"Who're you trying to convince, me or yourself?" he joked. Little did he know how close to the truth he was.
"When can you come for a visit? I'm lonely, and I miss you." Oh, boy, did that sound needy, so I added, "And I have bologna." One of the things Jenks says he loves about me is my bullheaded independence. Okay, maybe not the bullheaded part so much.
"You're worrying me, Hetta. What's wrong? Are you sick? Po Thang okay? You need bail money again?"
I laughed, relieved that I could. "Nope, not sick and not in jail. But I do have a lovesick hound on my hands," I said, hoping to change direction, lighten the chat before I said something like, "And there is this handsome Scot next to me at the marina who plays bagpipes and calls me Lass, and you're not here and I'm so lonely I'm tempted to jump his haggis."
During the rest of our twenty minute call, I recounted the story of Bubbles, me finding a sailboat adrift, and the Navy meeting me to take the boat off my hands. I skipped admitting to my iffy docking technique—no harm no foul, right? By the time I hung up, I felt much, much better.
And, there was icing on the cake; my call to Jan set in motion a diversionary tactic to keep me away from any possible hanky-panky. She'd be on my boat by late afternoon, all five-foot eleven inches of blonde haired, blue-eyed, man-killer.
If anyone can put a tilt in a Scotsman's kilt, it is she.
Jan arrived in time for cocktail hour, which in the past was a precursor to way too much alcohol over several hours. We had, however, come to the conclusion that we should try using adult beverages, like, say, adults. Hey, it could happen.
We took our drinks out on deck and she asked, "So, what's the big deal that had me driving six hours to get here?"
"Uh, oysters."
"Say what?"
"I got you oysters and you gotta eat 'em, because I took them out of the water and put them in the fridge yesterday."
She narrowed her eyes. "And this you consider an emergency?"
"You like them, I found them, and now both you and they are here."
She looked doubtful, but asked, "Hookay, then. What kind are they?"
"Ones with shells?"
"One would hope. Okay, let's see these treasures you dragged my butt down two-hundred miles of Baja One to eat."
I went into the galley and took a bowl from the fridge. I'd read on the Internet to cover fresh oysters with wet paper towels and refrigerate at a temperature of forty degrees or so. "The Net said not to keep them more than a couple of days like this, and if they opened up to throw 'em out. They aren't open."
Jan picked one up and sniffed it. "Seems okay, but they sure are small."
"Yeah, I thought so, too. Not like the ones you dove for on the Pacific side."
"I've never seen any like these before. Maybe they aren't even oysters. Gimme a knife."
I fetched my knife from the dive locker and she expertly pried open one of the shells, inspected what I consider the ick factor inside, gave it a sniff, and decided they were indeed oysters and might be okay to eat. Just to be on the safe side though, she decided to steam and re-chill them.
With her oysters back on ice and our main course heating, we moved out on deck for another cocktail. In honor of our newly turned over leaf, it was only our second drink.
What a concept.
The oysters had popped open on steaming, so Jan snagged some Tabasco sauce and tackled one. It was so small it was barely a good bite and she gingerly tested it with her front teeth.
"What do your think?"
"Tough as shoe leather. Sorry, Hetta. You went to a ton of trouble for nothing."
"Oh, well, Po Thang'll eat it. Here boy," I called, offering the, to me, nasty looking critter.
Po Thang, always polite, sniffed it, took it between his front teeth as Jan had done, bit down, and spit it out.
Jan hooted. "A dawg of discriminating taste. Must take after his Auntie Jan."
I frowned at the blob on my carpet and went for a paper towel. Swooping it up, I felt a lump and inspected it. "Jan! Look at this!"
"Wha—Oh. My. God. A pearl!"
Forgetting all about our rapidly cooling stroganoff, we washed the pearl—Jan insisted we do so in salt water—and inspected our find. It had an incredible luster, an iridescence not unlike that of the inside of an abalone shell, but darker. Black actually.
Jan went online and identified my find as Pteria Rainbow lipped pearl oysters, and declared I had hit the pearl jackpot. Especially if this one turned out to be natural and not cultured.
We finally reheated dinner and speculated about what we had over a bottle of wine. So much for leaf turning.
After dinner we inspected the rest of the oysters, and found two more pearls, smaller and not as round. Jan said they were baroques, but were probably still valuable.
"Hetta, what did you do with that net?"
"I threw it in the garbage bin behind the yacht club."
And that is how, in full view of amused cruisers, Jan and I dumpster dove. Dived?
Into a Mexican dumpster.
Our mission was accomplished, but at great loss of dignity.
We lugged the large black garbage bag containing a severely reeking net back to the boat, triple bagged it and dropped it into Se Vende, which had been given a one day reprieve at my side until it found a new home. By now we were fairly odiferous ourselves and decided to let reeking nets lie for the night and took badly needed showers.
All this hard work called for a second bottle of wine.
Sipping the last of it on deck, Jan reminded me we were supposed to go shopping for my mom's birthday present, which she would carry north with her in a few weeks. Her own mother was having foot surgery and Jan was needed to help out for a few days.
"You could come with me, ya know," she said.
"I could, I guess. But I really don't want to spend the money right now. Maybe the Trob can come up with something that'll pay the bills."
The Trob is Fidel Wontrobski, the guy who keeps me one bare step ahead of bankruptcy. His father was a Polish communist, thus the name. He's an engineering genius with less than stellar people skills, but a big cheese at the mega-firm, Baxter Brothers, in San Francisco. I once graced their personnel roster, but fell into disgrace because I wasn't, in their estimation, a team player, just because I ratted them out to a client for price gouging. Despite that little fall from grace, the Trob and I have remained friends and he feeds me clients the B brothers don't feel like gouging. That's my job.
"Good. You need to stay busy, ya know." She waved her almost empty wine glass and gave me a look. "So, are you ready to tell me why you really wanted me here in such a big ole hurry?"
"I told you. Oysters."
"Not buying it. Known you way too long."
I shrugged.
"Okay, so don't tell me. Since you are totally incapable of keeping a secret, I'll find out soon enough."
Out of the corner of my eye I spotted the kilted wonder standing on his back deck. "Yep, you surely will. Very soon. Like, in five, four, three, two...."
The skirl of a bagpipe wailing "The Yellow Rose of Texas" from the boat next to us made Jan swivel in her chair, and Po Thang cover his ears with his paws. Spotting all that plaid-clad hunkiness, Jan's mouth dropped open and she looked at me, then back again. And when said hunk pointed at me and said, between breaths, "This is for you, Hetta Lass," she swiveled back.
"Oh, hell, Hetta. What have you done now?"
Being serenaded called for a wee bit more wine.
Chapter Six
"Ya know, Hetta," Jan whispered as we carbo-loaded huevos a la Mexicana, refried beans, tortillas, and salsa at the Dock Café in preparation for a day of crime, "it isn't like you harvested those oysters on purpose. You just found a net and it had oyster pearls in it. And since it looks like a carefully built net for oyster farming, it must have broken loose."
"I do know that. But I sure as hell don't want to have to explain that to anyone in authority who knows it's be
en against the law since 1939 to dive for pearl oysters. You know how things work down here. We'll need a fence."
Jan raised an eyebrow. "What you mean is we still need a fence."
Over the past summer we had "liberated" a stash of Spanish silver coins minted in Mexico in the early fifteen hundreds that, if the Mexican government found out we had them, would be confiscated. My safe was brimming with contraband in need of a buyer, but first we had to find someone who could fence the goods. Someone in low places.
"Boy, do we," I agreed.
Jan buttered a tortilla, which is what we Texans do, just in case our cholesterol is a little low that day. "What do you think the pearls are worth?"
"According to the Internet, the one perfectly round pearl, if it's cultured, sells for a hundred or so. And if it is cultured, we won't have a problem selling it. On the other hand, should it be natural? Katy bar the door."
"Who can tell us? We can't just walk into the pearl farm up in Guaymas and say, "We found this oyster on the beach and there was this pearl in it. Or can we?"
"Still checking that out. I did see there is a pearl place here in La Paz, so tomorrow let's drop in and grill 'em for info. And, maybe buy your mom some earrings for her birthday."
We plowed back into our food, then Jan said, "We probably should have invited that Scottish hunk over after all the playing he did for you."
"Better to let those bagpipes lie. Besides I'm fresh out of haggis."
"Betcha don't even know what that is."
"Sure I do."
"Okay, what is it?"
"Chitlins and grits?"
"You're asking me?"
"Anyhow, I'm trying to stay out of trouble, not invite it over for a drink."
"Since when?"
"Since I'm feeling lonely. Tired of being alone."
"I'm here, and you have Po Thang."
"You know what I mean."
"I sure do. Gotta admit, he does seem to have a thing for you. Time was you'd a already played his bagpipes by now."
"I'm a reformed woman."
Jan almost spit out her refrieds.
After breakfast we loaded up Po Thang, drinking water, sunscreen, dive knives, a cooler of beer and sandwiches, even more plastic bags, and snorkeling gear into Se Vende for a run to the other side of El Magote, a barrier peninsula protecting La Paz harbor.
This seven-mile long spit between the harbor and the open water of the Sea of Cortez has some sandy beaches on the sea side, and when the north wind isn't blowing, can be a great place to hang out. We had hopes of swimming with a whale shark, but their season for hanging out near La Paz is early winter to late spring, so chances of finding one were slim. There are some condos and a golf course on one end of the spit side wide open to hurricanes—why on earth did someone think this was a good place to build? Just sayin'—and is only readily accessible to the public via a small water taxi that runs every half hour. It can be driven, but the road is the pits and takes for-ever.
I knew of a stretch of beach remote enough that prying eyes can't witness the shucking of booty, and where Po Thang can run freely. Letting him loose is an iffy proposition where temptations are afoot, because he suffers from DAWGS: Doggie Auditory Willful Guile Syndrome, a condition that prevents him from hearing me yelling, from fifteen feet away, "COME HERE YOU LITTLE TURD!" On the other hand, opening a candy wrapper at a hundred yards has him by my side in record time.
While Po Thang ran and sniffed and splashed after fish—hopefully not a stingray—in the shallows, Jan and I dragged the reeking black plastic bag onto the beach and cut it open.
"Ack," Jan complained, "we should have brought your rebreather."
"Hold your breath. We'll take turns. You go first."
"Why do I have to go first?"
"Because I have to go throw up now."
Po Thang rushed us, grabbed the net and started pulling it toward the water, so we had to throw ourselves onto the mess to hold it. Thinking this was a great game, he jumped on top of us. In the ensuing dustup Jan, Po Thang, and I got slimed, but we finally managed to shove the dog out of the way and tie the net to my panga.
Undaunted, Po Thang lunged into the net again, and came up with an oyster. As is his habit, he trotted to my feet, deposited it, and went for another. We popped a beer and let him do the dirty work.
"That dawg is really growing on me, Jan."
"You do realize he's gonna stink for days, don't you?"
"Nope, because I'm going to make him swim home."
"Slave driver."
Po Thang brought another five oysters to the pile before lying down on the job. It was time for us humans to check them for pearls, but the dog now took proprietary custody, throwing himself on the pile and growling when we tried picking one up. I was headed for his leash when he froze in mid-growl, yipped happily, and rushed into the water.
Bubbles was back.
When we headed back to port, she followed for awhile, swimming alongside Po Thang, but as we made the turn around the end tip of the Magote and headed for the marina, she fell off, gave one last leap and was gone.
Po Thang, back in Se Vende, peered longingly over the transom, but Jan held him so he couldn't jump back into the water. She hugged and cooed to him while he whined and howled.
Love's a bitch.
Chapter Seven
As we parked Se Vende behind Raymond Johnson, I was feeling a little down, since this was my last trip in my much loved twenty-two-foot panga. I'd already found a buyer for her, and my new custom-built, nine-foot panga would be finished soon, and cradled on the roof of the sundeck, thanks to my handy dandy lifting system. I loved that old seaworthy, but cumbersome, Se Vende, but the new, smaller, dink would be a much smarter addition for cruising back up the coast to California.
And another bummer: I couldn't help but notice, with what I'll admit was a little disappointment, that my man in plaid and his boat were gone. Rats, I hadn't even caught his name, but I knew his boat's name, so perhaps a little snoopery might be in order down the line. Not that I care, mind you, but he did call me Lass.
After some rigorous scrubbing—not the pearls, those we rubbed with a towel and table salt to remove oyster gunk and bacteria, just like the Internet (that blessed new knower of all things) told us to—and shampooing, Jan, Po Thang, and I smelled civilized enough to enter the Dock Café for hamburgers. Po Thang dearly loves the Café, because the outdoor section is dog friendly and gives him an opportunity to hone his, "So, you gonna eat all of that?" eye-beg.
"I guess you noticed that Scottish hunk's boat's gone," Jan said with just a smidgen of malice. She so likes messing with me.
"Really? No, I didn't notice."
"Like hell."
I waited until she raised her burger to her lips and took a big bite before saying, "Besides, who gives a damn about that Highlander look-alike. I mean, who names his boat Full Kilt Boogie, anyhow?"
Jan's eyes went wide and her hand boggled. She almost dropped her burger as she choked on laughter. Po Thang took notice and went on alert, just in case a treat was in order, but Jan managed to catch both her burger and her breath.
"You set me up," she yelped.
"Yep, he is the reason you are here, my dear. Not that it matters now, but your job was to put a full tilt in his kilt, thereby keeping me out of trouble."
We were still cackling when my cell phone rang.
It was the Trob.
"Yo, Wontrobski, what's the haps?" I asked, trying to stifle a giggle.
"What are you celebrating?"
"How do you know I'm celebrating anything?"
"You sound happy."
"Don't I usually?"
"No."
Golly gee, I guess I'd better brush up on my telephone skills. I'm normally a phone deceiver of the highest order. "Jan and I are celebrating...Wednesday."
"Okay."
"Did you call for a reason?"
"Yes."
I rolled my eyes at Jan, who enjoys watching
me struggle to converse with the mostly monosyllabic Trob. I love the guy, but mundane stuff like small talk falls far below his stratospheric intellectual capabilities. He is an engineering genius at one of the largest Engineering and Construction companies in the world, but his people skills seriously suck.
"Would you perhaps like to share with me what that might be?"
"E-mail."
"Roger. I'll get right back to you, soon as I finish this beer."
"Who is Roger?"
"Hanging up."
"Bye."
Jan took a swig of Tecate and said, "Gosh, Hetta, that was a pretty long conversation for the Trob."
"My guess is he has a job for me and has sent me an e-mail about it."
"How do you always know what he means?"
"I speak fluent shorthand."
"Dating yourself there."
"Saw it in an old movie."
Po Thang whined that he needed a walk. I also speak dawg.
Jan took Po Thang for a stroll while I checked my e-mail for Trob's big news.
I read it twice, then again. What the hell? I called him back.
"Wontrobski, are you telling me someone wants to hire me to captain their boat, or that someone wants to hire me and my boat?"
"Your call."
"To do what? Not that I really care if the price is right. My bank account is in dire straits."
"You name it."
"You're kidding me," I said, although I know my mentor never kids anyone.
"No."
"Oh, never mind. Who is my new boss and what should I charge him or her?"
"Don't know."
I sighed. "Just give me a contact number and I'll sort it out. One question, is this in any way connected to my skill set as an engineer?"
"Maybe."
I gritted my teeth. "The number, please."
"E-mail only."
While I waited for his e-mail with my contact's e-mail address, I mulled over this new turn of events. I am in no way legally allowed to charter my boat in Mexico, so if I got caught Raymond Johnson could be confiscated. On the other hand, whoever wants my services came through the Trob, so the potential client must know who I am, and where I am. I trust the Trob, so whoever it is must be able to pay in US dollars to a San Francisco bank account as we require, and on the up and up. Or at least out on parole.
Just Different Devils Page 4