Read Online The Ordinary Seaman by Francisco Goldman - Free Book Online
Authors: Francisco Goldman
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that wouldn’t stick either, maybe Esteban is slippery with nicknames (though in his BLI he’d eventually had one which made him blush and grin like crazy…). With a name like Tomaso Tostado, Tomaso Tostado doesn’t need a nickname. Bernardo is just the viejo, and José Mateo is just the cook, Cocinero.
Throughout that first month Capitán Elias and el primero Mark were still coming to the ship every day, even Sundays, to share and guide the crew’s labor. They worked right alongside the crew from morning until dark and often later, their commitment to the task of repairing the ship setting a tone of concentrated urgency and optimism: they were in a hurry. They didn’t have all the time in the world. The port berthing fees were costing the owner a fortune. Soon the ship would sail. On hands and knees under the barbed sun, the ordinary seamen scraped, sanded, and chipped, scrubbed with wire brushes; and so did Mark, melting with sweat, cheerlessly and silently grimacing like a man clawing a tunnel out of prison with his fingernails. Orange extension cords and pneumatic cables ran from the generator and compressor on the pier up onboard, powering the few disc sanders, chipping hammers, grinders, and blowtorches they took turns using; plumber’s lamps for working below deck. All day long the industrial shriek of tools blasting iron numbed their ears and doubts. Capitán Elias, the electricians and mechanics immersed themselves in the engine room, attacking the dead forest of wiring and generator at their scorched roots, huddling over el Capitán’s small library of well-thumbed, grease-stained engineer’s and electrician’s manuals …
Capitán Elias and el Primero always lock up the generator and compressor on their pier and take the keys with them when they drive off at night with Miracle in the back of the Mazda. Mark, when he and Miracle come alone—Miracle is Mark’s dog—drives a maize-colored Honda. Where do they go at night? Where do they live? They live
in the city.
Capitán Elias says his wife is an artist and a university professor—“An artist first,” Esteban heard him say once, “a professor second, and a wife, though she does love me, a distant third, soon to be an evenmore distant, over the horizon let’s say, fourth”—el Capitán’s wife is “expecting a baby.” El Capitán says his wife’s belly “is like a melon.” Hmmmm, qué rico. Why doesn’t el Capitán ever think to bring them a few melons? Even one melon. It would be great to eat a melon.
Sometimes, when he’s in the mood, Capitán Elias becomes curious about the crew and politely asks them all sorts of questions about themselves, his tender sheep eyes so attentively fixed on their faces as they answer. And sometimes they question him. Capitán Elias says his father is British and his mother Greek, and mainly he’s lived in London, right here in New York, and all over Latin America, in the Amazon even, that’s why his Spanish is so good. He studied mechanical engineering, engine room mechanics, and ship design before switching to navigation and officer’s training at a nautical academy in Greece. He also studied medicine in London for a while. He’s tried his hand at lots of things, he’s very educated and worldly. This is the second time he’s been hired as a shipmaster. He says that someday he would like to open up a first-class Greek restaurant in New York, and own his own small fleet of cargo ships, and spend part of every winter in the Aegean and summers in Wiltshire, which is in the English campo. Personal questions always make Mark grimace; he never tells them anything about himself, hiding easily behind his lack of Spanish. Though Mark’s private life seems to be a constant topic of conversation between him and Elias, with el Capitán always seeming to give advice, which Mark eagerly or miserably accepts, nodding, ruefully smiling, frowning, or wincing. When Capitán Elias talks to Mark, he talks very fast,
Throughout that first month Capitán Elias and el primero Mark were still coming to the ship every day, even Sundays, to share and guide the crew’s labor. They worked right alongside the crew from morning until dark and often later, their commitment to the task of repairing the ship setting a tone of concentrated urgency and optimism: they were in a hurry. They didn’t have all the time in the world. The port berthing fees were costing the owner a fortune. Soon the ship would sail. On hands and knees under the barbed sun, the ordinary seamen scraped, sanded, and chipped, scrubbed with wire brushes; and so did Mark, melting with sweat, cheerlessly and silently grimacing like a man clawing a tunnel out of prison with his fingernails. Orange extension cords and pneumatic cables ran from the generator and compressor on the pier up onboard, powering the few disc sanders, chipping hammers, grinders, and blowtorches they took turns using; plumber’s lamps for working below deck. All day long the industrial shriek of tools blasting iron numbed their ears and doubts. Capitán Elias, the electricians and mechanics immersed themselves in the engine room, attacking the dead forest of wiring and generator at their scorched roots, huddling over el Capitán’s small library of well-thumbed, grease-stained engineer’s and electrician’s manuals …
Capitán Elias and el Primero always lock up the generator and compressor on their pier and take the keys with them when they drive off at night with Miracle in the back of the Mazda. Mark, when he and Miracle come alone—Miracle is Mark’s dog—drives a maize-colored Honda. Where do they go at night? Where do they live? They live
in the city.
Capitán Elias says his wife is an artist and a university professor—“An artist first,” Esteban heard him say once, “a professor second, and a wife, though she does love me, a distant third, soon to be an evenmore distant, over the horizon let’s say, fourth”—el Capitán’s wife is “expecting a baby.” El Capitán says his wife’s belly “is like a melon.” Hmmmm, qué rico. Why doesn’t el Capitán ever think to bring them a few melons? Even one melon. It would be great to eat a melon.
Sometimes, when he’s in the mood, Capitán Elias becomes curious about the crew and politely asks them all sorts of questions about themselves, his tender sheep eyes so attentively fixed on their faces as they answer. And sometimes they question him. Capitán Elias says his father is British and his mother Greek, and mainly he’s lived in London, right here in New York, and all over Latin America, in the Amazon even, that’s why his Spanish is so good. He studied mechanical engineering, engine room mechanics, and ship design before switching to navigation and officer’s training at a nautical academy in Greece. He also studied medicine in London for a while. He’s tried his hand at lots of things, he’s very educated and worldly. This is the second time he’s been hired as a shipmaster. He says that someday he would like to open up a first-class Greek restaurant in New York, and own his own small fleet of cargo ships, and spend part of every winter in the Aegean and summers in Wiltshire, which is in the English campo. Personal questions always make Mark grimace; he never tells them anything about himself, hiding easily behind his lack of Spanish. Though Mark’s private life seems to be a constant topic of conversation between him and Elias, with el Capitán always seeming to give advice, which Mark eagerly or miserably accepts, nodding, ruefully smiling, frowning, or wincing. When Capitán Elias talks to Mark, he talks very fast,
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