Jaws

down.

“Planing,” said Hendricks.

Brody grabbed a steel handle on the side of the console. “Are there any life jackets?” he asked.

“Just the cushions,” said Hendricks. “They’d hold you up all right, if you were an eight-year-old boy.”

“Thanks.”

What breeze there had been had died, and there was little chop to the sea. But there were small swells, and the boat took them roughly, smacking its prow into each one, recovering with a shudder that unnerved Brody. “This thing’s gonna break apart if you don’t slow down,” he said.

Hendricks smiled, relishing his moment of command. “No worry, Chief. If I slow down, we’ll wallow. It’ll take us a week to get out there, and your stomach will feel like it’s full of squirrels.”

Gardner’s boat was about three quarters of a mile from shore. As they drew nearer, Brody could see it bobbing gently in the swells. He could even make out the black letters on the transom: FLICKA.

“He’s anchored,” said Hendricks. “Boy, that’s some lot of water to anchor a boat in. We must have more than a hundred feet out here.”

“Swell,” Brody said. “That’s just what I wanted to hear.”

When they were about fifty yards from the Flicka, Hendricks throttled down, and the boat settled into a slow side-to-side roll. They closed quickly. Brody walked forward and mounted a platform in the bow. He saw no signs of life. There were no rods in the rod-holders. “Hey, Ben!” he called. There was no reply.

“Maybe he’s below,” said Hendricks.

Brody called again, “Hey, Ben!” The bow of the Aqua-Sport was only a few feet from the port quarter of the Flicka. Hendricks pushed the handle into neutral, then gave it a quick burst of reverse. The AquaSport stopped and, on the next swell, nestled up against the Flicka’s gunwale. Brody gabbed the gunwale. “Hey, Ben!”

Hendricks took a line from the lazaret, walked forward, and made it fast to a cleat on the bow of the AquaSport. He looped the line over the railing of the other boat and tied a crude knot. “You want to go on board?” he said.

“Yeah.” Brody climbed aboard the Flicka. Hendricks followed, and they stood in the cockpit. Hendricks poked his head through the forward hatch. “You in there, Ben?” He looked around, withdrew his head, and said, “Not there.”

“He’s not on board,” said Brody. “No two ways about it.”

“What’s that stuff?” said Hendricks, pointing to a bucket in the corner of the stern.

Brody walked to the bucket and bent down. A stench of fish and oil filled his nose. The bucket was full of guts and blood. “Must be chum,” he said. “Fish guts and other shit. You spread it around in the water and it’s supposed to attract sharks. He didn’t use much of it. The bucket’s almost full.”

A sudden noise made Brody jump. “Whiskey, zebra, echo, two, five, niner,” said a voice crackling over the radio. “This is the Pretty Belle. You there, Jake?”

“So much for that theory,” said Brody. “He never turned off his radio.”

“I don’t get it, Chief. There are no rods. He didn’t carry a dinghy, so he couldn’t have rowed away. He swam like a fish, so if he fell overboard he would’ve just climbed back on.”

“You see a harpoon anywhere?”

“What’s it look like?”

“I don’t know. Like a harpoon. And barrels. Supposedly, you use them as floats.”

“I don’t see anything like that.”

Brody stood at the starboard gunwale, gazing into the middle distance. The boat moved slightly, and he steadied himself with his right hand. He felt something strange and looked down. There were four ragged screw holes where a cleat had been. The screws had obviously not been removed by a screwdriver; the wood around the holes was torn. “Look at this, Leonard.”

Hendricks ran his hand over the holes. He looked to the port side, where a ten-inch steel cleat still sat securely on the wood. “You imagine that what was here was as big as the one over there?” he said. “Jesus, what would it take to pull that mother out?”

“Look here, Leonard.” Brody ran his index finger over the outer edge of the gunwale. There was a scar about eight inches long, where the paint had been scraped away and the wood abraded. “It looks like someone took a file to this wood.”

“Or else rubbed the hell out of it with an awful tight piece of heavy rope.”

Brody walked over to the port side of the cockpit and, aimlessly, began to feel his way along the outer edge of the gunwale. “That’s the only place,” he said. When he reached the stern, he leaned on the gunwale and gazed down into the water.

For a moment, he stared dumbly at the transom, unseeing. Then a pattern began to take shape, a pattern of holes, deep gouges in the wooden transom, forming a rough semicircle more than three feet across. Next to it was another, similar pattern. And at the bottom of the transom, just at the water line, three short smears of blood. Please, God, thought Brody, not another one. “Come here, Leonard,” he said.

Hendricks walked to the stern and looked over. “What?”

“If I hold your legs, you think you can lean over and take a look at those holes down there and try to figure out what made them?”

“What do you think made them?”

“I don’t know. But something. I want to find out what. Come on. If you can’t dope it out in a minute or two, we’ll forget about it and go home. Okay?”

“I guess so.” Hendricks lay on the top of the transom. “Hold me tight, Chief… please.”

Brody leaned down and grabbed Hendricks’ feet. “Don’t worry,” he said. He took one of Hendricks’ legs under each arm and lifted. Hendricks rose, then bent over the transom. “Okay?” said Brody.

“A little more. Not too much! Jesus, you just dipped my head in the water.”

“Sorry. How’s that?”

“Okay, that’s it.” Hendricks began to examine the holes. “What if some shark came along right now?” he grunted. “He could grab me right out of your hands.”

“Don’t think about it. Just look.”

“I’m looking.” In a few moments he said, “Sonofabitch. Look at that thing. Hey, pull me up. I need my knife.”

“What is it?” Brody asked when Hendricks was back aboard.

Hendricks unfolded the main blade from the body of his pocket knife. “I don’t know,” he replied. “Some kind of white chip or something, stuck into one of the holes.” Knife in hand, he allowed Brody to lower him over the rail again. He worked briefly, his body twisting from the effort. Then he called: “Okay. I’ve got it. Pull.”

Brody stepped backward, hoisting Hendricks over the transom, then lowered Hendricks’ feet to the deck. “Let’s see,” he said, holding out his hand. Into Brody’s palm Hendricks dropped a triangle of glistening white denticle. It was nearly two inches long. The sides were tiny saws. Brody scrapped the tooth against the gun-wale, and it cut the wood. He looked out over the water and shook his head. “My God,” he said.

“It’s a tooth, isn’t it?” said Hendricks. “Jesus Christ Almighty. You think the shark got Ben?”

“I don’t know what else to think,” said Brody. He looked at the tooth again, then dropped it into his pocket. “We might as well go. There’s nothing we can do here.”

“What do you want to do with Ben’s boat?”

“We’ll leave it here till tomorrow. Then we’ll have someone come get it.”

“I’ll drive it back if you want.”

“And leave me to drive the other one? Forget it.”

“We could tow one of them in.”

“No. It’s getting dark, and I don’t want to have to fool around trying to dock two boats in the dark. This boat’ll be all right overnight. Just go check the anchor up front and make sure it’s secure. Then let’s go. No one’s going to need this boat before tomorrow… especially not Ben Gardner.”

They arrived at the dock in late twilight. Harry Meadows and another man, unknown to Brody, were waiting for them. “You sure have good antenna, Harry,” Brody said as he climbed the ladder onto the dock.