Run Before the Wind

by Stuart Woods

  The next morning I had finally found the courage to ask her. “What happened with you and the other guy? The one I met at the Spaniard?”

  She giggled. “Terry? He’s my brother, the priest; I told you about him long ago. He’s gone back to India.”

  “Your brother? And you let me think …”

  She rolled over, clutching herself with laughter while I sputtered. Soon we were both laughing uncontrollably.

  The police telephoned once for some further information. The press didn’t know where we were. We listened to the BBC and heard a report that Mark, two days into the race, seemed to be among the leaders. I had no doubt that he would remain there. After six days of this bliss we drove back to Plymouth and gave John Aslett his house key.

  “Any more news of the race?” I asked.

  “I was at the club this morning. They’re marking positions on a chart there as they get reports. Nothing on Mark since the second day. That’s not unusual, though. He has no long-range radio, and it’s a big ocean.”

  We said our goodbyes and drove east out of Plymouth toward London and Heathrow, where Connie would fly to Cork and I to New York and Atlanta. I had a bar examination to prepare for. At Exeter, we turned on the car radio for the noon BBC news, hoping for further word of Mark. There was word.

  “Position reports on yachts in the Singlehanded Transatlantic Race have been patchy, at best, as the fleet scatters into the North Atlantic, each competitor following his own idea of the best route,” the announcer said. “Just a few minutes ago, though, word came that one yacht has been sighted by the Plymouth Coast Guard station, sailing back toward Plymouth. The yacht is Wave, a sixty-foot, custom design, sailed by former Royal Marine Captain Mark Pernberton-Robinson, whose wife was killed in a tragic accident in Plymouth three days before the race. There has been no report yet of his reason for returning, and Coast Guard spotters said the yacht showed no sign of damage. We’ll try to have further information on the six o’clock news.”

  I stopped the car. “Why?”

  “They said there was no sign of damage.”

  “Even if there had been damage, Mark would have repaired it and sailed on.” I turned the car around and headed back toward Plymouth.

  We arrived at the Royal Western Yacht Club an hour later, in time to join the crowd on the terrace and watch Wave sail past Plymouth Breakwater into the harbor. Members of the yachting press stopped questioning me when they discovered that I had no more idea than they of what was happening.

  “We’ve tried to raise him on the VHF,” a committee member said, “But he’s not replying. He must not be switched on.”

  We watched as the yacht came toward the club, then, before we could get a good look at Mark at the helm, turned and continued up the Tamar toward the marina.

  “Come on,” I said to Connie. “Let’s get over there.”

  We drove to the marina as quickly as possible, followed by carloads of committee members and journalists, but traffic was heavy. By the time we arrived at the pontoon ramp, we could see Wave neatly tied up on an outer float. We ran down the ramp and out toward the yacht.

  “Hello, down there!” I called out, hoisting myself over the lifelines and into the cockpit, with Connie right behind me.

  “Hello!” a voice called back. And then a man appeared in the hatch. I didn’t know him. “Hello,” he said. “My name is Martindale. Are you a friend of Mark Pemberton-Robinson?”

  “Yes,” I said.”

  He looked at me sadly. “I’m sorry,” he said.

  I sat at the saloon table with Martindale, surrounded by committee members, looking at Wave’s logbook and trying to grasp what had happened. Mark’s last entry said, “Wind getting up, time to reef the main. Must be careful for Willie.”

  “I’m sorry you had to find out this way,” Martindale said. “Our high-frequency radio was down on the ship, and there was simply no other way to get in touch. Then, when I was closer to Plymouth, it seemed a better idea to break the news in person rather than using the VHF.”

  Connie got up and began to rummage through the galley lockers. Seeming not to find what she wanted, she turned to me. “Give me the car keys,” she said.

  I gave them to her and turned back to Martindale. “Did you conduct a search?”

  He shook his head. “The last log entry was about thirty hours before we found the boat. She was under wind-vane self-steering and could have changed course radically during that time. We wouldn’t have known where to begin.”

  The chairman of the race committee asked Martindale to repeat everything, so that they could have it absolutely straight for the press. After half an hour a statement was given to the reporters, and they ran for telephones. Then Connie appeared with John Aslett, both of them laden with sacks of groceries.

  “What on earth are you doing?” I asked, wearily.

  “Tell him,” Connie said to John.

  The solicitor set down the bags and reached into his pocket. “Read this when you have time; it’s a copy of Mark’s will. He’s bequeathed Wave to you.”

  I stared at him, speechless.

  “I knew about it,” Connie said. “John and I witnessed the will.”

  “He’s instructed that Toscana and the farm be sold and the proceeds divided between the Royal Lifeboat Association and the Royal Naval Sail Training Association. But Wave is yours, free and clear. I’m Mark’s executor; I’m dispersing this part of his estate now.”

  “John,” I said, “When you and Mark were preparing the will, did he seem … do you think …”

  “No,” the solicitor said. “Annie had been his principal beneficiary, and with her gone, he had to do another will, that’s all. I’ve known Mark a long time, and I don’t think he’s the sort to do away with himself.”

  “Neither do I,” I said. “It seems clear to me that he lost his balance while reefing and went overboard. With the boat on self-steering, she’d have sailed right away from him. Perhaps the leg wasn’t as good as he wanted us to believe.”

  Connie began unpacking and stowing groceries. “John,” she said, “will you get a hose and top up the boat’s water tanks, please?”

  Then my mind caught up with Connie’s. I owned this boat. I had qualified to sail in this race. I turned to the committee chairman, who had stood next to me, listening to this exchange. “Sir, can I still be an official entry in this race as Mark’s alternate?”

  He glanced around at the other committee members, getting nods. “I don’t see why not,” he said. “You’re a bit over six days behind the others, but you’ve a fast boat.”

  I looked around the boat. Connie had finished her reprovision-ing. I could hear water running into the tanks. “Well, then, if you gentlemen will excuse me.”

  They clambered ashore. I took the moment to put my arms around Connie Lydon. “Will you meet me in Newport?”

  She wouldn’t look at me. “I don’t know, Will, I have a lot of thinking to do.”

  “What’s to think about?” I asked. “We’ve put it back together, haven’t we?”

  “Yes,” she said, “I suppose we have. Now I have to figure out just what ‘it’ is. Can you understand that?”

  I wanted a more romantic departure than that, but I restrained myself. Connie didn’t respond well to pushing. “Yes,” I said. “I can understand that. I hope you’ll be there. Cape Cod and Maine still sounds like a great cruise, doesn’t it?”

  She nodded and buried her head in my chest. I held onto her for a moment, then she broke free and climbed into the cockpit. “How’s the water coming, John?”

  “All topped up,” I heard him shout as I climbed into the cockpit.

  “Then stand by that bow line,” she ordered. “I’ll get the stern.”

  I started the engine. “All right,” I called out, “cast her off.” John tossed his line aboard and pushed the boat’s bows away from the dock. Connie kept the stern line snubbed while the yacht pointed toward the Tamar. Finally, she stood, held onto the e
nd of the line for just a moment, looking at me, then tossed the line aboard. I pointed Wave downstream, toward Plymouth Harbour, the English Channel, and the North Atlantic Ocean.

  63

  I TOOK the rhumb line from Wolf Rock to Newport, heading due west, as Mark had planned, ignoring the conventional wisdom of the shorter, great circle route, and the fond hopes of the longer, southern route, where skippers prayed for more favorable winds. I sailed fast. Every nuance of Wave was familiar to me, I thought, but she taught me some new things about herself. We had a total of nine days of heavy weather, but usually from the right direction, and only one day of flat calm.

  There were books aboard, and a radio to listen to, but I hardly bothered with either. I had a lot to think about, and I relished having the time to do it. I learned the value of solitude. I relived many small chunks of my life, and one large one—the one that began when I met Mark and Annie, the one that would end in Newport. I wept at certain times, with certain thoughts. It was easier to do with no one there to see me; easier to laugh, too; easier to think about the future in terms of what the past had taught me. In the future, I would make better judgments about what was important. I would let those I loved know it, before it was too late.

  I would like to tell you that we won the race, Wave and I, but we did not. Six days was too great a head start to overcome. We did, however, with a great deal of luck and, perhaps, just a bit of skill on my part, cross the finish line at Brenton Reef Light some twenty days, twelve hours, and fifteen minutes after we began. That was exactly one hour less than the time of the winner, and a new record for the race.

  We headed into Newport, surrounded by a small, noisy flotilla of other yachts and boats, toward a berth where I hoped someone waited.

  The years have passed, and all this has remained fresh with me. I think of Mark often. I cannot bear to think of Annie.

  AUTHOR’S NOTE

  THOSE WHO HAVE read my previous book, Blue Water, Green Skipper, will recognize most of the locales in this book as being from my personal past. They may even recognize a character or two. I should say, however, that Mark and Annie Pemberton-Robinson resemble my late friends, Mike and Lizzie McMullen, only in their love of sailing, in Mike’s Royal Marine service, and in the manner of their deaths. Will Lee resembles me even less. This book is fiction.

  A TECHNICAL NOTE

  FOR THOSE WRITERS who might be interested, this book was written on a PolyMorphic 8813 microcomputer using a word processing program. After the finished manuscript had been manually copy edited, the spelling was corrected yet again using a program written by Frank Stearns Associates of Vancouver, Washington, then all the necessary changes were made in the computer. Using file transmission software prepared by Bob Bybee of Polyletter, the final manuscript was then transmitted over telephone lines to the Source Telecomputing Corporation, which sent it on IBM-compatible magnetic tape to ComCom, which then set the book in type directly from the tape. This procedure both saved time over the usual method of retyping the manuscript into the typesetting machine, and prevented a new generation of typographical errors.

  This is, to my knowledge, the first time a novel has been transmitted electronically from its author’s computer to a typesetting computer. There were many technical snags to overcome, and I must here give my heartfelt thanks to my friend, Mark Sutherland, who so generously gave his time and expertise to solve these problems. It was worth the trouble, and I believe that in the future, books will be routinely transmitted in this manner.

  Copyright © 1983 by Stuart Woods

  All rights reserved

  Published simultaneously in Canada by George J. McLeod Limited, Toronto.

  Printed in the United States of America.

  First Edition

  The Library of Congress has cataloged the printed edition as follows:

  Woods, Stuart.

  Run before the wind.

  I. Title.

  PS3573.0642W5 1983 813’.54 82-14266

  ISBN 0-393-01651-X

  ISBN 978-0-393-06352-3 (e-book)

  W. W. Norton & Company, Inc., 500 Fifth Avenue, New York, N.Y.10110

  W. W. Norton Ltd., 37 Great Russell Street, London WC1B 3NU