goes to the captain and says, ‘Captain, now I need a derrick and a blowtorch.’ Captain says okay, and, next morning, the cushmaker gets a couple of guys to help him and they roll that tin ball, it’s big, maybe ten feet around, out of the shop and onto the main deck, where the derrick is. Next he hitches the ball to the derrick cables, and has it swung out just where he can reach it, but it’s over the water.”
The barman looked around, checking on his other customers, then leaned his elbow on the bar. The story had apparently been going on for quite a while. “Over the water, see?” the man continued. “Then he takes this blowtorch and he begins to heat the ball, it’s big, like I said, but he doesn’t quit, just keeps that blowtorch going. By now, the whole ship is watching-guys up from the engine room, guys who just happen to have something to do on deck, everybody. Finally, the tin ball begins to glow, a little bit at first, then bright red. The cushmaker stands back and rubs his chin, like this. Is it hot enough? Is it ready? Yeah, he thinks, it’s just right. He puts the blowtorch down and he signals the guy on the derrick, let go! The derrick man pulls the release lever, and the ball drops right into the sea.”
The barman waited. Then said, “And?”
“And it went cushhhhh.”
Both sailors grinned, and, after a moment, the barman managed a laugh.
“Cushhh, yes, it’s funny,” he said, and went off to see another customer.
The storyteller turned to DeHaan. “I don’t think he got it.”
“No,” DeHaan said. “He thought you were making fun of him.”
“Jeez,” the man said.
“It ain’t a Moroccan joke,” his friend said.
“I’m Whitey,” the storyteller said. “And this is Moose.”
The nicknames were a good fit, DeHaan thought. Whitey had long, pale hair, combed straight back, and Moose was broad and thick. “My name is DeHaan,” he said. “Captain of a ship out there.” He nodded toward the bay.
“Oh yeah? Which one?”
“ Noordendam. Netherlands Hyperion Line.”
“Dutch.”
“That’s right.”
“What do you do?”
“Dry cargo tramping.”
Whitey nodded. “You in to bunker?” That was the old term, for the bunkers loaded with coal, still used for refueling with oil.
DeHaan said he was.
“We’re off the Esso Savannah, so maybe it’s our oil.”
“Could be. Actually, I’m in here to hire ABs.”
“Oh yeah? Well, that’s us, but we’re happy where we are.” He turned to his friend. “We like Standard Oil, right?”
“Yeah sure, we love it,” Moose said.
“No, really, it’s okay,” Whitey said. “Some guys always think it’s better somewhere else, but it’s all about the same. In the U.S., anyhow.”
“You’d be surprised, what we pay,” DeHaan said.
“On a Dutch tramp?”
“When we’re short crew, yes.”
“Well,” Moose said, “we won’t be on the Savannah too much longer.”
“No?”
“What he means,” Whitey said, “is that as soon as old Rosenfeld gets us into this war, we’re gonna go regular navy.”
“Are you sure they’ll let you?”
“Sure, why wouldn’t they?”
“Because, if the U.S. gets in, they’ll need every tanker they can get.”
A brief silence. The two sailors would be, in DeHaan’s version of the future, at sea in an enemy tanker, no longer protected by American neutrality. Finally Whitey said, “Yeah, may-be.” Then he downed the last of his beer and said, “Have one on us, Captain-boilermaker, shot’n-a-beer, okay?”
DeHaan would have preferred to stay with beer alone, but Whitey was too quick for him, and called out, “Hey, Hassan, three more down here.”
The shot was rye, sticky sweet, and bottled in Canada, according to the label. But DeHaan was too well aware that imported whiskey was an iffy proposition in foreign ports, and he could only hope that it hadn’t been brewed up in some garage in Marrakesh. Still, no matter what it was it worked, and, by the third round, DeHaan knew he would stagger when he got off the stool. Good for comradeship, though. Whitey and Moose let him know in no uncertain terms how sorry they felt for the people locked up in occupied Europe, and how they were itching to get a crack at the Nazis. They’d seen British tankers ablaze off the beaches of Miami, where the local citizens, excited by the idea of U-boats right out there, came down to the water to watch the show.
By eight-thirty, the bar was crowded and noisy, and DeHaan, despite the boilermaker fog, knew he had to go find his courier. “Gentlemen,” he said, “I believe it’s time I was on my way.”
“Nah, not now. You ain’t hired anyone yet.”
DeHaan looked around. A barful of drunken sailors, likely the most he’d manage was to get his nose broken. “I’ll try another night,” he said, swaying as he stood up. He reached in his pocket for money, but Whitey peeled a few dollar bills off a roll and tossed them on the bar. “That’s too much,” Moose said, as DeHaan said, “No, let me.”
Whitey waved them off. “Make it up to Hassan,” he said. “Cushhh.”
DeHaan laughed. He couldn’t wait to tell this joke-maybe the courier would like it. Moose looked dubious, but said, “Well, okay, I guess.” Then, to DeHaan, “Where you headed, pal? Down the port?”
“No, no. You fellows stay.”
“What? You gotta be kiddin’,” Whitey said. “Let you go out there alone? Us?” He shook his head, some people.
And he wasn’t wrong. They came out of the bar into a warm night, carefully descending the steps of the rue el Jdid. And Whitey, in a mellow tenor, was just getting started on his repertoire, having reached “Finally I found one, she was tall and thin/Goddamn, sonofabitch, I couldn’t get it in,” when two men stepped out of an alley. Hard to know who they were. They wore dark shirts and trousers and straw hats with the brims down over their eyes. Spaniards? Moroccans?
The two sailors didn’t like it. They turned around and stood still, while the two men took a few steps, then stopped, ten feet above them.
“You want something from us?” Whitey said.
DeHaan sensed they didn’t speak English. One of them put a hand in his pocket.
“He’s mine,” Moose said. “You take the other one.”
Whitey put his index and pinky fingers into his mouth and gave a sharp, two-note whistle. This produced a few silhouettes from the doorway of l’Ange Bleu at the top of the street, and a shout, “Somebody need help?” For a long moment, a stalemate, then, from the doorway of the bar, the sound of a bottle broken off at the neck.
That did it. The two men walked slowly down the steps, past DeHaan and the sailors. They were leaving, not running away. One of them looked DeHaan in the eye, then angled his head sideways, down and back, an appraisal. If it was just you. “And fuck you too,” Moose said, taking a juke step toward the men. One of them said something, the other laughed. They continued down the steps, fading into the darkness, their footsteps audible until they turned a corner at the bottom of the street.
5 June, 2105 hours. Room 13, Grand Htel Villa de France.
DeHaan caught the smell of burning while he was still out in the corridor, and it was strong in the room. “You’re DeHaan?” the courier said, closing the door.
“That’s right.”
“Where’ve you been?” He’d hung his jacket over the back of a chair and loosened his tie. A briefcase, straps
