Cayos in the Stream Read Online Free PDF Page A

drums loud and fast in your chest. Beads of sweat dot your palms. If you try to spit now, what will come out? Dust, as in ashes to ashes, dust to.
    “Won’t be long now, boys,” you say. Despite your flannel tongue, you sound like yourself. It is a neat trick. You wish you knew how you did it.
    One of the Nazis on the conning tower wears a cap with a white crown. Not a very clean white crown, but still . . . That is their captain. If he plays it smart, you have not got a prayer. He will not let you near the submarine. He will send over a boat and take whatever you have that he wants. The Germans at the deck gun and the machine gun will cover the Pilar . You will not be able to do a thing.
    That is, if he plays it smart. He had better not play it smart, then. The best way you have thought of to keep him from doing that is acting like an idiot yourself. Well, almost. The best way you have thought of to stop him is acting like a famous idiot.
    Who says you will be acting? You hear Martha’s acid voice inside your head. She is not aboard the Pilar . She is back at Finca Vigia. You hear her acid voice anyhow.
    If you are going to act like a famous idiot, the time to start is now. “Hand me the megaphone,” you murmur to one of the men who has put his life on the line along with yours.
    “Here you go, boss.” He gives it to you. He figures you know what you are doing. He would not be out here with you if he did not. Maybe he is the idiot. Or maybe you are, after all.
    You raise the megaphone to your mouth. It does not weigh anything much. It looks like one a high-school yell leader would use. The only difference is, it has no high school’s name painted on it.
    “Ahoy, the submarine!” you bawl through it. “Can you give us a hand, please? I’m Ernest Hemingway!”
    If no one on the conning tower speaks English, this will not work. It may not work any which way, but that will scuttle it for sure. But the Germans on the tower—and the ones at the 88 on the rusty deck—jerk as if you poked them with pins. The skipper calls something down the open hatch. After a minute, someone hands him a megaphone a lot like yours.
    “You are . . . Ernest Hemingway?” he calls back to you. His English is accented. It is a hell of a lot better than your scraps of German, though. “ The Ernest Hemingway? Do I hear this rightly?”
    “ The Ernest Hemingway.” You try to sound like a proud, famous idiot. “See for yourself.” Proudly, you lower the megaphone.
    The U-boat skipper looks you over with a big pair of binoculars. “You are Ernest Hemingway,” he says through his megaphone. Even across that stretch of ocean, he sounds amazed.
    “Told you so.” If you are going to be an idiot, be a big idiot. Be a big, smug idiot, in fact. That makes you seem even stupider.
    “We are at war, your country and mine,” the skipper says. At his gesture, one of his men runs up a flag. Red, white, and black, sure as hell. An ugly old swastika—is there any other kind?—in the middle. The Nazis’ calling card.
    Oh, you bet we are , you think. “Well, so what?” you say. Yes, be a big, smug idiot. Who could want to hurt a world-famous writer? Except for some ex-wives and an editor or two, that is? Nobody at all. So you go on, “What are you going to do? Sink me?” You laugh as if the idea has never once crossed your mind.
    “It did occur to me, ja .” Even speaking a language not his own, the U-boat captain owns a dry wit.
    You laugh to show you notice. Always notice when they think they are funny, whether they are or not. Especially when they are not, in fact. It disarms them. Just for a moment, you eye the 88 aimed at the Pilar . If only you could literally do that!
    “What the devil for?” you say. “Our countries may be fighting, but I’ve got no beef with you. No beef—but I’ve got some marlin steaks in the ice chest.” You swell yourself up like a proud, smug idiot. “Caught the marlin myself.” You are not even lying