Stormchild

by Bernard Cornwell

  “Couldn’t sleep,” he explained brusquely. “Brought you a coffee.” He put the mug beside me, then settled on the opposite thwart. “I’m sorry,” he said as curtly as he had explained his presence. He radiated embarrassment.

  “Why are you sorry?” I asked him.

  “You’re wondering about Nicole, aren’t you.”

  He had not, I noticed, described what worried me, but he knew well enough. “She’s my daughter, David,” I said, “of course I worry about her.”

  “Then that’s why I’m sorry.” He was silent for a long time. Water rippled on the hull and the air was cold enough to mist our breath. “I’ve been thinking, Tim”—David broke the silence—”I guessed you might be too upset to be clear-headed, so I decided to make a few decisions on my own.”

  “Good. Splendid.” I was hardly making it easy for him.

  “What we have to do”—he spoke with the forced enthusiasm of a scoutmaster addressing a particularly obdurate troop—”is sail north, get ourselves to Santiago, and enroll some first-class assistance there. Frankly, we’ve exhausted our options here, and I don’t relish our chances of stirring up real action in Puerto Montt, but I’ve no doubt our embassy in Santiago will listen to us, and I’m sure the Australian government will want to hear the story that girl told us tonight. So, first thing in the morning, I think we should up anchor and sail north. Don’t you agree?”

  “I never thanked you for making the coffee,” I said. “So thank you.”

  David sighed, but was determined to stay reasonable. “You have something else in mind, Tim?”

  “I was just wondering,” I said mildly, “what we planned to do about Nicole?”

  “She’ll have to take her chances with the rest,” David said awkwardly.

  I turned my head to look at him. “What does that mean?” I asked.

  “It means nothing,” David said. He, like me, was skirting around the mine field of Nicole’s character. “I am sure,” David said heavily, “that Nicole has done nothing, and therefore has nothing to fear from the authorities.”

  “She sails a stolen yacht,” I said, “and I’ll bet you next Easter’s collection that the Australian crew was murdered.”

  “Oh, come!” David was offended. “We don’t know that! And we certainly don’t know if Nickel was involved!”

  “Indeed we don’t,” I said, “which is why I want to find her before I condemn her.” I paused to stare up at the cold stars. “I don’t believe she’s a killer,” I said at last. “I think von Rellsteb is, but not Nicole. I really can’t believe she’s a killer. Not my daughter.”

  “So there can’t be any harm in summoning the authorities, can there?” David asked.

  “But I want to find out exactly what she is,” I went on as though David had not spoken. “I just want to see her before I loose the dogs on her.”

  “It’s not a question of releasing the dogs,” David said very awkwardly, then fell into a moody silence. The thin moonlight showed a pale mist seeping off the black water, so that Stormchild seemed to float in a silver vapor beneath a canopy of silent starlight. The peace was broken by a bird, roosting somewhere on the cliffs above, making a brief, raucous protest. There was a flap of wings, another indignant squawk, then silence again.

  “How’s the glass?” I asked suddenly.

  David paused, wondering what trick I was playing, then decided to take my question at face value. “It’s still rising. I suspect we’re in for at least one more day of fine weather.”

  I rested my head on the safety rail. “If we really intended to run for Santiago, David, we’re too late.”

  “Of course we’re not.”

  “To reach Santiago,” I interrupted him icily, “we would have to sail to Valparaiso, which would mean weathering Cape Raper. We have now been holed up in this cove for nine hours, which means that the Genesis boats will already be ahead of us, and they know damn well we need to clear the Cape, so they’ll be waiting for us there. I know we can sail far out to sea, and thus try to evade them, but what I’m telling you is that they’ve already positioned themselves between us and the authorities, and getting past them will be risky.”

  “We can’t be certain of that,” he said stiffly.

  I turned my head to look at him. “You want to bet your life on that uncertainty?” There was no answer. I shrugged. “The settlement will have radioed the mine, and whatever boats were there will have left to track us down. They know we sailed north, so that’s the direction they’ll pursue, and they’ll know that their catamaran is far faster than Stormchild, so they’ll be hoping to overtake us long before today’s dawn. What they don’t know is that we’re holed up here, and that consequently they’ve overshot us.”

  “Ah!” David suddenly brightened. “You’re suggesting we sail south to Puerto Natales instead? Good idea! There’ll be a police post there, I’ll be bound, and we can talk to the embassy by phone. Not as effective, perhaps, as bashing on the ambassador’s door, but if we make a fuss they’re bound to listen.”

  “No,” I said, “I’m not proposing that we sail to Puerto Natales, but to the mine.”

  There was a second’s silence before David exploded in protest. “You’re a fool, Tim! We don’t even know if Nicole is there!”

  “She probably isn’t,” I admitted, “but maybe she is. Berenice saw a catamaran a week ago, and we know Nicole sails one of their two catamarans. But even if she isn’t there, it’s the place where I can find out about her life. The mine is Nicole’s refuge, her bolthole, and that’s where I’ll either discover her, or her belongings.”

  “And in any case”—David entirely ignored my ex-planation—”the mine is at the very end of the straits and we’ll be bottled up there like a mouse trapped in a Wellington boot! My dear Tim, I entirely sympathize with your concern, but I must insist that we behave sensibly. We did agree to be prudent, didn’t we?”

  “The prudent behavior,” I said very irritably, “was never to have come here at all, but having come this far I’m not going to go for help to the Chilean authorities. Not before I know what kind of future I’m making for Nicole by bringing in the Chilean police.”

  David was silent for a long time. His pipe glowed intermittently as he puffed smoke into the rigging, and when he did finally speak his voice had become calm and reflective, as though he knew he could not dissuade me by argument, so would now try a more subtle approach. “Go to bed, Tim. In the morning we’ll decide how to escape this trap.”

  I did not move. “The point is,” I said instead, “that I came here to find Nicole, and to talk to her, and it seems very stupid to get this close, then just run away.”

  “We are not running away,” David said very firmly. “We’re simply fetching competent assistance. If you discover a wasp’s nest in your garden shed you don’t go after it with bare hands. Besides, just what chance do you think we have of escaping from the dead end of the Desolate Straits? We’ll be trapped there! Come, Tim! Be realistic!”

  “I wasn’t thinking of using the Desolate Straits,” I said very mildly. “I rather thought we might try the Canal Almagro instead.”

  There were a few seconds of silence as David recalled the chart, then his protest was loud enough to disturb some of the nesting seabirds. “You’re crazy!”

  “Not if the weather holds,” I said gently, “and you said yourself that the glass was rising.”

  “It’s madness, Tim!” David said earnestly. “Madness!”

  The Almagro Channel was the deep and winding fjord that pierced the Pacific coast of the Isla Tormentos, and which very nearly cut the island in two. On our best chart the fjord’s dead end looked to be only two or three miles from the limestone working, and it would thus carry us very close to the Genesis community’s innermost lair, but it was a passage full of danger. The danger was not from the gunmen of Genesis, for they would surely not believe that anyone would be foolish enough to use the fjord, but rather lay in the entrance to the Canal Almagro
which was narrow, rockbound, and exposed to the full impact of the massive Pacific rollers. The fjord’s entrance would be impassable in rough weather, but there was just a chance that if this fine spell lasted, then the perilous entrance might prove navigable. And it was a chance that seemed worth taking if I was to discover more about my daughter.

  “I won’t let you do it,” David said in his most authoritative manner. “It’s far too dangerous. You’re not thinking straight—”

  “Shut up!” I interrupted him with a savage firmness, “I am master of this vessel. I command here. This is not a democracy. And later today, if the weather holds, Stormchild will sail to the Almagro Channel. If you choose not to stay aboard, then I’ll find a place to put you ashore.” I stood. “I’d be grateful if you woke me in two hours time.”

  “Whatever you say,” David said unhappily.

  I went to my sleeping bag, but could not sleep. Berenice was sobbing in the cabin that had been Jackie’s quarters. David, under the lights of heaven, sat guard in the cockpit. And I lay awake, waiting for dawn and for nightmare.

  I took Stormchild out of her refuge before first light. There was still scarcely a breath of wind, so we ghosted with an idling engine through a lightening mist that pearled our rigging with silver beads of water. Just as we emerged from the sheltered channel I was alarmed by a heavy splash and I whipped round in fear that our enemies had been waiting in ambush for us, but it was only a sea lion plunging off a rock. The mist became thicker as we nosed into the main channel, which I was forced to navigate by instinct and radar.

  David had agreed to accompany me into the Almagro Channel. He came under protest and on the firm understanding that I would turn back at the first sign of real danger. He had also insisted that, when I explored the limestone mine, I would use the utmost circumspection so that our enemies would not suspect our presence on the island. I had solemnly promised that I would indeed be prudent.

  Two hours after dawn the mist was gone, shredded by a rising wind that blew us toward the open sea. As we neared the ocean the swells began to make themselves felt in the rockbound waterways. The water surged in great billows between the high walls, gurgling and pouring over black boulders, then sucking and draining as the troughs followed. I hoisted the sails, and, as Stormchild emerged into the open sea, the rising wind caught us and carried us fast to where the great waves rose and fell on the rugged cliff faces of the outermost islands. Birds screamed at us. I killed the engine, hardened the sheets, and felt the exultation of a sailor released from rockbound channels into open water.

  We sailed five miles offshore, then turned Stormchild south. David cooked bacon and eggs, while Berenice, who was now wearing Jackie Potten’s oilskins, came to the cockpit and stared in wonder at the open sea and sky. There were no other sails in sight and I suspected that our enemies had gone far to the north, leaving their back door unguarded.

  I told Berenice what we planned to do. She looked terrified at the thought of going back to the Isla Tormentos, but I explained that she would not have to go ashore. “I’ll walk to the mine,” I told her, “and you can stay with David. I’ll only be gone a few hours.”

  “Are you looking for Nicole?” she asked me timidly.

  “Yes. Or for news of her.”

  “She might be there,” Berenice said, though without any conviction. Her voice was dull.

  I paused to tack ship. For a second the headsails banged like great guns, then Stormchild settled on the port tack. A wave shattered on the stem to spray foam down our canted deck. I sheeted in the staysail, then glanced at Berenice. “You don’t like Nicole, do you?” I had guessed as much the previous night from the hesitant way in which Berenice had spoken of Nicole.

  Berenice seemed taken aback by my challenge, but she did her best to meet it without causing me offense. “She’s very fierce,” she finally said in a pathetic voice.

  “She always was,” I said soothingly. “She’s very competent and she doesn’t have a lot of patience with people who aren’t as skilled as she is. I’m not surprised she had a fight with Caspar von Rellsteb.” I waited a second, then decided it was worth asking again what the argument had been about. “Was it about the Australian catamaran?” I guessed.

  I expected no answer, but to my surprise Berenice was suddenly loquacious. “It wasn’t about that,” she said, “but because Nicole thinks we ought to be more active. She says it’s really counterproductive for all of us to be isolated in South America. She thinks that there ought to be Genesis communities all over the world.”

  I smiled. “That sounds like Nicole,” I said, “ready to organize everyone and take over the world.”

  “Nicole thinks we aren’t achieving enough,” Berenice said weakly, then, in a rush of frankness, she admitted that many in the group believed Nicole was right and that von Rellsteb’s dream had failed. “It was meant to be different when we moved down here,” she said. “We were going to be strengthened by isolation, at least that’s what Caspar said, and we were going to sail out like old-fashioned warriors to put right all the world’s wrongs, but it just didn’t work.” She frowned. “Things are so difficult! Even to organize a meal is hard. And we were supposed to be doing these experiments on degrading oil spills, but they all went wrong, and then he got angry, and somehow nothing works any more. We just survive. Most of us just go from day to day and hope nothing awful happens, but even organizing a meal is hard.”

  I was appalled at the hopelessness in her voice. “Why the hell didn’t you run away sooner? Or protest? Why didn’t you rebel!”

  “Because if we tried anything like that,” Berenice said limply, “we were punished. Not by Nicole,” she added for my benefit, “because Nicole’s usually at sea. She’s by far the most committed of all the crews. I mean if anyone’s doing any good, it has to be Nicole.”

  That, at least, was some good news about my daughter, and it made me dare to hope that, perhaps, I had let my suspicions of Nicole run away with me in the night. Perhaps, in the welter of disappointment and failure that dogged the community, only Nicole was achieving anything worthwhile. Perhaps, I thought, I had no need to explore further, because, if Berenice was right, then Nicole was not tarred with the brush of von Rellsteb’s violence.

  “Grub up!” David appeared with bacon-and-egg sandwiches, and I made Berenice repeat her description of Nicole’s activism. “It doesn’t surprise me that she’s the most effective,” David said proudly, and again I felt the hope that my daughter was struggling to distance herself from von Rellsteb’s brutality and failure.

  Berenice wanted to know about Jackie. I told her what I could, though had to invent an anodyne answer when Berenice asked why her old friend had abandoned Stormchild in Antigua. “I think she just wanted to find a newspaper that would commission a story about Genesis,” I lied.

  Berenice accepted the answer at its face value, then, after thinking for a few seconds, her face brightened. “Do you think she’ll come here to find me? On her own, I mean?”

  “Good God, no,” David said hurriedly. “She hasn’t got the means to come here, has she, Tim?”

  “Not unless a newspaper funds her,” I said, and bleakly wondered just how the idealistic Jackie would survive in this maelstrom of failure and violence.

  By mid morning the wind had freshened into the south and Stormchild’s heavy bows were chopping with a perceptible shudder into each new wave. I feared that the rising wind might already have made the fjord’s entrance impassable, while David was clearly pessimistic of our chances because the ocean swell was huge and, while such big seas were harmless in the open water, they would be killers where they crashed against the cliffs of the barrier islands to bounce back in complex and tumultuous cross patterns of surge and trough. Stormchild would have to be steered through those clashing tons of water and through the cold lash of the wind that would be trying to hurl her against the northern cliffs of the fjord’s entrance. The rising wind, reflecting like the water off the cliffs, would be
as tricky to negotiate as the sea. I would use the engine to make the passage, but I still faced an immensely difficult piece of seamanship.

  Once inside the fjord we would have a fifteen-mile journey to where we could anchor for the night. In the darkness, just before dawn, I planned to go ashore. I hoped to approach the mine in the mists of early morning, make my reconnaissance, then sneak back to the boat unseen and unheard by Genesis. Yet the whole plan, if it could even be distinguished by the word “plan,” depended on successfully negotiating the narrow sea gate where the wind and waves waited in awful ambush.

  “There,” David said somberly in the early afternoon, and he handed me his binoculars and I saw, in the great line of cliffs, a place where the spray was being shattered high into the freshening wind. Beyond that shimmering curtain of broken foam was a dark cleft in the rock. I was looking at the seaward face of Isla Tormentos, and at the desperately narrow crack in its stone coast. I let Stormchild fall off the wind, then turned the key to put power into the boat’s starter motor. “Go, go!” I murmured encouragement to the big diesel as the starter motor thumped the engine into life.

  I suddenly knew this was madness, but I would not turn back. Beyond the shadowed rockbound gut, and beyond the storm of breaking waves, lay Nicole and my confused hopes of her innocence and my equally confused fears for her guilt. And so we plunged toward the rocks.

  “God help us!” David, who would have hated me to know he was nervous, could not resist the prayer. I knew he wanted to turn back, but for the moment his pride would not let him make that confession. Instead he just closed his eyes and talked to God.