back in harbor past one in the morning and tied at the cannery. Adele waited for them with the pickup, her hair lumpy with curlers beneath a scarf. Hank had never seen her so upset, even when the earthquake had ruined her house. She clutched Jones, and lay her head on his shoulder. “Oh, Daddy. I knew one of you boys would get hurt some day, and every night I pray it won’t be ..She reached out a free hand to pat Steve’s arm.

  “What about Ivan?” asked Jones gruffly.

  “They won’t tell me. When the Coast Guard phoned I went straight to the hospital. They said he’s alive, but they wouldn’t..Her voice broke.

  They raced to the hospital. A nurse told them to come back at ten in the morning. She made the mistake of giving them the room number, and the four of them stormed along the single corridor until they found Ivan. He was asleep, tucked under white sheets, his hairy chest strangely naked without the layers of worn fishing clothes over the gray long johns. Hank marveled at the awful limpness of his muscular arms. A bandage covered half his face, but the other half looked exactly like Ivan, and the snore was certainly Ivan’s.

  “He’ll make it,” Jones declared.

  Both Steve and Adele
accepted his word, and relaxed visibly. But: “I’m staying with him,” Steve declared.

  By this time the two other occupants of the room had begun to stir. The nurse turned off the light again and ordered them out.

  “I ain’t going,” said Steve. “What if he wakes up and wants to tear the place apart? Somebody might hurt him.” Jones used his authority and Steve followed, protesting with outstretched hands: “Boss, them doctors would just as soon cut off his leg.”

  They all drove to the house. Adele brought out a bottle of Scotch, said that at three in the morning it didn’t matter about ice, then took the first swig herself and handed the bottle to Steve. Their talk was a continuation of the shared experience of danger, with Adele a participant. Hank had thought little until that night of the waiting role played by a fisherman’s wife. It was still dark at seven in the morning when Steve and Hank returned to the boat. The cannery crew had begun automatically to unload their catch.

  “I see you lucked out,” said one of the men in shrimp-splattered rain suits who was climbing from the hold. It was the burly kid he had met in the bar with Jody.

  “Not sure what kind of luck at this point,” said Hank, and explained the circumstances.

  “Anything’s luck after you’ve been on the beach since Christmas.” “Still in that sleeping bag at the empty cannery?”

  The kid nodded. “You don’t have to tell any fishermen you saw me here. They might think I’ve given up on the boats.”

  Steve fixed coffee and declared it wasn’t worth sleeping when they could see Ivan at ten. “You think he’ll be all right, Hank?”

  “Sure he will.” Hank dozed to the clamor of the cannery crew. If such an accident could happen to Ivan, then he, in his turn, sooner or later...

  Ivan was too sturdy to be killed by a splintered block, although the doctor said he had a dent in his skull that would have done in most men.

  “Yeah,” said Ivan, scratching where the bandages permitted, “Now gimme my pants. Those Russian bastards going to take all the shrimp if we don’t get back out fast.” The doctor said he had to stay in bed for a week. When Ivan started to roar his objections, the doctor had his clothes removed from the room and said he’d tell the orderlies to tie him if he didn’t calm down.

  The threat visibly frightened Ivan. He gave a pleading look to Jones and Steve.

  “You hear that,” said Steve, advancing to take his place by Ivan. “They’d as lief cut his leg. I told you.”

  Adele assured them both that she would visit every day, and that she would have the Coast Guard radio them at sea if anything went wrong.

  “You’re going fishing without me?”

  “Hank’ll just take it until you get your rest,” said Jones.

  They left him wide-eyed and miserable. Steve was no happier. “Goodbye, buddy. We’ll be back soon, don’t worry.”

  “It’s dangerous out there,” said Ivan. “Steve, you be careful without me. Watch you don’t get in the way of them doors.”

  At least for Hank it was a trip in his own right, with a crew share paid. Through the enforced responsibility he learned to handle his portion of the gear more smoothly than before. Steve, however, turned testy and unreasonable. He must have felt that his loyalty to Ivan demanded it. At the end of the trip, Ivan was waiting on the dock: the doctor had given up trying to keep him in bed. The bandage on his head was smaller, with the cleanness of fresh application. Adele had laundered all his clothes. Otherwise, it was Ivan as before. Steve and Jones made much of greeting him. He returned aboard with dignity, his eyes darting to find any signs of change. Hank had left his watch cap on the foot of Ivan s bunk. Ivan threw it to the deck. “You taking over my goddam bunk? You scratch your name yet in my deck hose?” Steve reassured him like a mother hen.

  Later, Hank told Jones lightly that he guessed it was time to stick it out on the beach and find his own berth. Jones’ apparent relief hurt him, as had Steve’s attitude during the week. He even remembered that when Adele had met them the night of Ivan’s injury she had embraced Jones and patted Steve’s arm, fretting for their safety, but had paid no attention to him. He was an outsider, after all.

  Jones escorted him around the floats and introduced him to other skippers with: “This here’s a good man. You’ll find he pulls his weight.” Hank tried to recall the names of the boats he had promised the kid in the bar to leave alone. However, being realistic after several weeks, he followed where Jones led. Most of the skippers told Hank to drop by for mug-up whenever he saw them in port, but none had openings.

  It was snowing as the Adele H passed the breakwater, and a northeaster kicked forty or fifty knots. A hard trip ahead, but he felt desolate to see Jones Henry’s boat leave without him. When he had cast off their lines, both Jones and Steve wished him luck, but then neither looked back. The snow finally blurred Steve’s and Ivan’s glistening rain gear as they stowed the lines and fenders, and a few minutes later the boat itself blended into the wall of whiteness.

  He could find no graceful way to leave the Henrys’ house. Jones had insisted he stay, and Adele made it plain her feelings would be hurt if he left. He wished for the scruffy freedom of the old days again. It was difficult to be casual about meals with Adele so that he might be free to accept spontaneous hospitality aboard the boats. With someone appreciative to cook for, she wanted to prepare gourmet lunches, and dinners with wine. And, even though she was bright and intelligent, she talked incessantly of politics and art. His mind was turned to the boats.

  If he could not be at sea, he thirsted at least to spend his time in galleys with other fishermen.

  Others on the beach also visited the boats—not only Seth O’Malley, whose name he soon remembered. He was, after all, only part of a small, hungry coterie. Most crews tolerated them to draw coffee and sit at the galley table, and sometimes they were offered food. Collectively they stuck together, nursing beers at night around a table in one of the taverns and conversing in monosyllables. But each had a gaze that wandered individually for the appearance of some skipper back in port, and each tried to elude the others in visiting the boats first.

  After a week, Hank found work in a shrimp cannery. His twelve-hour days were spent standing beside a conveyor belt, picking the hundreds of candlefish from the thousands of shrimp that passed. Once at coffee break he said lightly to the foreman, a man no older than himself: “Hey, I’m going nuts on that belt. How about letting me unload boats?” “You’ve got a very important job. Keep at it.”

  At coffee and lunch breaks he raced the docks to maintain his contacts with boats and skippers. The foreman warned him twice about returning to the line late, and the third time fired him. Hank phoned Adele that he had to work late, and spent the rest of the day and evening hunched in the dark corner of a bar.

  Maybe, indeed, he had passed in education and experience beyond the life he thought he wanted. Maybe, in fact, he didn’t want to spend his life in a wet, cold, unsophisticated town, courting certain discomfort and probable injury.

  Yet, whenever he saw one of the boats pass through the breakwater and start bucking the seas, he felt sick with longing to be aboard.

  Then one night at a bar he met Nels Hanson. His shrimper Delta was tied in Port Bailey with a minor breakdown, and one of his crewmen had quit. Hank listened with growing excitement, his gaze darting to make sure none of the others on the beach might see and try to horn in.

  Nels was squat and muscular, about fifty, a man with a steady look, no smile, and little talk beyond the facts. His hands on the bar were big and scarred, with black in the creases and under the nails.

  “Matter of fact,” said Hank, “I’m looking for a boat myself.”

  “Let’s see your hands.” Fortunately the shrimp picking had not yet softened the callouses. Nels thumped Hank’s chest and arms, then 1S drank the shot in front of him and ordered another. After a while: “If you want to come, I give a ten percent crew share. You foot a third of the grub and fuel.”


  Jones Henry paid nineteen percent and had absorbed the fuel costs into the boat share. Hank debated bargaining for more, but thought of Seth and the others. “Okay.”

  Nels’ hand sealed it with a shake that slowly squeezed Hanks hand to the crushing point. “Bring your gear to the plane ramp tomorrow at first light.”

  Hank was waiting next morning when Nels appeared, a cigar in his mouth, just as the gray daylight had begun to delineate the colors of buoys and plane wings. Nels seemed even heavier and more squat than the night before in the bulky wool jacket he wore, and his thick wool cap smoothed his head into the size and shape of a basketball.

  “Morning, boss,” said Haníc tentatively.

  Nels regarded him through a swirl of cigar smoke. His eyes reached the level of Hank’s chin, but he stood far enough distant that he did not appear to be looking up. “You got a buddy? I need two crewmen this morning.”

  Hank raced across the harbor and along the gravel cannery road. His first guess was correct: Seth was down in a shrimp hold, unloading. He listened to what Hank said, jammed his shovel into the ice, climbed to the wharf, peeled his cannery skins, and told the foreman, “I quit.” At the closed-down cannery where he slept, his knapsack and sleeping bag were hidden behind a stack of cartons, packed. He scribbled a note to the watchman, and off they went.

  “You didn’t give me a chance to explain,” said Hank. “This skipper only pays a ten percent crew share, and I think most two-man shrimp crews get nineteen.”

  “And one guy I know gets five, and all I’ve gotten so far is grub for the three trips I’ve made.” Seth stopped and held out his hand. “I appreciate this, man.” In shaking, he locked thumbs with Hank instead of pressing his palm.

  Nels questioned Seth about his experience, felt his muscles, and examined his hands. “Three trips for grub since Christmas, that’s all, uh? Give you eight percent crew share, you pay a third of expenses.”