Henry came up and took the wheel and the controls when they anchored. Now that they were in the open again, Thomas Hudson felt her swing into the wind.
“There’s lots of water in here, Tom,” Henry said.
“I know. All the way to Caibarién and the two channels are clear and well marked.”
“Please don’t talk, Tom. Just lie quiet.”
“Have Gil get a light blanket.”
“I’ll get it. I hope it doesn’t hurt too much, Tommy.”
“It hurts,” Thomas Hudson said. “But not too bad. It doesn’t hurt any worse than things hurt that you and I have shot together.”
“Here’s Willie,” Henry said.
“You old son of a bitch,” said Willie. “Don’t talk. There were four in there with the guide. It was the main party. Then there was the one Ara got by mistake. He feels awful about it when you wanted a prisoner so much. He’s crying and I told him to stay below. He just loosed off like anybody would.”
“What did you throw the grenade at?”
“Just a place I didn’t like the look of. Don’t you talk, Tom.”
“You have to go back and detrap that hulk.”
“We’re going right away and we’ll check the other place. I wish the Christ we had a speed boat. Tommy, those goddam fire extinguishers are better than an .81mm mortar.”
“Not the same range.”
“What the hell we want with range? That Gil was throwing them into a bushel basket.”
“Get going.”
“How bad are you, Tommy?”
“Pretty bad.”
“Think you can make it?”
“I’m going to try.”
“Keep perfectly still. Don’t move for anything.”
They were not gone long but it seemed a long time to Thomas Hudson. He lay on his back in the shade of a canopy Antonio had rigged for him. Gil and George had unlaced the canvas from the windward side of the flying bridge and the wind came fresh and friendly. It was not as strong as it had been yesterday but it was steady from the east and the clouds were high and thin. The sky was the blue sky of the eastern part of the island where the trades blow strongest and Thomas Hudson lay and watched it and tried to hold his pain in control. He had refused the hypodermic of morphine that Henry had brought him because he thought he might still have to think. He knew he could always take it later on.
He lay there under the light blanket with the dressings on his three wounds. Gil had sifted them all full of sulfa when he dressed them and he could see sulfa spilled like sugar on the part of the deck where he had stood at the wheel while Gil had worked on him. When they had taken down the canvas, so he would have more air, he had noticed the three small holes where the bullets had come through and the others to the left and to the right. He had seen the gashes in the canvas from the grenade fragments.
As he lay there, Gil watched him and saw his salt-bleached head and his gray face above the light blanket. Gil was a simple boy. He was a great athlete and nearly as strong as Ara and if he could have hit a curve ball he would have been a very good ball player. He had a great throwing arm. Thomas Hudson looked at him and smiled, remembering the grenades. Then he smiled just to look at Gil and the long muscles of his arms.
“You should have been a pitcher,” he said and his voice sounded strange to him.
“I never had control.”
“You had it today.”
“Maybe it wasn’t really necessary before,” Gil smiled. “You want some water on your mouth, Tommy. Just nod your head.”
Thomas Hudson shook his head and looked out at the lake that was the inside passage. It showed white caps now. But they were the small waves of a good sailing breeze and beyond them he could see the blue hills of the Turiguaño.
That’s what we’ll do, he thought. We’ll head for the Central or for the other place and they may have a doctor there. No, it’s too late in the season. But they can fly a good surgeon in. They are all fine people in there. A bad surgeon is worse than none and I can lie quiet until he comes and they move me. I ought to take a lot of sulfa. But I shouldn’t drink water. Don’t worry about it, boy, he said to himself. All your life is just pointed toward it. But why couldn’t Ara not have shot that son of a bitch so we would have something to show for it all so it would have done some good. I don’t mean good. I mean so it would have been some use. Hell, if they had had the firepower we had. They must have pulled the other stakes on the channels to suck us into that one. But maybe if we had the prisoner he would be stupid and know nothing. He would have been useful to have had though. We are not being very useful now. Sure we are. We are detrapping that old turtle boat.