Free Deeper by Moore-JamesA Page B

either.
    "If you
change your mind, Captain, you have but to ask.   I think we could find a spare mask and tank."
    "Thanks.   You never know.   I might take you up on that."
    Instead of
leaving him to worry and pace, I showed the man how to bait lobster traps.   We talked a bit more about not much of
anything.   I found out he was married and
divorced.   He found out I was
married.   Other than the job at hand, we
also discovered we had damned near nothing in common.
    That didn't
mean we couldn’t get along.   The two of
us sat in silence and manned the traps for a few hours.   It was nice.
    I didn't ask
him if he and Diana were an item.   It wasn't any of my business.   Honestly, I don't think there was anything
between them.   I think there was a mutual
attraction, but I also don't think he was the type to try sleeping with his
students.   Okay, let's be honest
here:   I couldn't imagine him sleeping
with anyone.   He wasn't a bad looking
guy, but I sort of got the impression he was prissy.   The idea of dirt touching him was enough to
make him want to shower, and the idea of exchanging bodily fluids?   I could just see him spending a week in a
decontamination chamber.
    That might be
mean, but that was just the impression I got from him.

     
    *           *           *           *           *

     
    Close to four
in the afternoon, they were done for the day.   That was a good thing, because they'd used up all the oxygen tanks by
then, having come up a couple of times to get refills.
    Charlie was
finally getting over his attitude, and that was an even better thing.   He walked over to me as he was toweling off
and shivering violently.   Mostly, I
think, because I was the one handing out coffee and chicken soup in big mugs.
    "Cold enough for you?"
    Charlie looked
at me as he took the hot coffee and downed half of it in one gulp.   I figure there were probably a few layers of
his throat that weren't burned to sin after that, but only a few.   "You don't know from cold, Joe.   My balls didn't shrink, they
disappeared."
    I chuckled and
handed him a mug of soup and a spoon.   He
was the last in line for the stuff and I had the heater going in the main
cabin.   He was still shivering but it was
a little less violently.   The thing about
being in water like that is your body adapts to a certain extent.   It feels a lot worse when you come out and
your blood starts flowing again.   Charlie
was proof of that.   He was practically
doing a jitterbug; he wasn’t trying to.   A couple of kids who'd been down there were still shaking so hard they
were having trouble carrying their mugs without covering themselves in coffee
or soup.   I don't think they minded much
when the hot liquid spilled over them.
    I'd thought
long and hard about telling Charlie what I'd seen along with Mary Parsons.   In the long run, I decided to keep my mouth
shut unless he asked about it.
    Instead I
brought up the dive.
    "Did you
see anything interesting down there?"
    "Oh, yeah."   He nodded hard and fast.
    "Seriously?"
    "Very seriously."   He settled down and I sat across from him on a couple of the
chairs.   "Those caves, Joe, they're
unbelievable.   We've mapped a big part of
them with the sonar, and I swear, I think they could go on forever."   He sounded as stunned as I guess he should
have.   I was trying to picture the caves
and having trouble.   "There's this
little tunnel — I guess you'd call it — and it goes on for a damned long time,
but once you're past that, it opens up and it's huge."
    "What the
hell causes something like that?"
    "Doc Ward
says it's probably gas bubbles from when the reef formed in the first
place."   He frowned.   "I dunno.   Parts of it seemed almost too smooth, does
that make sense?"
    "Too smooth?"
    "Yeah,
like they were polished."   He sipped
at his soup, and then broke down and used his spoon like a human being.
    "Yeah, I
think that's called