Lloyd hated them. And he was grateful to them. Maybe he only hated Madison. He would not have found his grandfather without Jules, nor would Maas Conrad be receiving expert care in this modern hospital without her. But her motives, their motives were clear—it was the dolphins they cared about. Should he deliver Black Crab’s message? “Me outside,” he said to Jules and pointed through the glass at the bench. “Call me if anything.”
The warm air outside was welcome. He saw with surprise it was late afternoon. He sat on the bench and looked out over the road and parking bays and through a chain-link fence to a grassy area with big trees. He was so tired. It would be good to lie on the green grass. His stomach growled—he had not eaten since breakfast. Every now and then someone walked by on the road, but mostly he saw only luxury cars and a few battered taxis easing their way over the speed bumps. A security guard came up to him and asked him what he was doing. “My gramps sick. My sister and her friend in there,” he answered, jerking his thumb at the two women inside. The security guard left him alone.
Who had caused Maas Conrad to be on Portland Rock without his boat? Had his father gone to the rock to murder or to rescue? He did not believe Vernon was fishing on the Pedro Bank—it was too difficult a journey. Perhaps Gramps had gone there to fish, moored his boat, and Water Bird had broken away. Lloyd did not believe his grandfather would have moored his boat carelessly but he knew ropes could break.
Had he gone to Portland Rock in search of the dolphin catchers, as Slowly had said? Jules said there were dolphins there—that was where she did her counting. Perhaps he had found them and there was some kind of fight. Perhaps the dolphin catchers had sneaked up on the moored Water Bird and cut the canoe loose. That seemed possible—if Gramps had no boat, he could not chase them. They could do what they wanted. And maybe the dolphin catchers knew fishers used Portland Rock and would show up sooner or later to rescue the old man. Maybe they had not meant to hurt Gramps; just to frighten him so he would leave them alone. Gramps had fallen and hurt himself and his leg had swollen and he could not look after himself. That could have been what had happened. But he had found his father holding a billy club standing over his grandfather.
Lloyd knew the two men had been on a collision course for all of his life because the line of fishermen had been cut by his father. Fishers were involved in crimes against the sea and against other men. He was sure Vernon had tried to kill Maas Conrad. He felt he had always known it and the details did not matter.
Lying on the grass outside the hospital Lloyd could not see a happy ending. If Maas Conrad got better he would be able to say what happened out on Portland Rock and then Black Crab would kill him. There would be blood and death—perhaps even his own death and the death of his mother. And if Gramps died his death would be simply another fishing accident and the dolphin catchers and the dolphin traders would continue their work.
Maybe everyone who had given him advice to forget about his grandfather—Black Crab and Maas Roxton and Miss Violet and Miss Lilah and his own mother—had all been right. Maybe one of them had even told his father about his trip to Portland Rock with Jules and his father had intended to kill him as well. He should have simply mourned the loss of his grandfather, just another lost fisher, another person lost at sea.
He longed then for his mother. He should call her. She should be here. Miss Beryl loved the old man and would be glad to know he was alive. If she came to the hospital, she would sit with him and he would feel less alone, less strange in this place. They would wait together for news from the doctors and nurses. He did not imagine he could talk to his mother about what his father had almost succeeded in doing.
Then he shook his head. It was not going to happen like that. He heard Gramps’s voice in his mind: the seventh wave is always bigger. They used to count waves together, especially in a following sea. Like the threat of a seventh wave he feared his mother must have known what happened to Maas Conrad. He remembered the voices of his parents, speaking of Black Crab, after they thought he was asleep. He counted up the lies he had told his mother. It was time to face the lies she might have told him.
36
Lloyd stood at his own front door. He had gone back into the hospital and told the two women of Black Crab’s threat. “Go home,” he said to Madison. “Find something else to study,” he said to Jules. They did not reply. He asked Jules for the bus fare and she gave it to him. The doctors came and told them Gramps was resting comfortably and there would be no news for hours, maybe days. “Go home and get some rest,” Jules told him. “We will stay for a while.” The bus radio had been blaring tropical
