68 Knots (10 page)

“So you're on a training course,” Turner said. “That's fascinating. Nothing like sailing to instill a sense of discipline and order. Nothing like it at all.”

Arthur smiled. “We learn more every day. And it sure hasn't been dull.”

Turner took a sip of his martini, stared off at the dark sea, and sighed. “Ah, I remember learning how to sail long ago, as a boy in Portsmouth, New Hampshire. My father had given me a Laser, even though my mother protested vigorously: ‘But
Bruce, he's only six! That boat's too big for such a young boy!' Father just grinned. ‘Let's see who's bigger—the boy or the boat.'” Turner chuckled. He rolled his eyes. “Rumor has it—the boy was bigger.”

Arthur raised his glass. “The boy is always bigger than the boat,” he said. It was Dawn's turn to roll her eyes.

“So tell me,” Turner asked, “who is in charge of this sailing outfit of yours? Not that you can't take care of yourselves, of course, but surely the people running this camp don't just throw a bunch of you on a tall ship and push you out to sea. Who is supervising this trip? And why isn't he over here, helping himself to our hospitality?”

Dawn didn't miss a beat. “He's down below,” she said, struggling to find words that were truthful but misleading, “and he has asked not to be disturbed.”

The term “down below” nearly caused Arthur to choke on a shrimp, but he managed to keep his composure.

“Ah, too bad,” Turner said. “Please give him my regards. It's a pleasure to meet young people who are working to improve themselves, and I'm sure your leader must be a very interesting individual.”

Marietta pried her way into the circle. She had a martini in one hand and a salmon-and-cream-cheese mini-sandwich in the other. She was wearing a low-cut blouse, and she laughed and stepped in between Arthur and Dawn. “What a beautiful boat this is, Captain,” she said. “What do you do for a living? You must be very successful.”

Turner cleared his throat. “Yes, well, I'm the CEO of a manufacturing firm. Paper products, mostly. Nothing terribly exciting. Probably the highlight of my dreary grind is getting out on this boat and enjoying a day off every now and then.”

“Fascinating, simply fascinating,” Marietta said, twirling her blond-streaked hair. “Arthur, could I show you something? I just got a tour of the boat, and there is something you have to see.”

“Sure,” Arthur shrugged. He didn't want to seem uninterested in Turner's pride and joy. He turned to Dawn. “I'll be back in a little while.”

Marietta led Arthur across the deck and down the gangway toward the cabins below.

The captain's quarters of the
Elkhart
shimmered with polished brass, hand-rubbed mahogany, and sparkling crystal. A large bed covered with an inviting feather comforter nearly filled the room. The piano music brightened the warm air. Marietta sat down on one corner of the bed and motioned for Arthur to sit beside her.

“Wouldn't it be great to have all this?” she asked. “Wouldn't you just love to take this beautiful ship out for a sail whenever you wanted to?”

“It would be nice,” Arthur said, sitting on the bed. “When I own a boat like this, it will be because I own some really cool company of my own. Something I start from scratch. Something that everyone else wishes they were doing.” He smiled. Decide what you want, his father had said, and then go for it. Don't let anything stand in your way.

“And as the owner and president,” Marietta said, fussing with her hair, “you'd do things to make it all worthwhile—like go golfing all over the world, and have servants cook and clean for you, and drive really fast cars. Or better yet, hire a chauffeur and make
him
drive really fast!”

Arthur smiled. “And I'll have a mansion on an island somewhere, and the only way to get to it is by boat. And I'd live out there, and I'd write fantastic novels, and I'd fly my own
plane around to inspect my companies, and I'd give money to the library and the school and the Little League in town, and everyone there would think I was great. And then, when I died, I'd be buried in the little cemetery overlooking the harbor, and teachers would bring elementary-school students out to see my grave, and they would talk about me for hundreds of years, and the whole island would be preserved as a museum until one day, without warning, it disappeared into the sea and was never seen again.”

Marietta stared at him. “You're kind of strange, you know that?” she said, a perplexed scowl flashing briefly across her face. “That is
really
bizarre. Fortunately, I happen to like bizarre guys. Especially when they're Captain.” She pressed against his side and looked directly into his hazel eyes. She waited.

Arthur waited, too, but just for a moment. Then he kissed her, and they both leaned back across the bed. They kissed again—and at that moment, the door burst open. The
Elkhart
's meteorologist, a large and boisterous woman with a florid face and a booming voice, crashed through the door, laughing and shrieking loudly, with a man in one hand and a drink in the other.

“Whoops!” she screamed with a flushed giggle when she saw Arthur and Marietta on the bed. Arthur leapt to his feet, but Marietta stayed where she was. The meteorologist guffawed again. “Didn't know it was
occupado
! So sorry!” She laughed and shrieked again, then staggered down the hall and up the gangway, trailing the man behind her. Arthur turned to Marietta.

“We should get back on deck,” he said.

It was nearly 2
A.M
. when the party broke up. Arthur, concerned that late nights could weaken the discipline among his crew, stretched his tall frame and said to Turner, “I'm tired. I'm
going to bed. My shipmates should, also.” The two crews said goodbye, and the
Dreadnought
sailors began to climb over to their own ship.

“I have to ask you one question before I go,” Arthur said to Turner as they shook hands. “About the race. You beat us by a little bit, but I noticed that your boat was heeling awfully hard out there—right up until the last minute. Did you do that on purpose, to slow yourself down and make the race more interesting?”

Turner grinned. “You'll never get me to admit it,” he said.

In the dining room of the
Dreadnought
, the crew sat around the table and talked about the race and the party.

“If that's what we get for losing,” Logan wheezed, “I think we should race 'em every day. Bay–BEE! Just imagine what we'd get if we
won
.”

Joy was at the helm in a rainstorm, two days later, when Crystal shouted from the bow. “A whale! Another whale!” She pointed off to starboard. A few seconds later, the entire crew was on deck, squinting through the glare on the turbulent waves.

A spout. Unmistakable. The large whale swam slowly, taking frequent breaths. Each time it surfaced, it blew a cloud of mist into the air. The mist cut horizontally across the choppy waves and mingled with the whitecap foam blown up by the wind.

“It's another one trapped in a net,” Crystal called back. “What do you want to do?”

Joy pulled her raincoat hood tight and thought for a moment as the rain soaked the wheel and chilled her hands. On the one hand, everyone would feel better if they could rescue this whale; it might make up for losing Ibis. On the other
hand, losing this whale also would make them feel even worse. And the last time they tried a rescue, Logan had nearly been killed. Still, if they could somehow get in close enough . . .

“What do you want to do?” Crystal called out.

Joy glanced nervously at the faces around her. They expected a decision, but Joy didn't want to make one. Decisions were for God to make, she thought. Our job is to follow them.

Then she pulled from her shorts pocket the coin with the saints on it. She held it above her and prayed out loud: “Our Father, Who art in Heaven, please hear our prayer. We are lost at sea without your guidance and grace, and in Christ's name we ask that you show us the way. Should we try to save this whale or not?”

She knelt on the deck, held the disk edgeways between her left forefinger and her right thumb, and gave it a spin. It twirled furiously for a moment, a silver sphere dancing on the dark wood deck, and then it slowed and wobbled to a stop. Saint Francis was on top.

“The patron saint of animals.
Muchas gracias
,” Joy said, pocketing the coin. “God wants us to save that whale.”

Dawn nodded. “We're going to try it!” she shouted. “Everyone gather around for instructions.” She suggested a plan, gesturing and pointing with her long thin fingers. As long as the whale was swimming, she said, any attempt to untangle the net would be useless—and dangerous. “But I've been reading about the old Nantucket whalers, and I have an idea.” The
Dreadnought
would sail in as close as possible, and several of the crew would row the dinghy in closer. They would take one of the large plastic floats that protected the side of the ship from damage, and when they were right next
to the whale, they would clip the float line onto the net. The float would help them track the whale's movements, and the extra drag would tire the whale quickly. Once it was exhausted and resting at the surface, they could try to cut the net away. “That's what the Nantucket whalers used to do, except they used harpoons and their boats instead of clips and plastic floats,” Dawn said. “And of course they killed the whale once they got close to it. This is our chance to make up for all that cruelty. Get back in the whales' good graces.”

Arthur stood nearby, his arms folded across his chest. He was troubled that such an important decision was being made without his guidance, but he thought it might be a good idea to give the crew some leeway every now and then. Let them feel important and responsible. He decided to say nothing.

The crew scrambled into position, and Arthur could see that his drills were paying off. The crew handled the sails quickly and skillfully, and the ship began to gain on the whale. As the ship grew closer, Jesse, BillFi, Dawn, and Arthur pulled the dinghy alongside and prepared to climb down the ladder.

“Godspeed, sailors!” shouted Joy. “
Vayan con Dios
!” The dinghy crew leapt into the small boat and pushed away. With Jesse on one oar and Arthur on the other, they chopped through the waves. Dawn sat in the stern and directed the rowers; BillFi crouched in the bow next to a round pink float. It was about three feet in diameter and covered with a fine film of algae, and trailing from it was a stout twenty-foot rope that ended at a metal clip. BillFi's job would be to secure that clip to the net before the whale had a chance to dive and swim away.

Jesse's power made steering difficult—the dinghy veered off course several times, and Jesse had to stop rowing until Arthur could catch up—and they weren't narrowing the gap
between them and the whale. It would pause, take a breath or two, then submerge again, and any gains they made during the rests would be lost in a single dive.

Then Jesse put his oar down. “Arthur, let me have both,” he said.

“That'll slow us down,” Arthur said. “Two of us can—”

“Trust him,” BillFi called back from the bow, blinking through his thick glasses. “Give him your oar.”

Arthur nodded with a frown and moved to the stern, next to Dawn. Jesse shifted to the center of the boat, picked up both oars, and began to pull.

The difference was obvious immediately. Jesse pulled against the oars with his arms, his back, and his legs. His entire body lifted off the seat as he reached forward, and then he pushed his feet against the seat in front of him as the blades dug into the water. The dinghy shot across the waves, leaving a strong wake behind it. In minutes, BillFi was just yards away from the whale.

It dove again, lifting its tail out of the water. Arthur saw the black curve, stark against the white flesh on the underside, and he shouted out loud.

“It's Ibis! It's the same whale!”

Dawn's freckled face beamed with joy, and she shouted the news back to the
Dreadnought
, which was still sailing along behind. She could see the other sailors jump and cheer on deck.

And Jesse continued to row. The dinghy moved in a straight line, and a moment later, something bumped into the portside oar from below.