White Shark (17 page)
Authors: Peter Benchley
Tags: #Science Fiction, #Mystery, #Suspense, #Thriller, #Horror
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On the surface, the small boat was caught
in the flooding tide.
It moved quickly,
spinning erratically in lazy circles because of the drag caused by the heavy
rubber-coated wire dangling off the bow.
It grounded briefly on a shallow reef, but
the surge from a distant ship lifted it gently up and over the reef and sent it
on toward shore.
16
Chase aimed the bow of the Whaler toward
an empty slip in one of the floating docks in front of the tiny yacht club on
the western edge of the borough.
He
wasn't a member of the club — he didn't play tennis, race sailboats or wear
pastel slacks emblazoned with ducks — but he had known most of the members for decades,
liked many of them, and they never begrudged him the loan of one of their
coveted slips.
The water was glass calm in this hour
after dawn, as if the day's breeze hadn't decided which direction to blow.
Seabirds hadn't yet begun to feed, so beds of
fry made barely a ripple as they scurried aimlessly between anchored yachts.
Chase pulled the gearshift lever back into
neutral,
then
turned the key that killed the engine,
letting the boat nose silently into the slip.
He saw Max standing in the bow, ready to fend off the dock, and told
himself
:
keep your
mouth shut, don't warn him again to watch his balance so he doesn't fall
overboard.
Max bent his knees and braced himself and
fended off perfectly, hopped up onto the dock with the painter in one hand and
cleated it off like an expert.
Chase didn't say anything as his son
cleated the stern line, didn't congratulate Max or even nod in acknowledgment
of a job well done.
But he did
congratulate himself as he noticed Max's little smile of pride, for he realized
that he was learning something nearly as difficult as how to be a parent — when
and how to
stop
being a parent.
He passed Max his knapsack and climbed up
onto the dock, and they walked together toward the parking lot.
A single gull cawed in the distance, and
somewhere in the borough a dog barked.
Otherwise, the loudest sound they heard was the soft hiss of their feet
on the dewy grass.
Then, carried across the treetops, came
the muted bong of a church bell ringing six times.
"Six o'clock," Max said, and he
looked around as if in discovery.
"I've never been up at six before.
Ever.
I
mean, since before I can remember."
"At this time of day, everything's
new and clean," said Chase.
"It's the time for belief in second chances."
"I should've come with you
before."
Max started to say
something more, hesitated, then took a breath and said, "You're worried
about money, aren't you...
about maybe
losing the island?"
"Not at six o'clock in the morning,
I'm not."
Chase smiled.
"It's impossible to worry about money at
six o'clock in the morning."
They reached the parking lot, and Chase
leaned against the wall of the clubhouse and stretched his calves and thighs
while Max unzipped his knapsack and spread his gear on the pavement.
For the first days Max had been with him,
Chase had gone running alone, waking, automatically as always, at five or
five-thirty and circling the island six times, a course of two miles, more or
less.
He had showered, shaved, dressed
and eaten, and was at his desk or in one of the labs by the time Max got up at
eight or nine, grumpy and uncommunicative until infused by Mrs. Bixler with
glucose and protein.
Last night, for no apparent reason, Max
had asked if he could go with his father in the morning.
"Sure," Chase had said.
"Why?"
"I don't want to miss anything."
"What's to miss?
You huff and you puff."
"And you feel great, right?"
"On good days,
yeah.
You pump the beta0endorphins, and you feel
great."
"So," Max had said, "I want
to go with you."
Chase hadn't pressed the boy because
suddenly, blessedly, he had understood what Max was really saying —
that
he had a month to be with his father and, though he probably didn't know he was
looking for them, to uncover things, find answers, solve riddles about
himself
.
Thirty days
to make up for eight years.
Like an
archaeologist digging for clues to a lost people, Max was determined to scrape
away the overgrowth of years and find out who he was and where he had come
from.
The only problem was
,
Max didn't actually want
to run, he wanted to Rollerblade, because his hockey coach had said it was the
best way for him to improve his skating so he'd have a chance to make the
varsity hockey team this coming winter.
That meant going into town, for there was no paved surface on
Chase had debated pressing Max to run with him on the island, arguing
that to waste gasoline in search of pavement rather than to run on nature's own
grass and rocks was a kind of corruption.
But as he had formed the words in his mind, he realized that he was
sounding like a pious pain in the ass.
So they had taken the Whaler and left the island at sunrise and gone into
Waterboro.
As they had planed across the flat water, Chase had felt a niggling
sensation that something was awry... missing, out of place or just...
wrong.
He didn't know what it was, but
it was there, somewhere in his mind.
His buoy.
That was it.
The one he and Tall
Man had dropped the other day to mark the sensor head.
They had meant to come back and dive the
sensor up, but the compressor needed a part from
They had gotten busy with other things; after
all, the sensor wasn't about to go anywhere.
But where was the buoy?
He should
have seen it as they approached Napatree Point, but he hadn't, and now they
were past Napatree, and as he looked eastward he was blinded by the rays of the
rising sun.
He dismissed it; the buoy was surely there, they'd find it on the way
back.
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Chase finished stretching and pretended to be busy, double-knotting his
running shoes and doing knee bends, as he glanced at Max putting on his
elaborate outfit:
knee pads, elbow pads,
helmet and, finally, a pair of black high-top lace-up shoes soled with yellow
rubber wheels.
The boy looked like a
B-movie robot.
All Chase said was "That's safe, is it?"
"Sure."
"So how come all the pads?"
"Well... it can be kinda hard to stop."
"So you're like a runaway train."
Chase grinned.
"Okay, killer, let's go for it."
"Where to?"
"You haven't seen the borough yet."
Chase pointed.
"We'll make a circuit:
down
here.
That's a mile plus.
If you're still feeling your oats, we can
shoot out
to
Route
One and back."
"Okay."
Max stood up on
the grass, as shaky as a newborn calf, and hobbled onto the pavement.
The first foot to hit the hard ground skidded
forward, and he staggered, windmilled with his arms, tottered, splayed and
recovered.
He smiled sheepishly and
said, "Little rusty."
"That's a
sport?
"
Chase shouted in mock alarm.
"Jeez, maybe after breakfast we can have
a friendly game of Russian Roulette."
"Just watch," Max said, and he leaned forward, pushed off with
one foot, took a couple of long, striding steps, spread his arms and, as Chase
watched in surprise, described a graceful circle around the parking lot.
Then he pumped a fist in triumph and skated
off toward the road that led into town.
Chase wanted to shout out warnings about traffic, pedestrians — about all
the perils of growing up too fast — but he didn't.
He took a few deep breaths and started to
run.
As he crested the gentle hill that led into the borough, he smelled the
aroma of cinnamon buns and frying bacon from the two restaurants on
catered to the locals who worked early shifts at Electric Boat.
There was no traffic this early, so he ran down the middle of Beach
Street, waving to Sally, who was stacking vegetables in front of the Borough
Market, to Lester, who was unloading cases of beer from his truck at the back
of the liquor store, and to Earl, who had been purveying newspapers, magazines,
cigarettes, gun and paperbacks from the same storefront since long before Chase
was born.
Everybody waved back, everybody had a word for him and Chase suddenly
regretted that he didn't come into town more often.
This was home, home was people and he
wondered if his passion for his island was becoming unhealthy, turning him into
a recluse.
He ran past
on the point when the British, in a fit of malicious whimsy, had shelled
Waterboro during the War of 1812.
Chase met Max at the end of the point, where they spent a moment
appreciating the sunrise.
Then they
turned back and, with Max zigzagging like a minesweeper in front of his father,
threaded their way through the little side streets until they emerged onto
its stately captains' houses from the glory days of whaling.
Oak Street was wide, straight, open and empty.
"I'm gonna pump," Max said.
"See you back at the club."
"Go for it.
Just be—"
But Max was gone, churning with his legs, sweeping with his arms, head
down, back bent, his rubber wheels humming on the macadam.
Chase sprinted after him, more for the exercise than from any real hope
of being able to keep up with him, but after two blocks he was winded, and he
slowed to his normal rhythmic lope.
Max pulled away, a block ahead, then two,
then
became only a dark blur speeding down the shaded street.
Chase saw the girl first, saw her step out of the door of the house and
turn back to pull the door closed and cross the sidewalk — looking not at the
street but down into her tote bag — and step into the street.
He shouted, but his words were whipped away in the wind.
Max probably never saw her, for his head was down; he certainly never
heard her, for the padding in his helmet pressed tightly against his ears.
Chase saw the girl's head suddenly snap up, the tote bag fall from her
arms, and her hands rise toward her face.
Max must have sensed her then, somehow felt her presence, for he jerked
upright and tried to veer to the right.
One foot must have hit the other, or crossed over it, for his feet came
to a sudden stop and his upper body catapulted forward.
One of his wheeling arms struck the girl and
spun her into a parked car.
She bounced
off the car and fell to the street in a billow of blue cotton skirt.
Chase saw Max fly for a moment in gangly slow motion and fall like a shotgunned
bird, striking the ground first with his knees, then with his elbows, then with
his head.
He somersaulted once, and lay
still.
Chase accelerated to a sprint, his mind cursing and praying while his
body gasped for oxygen.
He saw the girl grasp the bumper of a car and pull herself to her
feet.
She walked over to Max and knelt
down and touched his face.
Max sat up,
they looked at each other and Max said something; the girl shook her head.
Chase saw the girl turn her head his way, see him and suddenly jump to
her feet, grab her tote bag and, with a last look at Max, disappear down an
alley between two houses.
By the time Chase reached Max, the girl was gone.
Max was on his hands and knees.
He
reached a hand up, and Chase took it and pulled him to his feet, keeping an arm
around his waist to steady him.
"Are you okay?"
