The Cay Read Free Page B

lifeboat in the fire’s glow, very alert, giving orders to the crew. He was carrying a brief case and a navigation instrument I knew to be a sextant. On the other side of the ship, another lifeboat was being launched.
    Near us, two sailors with axes chopped at lines, and two big life rafts plunged toward the water,which looked black except for pools of fire from burning fuel oil.
    The captain shouted, “Get a move on! Passengers into the boats!” Tins of lubricating oil in the afterholds had ignited and were exploding, but the ones forward had not been exposed to the fire.
    A sailor grabbed my mother’s hand and helped her in, and then I felt myself being passed into the hands of a sailor on the boat. The other passengers were helped in, and someone yelled, “Lower away.” At that moment, the
Hato
lurched heavily and something happened to the boat falls.
    The bow tilted downward, and the next thing I knew we were all in the water. I saw my mother near me and yelled to her. Then something hit me from above.
    A long time later (four hours I was told), I opened my eyes to see blue sky above. It moved back and forth, and I could hear the slap of water. I had a terrible pain in my head. I closed my eyes again, thinking maybe I was dreaming. Then a voice said, “Young bahss, how are you feelin’?”
    I turned my head.
    I saw a huge, very old Negro sitting on the raft near me. He was ugly. His nose was flat and his face was broad; his head was a mass of wiry gray hair. For a moment, I could not figure out where I was or who he was. Then I remembered seeing him working with the deck gang of the
Hato
.
    I looked around for my mother, but there was noone else on the raft. Just this huge Negro, myself, and a big black and gray cat that was licking his haunches.
    The Negro said, “You ’ad a mos’ terrible crack on d’ead, bahss. A strong-back glanc’ offen your ’ead, an’ I harl you board dis raff.”
    He crawled over toward me. His face couldn’t have been blacker, or his teeth whiter. They made an alabaster trench in his mouth, and his pink-purple lips peeled back over them like the meat of a conch shell. He had a big welt, like a scar, on his left cheek. I knew he was West Indian. I had seen many of them in Willemstad, but he was the biggest one I’d ever seen.
    I sat up, asking, “Where are we? Where is my mother?”
    The Negro shook his head with a frown. “I true believe your mut-thur is safe an’ soun’ on a raff like dis. Or mebbe dey harl ’er into d’boat. I true believe dat.”
    Then he smiled at me, his face becoming less terrifying. “As to our veree location, I mus’ guess we are somewhar roun’ d’cays, somewhar mebbe fifteen latitude an’ eighty long. We should ’ave pass dem til’ dat mos’ treacherous torpedo split d’veree hull. Two minute downg, at d’mos’.”
    I looked all around us. There was nothing but blue sea with occasional patches of orange-brown seaweed. No sight of the
Hato
, or other rafts, or boats. Just the sea and a few birds that wheeledover it. That lonely sea, and the sharp pains in my head, and the knowledge that I was here alone with a black man instead of my mother made me break into tears.
    Finally the black man said, looking at me from bloodshot eyes, “Now, young bahss, I mos’ feel like dat my own self, Timothy, but ’twould be of no particular use to do dat, eh?” His voice was rich calypso, soft and musical, the words rubbing off like velvet.
    I felt a little better, but my head ached fiercely.
    He nodded toward the cat. “Dis is Stew, d’cook’s cat. He climb on d’raff, an’ I ’ad no heart to trow ’im off.” Stew was still busy licking. “ ’E got oi-ll all ovah hisself from d’wattah.”
    I looked closer at the black man. He was extremely old yet he seemed powerful. Muscles rippled over the ebony of his arms and around his shoulders. His chest was thick and his neck was the size of a small tree trunk. I looked at his hands and feet. The