Long Voyage Back (10 page)

Èxcuse me,' Neil said and walked up and past Carl. The woman, crouching at the far end of the cabin, had a butcher knife in her hand. It was Jeanne Forester. He was startled by the sudden impact of her tensed animal beauty, accentuated

by her gleaming wide dark eyes and long black hair falling wildly across one side of her face.

`Hey, Ned!' Carl shouted up to the cockpit. 'Who is this

guy?'

`Hand me up the gun!' Ned shouted back.

Neil had stopped three feet from Jeanne. What a beautiful woman, he was still thinking irrelevantly.

`Can you swim?' he asked her softly.

`What?' she said back. 'Who are you?'

As Neil walked again forward she raised the knife but he picked her up in his arms. She brought the knife down and held its point against his chest and stared at him. With her eyes only inches from his and the knife.point pricking his skin Neil gazed at her.

`Can you swim?' he asked her softly.

`Yes,' she answered, still holding the knife tight against his chest, her eyes searching his. He swung around and began to leave just as Carl handed a gun up to the man in the cockpit. Neil again brushed past Carl, climbed the stairs, went out into the cockpit, walked up to and past the man with the gun and in one unbroken motion threw Jeanne out into the water. She landed with an undignified splash, but began immediately swimming for shore.

`What the hell?' the older man said, rushing up beside Neil and looking down at Jean'-e. Neil hit him a crushing blow to the side of the head that sent him sprawling against the cockpit seat, the gun clattering to the deck. Neil picked it up and glanced back: the big, bearded man had been about to spring forward but stood frozen now in a crouch. Neil stuffed the gun deep into his trousers under the pressure of his belt and dived overboard. He swam the first thirty feet underwater, and when he - surfaced he looked back to see if the men on the yawl had other weapons, but they were hurrying their preparations to get out to sea. Neil began swimming after Jeanne.

He came up to her where she was resting with her two slender hands grasping the edge of a small boat dock at Kelly's, her head bowed, her wet black hair clinging in strands down her back. When she turned to him, she looked puzzled.

Àre you Neil Loken?' she asked.

`Yes, I . .

Àre you really Neil?' she persisted, suddenly smiling and crying both at once. 'Thank God. Is Frank here? The boat? I couldn't find it. We waited and waited. I was trying to get . .

Ìt's okay,' he interrupted, reaching out with his free hand and touching her shoulder. 'Let me help you up on to the dock.'

Àt first I thought you were another member of their crew,' she went on, still crying and laughing at the same time. 'When you asked, "Can you swim?" I thought . . .' She shook her head. 'How did you find me?' she asked next, pulling her head back and smiling up at him, tears mingling with the salt water on her face.

`Lisa found me,' Neil answered.

Òh my God, where are Lisa and Skip?'

When Neil pointed to Lisa standing on the dock watching them, she began trying to pull herself up on to the edge of the dock. Neil spread his right hand across her buttocks and lifted her up; she sprawled forward on to the dock. With a quick surge he pulled himself up beside her.

`Let's get to Vagabond,' he said, helping her up. They ran up the gangway to the main dock where Lisa and her mother hugged each other.

`Where's Skippy?' Jeanne asked as they all rushed on.

`Still on the grass,' Lisa said happily, pointing.

While Neil picked Skippy up into his arms, Lisa and Jeanne grabbed their bags. Together they hurried back along the street to the town dock, Neil already beginning to worry about Vagabond.

As he looked at the end of the dock Neil was surprised to note that the crowd had evaporated, but just as he was feeling reassured he saw trouble: seven or eight people had got aboard Vagabond, which had somehow drifted back to the dock. The stern of its starboard hull was banging periodically against a piling. People had thus been able to board directly.

Neil felt a flush of anger at Jim. When he went to board Vagabond he saw a man in a bright pink shirt and green pants standing on the hull facing him with a pistol.

`No more aboard,' the young man said to Neil.

Feeling an incongruous rush of mirth, Neil laughed. The man frowned, made uneasy both by the laugh and by the gun shoved in Neil's jeans.

Ìf you plan to try to sail this boat,' Neil said, 'you'd better let me aboard.'

`Neil!' he heard Jim shout and saw him standing in the side cockpit behind the man with the pistol.

Òkay,' the man said. 'You can come aboard. But you'll have to give me that gun.'

`Like hell I will,' Neil replied.

`He's the captain,' Jim said. 'No one can sail us out of here except him.'

The man stared at Neil and then shrugged.

Neil stepped down and then helped Jeanne, Lisa and Skip down after him. He could feel his body tense at the invasion of his boat and remained for the moment on the deck to , steady himself. Lisa had rushed up to Jim and buried her head against his chest, clinging to him. Neil noticed a mother breast-feeding her child in the side cockpit, three suitcases scattered around her feet. As he went past Jim and Lisa into the wheelhouse he saw two men and a woman standing on one side looking nervously at a thickset man seated opposite them. In the far cockpit someone was sprawled on the deck with a woman bent over him weeping. Neil turned to Jim, who had followed him into the wheelhouse.

`How many people have guns?' he asked.

`Just that young guy guarding the starboard hull and him,' Jim replied, nodding towards the man sitting on the settee at the rear of the wheelhouse, one leg crossed over the other, dressed in a brown business suit, a large .45 and Jim's .22 cradled in his lap. The man met Neil's gaze with alert coldness.

`What happened?' Neil asked.

`The wind shifted a little,' said Jim earnestly. 'And Vagabond swung around closer to the docks. When I went forward to shorten the anchor a whole mass of people got aboard. The two guys with guns herded half the crowd back up on to the docks and . . . shot the man in the side cockpit when he refused to get off '

Jeanne had passed them and was kneeling now beside the weeping woman. Lisa stayed with Skippy, listening. Neil turned to the man seated with the .45 on his lap. In his midthirties, thickset with dark, receding hair, he again gazed back at Neil with quiet confidence.

`We're sailing over to Crisfield to pick up a friend,' he announced. The man simply nodded. 'I don't appreciate people forcing themselves on to my boat at gunpoint,' Neil added coldly.

`These are tough times, Buddy,' the man said softly. 'And I didn't notice you or your friend selling tickets.' `You had to shoot someone?' Neil asked.

`There were thirty people aboard,' the man replied quietly. 'Your young friend said this boat couldn't sail out of here with that much weight. Jerry and I kicked twenty of them off A guy pulled a knife on Jerry and Jerry shot him. It's only a shoulder wound and I already patched it up. Nothing serious.'

Ì'd like our .22 back,' Neil said quietly.

The man looked down at his lap as if surprised to find Jim's rifle lying there.

`Sure,' he said after a pause. 'Just borrowed it for a minute.' He handed it to Neil.

'Lisa,' said Neil, turning to the young girl, 'get Skippy and your mother down into the port cabin. Jim, get the sails back up.'

He turned back to the man with the .45.

'Do you know much about sailing?' he asked him. 'Not much,' he said.

'How about your friend Jerry?'

'He thinks he's standing on the front of the boat.'

Neil glanced at the pink-shirted Jerry who stood nervously on the stern of the port hull watching the dock.

'All right,' said Neil. 'This boat is motorless so I'll trust you're not stupid enough to get rid of Jim and me since we're the only ones who can sail it. I'd appreciate it, however, if you'

d both put your guns away.'

'Sure,' said the man with a slight smile. 'You're the captain.'

Jim had raised the two sails forward and as Neil headed there to help him with the anchor Jeanne appeared. 'Where's Frank?' she asked.

'We're meeting him in Crisfield,' he answered. 'And then?'

'Out to sea,' he replied and, as he moved forward, frowned at how simple the three words made it sound. He doubted they'd ever see Frank again, and their chances of getting past Norfolk to the ocean in one piece were probably small. He'd be happy if they made it to Crisfield without the wind dying or one of the outlaws shooting someone. But one step at a time. Jim came aft after making the main halyard fast.

'Take the wheel, Jim,' he said, 'and put her on the port tack. I'll handle the anchor.'

'I couldn't stop them,' Jim burst out unexpectedly. 'The guy in the wheelhouse said he'd shoot me.'

Neil nodded and thought of the man in the wheelhouse. `He would have,' Neil said. '

Now go.'

In five minutes Vagabond was labouring across the bay at six knots in a nice breeze. Neil found himself looking for Jeanne, but the wheelhouse remained empty except for Jim and the cold-eyed Buddha with the gun. With Vagabond moving again Neil felt almost content, even strangely happy. Then, looking aft, he saw that the cloud mass from Washington was still spreading; the sky directly above them was no longer blue. He looked at it a moment, feeling fear and anger both, then went back to work. 14

Although the traffic between Crisfield and Salisbury had been thin, at the airport the parking lot was overflowing. There were three Maryland State Police cars and eight or nine policemen, but they seemed unclear about what they were supposed to be doing. Inside the drab terminal, people were strangely quiet. The room was crowded but what little movement there was occurred slowly as if everyone was moving through molasses. As Frank walked directly towards the door marked `Manager's Office', he had to push his way through two long lines that stretched far out into the room from the ticket counter. Ì want to buy or charter a plane,' he said to the small, spare man seated at a desk who had invited him in when he knocked.

After looking at Frank for a moment the man frowned down at the papers he'd been looking at.

Àll the regular charter planes are filled,' he said. 'There are also twenty or thirty private planes operating out of this airport and a few are unofficially selling seats to passengers. The going rate is five thousand dollars a seat.'

Àny of them going to New York?' Frank asked eagerly.

`None going north,' the manager replied. 'Most are going to the Bahamas or West Indies. One or two of the bigger ones to South America.'

`Then I want to buy a plane and hire a pilot.'

`No one will fly you to New York.'

`Money talks,' said Frank.

`Not very loudly as far as heading north is concerned.

The manager squinted up at Frank. 'May I ask why you're so hot to get to what's left of New York?' he asked. `Family.'

Àhhh,' the manager said and shook his head. 'Well, I can't help you. The private planes are housed in C and D Hangars at the west end of the field. If someone wants to sell a plane that's where they'd be.'

When Frank got to Hangar C there was a flurry of activity: two small planes being worked on, one being pushed out of the hangar, and three or four clusters of people talking. Frank began asking people who might sell him a plane to fly north.

`There's only one guy here I know of who said he'd let his plane go north if the money was right,' one man told him, ànd that's Tommy Trainer over in Hangar D.'

'How'll find him?' Frank asked.

`Little guy. Wears a natty white suit,' the man answered. `He owns the two-engine Beechcraft over in the back corner. But, Buddy, you don't think you're going to make it north and back through what's happening up there, do you?'

Frank wheeled and headed off to Hangar D. Tommy Trainer was a flashily dressed little man with dark, slicked-down hair and an absurdly large cigar. He was checking his Beechcraft with a mechanic when Frank found him. After listening to Frank explain what he wanted to do; the little man just continued to stare at him and chewed lightly on his unlit cigar.

`Well, suh,' he said in the dignified drawl of a southern gentleman completely in contrast to his bookmaker appearance. Àh'd like to help you, I really would. But I believe the general opinion is that it's dangerous travelling north these days. I believe there's just a bit of risk involved. Wouldn't you agree, suh?'

À lot of risk,' Frank said. 'I'll pay accordingly.' `That's right generous of you, suh, and I appreciate it. I'll tell you what,' he continued in his southern drawl, 'I can't charter you my plane 'cause the insurance doesn't cover it, you know, but I'll sell you the plane. Let's see. One hundred thousand dollars. How does that sound, suh?'

`What about a pilot?'

Ì believe I might be able to obtain you a pilot for . .. yes, for another twenty.'

Frank, who sometimes quibbled over the price of a twenty-five-cent sinker, felt a flash of anger. The beat-up plane couldn't be worth more than twenty-five thousand dollars and the pilot would be doing at the most a half-day's work.

Ìt's a deal,' he said.

Ìn cash, gold, or silver,' said Tommy Trainer.

Frank frowned, his forward momentum checked. He

looked at Tommy Trainer. Wherethe hell could he get the •

money?

`Where's. the nearest bank?' Frank finally asked. `Bank!' Tommy Trainer exclaimed. 'It's a little late for banks, I'm afraid.'

Frank stared at him uncertainly.

Ì'll be back,' he said.

On the short drive from the airport into Salisbury Frank realized that it wasn't going to work. He needed a plane this instant, and the banking system, even in the best of times, was not used to producing a hundred and twenty thousand dollars in an instant. In these times .. .

The situation turned out to be worse than he had imagined. Most banks hadn't even opened. The two that were, were mobbed with long lines outside their doors. And he realized, of course, that there was no phone or teletype contact with either of his New York City banks nor his bank in Oyster Bay.