Caleb Pottle, captain of the F/V Cavalier, took a pull on his pipe and regarded his passenger. Seth Hazlitt was pacing the stern deck of the charter fishing boat, muttering under his breath impatiently, as he had been doing for the better part of an hour.
"I don't think she's coming, Doc," he said.
Seth stopped his pacing momentarily to look down the length of the wharf. "She'll be here," he said, more to himself than to Caleb. "We'll give her ten more minutes." It was the fifth - or was it the sixth? - time that morning Seth had decided to delay their departure by "ten more minutes."
Caleb shrugged. It made no difference to him when they left - he charged his customers by the day, not the hour - but it seemed a shame to waste even part of such a fine spring day tied up at the pier when he knew the stripers were running out by Little Duck Island. The early morning fog blanketing the coast had burned off, and now the sun was shining on calm waters under a bright blue sky - perfect weather for fishing.
In an effort to lighten Seth's mood, Caleb tried to distract him by changing the subject.
"Henry McIntyer got a length of pot warp wrapped around his prop shaft three days ago," he said. "He had to get Danny St. Onge to dive for him and cut it off."
"That so," Seth said absently.
"Ay-yuh. 'Course, he had to wait a couple a' days 'cuz Danny was already working on another job, checking the keel pipes on Matt Hansen's boat after he scraped her bottom on some ledge in shoal water."
"Really."
"I told Matt he'd be better off grounding out so he could fix any damage that he found at the same time, but you know Matt, he can be wicked hard-headed sometimes."
"Uh-huh," said Seth as he checked his watch.
Caleb sighed internally and gave up. Usually Seth was happy to listen to harbor gossip, but clearly his mind was elsewhere today. Not that he could blame him: it had been an eventful week in Cabot Cove, and things were just beginning to settle back down to normal. As for Seth himself, he'd only been discharged from the hospital yesterday after what everyone was describing as a very close call.
Ten minutes came and went, as they had come and gone before.
"Doc," Caleb said, "I really don't think she's gonna show."
Seth looked crestfallen, but at last he reluctantly agreed. "I guess not," he sighed. "Let's go."
But as Caleb turned to head to the wheelhouse, they heard the sound of running feet.
"Seth!" Jessica called as she ran along the dock. "Seth, don't go!"
Seth heard her voice and smiled, sharing a knowing look with Caleb, having known all along that Jessica would eventually change her mind.
"Well, now, I'd just about given up on you!" he exclaimed.
Somewhat breathless after her dash to the harbor, Jessica took Seth's outstretched hand and allowed him to help her aboard. "After that gracious invitation, how could I refuse?"
"Well,"he said, "if you want to make yourself useful, why don't you bear a hand with that bow line."
Jessica looked at Seth in disbelief. "You mean you've been waiting here for me for an hour, and all you can tell me to do is to see to that bow line?"
"We haven't been waiting," Seth said stiffly. "We had ... mechanical difficulties."
"Oh," said Jessica. Now it was her turn to look crestfallen. "Well. Fine. I'll see to the bow line."
Caleb watched the exchange from his vantage point in the wheelhouse. He could understand why Seth wasn't keen to let on the real reason for the delayed departure - Doc had his pride, after all - and maybe Jessica deserved her disappointment, at least a little bit. But he had no intention of keeping her in the dark about Seth's true motivations.
As she went up to the bow of the boat and began to coil the Cavalier's bow line, Caleb stepped out of the wheelhouse and came up behind her, still casually smoking his pipe.
"Oh, morning, Caleb," Jessica said brightly.
"Morning, ma'am," he said. "Fact is, we've been waiting here for over an hour. Sure glad you showed up - the Doc was getting mighty testy."
Jessica smiled, reassured by the knowledge that Seth had waited for her after all.
Caleb returned to his place in the wheelhouse and fired up the Cavalier's diesel engine. As Seth tossed the stern line to the dock and came forward to join Jessica at the bow he nudged the throttle forward, and the boat eased out into the harbor.
Finally, it was time to go fishing.
The End
Glossary of Possibly Unfamiliar Maine Words and Phrases:
Ay-yuh - Maine-speak for "yes."
Bow line - A rope ("line") that secures the front of a boat ("bow") to the dock.
Grounding out - Intentionally beaching a boat at low tide in order to work on the hull below the waterline while the tide is out. When the tide comes back in, it re-floats the boat.
Keel pipes - A cooling system consisting of pipes mounted under the hull through which engine coolant is pumped. The coolant in the pipes exchanges heat with the ocean water, thus keeping the engine temperature down.
Pot warp - The rope connecting a lobster trap (or "pot") to its buoy. A boat that accidentally runs over the buoy can end up with the rope tangled in its propellor.
Shoal water - Shallow water.
Stern line - Same thing as a bow line, but located at the back ("stern") of the boat.
Stripers - Atlantic striped bass, a fish popular for sport fishing, and also for cooking.
Wicked - A common New England term meaning "very."