by Eddie Jones
“Morning, sunshine.” Anna appeared in the hatchway with a brown bag. “Brought you breakfast.”
He swung his feet onto the floor and pulled his shorts up a little. He peeked inside the bag. “Coconut tarts?”
“And pineapple, with coffee.” She handed him the foam cup.
Pulling back the curtain, he peered into the blushing gray of dawn. “What time is it?”
“Time to be going.” She patted him on the head.
She leaned over the back of the transom and pulled the starter cord of the outboard. The tiny motor squalled and the dock pilings grew pale behind blue-gray smoke.
Poking her head back inside, she pointed to his crumpled duffle bag. “While I let it warm up why don’t you run up to the bathhouse and put on your pretty face. When you come back, bring the dive tanks. I left them in the cart next to the showers.”
“Aye, cap’n.”
****
While the outboard settled into a low purr, Anna busied herself with storing her gear. Towels, purse, a change of clothes, bathing suit (one piece) water bottles and Boggs’s phone tucked away neatly in the nav station.
Topside she pulled off the main sail cover and tossed it onto the floor of the cabin. She’d wait until they were outside the harbor before setting the sails. She moved the traveler cars for the headsail and looked up when she heard the clatter of plastic wheels rolling over the wooden planks.
Sonny had returned with the tanks.
Minutes later they backed out of the slip and motored out of the harbor. Ahead lay open waters and the Atlantic and Gulf Stream. Beyond that, Cuba and the Wicked Witch where, if her agency’s intel was correct, the congressman and his staff had planned a full day of diving and sunning on a remote island along the edge of Cuban waters.
At the end of the breakwater, a brown pelican came gliding in low, the tips of its wings nearly touching the flat calm water.
Only the sound of water washing past the hull and the constant drone of the small outboard interrupted her thoughts―memories of how she’d felt last night pulling Sonny close and guiding him from the dance floor.
Sure, part of it was her training. But another part was desire―her need to be held and to hold a man who cared for more than just her body. But the main reason she’d sought him out was because she needed an extra pair of hands.
After Sonny left her cottage, she’d walked to the marina, hoping to find Boggs and return his cell phone, but before she could reach the dock, she saw the Wicked Witch steaming out of the harbor and into the night. She’d checked with the bartender at the Tiki Bar; he’d pointed down the dock to the only boat available for rent.
An ancient, production-built plastic tub that would, in the right conditions and with skilled crew, maybe not sink under her. With the forecast calling for calm seas in the morning before building to six-to-eight foot swells by the afternoon, she was certain the captain of the cruise ship wouldn’t linger long on the tiny island before steaming back to Florida. The rental sailboat and Sonny were her best shot of salvaging what was quickly becoming a potentially mortal blow to her government pension.
She felt the lift and fall of oily swells rolling beneath the hull. Stars in the west blinked off as the day brightened. The boat cleared the tip of the island and the digital read-out on the depth gauge plummeted. Behind her, a deep red line, narrow as a needle, split the eastern sky. Dive tanks clanked below. She bent forward and saw Sonny sitting cross-legged on the cabin floor.
“Need any help?” she called.
He held up a dive regulator. “Nope. Just making sure we have everything.”
A sortie of gulls circled, dive-bombing into the sailboat’s wake. A puff of wind scuffed the water. She locked the tiller in place and loosened the furling line, took three turns on the winch and rolled out the headsail. When the sail pulled taut, she tied off the jib sheet and killed the outboard. Loosening the main’s sail ties, she tossed them at Sonny whose skin had turned to the color of oatmeal.
“How’s it coming?”
“It’s coming,” he said, weakly.
“You didn’t finish your pineapple tart. Not hungry?”
Dead eyes looked up at her.
“I can whip you up some eggs if you want.”
He smiled unconvincingly. “Funny.”
“Come out here and steer. We can rig the tanks later.”
He wallowed into the cockpit and collapsed onto the seat, bracing his back against the bulkhead. Looking off the stern, he pointed to the band of pink in the east. “Red sky at night, sailor’s delight. Red sky at morning, sailors take warning.”
“You know that saying?” asked Anna.
“Read it in a sailing magazine back when I was trying to learn some of this stuff. Wanted to impress you with my sailing skills.”
“Didn’t work.”
The boat tumbled off a wave and he grimaced.
“It’s Scriptural.”
“Um?” he grunted.
“The saying. It’s from the Bible. Forget which Gospel. Jesus was pointing out how the people of his day could read the weather but couldn’t recognize God’s presence among them. You sure you’re OK?”
“Peachy.”
But he wasn’t. His cheeks had a greenish tinge; his eyes were dull like a fish on ice.
“Sometimes it helps to focus on the horizon,” she said. “See the big picture.”
He didn’t answer. Just belched noisily and looked off the back of the boat.
She unleashed the tiller and nudged his knee. “You steer. Aim for that dot on the horizon.”
“That’s a bird floating on the water.”
“And something to fix your eyes on. I need to check the charts.”
Once below, she peeled off her lightweight jacket and marked the time. A quarter after six. She found a yellow legal pad in the nav station next to Boggs’s cell phone and entered the time and heading. Course made good over ground, 4.5 knots. Winds from the east and steady, probably around 15 knots. Seas 1-2 feet. She noted their position on the chart and went topside, walking to the bow.
Ahead lay an unbroken horizon of purple-pink. Behind, a dry bed, warm shower, and air conditioning. She knelt and inspected the furling drum on the headsail. When she straightened, she saw Sonny slumped forward, the tiller in hand, his head hanging heavy and sallow.
In a warbling voice, she began to sing the words to an old song. When he did not look up, she sang louder. He peeped at her from sallow sockets, the corners of his mouth sagging as he feigned a smile. Holding onto the forestay for balance, she belted it out. She sang, smiling at him. “Come on, help me out. No way you’ve forgotten that song.”
In a low husky voice, he croaked, “but somewhere I went wrong.”
“‘Something,’ not somewhere, you big goof.”
“Whatever. I’m still in misery.”
She patted him on the head. “Apparently so. Think you can stand a watch by yourself? Good. I’m going to grab a nap. I didn’t sleep well last night and was up way too early this morning. Keep on this heading. Don’t mess with the sails. Don’t touch the outboard. And don’t run aground. Got it?”
He nodded unconvincingly.
She gave him a quick peck on the cheek and retreated into the cramped cabin, nursing a brooding, irrational feeling that the federal pension she’d worked for all her life, and her plans for leisurely retirement on the government’s dime were quickly sinking below the horizon.
20
Outside the Oval Office Tommy sat in an ancient hand-carved, wooden chair that, according to a summer intern on loan from Georgetown University’s law school, had arrived at the White House by way of the Mayflower. “Trucking line,” she’d said, pointing to the shipping tag on the leg of the chair. “Get it?”
“Hilarious,” Tommy had replied dryly and returned to watching the small television mounted on the credenza behind to the President’s secretary’s desk.
A grim-faced reporter spoke into a camera. Behind him, pan
demonium reigned in the streets of the nation’s capital. The camera zoomed in on a longhaired Caucasian man with dreadlocks sprinting barefoot across Lafayette Park and toward the White House north gate.
Ahead, police stood behind riot shields. A bullhorn blared.
Dreadlocks catapulted over a cement barricade and rushed the security gate. Guns blazed. The view swerved to a close-up of blades of grass.
Above the gunfire the reporter screamed, “I’m hit! I’m hit!”
The network cut to a silver-haired man with a carefully groomed beard standing under the colonnade near the front of the White House. His face reflected the somber mood of the situation—plus years of on-camera experience.
“We are reporting to you live outside the White House where things are out of control here in our nation’s capital. Mounted police are using tear gas and rubber bullets as reports continue to pour in suggesting that America is at war. Now, for more on this developing situation, we send you to Linda Penkavajava, who’s reporting from the Rock Island Arsenal in Davenport, Iowa. Linda, I understand things are bad where you are.”
“You wouldn’t believe me if I told you.”
“Try.”
“Well-armed civilians, with the help of an overly zealous local militia, have taken control of the armory and barricaded themselves inside. They’re demanding an escalation to hostilities with the Russians and free Internet for rural farmers in Iowa and the two Dakotas. They’re also demanding that the President—”
“Excuse me, Linda, but we have Chris P. Burns reporting from the Middle East. Chris, what can you tell us about what you’re seeing?”
The network cut to a skyline view of Jerusalem.
Tommy hunched closer to the monitor. A reporter in a tan safari jacket stood on a balcony and pointed toward orange starbursts erupting in the night sky.
“It appears from our vantage point that at least two Russian-made SCUD missiles just exploded in the Old City. The bombardment began around 10:35 local time, igniting fuel tanks near the airport. Tank rounds and RPGs strafed the tarmac as baggage handlers tried to retrieve luggage from an inbound flight from Paris. Based on confidential sources close to the Mossad, we can confirm that all, I repeat, all U.S. military personnel have been safely evacuated from the area.”
“What about the American civilians in the airport’s terminal?”
“It’s a blood bath.”
“Anything else you can tell us, Chris?”
“There’s widespread panic in the Gaza Strip and violent protests next to the Wailing Wall. Someone got into the happy gas and popped all the helium balloons set up for Chairman Yasir Nosir’s proposed visit. Worse, a tour bus packed with Christians on their way to the Church of the Nativity is stuck in traffic. The driver is threatening to blow up the bus if passengers don’t stop singing “Pass It On.” It’s bedlam in Bethlehem, brunch in Bethany, and unlimited baptisms in the Jordan River for the first 100 pilgrims to arrive.
“Where I’m standing is about four miles away from the Dome of the Rock and I can feel explosions shaking the buildings. As you can see, the night sky is one huge fireball. For those who don’t have access to the kind of information we do, one can only imagine what they’re thinking.”
“What kind of information is that, Chris?”
“Mostly second-hand hearsay. My sources are telling me it’s risky to venture too far from my hotel, so I’m staying put. Besides, the coffee shop downstairs serves this killer biscotti.”
“I’m with you, bro’. Is there anything else you can tell us?”
“They’re shipped in from Cameron and made with almonds and dark chocolate.”
“I meant about the fighting that’s going on.”
“Just that within minutes of the first explosion, our cell phones went dead. It may be an effort to cripple the communication’s infrastructure—or it could be my service plan. For you listeners out there, let me just say if you have a choice of wireless providers don’t ever under any circumstances sign a contract with―”
“Hate to interrupt, Chris, but isn’t the area where you’re staying called the ‘Isosceles Triangle of Death?’”
“That’s right, Chet. It straddles the Christian, Muslim and Irish quarters. It has been the scene of some deadly uprisings in the past few decades. In fact, I’m working on a book that addresses this very issue. It covers the rise and fall of the Celtic influence in—”
“Hate to cut you short, Chris, but we have new information out of Iowa. Linda, are you still there?”
“Still here, Chet.”
“How’s it going?”
“Not good. As I was saying, local militia have stormed the compound and taken over the arsenal. Vigilante groups are expressing their anger at the President’s―”
“Excuse me Linda, but I have Jamie Macintosh reporting from the Pentagon with a breaking story. Go ahead, Jamie.”
“Chet, I’m here at the Pentagon where the Joint Chiefs of Staff are meeting behind closed doors.”
“What are you hearing, Jamie?”
“Nothing. I told you, they’re behind closed doors.”
“Anything else?”
“Only what I’m reading on the internet. The Fudge Report is claiming that the U.S. launched the first missile. No word yet on why or who gave the orders, but rumors have it that a congressman on vacation in the Bahamas may be involved.”
Tommy put his hands over his face.
“Jamie, are you suggesting that a United States of America Congressional representative may be behind this bloodshed?”
“I’m not suggesting anything, Chet. The risk of a libel suit is too large. I’m just reporting what I’ve read and heard on the social networking sites. But if this is true, then I’m sure that Russia’s response will be swift, severe, and delivered during prime time for maximum media exposure.”
Behind Tommy, the door to the Oval Office opened. A white-haired woman with bags under her eyes, a hawk-bill nose, and wearing a designer scarf, stepped out.
“The President will see you now.”
21
Sonny sat in the cockpit, hand on the tiller and back straight. His stomach was in knots. He breathed in, swallowed and pushed down the impulse to hurl by staring at the expanding bar of blue sky that marked the beginning of a new day.
The longer he guided the sailboat toward the white speck on the water, the more he began to anticipate the lift and fall as the swells rolled beneath him. Slowly he came to appreciate the way the tiller felt in his hand, the curve of its smooth wood and the way, with small adjustments, he could cause the boat to lie over and accelerate or straighten and stall.
This was how he’d hoped it would be. Her and him, sailing past islands—sun bright, sky clear, air heavy with the smell of salt. He peeked into the cabin to check his crew.
Anna lay face down on the narrow bunk, her small fist balled tight and tucked under her chin. The boat’s battery provided just enough juice to spin the bulkhead fan, its slow oscillation rustling her brown curls. Mouth slack, lower lip moist.
Leaning back on a boat cushion he took in the expanding swath of sky turning slowly from black to dusty blue. All the planning, all the months of waiting had paid off. They were together at last, sailing through paradise. If only he’d done this sooner. Before…
By the time the sun rose above the smudge of the clouds, the wind had died. The boom banged back-and-forth, rattling each time a swell rocked the boat.
“Don’t touch the outboard,” she’d warned.
“But we’re dead in the water,” he wanted to argue, peering up at the limp mainsail. He reached between his legs, primed the bulb on the gas tank and yanked the starter cord. The outboard hiccupped. He tried again, heard the gargling cough of sparkplugs firing, throttled back, and shifted into forward.
****
She’d remembered the sound of the main sail slapping the spreaders jolting her awake. For several moments, she lay there listening to the drone of the outboard, willing he
rself to rise, but unable to find the energy. Then the steady rocking of the boat had pulled her back down. Now the motor was silent, the boat still. Anna swung her legs over the side of the bunk and sat upright.
“Something wrong?” she asked, shading her eyes from the blinding whiteness of the cockpit.
Sonny, kneeling with his head in a storage locker under the cockpit seat, looked up. “Just trying to find the anchor.”
“Hanging off the bow pulpit behind the head sail. Where are we?”
He pointed.
She lifted her head above the companionway hatch and saw a brown-green clump of trees on the rim of the horizon.
“That’s our island, right?”
Anna checked the coordinates on the GPS and matched them to the chart. “Why’d you stop?”
“Depth gauge says we’re in twenty feet of water. It’s been coming up fast and you said not to run aground.”
“You know, you might make a decent skipper after all. Any sign of the cruise ship?”
Sonny pivoted slowly. “Be sort of hard to hide a ship out here. Maybe they’ve already come and gone. What now?”
“There’s supposed to be an underwater sea park nearby. According to the ship’s itinerary, it stops offshore, lets the passengers play in the water while the crew goes ashore to prepare a beach picnic. I’ll try to raise them on the VHF. You go up front and drop the anchor.” She turned on the radio by the nav station and tried to raise the Wicked Witch with no success. She removed the binoculars from their case, braced her elbows on the curved roof of the cabin and scanned the horizon.
Empty, except for the tiny smudge of land that reminded her of Gilligan’s Island. This was bad. No, worse than bad, this was a mortal blow to all she’d ever worked for. Her boss would be furious once he learned she’d lost Boggs and Martinez and was now sailing around the islands with her old boyfriend.
She’d already phoned him twice, leaving messages for him to return the call. But still no word on where the rest of her team was, or what, if anything, they had on the whereabouts of Martinez.
