Leaving Protection by Will Hobbs Page B

south side. A giant swell from the big splash raced down the bay at a hundred miles an hour, something like that. The people in the boats, they’d heard the big landslide and could see the swell coming. The boat farthest inside the bay rode way up on it and washed back safely. The other two, at full throttle, tried to ride the wave out of the bay.”
    â€œYou’re kidding.”
    â€œYou look a little green around the gills. You should. Be scared, kid: you have no idea what the ocean can do. When the swell hit the spit of land that pinches the mouth of Lituya down to a small opening onto the Pacific, that’s where it rose the highest, and that’s where it crested and broke. Both of the trollers that took the ride were destroyed.”
    â€œAny survivors?”
    â€œOne crew was lost, one survived—a married couple. They told of looking down from the crest of the wave onto the tops of trees eighty feet below. When their troller was swamped outside the spit, they managed to climb into their skiff.”
    â€œUnbelievable.”
    â€œBelieve it.”
    â€œWait a minute, Tor. It says here that on average, an earthquake wave in Lituya Bay occurs every twenty-two years. It says a wave drowned a party of Tlingits once, in their war canoes. Didn’t you say that Lituya Bay was our safe harbor? With a wave more than twenty years overdue?”
    The old pirate grinned through his pain. “Feeling lucky?”

14
    S ALMON TROLLERS DOTTED the northern horizon. We had reached the west bank of the Fairweather Grounds. To the east, one mountain peak stood higher than all the rest along the great white wall. “When you can see Mount Fairweather,” Tor said, “you’ve got a couple days of fair weather fishing ahead of you.”
    â€œIf we can’t see it, we don’t stay here?”
    â€œI didn’t say that. You fish it anyway, you just don’t sleep as easy. You listen to the forecasts, and you watch the birds, the clouds, and your barometer, in case you have to make a run for it.”
    At last we closed with the boats ahead. Tor throttled down and we dropped in behind a troller headingnorth. Two men were leaning over the stern, gaffing salmon. I said, “You see what I see?”
    â€œDrop the gear,” Torsen answered. “We got three hours of daylight. Make it count.”
    I swung into the cockpit and let the gear down, port side first. Torsen stood above, hanging on to the hayrack and watching my every move.
    Let him watch. The bite was on, and I was ready to do some serious fishing. I had worse things to fear from him than making a mistake running his gear.
    I didn’t have to wait long. The tip line was jerking before I even put the heavy down.
    â€œNever had trouble with sea lions out here,” Tor said. “Run all four lines down before you start to pull any back up. I’ll steer from up front. You’re going to have to do all the fishing.”
    â€œI can handle it,” I said as I began to bring the first line up. There was a king on the second leader, and underneath it, another on the third.
    Until it was getting too dark to see, nearly four hours later, I ran the gurdies, clubbed and gaffed and landed and cleaned salmon. It was unbelievable, and they never quit coming. Afterward, by the electric lights in the fish hold, I iced them until there wasn’t another left to be taken care of. At last I climbed out of the hold, shucked my gory bibs and boots, and staggered into the wheelhouse.
    Torsen was snoring. My watch said ten minutes after eleven. I flicked the switch above the galley sink and looked at myself in the mirror. My face wasspeckled with dried fish blood. There were fish scales on the tip of my nose; a piece of gut was stuck to the side of my chin. I was sunburned and my hair was matted with slime.
    Torsen’s dirty dishes were in the sink. The man hadn’t forgotten whose job that was, I thought bitterly.