Chilli sweats 5

Chilli Sweats 5

I left my cabin fully armed, to the teeth in fact, well prepared for any

trouble.  When I got on deck, there  was Wheels, there was Sid, there was

Silver Fox.  They were just doing their jobs.  I looked at the wheelhouse;

there was the Captain.  She looked as happy as hell.  She had a big smile on

her face.  There was a mild swell; we were cutting through the waves.  There

were the lovely, black slave girls, looking hot and luscious, as always.  And

it was obviously time we were bringing in some swordfish.  It was that time of

year.  Everything was normal.  Everything was cool.  Was it possible I could

even say anything to anybody?  Was that a dream?

Anyway, it just wasn’t the right time to say anything.  I just lay back, stayed

cool, did my job.  I had nets to mend.  I knew I was way behind so I just got

on and started mending my nets.  Everything was fine.  I spent maybe two,

three, hours mending the nets.  I didn’t say a word.  I thought, “Err...best

leave it alone.”.

Anyway, later on, the sun was going down; it was time for a card session.  So I

let everybody else go down, do the cards, and I stayed on deck for a while.  I

just looked at the setting sun and watched it go down and thought, “Hey, that

was a close shave!  I don’t know what that was, but it was a close shave.”  So

I was feeling well, I don’t know, what can I tell you?  It was a situation I

couldn’t really talk to anybody about, so I thought that maybe if I went down

below shortly and played some cards, I would be able to ask a few questions.

“What’s been happening?”  You know.  Maybe I’d got a bit drunk, passed out.

“You guys, what have you been doing?  What’s been happening?”  Just to try and

find out where the time line was.

So I went down the steps, down to the rec. room and everybody was in there.

Things were getting a bit hot, people were slamming cards down, money was

changing hands.  Things were getting pretty damn interesting.  I’d been missing

out on some early action.  Not that I was that bothered ‘cos I had something

else on my mind.  So I thought it certainly wasn’t the right time to say

anything.  And as it happened, it never was the right time to say anything.  It

never, ever was possible.  It never felt right to say anything.  So I had to

keep all of this stuff to myself.

Anyway, the only thing that was quite interesting was that while they were

playing cards – funnily enough it was a card game I had invented, called

“Waffle”.  It’s a little bit like “Knock” but you lay the cards down in front

of you and ultimately it became quite famous.  In fact, you may even meet

people that know “Waffle” and if I were to speak to them and say, “Hey, I

invented that!”, they would just laugh at me.  It was that famous.  Strange,

the  way things happen.

Anyway, lots of money was changing hands.  Since I wasn’t on the case I stayed

clear– especially when Wheels is playing – you have to be on the case.  As soon

as he was losing, he  would just shoot off at a tangent, telling stories, and

the next thing you knew, you were down all your money.  You were down all your

money.  It was that quick, that fast.  He is a vrai expert.

What was I saying?  Cards.  Well, they had been talking about something.  They

had been talking about something when I had walked into the room: “Black Crow.”

But as soon as I had walked into the room, they had stopped talking about it,

which made me suspicious.  So obviously I was very interested.  For some time

afterwards I wondered, “What is Black Crow?”.  It was obvious I wasn’t going to

be told.