Trawler (14 page)

From a yard or two beneath me the engines for the hydraulic lifts opened up, shaking the bunk with a new pulse, just faster than the excess adrenalin beat of an impending heart-attack. I struggled out, careful to hang on to the edge of the bunk with one hand as I pulled on my trousers with the other. No, I thought, I really do not want to go flying again. I don’t like flying, not one bit.

In the lighted companionway a man with dark shaggy hair, wearing a white singlet, blue overalls like a crofter, and with a pair
of bright orange ear-protectors slung round his neck, stepped slowly, with deliberation, over the sill of the open door to my left. From the engine room. So he was Dougie, the engineer.

I introduced myself. “Aye,” he said with a slow, gentle smile, removing his ear-protectors and hanging them on a hook to the left of the galley entrance. “I know all about you. You’ve been ill. You’ve no eaten. So come in here a moment. We’ll have a little chat.

“Dougie,” he said, shaking my hand. “Dougie Twatt. So—sit here a while. I’ll get you something. No hurry. You and I—we’ll have a chat.” He ambled down the pitching galley to the storeroom off to the left. He was older than any of the crew, maybe even over forty. And calm. He’s probably calm anyway, I thought, but it must help—to be on a fixed salary…

He returned, equally slowly, and in front of me he set a mug of water and six thick dry biscuits, on a white plate. “Now,” he said, taking the place opposite, folding his arms on the table, staring straight into my eyes (I thought: hypnosis). “This never fails. It never has. It never will. I’m going to watch you—until you’ve eaten every last crumb.”

I took a bite—a mouthful of gravel. And a gulp of water. “You must love engines,” I spluttered, for something to say.

“Aye,” he said, not taking his eyes off my face. “Aye, I was brought up on Eday I worked on the croft till I was twenty-one. Fifty acres. All sheep. But there was no enough work for us all—so I went to sea. I knew all there was to know about tractors. You have to—there’s no a crofter in Orkney who’s no his own mechanic. You mind the engines—they were good and simple then. You knew where you were. I still love tractors. I collect old tractors. That’s what I live for, really. Don’t get me wrong, I like the engines here, they’re old, Blackstones. They’re always interesting, always a surprise.”

“A surprise?” (Biscuit number two.)

“Aye, because you never know which bit will fail you next. I’m a nurse down there, I nurse them along. But the truth is—it’s no very nice down there.”

“How did you learn?” (Only four biscuits to go.)

“Marine engines? I learnt the best way, I taught myself, I learnt at sea.”

“And what do you do at home? When you get home?”

“Aye, I love to be at home. At home I look after my tractors. You’ll no find better. I’ve four tractors. A Ferguson …”

“A grey Fergy? The little grey Fergy? My father-in-law had one! My wife learnt to drive on it!”

“Aye. They made them from 1947 to 1956. And then I’ve three Fordsons. 1929. That’s my best one. That’s special, that was my father’s. Made in Cork. The Ford Motor Company. And I’ve a 1939 and a 1940 model. They’re all in working order. I could start them up for you …”

“And what about a car? Do you have an old car?”

“A car? No. No
—that’s a real waste of money.
No. I’ve a motorbike. A Matchless. A 1953 Matchless 350 …”

WHEN I REGAINED
my place at the gutting table the trays were already full—and in his arms Sean was holding a different kind of flatfish. It was around 4 feet long, thick-bodied, black on top, pearly white underneath. Sean, his eyes askew and shining, was shouting at Luke: “So Jason says to me, ‘Look Sean,’ he says, ‘if it’s for your nan, that’s OK, that’s OK by me—if it’s for
her,’
he says, ‘then nothing but the best
will do.’
One time I took her a halibut like this one—a real whole White halibut! Aye—mebbe eighty pounds’ worth! That’s the kind of skipper he is …”

“Aye!” shouted Robbie, from across the table, at his senior position beside the waist-high entry and knee-low exit conveyors, in front of the drop-gate lever for discards down the steel chute to the starboard scupper, beneath the overhead stop-start table-controlling levers. “Luke! Fock all that. That’s his nan in Caithness like. She brought him up! But that halibut there, I’m telling you, that’s for the galley!”

Sean, with uncharacteristic gentleness, even reverence, lowered the White halibut, the prize, the prince of North Atlantic fishes, into Luke’s red plastic specimen-basket.

Luke, over-excited, it seemed to me, even at the thought of this best of fishy dinners, said (half-way to a shout), “That’s
rare
right enough. It’s rare to catch one in a trawl—they’re fast, too fast for a trawl, great predators, you get them on long lines, they hunt about the bottom, they feed on fish, especially redfish—and I promise you, Redmond, you and I will see
lots
of redfish with Jason as skipper, because he knows, the boys say he never fails … Aye,” he said, chucking yet another Greenland halibut up and over and down the tube (nothing stops him working once he’s started, I thought, whereas here am I gawping about a mere White halibut, doing sod all) “the White halibut, they’re the number-one fast hunters down to a kilometre and a half—and in cold water, too, around 2.5-8 degrees C. But if we ever get the chance in the UK I’m
sure
we could breed them, farm them. In the far north—Shetland. Magic! They’re not like your average pussy-soft flatfish, there’s no lacy undulations of the fringing fins for them—no, they’re rock-and-rollers, they’ve got muscles, their whole bodies, their zap-thrust tails. And they’ve
a great
trick, Redmond, because when they’re on the bottom on the upper slope where the light penetrates, when they’re young, their topside, the dorsal surface—it’s coloured like the seabed. If a White halibut’s taking a rest on mud its back’ll be black. And if it whops over to a patch of sand—it’ll grow pale. And if (yes it’s OK, I hear you, these are observations from an aquarium)—if it has its head on sand and its body on mud, it’ll have a pale head and a black body!”

“Hey Redmond!” said Sean, focusing on me for the first time. “Where you bin?”

“I’ve been talking,” I said, as I tried to concentrate, pronto, on the gutting of my first Greenland halibut of the day (if it
was
a new day). “I’ve been talking—or rather listening, I’ve been listening to Dougie.”

“Dougie! Dougie?” Sean dropped his Greenland halibut back into the tray. “Dougie? Dougie’s a
grand
old guy. But talking? Talking’s not his bag, man. Dougie’s
no a talker!
Hey Robbie! Redmond here—he’s been
listening
to Dougie!”

Robbie, his responsibilities forgotten, stopped work and
leant across the table. “Dougie? Talking? Look, Redmond, like:
Dougie doesna talk.
He’s an engineer. He’s different. Know what I mean? Engineers—it’s difficult, all that. And fock it, I should know. You see Jason—and I want you to hear this—Jason has
paid,
twice, for me to take my engineer’s exams in Aberdeen. Because it’s the law—you canna go to sea in a trawler without a qualified engineer on board. Now I really want that ticket, dinna get me wrong, I tried, I really did, I owe it to Jason, because he has faith in me, he has the faith, and I want it for me, for Robbie—because if you’re an engineer you have a
salary.
And if you have a salary you can go to a bank. You’re respectable. People respect you. You can get a flat. You can marry! But in Aberdeen they’re bastards, real bastards, they failed me
both times.
It’s difficult, to be an engineer—and then when you are, it’s difficult, your head’s full of engines, systems. Like here—the
Norlantean,
she’s packed with ancient metal. She’s great, she’s old, but if truth be told, Redmond—she’s a focking death-trap. And Dougie? He’s old too—and Jason asks himself, especially at this time of year, what the fock is Dougie doing putting up with all this? He does not have to face a Force 12 every year of his life! Why should he? He could get a safe job just like that” (Robbie clicked his blue-gloved fingers with a report like a pistol-shot) “in a garage, parts and services, farm machinery, an oil-rig, anything. That’s why Jason needs me. And I keep failing him! Christ, fock it, Redmond, you know what I mean? If Dougie’s
talking
we’re in real trouble …”

Sean, getting back to work, said softly, almost to himself, “Robbie, Robbie, you did yer best. We all know that. You always do yer best. You didna let him down …”

Luke, a native in this world of high emotion which I didn’t understand, said, “Och aye, Redmond. But what did Dougie
say?”

“Biscuits. He made me eat these biscuits … He said if I
looked him in the eye
and ate these biscuits, every crumb, I’d be cured. He said that on this trip I’d never feel seasick again, not for a moment. It was weird, odd, whatever, so what…” And then a different part of me said, or rather shouted, in a tone and volume devoid of the charm, the friendliness, the social control that I
liked to imagine I possessed at all times (and particularly in times of stress, be they merely internal or obvious and real)
“And I fucking well don’t want to talk about it!”

“Aye!” said Robbie, relaxing at once, picking up a Greenland halibut. “Dougie, the treatment. That’s all it was. Aye, hypnosis. He must’ve decided he
liked
you. Dougie’s treatment—that never fails.” He laughed. Sean laughed. “Aye,” said Robbie, “Dougie’s got the gift. But there was a mate of mine once—he was seasick every time he went out. For the first two days like. He’d be gutting—right there where Sean is. He’d be talking to you, standing on his box, gutting away and bang! He’d lean over and throw up—into the scupper chute. Then carry on gutting and talking, talking and gutting—that’s courage, that is. Dougie didna like him. He’d said something bad to Dougie, called him old or an oddball, something like that. So Dougie wouldna help. So my mate just carried on, working, chucking up, all over the place. Aye, that was a man, right enough.”

“So what happened to him?” I said, chastened.

“Och aye. He saved every penny. He was no a drinker like. He had a wife at home. And believe me, Redmond,
that really helps.
Up here that’s the most important thing. Orkney, Shetland, darkness half the year. So when you meet someone at sea, when there’s a new man in the crew, you ask yourself, does he have a wife at home? Because 90 per cent of the time, if he does, you’ll know, that’s
OK—you can trust him with your life.
He’ll no let you down. Look at Bryan. Aye, if you dinna believe me—look at Bryan!”

To my right, Sean muttered, again almost to himself, “Robbie, Robbie. Aye—you’re a dirty old bastard. Jesus, you’ve done things.” (And this was said with an obvious and deep admiration, as he picked up a fish that was the weirdest fish I’d seen since the Rabbit fish, a week or so ago, was it? And he threw it up and over and down the central tube, ungutted.) “But you’ve got a girl right enough.” (At this point I realized, flattered, that Sean, who never even glanced at me, to his left, close-cramped beside him on my adjacent box, was,
sotto voce, talking to me.)
“Aye, and she’s all of sixteen. She’s at school, for Chrissake. And you’ve given up the drink
for her. And you’re no a smoker, if you know what I mean.” (Sean gave his current Greenland halibut, his Black butt, a squashy wink of his right eye.) “Aye, you dirty old bastard you. You give her everything, focking everything. And if she doesn’t focking well watch herself, you’ll marry her!”

“Robbie!” I shouted across the table, “What happened to him, your mate, the one who was sick?”

“Eh? What’s that? My mate?” shouted Robbie, his thoughts already somewhere else. “I told you! I just told you—the minute he got the price, he bought a shop, a grocer’s shop. A peedie bit of local meat like. That too. His wife planned it. He gave her all the money he got, as he got it. She planned it all! And I tell you, they’re happy.
Really happy.
They got a baby! No fish for the baby! No fish for him! No fish for her! If you want to upset him—give him a fish!”

“Aye!” shouted Sean, joining in. “Sling a fish on his counter—he’s well unchuffed!”

“Tell me, Sean,” I said in his ear, “what did he mean, Robbie, what he did mean about Bryan? What’s special about Bryan?”

“Aye,” said Sean, not looking at me. “Bryan—you’ve no sussed him?
Everything’s
special about Bryan. You go overboard? You think you’re going to die? Give it five minutes max, right? Who do you want to see at the rail?
Want like fock?
Bryan! And why? Because he’s calm and he knows it all and he’ll no panic and he’ll do something. Aye. Robbie’s right. You can trust your life to Bryan. He’s a real man right enough. He got married—and he took on the woman
and
her two kids. Aye. Now he’s one of his own. But he treats them all the same. The whole family. You’d never mind they weren’t all his. Aye. Focking marvellous, really. Like my nan. A focking marvel. And no a drinker …”

“And he’s no a smoker,” I said, getting into the roll and pitch and swing of things, beginning to think I was myself again.

“Aye! You’re right! Bryan ashore? Forget it! Bryan ashore? Now that’s a turn-off! He’s no a
raver.
Know what I mean?”

…

THE ROUTINE SEEMED INTERMINABLE
, the sudden absence of the human voice (or so it seemed to me) in the chaos of overwhelming inhuman sound began to be intolerable. (“Don’t talk,” I told myself. “You’ve no staying power. At least stick at it like Luke. Don’t be a wimp. Please, be as silent and committed as Luke …”) But I couldn’t take it, stand it, hack it, and my extraneous thoughts came in threes of emphasis, like that, like the onset of a fever. So I picked up one of the increasingly common strange new species of fish in my tray (a tray which I managed, now, most times, to half-clear, before Robbie revolved the table, dealt with my leavings and everyone else’s mere guts and discards, and turned on the hopper-conveyor for another delivery). And I held it up for Luke’s inspection. “So what’s this?” I said.