The limo made a right turn, and there it was: the yacht Nadine, rising up majestically, above all the other yachts. God—how I hated the thing! Why the fuck had I bought it? I turned to my guests and said, “Is she gorgeous or what?”
Everyone nodded. Then Ophelia said, “Why are there waves in the harbor?”
The Duchess said, “Don’t worry, O. If it’s too rough we’ll wait it out.”
Not a fucking prayer! I thought. Movement…movement…I needed movement.
The limo stopped at the end of the dock, and Captain Marc was waiting to greet us. Next to him was John, the first mate. They both wore their Nadine outfits—white collared polo shirts, blue boating shorts, and gray canvas boating moccasins. Every article of clothing bore the Nadine logo, designed by Dave Ceradini for the bargain price of $8,000.
The Duchess gave Captain Marc a great hug. “Why is the harbor so rough?” she asked.
“There’s a storm that popped out of nowhere,” said the captain. “The seas are eight to ten feet. We should”—should—“wait ’til it dies down a bit before we head to Sardinia.”
“Fuck that!” I sputtered. “I gotta move right this fucking second, Marc.”
The Duchess was quick to rain on my parade: “We’re not going anywhere unless Captain Marc says it’s safe.”
I smiled at the safety-conscious Duchess and said, “Why don’t you go on board and cut the tags off your new clothes? We’re at sea now, honey, and I’m a god at sea!”
The Duchess rolled her eyes. “You’re a fucking idiot, and you don’t know the first thing about the sea.” She turned to the group. “Come on, girls, the sea god has spoken.” With that, all the women laughed at me. Then, in single file, they headed to the gangway and climbed aboard the yacht—following their cherished leader, the Duchess of Bay Ridge.
“I can’t sit in this harbor, Marc. I’m heavily post-Luded. How far is Sardinia?”
“About a hundred miles, but if we leave now it’s gonna take forever to get there. We’d have to go slow. You’ve got eight-foot waves, and the storms are unpredictable in this part of the Med. We’d have to batten down the hatches, tie everything down in the main salon.” He shrugged his square shoulders. “Even then we might sustain some damage to the interior—some broken plates, some vases, maybe a few glasses. We’ll make it, but I strongly advise against it.”
I looked at Rob, who compressed his lips and gave me a single nod, as if to say, “Let’s do it!” Then I said, “Let’s go for it, Marc!” I pumped my fist in the air. “It’ll be a fabulous adventure, one for the record books!”
Captain Marc smiled and started shaking his rectangular head. And we climbed aboard and prepared to shove off.
Fifteen minutes later, I was lying on a very comfortable mattress atop the yacht’s flybridge, while a dark-haired stewardess named Michelle served me a Bloody Mary. Like the rest of the crew, she wore the Nadine uniform.
“Here you go, Mr. Belfort!” said Michelle, smiling. “Can I get you anything else?”
“Yes, Michelle. I have a rare condition that requires me to drink one of these every fifteen minutes. And those are doctor’s orders, Michelle, so please set your egg timer or else I might wind up in the hospital.”
She giggled. “Whatever you say, Mr. Belfort.” She started to walk away.
“Michelle!” I screamed, in a voice loud enough to cut through the wind and the rumble of the twin caterpillar engines.
Michelle turned to me, and I said, “If I fall asleep, don’t wake me up. Just keep bringing up the Bloody Marys every fifteen minutes and line them up next to me. I’ll drink them when I wake up, okay?”
She gave me the thumbs-up sign and then descended a very steep flight of stairs that led to the deck below, where the helicopter was stowed.
I looked at my watch. It was one p.m., Rome time. At this very moment, inside my stomach sac, four Ludes were dissolving. In fifteen minutes I would be tingling away; fifteen minutes after that I’d be fast asleep. How relaxing, I thought, as I downed the Bloody Mary. Then I took a few deep breaths and shut my eyes. How very relaxing!
I woke up to the feeling of raindrops, but the sky was blue. That confused me. I looked to my right, and there were eight Bloody Marys lined up, all filled to the rim. I shut my eyes and took a deep breath. There was a ferocious wind howling. Then I felt more raindrops. What the fuck? I opened my eyes. Was the Duchess pouring water on me again? She was nowhere in sight, though. I was alone on the flybridge.
All of a sudden I felt the yacht dipping down in a most unsettling way until it reached a forty-five-degree angle, and then out of nowhere I heard a wild crashing sound. A moment later a thick wall of gray water came rising up over the side of the yacht, curled over the top of the flybridge, poured down—soaking me from head to toe.
What on God’s earth? The flybridge was a good thirty feet above the water and—oh, shit, oh, shit—the yacht was dipping down again. Now I was being thrown on my side, and the Bloody Marys went flying on top of me.
I sat up straight and looked over the side and—holy fucking shit! The waves had to be twenty feet high, and they were thicker than buildings. Then I lost my balance. I was flying off the mattress now onto the teak deck, and the Bloody Mary glasses followed me, shattering into a thousand pieces.
I crawled over to the side, grabbed hold of a chrome railing, and pulled myself up. I looked behind the boat and—Holy shit! The Chandler! We were towing the Chandler, a forty-two foot dive-boat, by two thick dock ropes, and it was disappearing and reappearing in the peaks and troughs of these enormous waves.
I got back on all fours and started crawling over to the stairs. The yacht felt like it was breaking apart. By the time I’d crawled down the stairway to the main deck, I’d been soaked and banged around mercilessly. I stumbled into the main salon. The entire group was sitting on the leopard-print carpet, huddled in a tight circle. They were holding hands and wearing life vests. When the Duchess saw me, she broke from the group and crawled toward me. But then all at once the boat began tipping wildly to port.
“Watch out!” I screamed, watching the Duchess roll across the carpet and smash into a wall. A moment later an antique Chinese vase went flying across the main salon and smashed into a window above her head, shattering into a thousand pieces.
Then the boat righted itself. I dropped to my hands and knees and quickly crawled over to her. “Are you all right, baby?”
She gritted her teeth at me. “You…you fucking sea god! I’m gonna kill you if we make it off this fucking boat! We’re all about to die! What’s going on? Why are the waves so big?” She stared at me with her enormous blue eyes.
“I don’t know,” I said defensively. “I was sleeping.”
The Duchess was incredulous. “You were sleeping? How the fuck could you sleep through this? We’re about to sink! Ophelia and Dave are deathly ill. So are Ross and Bonnie…and Shelly too!”
Just then Rob came crawling over with a great smile on his face. “Is this a fucking rip or what? I always wanted to die at sea.”
The doleful Duchess: “Shut the fuck up, Rob! This is as much your fault as my husband’s. You two are complete idiots.”
“Where are the Ludes?” sputtered Rob. “I refuse to die sober.”
I nodded in agreement. “I have some in my pocket…Here,” and I reached into my shorts pocket, pulled out a handful of Ludes, and handed him four.
“Give me one of those!” snapped the Duchess. “I need to relax.”
I smiled at the Duchess. She was a good egg, my wife! “Here you go, sweetie.” I handed her a Lude.
I looked up and Ross, the brave outdoorsman, was crawling over. He looked terrified. “Oh, Jesus,” he muttered, “I’ve gotta get off this boat. I have a daughter. I…I…I can’t stop vomiting! Please, get me off this boat.”
Rob said to me, “Let’s go up to the bridge and see what’s going on.”
I looked at the Duchess. “You wait here, honey. I’ll be right back.
”
“Fuck that! I’m coming with you.”
I nodded. “Okay, let’s go.”
“I’ll stay down here,” said the brave outdoorsman, and he started crawling back to the group with his tail between his legs. I looked at Rob, and we both started laughing. Then the three of us began crawling toward the bridge. On the way, we passed a well-stocked bar. Rob stalled in mid-crawl and said, “I think we should do some shots of tequila.”
I looked at the Duchess. She nodded yes. I said to Rob, “Go get the bottle.” Thirty seconds later Rob came crawling back, holding a bottle of tequila. He unscrewed the top and handed it to the Duchess, who took a giant swig. What a woman! I thought. Then Rob and I took swigs.
Rob screwed the top back on and threw the bottle against a wall. It smashed into a dozen pieces. He smiled. “I always wanted to do something like that.”
The Duchess and I exchanged looks.
A short flight of stairs led from the main deck to the bridge. As we made our way up, two deckhands named Bill came barreling down, literally jumping over us. “What’s going on?” I yelled.
“The diving platform just ripped off,” screamed a Bill. “The main salon is gonna flood if we don’t secure the rear doors.” And they kept running.
The bridge was a beehive of activity. It was a small space, perhaps eight by twelve feet, and it had a very low ceiling. Captain Marc was holding on to the ship’s antique wooden steering wheel with both hands. Every few seconds he would take his right hand off the wheel and work the two throttles, trying to keep the bow pointed in the direction of the oncoming waves. John, the first mate, was standing next to him. He was grasping a metal pole with his left hand to maintain his balance. With his right he held a pair of binoculars to his eyes. Three stewardesses were sitting on a wooden bench, their arms interlocked and tears in their eyes. Through wild bursts of static I heard the radio blaring: Gale warning! This is a gale warning!
“What the fuck is going on?” I asked Captain Marc.
He shook his head gravely. “We’re fucked now! This storm is only getting worse. The waves are twenty feet and building.”
“But the sky’s still blue,” I said innocently. “I don’t get it.”
An angry Duchess said, “Who gives a flying fuck about the color of the sky? Can’t you turn us around, Marc?”
“No way,” he said. “If we try to turn we’re gonna get broadsided and tip over.”
“Can you keep us afloat?” I asked. “Or should you call Mayday?”
“We’ll make it,” he replied, “but it’s gonna get ugly. The blue skies are about to disappear. We’re heading into the belly of a Force Eight gale.”
Twenty minutes later I felt the Ludes taking hold. I whispered to Rob, “Give me some blow.” I looked at the Duchess to see if she’d busted me.
Apparently she had. She shook her head and said, “You two are off your fucking rockers, I swear.”
But it was two hours later—when the waves were thirty feet or better—that the shit really hit the fan. Captain Marc said, in the tone of the doomed: “Oh, shit, don’t tell me…” Then an instant later he screamed, “Rogue wave! Hold on!”
Rogue wave? What the fuck was that? I found out a second later when I looked out the window—and everyone on the bridge screamed at once: “Holy shit! Rogue wave!”
It had to be sixty feet high, and it was closing fast.
“Hold on!” screamed Captain Marc. With my right hand, I grabbed the Duchess around her tiny waist and pulled her close to my body. She smelled good, the Duchess, even now.
All at once the boat began dipping at an impossibly steep angle, until it was pointing almost straight down. Captain Marc jammed the throttles to full power, and the boat jerked forward and we started rising up the face of the rogue wave. Suddenly the boat seemed to stop on a dime. Then the wave began curling over the top of the bridge, and it came slamming down with the force of a thousand tons of dynamite…KABOOM!
Everything went black.
It felt like the boat was underwater for forever, but slowly, painfully, we popped back up again—listing heavily to port now at a sixty-degree angle.
“Is everyone okay?” asked Captain Marc.
I looked at the Duchess. She nodded. “We’re fine,” I said. “How about you, Rob?”
“Never better,” he muttered, “but I gotta pee like a fucking racehorse. I’m going downstairs to check on everyone.”
As Rob made his way down the stairs, one of the Bills came barreling up, screaming, “The fore-hatch just blew open! We’re going down by the bow!”
“Well, that kinda sucks,” said the Duchess, shaking her head in resignation. “Talk about your shitty vacations.”
Captain Marc grabbed the radio transmitter and pushed the button. “Mayday,” he said urgently. “This is Captain Marc Elliot, aboard the yacht Nadine. This is a Mayday: We are fifty miles off the coast of Rome and going down by the head. We require immediate assistance. We have nineteen souls on board.” Then he bent over and started reading off some orange-diode numbers from a computer monitor, giving the Italian Coast Guard our exact coordinates.
“Go get the wish-box!” ordered the Duchess. “It’s downstairs, in our stateroom.”
I looked at her as if she were a crazy person. “What are you—”
The Duchess cut me off. “Get the wish-box,” she screamed, “right fucking now!”
I took a deep breath. “Okay, I will, I will. But I’m fucking starving to death.” I looked at Captain Marc. “Can you have the chef whip me up a sandwich?”
Captain Marc started laughing. “You know, you really are one sick bastard!” He shook his square head. “I’ll have the chef make us some sandwiches. It’s gonna be a long night.”
“You’re the best,” I said, heading for the stairs. “Can I also get some fresh fruit?” Then I ran down the stairs.
I found my guests in the main salon, in a state of panic, tied together with a dock rope. But I wasn’t the least bit worried. Soon enough, I knew, the Italian Coast Guard would be here to rescue us; in a few hours from now we’d be safe and sound, and this floating albatross would be off my neck. I asked my guests, “You guys having a fun vacation?”
No one laughed. “Are they coming to rescue us?” asked Ophelia.
I nodded. “Captain Marc just called in a Mayday. Everything’s gonna be fine, guys. I gotta go downstairs. I’ll be right back.” I headed for the stairs—but I was immediately knocked over by another massive wave and went crashing into a wall. I rolled back onto all fours and began crawling to the stairs.
Just then one of the Bills passed me, screaming, “We lost the Chandler! It snapped off!” and he kept running.
When I reached the bottom of the stairs I pulled myself up by a banister. I stumbled into my stateroom through ankle-deep water and there it was: the fucking wish-box, sitting on the bed. I grabbed it, made my way back up to the bridge, and handed it to the Duchess. She closed her eyes and started shaking the pebbles.
I said to Captain Marc, “Maybe I can fly the helicopter off the boat. I could take four people at a time.”
“Forget it,” he said. “With the seas like this it’d be a miracle if you made it up without crashing. And even if you did, it’d be impossible to land again.”
Three hours later, the engines were still running but we were making no forward motion. There were four enormous container ships surrounding us. They had heard the Mayday and were trying to shield us from the oncoming waves. It was almost dark now, and we were still waiting to be rescued. The bow was pointing downward at a steep angle. Sheets of rain pounded against the window, the waves were thirty feet plus, and the winds were fifty knots or better. But we were no longer stumbling. We had our sea legs.
Captain Marc had been on the radio for what seemed like an eternity, talking to the Coast Guard. Finally, he said to me, “Okay, there’s a helicopter hovering overhead; it’s gonna lower down a basket, so get everyone up to the flybridge. We’ll
get the female guests off first, then the female crew members, then the male guests. The male crew will go last, and I’ll go after them. And tell everyone, no bags allowed. You can take only what you can carry in your pockets.”
I looked at the Duchess and smiled. “Well, there go all your new clothes!” She shrugged and said happily, “We could always buy more!” Then she grabbed me by the arm and we headed downstairs.
After I explained the program to everyone, I pulled Rob aside and said, “You got the Ludes?”
“No,” he said grimly. “They’re in your stateroom. It’s completely flooded down there, maybe three feet of water—probably more by now.”
I took a deep breath and let it out slowly. “I’ll tell you, Rob: I got a quarter million in cash down there and I couldn’t give a shit about it. But we gotta get those fucking Quaaludes. We have two hundred, and we can’t leave ’em behind. It would be a travesty.”
“Indeed,” said Rob. “I’ll get them.” Twenty seconds later he was back. “I got shocked,” he muttered. “There must be an electrical short down there; what should I do?”
I didn’t answer. I just looked him straight in the eye and pumped my fist in the air a single time, as if to say, “You can do it, soldier!”
Rob nodded and said, “If I get electrocuted, I want you to give Shelly seven thousand dollars for a breast job. She’s been driving me crazy about it since the day I met her!”
“Consider it done,” I said righteously.
Three minutes later Rob was back with the Ludes. “God, that fucking hurt! I think I got third-degree burns on my feet!” Then he smiled and said, “But who’s better than me, right?”
I smiled knowingly. “No one, Lorusso. You rule.”
Five minutes later we were all up on the helicopter deck, and I was watching in horror as the basket swung back and forth a hundred feet in either direction. We were up there for a good thirty minutes—watching and waiting with sinking spirits—and then the sun dipped below the horizon.
The Wolf of Wall Street Page 46
