always, always, the sounds and scents of the water.
Timing it, he grabbed his gaffing pole and in a practiced motion as
smooth as a dance hooked the pot line and drew it into the pot puller.
In seconds, the pot rose out of the water, streaming with weed and
pieces of old bait and crowded with crabs.
He saw the bright-red pincers of the full-grown females, or sooks, and
the scowling eyes of the jimmies.
"Right smart of crabs," was all Jim had to say as he went to work,
heaving the pot aboard as if it weighed ounces rather than pounds.
The water was rough today, and Ethan could smell a storm coming in. He
worked the controls with his knees when he needed his hands for other
tasks. And eyed the clouds beginning to boil together in the far western
sky.
Time enough, he judged, to move down the line of traps in the gut of the
bay and see how many more crabs had crawled into the pots. He knew Jim
was hurting some for cash--and he needed all he could come by himself to
keep afloat the fledgling boatbuilding business he and his brothers had
started.
Time enough, he thought again, as Jim rebaited a pot with thawing fish
parts and tossed it overboard. In leapfrog fashion, Ethan gaffed the
next buoy.
Ethan's sleek Chesapeake Bay retriever, Simon, stood, front paws on the
gunwale, tongue lolling. Like his master, he was rarely happier than
when out on the water.
They worked in tandem, and in near silence, communicating with grunts,
shrugs, and the occasional oath. The work was a comfort, since the crabs
were plentiful. There were years when they weren't, years when it seemed
the winter had killed them off or the waters would never warm up enough
to tempt them to swim.
In those years, the watermen suffered. Unless they had another source of
income. Ethan intended to have one, building boats.
The first boat by Quinn was nearly finished. And a little beauty it was,
Ethan thought. Cameron had a second client on the line--some rich guy
from Cam's racing days--so they would start another before long. Ethan
never doubted that his brother would reel the money in.
They'd do it, he told himself, however doubtful and full of complaints
Phillip was.
He glanced up at the sun, gauged the time--and the clouds sailing
slowly, steadily eastward.
"We'll take them in, Jim."
They'd been eight hours on the water, a short day. But Jim didn't
complain. He knew it wasn't so much the oncoming storm that had Ethan
piloting the boat back up the gut. "Boy's home from school by now," he
said.
"Yeah." And though Seth was self-sufficient enough to stay home alone
for a time in the afternoon, Ethan didn't like to tempt fate. A boy of
ten, and with Seth's temperament, was a magnet for trouble.
When Cam returned from Europe in a couple of weeks, they would juggle
Seth between them. But for now the boy was Ethan's responsibility.
The water in the Bay kicked, turning gunmetal gray now to mirror the