China Jewel (13 page)

Stringer said, “Would have liked to laminate these masts from several pieces. Get some strong resin into the wood. However, we had had to be accurate to the old designs, so there was no way to add strength.”

“I can do it,” Smithy said, as he chose one of the adze tools near the logs. He touched the blade for its sharpness and was satisfied. He took his first cuts. Here was the master, the man who with a simple ax could round these logs into piece of precision wood, a true artist. The other carpenters knew he was the only man in the region with the innate skill to do this work. One false blow and a log would be splintered into a false cut that could not be retrieved. A weak cut of mast wood would ruin the whole job in the way that a diamond could be chipped into destruction.

“How long?” asked Cutter.

Smithy looked at him and the other carpenters who had come over to stand with him. He shook his head, meaning he would work as fast as he could, and he continued cutting. Cutter and the others joined him and stood by to turn the heavy logs as Smithy signaled.

Above them, the white sign with the black letters played in the shop lights. The words, flecked with sawdust from the boatbuilding machines, still could be read. Cutter smiled. He knew the quote from the days of the historic Peregrine race against a British boat in China. She lost that one but the captain promised revenge.

“Peregrine will come back. She’s not finished yet.”-Captain Tolchester

Later, in the middle of the night, Cutter stood outside as they all took a short break from pure exhaustion. Inside the logs were beginning to look something like masts but they were still far from the correct diameters. Each fitting of the templates did show progress but the work would take many more hours.

He looked at the night lights playing over the large ways and smelled the stink caused by the low tide exposing mudflats and drying seaweed. The nighthawks still dived at bugs in the glare from the shop behind him. He remembered the day early in the summer when the Peregrine was launched. He saw again the finished hull ready to go.

He had a rare telegram of congratulations from his former wife, sent to him from Argentina. He read between the lines. She was worried and still had a lack of forgiveness, a sense he had once again put their son in danger.

“I hope this finds you and your ship in good conditions. I pray daily that our son will be kept out of harm’s way in this adventure. Sincerely, Rosa.”

Jolly’s drawl behind him broke into his thoughts. “Let’s get back to work,” Cutter heard Jolly say. He turned in the bright lights of the workshop. As he did, his shadow arched out over the shallow tidewater behind him.

Doc Jerry reminded him one more call had to be made. He listened as the phone rang in China. Dela picked up on the fourth ring.

“We need a replacement antenna.”

“You have so many troubles with our equipment. What have you done to the antenna?”

“The masts broke. The antenna was crushed. I’m taking out new masts to our ship tomorrow.”

“I see. You have the approval of the boat committee?”

“Yes. You can check with New York.”

“Very fine, James Cutter. I’ll have one delivered to the boatyard in the morning from our stateside warehouse.”

Dela hesitated then said, “Your entry is receiving far more attention from us than the other boats. It may be that the other companies will protest. We have to be neutral in all our effort.”

“You’d like that, wouldn’t you, General?”

“As I told you, I have no rank anymore. Those days are gone forever, my friend,” said Dela, his voice smooth.

“Let’s just say that once a Charlie, always a Charlie. Get this. I’ll expect the antenna tomorrow.” He was referring to the Army nickname for the Viet Cong, “Charlie.” Cutter hung up without waiting for Dela to comment. Somewhere along the line before this race was over he knew he’d have to face that grinning man again. In a way, he was looking forward to it and this time he’d finish what he started in Vietnam long ago.

Chapter 10

June 26, 3 PM

Atlantic Ocean

It had been a slow trip out to the Peregrine. The flying boat was sturdy but heavy. In seaplanes the engines carried not only the weight of the aircraft but also the weight of the attached hull structure. As a result the plane was slower than a similarly powered landplane. In the cockpit Willoughby drove with Jenks, his co-pilot, a man Cutter had met on past trips. He was a red-headed Irishman with a face of freckles and a large grin.

Cutter said, “Did Bill talk you into restoring this seaplane?”

Jenks said, “They brought me in to clean out the fish.”

Willoughby said, “He also flew with me in Iraq.”

Jenks said, “You mean, we were lucky they couldn’t shoot straight when we came over. That C130 gunship we flew was pretty slow.”

“We called them Puff the Magic Dragon when they let loose with the
Gatling guns,” said Cutter. “What’s the landing going to be like out here?”

Captain Willoughby said, without looking away from his instruments, “Sparkles is giving us light winds and good weather. We’ll have enough time to get their mast fixed and get on our way. She predicts some swells but we can land in them.”

The brigs finally came into sight, surrounded by warships and passenger vessels carrying newsmen and race officials. They circled, exchanging radio signals with the American destroyer.

Willoughby said, looking down, “We can judge the wind and see where the surface gives us the best landing. Then we’ll come up to the boats.”

As Sparkles had predicted the ocean surface had a light wind and large swells coming in from many miles away. The plane approached to land in the trough of one of the swells. As she came in, Willoughby brought the seaplane lower until he was flying level a few feet above the water surface. Adjusting for the wind, the big plane settled onto the water and gradually landed from its flat glide path. Willoughby began to taxi. The spray was heavy at first but then subsided with Willoughby and Jenks keeping the nose high enough to avoid water on the propeller blades. “Too much water will ruin those prop blades with corrosion.”

Cutter automatically flinched back with the noise of the salt spray that crashed against the plane. The wash overwhelmed the cockpit glass like a white waterfall. Cutter felt as if he were deep underwater. His brain worried the torrent would be sucked into the radial engine air intakes above, leaving the cylinders full of salt water and inoperative. Yet, the water receded. Cutter recovered just as quickly. He mentally stopped himself in an old reflex of going into action when danger approached, his right arm groping hypnotically for an M16 rifle he didn’t have.

After they were down and moving slowly on the ocean surface, the large propellers motored the plane easily through the waves. Captain Willoughby turned to him and said, “Like a cat, she can land anywhere.”

Willoughby whistled Yankee Doodle as he worked the engine levers and rudder pedals to begin a slow turn of the plane’s hull towards the brigs. They twinkled in the sunlight, visible as the seaplane was at the tops of the long swells and then gone. Cutter could see he gauged the ocean carefully to keep the wing tips out of the water. He’d gun the engines to keep the high wing from upsetting the plane by dropping too far and grabbing the sea surface.

As they approached Cutter watched the crew working on the forward deck of the Peregrine. Several block and tackle hoists were fastened to the bottom shafts of each mast. The broken top of the foremast had been stripped to its masthead. The lines and shrouds which had held up the top masts were piled on deck ready to be assembled when the new masts went up. The French boat was on the other side of the Peregrine and its sails had been carefully furled so as to minimize tangling with the Peregrine rigging. Cutter could see his old friend standing with a bull horn at the bow of the Louis Fourteen, gesticulating and shouting. A beautiful young woman in jeans stood next to him. Captain Hall was at the other end of his own ship doing the same thing with his team. A set of wood planks created a walkway between the two racers. He smiled at the sight of the albatross supervising from the tip of the highest mainmast section, the topgallant mast. At the same time, he noted the broken front mast still had only its bottom section, waiting for the topmast and the top gallant.

Within a few hundred feet of the Peregrine, the four Pratt and Whitney radial engines were idled back. The seaplane’s nose slowly moved up and down and her hull drifted casually with the waves. Willoughby ordered the rubber raft inflated to take over a line to the brig. By now the two sailing ships towered over the seaplane, their masts waving back and forth in the swells. The high spars slowly approached almost to tap against the aircraft wing and then went back the other way again. Captain Hall called out to keep lines paid out enough to keep the seaplane clear.

An occasional helicopter passed over them. “Probably out from Brazil or flying from the Azores,” Willoughby estimated. “The reporters are taking video for the news.” None came low, fearing, as Cutter guessed, they might get too close and tangle with the up thrust masts of the ships. Further away the large naval vessels of the Chinese, Americans, and Brazilians were monitoring the activity.

Finally secured, the seaplane stayed several hundred feet from where the two brigs were tied together. The engines were shut all the way down. Cutter paddled in the plane’s inflatable boat to the Peregrine. The sudden quiet after the hours of throbbing engine noise was pleasant to Cutter, almost relaxing. He looked at the parcel beside him. It contained the new radio assembly General Dela had rushed to his office. The gear had been wrapped in protective plastic labeled with Chinese characters. He reached the side of the brig, its black wooden planking rising more than ten feet above the raft. He had to grab quickly for the boarding ladder as it rose and lowered, slapping the ocean surface.

When Cutter was aboard, he turned to look down the deck. Among the bustling crew members, he saw the young woman coming toward him. She moved her head up, tossing back her long black hair and stopped, facing him. Cutter looked into her deep black eyes. She smiled at him, her face radiating excitement and youthful energy.

“Now we get our mast,” she said, pulling back her hair which fell again.

“We’ll fix lines on them and haul them aboard,” Cutter answered.

“Come. I’ll take you to the American captain. Are those the radio repair parts? Give them to me and I’ll rig them.” He complied. She had a tough but passionate voice. He could understand what Jamie saw in her.

He handed over the package and followed her by several feet. The blur of her white trousers moved ahead of him in the sunlight and through the torturous crowded deck of the dissembled sailing ship. He became aware of the size of the Peregrine. While it had dwarfed the other boats in the harbor at River Sunday, here in the middle of the ocean it was tiny, like a small leaf in a large pond. His mind calculated only fifteen men could lay head to toe from its bow to its stern. That assumed they could stretch themselves around hatchways and the cabin. The rear or main mast was still complete, its sails pulled up and tied to their yards. The front mast rigging was neatly, or as neatly as possible, stacked over the whole deck. Sails because of their great size would have been difficult to handle in any situation and were folded to keep them from damage. The spars and various rigging, smelling of varnish, some too stiff with tar to be coiled, were stashed in lengths along the hatches and walkways. Cutter had to proceed carefully through dark areas on the deck where he could trip over materials and lines.

The woman led him forward, like a nymph amidst this clutter, dancing gracefully to stop at the side of Captain Hall, a tall slender man, his beaked hat at a jaunty angle. His arms constantly moved as he directed and assisted his crew in pulling on a line that reached to the top of the stubbed foremast. His voice was hoarse, but steady and knowledgeable.

“Mr. Cutter, glad you could get here.” Hall stepped back from his work, pleased to see his boss. “Good work, Madeline,” he said to the woman. She grinned and slipped to the opposite side of the brig where she crossed a wood plank to the French boat’s deck. In a moment, she turned and waved back as she disappeared into that ship’s stern cabin.

“We’ll get the masts aboard and have you on your way as soon as we can, Mr. Cutter,” Hall said, his eyes back on his task.

“I’ll stay around and help with the rigging as long as I can.” Cutter searched the deck now, looking for Jamie amidst the several men and women moving with their tasks up forward.

“Lucky the French came along,” said Hall. “We’ll get her right. Excuse me, Sir.” Hall turned back for a moment to direct repairs of the standing rigging. When the mast broke, some of this rigging linking the foremast and the mainmast was weakened. The lines on the lower part of the foremast were taking too much strain.

Cutter spotted Jamie directing a team of companions trying to fix some large tackle. He remembered that his son had been assigned some mate duties.

“I’ve got to see my son,” he told Hall.

“Of course.”

“I guess you’re getting the experience like the old time captains, aren’t you, Captain Hall,” said Cutter. He remembered how Hall had talked of this goal in his interview for the job.

Hall grinned, rubbing at the grease that had come from a pulley and got on his forehead, “Maybe a little more than I wanted, but yessir, it’s all right. I love it. Every one of the crew does too.”

“You picked up an albatross for a passenger.” Cutter pointed at the large bird on the rear mast.

“She landed on the deck a few days ago. Your boy fed her and now she likes us. Sometimes those birds do that. She might go with us all the way to China.”

“Legend says an albatross carries the soul of a sailor who drowned in a storm.”

“She hasn’t brought us any bad luck yet,” said Hall, squinting at the bird.

“They name her?”