The jeans she was wearing were so tight they must have made her ankles swell. She had on a halter top that was working overtime to hold her breasts in. The sun struck her black hair and made it the color of a raven’s wing. There were little brown freckles on her shoulders I hadn’t noticed before, but now, out in the full sunlight, they showed clearly. I liked them.
I said, “Don’t tell me this is a coincidence.”
“I was trying to decide if I wanted to go in and ring your room. I did not expect you to be out so early.”
“I had a phone call to make.”
“You are not leaving already?”
“That seems like a funny question. You know I was supposed to.”
“Yes.”
“Leonard and I changed our minds. We’re going to stick a few days.”
“Good. Good. I need to talk to you.”
“We can go upstairs,” I said.
Leonard greeted Beatrice with as much enthusiasm as his suspicious mind could muster, and we all went downstairs together and over to a little cafe for breakfast. The cafe was fairly crowded and there was the sound of European and American voices all over the place. A cruise ship had most likely sent in its passengers on a tender. We found a table in the corner, ordered coffee and food, waited a long time for it.
While we waited, Beatrice said, “I have had a situation arise.”
“Oh?” said Leonard. “Really?”
I gave him a hard look. He gave me back a dreamy smile.
Smug sonofabitch.
“You have problems with me?” Beatrice said.
“I just don’t like to be fed shit and told it’s tapioca,” Leonard said. “My buddy, Hap, he don’t mind some shit for tapioca. He even gets to like it now and then.”
“I do not understand,” Beatrice said.
“Look, I’m not trying to be offensive,” Leonard said.
“You are doing a very good job of it,” she said.
“All right. Take it like you want to take it. But I think you can smell a sap good as a shark can smell blood. I think you’ve got a scam going and you’re playing him into it, which means you’re playing me into it. It happens to him, it happens to me.”
“You think that, Hap?” Beatrice asked.
“He’s right more than he’s wrong,” I said.
Beatrice hung her head and stared at the table. She looked soft and cute and childlike. I wanted to reach across the table and slap Leonard.
“Well,” Beatrice said, “I did not set out to ask you for anything. I met you by accident, you must admit that. My father and I did help you in your time of need.”
“So now you need help?” Leonard said.
“I do.”
“You and about three million other women Hap knows. Not to mention guys, pets, et cetera.”
“Ah ha,” I said. “You rescued an armadillo once.”
“I admit it,” Leonard said. “That was another fine mess you got me into, if you’ll recall.”
He was right. There was nothing to say.
Our food arrived. We drank coffee and ate, waiting for Beatrice to drop the next shoe. Hopefully a very small shoe, like a flip-flop maybe. But no, that would be too easy. I figured it would be a boot. Steel-toed. Very heavy.
She ate and we paid up and left.
Outside she said, “Hap, can we talk?”
“Alone, you mean?” Leonard said.
“Yes,” she said.
“That figures,” Leonard said. “He’s no good alone, lady. But then you know that, don’t you? Don’t ask him to do anything you wouldn’t ask me to do, because you ask him, you’re asking me.”
“It does not have to be that way,” Beatrice said.
“Yes it does,” Leonard said, and walked away. He called back: “I’ll be at the hotel. Crying.”
“Will he really?” Beatrice said.
“In a manner of speaking,” I said. “Come on, let’s walk and talk.”
We went along the shoreline on a concrete walk. The sea was bright green, as if lit from below by an emerald light. In the distance I could see the brown line that was Cozumel and against that the horizon. The ocean stank of oil and dead fish and up close to shore there were plastic wrappers and aluminum cans washing against the blinding white sand.
“Now that Father is injured, he cannot do any more than drive the boat.”
“What about you?”
“I am company.”
“Ah. Company. To this man you told me about.”
“Yes. This rich American and his friends. They are here in Mexico for a short time. This one who arranged it all. He wanted to fish the other day. When my father could not go out, he was ready to cancel. We would lose all the money. I tried to convince him with words to wait. To give Father just a couple of days. He could be on the boat then. He didn’t want to listen. So I convinced him with something besides words.”
“You slept with him?”
“If this man I slept with is a pig, the one Father owes is a butcher… It is not for me, Hap. It is for my father. If I don’t make the money, the men my father owes will kill him. They may kill me.”
“What are you asking, Beatrice?”
“Help me. Just for a day or two. Please.”
Leonard said, “Once more into the breach.”
We were sitting at the cafe again, just me and him, having coffee. Leonard was feeling pretty good. His appetite was back.
“You know she’s just jerkin’ you?” he said.
“Yep. I know.”
Leonard sipped his coffee. “I don’t care she slept with this guy. That’s her choice. I don’t see that as something pathetic. You aren’t jealous, are you?”
“We aren’t in love, if that’s what you mean. But it hurts my pride some. She slept with me, then she slept with the other guy to make sure he went fishing. Worse yet, she has a hotel room and is staying in town tonight. I doubt it’s just because she wants to be close to the sea.”
“More favors?” Leonard asked.
“I suppose.”
“Maybe he was just a better lay. I bet that was it.”
“Thanks for being concerned with my pride.”
“Don’t mention it… So we’re going to be conned into being sailors.”
“You can con me all you want, and I’m no sailor. Actually, I think she wants us to bait hooks, that kind of thing.”
“Believe it or not, that takes skill.”
“Aren’t you the one said you wanted to go fishing?”
“Yeah, but I wanted someone else to bait my hook.”
Next morning, Leonard and I arose early and couldn’t find anything open to have breakfast, so we walked on over to where Ferdinand’s boat was docked. Ferdinand’s boat was being loaded with bait by Jose.
“I thought we were the crew,” Leonard said.
“When it leaves dock, we are.”
I climbed on board. I found Ferdinand on crutches. “Where is Beatrice?” he asked.
“That is what we were wondering, senor.”
About that time a large man and two other men came up the dock and climbed on board the boat.
