Hemingway's Notebook by Bill Granger

in his task. He touched every object in both rooms. His fingers turned over books and notebooks and canister jars full of caked salt and a Zenith transoceanic radio and bedclothes that were strewn around an unmade army cot. It was the home of a lonely, middle-aged man who had gathered some treasures and comforts and then had abandoned them because they were not enough.
    There was nothing in the house.
    Devereaux walked outside and stretched in the muggy air. The sun was filtered by trees here and it was not so hot as it was down on the beach.
    “You see,” said Philippe with triumph in his voice. “No one can find Monsieur Harry’s notebook.”
    “Because it does not exist.”
    “That is what I think,” Philippe said. But he had lost the attention of the white man, who was crossing the bare, sandy yard in back of the shack to the privy.
    Devereaux opened the door and was assailed by the dank stink of rotting feces in the holding tank.
    “What do you look for?”
    “The same thing the other men looked for.”
    “Commander Celezon.”
    “And Colonel Ready.”
    “Once Colonel Ready came here. I know. Alone. I saw him. He was like you. He looked in the toilet. What are you looking for?”
    Devereaux made a face and stood still until he became accustomed to the smell. Then he took a stick and poked at the underside of the toilet seat, which was a wooden shelf with a hole cut in the middle. There was nothing.
    He expected to find nothing. But it was the way you did a search. The way Ready would have done a search.
    He dropped the stick.
    The stick dropped into the filthy holding tank and struck something. The sound was hard, wood on metal.
    He looked at Philippe, who was staring at him with wide blue eyes in a wonderfully old and cynical child’s face.
    Devereaux reached under the seat and pulled at the nails that held it to the support boards.
    The nails screeched and the board came up. The holding tank was open but there was nothing to be seen but the murky filthy water and the bits of paper and leaves and the rotting feces.
    The stick floated on the scum.
    Devereaux made a face. He took the shelving of the toilet bench and poked the surface of the water. He felt a hard object beneath the opaque scum.
    He put the toilet seat back on the boards and stepped out of the privy. He stared at Philippe and the boy returned the stare. The boy knew, Devereaux thought. He had known when he had watched Colonel Ready alone go through the search and miss it. He had known when he saw Celezon and his men tear up Harry’s place and miss it. He had known.
    “How does Harry get it out?”
    “I don’t know what you mean.”
    Devereaux shrugged. He walked back to the shack. He found it in plain sight. Fishing poles and bits of tackle and leaders and reels. Also an old net.
    And the net on the pole.
    He went back to the privy.
    The box was wrapped in oilcloth and it was dripping with scum when he lifted it out of the holding tank. He dropped the box on the ground. With the end of a stick, he opened the oilcloth. He took the box and wiped his hands on his trousers and they streaked his trousers with filth.
    He was sweating and the boy was watching him but from a little distance.
    “This is Harry’s secret place isn’t it?”
    “I don’t know,” the boy said and he took a step back.
    “Is that true?”
    “I would not lie.”
    “You would lie to protect Harry.”
    “I would protect Harry anyway.”
    “If I open the box and you see what it is, what will you do?”
    “Nothing.”
    “You might tell the police.”
    “You don’t ever talk to the police. You don’t know that? But you are white, so you don’t have to know that.”
    Devereaux thought he understood. Besides, what would the boy know?
    My God, Devereaux thought. A secret. Harry has a secret after all. It was the last thing he wanted.
    He wanted only to have enough time to put a finger on Colonel Ready, set the trap he had already baited with his gaudy performance in