Страница 33 из 73
"I kind of like it, too," said Poe. "Except when they go overboard and do twenty or thirty breaches in a row. Even I get sick when they do that. And the noise… well, you heard it."
Qui
"They're amphibious, right?" Qui
"Which would be why we call them the whaley boys," said Poynter.
"Wait, are you accusing us of something?" asked Poe. "Because these guys are not the love children of us and some whales. We don't do that kind of thing."
"Well, there was that one time," said Poynter.
"Okay, yeah, just that one time," said Poe.
But Qui
"Let's ask them," said Poe. "Scooter, are your vertebrae fused together, or are you just a big, no-necked gray thug?"
Scooter turned his head to Poe and made a loud raspberry sound, spraying whaley spit all down the front of Poe's khakis and increasing the odor of decaying fish in the cabin by a factor of ten.
"We don't know what they are, Dr. Qui
"Meep," said Skippy.
"I taught him that," said Poe.
"That's from a Warner Brothers' cartoon," Qui
"No, that would be two meeps. Skippy only does one. Therefore, it's original. Isn't that right, Skippy?"
"Meep."
For some reason the meep did it. Some minds, particularly those with a scientific bent, a love of truth and certainty, have limits to how much absurdity they can handle. And here Qui
"Skippy and Scooter and Poynter and Poe — I can't handle it!" he screamed.
He felt as if his mind were a rubber band being stretched to breaking, and the meep had tweaked it. He screamed until he could feel veins pulsing in his forehead.
"You let it out now," said Captain Poynter. "Just go with it." Then, to Poe, "You know, I wouldn't have thought the alliteration would have done it. You ever hear of that?"
"Nope, I had an uncle who used to get nauseated at Reader's Digest article titles — you know, 'Terrible Truths of Toxic Toe Jam' — but I thought it was more because he read them in the doctor's office than the alliteration. You sure it wasn't the meep that did it?"
"This can't be happening. This can't be happening," Qui
"Anxiety attack," said Poynter. He put his hand on Qui
And it was then that Poynter stepped back and Poe threw the bucket of cold seawater in Qui
"Hey," Qui
"I told you to go with the dead thing, but you didn't listen," Poe said.
Nothing had changed, but things, his heart, slowed down, and Qui
Poe held the bucket at ready. "You're sure you're okay? I don't want to freak you out again."
"Yeah. I'm okay," said Qui
"That's the spirit," said Poe. He held the bucket against a wall, and a small portal opened and sucked the bucket in. Qui
"Hey," said Poynter, taking on the tone of the deeply offended, "now that you're dead, I've got a bone to pick with you about not bringing me my sandwich."
Qui
"Damn it, how hard could that have been? You've got a Ph.D. for Christ's sake — you can't get a fucking pastrami on rye? I've got a good mind to chuck you out the anus."
"Shhhhhhhh, Cap," Poe said. "That was go
"Meep," said Skippy.
CHAPTER TWENTY
Missing Biscuit,
Flopping Tuna
"Bwana Clay, you seen the Snowy Biscuit?"
Clay and Clair sat on the lanai of Clay's bungalow drinking mai-tais and watching smoke roll out the vents of a Weber kettle barbecue. Kona had his long board tucked underneath his arm and was heading for his Maui cruiser, a lime Krylon-over-rust 1975 BMW 2002, with no windows and seats that were covered in ratty blankets.
Clay was two mai-tais south of lucid, but he could still talk, "She took Nate's truck into town this morning. Haven't seen her since."
"Sistah wanted me to teach her some surfing. Got some easy sets rolling on West Shore, good for that."
"Sorry," said Clay. "We're smoking a big hunk of ahi tuna if you'd like to join us."
"No," said Clair.
"Tanks, but I'm going down to Lahaina town and see if I can find that Snowy Biscuit. We going to work tomorrow?"
"Maybe," said Clay, trying to think through a rum cloud. They'd pulled the Always Confused up out of the bottom of the harbor, and the boatyard had said it would be a week or so before it was ready to float again, although even then it would need some major cleaning. Still, they had Nate's boat. He looked at Clair.
"You're not sitting home tomorrow whining to me about your hangover," Clair said. "You get out there on the water and be sick like a proper man." She'd revised her thoughts on Clay's staying off the water. He was who he was.
"Yeah, plan on going out if it's not too windy," Clay said. "Hey, we supposed to have wind?" It occurred to Clay that he hadn't checked the weather since Nate had disappeared.
"Calm morning, trades in the afternoon," Kona said. "We can work."
"Tell Amy when you see her, okay. Take my cell phone with you. Call me when you find her. You sure you won't have di
"No," said Clair.
"No," said Kona, gri