Arctic Fire by Stephen Frey Page B

shark’s did when its jaws closed down on prey. “Weird things like that always seem to happen on this ship,” he said through his mouthful of food. “Know what I mean?”
    “Yeah, like how about all those brand new traps that were waiting for us on the dock in Dutch after we put off that first load in Akutan? To replace the ones we lost in the storm, right? I figured we’d be in Dutch for at least a week waiting for new stuff.” Speed Trap shook his head. “So what happens? One day in port and we’re out of the harbor and back on the crab.”
    “Exactly,” Grant agreed. “Nobody gets traps that fast. No fucking way.” He stared at the microwave for a few seconds. “What about that guy we picked up in the raft west of St. Paul last year during the opilio season? That was insane.”
    “Yeah, that was insane.”
    “I mean, there’s nothing at all on the radio about that guy. No heads-up from the Coast Guard boys, no chatter from any of the other boats. Then boom, there he is in the middle of the Bering Sea, waving us on from the raft and tapping his watch like he’s late for a dinner party.” Grant’s eyes narrowed. “The weirdest thing about it all was that Sage didn’t seem surprised. It was like he knew the raft was going to be there.”
    “Think he did?”
    Grant hesitated. “I’ll tell you this, little brother. We’ve never, and I mean
never
, dropped traps anywhere near that area of the Bering Sea before. Not during the king hunt or the opilio season. Even before you started crabbing with us we didn’t.”
    “And the test line we sank out there wasn’t very long,” Speed Trap added, referring to the line of traps Sage dropped in places they were unfamiliar with to see if crabs were foraging on the bottom. “Uncle Sage doesn’t drop many test lines to begin with, but when he does, they’re longer than that. You know?”
    “Yup.”
    “It was like he dropped that line to make us think he was into that spot, that he thought it could be a honey hole, but he really wasn’t. It was more like that was our excuse to be in thearea. I mean, when we pulled the traps back up there were crabs in them.”
    “But we didn’t stick around. Yeah, I’m with you.” Grant reached across the table, grabbed Speed Trap’s hot dog, and took a huge bite—which was nearly half of it—before tossing what was left back on his younger brother’s plate. “You know that guy stayed in Sage’s room until we got back to Dutch too. He never came out once. Not that I saw, anyway. Sage doesn’t let anybody use his room, not even Dad.”
    “And when we got to Dutch,” Speed Trap said, pulling his plate far enough to one side that even Grant’s long arms couldn’t reach what was left of the hot dog, “he was off the boat and gone as soon as we got to the pier. He actually jumped off the boat before we even tied up.” Speed Trap looked down at his plate dejectedly. “And we’ve thrown those greenhorns overboard,” he mumbled. “That’s the worst thing of all, Grant.”
    Grant chuckled dispassionately. “That’s just because Sage and Dad want to save some money, little brother. That’s just them being big old bastards.” He finished the beans by picking up his plate and tilting it so they dribbled into his mouth. “You and I didn’t see any of that money, did we?” he asked when the last bean was gone. “Technically, we should have split Troy’s share, but we didn’t. I got eighty-one grand. What did you get?”
    “Same.”
    “I rest my case. Throwing those greenhorns over the side is just about the money. And we’re not the only ship that does it.”
    Speed Trap remembered the terror he’d felt as he was hanging off the side of the
Arctic Fire
in that storm by what seemed like nothing more than one thin strand of the yellow safety harness. And that incredible sensation of overpowering relief that had rushed through his body when Troy had pulled him back on board. For a few incredible moments