Sinbad
By Gwayne Naug

The pier had been there for over a hundred years, and had played host to a thousand ships. But now it was used only for recreational purposes.

Wayne reeled in his fishing line and whistled between his strong teeth, wrinkling his freckled nose. "Nothing doing today - not even a tiddler".

His brother Brad moved chewing gum from one pudgy cheek to the other. "Just think. Next week, we'll be on a ship as big as that one right out there."

The elder, Steve, pushed a blond lock out of his eyes. "That's an oil tanker. Remember how old Sinbad has taught us to tell the difference between bulk carriers, containers and liners."

"He came out here on a liner, didn't he?" asked Wayne.

“No, says it was a windjammer in the days of sail."

“You reckon he's that old?" asked Brad as he swatted a fly.

"I once thought he was the oldest man we knew, more ancient than our grandfather," replied Steve, "but now I'm not so sure."

"I used to love his stories about the pirates in the China Sea, and how when they attacked his ship he helped repulse them with belaying pins," said Wayne.

Brad looked up. "What's a belaying pin?"

"They don't have them any more," said Wayne as he cleaned his fish hooks.

"The old man has a cutlass, though," said Brad. "Remember, he showed it to us once. Said he bought it in Shanghai after he was attacked by opium smugglers."

“He seems to have been attacked a lot."

'He was even kidnapped in Africa once," said Wayne, "somewhere down the Ivory Coast, I think he said it was."

"How'd he get away?" asked Brad, wide-eyed.

"I think he was rescued by a Caliph just as he was about to be sold as a slave. Luckily he escaped on an Arab dhow to Morocco."

Brad opened a packet of popcorn. "Wonder he doesn't write a book about his adventures."

"I don't think he writes very well," said Steve. "In fact he doesn't even know what longitude we are here."

"Oh, who does?" sniffed Wayne as he pulled a comic out of his pocket and turned the printed pages.
“Do you think he'll miss us?" asked Brad.

'Should we tell him we'll be going to live in Sydney after we return from our cruise?" asked Wayne. "Perhaps we should just disappear."

"No," Steve said. "That would be cruel. Remember, he's often said we're like a family to him. After all, he lost his family in a cyclone and then a tidal wave."

"Wonder where his home is?" asked Wayne as he turned his baseball hat back to front. Some cold place where they have lots of ice and snow and those terrible storms like the one that wrecked his father's ship."

"Look! Here he comes nowl" called Steve. An elderly man hobbled toward them along the pier, raising his walking stick in a salute. He had a grey beard on his pointed chin, a tanned complexion and bleached blue eyes the colour of the sea when the hot sunlight danced on it at noon.

"Ho, me hearties, what have you caught today?"

"Nothing much," said Steve, watching with envy as a Greek kid caught a fair-sized calamari.

"I remember when we were becalmed in the Sargasso, and lived on them eight-legged things - we'd eaten everything from the galley, even the hard tack."

"Where was the place the barracuda attacked you?" asked Brad.

"'Twas when I fell overboard near Java. My foot bled all over the water after the barracuda got two of me toes, and I knew the sharks would come to finish me off - they can smell blood two miles away, you know."

"What happened?"

"Just as a big grey nurse was circling me I managed to catch a line thrown to me by a passing junk."

"You've been on all kinds of ships, haven't you?" said Wayne.

"Never been on a submarine. The Navy wouldn't take me because of an old knee injury."

"How did you get that?" asked Steve curiously.

"Fell out of the crow's nest when we were rounding Cape Horn. The Captain wanted to put me into hospital in Chile, but I didn't want none of that, so I had the old Lascar cook brew me up some of his herbs to make a tea. It took the edge off the pain."

"You got to be brave at sea, facing danger like you did every day," said Wayne.

"Aw, nowadays it's nothing like it used to be," said the old salt. "They've got all that newfangled radar and stuff."

"But they've still got pirates," said Steve. "I read about them recently."

"Don't believe everything you read," said the old man.

Steve wanted to add, "Nor hear", because he was starting to doubt some of the old man's words. But young Brad believed the yam about the sea monsters that roared like lions off the coast of Sri Lanka, so who was he to break the spell? Little kids believed in Santa Claus and all the magic stories which surrounded him. Perhaps the old salt was a Santa Claus of the sea. Brad and Wayne would realise one day that good stories did not have to be true, and that magic was everywhere.

But Steve suspected that Wayne was starting to add up a few things when he asked, "How many times did you cross the Line?"

"Oh, I've lost count - Neptune knows me as a regular."

"We'll be crossing the Equator soon," said Steve.

"Why, where you going?" asked the old man quickly, as he filled his pipe with tobacco from a tin with a ship painted on its lid.

"We're going to Fiji and Hawaii with our parents on a cruise," said Wayne.

"Ah, the Sandwich Islands, where the great sailor Captain Cook was speared by the natives. You'll be able to tell me all about it when you come back."

Steve stood up and put his arm around the old man's thin shoulders. "We're not coming back".

"But, crikey, you can't just go away - who'll I talk to, who'll keep me company on the days when you've gone? Why?" The old man's voice trembled. "Where you going to live, anyway?"

"In Sydney," said Wayne. "Near the Harbour - we can watch all the ships and think of you. We won't forget you."

The old man sighed. "Oh, yes you will - you'll grow up. In fact, you're all growing like bean stalks. How old are you, Steve?"

"I'm twelve next year. I was only nine when I first started fishing here. Young Brad was allowed to join us when he was seven."

The wind blew a sharp message of impending rain, and all about them on the pier the anglers were hastily packing up. The children walked with the man they called Sinbad to the road, and as they waved him goodbye he brushed back a tear, and was narrowly missed by a truck. He recalled the time he had been hit by a motor cycle and lost two of his toes, but that was a long time ago. So was the time when he came to this seaside place and found a job and lodgings - he'd been fifteen then and had run away from a cruel father and the arid wheatland in the harsh inland part of the state. He had meant to run off to sea, or join the Navy, but somehow he never did. In fact, he'd never been farther away from here than a ferry ride across the bay. But one day ... one day he would catch a boat to somewhere . . .