The Incident on the Bridge (23 page)

S
ometimes the weather changed in an instant on summer afternoons. The fog was coming in fast now, whiting out the sky, flattening out the light in the backyard, chilling the air with drops of water that Carl could feel on his bare arms.

Carl stared at the bark of the ficus tree in the Lockes' backyard and pressed the phone to his skull as if he were still listening to Howard say there was no point in searching again so soon. He felt relieved that Fen had texted him a few minutes earlier to ask if he could go for a walk with Ted because she'd asked him to.

Sure
, he told Fen.
Go ahead.

K
elp, it looks like. Blocking the water intake and overheating the engine. Frank unscrews the top of the strainer, finds a skewer to poke out the kelp, curses when the water shoots up and soaks his sleeve and pants, picks the kelp out in long stringy pieces and short slimy bits. Edite the cat paces the whole time.

“What are you looking at?” he says to Edite. She licks a paw.

Still the motor won't keep going for more than ten seconds. He has to buy a new pump impeller. Nothing else to try but that. He'll have to go ashore, find the nearest marine supply, make quick work of it, then sail or motor around the point, head north.

He has only an hour, maybe an hour and a half before dark. A cloud's rolling over the water, swallowing boats, sky, jetty, the navy jets sitting on the tarmac. He can no longer see the bridge or downtown, just the choppy little breakers that rise and fall below his bow. Nothing to do but find a marina and go ashore. Shelter Island might be the closest—that or Point Loma. He needs a bank and a marine supply right together. Maybe he has the addresses on a card in his wallet? He puts his hand into his back pocket, but he knows it's empty before he reaches in.

His pocket is a blank space.

He opens the black box by the wheel, the one where he keeps his wallet when he's working on deck and doesn't want the bulk to bother him, and inside the black box are spare keys, a flashlight, a few coins, and a can opener. No wallet. Had he worn his coat ashore last night? His coat is flung over the cushions, getting damp in the foggy air. The cushions are wet already, the skin on his face is slick. No wallet in the coat, not the first time he checks the pockets, nor the second.

Think back. He hadn't done the whole circuit Sunday night, had interrupted his plans when he saw Julia walking like a vision across Tidelands Park. He had not gone to Albertsons. Had not gone to the ATM. Had only sorted through the first three trash cans, the ones by the playground. No time to do the other things. If he hadn't taken the wallet out of his back pocket to pay or collect money, how could he have left it anywhere? It might have fallen out of his pocket when he was maneuvering things. When he was sorting the cans. Could it have fallen out in the acacias, where he zipped up the sail bag?

No cash, no pump impeller. If someone had found the wallet by the trash cans, they would have taken his cash, sixty dollars at least, then gone to the ATM, emptied his account. But he had a PIN code. A thief wouldn't know the PIN code. Maybe he just lost the cash. Bank would give him a new card and he'd be okay. It would take a little longer, that's all. The women behind the counter in their jewels and heels would look him over; the men in their gray suits would see his shoes and judge. If the wallet was gone, it would take some time.

He could just go on to Pismo. Hope for wind the whole way. Make do.

Or there could be days and days of stillness. Fog or heat. No fresh water, not enough food. Wind pushing him out, a storm.

A wave slaps the boat as he checks his pockets again. He can see less and less of Cabrillo as a layer of clouds rolls over the point and thins.

It would be much safer to find the wallet and buy the pump impeller. Within the haze, the old lighthouse suddenly appears, trim as a sugar cube. Then the fleece thickens and the whole hill is blotted out.

Barely enough wind at present to turn around and sail back. May take hours. Once he gets back to his mooring, he can anchor the boat and row ashore and go to the trash cans and find the wallet if the wallet is there to find. It will take forever, forever, forever. Get the cash and buy the impeller. One more day was all it was, not forever. A day and a night.

“Frank!” Julia is calling him, her voice surprisingly faint, but he doesn't answer yet. He doesn't want her to think he can't take her home. Still a failure. Still incompetent.

“Hey!” she says, as if from far away. He looks to see if there are boats nearby, but the nearest is fifty yards, a day-tripper heading back.

Edite the cat jumps down to her cushion. She doubts him, too, from the way she stares.

He will have to bind Julia's feet and hands again. Tell her it's necessary. Tell her to pretend it's part of the game.

“F
rank?” she shouts.

The water flows hard and fast around the boat.

Her boots aren't here. She wasn't wearing them when she first woke up, and they aren't on the floor. If he put her in a car to bring her to this boat, did he bring the boots?

“Hey!” she shouts. Maybe she dropped the boots and he forgot about them, and right now her boots are lying near the bike path, where a jogger or a cyclist will see them.
What's this?
the jogger or cyclist will say.
A pair of pink boots? Suspicious!
They will call the police.

The boat turns hard and she falls against the table. She gets up and kneels on the cushion, pushes jars aside. The long, narrow window is covered with a ruffled cloth, stained and dusty like everything else on the boat. She forces it aside and sees drops of water on the glass, a misty world, the choppy white waves of a wide choppy sea. Then a thing comes to the window: dirty ivory fur, the face of an animal. A cat looks in at her and she looks back. The cat goes away and she sees reddish land. A cliff without a beach, mist floating, clouds gathering thickness and weight. Houses appear on the hillside: colored boxes and roofs, everything silent, as if asleep. A long white building that must be a hotel, not a soul on a single balcony, not a sign that she can read. Where, where, where, where. She can hear Frank moving on deck, can hear ropes and sails and rudder. She finds the knife in the drawer—how silly he was to leave it there—and she holds it while she watches the cat stalk back and forth outside the porthole, waiting for a sign.

“W
hose house is this?” Fen asked.

“Clay's,” Ted said.

It was weird how fast the fog was moving. He could see it floating along the street, cloudlike and cold. They were near the bay now, and Ted was shoving one of the flyers into a mailbox on a locked gate. Behind the locked gate stood a strange house with a gleaming silver wall. All over the wall were metal swirls. The fog made him cold, but he didn't say anything, just turned his bicycle around and followed Ted when she said they were going to Albertsons next.