Down to a Soundless Sea (13 page)

The gentleman’s curiosity had been piqued. He made his way to the edge of the dock, exchanged a smile with the cheerful Mexican boy, and looked into the open fish holds. He was surprised to find not fish, but sharks. Small, exotic sharks with dark skins and eyes like precious emeralds. Albino sharks two feet long with eyes like burning rubies and fins tipped in mother-of-pearl.

There were sharks only eighteen inches long that sported camouflage akin to jungle cats and possessed eyes like large, jet-black pearls. As his well-schooled gaze ran over the boat, the gentleman’s eye was caught by a stamped commissioning plaque attached to what had been the foremast step. It had been painted over many times, but he could still make out the letters even at that distance.
USS WYANDA
. He smiled and nodded to himself again.

The captain of the fishing boat emerged from the little pilothouse. He was weathered beyond any judgment of age. He could have been thirty, or he might have been forty-five or fifty. It was impossible to tell. He wore a Portuguese knit cap and a hooded sea coat. He walked toward the holds and stared up at the dapper older gentleman through archaic beetle-green dark glasses.

The stranger touched his hat in an offhand military fashion and began to inquire about the oddity of the catch. “Where do you hunt these strange specimens, sir? I have never seen anything quite like them.”

The fisherman touched his cap to return the salute. “I take
them deep, sir, very deep. There’s a mighty great valley that cuts across the bay out there, an almighty trench. No bottom at all sometimes. These wonderful critters live thousands of feet down, sir. Takes hard work to set and draw trawl lines that deep, but it’s well worth the effort, sir. The wee beasties are worth their weight in gold.”

The fisherman laughed at the look of incredulous skepticism on the elegant stranger’s face. The fisherman winked at the Mexican boy as though they shared a private joke.

The old man smiled and asked, “So she’s a lucrative little venture, is she? She looks like a craft worthy of her heritage.”

The fisherman grinned with pleasure. “Well yes, sir, when the luck is with us, but beyond that, it gives a man great pleasure to be master of his own craft, so to speak.” The fisherman seemed to enjoy his own pun, but continued when he found his audience had taken no notice. “I take little pleasure in anything but my boat and my skill. But you know how it is, sir.”

The man stroked his goatee and nodded. “But to who do you sell these unusual creatures? I’ve never seen one on a plate, and I’ve messed down on my share of fish, I can tell you.”

The fisherman smiled and began sorting the varieties of catch into separate baskets fetched from a dock shed by the Mexican boy. “Why, sir, I sell them to the gentlemen standing just behind you, and a very generous lot they are when they get what they want. They never fail to clear out my whole catch, and for that my little ship and I are deeply grateful.”

The man slowly turned about and noticed six well-dressed Chinese patiently waiting politely for an opportunity to speak to the fisherman. They smiled self-consciously, bowed slightly, but said nothing. The white-haired gentleman faltered a graceful
apology for the interruption of business, tipped his boater, began to withdraw, and then stopped.

“How did you come by your unusual vessel, sir, if I might ask? Just a matter of idle curiosity, I assure you.”

“You’re by no means the first to ask, and the answer is always the same. Blind luck, sir, and that’s the God’s honest. Take it from a ship’s brat what knows, as they say. It’s always a matter of blind luck for men like us. As long as God loves fools and the fishing is good we go on. As for my boat, it would be fair and honest to say we found each other, but isn’t that always the way of it, sir? Like true love, every now and then a fellow gets lucky, don’t you know.”

A young woman’s voice called out from a distance, almost lost over the noisy commotion of the wharf. The old man turned to the sound. The girl called out again.

“Grandpa! Grandpa, come here at once. I’ve found the king of all salmons. It will make the wedding supper supreme. Where are you, Grandpa? Come give this man his price before it’s gone! Captain Leland! Are you there? Captain Leland? Show yourself, Grandpa. This beauty isn’t getting any fresher.”

When the fisherman heard the gentleman’s name called out he looked up in surprise. He would have said something to his old captain, but the gentleman had disappeared, leaving a file of eager, bowing Chinese to take his place.

At once the bargaining began in earnest. The smiling Mexican boy translated bids and counteroffers at a mile a minute. The Chinese spoke near-perfect Spanish, but little English. This paradox always amused most people. These important Chinese customers were appraised as fine doctors among their own society, though the fisherman suspected more magic than medicine to their arts.

In the end it hardly mattered. The Chinese always paid top prices, bowed politely, thanked Captain Lodge for his efforts, and never made a fuss. Lodge seized on these unadorned courtesies as high praise for a plainspoken fisherman with no home save his boat.

Plain he may have been, but Chapel Lodge lived a long, enterprising, and cheerful life. He died in his sleep aboard his last boat, the
Dulce Fortuna
, at the venerable age of eighty-six; his faithful old bilge cat, Mr. Pepper, stayed with him until the end. It was agreed by all that Captain Lodge passed away gracefully at home and in the very best of company.

Doc Roberts was a respected medical man and good friend to almost everybody on the Monterey coast. In one sense it might even have been said that he was indispensable, being the only physician willing to ride the long and dangerous coastal mountain circuit to care for his patients. His perseverance and dedication were well regarded by all who knew him, and even crazy old man Clarke, who wasn’t the least bit crazy, said Doc Roberts had the sharpest aptitude for the truth of any man he had ever met. That comment passed for something rare and unique, coming as it did from a man who went to great lengths to camouflage his own extensive scholastic credentials under the guise of partial but harmless derangement.

The doctor was a strongly built specimen with orderly, handsome features and a generous expression, a look that inspired instant confidence and respect in strangers. His dark hair
and full mustache were set in fine proportions. His narrow, pale eyes habitually cast an expression of warm concentration and interest. His handsome and pleasant features, when crowned with a physician’s social status, had enticed many a young woman to pass her hours in hopeful speculation.

Inventive feminine ploys had not gone unnoticed by the intended victim, so Doc forestalled all future attempts in that vein by sending for his young fiancée and marrying her at once. This one act did wonders for his respectability in Monterey. A family man of sober habits could be trusted not to desert his responsibilities to his patients. At least that was the model supposition of the day.

After six years of practice, from Monterey to the Big Sur, Doc Roberts had accumulated an inestimable treasure of gratitude, loyalty, and respect. In fact, Doc’s rounds actually carried him from Santa Cruz in the north to the jagged mountains of the Big Sur in the south. But it was always in the heart of the Big Sur that he was happiest. If there was a trail—and if his horse, Daisy, didn’t throw a shoe, refuse the hitch, or pretend to go lame—Doc Roberts would make his way to the sufferer without fail. His favorite mode of transport, if the roads were decent and the weather marginally dry, was his two-wheeled cart.

Doc’s cart was a hybrid vehicle of his own design and fabrication. Because he was not particularly skilled in simple carpentry, Doc’s rig presented a sadly slapdash appearance. He had purchased the frame, axle, and wheels from John Gilkey and had proceeded to build a crude pine box on top of the frame. No two boards matched; all were crudely nailed; and when the wood had fully dried, all the knots fell out, leaving holes everywhere. Doc said it made for better drainage in the rain.

Tom Doud once witnessed Daisy kick up a fit and take on a bit mulish while Doc struggled in vain to maneuver the wary animal into her hitch. Tom Doud was an earnest and forth-right rancher who took the opportunity to express the opinion that no self-respecting four-legged beast, regardless of species, would want to be seen near Doc’s cart, much less be caught pulling it anywhere.

He told Doc to his face that his cart was an eyesore, more fitted to the transport of plague victims than the conveyance of a successful doctor. As far as he was concerned, it was no wonder the poor animal wanted nothing to do with the bargain. The humiliated creature shivered and hung its head with shame at the prospect.

Tom laughed and said, “Your mare may be only a simple dumb beast, Doctor, but she’s not downright stupid.” This insight didn’t particularly amuse Doc Roberts at the time, but Tom Doud almost soiled his pants laughing at his own quip. Tom told the story affectionately for years. Secretly, Doc was forced to admit to himself that Daisy much preferred the saddle to the hitch, but the cart carried more supplies and there was room to convey a serious patient to the little hospital in Monterey if necessary. So, as far as Doc Roberts was concerned, Daisy would eventually have to bow to public service when required, just as he did.

In those rugged days the Monterey coast shouldered more than its fair allotment of scoundrels, but even among this callous fraternity there was one character who was rigorously shunned, even by the rest of the roguish brotherhood. He was a perfidious and miserly old rancher who ran a pathetic spread
out of a dilapidated house atop a promontory then known as Grace Point. His lair was approximately fifteen miles south of the Big Sur River. Everyone agreed that the old man’s livestock (cattle, horses, pigs, and chickens) were of the most deplorable sort and condition. These sad creatures looked as though they longed for immediate dispatch from the miseries of this world in favor of the relative peace and tranquility of the smokehouse, tannery, and bone mill.

The malevolent old man had a name, but nobody chose to use it. Everyone referred to him, when at all necessary, as “the old Stoat.” This discerning appellation not only characterized his weasel-like attributes, but also alluded to his controversial acquisition of a young bride of eighteen. The girl was a shy, penurious child from the streets of King City with little understanding of the world.

Rumor had it that the Stoat treated her unmercifully and did everything in his power to break her simple spirit. The Stoat was also widely known for his liberal use of the foulest language possible. It was said that he savored and unleashed his sharpest thorns on his child bride, habitually reducing her to defenseless tears. These anecdotes were commonly acknowledged by his neighbors, so it would not seem strange that almost everyone found something detestable in the Stoat’s character. In fact, it might have been fair to assume that most people would have celebrated his timely reunion with the primordial dust from which he sprang.

Doc Roberts was usually too preoccupied with his own business to affect much interest in gossip, so he was only marginally prepared with intelligence when one day he found himself summoned to the side of the crusty old rancher to treat a badly broken leg.

Young Ned Murray had brought word of the accident when he came into town for supplies, so Doc Roberts determined to take his cart in case the old man required surgical attention in Monterey. The doctor was not one for unnecessary amputations.

Having assembled the requisite medical supplies, Doc hitched up Daisy and made his way south. Since Daisy knew the way down the old coast road without meddlesome interference, Doc secured occasional opportunities to read his medical journals, eat sandwiches, or drink coffee without reference to his course. He had often napped in the back of his cart in full confidence of Daisy’s discretion.

The doctor sometimes stopped to greet a friend or patient on the road, but more often than not, the route was barren of incidental traffic. The occasional tinker or peddler sometimes camped by the way, and these dusty gentlemen of the road always received a civil greeting and a few moments’ conversation from the doctor. He had discovered that commercial travelers often held keys to all manner of useful intelligence.

About a half mile north of the western cutoff to the Stoat’s homestead, Doc Roberts came across just such a fellow. Mr. Elysium Shellworth Grey, as he styled himself, was a traveling vendor of patent medicines and numerous varieties of everyday pharmacopoeia. A sign on his highly decorated box wagon announced the vending of trusses, braces, crutches, and prosthetic devices at reasonable cost.

The duster-clad Mr. Grey was in the process of greasing a troublesome axle when Doc Roberts pulled up with an amiable greeting. A few moments’ pleasantries revealed that the peddler had just come from the doctor’s destination.

Mr. Grey shook his head slowly and rolled his eyes to
heaven. “That crusty old bastard is a real piece of work and no mistake. I could have saved myself the trouble of visiting the bloody old pike. They said up at Notley’s Landing that a rancher had broken his leg. I thought it would be a kindness to go out of my way to see if I could be of service. I’m not a doctor you understand, but I do dispense a very fine tincture of laudanum that would have alleviated his pain until medical services could be rendered.”