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0038When did you wake up?Thomas Hudson asked him. When I heard a gurgling noise. Ill make a gurgling noise some night and see if that wakes you up. Dont worry, Tom. Willie does that for me every night. Thomas Hudson decided not to drink the rum. Then, seeing them all having had a drink and being cheerful and happy on an uncheerful errand, he thought it would be pompous and priggish not to take it. He wanted it, too. Split this with me,he said to Peters. ¨You are the only son of a bitch I ever knew that could sleep better with earphones on than without them. That splits nothing,Peters said, entrenching himself in the retreat from formal discipline. ¨That split doesnt give either of us anything. Get one of your own, then,Thomas Hudson said. ¨I like the goddam stuff as well as you do. The others were watching and Thomas Hudson could see Henrys jaw muscles twitching. Drink it up,Thomas Hudson said. ¨And run all your mysterious machines tonight as well as you can. For yourself and for the rest of us. For all of us,Peters said. ¨Who is the hardest-working man on this ship? Ara,Thomas Hudson said and sipped the rum for the first time as he looked around. ¨And every fucking body else on board. Heres to you, Tom,Peters said. Heres to you,Thomas Hudson said and felt the words die cold and stale in his mouth. ¨To the earphone king,he said, in order to recover something he had lost. ¨To all gurgling noises,he added, being now a long way ahead as he should have been at the start. To my commander,Peters said, running his string out too far. Any way you want to take it,Thomas Hudson said. ¨There are no articles that cover that with us. But Ill settle for that. Say it again. To you, Tom. Thanks,Thomas Hudson said. ¨But I will be a sad son of a bitch before I drink to you until all your radios and you are functioning. Peters looked at him and into his face there came the discipline and into his body, which was in bad shape, the carriage of a man who had served three hitches in something that he had believed in and left for something else, as Willie had, and he said, automatically and without reservations, ¨Yes sir. Drink to you,Thomas Hudson said. ¨And crank up all your fucking miracles. Yes, Tom,Peters said, without any cheating and without reservations. Well, I guess that is enough of that, Thomas Hudson thought. I better leave it as it lays and go back to the stern and watch my other problem child come aboard. I can never feel about Peters the way the rest of them all feel. I hope I know as well as they do what his defects are. But he has something. He is like the false carried so far that it is made true. It is certain that he is not up to handling what we have. But maybe he is up to much better things. Willies the same, he thought. One is as bad one way as the other. They ought to be in now. He saw the dinghy coming through the rain and the white drifted water that curled and blew under the lash of the wind. They were both thoroughly wet when they came aboard. They had not used their raincoats but had kept them wrapped around their ni?os. Hi, Tom,Willie said. ¨Nothing but a wet ass and a hungry gut. Take these children,Ara said and handed the wrapped submachine guns aboard. Nothing? Nothing multiplied by ten,Willie said. He was standing on the stern dripping and Thomas Hudson called to Gil to bring two towels. Ara pulled the dinghy in by her painter and climbed aboard. Nothing of nothing of nothing,he said. ¨Tom, do we get overtime for rain? We ought to clean those weapons right away,Willie said. Well get dry first,Ara said. ¨Im wet enough. First I could never get wet and now I have gooseflesh even on my ass. Tom,Willie said. ¨You know those sons of bitches can sail in these squalls if they reef down and have the balls to. I thought of that too. I think they lay up in the daytime with the calm and then run with these afternoon squalls. Where do you put them? I dont put them past Guillermo. But they could be. Well start at daylight and catch them at Guillermo tomorrow. Maybe well find them and maybe theyll be gone. Sure. Why the hell havent we got radar? What good would it do us right now? What do you see in the screen, Willie? Ill pipe the hell down,Willie said. ¨Excuse me, Tom. But chasing something with UHF that hasnt got a radio ... ? I know,said Thomas Hudson. ¨But do you want to chase any better than weve been chasing? Yes. Is that OK? OK. I want to catch the sons of bitches and kill every one of them. What good would that do? You dont remember the massacre? Dont give me any of that massacre shit, Willie. Youve been around too long for that. OK. I just want to kill them. Is that all right? Its better than the massacre thing. But I want prisoners from a U-boat operating in these waters who can talk. That last one you had didnt talk much. No. Neither would you if you were up the creek like he was. OK,Willie said. ¨Can I draw a slug of the legal? Sure. Get on dry shorts and a shirt and dont make trouble. With nobody? Grow up,Thomas Hudson said. Drop dead,Willie said and grinned. Thats the way I like you,Thomas Hudson told him. ¨Keep it that way. XIV THAT NIGHT THERE WAS HEAVY LIGHTNING and thunder and it rained until about three oclock in the morning. Peters could get nothing on the radio and they all slept hot and muggy until the sand flies came out after the rain stopped and wakened them, one after the other. Thomas Hudson pumped Flit down below and there was coughing and then less restless moving and slapping. He waked Peters by Flitting him thoroughly and Peters shook his head with the earphones on and said softly, ¨Ive been trying hard, Tom, all the time. But theres nothing. Thomas Hudson looked at the glass with a torch and it was rising. That will give them a breeze, he thought. Well, they cant say they havent had luck again. Now I must figure that. He went back to the stern and sprayed all the Flit he could into the cabin without waking the people. He sat in the stern and watched the night clear and flitted himself occasionally. They were short of repellent but had plenty of Flit. It burned where a man had been sweating but it was better than sand flies. Their effect differed from mosquitoes in that you could not hear them before they hit and there was an instant itching from the bite. The bites made a swelling about the size of a very small pea. In some places on the coast and on the keys, they were more virulent than in others. At least their bites seemed to be much more annoying. But, he thought, that could be the condition that our hides are in and how much they are burned and toughened. I do not know how the natives stand them. They have to be hardy people to live on this coast and in the Bahamas when the trades arent blowing. He sat in the stern watching and listening. There were two planes, high in the sky, and he listened to the throbbing of the motors until they no longer could be heard. Big bombers going to Camag?ey on the way to Africa or going straight through to somewhere and nothing to do with us. Well, he thought, they are not bothered by sand flies. Neither am I. The hell with them. The hell with them and the hell Im not. But Id like to get some daylight and get out of here. Weve checked all the way up to the end of the point, thanks to Willie, and Ill run the little channel right along the edge of the bank. Theres only one bad place and with the morning light I can see it OK even in a calm. Then well be at Guillermo. They were underway at daylight and Gil, who had the best eyes, was watching the green shore line with the twelve-power glasses. They were close enough to shore for him to see a cut mangrove branch. Thomas Hudson was steering. Henry was watching out to sea. Willie was backing up Gil. Theyre past this part, anyway,Willie said.
feiyu2009 发表于：2010-4-24 10:59:04
