“You are kidding?”
“No, I am not. I don’t have anything to do until my friends arrive later this afternoon.”
“That would be wonderful.” With a sheet of butter, she glazed the croissants she had taken out of the oven. I glanced quickly at the bulkhead on the starboard side, which was covered with a collage of photos of both Sophie and Montana at younger ages against a variety of backdrops. Some were familiar, and others were not. One showed a man suspended from a harness, hanging in the air from a mountain.
Montana continued to draw intensely with her brow furrowed, and her little pink tongue poked out of the side of her mouth. “How do they jump so high?” she asked in a practical voice.
“Who?” I asked.
“The fish. They have no legs or feet.”
“They use the muscles in their body and tail,” I answered.
She started to giggle as she continued to draw, and then she said, “My daddy loves to fish. I fish with him in my dreams.”
“Really?” I answered, suddenly feeling a little bit uncomfortable.
“Yes, we catch lots of different colored fish, but I do not like to touch them. They’re slippery, you know.” She continued to sketch and then looked up and pointed to the picture of the man hanging from the mountain. “That’s him. My papa fell off of a mountain before I was born. He lives in the sky now. He is a star, and I can see him at night. He is very close, but I cannot touch him. Sometimes that makes me sad.”
Not knowing how to respond, I looked again at the photos above us.
Sophie sensed my discomfort immediately. She had obviously dealt with this before. She spoke to Montana in French, and the young artist put away her pencils and pad and slid off the seat.
“It will be fun to catch a real fish with a real person,” Montana said to me. From the companionway, she gave me an impish look, then held up the drawing for me to see. It was a picture of a stick man on a small boat with a line connected to a giant fish that had legs. At the end of the legs she had drawn tennis shoes with springs on the bottom. “I gave your fish feet,” she said with a giggle. I was about to comment on her drawing when she turned and disappeared into her cabin.
Sophie arrived with two plates and set them down. “Mon Dieu, I haven’t set the table!” she exclaimed. “Please excuse me.” With that, she produced two place mats, silverware, and cloth napkins from a drawer in the galley. In a matter of seconds the table was set, and the omelets were still piping hot.
So it was over breakfast on a solitary sailboat anchored off a deserted island that Sophie Diamant told me her story.
She had been born on the island of Corsica and grew up there in a small coastal village called Calvi. Her grandfather was an American PT boat captain from Key West, Florida, who had been stationed there during World War II. He had fallen in love with Corsica and the daughter of a hotelier and did not return to the States. He married and took over the hotel, then started a diving business and raised a family. Sophie was an only child, and when her father died in a diving accident, it was her grandfather who filled the hole in her life. It is said that adventure is second nature to Corsicans, and Sophie was no exception. Early on she had dealt with her overprotective mother by spending as much time as she could on the beach, until she was old enough to go to school in Paris, where she studied photography. Through her grandfather’s friendship with the legendary Jacques Cousteau, she landed a job on the Calypso. By the time she was twenty-five, she had circumnavigated the world twice. During the last voyage, both her mother and grandfather had passed away while she was halfway around the world in Tasmania. Her mother was buried next to her father in Calvi, but, according to his wishes, her grandfather was laid to rest in Key West, his original home. Sophie Diamant was left to grieve as an orphan on the high seas. She dealt with it by losing herself in her work.
Through her position with Cousteau, she had gained a reputation with other filmmakers and had established her own career as a top nature photographer. That is what took her to the remote and barren landscape of Mali, the former realm of the Sahara known as French West Africa. She had gone on assignment for a French magazine to shoot a story about a tribe that inhabited the Bandiagara Cliffs. They were called the Dogon, and they guarded the place of their ancestors, a mysterious tribe called the Tellem, who, thousands of years ago, used their magical powers to fly about the cliffs. The Dogon had sidestepped the organized efforts of Islam and Christianity and still held on to their ancient mythology—where desert foxes foretold the future, and spirits roamed at large, and rocks and trees guarded the elevated burial chambers of their Tellem ancestors in the overhanging sheer cliffs.
While they were there shooting pictures, she had met Montana’s father, a mountain-climbing guide named Larry Moore. Although he lived in Montana, like her grandfather he was originally from Florida. “It was amusing to me,” she said, “that such a great climbing guide like Larry would come from a place as flat as Florida.”
Larry had come to Mali to lead an expedition up the sheer sandstone faces of the Bandiagara Cliffs for a client. They were a thousand miles from any hotel, and the huts in the local village were full, so Sophie, the orphan from Corsica, shared a tent with a climber from Florida. Sophie discovered that Larry had actually grown up in the Florida Keys and had worked in Key West. She told him of her family connection to the island—through her grandfather—and that she was bound to travel there to visit his grave. Sophie told him the stories she had heard all her life from her grandfather about alligators, Indians, trips to Havana, and the beauty of the Florida Keys.
Larry’s own tales intensified her longing to see this almost mythical island city for herself. Traveling there became a necessity for Sophie Diamant.
It is amazing how things unfold. I had come to Fortune Island to be alone with my thoughts, to fish in solitude, and then make the giant leap into the new chapter of my life. The next thing I knew, I was being served breakfast on a picture-book ketch by an enchantress from Corsica who was going to the same place I was. When Sophie told me of her longing to go to Key West, my first instinct was to inject my own agenda and tell her I was traveling to the same destination; of course I would be happy to be her guide. But I sensed there was more to the story of Sophie and Montana, so I waited and kept the information to myself. I am glad I held my tongue.
Sophie and Larry had fallen immediately in love in one of the most remote and inhospitable places on the planet. They spent a week with the Dogon, and then Larry went with her to Dakar. There they spent a romantic weekend by the sea in the exotic city. The night before Sophie had to catch a flight to Paris, they stood on the African shore and watched the sun set over the vast Atlantic. When it had disappeared, Larry had promised her that they would see the sun do the same thing from Mallory Square when he finished his expedition. He would build a boat and take her to Key West.
Sophie flew off to Paris, and Larry went back to Mali to meet his clients. He was to join her a month later in France. Larry never arrived. He was killed in a fall, and that was all she had been told by a voice on the line from the U.S. Embassy in Paris.
It was later, through friends, that she learned he was killed by Dogon guards when he tried to protect his client, who had accidentally stumbled upon an ancient Tellem burial chamber. As far as French and American officials were concerned, Larry Moore was just another crazy climber who had stumbled into the wrong place at the wrong time.
A staffer from the U.S. Embassy in Timbuktu had claimed the ashes of his cremated body and shipped them to his relatives in Florida, where they were scattered out at sea. The story of his death was no page-one account in the New York Times or Le Monde. It was only mentioned in the local Montana papers and the Key West Citizen in a two-paragraph story, but to a young woman waiting in Paris, it rocked her world.
The news of Larry’s death arrived the day Sophie discovered she was pregnant. She went back to Corsica to have the baby and try to get some perspective on her life in sage
and familiar surroundings. She named the baby Montana as a tribute to Larry. Word had come to her that days before his death, Larry had arranged to make her the benefactor of his estate, and she was surprised to receive a large check, accompanied by a letter from Larry. In it, he wrote that he was worried about the dangers of his upcoming trip and that he had made an adjustment to his will in case of an accident. He told her to use the money to fulfill their mutual dream to build a boat and take the trip. Sophie fulfilled Larry’s last wish with fiery purpose.
She set about the task of finding the right boat for her mission, which was to sail to Key West with her daughter and visit the final resting place of Montana’s father and Sophie’s grandfather. Along with raising her young daughter, she supervised the construction of the Rêve Bleu, learned to be a navigator, and trained herself for the rigors of an Atlantic crossing. Once Montana was old enough, Sophie turned her into a little sailor as well, and when the boat was finally launched, they sailed away.
“You’re not eating,” Sophie said.
I had been so fascinated by her story that I hadn’t paid attention to my breakfast, which is not a good thing to do to a French chef. I attacked the eggs as she laughed at my absentmindedness.
Finally, I could hold my excitement no more. “I am going to Key West too,” I said.
“You are kidding. In that boat?” she gasped.
“No, no, no. I have a friend who has a much larger boat. He’s picking me up here. I’m kind of starting a new chapter of my own life,” I added.
“Do you know Key West?” she asked. “Have you ever been to the cemetery?”
“Strangely enough, I was just there.”
“That is where my grandfather is buried,” she said.
Sophie stepped into the galley and picked up another croissant. She placed it on my plate. As I took a bite, she said, “You must come with us.”
I deflected the seriousness of her statement with a question. “Does this mean I’ve been taken prisoner by a gang of lady pirates?”
“If that is what you wish to believe,” she said with a smile.
Breakfast was over. I helped Sophie move the dirty dishes from the table to the tiny sink in the galley.
“You must take us to the cemetery,” she said. “I want to hear your Key West story. I will feed you and teach you to sail.”
“I already know how to sail,” I told her. I was about to describe my time at sea when Montana dropped down the ladder.
“Look what I found,” she said excitedly as she gently opened her hands and revealed a small green lizard.
“Now where did that come from?” Sophie said as she picked up the lizard and attached it to Montana’s ear. The little girl giggled and ran back up the stairs.
I stood there with my mouth open. “The dancing earring,” I whispered.
“What did you say?” Sophie asked.
“Mama!” Montana yelled down through the companionway. “It’s the big boat! The one from my dreams. It’s right out there!”
Sophie looked out the porthole. “Mon Dieu!” she screamed as her coffee mug slipped from her hand and shattered on the table. Déjà vu.
“It’s Aunt Cleopatra’s boat!” I heard Sophie shout. She leaped over the mug fragments and quickly climbed up the stairs to the deck.
I was suddenly totally disoriented. Then, as I stood there beside the shattered pieces of the mug, an old photo on the bulkhead caught my eye. There, mixed in with the rest of the pictures, was a three-by-five faded color print of the unmistakable wheel of the ship that had rescued me and changed my world. Seated behind it was a much younger version of Cleopatra Highbourne in her familiar foul-weather gear. On her lap sat a young girl in a blue sailor suit who looked exactly like Montana, but I knew it was Sophie.
Sophie’s voice cut through my thoughts. She was yelling for me to join them up on the deck. I followed her orders and climbed through the gangway. Montana was there to greet me with the lizard still dangling from her ear.
“Why are you crying?” Montana asked.
I couldn’t answer. I felt her take my hand, and she led me over to Sophie, who stood with a pair of binoculars trained on the ship.
We watched the Lucretia under full sail, knifing her way through the waves as she approached. Cleopatra Highbourne had not only sent a girlfriend for my horse but also made sure that, unlike the statue of Carlos Gardel in Buenos Aires, I would not be dancing alone.
I pulled the Lister’s conch out of my pocket and placed it in Montana’s small hand. She looked down at the shell and then up into my moist eyes. “Montana, I believe this is for you,” I said, and closed her fist around her new good-luck shell.
44
Boats to Build
Diamant means Diamond in French. Sophie Diamant was the only granddaughter of Teddy Diamond, Cleopatra Highbourne’s beloved younger stepbrother. Yes, it is true: her grandniece had sailed into my life that day on Fortune Island.
I think that Sophie and her daughter were more shocked to learn that Cleopatra had lived to be 102 than they were of the news I had the sad duty to tell them. Their welcome aboard the Lucretia was greeted first with joy and then tears, as the news spread as to the identity of Sophie and Montana. But the ship herself served as the perfect floating funeral parlor as we sat in the cockpit with all sails stretched above us and set a course for Cayo Loco. Montana wasted no time in befriending Solomon, who harnessed her up and took her to the top of the spreaders.
“Aunt Cleopatra taught me to do that,” Sophie said from the deck. I took her hand and placed it on the rail, and we followed Montana and Solomon up to the crow’s nest, the way Cleopatra had trained us all.
We left several crew members behind on the Rêve Bleu while we headed back to Cayo Loco. Sophie wanted to see the light. As we sailed for the island, I led Sophie and Montana out to the tip of the bowsprit, where we rode with the boat behind us and the ocean below. It was perched there that I told them the whole story of the search and discovery of the soul of the light.
Needless to say, our unscheduled return to Cayo Loco with living relatives of Cleopatra was greeted by the lighthouse crew with shock and jubilation, in that order. Sophie and Montana were treated like mythical sea goddesses who had sailed in to put the proper ending to a wonderful story. And that is just what they did. They, in turn, fell instantly in love with Cayo Loco and spent several hours examining all the treasured possessions from Highbourne Hill that Cleopatra had deposited in her small cottage.
The light was attended like a church, and then we rode Mr. Twain and Ocean along the beach. Our final stop was Osprey Point.
It was there that Montana produced a conch shell she had been carrying in her little backpack, and she placed it below the tree. “I think I will bring her a new shell from someplace different every time I come to visit Aunt Cleopatra,” she said.
No more words were needed from the adults in attendance. Montana saw the island the way Cleopatra had truly intended it to be.
A day later, we returned to Fortune Island, where we were greeted by the persistent school of tarpon rolling in the channel. They seemed to be waiting to be caught. We happily obliged, and before I loaded my skiff onto the deck of the Lucretia, I took Sophie and Montana fishing. Each of them hooked and released her first tarpon.
The Bariellete then went on board the schooner, but I did not. Instead, I had accepted the captain’s invitation and signed on as the first male crew member of the Rêve Bleu. As the sun was setting, we sailed for Key West.
The day we dropped anchor behind Christmas Tree Island, I took Sophie and Montana back to what was now familiar territory for me: the Key West Cemetery. It was very emotional, standing there at the grave sites of a collection of lost relatives. I pointed out the family plots and Teddy’s headstone, then waited, as I had done for Cleopatra, while Montana played with the tree lizards. Then she finally broke the silence, saying simply, “I would like to see your house now.”
Walking together down Spoonb
ill Lane and up the driveway to Highbourne Hill, I think we collectively sensed that it was time for us all to finally come ashore. A few days later, I drove Sophie and Montana up to Marathon. Sophie had asked me to help her make contact with Larry’s father. She wanted Montana to meet her grandfather. He was a crusty old retired Navy pilot who had outlived his wife and resided alone aboard an ancient catamaran anchored in the harbor. He was thrilled to meet the granddaughter he had only heard rumors of.
Sophie and I volunteered as crew members, and Montana and her grandfather handled the wheel as we sailed out to the edge of the Gulf Stream past Sombrero Light, where Montana dropped a small bouquet of hibiscus into the water where Larry’s ashes had been scattered. Sophie and Montana decided to stay and visit for a few days. I headed back to Spoonbill Lane and Highbourne Hill.
When they returned from Marathon, I was helping Lupe trim the bougainvillea hedges along the driveway. They walked up the driveway, surprising me from behind. The first thing I noticed was the small gold chain Montana now wore around her neck. From it dangled her new lucky conch shell. “If it is okay,” Sophie said, “we would like to accept your invitation to stay here for a while.”
It was and still is. Sophie and Montana have brought a sweetness to my life that I still find hard to describe.
One day, while I was sanding and varnishing the cap rails of the Rêve Bleu, Sophie rowed out in the dinghy. She climbed aboard, kissed me, and then hung a FOR SALE sign on the lifeline. “I have some good news,” she said. It seemed that in a devious attempt to exclude the Highbournes from the family holdings, Donald Diamond the Turd had made direct descendants of his branch of the family the sole heirs of most of the shipping fortune. Guess who he didn’t count on showing up in this life? My Corsican wife.
Yes, we were married in Haiti, and now I, too, have a beautiful stepdaughter I am helping to raise at Highbourne Hill and teaching how to fish.