"Shelby, are you all right?" Alex asked, as he came up the swim ladder. "I’ve been really worried. I had a hell of a time getting back here, and I was afraid something bad had happened to you. I couldn’t get you on the radio. Where were you?"
"I’ll tell you about it in a minute," I said. "Come below now. I’m making coffee." My hands and feet were still cold, and I still felt dizzy from the tequila. The water on the stove was boiling. I pulled out two cups, added instant coffee and a mound of sugar to each, then poured water into the mugs.
Alex went on talking. "The engine on the dinghy just wouldn’t start, and I didn’t know what to do. Are you sure you’re okay, Shelby? What happened? What is that in your hair?" He pulled a long strand of slimy river weed out of my hair.
"Here," I said, handing him a cup of coffee. "Let’s sit down. We need to talk."
"Wait, let me change really quick. I got soaked from the rain."
A few minutes later, freshly dressed in dry clothes, he sat down on the other side of the salon, facing me. I said, "Rumbar was here. With Duke."
"Duke?" Alex said, surprise and disbelief on his face.
"Yes, apparently they’re cousins. But Duke was here because Rumbar threatened him."
"What happened?"
I took a drink of my coffee, grateful for the warmth. Then I gave him the story, finishing with, "So that’s why I had goop in my hair. I was in the river. Now tell me, what happened to you? I thought you’d be back hours ago."
"Oh, Shelby, I feel terrible that I left you here by yourself. I never should have done that."
"It doesn’t matter, Alex. They would have come here anyway, and you might have gotten hurt, or…worse. And I’m fine now, anyway. So tell me what happened."
"Well, the first part you know. I ran into a guy at the landing, and he offered me a ride. He took me to his house first to drop off his boat and trailer. There was some kind of neighborhood thing going on though. A block party right outside his house. A bunch of people were there. He felt like he had to stop and visit with them, and since he was being so nice about taking me into town, I didn’t feel like I could rush him," Alex explained. "But I was really getting anxious and impatient. We left so late, we barely made it to the marine parts store before it closed. By the way, I bought five impellers, just in case. And some gaskets. The guy said we might need those too." He got up and handed me a damp paper bag that he’d put on the nav station.
I peeked into the bag, grinning. "Great, thanks."
"Well, when the guy dropped me off at the dinghy, it was already dark. That’s the first time I tried hailing you. When you didn’t answer, it made me nervous. Then I thought maybe you were just in the shower or something."
"Did you have a flashlight? I forgot to ask you before you left."
"I didn’t think of taking one with me, but I found a small one in one of the pockets of the dinghy. It was a good thing, too, or otherwise, I never would have made it back."
"What happened with the engine?"
"Well, it just wouldn’t start. I tried it. Nothing. So I tried hailing you again. Then I got really afraid. I couldn’t get you, and I didn’t know what to do. I just wanted to get back to you as fast as I could. I kept pulling on the starter cord and nothing happened. Finally, I started checking things and figured out that the spark plug wire was loose. But then, the engine was flooded, so it was still a while before I could get it started. I felt like a complete idiot. I’ve been working so hard on learning to sail that I didn’t even think about learning dinghy engine maintenance."
"Well," I said, "Don’t worry about it. It wasn’t your fault. Rumbar said he did something to your boat, to keep you from getting back here. He must have heard you hail me when you got to Frying Pan Landing, then came along after you left and just pulled the spark plug wire loose. It’s easy to miss."
"What do we do now?" Alex asked. "Should we hail the police on the VHF?"
"I think we should head toward Belhaven," I said.
"Isn’t that the way they were headed?"
"Yes. But they’re in a hurry. And I think Belhaven’s closer than anywhere else, for us."
"So wouldn’t it make sense for us to hail the police?"
"If we do, they’ll hear us. Then they could double back, if they think the police are on their way. I don’t want them to know that they didn’t kill me. And I sure as hell don’t want to have another confrontation with them."
"But they could come back anyway."
"Yeesss," I said, slowly.
"Um. Shelby, isn’t this a little like the heroine in a horror movie, going down into the basement on her own? When the audience is all yelling for her to stay out of the basement?"
In spite of the situation, I laughed. "Yeah, I guess it is."
I stood up, put my cup into the sink and said, "Let’s get the impeller in and get the engine running again, and we can talk about it some more." I opened the engine compartment, smushed the impeller a little to bend the blades slightly, and put it into the pump. "Can you hand me the dish soap?"
With a puzzled look, he passed me the bottle. I squirted a liberal amount around the new impeller, then put the gasket on before tightening the pump cover screws down. Leaning down, I opened the seacock.
"Okay, Alex, grab a flashlight. Go up and crank up the engine, then shine the light down where the raw water exhaust comes out. Watch the water. Once the water starts circulating through the system again, the dish soap will start bubbling, and we’ll know we’re good to go. Also, keep an eye on the engine water temperature. If it starts getting too hot again, shut the engine off, okay?"
He nodded and climbed up to the cockpit. A moment later, the rumble of the diesel started up. I watched the cover of the water pump. No leaks. Good. A few minutes later, Alex yelled, "There it is! It’s bubbling." With relief, I shut the engine compartment and climbed up into the cockpit.
I said, "Leave it in neutral, okay? And keep an eye on the temperature."
Alex stepped back into the cockpit and sat down, then stood up hastily because the seat was still wet from the rain. "Ah, well," he said, shrugging and sitting back down. "I guess I’m already wet now. So, what’s our plan? Are you sure you still want to go to Belhaven?"
I nodded. "I know it’s a risk, but from what Rumbar was saying, they’re in a big hurry to get somewhere else. He said something about meeting someone. It sounds like they’re trying to get out of here, and they think I’m dead anyway, so I don’t think they’ll ambush us. But I think the sooner we can get to the police, the better. If we get close enough to Belhaven, we should start getting signals on our cell phones again, then we can call them. Rumbar has a good head start. I don’t think we’ll run into them."
"That sounds logical," Alex said. "But couldn’t we go back out the way we came, and go another route to get to Beaufort?"
"No," I said. "There’s a fixed bridge on that route that’s too low for our mast. This is the only course we can take."
"Does that mean you want to go now, tonight?"
"I think that would be the best. The sooner we can get to the police, the sooner the police or ATF or whoever may be able to catch up with Rumbar. It’s going to be a long night though. What do you think?"
Alex reached over and squeezed my hand, smiling. "You’re the captain, Shelby. I’ll do what you want me to do. One thing for sure is that I’m not leaving you alone again."
"Before we get going, I need to take a quick shower." I had been in a hurry just to get into dry clothes earlier, so I hadn’t showered after being in the river. I was starting to detect an unpleasant swampy odor about myself. Vaguely, I wondered about the possibility of some vile parasite setting up camp in my hair. "Look at the charts while I’m in there, so you’ll get an idea of where we’re going."
When I stepped out of the shower a little while later, Alex was sitting in the settee, intently looking at the chartbooks.
"You’re right, Shelby, this is the only route we can take," he said. "And
I agree, the sooner we can get to a place we can call the police, the better. You’re probably right, too, that Rumbar is long gone by now."
"Okay, what we’ll need to do is take shifts, one of us at the bow and one of us at the helm. The person at the bow needs to watch where we’re going and make sure we’re staying dead in the center of the channel," I said.
"Won’t the chartplotter tell us that?" asked Alex.
"Yes, but the canal is very narrow, and I don’t want to use the chartplotter as the only source of navigation. There can also be debris that we need to watch for. I’ll take the first watch in the bow if you’ll take the wheel. Are you ready for this?"
"Yeah, I think so."
"Make sure the chartplotter is on the night setting so you don’t ruin your night vision. Watch me. I’ll use my arm to point where you should go, if you start getting out of the center of the channel, like this," I said, demonstrating my all-purpose straight-arm pointing stance. "Now, I’ll go pull up the anchor, and we can get going."
"I’m glad you’re here with me, Shelby," Alex said. "I’d hate to be doing this by myself."
"Well, you’re only in this situation because of me," I said. "I feel terrible that all this is happening on your trip."
"Adventure of a lifetime," Alex said. "Isn’t that what all the books say?"
"I don’t think this is what they had in mind when they wrote that."
"Maybe not. Still. How many people will be able to tell the stories we can?"
I patted him on the arm, smiling, then moved up to the bow. The anchor had sunk down into the mud, and it took some huffing and puffing to get it up again. I dunked it up and down into the water a few times, cleaning it off before pulling it all the way in. Then I stood up and gave Alex the "go" signal, my arm pointing forward. The boat jerked a little as the transmission engaged, then we moved forward, into the dark.
Chapter 18
The flashlight danced on the surface of the water, revealing small flying insects and an occasional ripple as some fish went about its fishly business. Something larger bumped the boat, and I wondered if it was an alligator, or just a piece of rotten log. The thought that I had been in that water gave me the shudders.
Alex guided the boat through the basin and into the mouth of the canal, watching for my signals and keeping the boat pretty much dead center of the canal. I flashed my light along the bank. The foliage here had nothing of the warm green lushness of the Dismal Swamp Canal. Instead, a tangle of stark, witchy-looking trees guarded the banks, like sentinels.
The rain earlier had cooled everything off, and I was glad for my sweatpants. I wished I’d thought to put on some shoes and socks because my feet were cold. Oh, well. I’d be all right.
Half an hour passed, then an hour. The hush of the night was only marred by the sound of insects humming and the soft hiss of the boat moving through the water. Once, when I shone the light along the shore, I caught a glimpse of a derelict shack, its ruins a dark outline. It reminded me of some of the stories Alex had read to us, about the Dismal Swamp being haunted. At that moment, I was pretty sure whatever hauntings might be happening weren’t limited just to the Dismal Swamp. The night here on the canal was definitely creepy.
The rest of my watch passed slowly. Finally, the engine throttled down, and the boat slowed. I heard Alex call me. I headed back toward the cockpit.
"All quiet on the bow?" he asked.
"Yes. Are you ready for me to take the helm?"
"Yeah."
"What time is it? I didn’t even look before we got underway."
"It’s about 2:30."
"Okay." My feet were freezing now, and I told Alex that I wanted to grab some socks and a jacket first. I went below and grabbed what I needed, including my phone, then came back up.
"Ready?" I said, taking the wheel. Alex nodded, took the flashlight, and walked back up toward the bow. The flashlight swept across the shoreline. A mist had settled, wrapping the trees and the shoreline in a ghostly fog.
Now that I was at the wheel, a greater sense of urgency filled me. I pulled out my phone for the twentieth time. Still no signal. Keeping an eye on Alex’s directions as well as the chartplotter, I nudged up the throttle a little, then a little more. The engine thrummed, the water temperature gauge staying in the normal range. I glanced over my shoulder. Behind us was a wall of hazy darkness, out of the range of the dim glow of the chartplotter. I shivered. I felt none of the sense of comfort and enjoyment of the solitude that I usually felt on night passages, maybe because I had never been in a closely confined canal like this before overnight. Instead, it felt oppressive and frightening, a feeling that was intensified by my encounter with Rumbar and the pervasive fear that he was still out there, looking for me. The little voice in my head woke up, saying hurry hurry hurry. I gave the throttle another nudge.
The mist slowly condensed, until it was a thick layer of fog. Now the darkness was complete. Alex’s flashlight reflected off the fog, making it nearly impossible to see more than ten feet ahead of us. I felt disoriented: Without visibility, I had no sense of motion, only the swirling haze around us providing any movement. The heavy air muffled and distorted the nighttime noises. Once, I heard the cries of a water bird, but I couldn’t see the bird anywhere, its shriek of protest seeming to come from all around us.
My sense of urgency intensified as the darkness closed around us. Although the chartplotter showed me that we were making progress, an irrational fear said that we weren’t going anywhere, that we were trapped in an endless limbo, here in this swamp, where I couldn’t see the water, the shoreline, or the night sky.
Hurry hurry hurry. Get out get out get out.
I checked my cell phone again, its bright light seeming to float in the blackness of the night. Only twenty minutes had passed since I’d checked it last. Against all reason, I eased the throttle up a little more. Anything to escape from this suffocating darkness. My eyes went from Alex’s light to the chartplotter. Back and forth. Back and forth.
Behind me, I heard something heavy splash in the water. A moment later, I heard a furious splashing, as some hapless fish was eaten by…what? A bigger fish? An alligator? I picked up a flashlight and shone it behind me, but the fog was too thick for me to see much farther than about ten feet away. I held the light straight down, and immediately regretted it. Two unblinking reptilian eyes gazed back at me from just above the surface of the water. With a great snap, the alligator came up out of the water. Reflexively, I jerked away, although there was no way it could have reached me. My heart thudding, I shut off my light, feeling three solid bumps as the alligator pursued us, thumping his big body against the hull.
Easing the throttle up, I huddled closer to the wheel, holding it tightly with both hands. There were no more thumps. A moment later, I heard another frenzied splashing off to my left as the alligator moved on to easier prey.
Reason told me that nothing in the water could hurt me. Alex and I were both safe in the boat. But there was something primal, some visceral fear, that overrode rational thought, the images of hungry predators lurking in the swampy water coupling with feelings of being hopelessly lost in the fog and the darkness. Almost without conscious thought, my hand nudged the throttle up a little more. Another splash, this one to my right. I turned to look over my shoulder, my eyes straining into the night, knowing that I couldn’t see anything but trying anyway.
I’m not sure how long I stood like that, my heart hammering. I heard Alex yell, but it was too late: With a sickening lurch, we ran aground.
✽✽✽
QUICKLY, I THROTTLED down, then gently eased into reverse. Behind me, the water churned as the prop spun, trying to gain enough way to back the boat out of the mud. That was the only good thing about this, that we’d hit mud or sand, and not rock. The bad thing was, I’d been going too fast, and we were wedged in pretty tight.
Way to go, Shelby.
Alex came back to the cockpit. "Sorry, Shelby, I didn’t see the mud bank
until we were right on top of it."
"It wasn’t your fault," I said. "I was going too fast, and I wasn’t watching you or the chartplotter. We’re too close to the edge of the canal."
"What do you want me to do?"
"Can you go back up there and just watch? See if you can tell which direction is going to get us off faster?"
"Sure."
The prop was still laboring away. I throttled down and put the boat into neutral, rubbing my forehead in irritation with myself. Alex called back, "I don’t think we’re making much progress."
I put the boat into reverse again and eased the power up, then turned the wheel hard over in the hopes that the maneuver would wiggle the bow enough to break free. I had to be careful though, because if we came unstuck, I could end up backing right into the shoreline. With the way my night was going, that didn’t seem to be a farfetched possibility. Throttling down, I turned the wheel the other way, then gave the engine some power.
We didn’t seem to be moving. Sighing, I straightened the wheel, slowed the engine, and put it in neutral.
"Alex," I called. "Can you come back here?"
His flashlight bobbed toward me. "Could you grab that anchor that’s hanging on the stern there?" I asked, pointing.
"Sure, what do you want me to do?"
"I’m going to wrap the line around the winch. I’d like you to get into the dinghy, take the anchor out about thirty feet, and set it. And listen…be careful. I saw an alligator a few minutes ago."
"I’ll be fine," he said. Feeling cowardly, like maybe I should be the one in the dinghy instead of Alex, I wrapped the end of the line around the winch, while he climbed into the dinghy, then I handed him the anchor. The dinghy engine started on the first pull, and he chugged away. A minute or so later, he put the engine into idle, and I heard the soft plop as the anchor dropped. I tailed the line and cranked the winch enough so that the line was taut.
"Alex?" I called. "Okay. I’m going to put the boat in neutral again, then I’m going to crank the winch so that we can use the anchor to help pull us out of the mud. Are you okay back there?"
Telltale (Shelby Hope Book Two) (Shelby Hope Novels 2) Page 11
