Free A Second Chance in Paradise by Tom Winton

had thinned some, but I was still shrouded in shade. A well-worn footpath cut across the grass to the front of the house and after I stepped onto it I just stood there for a moment. From where I was standing the first time I’d seen Pa’s place, I hadn’t seen through the dense bush the two massive Poinciana trees now standing before me. Like towering twin sentinels, their long limbs intertwined above the path, forming yet another tunnel. But this one was different. A person would have to travel this world far and wide to witness a sight more magnificent than a Royal Poinciana in full bloom. And here I was, looking up at two. With the expansive boughs of these trees bursting with vibrant, flaming-red flowers above me, I knew I was looking up at some of Mother Nature’s finest work. I walked beneath them with my head tilted way back, still marveling with every step. But at the same time, a feeling other than wonderment came over me. I became somewhat leery. I didn’t know what to expect. Not knowing Pa Bell very well I felt like I was crossing a border into his private world. And I was. 
    After slowly climbing the wide wooden steps to the veranda, gently I rapped the door with the brass door knocker – a miniature ship’s bell with the family name “Bell” inscribed in it.
    Nobody answered. I knocked again, still no answer.
    I walked around the side of the house, skirted an old brick cistern then saw the old man. He was standing on a narrow wooden dock, facing Florida Bay, leaning over the railing at the end of it with his back to me. Not wanting to startle him, I announced my presence by walking heavily on the faded gray planking. As I approached he turned around.
    “ Hello, Mister Bell.”
    Calmly as can be, as if he’d already known I was on his property, he said, “Mornin’.” Then he looked into a white plastic bucket sitting next to him on the dock, reached in, grabbed a handful of small dead fish and flipped them over the railing. I came up alongside him and we both looked down into the clear water. I couldn’t believe what I was seeing.
    All at once a n entire school of ten to fifteen-pound snook rushed for the baitfish. As they struck the slowly sinking cigar minnows, sunlight reflected in bright flashes off their silvery sides. One of the small fish floated on the surface but it wasn’t long before a large snook crashed it. Its huge mouth agape, water flew everywhere and it produced a loud, distinct popping sound.
    Pa then repeated the process, and with my eyes still glued to the water I said, “Wow, this is something else. They’re all nice size fish.”
    “See that one over there, the one laying in the eel grass?” Pa asked, pointing a sausage-like finger toward the far edge of the school, “Been feeding him for years. Call him ‘Old Moe’.”
    “ How do you know it’s the same fish?”
     
    “ That’s easy,” Pa answered, squinting into the sunlight, “see that there scar at the base of his tail ... where his black lateral line ends?”
    “ Ohhh yeah,” I said, studying the fish like an ichthyologist.
    “ Well ... when Buster found ’im he was still runnin’ gill nets, right out there at the front of this channel. Anyway, this one time he pulled up the net and Old Moe was stuck in it, by his tail. Where that scar is he had a diver’s spear plum through his body. It got tangled in the mesh.” 
    P a lit up a Lucky Strike then and I thought about having my first smoke of the day. But I didn’t. I wanted to hold off until I had my morning coffee.
    Exhaling as he spoke Pa said, “ Buster put ’im in the live well and brought him here to the dock. We sawed the spear in half, pulled it out, and let ’im go.”
    “ And he’s still here.”
    “ Yep! He’s still hangin’ ’round the dock. Snook favor stayin’ around structures you know.”
    It was easy to see that this man loved to talk about the sea and the life it sustains. That became even more obvious as he went on with