Dead calm

by Charles Williams

  Working rapidly now, she dropped sugar into the glass with the powder from the pulverized tablets, put in a few spoonfuls of water to start it dissolving, and squeezed in a whole lemon. Then she opened the door of the tiny electric refrigerator inset in the after bulkhead and took two ice cubes from the tray. She finished filling the glass with water and stirred until there was no trace of the powder left in the bottom and the glass itself was beaded with moisture from the cold. Warriner had been sitting there in the sun since nine this morning with nothing to drink; there wasn’t much chance he could resist it—especially if she didn’t offer it to him and was drinking from it herself. A little of it wouldn’t hurt her.

  She carried it up the ladder into the hot glare of sunlight on deck. Warriner looked up from the compass with watchful appraisal but appeared to relax when she sat down on the after edge of the deckhouse beside the mizzenmast, rather than coming down into the cockpit. He said nothing. She ignored him, looking aft as if hoping to see the other boat following them. She took a sip of the lemonade.

  The sun was diagonally behind her, falling over her left shoulder, which meant their course was somewhere in the vicinity of southwest. There was a good chance he was steering for the Marquesas or for Tahiti, but she couldn’t depend on that because there was no guarantee he even knew the correct course to either of them. She had to narrow it down. Moodily, as if lost in thought, she let her gaze run idly along the scupper on the port quarter, the extreme edge of the deck where it was crossed by the shadow of the mizzenmast.

  Of course the shadow was by no means stationary. With Saracen’s corkscrew motion as she quartered across the swell, and his deviations on either side of the course he was steering, it moved forward and aft along the edge of the deck as much as two feet or more. But by catching it several times when the boat was on an even keel to cancel out the rolling, she was able to strike an average between the extremes of his steering. The after edge of the shadow would be about three inches forward of that lifeline stanchion, the second one counting from astern. All she had to do, if and when she got the wheel, would be to line the shadow up on that spot, note the heading on the compass, and figure out the reciprocal. But was he going to take the bait? It had already been several minutes.

  She looked aft and, without appearing even to notice him, saw that his eyes had been on the glass. She raised it to her mouth, took another sip, and set it beside her on the deckhouse while she reached in her pocket for a cigarette. It was well beaded with moisture, and she knew he could see the ice. How much longer could he stand it?

  “What’s that you’re drinking?” he asked then.

  “Lemonade,” she said.

  “Oh.”

  She put the cigarette in her mouth, and returned the pack to her pocket. Let him wait. Make him ask for it. Then she saw him look at the glass again and knew she had won. Her only problem had been to make him want it.

  There was no way she could lose now, whether he suspected anything or not. If he asked her to bring him a glass, she would merely make another with three of the tablets in it. And whether he did or did not demand to trade after she’d given it to him, it made no difference. But she had an idea he would take the simple way. He did.

  “It looks good,” he said.

  “Would you like me to make you one?” she asked.

  There was a trace of slyness in his eyes now. Mother was all right when he was scared and needed her, but she wasn’t going to put anything over on him. He was too smart for that. “Why not just give me that one and make another for yourself?”

  “But I’ve already drunk out of it,” she protested.

  “That doesn’t matter.” He smiled, as if thinking of some secret joke, and held out his hand.

  She shrugged and handed it to him and started down the ladder. Then she turned and asked, “Would you like me to make you another while I’m at it?”

  “No, this will do,” he replied, still smiling. “And thanks a lot.”

  Once out of sight at the foot of the ladder, she hurried forward. That should have dispelled the last doubt, she thought, and he’d gulp it right down. How long would it take? Not more than five to ten minutes, probably, but with the first wave of drowsiness he was going to know she’d tricked him and he’d be dangerous until he finally collapsed. She’d better stay here, ready to barricade the door if she saw him start down the ladder, though she didn’t believe he’d ever make it this far. Of course there was the chance he might think to close and fasten the hatch to lock her below, but it couldn’t be helped. She didn’t dare remain on deck. Anyway, noise would never wake him, that thoroughly drugged, and she could tear the hatch cover apart with a hammer and marlinspike and force her way out.

  She grabbed a coiled heaving line, which was soft and easy to handle, and the knife she’d used to cut open the box of shotgun shells. With the door just cracked, she peered out, watching the hatch. A minute went by. Three. Ten. Saracen continued to plow ahead, apparently still on course. Had he become suspicious of it after all? She was sure there’d been no taste; it was well covered by the lemon and sugar. Then she felt Saracen lurch and begin to turn. At the same time a demonic cry shot up above the noise of the engine, like a prolonged scream of rage, and the glass came flying in the open hatch. It narrowly missed the radio and smashed against the bulkhead at the forward end of her bunk. Saracen rolled down and turned in the opposite direction. She continued to watch the hatch with apprehension, but sunlight fell through it unobstructed. Almost a full minute went by. Nothing happened except that Saracen continued to turn, as if she were going around in a tight circle. She could visualize what had happened. Trying to get up, holding onto the wheel, he’d turned it, and then collapsed across it.

  She ran through the after cabin, mounted the first step of the ladder, and peered out. Then she froze. He had fallen forward across the wheel, but now he was moving again, making one last effort to get up. His face was distorted, and he cried out as though in rage against the darkness swimming around him. One hand reached down to the engine control panel. The noise of the engine cut off abruptly, his arm swung, and she saw the ignition key flash in the sunlight as he threw it overboard.

  The brass cover of the binnacle followed it over the side, and then, still screaming, he had hold of the compass itself, swinging in its gimbals. Muscles writhed in his arms and shoulders, and the tendons stood out in his throat. It tore free, and while he was turning with it in his hands to throw it into the sea he fell back onto the seat and collapsed with his head and shoulders on the narrow strip of deck beside him. The compass dropped on deck, burst with an eruption of alcohol, and slid over the side as Saracen rolled down to starboard. In the abrupt and almost terrifyingly lonely silence as Saracen slowed and came to rest she could only cling to the handrail of the ladder in defeat, and for a moment she wished she had killed him when she’d had the chance. There was no other compass aboard.

  Then it was gone, and she was moving ahead. After what she’d been through to get this far, nothing was going to stop her. She had no idea how she was going to find her way back across all those miles of open sea with nothing to guide her, but that would have to wait till she could get to it. The first thing was to tie him. Why, she wasn’t quite sure, because he’d probably be unconscious for at least eight or ten hours and if she hadn’t found the other boat in five or less she’d never find it at all and after that nothing mattered anyway, but he had to be immobilized once and for all. Maybe it had something to do with having been completely at his mercy for all those years since early this morning, and if there had been any way to embed him in a barrel of hardening concrete up to his neck she would have done it. She stood above him in the cockpit with her heaving line and her knife.

  He hadn’t moved since he’d fallen. She reached down to touch him, a little fearfully, and then realized nothing was going to rouse him now. He was still behind the wheel, and there was no possibility at all of moving him. He must weigh 180 or 190 pounds, and, inert as
he was, it would take a professional weight-lifter to get him out of there. But it didn’t matter. She could handle the wheel from the port seat of the cockpit, or standing up. The only thing that did matter was that she had to hurry.

  She cut a piece about twelve feet long from the heaving line and bound his wrists together in front of him, going around them and then between them to form an unslippable pair of handcuffs. She stretched his arms out along the strip of deck and made the end of the line fast to a lifeline stanchion. Then she tied his ankles together and anchored them to the base of the binnacle. There was no way he could move at all. His face rested on his outstretched arms.

  She stood up, wiped sweat from her face, and looked at her watch. It was 2:20 p.m. Her mind was instantly swamped with all the problems clamoring for attention, calculations of time and distance and the unknown factor of direction and the need to do everything at once, but she brushed them aside. One thing at a time, and the next was to start the engine. She couldn’t stand the silence. Normally she disliked the noise as much as John did, but now she needed the comfort of it to be able to think. Saracen had come to rest and was rolling forlornly on the groundswell, completely becalmed and helpless on a sea as unruffled as glass and achingly empty in all directions to the far rim of the visible world, where it met the converging bowl of the sky. With John there, it was privacy, but now it was a loneliness that screamed.

  She knelt and reached in under the engine-control panel. There were wires coming up to the ammeter as well as to the ignition switch, but she could identify them by location. There were only two to the switch. She twisted and yanked until she had broken them loose. She pulled them down into view and peeled the insulation from them with the knife; then she twisted the ends together, pulled the lever back to neutral, and pressed the starter button. The engine rumbled into life and began to roar. She eased the throttle back to idle.

  Now …

  All she had was the sun, and she’d only have that for another four hours—unless it disappeared before then behind a cloudbank or in a squall. She’d been facing directly aft, and it had come diagonally over her left shoulder, so facing forward she’d want it in the same place. It wasn’t much, she thought fearfully. But wait—she could do better than that.

  What about the shadow of the mizzenmast, and her mark? If she projected the mark to the opposite side of the boat along the same plane she should be very near the reciprocal of the course he’d been steering. She grabbed up what was left of the heaving line, whirled, and caught the wire lifeline on the port quarter beside the cockpit. Three inches forward of the second stanchion, counting from aft. Right here. She made the end of the line fast, passed it ahead of the mizzen, and went up the starboard side with it. She pulled it taut, and then moved her end aft until it just touched the forward side of the mast. It intersected the starboard lifeline nearly midway between the third and fourth stanchions, again counting from aft. She tied it there, winding the surplus line three or four times around the wire to make it easier to see from the wheel.

  At best it was still only a prayer, a stab in the dark. The bearing of the sun was going to change as it moved down toward the horizon, and there was no guarantee at all that Warriner had even gone back to his original course when he’d returned to the deck after smashing her compass. But, she thought, trying to still the fear inside her, all she had to do was come within four miles of Orpheus and she’d be able to see her.

  She jumped back into the cockpit, pushed the lever into gear, ran the throttle up to about where Warriner had had it, and put the wheel over. Sitting on the port seat of the cockpit beside it, she could see her marker all right. She brought Saracen on around until the shadow of the mizzenmast fell on it, swinging back and forth on either side of it as she rolled. As she steadied up, she looked at her watch. It was 2:35 p.m.

  How far, how many hours? It was a few minutes past two when Warriner had stopped the engine and thrown the key overboard. From nine this morning, that would be five hours since they’d left Orpheus—less the time he’d been below while Saracen was running God knew where with no one at the wheel. Call it four and a half hours—twenty-five to twenty-seven miles. At the same speed going back, she should be in the area at seven p.m. That would be a little after sunset, perhaps not quite dark, but by then she would be running blind.

  So Orpheus had to be in sight by then, because there would be no second chance. If she weren’t there, she’d already sunk, or the course had been wrong, and with no compass the latter was as irreversible as the first. Within a half-hour she’d be hopelessly lost herself, with no idea where she was going or where she’d been. She couldn’t think about it. She tried to force everything from her mind but the mechanics of steering by the shadow of the mizzenmast and the continuing prayer that the sun would go on shining.

  At a little after three she began to see the dark cloud in the north. The squall was still far over the horizon, but she couldn’t take a chance of running into it with all sail set; they might be knocked down or dismasted. But she hated to stop, even for a few minutes. It appeared to be moving to the westward at the same time it was coming nearer; maybe it would be gone by the time she got there. But she should take in sail anyway; the main and the jib were going to interfere too much with her view ahead. At a little after four, while the sun was momentarily obscured by a passing cloud, she stopped and took in everything. She was under way again in less than twenty minutes, with the sun visible once more on the thinning edge of the cloud.

  Warriner had never moved since he’d fallen. She began to be afraid the three tablets had been too much and she’d killed him. She reached over and touched his throat, and she could feel the pulse. It was slow but steady.

  At four-thirty she reached inside the hatch for the binoculars and began to search the horizon to port and then to starboard between corrections to the helm. There was the chance Orpheus had got a breeze and John had tried to follow them.

  Her eyes encountered nothing but the empty miles of water and the far rim of that circle in which they seemed to be forever centered. The noise of the engine went on, they rose and fell in a long pitching motion as the glassy billows of the swell rolled up under her quarter, but they never appeared to move at all.

  It was five o’clock. Five-thirty. The squall ahead was moving into the west and breaking up. Scattered clouds began to obscure the sun at intervals, but she went on, looking over her shoulder and trying to judge its position. She continued to search the horizon to port and starboard with the glasses. The sea was empty all around her. By six the tightness in her chest was becoming almost unbearable.

  Six-thirty. The sun came out from behind another cloud, and it was far down now, less than a diameter above the horizon and beginning to redden in the haze. The shadow of the mizzenmast was gone. She stood up, holding the wheel with her right hand and steering with the sun just behind her left shoulder while she held the binoculars to her eyes and scanned the sea ahead.

  The colors began. Far overhead the fleecy edges of clouds were touched with gold and then pink, darkening to crimson. The sun slid downward into the low cloudbank on the horizon, and in a moment it was gone from sight and there were only the vertical rays of pale lemon extending upward against the sky. Just for an instant the defenses of her mind gave way and she remembered sunsets she had watched with John here in this cockpit in the Bahamas and Caribbean and the Gulf of Panama. She began to tremble. She dropped the engine out of gear, pulled the throttle back to idle, and leaped up on deck. She climbed atop the main boom with an arm about the mast and slowly swung the binoculars all the way around from the already darkening east to the great flame of the afterglow in the west, and there was no sign of Orpheus anywhere. It was 7:05 p.m.

  15

  Ingram’s eyes were bleak as he looked down into the fading light of the main cabin. If you had any talent for kidding yourself, he thought, now would be a good time to break it out. With the two of them bailing and Mrs. Warriner at the pump, the water
had gained several inches in the past half-hour. They must have lost whole planks off her outer skin in that squall.

  He turned and searched the emptiness of the sea down to the southwest and then glanced at his watch. It was 6:50. He dropped the bucket on the deck and went back to the others. “Knock off a minute.”

  Bellew looked at him inquiringly. Mrs. Warriner straightened and pushed damp hair back from a face deeply lined with fatigue. “You mean we’re gaining on it?”

  He shook his head. “No. We’re not even keeping up with it. But a quarter of an hour one way or the other’s not going to make any difference, and before it gets too dark to see I want to have one more look around from the masthead.”

  He slung the glasses around his neck and shackled the sling to the main halyard again. He climbed atop the boom and stepped into the sling with his lifeline around the mast. “Haul away,” he ordered. In the confused sea left behind by the squall, Orpheus was wallowing even worse than before, but he managed the tricky business of getting past the spreaders without accident. When he was up just short of the masthead light, he called down, “That’ll do. Make fast.”

  They were lying on a southerly heading at the moment. Legs locked against the dizzying swing of the mast, he looked around him. In the east the blue was already beginning to darken with the coming of night, while off to starboard the sun had dropped over the horizon and the western sky was aflame. It was impossible to escape entirely the beauty of it or to seal the mind against all of memory’s infiltration, and he was glad he was up here where they couldn’t see his face. Then he put the glasses to his eyes and began a cold and methodical search of the horizon to the southwest, fighting the lunging of the mast. He moved on into the south, and around to the east, where the light was beginning to fade. Nothing. Still nothing …

  Where was she now? Was she still alive? The glasses began to shake. He lowered them and closed his eyes. The feeling passed in a moment, and he had control of himself again. He raised the glasses and came back, very slowly, across the whole area he had searched before, and then on into the dying fire and the wine-red sea of the west. He stopped abruptly. Something came up into his throat, and he swallowed. He tried to swing the glasses back, but for an instant he couldn’t. He was afraid to look again.