CHAPTER 28

A MORNING’S WORK

      Murray made no further attempt to engage him in conversation as they sat on the cabin top with the scones and tea. The sun was getting uncomfortably hot, and Frank was beginning to wish that Murray had suggested they take their break below, when he stood up and said, “Right, now. This is when we put on our swimming togs.” He picked up plates and mugs; Frank followed him down the companionway. He put the dishes on the galley counter, and without comment stripped naked, then pulled on a bathing suit that Frank thought unnecessarily skimpy. “Come on,” he said, “Christmas is coming. Time to get to work,” and went on deck.
      Frank changed hurriedly, and followed him, to see that he had attached two buckets to long lanyards tied to the rigging. He tossed them overboard, handed Frank a scrubbing brush, and with a splash followed the buckets. Frank jumped after him.
      The water was cold, but not unpleasant after the heat on deck. It came almost up to Frank’s chest. “We start at the bow,” said Murray. “Scrub her clean, then rinse off with a bucket. Like this.” He began to ply his brush with gusto along the red-painted bottom, almost a foot of which was already exposed below the waterline by the rapidly falling tide. Frank could see the muscles in his back working vigorously beneath the loose, wrinkled skin. It was funny how he complained about his back, he thought, like his father, except that his father’s back only prevented him from doing things he didn’t want to do, while this guy’s back didn’t seem to hold him up at all.
      Murray dropped his brush into the water, grabbed a bucket, and sluiced off the patch he had scrubbed. “There you are,” he said. “You take this side, I’ll take the other. I’ll race ya. Should be no match, a strong young fella’ like you, against me with me bad back. And I’ve given you a start.”
      Without waiting to see Frank begin, he splashed away around the bow of the boat, ducking under the bobstay; Frank heard him grunting as he went to work. He put his own brush against the planking, and rubbed back and forth a few times. The red paint was covered with a layer of brown slime, with wispy patches of green weed here and there. The slime came off easily, bringing some of the paint with it – the weed was a lot harder to remove. As Murray had predicted, the bottom was clean-er lower down. He worked hard on a patch about three feet long, rinsed it with the bucket, and started on a new patch. He was about to rinse that, when Murray splash-ed back around the bow. “That’s the ticket,” he said. “Keep at it,” and splashed away again.
      As he worked aft along the hull, Frank found that the falling tide was exposing more and more of the bottom; by the time he was halfway to the stern, only the deadwood was still covered. He had to reach further underneath now, and his shoulders and arms were be-ginning to ache. When he stopped, he could hear Murray splashing and grunting opposite him; he straightened his back for a moment, then went at it again. The water around him was brown with the dislodged slime, which had a strong, cold, foul smell; he no longer noticed that it was chilly. He was standing on a mixture of fine sand and close packed mud, with patches of gravel here and there. Sometimes he stepped on a sharp stone that hurt his foot, but if Murray could do it barefoot, he thought, he could too. He worked on, doggedly, refusing to be daunted by the area still to be cleaned.
      At length he found himself close enough to the stern, where the deadwood ended, to be able to see that Murray had drawn ahead of him, though not by much, on the other side. He redoubled his efforts, but Murray reached the transom first, scrubbed and rinsed it, and came around to Frank’s side just as he was finishing up. “Dead heat,” he said. “Nearly, anyway.” He stood back to scan Frank’s work. “Looks like you did a good job. We’ll just give that deadwood a rub over, and then we’ll be done.”
      The tide had now left the Hatea entirely, and Frank could see the bottom of the thick deadwood, which had sunk an inch or so into the sand and gravel of the beach. They had to bring buckets of water from beyond the Hatea’s stern to rinse it off. This was the hardest part to reach; they had to bend double to get at it. Frank tried to imagine what it would be like to be underneath a boat twice this size, scrubbing a flat bottom over his head, without even being able to stand up. He was glad he didn’t have to, he decided.
      Murray appeared again, said, “That’ll do it. Let’s rinse off,” walked to the water, sloshed his brush around, threw it back onto the beach, waded out until the water was up to his waist, dived under, and swam a few strokes into deeper water, where he turned on his back, and squirted a little fountain from his lips. Frank follow-ed him, but trod water, upright, and omitted the foun-tain. “Time for lunch,” said Murray, “and something to drink. I’ve got a thirst on me that Noah’s flood wouldn’t slake. Come on.”
      As they climbed the folding steps on one of the sheerlegs to reach the deck, Frank realized with a shock that he had all but forgotten the events of the day before, and the fears they had engendered, in his preoccupation with the effort to keep up with the old man. They re-turned now, their intrusion doubly unwelcome after the period of respite.