Well, if anyone is in the general vicinity, they know we’re here now, Malin thought.
He guided the shoulder back into the socket, then curled Raymond’s arm against his side.
“See? It’s done,” he said.
“It’s back in,” Raymond said with a moan, grabbing his arm. “I felt it go back in.”
Malin parted the ripped sleeve and saw the source of the blood: an ugly gash just above his elbow. It wasn’t big, but it was deep, and a jagged piece of wood was sticking out of it. While Raymond was busy moaning in pain, Malin quickly snagged the piece of wood and pulled it out, but this only made the wound bleed worse.
“This should help,” Elna said.
She stepped onto the dock, holding a large piece of folded sailcloth in one hand, a small first aid kit in the other. She knelt beside Malin, then drew her pocket knife and began cutting strips out of the cloth.
“That’s for repairing the sails,” Raymond said.
“Yeah, well, right now it’s for repairing you,” Elna said.
Raymond bent forward, moaning.
“I should’ve braced myself,” he muttered. “We came in a little too fast, and I wasn’t ready for it. I was trying to go fast, like real pirates, but look at what it got us.”
When Elna lifted his arm, even though she was gentle, he cried out in pain. Apparently, the shoulder still hurt.
“How did you cut yourself?” Malin asked. “What did you hit on the way down?”
“My arm hit the edge of the dock,” Raymond replied. “Is it bad?”
The gash was about an inch long and maybe half an inch wide, but bleeding plenty. Elna used a bandage to wipe away some of the blood. Then, as Malin stabilized the arm, she wrapped another bandage around the arm, covering the wound with a few layers. Elna then weaved a few long strips of sailcloth together and used them to create a sling for Raymond’s right arm. Then she rose and helped him to his feet.
“That’s the best I can do for now,” she said. “Try to keep the arm immobile, okay?”
Raymond wiped tears of pain off his cheeks before nodding his head in thanks. “Wow. It hurts like hell.”
With a sigh, Malin turned and gazed up at the house. The switchback path leading to the porch looked exhausting, but there was a sizable boathouse at the bottom of the hill. It was a quaint building, designed to look like a rustic cabin. Some boating equipment was strewn around the door, but he didn’t see anyone moving around inside.
“I’m pretty sure this place is abandoned,” he said.
“They could be hiding,” Raymond replied. “Let’s find water, grab it, and get out of here.”
While Elna took the extra sailcloth back down into the cabin, Malin lowered the sails completely and tied off the boat a bit more securely. When Elna returned, she was lugging her backpack. The way it pulled against her shoulders made it look heavy.
“What are you bringing?” Malin asked.
She tossed him one of the empty sacks, which he caught out of the air. “A bit of food, a bottle of water, and a couple bottles of wine.”
“Are you planning on bartering the wine?” he asked.
“I’m just planning for a variety of outcomes,” Elna said. “You know how I am.”
“I do, indeed,” he said.
They stepped back onto the deck, where a rather forlorn Raymond waited for them. He looked utterly deflated and quite possibly embarrassed. When Elna and Malin approached, he averted his gaze.
“It was an accident,” Malin reminded him. “Don’t be hard on yourself, Raymond. Remember when I almost fell into the ocean and you saved me? It can happen to anyone.”
Raymond said nothing to this. Instead, he turned and started down the dock toward the boathouse. Elna shrugged and followed him. As Malin started after them, he kept his gaze fixed on the house atop the hill. It was a big white building with sweeping gables and a couple dozen big windows looking out on the sea. Many of the rooms had curtains opened, and he saw hints of the dark interior. Plenty of gloom and shadows for people to hide and watch the dock.
He shuddered, wondering if the feeling came from eyes watching him. By the time they reached the boathouse, the feeling was almost unbearable. When Elna glanced at him with wide eyes, he knew she was feeling it as well.
“Do you suppose we’re being watched?” he asked.
“I think it’s very possible,” she replied.
Malin approached a small window beside the boathouse door, but his view through the murky glass was blocked by a stack of boxes just inside. He put his ear to the glass and listened, but the building was quiet.
“Guys, let’s just wait here a few minutes,” Elna said. Among the junk scattered around the boathouse door was a big plastic tub. She turned it over and sat down. “If there are people guarding the property, we don’t want to get trapped inside a building. We’re hidden from the big house in this spot. Keep your ears open and listen for anyone coming down the path, okay?”
Raymond put his back against the wood siding and slid down to the ground, wincing. The simple act of sitting down seemed to hurt him.
After all the dangers this guy has faced, he gets injured in the dumbest way possible, Malin thought. Poor guy.
When Raymond glanced at him, Malin began rooting around in the junk around the boathouse to hide what he was thinking. Mostly, it all seemed useless or broken. He found a bent anchor pole, pieces of a folding ladder, some stray wire ties, a scrap of what might have been a boat cover, a few weathered bungee cords, and other assorted bits that he couldn’t identify.
He moved to the corner of the boathouse and dared a glance up the hill. The hillside hid the first floor of the big house, but he could still see the dark, shadowy second-story windows. He intentionally avoided staring at them, afraid he might somehow draw attention. More junk had been scattered on this side of the building, and one object in particular stood out. A small two-wheeled handcart was leaning against the wall, the wheels checked by a big piece of scrap wood. At one time, the handcart had been painted orange, but most of the paint was chipped away, the metal beneath rust-flecked and rough.
“Be careful,” Raymond said. “Don’t stick your head out so far. They could have snipers.”
“I think we’re in the clear,” Malin replied.
Still, he hunched down as he stepped around the corner. He kicked the scrap wood aside, grabbed the handcart, and dragged it to the front of the building. The wheels weren’t flat, but the axle seemed either rusty or slightly bent. It took a bit of work to get it to move, and it bounced and thumped over the small bits of junk.
“This’ll help us get stuff back to the boat,” Malin said. “What do you think?”
Elna was standing beside the boathouse door, her hands on her hips. Her lips were pressed together, working from side to side, as she scowled at the ground. It was the face she made when she was deep in thought. Malin had come to know it well.
“What do you think?” he asked again.
She finally blinked a few times, seemed to come out of her thought, and looked at him. “That handcart is great, Malin. Good eye.”
“Are you okay?” he asked her.
“Just tired,” she said. “Really tired. Concerned about Raymond, and…thinking.” She shrugged. “Anyway, should we see what we can find? Here’s your chance to be a real pirate.”
“Let’s go for it,” he said.
Raymond started to get up, grunting from the pain and effort.
“Just relax, Raymond,” Elna said. “Let us handle this.”
He didn’t need to be told twice, and he dropped back down onto the ground.
Elna slipped the backpack off her shoulder and set it on the ground. Unzipping it, she reached inside and pulled out the small crowbar. She handed it to Malin.
“Would you mind opening the door for us?” she said. “I checked it, and it’s locked.”
Malin laid the handcart down and approached the front door. He felt conflicted. Was he really about t
o break into private property looking for stuff to steal?
Shouldn’t we discuss this further? he thought. We seem to be crossing a line here, and there might be no coming back.
He glanced at Elna, but she was lost in her thoughts again and staring off into the distance.
“Okay, here we go,” he said.
Beyond the feeling of regret, there was a lower emotion that he couldn’t deny. He felt it, a kind of electricity in his belly.
Maybe I’d make a good pirate after all, he thought, as he jammed the end of the crowbar between the door and the doorframe.
“Tell me if you hear anyone coming,” he said.
“I think we’re in the clear for now,” Raymond said. “Just hurry, please.”
Malin pulled on the crowbar and felt the doorframe crack. He dug the end deeper and pulled again, and this time the door groaned. On the third pull, he felt the latch bolt split the wooden doorframe, and then door swung open with a woosh of musty air. Malin stumbled backward and dropped the crowbar, which hit the ground and bounced among the junk with a clatter.
“Don’t summon the whole town,” Raymond said, tapping a finger against his lips.
“With all the yelling earlier, it’s probably too late for that,” Malin said and Raymond ducked his head in embarrassment.
Elna swooped down, grabbed the crowbar, and slid it back into her backpack. Malin stepped into the boathouse. The inside was spacious, with a generous storage area on one side that was partially walled off, but it was also damp and cluttered. Malin slid a big metal trunk out of his way and moved to the center of the room. From there, he began to scan the place.
Elna stepped through the door next, but she had to sidle up next to him to fit. He didn’t mind.
“What have you found, Blackbeard?” she asked.
“Well, other than the fact that my beard isn’t black,” he replied, “nothing yet.”
“Okay, Dirty Blondbeard, then,” she said. “Dirty Blondbeard, the Pirate of the California Coast.”
He was too tired to laugh. On a nearby shelf, he saw a large plastic jug tucked in among some boxes. He grabbed it and pulled it free. It was roughly rectangular, with rounded corners and a handle and spigot on top.
“Do you suppose this is meant for water?” he said, unscrewing the cap. He sniffed the inside. “Doesn’t smell like fuel.”
“It’ll work,” Elna said, taking it from him. “Good find. If we can get access to clean water, we’ll transport it with this.”
She took the jug outside and set it next to the handcart.
“Your first pirate treasure,” she said.
“Arr, matey, I be stealing your big jugs,” he replied, squinting with one eye.
Elna gave him a strange look, and it only occurred to him belatedly that his joke could be taken as an innuendo. This made him laugh hard, until Elna finally gave him a playful slap on the arm.
“I didn’t mean it that way,” he said. “I promise.”
As they continued searching the boathouse, they found a length of nylon rope still with a cardboard tag on it. The thing was neatly rolled and dusty, as if it had been purchased and never used. They also found a couple of folded blue tarps, which Elna said would come in handy. Finally, in a back corner of the boathouse, behind some boxes, Malin found half a dozen tightly rolled sleeping bags inside an old metal trunk.
“The ones we brought are probably soaked from the water leak,” Elna said. “Grab three of them.”
He dug them out of the box, where they’d been packed in snugly, and passed them one at a time to Elna. In the end, they stacked all of the things they’d found on the handcart and covered it all with one of the tarps.
“Not a bad haul,” Elna said, securing the tarp to the handle of the cart with bungee cords.
“Since it was my first time looting and pillaging, how did I do?” Malin asked.
“Not half bad,” Elna replied. “Nobody got hurt. Let’s keep it that way.”
Malin pulled the door shut behind him. It would no longer latch since he’d busted through the frame, but he closed it as best he could. He turned to the handcart, dreading the thought of lugging the thing back to the boat.
“I guess we need to find water next,” he said, “and then we can set sail again. We just have to trudge up the hill and hope the house is empty.”
He gazed off at the lowering sun, which was slowly sinking toward the endless roiling waves, turning the Pacific to fire. The thought of sailing again, of the endless tacking and trimming and running back and forth, made him want to collapse to the ground in despair.
“My friends,” Raymond said, the words coming out in a shuddery breath, “I don’t think I can make it up that big hill. I am in more and more pain. Maybe the shock wore off, I don’t know, but it hurts too bad.” He reached over to touch his injured shoulder, then seemed to change his mind and lowered his hand to his lap.
“I don’t relish trudging up all those switchbacks either,” Malin said, “but we need water if we want to get back on our way.”
To this, Raymond merely sighed. Elna was still gazing off at nothing in particular, but she grunted suddenly and shook her head. Turning, she looked from Raymond to Malin.
“We’re not going anywhere today,” she said. “We’re certainly not sailing, not with our best sailor in his current condition, and I don’t think any of us have the strength to trudge up the hill. We’ll camp here tonight, try to get some rest, and see how we feel in the morning.”
“Are we sleeping on board?” Malin asked.
Elna shook her head. “The boat is too visible. I would say let’s sail away from the coast, but I don’t know if we can manage it safely with Raymond’s injury. Malin, you and I could work the sails and rudder, but we need Raymond’s instructions. I’d hate for him to risk making his injury worse. It would only take another fall. Let’s camp somewhere on land, somewhere out of sight. We can take turns keeping watch.”
Part of Malin didn’t like this idea at all. He’d developed a phobia of being on the mainland. The very environment felt hostile.
Get me back on the island or get me back on a ship, he thought.
But the other part of him so craved sleep that he wanted to collapse right then and there amidst the junk.
“I’m sorry,” Raymond said. “I was clumsy, and look at what I’ve done.”
“You didn’t do it on purpose,” Elna said. “Accidents happen. We just have to deal with the hand we’ve been dealt.” She waved both of her hands at the boathouse. “I think we should camp in there.”
“In the boathouse?” Malin said. “I busted the door.”
“We can push something against the door. The boathouse has a storage area on one side. If we move things around, we can clear enough space to lie down. We’ll take turns at the window keeping an eye on things. If someone is drawn down to the dock, maybe we can get the drop on them before they get the drop on us. They’ll expect us to be on the boat.”
“If you say so,” Malin said. The idea of sleeping in the boathouse under the watchful gaze of that big house on the hill made his skin crawl, but he didn’t have a better idea.
“Help me unload the sleeping bags,” Elna said, kneeling in front of the handcart.
“I’ll take first watch,” Malin said.
When he knelt beside her, she hugged him suddenly, crushing him in her embrace and pressing her face against his shoulder. They stayed there for a minute, neither saying anything. Then she pulled away and said, “Thank you.”
It took a while to set up the sleeping bags. They had to disconnect the bungee cords, pull off the tarp, and carefully unstack everything. Then Malin spent a few minutes clearing space inside the building’s storage area, making the stacks of boxes and junk a little higher. As he did that, Elna cleared a space around the boathouse window, leaving a single trunk so someone could sit and stare through the glass.
Once they were done, there was just barely enough room for three sleeping bags set sid
e by side, but it was going to be cozy. Malin took the water bottle from the backpack and set it on the trunk beside him as he sat down next to the window.
This is going to be creepy as hell, he thought, seeing the darkening waves through the dusty glass, the mast of the Betty Lynn swaying like some strange, arrhythmic metronome. Elna and Raymond each took a sleeping bag, with Elna lying closest to the door and Raymond taking the other end. Because of his injured arm, Raymond could only lie on his left side.
It stank terribly in the small space, a mix of musty old boxes and filthy, unwashed people. When he glanced at Elna, he saw her lying on her back, her hands tucked behind her head. She was staring fixedly at the ceiling.
“Guys, I hesitate to say this,” she said softly, speaking into the deep quiet that had settled in the room, “but I don’t want to spring it on you tomorrow.”
When she left her thought hanging, Raymond finished it for her. “You think we have to go by land.”
When Elna didn’t immediately correct him, Malin felt a sinking sensation.
“I don’t think we have any choice,” she said, after a moment. “Not in your current condition. We need fresh water, you might need further medical care, and I’m worried about you moving around on deck. I’ve been trying and trying to talk myself out of it, but I don’t think so.”
“Contact with other people can be very dangerous, señora,” Raymond said gently, as if he had no fight in him.
“I know,” she replied.
And she left it at that.
12
The sound would have been loud in the small, closed space if not for the terrible, tooth-rattling death-snores of Raymond Cabello.
He must have a deviated septum, Elna thought, or sleep apnea. No healthy person snores like that.
The world beyond the dusty window glass was utterly dark, as if the little boathouse were drifting in a lifeless void. Only the soft roar of waves in the background let her know that the whole world had not somehow disappeared around them.
She didn’t feel good about any of their possible plans. Returning to the ocean was too risky. With Raymond’s injuries, they would find sailing much harder, not to mention quite dangerous. They’d barely made progress against the strong wind even with the three of them working tirelessly for hours on end. Still, going by land introduced a whole new set of dangers.
Island Refuge EMP Box Set | Books 1-3 Page 34
