Terns of Endearment

by Donna Andrews

  Michael followed their example. I found myself wakeful. Not unusual. Michael could almost always put aside anything and everything that was bothering him and fall asleep. I completely lacked this highly useful ability. I’d long ago learned that sometimes before I could fall asleep I had to figure out what was making my brain restless, and either deal with it or add it as an item in my notebook-that-tells-me-when-to-breathe, as I called the three-ring binder that held my voluminous to-do list. Most of the time just capturing things in my notebook allowed me to drift off, secure in the knowledge that I’d be tackling them in the morning.

  So what was bothering me tonight?

  The writers. I liked them. And I didn’t like Desiree. I hated the fact that her presence was already casting a shadow on their retreat together. I hated still more the idea that she might have done it deliberately—might even be planning to cause them trouble. And why was Dad suggesting that their friend Nancy’s death could be murder instead of suicide? Was he merely indulging his taste for detective drama, or had something about Angie’s account raised his suspicions?

  I rolled out of bed, opened up my laptop, and began composing an email to my nephew Kevin McReady. For years—ever since he turned fourteen or so—Kevin had been my go-to tech guru for everything from hardware problems and virus removal to complicated data searches. These days I could also call on Delaney—but Kevin wasn’t on vacation with his significant other. And possibly just as important, he wasn’t sharing a cruise with the people I was about to ask him to snoop on. And if he was someplace where he didn’t have good Internet access, he could just leave for someplace that did.

  I outlined the situation. Described Desiree. I had to rummage in my tote for my new collection of bookmarks to give him the other writers’ last names. And Nancy … someone had said her last name … Goreham. Feeling very pleased with my memory, I finished up the email, tasking him with finding out as much as he could about all of them, especially Nancy’s apparent suicide and the incidents that had led up to it.

  And after all that, at first I didn’t think I was going to be able to send it. Angie was right—the ship’s Internet was lousy. It kept timing out while trying to send my email. Finally, after about fifteen tries, it went through. I felt a surge of satisfaction—task done!

  And as I caught myself yawning a second or two later, I realized I’d done exactly the right thing. Just sending the email to Kevin was probably going to be enough to let me turn off my brain and go to sleep.

  As I drifted off, I found myself looking forward to the next day. Friday would be spent entirely at sea—the ship wouldn’t arrive in Bermuda until Saturday morning. But I was expecting our day at sea to be very pleasant. A hearty breakfast, followed by some miniature golf. Maybe a picnic lunch on the deck, followed by sword fighting with Janet. Maybe I’d go to afternoon tea with Mother and Aunt Penelope. And Grandfather had announced that he’d be lecturing about whales, dolphins, and sharks. He probably had tons of dramatically gory shark stories. The Sandburgs might not find it very reassuring, but the boys would be on cloud nine.

  I fell asleep, my head filled with visions of dolphins gamboling in the ship’s wake.

  I woke up, and at first I didn’t know why. It was still almost pitch dark. Of course, we had the curtains drawn, but I didn’t think they were concealing sunlight. Michael was breathing softly, without even a hint of his occasional not-quite-snoring. I checked my phone, which was lying on the bedside table, hooked to its charger. 4:35 A.M.

  I tiptoed over and peeked through the connecting door into the boys’ cabin. They were both sprawled over their beds, as relaxed as rag dolls and sleeping soundly. I closed the door again, tiptoed over to the window, and pulled the curtain open just an inch or so. A lance of bright moonlight fell across the stateroom floor. I peered out. The moonlight reflected off a sea that was smooth as glass.

  And we were motionless in it. Maybe that was what had awakened me. Suddenly it was obvious. Ever since we’d left port, the low, steady hum of the ship’s engines had been in the background, so that by bedtime I’d stopped even noticing it. The low hum and an almost imperceptible sense of motion. Now, nothing.

  Had we reached Bermuda? It didn’t seem likely. Not at four-thirty. And I couldn’t see land. Then again, our windows only showed the starboard side. Maybe on the port side …

  I threw on my robe, donned my flip-flops, grabbed my phone and my Pastime card, and slipped out into the corridor.

  Since our cabin was the last one along the starboard side of the corridor, it only took a minute to reach the sun deck. Where no sun was presently available, but it did give me a panoramic view of the ocean. And that was all there was—ocean. No land visible in any direction. Unless there was a small rowboat-sized island hidden right in front of the ship’s bow, the only place I couldn’t see from my current vantage point. Not very likely.

  And now that I was awake, I realized there was no chance we’d arrived at Bermuda. Today would be—okay, already was—Friday. The at-sea day. We weren’t scheduled to arrive in Bermuda until Saturday morning. Traveling from Baltimore to Bermuda took a day and a half, not a mere twelve hours. Rose Noire had found that suspicious—evidence of some dangerous paranormal barrier that the ship could traverse only slowly and with great labor. I finally took out a map and showed her what a really long way it was—over eight hundred nautical miles—but I wasn’t sure I’d convinced her.

  And if she was awake, she’d probably be wondering why we’d stopped. Some peril in the seas ahead? Icebergs? Pirates? Probably not a storm, given the glassy stillness of the water.

  They’d probably just stopped to make some minor repair. Engine trouble of some sort. I’d find someone to ask in the morning. In the meantime, probably time for me to go back to bed. A day at sea didn’t mean a day of quiet for those of us accompanying lively eleven-year-old boys.

  But the night was so pleasant that I stayed for a few minutes, leaning against the rail at the back of the sun deck.

  I found myself imagining what I’d be feeling if I were aboard a sailing ship. Today, the dead calm meant smooth sailing and less chance of losing my balance and bumping into something as the ship coped with waves. A couple of centuries ago, maybe I’d be worrying about how long the calm would last and whether we were in any danger of running out of food or water.

  But after a while the dead calm began to get on my nerves again. Engine trouble was the most logical explanation. But if we had engine trouble, why wasn’t I hearing sounds of crew members scurrying around to fix it?

  Possibly because the scurrying wouldn’t be up here on deck four. After all, I’d figured out last night that deck one wasn’t the lowest point on the ship. I knew deck zero existed—maybe that was where the engines were. Or maybe there was a deck minus one right below deck zero. It improved my mood to imagine that somewhere, far below, in the deepest depths of the ship, capable crew members were even now busy fixing whatever needed fixing. And if ship travel was regulated as closely as air travel, the problem could be something pretty minor. I’d once been on a flight that was delayed because the bathroom sink wouldn’t stop dripping.

  “No sense worrying about it now,” I told myself. I’d see if I could find someone to ask about it in the morning. Later in the morning.

  I returned to my cabin, made sure the curtain was pulled tightly closed again, in case our windows were facing east when the sun rose, and got back in bed. I lay there for what seemed like hours but was probably only fifteen or twenty minutes. I resisted the urge to pick up my iPhone to check, and eventually I fell asleep.

  I woke up again to find the boys bouncing on our bed.

  Chapter 10

  Friday

  “Mom! The ship has stopped.”

  “Mom! Why are we stopped in the middle of the ocean?”

  “Are we going ashore?”

  “In the middle of the ocean?”

  “Maybe the land’s on the other side. The port side.”

  “
We’re on the port side.”

  “No, we’re on the stabbed side.”

  “That’s starboard side.” I finally got a chance to get a word in. “We’re on the starboard side. But there’s no land on the port side, either. We’re stopped in the middle of the ocean and have been for several hours. I’m hoping we’ll find out why soon.”

  As if in answer, someone knocked on our cabin door. When I opened it I found a crew member standing outside, holding a sheet of paper and looking anxious.

  “Sorry to bother you, ma’am.” He handed me one of those door hanger tags the ship provided for those who wanted to order breakfast in their rooms, then looked down at his paper and began reading in a mechanical tone. “As you have probably noticed the ship has stopped to make some minor but essential repairs. The power has been turned off to facilitate the repairs. A continental breakfast is now being served in the main dining room. If you prefer breakfast in your room please make your selections on this tag and hang it on the doorknob. The captain will give a briefing at seven-fifteen A.M. in the main dining room for those who would like more information on how this will impact your holiday. Attendance is optional. If you prefer to continue enjoying your holiday you are welcome to do so and we’ll keep you posted.” He looked up at me. I half expected him to ask if I had any questions, but then I realized from his expression that he was fervently hoping I didn’t.

  “Thank you,” I said.

  “You’re welcome, ma’am.” He looked immensely relieved. Then he steeled himself again, continued down the passageway, and knocked on the door of the boys’ stateroom.

  “You can skip that one,” I called out. “They’re with us.”

  “Yes, ma’am.” He went on to 418.

  “Well, that’s not good news.” Michael came in from the balcony.

  I picked up my phone. Luckily it had finished charging by the time the power went out. I checked the time.

  “It’s already seven,” I said. “They’re not giving us much lead time on that briefing.”

  “You want to go?”

  I was already grabbing some clothes.

  “You guys want to go to the briefing?” Michael looked at the boys.

  “A briefing means that one of the crew members will stand up on the stage and talk to us for a while,” I put in.

  “Yuck,” Jamie said.

  “I bet it’s the first officer,” Josh said. “The one who fake-smiles all the time.”

  “Josh!” I frowned at him. I was about to point out how much stress the first officer was under, but then I remembered that I hadn’t even told Michael about the captain being encore bourré.

  “Or would you like to get dressed and play some miniature golf and let your mom fill us in on what she learns at the briefing?” Michael picked up where I’d left off.

  “If you do that, I can send someone up with breakfast,” I suggested.

  Not surprisingly, the boys opted for miniature golf and went back to their room to get ready. I threw on my clothes and hurried out the door.

  I saw a small cluster of people standing beside the elevator.

  “Seems to be out of order,” one of them said.

  “It’s the power,” another added. “No power in my room.”

  “Or mine.”

  “You’d think they’d have an emergency generator for, well, emergencies,” one older lady said.

  “Wait a minute,” one of them said. “If the power’s out, how are we going to get back into our rooms?”

  “The card readers have a battery backup,” someone else said. “I already tested it.”

  “‘Let’s go with Pastime,’ my husband says,” grumbled another passenger. “‘So it’s cheaper,’ he says. ‘How bad can it be?’”

  I pulled out my phone to text Michael.

  “Remember, elevator not working,” I typed. It wasn’t until after I hit SEND that I thought to wonder if the text would even go through. My phone hadn’t had a cell signal since shortly after we’d left Baltimore, and with no power there’d be no more Wi-Fi connection.

  Even before I got the “message not sent” notification, I saw Michael and the boys exiting the cabin.

  “Not even emergency power,” I said, when they got close to the elevator.

  “And that means no water,” Michael added.

  “Yikes,” I said. “I hope this doesn’t last long.”

  “Okay, guys,” Michael said to the boys. “Last one to deck five is a rotten egg!”

  They took off up the stairs. I could see that Michael was destined to be the rotten egg, but not by much.

  “My toilet wouldn’t flush,” one of the passengers standing by the elevator said. “I was going to pour a bucket of water into it to make it flush, the way you do when the water’s shut off, but there was no water.”

  “On a ship, all the water has to be pumped up to the staterooms,” a more knowledgeable passenger said. “So there won’t be water till the power’s back. And pouring water into your toilet won’t do anything. It’s a vacuum toilet. Also requires power.”

  “Oh, dear,” the first passenger said.

  “We’re going to have to take the stairs,” a third passenger announced.

  I took the stairs myself, heading downward. I saw a few other people on my way down. I was slightly surprised to find that forty or fifty people had shown up for the briefing—about a quarter of the passengers.

  Or maybe they’d come for the buffet. For a continental breakfast buffet, the spread the harried-looking crew members were setting up wasn’t bad, but neither was it anywhere near an adequate replacement for the hearty hot breakfast buffet promised in the brochures. I reminded myself that they were probably doing the best they could, and refrained from complaining. But others weren’t being quite as philosophical. Had they not noticed the power outage yet? The resulting lack of running water? Or did they think the kitchen staff normally cooked over open fires?

  Mother was presiding at a double table near the stage, where Dad, Horace, Rose Noire, Aunt Penelope, Rob, and Delaney were making serious inroads on a large supply of pastries and fruit. Actually, Rose Noire wasn’t eating much. She was too busy worrying.

  “I knew something like this would happen.” She was actually wringing her hands. “I did what I could to ward it off, but I’ve failed you. And now we’re marooned—marooned! In the Bermuda Triangle!”

  I decided to find another table.

  Nearby, Grandfather, Caroline, Wim, and Guillermo were eating while hunched over some papers. Planning for this evening’s lecture, I suspected. I hoped it was a topic Grandfather could handle without his PowerPoint. Although I also hoped the power wouldn’t still be out by seven.

  The four writers were sitting together at a table, all reading matching wads of paper, occasionally taking out a red pen and writing on their papers. Editing each other’s work, perhaps?

  I wasn’t feeling sociable, so I merely waved at various friends and family before snagging a glass of cranberry juice and a croissant from the buffet. Then I took a seat at a table near the entrance, in case the briefing got boring and I wanted to sneak out.

  A minute or so later, Captain Detweiler strode in, with a young officer and a crewman trailing behind him. As he stepped up onto the small stage, I studied him. His step seemed steady enough. He looked tired, but that was perfectly understandable. He’d probably been up in the middle of the night dealing with whatever had stopped the ship. Maybe I’d misheard Léonie. Maybe she hadn’t said “bourré” or “beurré” but something that sounded similar and had a completely different meaning. Or perhaps what she’d said to Serge was merely the idle gossip of a disaffected crew member.

  “Good morning, ladies and gentlemen.” Detweiler’s voice was good—no slurring. “As you already heard in the announcement, we’ve stopped to perform some minor repairs.”

  “Minor?” someone at the other side of room called out. “The whole ship’s dark.”

  “And the toilets won’t flush!”r />
  “Unfortunately, we’ve had to shut down our electrical systems for the safety of the crew members performing the repair work. But I assure you we’ll have everything up and running again as soon as possible.”

  “So what’s broken?” someone else called out.

  “I’d have to get our chief engineer to explain it to you—but we want him working on fixing the problem, don’t we?” Captain Detweiler’s smile was rather forced, and I decided he should have stuck to serious. “Our engineers are still diagnosing the precise nature of the problem, or were the last time I checked. But it shouldn’t be much longer.”

  I ate my croissant and drank my juice while several other people asked variants on the same question, and received equally polite but uninformative answers. I wasn’t impressed with the information content, but I had to admit that the captain seemed perfectly sober and of sound mind. Maybe Léonie had been exaggerating.

  “They should just give it up.”

  I glanced over to see the speaker—a small bespectacled man eating a Danish, who was the only other person at my table.

  “The people who keep asking questions, I mean,” he went on. “Pastime corporate policy. Never tell the passengers anything negative. Always put a positive spin on it.”

  “So if sharks are circling the ship, it’s a fabulous opportunity to get an up-close and personal view of marine life?” I suggested.

  “More like ‘sharks? Oh, you mean those dolphins over there? Note the unusually prominent dorsal fins.’ It’s the mushroom school of passenger relations. Keep them in the dark and dump … um, manure on them. I don’t blame the crew—they can only do what they’re told to do.”

  He finished his juice, rose, and left.

  After a few more minutes, I decided to follow his example, having figured out that the captain had told us, if not everything he knew, certainly everything he had any intention of revealing. Out of habit, I pulled out my phone to brief Michael, and then stuck it back into my pocket. With no cell phone signal or Wi-Fi, I’d have to deliver the bad news in person.