PULAU MATI by John L. Evans Page A

walked hand in hand down to the dock.   It was narrow and swayed as they walked out single file toward the end.  Lightweight nylon ropes stretched out into the clear, rippling water to where the traps were laid.  It looked like a crab had found it’s way into the first of the traps.  The angle of the sun and the ripples made it too difficult to be sure about the other three.  A steady, strong breeze blew into their faces from the east. At the end of the dock Gray scanned the horizon.  Anna put her arms around him from behind and rested her cheek against his bare shoulder.
    “You’re making me crazy, Anna.”
    “Yes?”
    “Yes.”
    “But we need to eat and get back across the island,” she said.
    “We need to make sure we have shelter tonight, especially for Lleyton and Malik.   They may already be in shock.  If it rains it could kill them.”
    The dock swayed and Gray glanced back to see Lex and Melanie coming toward them.
    Lex said, “Thought we would check the traps.  Whether they have crab in them or not, Melanie thinks we should eat and get back.”
    “We were thinking the same,” Anna said.  “It’s only fair to Shinobu and Keegan… and Paolo too I guess.  We’ll take back something for them to eat.”
    “Yeah, what is it with that guy?” Lex said.  “He makes me feel like I’m something distasteful he got on his shoe.”
    Gray laughed.  “Paolo?  I don’t know.  Don’t take it personally, Lex.  He seems to rub everyone the wrong way.”
    When they had pulled in and emptied the four traps they had a total of six crabs with bodies the size of a man’s hand and three eight inch fish. They cleaned the fish on the counter at the foot of the dock.  There was even a bucket there for drawing water to flush the counter clean when they were finished.  The fish guts and heads went into the traps and Lex threw them out again.  Five of the crabs they threw into a pot of boiling water in the hut.  While the water came back to a boil, Grey went up the slope to a stand of bamboo he had spotted and cut down two, two inch diameter stalks.  He cut them off at ten feet and left them by the trail to take back.
    Lex was sitting by the hut hacking away at a coconut with the machete.  The effort had him sweating.  When he had cleaned the majority of the fiber from the big brown seed he took a small bladed knife and tried to bore a hole in one end to get the water out.
    Anna called them to lunch about the time Lex succeeded in getting a hole in the shell.  He carried the coconut in and drained it into a cup.  There was only about a third cup of milky fluid in the shell and when he sipped it he made a face.  “This is not what I pay three bucks a can for.”  He offered the cup to the others but no one wanted any.
    Dayah asked, “You get coconut off ground?”
    Lex shrugged and made a long, “Yeah?” like a question.
    “Meat okay if… soon fall.  Coconut water you need coconut in tree.  Easy make hole then too.”
    “Ahhhh, thank you, Dayah,” Lex said.
    When they had eaten their lunch of fruit, fish, crab and rice, they packed up a pan of rice and some cooked crab.  They brought along a live crab in case Shinobu liked his raw.
    Gray had found a full size shovel and a small collapsible one so along with the bags of tools, coconuts, Claymore mines, food, water, pans, and poles, everyone had their arms full.  At the saddle a strong breeze was blowing against their backs. When they turned to look back, dark and menacing storm clouds stretched across the eastern horizon.  They hurried on.
    By Gray’s phone clock it took 28 minutes from the time they left the clearing to the time they reached the hut. Shinobu was asleep when they arrived as was Lleyton, and Keegan was asleep leaning against a tree trunk.  Gray woke the old man and motioned him and Paolo to move away with them so their talking did not disturb the resting young men.
    “Did I hear shots?” the old man asked when they