Depth Charge by Jason Heaton (carter reed .txt) 📗

time,” said Ian, who was sweating profusely under his broad-brimmed hat as he leaned over the gunwale of the rickety skiff. “I’m starving.”

Raj, the fisherman whose boat they’d rented for three months and who was helping them during this project, greeted Upali on the opposite side of the boat with a barrage of Sinhala and a hearty laugh.

“Got the kettle on?” Tusker smiled, handed his weight belt, tank and harness up to Ian, and heaved himself into the boat. He stripped off the upper part of his sopping wetsuit, tying the empty arms around his waist. Months in the tropics had tanned his torso a deep shade of brown, except for a long scar across his left shoulder that stood out as a slash of white. He ran a hand through his wet, sun-bleached hair, which he hadn’t cut since arriving the previous autumn. Without the care of a local barber, it had grown out, saltwater and sun stiffening it to the consistency of dry grass.

In the harbor the last of the fishing fleet was tying up, a mix of rickety wooden vessels with small outboard motors, ugly fiberglass skiffs like the one they were on, and a few traditional oruwa catamarans. The air reeked of rotting fish and diesel exhaust. Tusker had a sudden urge to be back home. It would be spring there, woodsmoke on the wind, the smell of damp soil, still some snow in the shadows. Heading back soon enough, he thought and shook off the daydream.

“Anything promising down there today?” Ian asked once they’d settled in the skiff.

“No luck today, it seems,” Upali said. “Not exactly the way I wanted to finish out the week before I head over to Batticaloa.”

“You sure chose a fine time to abandon us here,” Tusker jabbed him, shaking his head. Upali laughed.

“Yeah, another posh holiday disguised as official business,” Ian chimed in. “What is it this time? Interviewing female interns poolside?”

“All right, all right, guys,” Upali shook his head. “It might be another goose chase, but a fisherman reported snagging his lines on something deep offshore. HQ figured it’d be worth looking into, given all the lost war wrecks over there. I’m going to make a search grid and run some sonar scans.”

“A likely story,” Tusker replied. “You get the glamorous gigs while Ian and I are left here to dig in the mud.” He grinned at his friend and winked behind his sunglasses. “Batticaloa,” Tusker stumbled on the town’s name, “That’s a fair drive to get there, yeah?”

“From here it’ll be a good six hours cross-country. The funny thing is, it’s only about 350 kilometers. In the US, that’d take you two, maybe two and a half hours? But here, it’s all narrow roads and lots of small towns.”

“Oh, I’m well familiar now,” Tusker said. “I certainly will not miss the traffic here when I go back home. Where are you staying over there?”

“For the east coast work, MOCHA partners with a dive resort in Batti called the Deep Blue. They cater to the tech diving crowd, these macho foreigners who want to tick the Hermes off their bucket list.” Upali said, referring to the wreck of the British aircraft carrier, sunk by a Japanese aerial attack during World War II. “If I get some free time, I might do a dive or two. I need to keep my proficiency up, you know.” He grinned.

“Ah, the truth comes out,” Ian replied as he fished their lunch packets out of a sun faded cooler. “A diving holiday!”

Raj’s mobile phone interrupted the banter, ringing shrilly. He wiggled his head side to side in apology and fished it out of his shirt pocket. He spoke in animated Sinhala for less than a minute, then put the phone away and said something to Upali.

“That was a call from the guy who’s fixing the pump,” Upali translated. The tired dredging pump they’d been using to excavate sea bed had sputtered to a halt two days earlier. It required constant fiddling to keep running, but it did make their work a lot easier. They’d finally left it with a motorcycle mechanic in Galle to tinker with. “Sounds like it might be ready this afternoon.”

Tusker gave an exaggerated double “thumbs up” gesture. “Well, that’s some good news. Ian, if you want to go into town and pick it up, we can keep at it since we’re already suited up.” Tusker gestured to Upali and then at the muddy harbor. He took a pull on an insulated flask that had lost its battle with the tropical sun and got a mouthful of lukewarm water that tasted faintly of iodine.

“Right-o, I’m sure it just took a little gaffer tape and a whack with a big spanner,” Ian replied in his sharp Geordie accent. “I’ll go pick it up in the van and then start my weekend early.” He grinned.

“Got a big date, Ian?” Upali asked. “Still pursuing that waitress at The Lighthouse?”

“I’m waiting for you to teach me some more Sinhala so I can impress her!” Ian shot back.

“I’m not sure what would confuse her more, your Newcastle accent or your attempted Sinhala!”

Tusker laughed out loud. “Seriously, Ian. People say I sound like the characters in that show, Fargo, but the Midwestern U.S. has got nothing on the north of England when it comes to accents. It’s taken me six months to finally understand a word you’re saying.”

“Oh sure, you betcha,” Upali said in an exaggerated Midwestern American accent. Tusker punched him hard on the shoulder.

“Hey man, you spent enough time in Houghton to pick it up. Now you’ve got a weird mish-mash of Sri Lankan and Yooper,” Tusker joked, referring to the nickname given to Michigan’s Upper Peninsula natives.

After a short lunch of red rice and jackfruit curry eaten out of a banana leaf on the sweltering skiff, Tusker wriggled back into his damp wetsuit and spat in his mask. Raj would take Ian back to the dock while Upali and Tusker were underwater, returning with