Buried At Sea (29 page)

radio and showed him how to rig the bosun's chair, a harness seat, which they shackled to a halyard so Will could crank Jim up. But with only one usable hand he didn't have the strength to lift Jim's weight with the smallish mast winch.

"That's okay. I can climb the stay."

"I know you can, Tarzan, but it's safer in the harness:'

Will led the halyard back to one of the huge sheet winches and cranked Jim slowly skyward. From the masthead, they communicated by the VHF, with Will talking him through the inspection and lubrication of the blocks. When Jim described them as " pulleys," Will corrected him. "Blocks. As in blockhead." Next morning, Jim was wrapping fresh tape around a sharp fitting to keep the sail from snagging or chafing on the starboard shroud when Will came up early, carefully setting his own mug on the cockpit sole before he hiked himself one-armed through the hatch. Jim said, "Good morning."

Will nodded a remote good morning and took a long look to the southwest, the source of the cool, stiff wind that had sprung up at dawn. "Damn."

"What's wrong?"

"As any fool could plainly see, we've got a full gale bearing down on us." Jim had steered around two small squalls since he came on deck, easily managing to avoid the disturbances. "It doesn't look that bad."

"Have you looked at the barometer lately?"

With censure looming darker than the approaching weather he had failed to read, Jim hurried below. The atmospheric pressure had dropped sharply. He went back up on deck, full of apologies. He was embarrassed but also irritated by Will's superior attitude.

"Couldn't you feel it?" asked Will. "I feel it on my skin." "My skin isn't as fine-tuned."

"Then until it gets fine-tuned, please remember to read the goddamn barometer. That's what it's there for. It could save your life."

Thoroughly annoyed now, Jim said, "Since when are you afraid of a little blow?"

"Since I can't sail the boat alone."

Silence spread between the two men. Finally, Will spoke. "Why don't you take another reef in the main. And furl the jib. And hank the storm sail onto the jackstay just to be on the safe side. Can you find it?"

"Yes."

"I'll drive. Reef the main first:'

By the time Jim got the sails in order, the squalls were bunching closer together, squeezing the routes between them into narrow alleys. Soon there was no place to steer around them. They hit the boat one after another, sweeping the decks with hard rain. The gusts smacking into the sails and heeling the boat made for heavy work at a helm controlled by one hand and a knee. Jim took over. Will stood at his shoulder, offering suggestions that sounded very much like orders. The wind rose, as he had predicted, to thirty knots. It moaned through the rigging and scattered whitecaps. Soon the sea was streaked with windblown foam.

"She's steering like a dream!"

"She wouldn't be if you'd left the jib up."

The gale was short-lived, dropping by afternoon, as the wind veered east and north again. Jim rerigged the sails and auto-helm for the change, went below, caught a short nap, and woke to a bad odor. Will was at the stove.

"If that's lunch it smells like hell."

"The smell means we're running low on gas. Want to switch tanks? There's one more under the port cockpit bench."

Over the soup he had heated, he said, "Let's pull the drums off the winches. I'll show you how to lubricate the roller bearings."

"We already serviced the winches?'

"I did—you watched. This time you're going to do it."

Under the gleaming barrel of the starboard sheet winch, they found caked and blackened grease. Will cleaned it himself, with solvent. Then he showed Jim how to repack the bearings. "Not too much grease. You'll gum it all up." He reassembled the winch, showed Jim where to dissolve the sea salt that had caked up on the pawls, and sprayed them with light oil. Then he pointed at the port sheet winch.

"Your turn."

They made the rounds of all the winches. Jim finished reassembling the halyard winch as dark was falling. The wind was picking up again, veering south, and Hustle was throwing cold spray that hissed across the foredeck and the cabin roof. Jim was looking forward to drying off below and eating something warm.

"Okay, let's service the auto-helm."

"It's getting dark," Jim protested.

Will disengaged the automatic steering, locked the rudder so the boat would hold her approximate course, and began pulling parts from the auto-helm, which he passed back to Jim.

"You'll find half the day is dark. You can fix the refrigerator in daylight. You can substitute winches if one freezes until daylight. But there are certain jobs that won't wait—like things to do with the steering—so it's kind of helpful to know your way around in the dark."

"Will?"

"Hand me that—"

"Wait a minute. Just wait a minute. You've been testy and sarcastic, which is not your way. And you're riding me hard. I have a feeling either something is bothering you or you're trying to tell me something. Why don't you just say it?"

"I'm not trying to tell you something. I'm trying to teach you something."

"Which is?"

"I'm trying to teach you to take care of yourself and the boat."

"Why all of a sudden?'

Will looked away. "I should have started months ago." "But you didn't. And now all of a sudden you're putting me through a crash course."

"You're in need of one. You're in the middle of a serious ocean. You're not quite a novice anymore, but you're no pro, not even a high amateur."

"Will, are you all right?"

Jim waited for a reassuring answer. By some completely unspoken agreement, they had not discussed his shoulder since the "operation." Will had continued to refuse stitches and had turned very private. Jim had respected that, for whatever reason, the state of Will's health was an off-limits topic. Or, he had to admit, maybe he was afraid to ask, and maybe Will was afraid to voice his fears out loud.

"Are you all right?" he asked again.

"I'm not sure," Will answered.

"I thought you were getting better."

"I think I ought to talk to my doctor."

Will meant actual voice-talk, not e-mail, which indicated to Jim how seriously concerned the old man was, because he had said repeatedly how he feared that the McVays might track him by phone or radio signals.

Will couldn't get a connection with the satellite phone. "I'm getting a recording—no longer in service."

"Did you forget to pay?"

"It's billed to a card. . . Bloody awful time for a screwup." He switched on the longrange, single-sideband radio and tried to hail a ship-to-shore radio-telephone station.

"Most of them are either shut down or reduced because of sat phones," he muttered to a worried Jim, who stood beside him at the nav station, gripping an overhead rail as the boat rolled and wondering whether a new infection had invaded Will's wound or if he had screwed up and not eliminated all of the first one. "They used to track your signal with movable antenne, but with sat phones—and cell phones inshore—that's all going by the boards."

Will had no luck raising the South American communications centers to the west, so he tried South Africa, twentyseven hundred miles to the east. But the Cape Town station did not respond either. He took a last ditch stab at Portishead, England, on the chance that if the atmospherics were right, a skip signal might carry the six thousand miles to the North Atlantic station. "It all depends on the atmospherics, but the Portishead operators are top-notch. If anybody can hear me it'll be them."

"Portishead, Portishead, Portishead, this is Hustle, Yankee-Niner-Yankee-RomeoRomeo-Lima. Do you read me, Portishead?" He tried repeatedly, fine-tuning and switching channels, but raised no response from Portishead. Finally, he tossed down the headset and switched off the radio. "Maybe tomorrow."

Two days later he still hadn't made radio contact with the single sideband. No high-seas station responded in the west. Nothing east. He took another long shot at Portishead, England.

"Maybe this time—"

Static roared suddenly.

"What the hell is that? Sounds like they're next door." Whistles and clicks crackled from the speakers. "What is that?"

"Distress channel:' Will fiddled with the knobs. A voice—shrill with fear—leaped out of the speakers. "Mayday. Mayday. Mayday."

Will leaned intently into the radio and flicked the transmit switch.

"I read your Mayday. Speak your vessel and position." "Mayday, Mayday, Mayday." Over his shoulder Will said, "Remember this, Jim. If you ever have to transmit a distress call always, always, always report your position first. That's the one thing you have got to get through if they're ever going to find you." He lifted the microphone to his lips again. "I'm reading your Mayday loud and clear at 2182 kHz. What is your position?"

"Mayday."

"For Christ's sake." Then he said to Jim. "They're probably scared silly."

"Maybe they can't hear you?'

"I read your Mayday. Report your position."

"This is the motor yacht Pegasus. Call sign India-FiveJuliet-Tango-Echo. We are taking on water. One man and two women aboard. Two children."

"What is your position, Pegasus?"

"Twenty-six degrees, 30 minutes, 14 seconds south; 30 degrees, 28 minutes, 32 seconds west."

Will looked at Jim.

Jim pointed at their own pencil track on the chart. "They're close." Will measured the distance with his calipers. "Twelve hours. Pegasus, I copy 26, 30, 14

south; 30, 28, 32 west." "Roger that. We're sinking. Please come." Jim said, "Tell them we'll help."

"Where are you?" shrilled the panicky voice.

"On our way," said Will.

"What is your position?"

"We'll be there in twelve hours," said Will. "Out." He switched off the radio and entered Pegasus's transmission in Hustle's log. Then he marked the sinking vessel's position on the chart, glanced at the GPS for Hustle's exact position, marked it, and drew a line between the two vessels. Then he looked up at Jim. " There's our course."

'They're lucky we're near," said Jim.

"Extremely," said Will. He drummed his fingers on the chart for a moment. " Unbelievably lucky." He checked the wind direction and said, "All right, let's get some more sail up. We can make it on a broad reach if this wind holds." The rescue course took them a little north of west.

Hustle flew on the south wind, which continued freshening, pouring hard over the port side just aft of the beam. Jim concentrated on the helm—with Will coaching him to nurse more speed out of the sloop. But before long, Will sat down on the bench. His helpful recommendations came fewer and less frequently until he sank into a deep and lasting silence.

Even a cursory glance at the frail figure at Jim's elbow showed a man running on his last reserves. Fatigue had gouged deep lines in his cheeks. Jim had the eeriest feeling that the infection was like a volcano, smoldering in Will's being, building inexorably toward an eruption.

"Will, I'm okay up here for a while if you want to catch a little sleep." The old man stood shakily and shambled toward the hatch. "I'll check the radio again. . . . Maybe shut my eyes for a couple of minutes."

Jim sailed alone for the next two hours using every trick he had learned on his own and every trick Will had taught him to eke another half knot from the wind. When he finally engaged the auto-helm he was so tired that he knew that it would outsail him in his weary state and that the boat would make faster time in its mechanical hand. Belowdecks, he found Will asleep at the nav station, slumped over the chart table, the radio mike under his hand. Jim stretched out on the pilot berth and closed his eyes and listened to the water racing past the hull.

Then he got an idea. Other rescuers steaming to the distress call would speak to each other on the VHF. He got up, reached around Will, switched on the VHF, and listened to static.

"What are you doing?" asked Will, blinking awake. "Checking for VHF traffic."

"I've been listening. Nothing. No one's talking, no one's coming but us."

"Wait a minute. Shouldn't we pass it on? Call for more help?" Will shook his head. He seemed not to like what he was saying, even as he was trying to convince himself he was doing the right thing. "Plenty of ships will have caught the distress call. Commercial vessels monitor the emergency frequencies 'round the clock. We'

re heading their way, but I'm hoping some steamer will beat us to them. A container ship can easily do three hundred or four hundred miles in the time we do one hundred. We can check in an hour. . . . Still . . . in case they didn't . . . You're right, Jim. I've got to relay it. Dammit. Should have done it hours ago."

Will transmitted on the distress channel, "Mayday relay. Mayday relay. Mayday relay. Motor yacht Pegasus. IndiaFive-Juliet-Tango-Echo reports sinking 26 degrees, 30 minutes, 14 seconds south; 30

degrees, 28 minutes, 32 seconds west."

He repeated the relay twice.

An operator on Ascension Island responded in a London Cockney accent. "Thank you for the Mayday relay. What is your ship and your position, please?" Will shut the radio off.

"What did you do that for?" Jim asked.

"Same reason I didn't tell Pegasus our position." "Why?"

"I don't like this."

"What do you mean?"

"Something's off."

"It could be a setup. I think they're gunning for us." "They? You mean the McVays?"

"Could be."

"Yeah, but if they're not, then there are five people, including a couple of kids . . ."

"We relayed the distress call. And we'll keep heading that way and listen. See who responds. See what they find. See if it's really a sinking boat or some hired guns waiting for you and me."

"Well, you said there's an air base at Ascension Island. They'll launch search planes."

"I'm sure they will—if that was really Ascension Island." "What do you mean 'if'? You just heard them."

"I heard a London accent on an island leased to Americans."

"Maybe we're getting a little too paranoid?"

Will answered slowly, as if explaining long division to a student reared on calculators. " What if the McVays and Andy Nickels arranged for someone nearby to broadcast a phony distress call."