The Gulf by David Poyer Read Free Book Online

died.
    *   *   *
    Ola was still sitting in the kitchen, her plate untouched. The broken halves of the boy’s dish lay atop the trash. Her hands were curled around a mug in the shape of a bull’s head. She’d made and fired it herself. She made many things that way—things so beautiful he had no words to praise them or her—and sold them at field days in Addison and Franklin counties and all over the state. Now she watched him as he went to the stove and poured another cup of coffee.
    â€œJohn. I’m not sure I understand. Do you absolutely have to go to this—wherever they want you to go?”
    â€œNo. I don’t absolutely have to.”
    â€œAnd you haven’t decided yet.”
    He didn’t answer.
    â€œI don’t want you to.”
    â€œI know.” He took a deep breath and looked out the window, toward the sun, now a pale disk, cool and remote.
    â€œAnd Michael. The school counselor said he was doing better. Starting to trust you, the way he never could trust Louis.”
    â€œI’m sorry,” said Gordon. “I don’t want to leave you. Or him. Believe me. But I took the obligation. I took the pay all these years, Ola.”
    He waited for a minute, but she didn’t say anything else. So he went out.
    The muddy, hoof-cratered yard was growing bright now. The sky was red to the east, with only a few high, golden clouds. The wind was losing the chill of early morning, going mild in that brief New England summer mildness, warm yet with a hint of steel, that is like no other weather on earth. The smells of the warming earth, animal smells, breathed up from the ground and mingled with the forest scent of the wind.
    He stood in the yard, watching the stock on the near hill. They were due to rotate into the next square Monday. He had to remember to go over the ground one last time, make sure there were no thistles, no buttercups to bitter the milk. Then he remembered: He’d be gone by then.
    Well, if he had to leave, now was as good a time as any. Ola and Mike could keep up with milking. The herd was in good condition. Their feet were sound and their teats were holding up. He had second-cut hay coming up, not needing much attention till harvest, and he’d just bought fourteen tons of sixteen-percent grain from Bourdeau Brothers.
    If he wasn’t gone too long, it would put them money ahead. Active-duty pay, plus diving pay, maybe hazardous-duty pay—that looked pretty good next to a dairy farmer’s income.
    But they’d miss his labor. And Ola wasn’t any too good on the computer, keeping up with the payments and things.
    He looked at the mountains for a long time. At last, he went inside the barn again, and a moment later water spattered anew on concrete, and on the hill the tails swung lazily, and in the sky the sun rose, and rose, and rose.

3
    Karachi, Pakistan
    THE parrot merchant hung on Phelan like a grinning tick, explaining how rare the birds were, how valuable, how easy they were to take care of. “He is perfect pet for ship,” he said over and over, washing him from inches away with breath like the garbage littering the alleys off Paradise Street.
    Phelan evaded his eyes, hoping he’d give up. Passersby pushed past, women in dark clothes dangling enough gold to doom them in any American city, short men with glittering eyes that saw and understood everything instantly: American sailor, cornered by street merchant.
    But then those eyes would freeze on his face.
    The merchant reclaimed his attention by tugging on his arm. “Hey, I just don’t want the fucking thing, man,” he said. His voice was so soft it was almost lost in the racket of unmuffled exhaust.
    â€œBut you want the women, yes? The women, they love birds. How beautiful he is. Look, just look at him.”
    He found himself nose to beak with one of the parrots. He had to admit it’d give the guys on the Bitch a shit fit.