Cap'n Crabtoes's Arc

Chapter 1 of 1

Cap'n Crabtoes wanted the sunken galleon, and the galleon lay past water he could not cross. He was a crab the size of a man's fist. The treasure rumored inside that wreck was the greatest ever lost off Curacao. But every boat on the shore rose taller than his eye patch, and none would tip for a crab's weight on the oar. He scuttled the length of the beach at dawn. Fishing skiffs sat beached above the tide line. He climbed one gunwale, gripped it with his sabre claw, and pushed. The hull did not shift. He shoved again. Sand held it fast. A crab cannot launch a boat built for men, and he knew it before his legs gave out. He dropped back to the sand and looked for something smaller. He found the barrels near a stack of nets. Three of them, wooden, bound with iron hoops, warm and dark from years of aged rum. One lay on its side, half its contents drained. He tapped the wood with his claw. It rang hollow near the top. An empty barrel floats. A barrel his size might carry him. He worked through the morning. He pried the loose bung free and let the last rum spill into the sand. He gnawed a driftwood plank into a paddle no longer than his sabre. He dragged a strip of sailcloth over the open top for a deck. The barrel was round, unsteady, and smelled of drink, but it was the first vessel small enough for a crab to captain. The tide climbed by afternoon. He rolled the barrel to the waterline, digging all six legs into the wet sand. A wave lifted it. He scrambled aboard through the bung hole and clung to the rim. The barrel spun once, twice, then steadied. It floated. He raised his sabre at the open water where the galleon had gone down. "Now we sail," he said. He paddled out past the beached skiffs. The shore shrank behind him. For the first time the sunken galleon lay within reach, not blocked by wood too big to move. He drove the paddle deeper. Then the barrel dropped low in the water. Rum had soaked the old staves for years, and the wood drank the sea through every crack. Water rose past his claws. His vessel was sinking, and the shore was already far behind.