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The Hagens were in their early sixties and in reasonably good shape As with e, Claire's bottom had spread and her waist carried a little flab, but her face was fairly free of wrinkles and her breasts were still large and fir battle with a paunch that had grown into a well-rounded stoether they ran a fa in clean, low-e used cars
After Joe bought a 15- ketch, and named it The First Atte the ement of their business to their two sons They liked to sail down the coast and around Cabo San Lucas into the Sea of Cortez, spending the fallback and forth between picturesque ports nestled on the shores
This was the first time they had sailed this far north As he lazily trolled for whatever fish took a fancy to his bait, Joe kept half an eye on the fathoine with the sails furled The tides at this end of the Gulf could vary as much as 7 meters (23 feet) and he didn't want to run on an uncharted sandbar
He relaxed as the stylus showed a depression under the keel to be over 50 ht The seafloor on the north end of the Gulf was uniforh tide The bottom was usually a mixture of silt and sand The fathometer read the underwater depression as uneven hard rock
"Aha, they laughed at all the great geniuses," said Joe as he felt a tug on his trolling line He reeled it in and discovered a California corbina about the length of his arm on the hook
Claire shaded her eyes with one hand "He's too pretty to keep Throw the poor thing back"
"That's odd"
"What's odd?"
"All the other corbinas I've ever caught had dark spots on a white body This sucker is colored like a fluorescent canary"
She adjusted her halter and came astern to have a closer look at his catch
"Now this is really weird," said Joe, holding up one hand and displaying palht yellow "If I weren't a sane man, I'd say somebody dyed this fish"
"He sparkles under the sun as if his scales were spangles," said Claire
Joe peered over the side of the boat "The water in this one particular area looks like it was squeezed out of a lemon"
"Could be a good fishing hole"
"You irl" Joe moved past her to the bow and threw out the anchor "This looks as good a place as any to spend the afternoon angling for a big one"