The Crystal Clipper

by B. Roman

  “It is because nothing is new under the sun, not even knowledge. When we discover new facts, skills, and tools today, we are not just learning from our past but we are also remembering our future. For the past, present and future are all one.”

  As David stands at the stern, an enormous wave rolls up and crests under the Moon Singer. The mystical ship takes flight, higher and higher into the endless reaches of the universe, and the deep blue ocean below becomes a slick sea of glass once again. Under its transparent reflection, the Island grows smaller and disappears, just as David's hometown did at the start of his voyage.

  “I'll be back,” David vows, not knowing when or how, but knowing all the same.

  Like an angel's serenade, Saliana's song echos all around, guiding David's voyage home on the Crystal Clipper:

  “I know a place where the Moon Riders sail

  On a translucent river of diamonds and pearls.

  They journey through time,

  Until time ceases moving,

  Then float gently home on the soft wings of twilight.

  Moon Singer, Moon Singer, take to the sea,

  Fly on the wind where the sky used to be.

  Moon Singer, Moon Singer, take me along.

  Keep me safe in your light till I find my way home.”

  Twenty-five

  Port Avalon

  Harry Judd shifts uncomfortably on his feet, confronted by an authoritative Janice Cole requesting the official files for the sale of Fischbacher Shipping, Inc.

  “I don't know, Miss Cole. I'm really not permitted to turn over any files to outside parties on any transaction.”

  “I'm hardly an outside party, Harry. I'm not only Nathan's fiancée, I am his executive assistant with a seat on the Board.” Janice leans in toward him, speaking in a conspiratorial tone. “It wouldn't do to have any mistakes in these files when David Nickerson comes back again with his lawyers, would it?”

  Judd retains his haughty stance, but his forehead is clammy with nervous sweat. “Let them come. I have nothing to hide. My hands are clean.”

  “I want to be sure the files are clean, for Nathan's sake, and for yours. You understand, don't you, Harry? I promise I'll have them back to you in a few hours. And no one will know we had this little chat, will they?”

  Judd draws himself up officiously. Recalcitrant at first, then yielding to the inevitable, he retrieves the file from his cabinet. He hands it rudely to Janice.

  “Oh, and I'll take the other file, too, Harry. The one in your personal desk drawer?”

  Judd opens his mouth to protest, but changes his mind. He stomps to his desk, pulls the file folder from the drawer and thrusts it at her. Janice snaps her briefcase closed with the files safely inside.

  “Thank you, Harry. I'll put in a good word for you with Nathan.”

  Back in her office, Janice scrutinizes every word, every clause in the sale papers, noticeably disturbed by what she sees. With each new revelation, she places her hand up to her mouth, her throat, her heart, as if to hold back the shock. After a long, intense moment of contemplation, she swivels around in her chair and gazes intently at Nathan's portrait on the wall.

  “Oh, Nathan. How could you be so insidious, and yet so seductive? And how could I have been so blind?”

  Janice holds up her hand and studies her diamond engagement ring. She removes it carefully and places it in a small cloisonné dish on her desk. With determination to stem the flow of tears, Janice begins to work on the files.

  When early morning sun at last filters through the vertical blinds, Janice turns off the desk lamp. She heaves a sigh and leans back wearily in her chair. Just then, Nathan enters the office and is startled to find her already at work at her desk.

  “God, Jan. What are you doing here so early? You look like – didn't you sleep well?”

  “Actually, Nathan, I didn't sleep at all. I've been working all night on a rather important business deal.”

  Nathan's brows form parentheses around suspicious eyes. “What deal?”

  “Let's talk about it in your office. I think you'd better be sitting down for this.”

  Nathan shrugs dismissively and turns on his heels, grumbling, “I don't know what this is about, but let's do it later.”

  Janice follows him into his office and slams the door closed. “We'll do it now, Nathan. It's later than you think.”

  Registering surprise at her demand, Nathan slowly lowers himself into his chair.

  “Nathan, why do you want to marry me?”

  “Oh, for Pete's – is that what this is about?” He laughs with a semblance of relief. “Because I love you. You know that.” The words are devoid of emotion.

  “You love me, or my stock options?”

  “Is this some sort of pre-wedding jitters? I'd never expect you to act so immaturely, Jan, like a blushing bride. Not at your age.”

  “Thank you for reminding me that I'm old enough to know better. I had forgotten. I've been just like a dependent little girl. First on my father who sheltered me from all the realities of life. Then, dependent on you to take care of the business my family built and nurtured for more than a century, instead of having the courage to run it myself.”

  “Run this business?” Nathan smirks, and laughs derisively. “You're a bright girl, Janice, but hardly the kind of woman who could manage a worldwide industry.”

  “You mean I'm not like you, Nathan? A liar, a cheat, a fraud, a stock manipulator?”

  Nathan's face turns gray, as though all the blood has been drained from his body. “What are you talking about?”

  “This.” Janice thrusts a file folder at him. “This is what I'm talking about.”

  Nathan's jaw stiffens and the blood returns to his face in a fury. “Where did you get this?”

  “From your slimy cohort, Harry Judd. I overheard the two of you talking when you ordered Judd to hide the real file from David Nickerson, so he wouldn't know the truth about the sale.”

  “What truth?” Nathan hedges. “It's a perfectly valid sale. None of that kid's business anyway.”

  “And none of mine? Did you really think you could get away with it, Nathan? How long do you think it would be before I discovered that you used my stock options to perpetrate a phony deal?”

  “You see what I mean, Jan? You're just not equipped to handle the intricacies of business. Once we're married, your stock options are as good as mine. So, no harm done.”

  Janice throws her head back and emits a low growl of consternation. “You are amazing, Nathan. Truly amazing. How convenient you post-dated the sale just one day after our wedding was to take place.”

  “What do you mean was to take place?”

  “Let's make a deal, Nathan.” Janice hands him another file folder. “Let's open file Number Two.”

  Twenty-six

  The soothing sound of distant thunder is all that remains of the afternoon storm. Low lying clouds begin to break up, welcoming the gradual return of the sun.

  “David. David - please wake up, David.” Sally cradles her brother's head in her lap and rubs his face, trying to rouse him.

  Finally, David opens his eyes. “Holy cow. What happened?”

  “I think you were struck by lightning, a huge bolt of lightning.” Sally is still shaken by the experience. “It struck your crystals and then you fell over. I thought you were dead.”

  David raises up on one elbow and shakes his head to clear it. “How long was I out?”

  “For a few minutes. I'm not sure. The storm came and went so fast it didn't seem real.” Sally helps David stand up and brushes sand from his clothes.

  “If you think the storm was unreal,” David begins, “wait till I tell you about…” Then he stops, dumbstruck at this vision of his sister before him. “My God! Sally - you're standing. You're standing! How?”

  Sally is as befuddled as David. “I don't know. I was in my chair next to you and when I saw you get hurt all I could think of was - Oh, David, I couldn't stand it if
anything happened to you.”

  David hugs her fiercely, feeling their mutual sibling devotion. “Me, too, Sal. Me, too. But you can walk now. You can walk.”

  He spins her around and their joyous laughter echoes across the bay. When he sets her down, David notices the Rose Crystal pendant around Sally's neck. It's the pendant that Saliana had given him before he left the Island.

  * * *

  “You may all come in now.” His examination completed, the Nickerson family doctor snaps his medical bag closed as Isaac, Dorothy and David enter Sally's bedroom. David sits on the bed next to his sister and holds her hand.

  “I can't explain it, Isaac,” Dr. McMillan says, still baffled. “She seems perfectly fine. Oh, just a little weak, but all her mobility seems to have returned. It might only be temporary, but it surely gives us hope for a full recovery.”

  Isaac's voice trembles with gratitude, “It's a miracle. Nothing less than a miracle.”

  Dr. McMillan nods in agreement. “Sometimes a shock produces results that medicine just can't explain.”

  “Miracle is as good an explanation as any I can think of,” Dorothy chimes in, obviously tickled pink.

  “I'll get it, Dad,” David offers when the front door bell rings.

  But Dorothy motions for him to stay put, that she will answer it. In their excitement over Sally's recovery, no one notices that David actually heard the doorbell.

  “You get a lot of rest, young lady,” the doctor gives Sally a firm order. “Tomorrow we'll put you through some real tests, maybe see if you can still jitterbug like you used to.”

  Sally pokes fun at him playfully. “Oh, Doctor, nobody jitterbugs anymore.”

  “Well, maybe it's time they did,” he says with a wink. He and Isaac leave the room discussing the next steps he will take on Sally's case.

  “Sally, this has got to be the happiest day of my life,” David says. “Dad's right. It's a miracle.”

  “You did it, David. You made it happen.”

  “Me? How could I?”

  “Your crystals, David. I know it was the magic of your crystals on the sand.”

  “Some magician I am. I get hit by lightning and miss the whole thing.”

  “But I didn't.” Sally lowers her voice to a whisper. “Something else happened after the lightning struck. I couldn't tell Dad. He'd think I was crazy or something. But I know you'll understand.”

  “What is it, Sal? What did you see?”

  “There was this face - a woman's face. She looked like a gypsy or a fortune teller or something. Only she wasn't really there. It was more like I could see right through her, like a ghost or –”

  “Like a hologram?”

  “Yes. That's it. And she had this crystal ball. She kept calling my name and, this was really weird - she looked just like Aunt Dorothy. Remember when she dressed up and told fortunes at the Halloween Party?” David nods. “Like that. Well, then the gypsy disappeared and the next thing I remember I was out of my wheelchair and kneeling on the sand next to you. I think you conjured her up with the crystals, and she must have had some mystical powers that made me walk again.”

  David is silent, taking it all in.

  “Do you think I'm crazy, David?”

  David laughs and squeezes his sister's hand. “If you're crazy, Sally, then we both are. Two loony tunes.”

  Sally looks closely at the side of her brother's head. “Where is your hearing aid? How can you hear without it?”

  “My hearing aid?” The last he saw it, he had pulled it out just before killing the Glass Snake. “Oh, it was dirty, so I took it out,” he says, evasively. “Besides, you know what a champion 'lipper' I am.”

  “Undisputed champ,” Sally praises him. “But you heard Dad, too, and the doctor. You weren't reading their lips. And you heard the doorbell. How?” Her eyes widen. “Maybe it's another miracle, David.”

  “Maybe. But don't tell anyone just yet. One miracle a day is all this family can handle.”

  Janice Cole settles comfortably on the living room sofa and accepts the cup of tea Dorothy serves her. “I hope I'm not intruding on your family, Isaac, but I was so thrilled to hear about Sally. I just had to come by.”

  “It's very considerate of you, Janice,” Isaac says affably.

  David enters the room whistling, but stops short when he sees Janice. She greets him amiably.

  “David. I'm so happy about Sally.”

  David's response is curt. “Yeah. We are, too.” He walks over to the fireplace and leans on the mantel, avoiding Janice's eyes.

  Janice places her teacup on the table and walks over to him. “David, I'm sorry about what happened in Nathan's office the other day.”

  Isaac's eyebrows lift with curiosity. “What happened in Nathan's office?”

  “You should be apologizing to my father, not to me,” David snaps.

  “Apologize to me? What for?” Isaac asks, but no one pays him any mind.

  “You're right,” Janice concedes, “but I knew an apology wouldn't be enough. I had to do something to stop Nathan before it was too late.”

  “Stop Nathan from what?” Isaac again tries to get a response.

  “The only way to stop a man like Nathan Fischbacher is to crush him and break him into little pieces,” David says with pure venom.

  “The only way to break Nathan,” Janice counters, “is to beat him at his own game, the game he calls 'strictly business.' ” She turns to Isaac and explains, “Nathan lied to you about your designs, Isaac. They're magnificent, not worthless as Nathan told you. He was planning to sell them out from under you. When he told me this, I realized David had been right, only I was too blind to see.”

  Dorothy is signing Janice's conversation for David, and he plays along, signaling his understanding to his aunt, while hearing every startling word.

  “I was so angry,” Janice is saying, “and so ashamed. I decided to help David approach the new owners of the company, let them know who really created those designs and ask them to keep you on when they took over.”

  Isaac dismisses Janice's notion with a resigned wave of his hand. “No, Janice. I don't really care anymore. I'm up to here with it. The new owners probably aren't any less conniving and selfish than Nathan.”

  Janice smiles knowingly. “Oh, I don't know, Isaac. I think when you hear who the new owners are, you might change your mind.”

  “I doubt it.”

  Suddenly remembering something, David interjects. “Wait a minute. I went to the Administrator's office myself to look at the sale papers. There was no record of the new owners. How could you find out?”

  “Being Nathan's assistant all these years has taught me a few things about business deals, believe me, David,” Janice explains without boasting. “I overheard Nathan talking to someone over the phone, telling him not to let you find any information about the sale. I recognized the man's voice. It was Harry Judd at the City Administrator's office. I never did trust that little weasel.”

  David is agitated, but not surprised that Harry Judd had lied to him.

  “Yes. He knew that Nathan himself bought the company and listed one of his subsidiary corporations as the buyer,” Janice reveals.

  Now Isaac springs up from his chair, a fire lit under him. “I can't believe it. I knew Nathan was unscrupulous, but to falsify the sale…”

  “…and to sell it to one of his own corporations,” Dorothy adds, just as confounded as her brother. “It doesn't make any sense.”

  “Yes, it's very complicated,” Janice says. “And he could very easily have gotten away with it since the buying corporation is in a blind trust. No one would ever know he bought his own company at a cut rate to monopolize the stock options, fully intent on reselling it for a higher price.”

  “But now they will.” Dorothy slaps her knees and hoots gleefully. Fischbacher is finally going to get his due. “You are going to report him to the authorities, aren't you Janice?”

  “I thought of that, but I came up w
ith a better idea.”

  David snorts cynically. “What could be better than seeing Fischbacher rot in jail?” Except maybe to cut off his tail, David thinks to himself, remembering the satisfying vision of the Glass Snake's demise.

  “Nathan's going to jail wouldn't help your father or the other employees. But this will.” Janice retrieves some papers from her purse and gives them to Isaac to read. “These contracts are iron clad and totally legal, Isaac.”

  Isaac scans the papers then looks up at Janice, stunned. “You? You're the new owner? How did you manage that?”

  “I rewrote the sale agreement.” Janice's face beams with a mixture of pride and humility. “Oh, don't worry. I have plenty of stock in the company as well as my inheritance to put in a serious bid. And the stock held by you and the other employees will solidify the transaction, if you'll all be willing to sign them over in exchange for a limited partnership agreement.”

  Isaac is dumbfounded, but nods enthusiastically. “Of course we will. But how in the world did you get Nathan to agree to this?”

  “He called it blackmail. I called it shrewd negotiating. One shipping company in exchange for my silence.”

  Impressed by Janice's courageous actions, David is contrite for his attitude toward her. “Gosh, Janice. I had you all wrong. I'm sorry for everything I said. I had no right, especially to insinuate you were marrying Fischbacher for his money.”

  “It's all right, David. I know how devoted you are to your father and to Sally. I would have felt the same under the circumstances.” She moves closer to David and takes his hand in a gesture of friendship. “Actually, I should thank you for forcing me to open my eyes. I could never have married a man whose whole life is a lie. I guess my life has been one for a long time.”

  David glances down at Janice's hand holding his, and the startling blue stone that sparkles on her finger. “Your ring. It's different. It's blue.”

  “Yes. It was my mother's ring,” she says, brightening. “I thought I had lost it years ago, but it suddenly turned up. Isn't that strange?”