Stowaway

by Pam Withers

  During their bash-up party, Arturo must have spotted the folded-away Garmin and covered it up in hopes the captain wouldn’t see and surely destroy it.

  I look up at the radio mounted on the ceiling of the wheelhouse. Its microphone cable has been cut, but all we need is for it to receive. I cross my fingers and turn it on. “At least it has power,” I whisper. “But what about GPS?” My heart leaps as the navigation computer boots up and displays the words position acquired.

  I swing the arm into the pilothouse and select AIS on the Garmin; that’s the Automatic Identification System that uses a vessel’s GPS, marine radio, and transceiver to identify other AIS-equipped vessels in the area.

  Archimedes has AIS! Captain never imagined we could turn this tug around, let alone identify exactly where he is now and hunt him down.

  “Port! Starboard!” I command in turn for the next few minutes. Slowly, thrillingly, Homeward Bound’s heading responds. “Great work, Sergio and Sebastian,” I call out, truly appreciating their hard labour, especially now that the waves are growing violent. “You two are heroes!”

  I imagine their body odour filling the engine compartment and cusses sounding between their pushing and pulling.

  “Just a little more,” I notify them, watching the little image of our vessel on the chart plotter plod along the channel.

  Danillo steps onto the bridge. His face is as stormy as the Strait. “You’ve done a full U-turn,” he observes. “Why would you want to turn completely around when we were headed toward Comox?”

  “You’ll see in approximately ninety minutes,” I calculate. “Trust me, Danillo. You owe me that after drugging me.”

  He looks at his watch, throws me a glare, and disappears without noticing the arm.

  • • •

  Over the next hour and a half, the wind blasts us like something intent on blowing out our makeshift windshield, while the waves toss us until the boys are barfing over the side. Worse, rogue waves threaten to swamp us once or twice. My teeth are so gritted they hurt, but with my tillermen’s help, we remain upright and ploughing doggedly forward.

  “Feels like an out-of-control roller coaster ride,” a pale-faced Gabriel says when he brings me coffee at one point.

  “It’s nasty out there, but don’t underestimate this tough old tug,” I respond.

  • • •

  It’s less than ninety minutes before I call out, “Port! Port! A little more port, Sergio! Okay, stop! Steady as she goes.”

  Danillo reappears. “So explain yourself,” he orders, lifting a corner of the would-be window to gaze out. “Why did you turn us around?”

  I hand him the binoculars.

  He peers through them and straightens up suddenly. “Look, there’s land ahead! We’re turning into a bay! And there’s a boat anchored there! Coast Guard?” he asks me eagerly.

  Funny how the school bunch has been afraid of the Coast Guard till today, but now they’re ready to embrace any kind of rescue.

  “No,” I reply, checking my watch and eyeing the tiny image of Archimedes on the chart plotter, which is just another piece of equipment to most of these guys.

  Gabriel snatches the binoculars from Danillo. “Land ahoy, everyone! And there’s a boat we’re pointed straight at!”

  The others spill into the pilothouse. “A big boat,” Pequeño elaborates when he manages to wrestle the binoculars away from Gabriel. “Yacht.”

  “More than forty feet long,” Gabriel guesses.

  “No way. Is that —” Pequeño starts.

  “Archimedes?” Danillo finishes.

  “The one and only,” I declare.

  “Archimedes?” The twins echo in horror from their stations.

  “Starboard! Starboard!” Sergio calls out to Sebastian. “We don’t want to go anywhere near them!”

  “Oh, yes we do,” I call out calmly.

  A knuckle presses into my Adam’s apple and my head slams against wood panelling as Danillo grabs the front of my sweatshirt, pulls me up out of the captain’s seat, and pushes me up against the pilothouse wall. “How’d you track them down, Owen? And why? Captain’s got a gun, you know. He had a second one hidden that he has been carrying around since the pirates stole his other one. What are you trying to do, you maniac?”

  “I’m not trying to do anything,” I lie, slipping from his hold and reseating myself. “But it sure seems like there’s a wounded tug wanting to take revenge on a bully yacht. And since the controls aren’t functioning, it’s out of our hands.”

  “Oh no, it’s not!” Danillo says in a fierce voice.

  “Hey!” Sebastian shouts. “Stop fighting and tell us how to turn this around before it’s too late!”

  “Owen,” Gabriel pleads, “how do we stop? We can’t go hitting Archimedes. It’s way bigger.”

  “It’s not the size of the bird that matters,” I instruct them. “It’s the size of the talons. Or the flock.”

  “He has lost it,” Sergio rules, having abandoned his station to grab the binoculars and see Archimedes for himself. “Danillo, take over the controls.”

  “What controls?” Danillo screams back.

  I leap up. “It’s okay, guys. We’re not going to smash into Archimedes. I’m going to spray the fire extinguishers into Homeward Bound’s engine compartment when we’re about a hundred feet away from the yacht. That will kill the engine by starving it of oxygen. The tug will slow from eight to two knots in about thirty seconds. At most, we’ll give Archimedes a nudge. Just enough to scare them.”

  “You mean scare them into shooting at us?” Danillo barks. “What’s this really all about, Owen? Talk to us if you haven’t lost your mind!”

  “Okay. We’ve come back to give Arturo a chance to jump ship.”

  “Arturo? You’re totally nuts!” Gabriel declares.

  Now they’re all screaming at me. Danillo raises his fists in front of my face; his voice goes shrill. “Captain has a gun, I said. Didn’t you hear me? And Arturo will do anything Captain says. He just helped Captain smash up the controls, in case you missed that! They got their money, they’re on the run, and both of them want us dead. Give Arturo a chance to jump ship? No way!”

  They’re right. Not worth it, bro, Gregor weighs in. Should never have turned around this sorry excuse for a boat. You’re dealing with nasty elements. Didn’t I teach you anything?

  “You taught me well, and it’s time to make my own decisions, Gregor.”

  “Who the hell’s Gregor?” Sebastian wants to know. “Now Owen’s talking to himself, everyone!”

  “The Coast Guard is on the way, cutter and helicopter,” I inform them. “Courtesy of Arturo, who does not want us to die. He left us my cellphone battery, and my guess is he stopped the captain from destroying the Garmin chart plotter.”

  “What Garmin chart plotter?” Danillo asks in a stunned voice. His face reddens as I point to the fully functioning little screen on the foldaway arm.

  “I reckon Arturo needs off Archimedes before the Coast Guard shows up and the captain turns the gun on him,” I continue, “and I’m going to give him that opportunity.”

  The boys stare at me, open-mouthed.

  “Arturo left your phone battery?” Danillo repeats.

  “So we could call for rescue,” I confirm. “And I believe he saved the chart plotter from the captain’s sledgehammer.”

  There’s a moment of silence.

  “I believe you,” Danillo says. “I believe Arturo would do that.”

  “Maybe Arturo didn’t want to smash up the tug, but Captain would’ve shot him if he hadn’t,” Gabriel reasons.

  “I’m glad you agree. But I couldn’t take the chance that you wouldn’t,” I say, staring at Danillo until he looks away. “Especially since —”

  “We deceived you. We didn’t give you reason to trust us,” he concedes with a shrug. “Sorry.” The others nod silently.

  “I waited till the phone had reception for a moment,” I continue, “and called in
our position and situation to the Coast Guard. Besides talking to my parents.”

  “I never heard you,” Gabriel challenges.

  “From the head while you guys were distracted.”

  The boys lift a corner of the tug’s plastic windshield to scan the dark, tumultuous ocean for our saviours. None visible yet.

  I study the outline of Archimedes, now clearly identifiable without binoculars, then stare at my watch while doing some math in my head. We’re about 150 yards out. Archimedes is moored lying head to wind, and Homeward Bound is tracking straight at the centre of it. They’ve spotted us. I can see the captain on deck, open mouthed and staring into his binoculars.

  “It’s time for Sergio and Sebastian to get out of the engine room,” I tell everyone soberly. “Pretty soon I’ll release the fire extinguishers to kill the engine.”

  “You don’t need us to steer after the engine stops?” Sergio asks.

  “You’ll suffocate if you’re in there when I spray,” I inform them, “and we’ll reach Archimedes a minute after that. So, right now, everyone needs to get down to the stateroom’s bouncy castle feature. Surround yourself with the cushions, ready for impact. Keep your heads down and away from the portholes.”

  They move fast, with no argument. When I figure we’re nearing a hundred feet from the yacht, I kneel beside the engine compartment hatch, holding two five-pound fire extinguishers. With great care, I insert their nozzles down the hole the twins made with the pipe.

  Three, two, one — spurt! The bottles do a heavy sigh each while emitting their noxious fumes below. The second they’re spent, I drop them and sprint to the bow. It takes an agonizing ten seconds for the tug to lurch in response. Then there’s the sputtering and clattering of an unhappy engine and the subtle slowing of a tug-turned-missile.

  • • •

  ARTURO

  The cold splashes of saltwater bring me to.

  “Mierda! ” I swear.

  Captain is standing over me with a dripping bucket. “Wake up, Arturo. Homeward Bound’s in sight. I thought you pointed it west before we disabled her.”

  “I did!” I leap up, trying to hide a smile. He is coming back for me!

  Captain pushes me to the floor and rests a boot on my neck. “What did you do? They should have hit something, sprung some leaks, and sunk by now!”

  “But you said —”

  “They’re liabilities, Arturo,” he says as he pulls his belt off his trousers. “Don’t you get that? It’s not like other trips. Too many things have gone wrong. We can’t have them talking. And no one would have blamed their wreck on us. But somehow they’ve boomeranged.”

  “Boomeranged, Captain?” An English expression I do not know. While an electrical charge I do know is ramping up inside me.

  “They’ve gotten enough control of that bitch-tug to turn it completely around. I need you to lift anchor so we can get underway, now!” The belt slices through the air and lays its sting on wounds not healed from the last whipping. Pain sears through me. “I’m thinking you sabotaged our sabotage.”

  “I didn’t, Captain!” At least, not in the way Captain thinks. The truth is, I can guess how Owen managed to spin the tug around. I am both impressed and happy about the turn of events.

  We scramble up to the bridge.

  “See anyone aboard?” I ask Captain, who has the binoculars pressed to his eyes.

  “No one.”

  “Maybe it really is a ghost ship?” I say in Spanish. “Maybe the boys bailed before it boomeranged?” Cool new word, that.

  “Impossible. Don’t be stupid.” But a note of fear has crept into his voice.

  “There are missiles that can lock in on a target and —”

  “It’s a rustbucket tug, not a war machine! Doesn’t even have AIS or steering! But that pig has its snout pointed right at us.” His hands grip Archimedes’s wheel so tightly that his knuckles turn white.

  Keep pretending you’re onside till you can get away. “We can outrun them, Captain. Archimedes is a way better boat.”

  “Of course we can! So stop talking and move!” he bellows as he starts the engine. “Pull up the anchor! It’s your fault that thing has come back from the dead!”

  I run out of the pilothouse onto the bow. I am not expecting the force of the wind to almost fling me off my feet. Hail slaps my face like flying glass crystals, and even though we are at anchor, we are being bucked about by waves barrelling into shore.

  The storm is way worse now than when I fell asleep. Good thing Captain agreed to wait it out. As for Homeward Bound, it is amazing none of the swells out there has swamped her. Owen must be piloting.

  The tug’s older and less flashy than Archimedes, but strong as a bull. Owen’s words echo in my ears.

  A bull like Ruffian, charging toward us at this very moment.

  I draw my hoodie around my face to protect me from the hail and glance up at the black sky. Captain won’t move the boat forward till I operate the windlass to lift the anchor. I’ll just take my time. I listen to the clink, clink of the windlass as I draw out the usual three-minute procedure. From the corner of my eye, I see Captain pacing back and forth on the bridge and the tug bearing down.

  Did Owen get through to the Coast Guard? Does the Coast Guard fly in weather like this? And surely Owen is intending to rescue me, not ram Archimedes?

  The story of Owen’s brother rescuing him comes rushing back to me.

  He’s holding a life ring with a rope attached, and shouts at me to jump. I’ve never seen him so upset or determined. And he’s taking a big risk, trying to come alongside us in the big chop.

  It’s like all the current in Guatemala City’s power stations is diverting into my body. I abandon the windlass and run aft while shouting, “Captain, I need to reset the windlass hydraulic-pump circuit breaker!”

  “Fast!” Captain’s panicked voice barks.

  I race down the companionway, grab my tin of money from the broom closet, buckle on a lifejacket, and sprint to the swim platform, ready to leap.

  “Oh no you don’t,” Captain says, panting as much as me as he steps down from the fly bridge. His elbow closes around my neck and the cold metal of his Glock presses into my cheek.

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  OWEN

  If I were driving a car in a Hollywood car-chase scene, I’d perform what’s called a handbrake turn. Forward full speed, brake, and spin on a dime with the tires smoking. It’s called doing a donut. Or a quarter of a donut, really.

  In ideal ocean conditions — which we’re definitely not experiencing now — I could put Homeward Bound’s engine in neutral, then reverse and manoeuvre the helm with just the right timing to park parallel to the yacht. That would impress the moustache right off the captain.

  But given what I’ve got to work with, the best I can hope for is to nudge Archimedes before it ships anchor and heads out of the bay. What I don’t want to do is plunge so deeply into the yacht that I “hole” it and it sinks, especially since Arturo could be locked in the dog cage. But we have to get close enough for Arturo to do his team switcheroo if he can. Which I’m counting on him wanting to do.

  Like you?

  “Yes, Gregor, like when you came for me. You gave me a second chance.”

  Not the same. Riskier.

  “I’m not listening to you anymore.”

  I’ve noticed. Why?

  “Because I always wanted to be like you, but I’m not you, and you can be a bad influence on me. It was your gang that adopted me back in Ontario.”

  It was me who told you to get out after you made the bad decision to get in. And me who saved your ass that stormy night.

  “Okay, okay, have it your way. And I tried to save you. I really did.”

  The hail turns to rain, which streams down my face.

  I know, little bro. His voice is gentler. You’re right. It’s time to be your own person now. A better person than I was.

  “Gregor, I can do this because you taught me
well.”

  Then I’ll butt out. But remember my last words: Stay clean, and never tell Mom and Dad you were part of the gang. We were out there boating together, no stolen boat in sight.

  “And you died from hitting your head on our boat when you fell in the water. No other boat was involved. They still believe that, you know. Mom, Dad, and the Coast Guard. The guys never talked, of course.”

  I know.

  “But Mom, Dad, and the Coast Guard were suspicious. Why else would Mom and Dad have moved me to the other side of the country?”

  I understand. I miss you, Owen. We’re both sorry the Coast Guard didn’t get there on time. But you’ve kept our secret and stayed clean since. I’m proud of you.

  Proud of me keeping a secret that feels like a three-hundred-pound barbell on my shoulders? But I don’t say that.

  Ahead of us, Archimedes swings on its anchor line.

  Less than a hundred feet between the two vessels. Homeward Bound is tracking fairly straight, but it’s going to be close. I run to the bow and convert myself to a ship’s figurehead as I lean forward over the bow railing, a tethered life ring in hand.

  There’s no one in Archimedes’s pilothouse, as far as I can tell. That’s strange. And no one visible on deck or peeping out the portholes. My attention focuses on movement in the stern. What I see there turns my blood cold: Arturo on the swim platform, and the captain leaping down and pointing a gun at him.

  At the same time, I hear a roll of thunder louder than any that has yet sounded today. Instead of roaring and growing quieter, however, it keeps booming, accompanied by a whack, whack of lightning.

  Lightning or helicopter blades? Through the darkness of the clouds at the head of the bay, I hear it before I see its searchlights. My heart soars.

  “Jump, Arturo!” I scream.

  We’re closing in. Seventy-five feet: the distance that Olympic discus champs can throw. But I’m not one of them.

  I lift the life ring to my chest. My heartbeat is drumming so loudly in my ears, I can barely register the clatter of the helicopter approaching. Homeward Bound is now sixty feet from Archimedes. Fifty feet.