Islands in the Stream

V

Thomas Hudson saw the high lookout post on the sandy key and the tall signalling mast. They were painted white and were the first things that showed. Then he saw the stumpy radio masts and the high cocked wreck of the ship that lay on the rocks and obscured the view of the radio shack. The key was not handsome from his side.

The sun was behind him and it was easy to find the first big pass through the reef and then, skirting the shoals and the coral heads, to come up on the leeward shelter. There was a sandy half-moon of beach and the island was covered with dry grass on this side and was rocky and flat on its windward end. The water was clear and green over the sand and Thomas Hudson came in close to the center of the beach and anchored with his bow almost against the shore. The sun was up and the Cuban flag was flying over the radio shack and the outbuildings. The signalling mast was bare in the wind. There was no one in sight and the Cuban flag, new and brightly clean, was snapping in the wind.

“Maybe they had a relief,” Thomas Hudson said. “The old flag was pretty worn when we left.”

He looked and saw his drums of gas where he had left them and the marks of digging in the sand where his blocks of ice should be buried. The sand was high like new-made graves and over the island sooty terns were flying in the wind. They nested in the rocks up at the windward end and a few nested in the grass of the lee. They were flying now, falling off with the wind, cutting sharply into it, and dipping down toward the grass and the rocks. They were all calling, sadly and desperately.

Must be somebody out getting eggs for breakfast, Thomas Hudson thought. Just then he smelled ham frying in the galley and he went astern and called down that he would take his breakfast on the bridge. He studied the island carefully. They might be here, he thought. They could have taken this.

But when a man in shorts came down the path that ran from the radio shack to the beach, it was the Lieutenant. He was very brown and cheerful and he had not cut his hair in three months and he called out, “How was your trip?”

“Good,” said Thomas Hudson. “Will you come aboard for a beer?”

“Later,” the Lieutenant said. “They brought your ice and supplies and some beer two days ago. We buried the ice. The other things are at the house.”

“What news do you have?”

“The aviation were supposed to have sunk a submarine off Guinchos ten days ago. But that was before you left.”

“Yes,” Thomas Hudson said. “That was two weeks ago. Is that the same one?”

“Yes.”

“Any other news?”

“Another submarine was supposed to have shot down a blimp off Cayo Sal day before yesterday.”

“Is that confirmed?”

“We heard so. Then there was your pig.”

“Yes?”

“The same day of the blimp they brought a pig for you with your supplies and he swam out to sea the next morning and was drowned. We had fed him, too.”

“!Qué puerco más suicido!” Thomas Hudson said.

The Lieutenant laughed. He had a very cheerful brown face and he was not stupid. He was acting because it amused him. He had orders to do anything he could for Hudson and to ask him nothing. Thomas Hudson had orders to use any facilities the station could give and tell nothing to anyone.

“Any more news?” he asked. “Have you seen any Bahaman sponging or turtle boats?”

“What would they be doing here when they have all the turtle and sponge over there? But there were two Bahaman turtle boats came by here this week. They turned off the point and tacked to come in. But they ran for Cayo Cruz …