Eye of the Whale by Douglas Carlton Abrams Read Free Book Online Page B

to will away the sight in front of her.
    She knew this was the islanders’ celebration and communion, but for her the butchery remained an annual penance. The whalers were holding on to the two ropes, the mother’s wrapped around the loggerhead twice, as they pulled on the lines hand over hand, drawing the boat ever closer to the whale.
    Teo picked up the eight-foot killing lance, its steel tip looming above him.
    Elizabeth sprang to her feet before she had even considered her actions. She grabbed the thin brown metal shaft, smooth and worn from years of use. “Let her go.”
    “The harpoon done hit the lung. Is too late for this one.”
    “You promised me you wouldn’t hurt her. You lied to me.”
    “I ain’t know it was Sliver,” Teo replied almost pleadingly. “I promise you.”
    They both stopped dead, the killing lance between them. Everyone heard the sound coming from the far side of the boat.
    It was like a trumpet. Teo knew it well from when he had been foolish enough to try to strike a bull. Elizabeth let go of the metal shaft.
    “Echo come to save his queen,” Milton said, but there was fear, not joy, in his voice. The crew was looking down nervously, trying to see something, anything, in the dark blue of the deep water.
    Nap, the lead oarsman, looked up and cried out, “Watch out—the whale!”
    The tail towered above the boat like the hammer of God. It came crashing down on the water. Everyone fell onto the floorboardsas the wake rocked the boat violently. All steadied themselves by grabbing onto the gunwales. Elizabeth braced herself against a bulkhead and wedged her leg underneath a seat. Echo continued lobtailing, smacking his enormous flukes against the water next to the boat.
    “If the whale come any closer, he shatter the boat,” Teo said as he dropped the lance and grabbed the bomb gun. Elizabeth stood up and tried to steady herself as the boat continued to rock.
    “Get out the way, Liza.”
    “Just cut the line!” Elizabeth said, the headphone shaken from one ear.
    “Cap, shoot him, shoot him with the gun,” Rafee, the boat-steerer, cried from the stern.
    Teo took aim with the gun, waiting to see the chest or head.
    “Wait!” Elizabeth shouted to Teo. “The sound—it’s different.” She had heard Sliver’s call several times, but in the commotion she had not realized that it had changed.
    Echo’s tail sliced down into the water like a guillotine and disappeared. “The bull done flee!” shouted Meekel, the tubsman.
    Echo had sounded.
    The crew returned to their seats. Some smiled in relief; others still looked haunted by fear.
    Teo and Elizabeth turned back to the mother and calf. The calf hadn’t surfaced for a long time, tangled as it was against its mother. Sliver had stopped trying to roll away from the boat. Then she lifted her great head out of the water, and in the eye of the whale, Elizabeth could see what had happened.
    The baby was dead. The unmoving tip of the calf’s fin just above the surface confirmed her intuition. Tied to her baby, chest to chest, the mother must have felt its heart stop beating. Was that why she had stopped resisting? Was that why she had changed her call to Echo? It wouldn’t be long now for Sliver.

    Stepping from seat to seat, Teo, with the killing lance in his hand, jumped onto the whale’s back. Usually, it took several stabs to get at the heart or lungs, but Teo had a clear strike, and he raised the lance above his head like a sacrificial knife. He dug the killing lance deep into the heart as a bright red geyser of blood sprayed fifteen feet high and covered Teo and the boat. The men cheered as the thick blood came pouring down like rain.
    Elizabeth covered her eyes with her hand as the blood streaked down her neck and face. She shot a glance at Teo, and he looked back at her, shaking his head ever so slightly. She felt sick and hopeless. With the whales both dead, a deep animal loneliness spread through her chest. It always took days