Long Voyage Back

  When the war starts—'

  `Now cut that crap,' Frank interrupted with abrupt

  annoyance. 'This is just another game of international brinkmanship and neither their assholes nor our assholes are stupid enough to go to war. The Russians don't really care about Saudi Arabian nomads and we don't really care about Asian democracy.'

  `But we care about oil!'

  `Not enough to blow up the world,' said Frank. 'Now give me Neil. No, don't bother. Just hang up and get your ass up to Crisfield.' The line went dead. Jim stood alone in the aft cabin. He was angry. He hated the way his father dealt with him. Since he'd been only an average student and never held a job, his father had always made him feel he was something of a good-for-nothing. He enjoyed rock music, playing his guitar, getting high with his friends and partying, and making it with Celia or an occasional other girl. None of these qualified in Frank's eyes as anything but being a waste of time. The three or four occasions he'd sailed with Frank on Vagabond there'd been a lot of older people aboard who'd helped Frank handle the boat. Jim had ended up retreating to his cabin to get stoned and listen to music. His father had inevitably come to shout at him to turn it down and to criticize him for not helping more with the sailing. It had been a downer. He didn't even think he liked sailing much until this sail from Florida alone with Neil.

  He climbed slowly up the ladder from the aft cabin and went back into the wheelhouse. Neil, who'd heard Jim's end of the conversation and its abrupt termination, stared forward.

  `There's going to be a war,' Jim stated angrily. 'And Dad doesn't care.'

  Neil glanced at Jim and then back forward. 'I don't know,' Neil replied. 'I suppose it's possible our troops and theirs may be killing each other in a month or two. But maybe the world will pretend everyone's a guerrilla and we won't have to call it a war.'

  `But that retired general says we ought to hit Russia before they attack us,' said Jim. 'And those Protestant ministers said the same. If the Russians read that then they'll have to strike first. Don't you see?'

  `No, Jim .

  `They're going to do it,' Jim insisted, his long hair falling down his forehead so that when it obscured his left eye he tossed it back angrily. 'I know they are. I can feel it!'

  Neil looked forward, reminded of a young sailor on his last patrol who had panicked from watching B-52s bomb the coast two miles away. He knew from Frank that when Jim was fifteen he'd had a bad acid trip, hallucinated a nuclear holocaust about to occur and kept insisting to his family that they leave the country and fly to Australia. He'd had to be sedated for most of three weeks, and since then, according to Frank, Jim tended to become upset whenever there was news of nuclear power plant accidents or nuclear test explosions or the threat of war. There'd been a lot to be upset about in the last three years.

  `The Russians aren't going to start a nuclear war,' Neil said softly.

  `Then we are!' he shot back. 'There's no way the two sides can go on this way. It's going to happen!'

  `Take it easy, Jim,' Neil rejoined sharply, putting his hand on Jim's shoulder. 'Shouting isn't going to stop anything.'

  `Damn it! You don't care either.' Jim stood facing Neil defiantly, but Neil didn't look at him.

  `Look,' Neil persisted softly, 'it's no more appropriate to panic about this international storm than it is in a storm at sea. You just do what has to be done when it has to be done.'

  `We should find a fallout shelter, stock up on food. We .

  `Right now,' Neil interrupted firmly, 'our job is to sail Vagabond to your father.'

  Òh, Neil,' Jim responded. 'It's so sad. It's so . .

  `Drop it,' said Neil. He was still staring forward. 'Here, take the helm,' he went on. 'It's still your watch.' He walked away into the port cockpit and stood with his back to Jim. The shore was only dimly visible far off.

  He was feeling distinctly uneasy. Jim's fears struck a responsive chord; he could feel fear vibrating in his own gut. A part of him also wanted to return and run back out the mouth that he felt closing now behind them. His instinct was to get out to sea, away from the mess that men might make on land. He turned to Jim.

  `We're meeting Frank in Crisfield instead of Point Lookout,' he said quietly. 'Our course is changed to zero one zero. You got it?'

  `Zero one zero,' Jim answered, glancing once at the compass and beginning to turn the wheel to starboard.

  As Neil stared ahead he was surprised to find himself wondering anxiously whether Vagabond's charts of the West Indies were still aboard. Annoyed at his irrationality, he held himself firmly standing in the port cockpit staring at the great expanse of bay lying before him. His course was zero one zero, ten degrees east of north. Getting to Crisfield without an engine was worry enough for one day.

  Frank felt good. His adrenalin was really flowing. All morning he'd been marching in and out of his office ordering Rosie and Jason to phone here, phone there, get this, send for that, then marching back to telephone someone himself. It was one of those days that when he stared out his office window overlooking lower Manhattan and New York Harbour he felt like a king.

  He loved this war crisis. He loved the way it was driving the stock market down, just as he'd known it would; loved the way it made people edgy, nervous, scared shitless. A few things had gone wrong for him during the day -Neil's report of the bent propeller shaft, the booked flights to Washington, Jim's panic, a real estate deal falling through . . . but he shook them off like so much dandruff. He was making thousands of dollars an hour on his short selling of stocks and by tonight he'd be aboard Vagabond in the Chesapeake and the whole world could blow up and he wouldn't give a damn. After he'd talked to Neil and Jimmy at noon and eaten the lunch Rosie brought into him, he'd put in a call to his stockbroker. As he waited he leaned back in his huge leather chair, the phone at his ear, his long lanky body stretched out comfortably. He was a good-looking man in his mid-forties with thinning grey hair, warm dark eyes and an easy grin.

  `Hi, Al,' he said when he got through. 'Selling panic still in full swing? . . . Down thirtyfour points! Jesus, that's even worse than I thought it would be. Or better than I thought.'

  He laughed briefly, then listened. 'Okay, good. Look I think there's going to be a turnaround sometime late today - this

  thing can't look any worse than it does right now - so I want to take my profits in most of my shorts. Give me the quotes . . . Right. Okay. I want to cover the US Home at . . . what'

  d you say it was at now? . . . at twenty-four then; the Datapoint at fifty-five, and the Microdyne at thirty. Got it? All the shares . . . Yeah, I'll hold the other two short positions .. .

  Ì'm flying down this evening . . . I've got the radiotelephone on the boat but I don't like to think about stocks or real estate while I'm at sea. I'll phone you later today if I haven't left and we'll see what we did . . . Yeah? Thanks. I'm no genius. I just know that with the jerks who end up running countries, things have to get very bad before anyone can figure out a way to make 'em better . . . Okay, Al, thanks.'

  Well well well: even Al seemed worried about a war, poor bastard. Hell, New York City didn't have anything to worry about. It was such an archetypal centre of capitalist decadence that the Russians would probably want to preserve it as an historical park for their tourists: porno shops here, Harlem there, Wall Street next . . . They wouldn't nuke New York; hell, it would destroy itself in just a few more years. Frank got up and paced back and forth across the deep rust-coloured carpet and then buzzed Rosie to see if Jason had returned yet with the propeller shaft from Hempstead. No, but he was on his way. Let's see, what else for the boat? The new charts for the Chesapeake - he had them. And the bag of specialities that Norah had got for him from Flynn's delicatessen: caviar, cashews, some of Flynn's incredible cheeses, two loaves of good bread, and Norah's own fantastic pies: the sort of stuff Neil never got aboard no matter how many commands he was given. It was Neil's one great flaw: he shopped and cooked as if he were feeding a reform school.
r />   But Jesus, was he lucky to have got him as Captain. Imagine, a Navy officer! The guy sails a couple of thousand

  miles with as little fuss as most men go to the corner drugstore. He loses his engine to a freak accident and still probably will make it on schedule. Oh oh. He hadn't got through yet to Jeannie Forester about the change of plans. He returned to his big chair, buzzed Rosie, and waited for her to place the call. He felt a warm anticipation for that throaty, sexy voice of hers, sexy especially because she didn't really mean to be sexy. For two years now Jeannie had become the only thing that ever took his mind off business, and he was aware that whenever he thought of her he fell victim to an almost adolescent melancholy and longing. They'd been friends for five or six years and he knew she must be aware that he'd developed feelings for her beyond friendship. But she wasn't so much rejecting his feelings as kind of ducking and letting them slide past her.

  `Frank, hi. Everything still on for the sailing?'

  `Hi, Jeannie. Sure,' he replied, smiling at nothing. 'Only I've had to change my travel plans about getting to the boat.'

  Àre you still coming here this evening?'

  `No, that's just it. I can't get a flight into Washington, but I got one to the Eastern Shore, to Salisbury, and I'm meeting the boat at Crisfield - that's just across the bay on the eastern side.'

  Ì know. You want us all to meet you there?'

  'No no. We'll sail over to Point Lookout and pick you up. Unless something goes wrong we should still get there late this evening.'

  `That's great. I'm sorry you're not going to be here though.'

  Frank felt himself flush with pleasure. 'We'll see so much of each other in the next ten days you'll probably remember with great fondness your last evening without me.'

  Jeanne laughed. 'I like you, Frank,' she countered, 'but I

  confess I'm a little nervous about spending that much time on the Bay. I prefer water in a glass or a bathtub.'

  `Baloney.'

  `No, it's true. Now that you've finally got me to sail with you I'm going to be the worst sort of landlubber.'

  `You're a terrific swimmer,' said Frank.

  Ònly when I can see both the bottom and other end of the pool,' she commented. 'Hold it a sec,' she added, and her next words were spoken to someone in the room with her. `

  What's that, Rita? No. In the second drawer, I think. With the clippings from the Post . . . Sorry, Frank, where were we?'

  `What was all that about?'

  `My anti-nuke group is meeting here today,' she answered. Èmergency meeting because of the Arabian mess.'

  Òh, yeah, right,' said Frank, made uncomfortable by the subject. Jeannie became too emotional about any kind of war scare. He thought of making a joke about her group's being sure to stop the war for at least ten more days so they could finish their cruise, but stopped himself. 'It's a tough situation,' he finally said lamely. Ì've lost heart,' she replied with unexpected weariness. `We haven't achieved anything in these four years. And now it's really hopeless. I feel like a fool for even trying.'

  `Well, maybe that's good,' Frank said. 'Shows you need a vacation.'

  Ì suppose so,' she replied after a pause. 'Some of my friends think I'm going off to fiddle while Rome burns.'

  `No, you don't,' he said firmly. 'You've promised me. Let Rome burn.'

  Ì know, Frank, I'll be there. Tonight I hope, or tomorrow morning at the latest.'

  Àt Point Lookout.'

  `Fine. What, Rita? . . . Okay. Frank, look, I guess I've got to go. I'm looking forward to the sail and . . . I've got to go.' `Sure, Jeannie. See you soon.'

  `Bye, Frank.'

  Frank lowered the receiver slowly back into its cradle and sighed, feeling that ridiculous tingling she somehow created in him. Then he shook his head and grunted. Why did she bother with that stuff? Peace groups had been marching and protesting for five years but they'd never stopped a war and never would. They only weakened the poor nation that let them get too influential.

  Sighing, he leaned back in his chair, rocking slightly, looking out at the sky above the harbour past the Twin Trade Towers. He had finally got her to go sailing with him, though. In the past he'd invited her and her husband Bob and always ended up being stuck with just Bob. It was strange. An outdoorsy woman like her, good swimmer, tennis player, hiker - why the resistance to water? Was it her way of resisting him? He knew that he liked her a lot more than was probably wise for either of them, but he wasn't doing anything about it. And now for ten days they'd be together on Vagabond. His intercom buzzed and Rosie's crisp voice informed him that his wife was on the line. He remembered he'd promised to call her.

  `Hi, sweetheart,' he boomed out when he heard her soft musical voice on the phone. '

  Yep. Everything's go for this afternoon. I I. . . What? . . . Oh, don't be silly, it's just a war scare. Like the last time. A lot of sound and fury signifying . . .' Frank frowned and grimaced as he listened.

  `No, no, no,' he finally interrupted. 'It's going to be all right. Bob Forester says it's all just a big bluff, the Pentagon and the Russians know exactly what they're doing . . Again he listened for a while, and then broke in.

  `Hey, more good news. You should be proud of me. I made over eight thousand dollars on my shorts today . . . No . . . no, not that kind of shorts . . . stocks, selling stocks short, you know . . . He's fine. Captain Loken just told me he was a great sailor. Brought the ship single-handed through a

  terrific storm. When the sail . . . What? . . . No no no, there was no storm . . . I was just exaggera . . . He's fine I tell you. I bet he looks like a bronze Greek god. He's so goodlooking, he's obscene. Girls will be in heat all over the Chesapeake .. . Damn it, no. If there was going to be a war they would have told me in the Wall Street Journal ... Yeah, yeah, right, sweetheart. Look, I got to get going to the airport . . . Ten days . . . Oh sure, don't worry . . . Goodbye, honey . . . Right ... You too ... So long.'

  Frowning, Frank hung up. In the last year or two Norah seemed to be all fears, mostly about Jimmy, her 'baby', but sometimes about everything. Maybe that's where Jimmy got his panic from. He was glad Susan was home from college and staying there while he and Jimmy were off cruising. Norah needed company these days but couldn't join them in the Chesapeake until the last weekend.

  Rosie buzzed again.

  `Mr Tyler on the line.'

  Tut him on,' said Frank, reaching for the phone to speak to George Tyler, a partner on several real estate ventures.

  `Well, Frank, it was no go,' Tyler's voice announced loudly as if all important news had to be shouted. 'I'm afraid Mulweather called and gave me a cock-and-bull story which boils down to the fact that his clients are considering backing out on the West 80th Street deal.'

  `What the hell. Why?' Frank countered.

  `My guess is that his clients decided that an apartment house, no matter how attractive, tends to lose its cash flow when reduced to rubble.'

  Frank didn't reply, stunned by the sardonic comment.

  `Well,' Frank said after a pause, 'I don't think cash or stocks sitting at Chase Manhattan are going to retain much value either when they're drifting down over the Atlantic in a million pieces.'

  Ì know,' said Tyler with incongruous cheerfulness, 'but what are we going to do?

  Mulweather found a clause in our

  preliminary agreement and he can back out. In this climate I think everyone's more interested in vacationing in Tierra del Fuego than in conducting any new business.'

  Frank could feel himself becoming unreasonably angry at Mulweather and his clients for being panicked out of a deal that would make both parties good money. He stared gloomily at his desk.

  Òkay, George, keep after it,' he said finally with a sigh. `Make them feel like they're being chicken or something. Maybe they'll change their minds next week.'

  After Tyler had hung up, Frank felt depressed. Worse, it was getting late. What time was it? Almost four. Jesus, he had to be at La Guardia by five for h
is flight to Salisbury, so he'd have to hurry it.

  He made one last call to his broker and learned that the Dow Jones Industrial Average was down something like fifty-one points, the high speed ticker still almost twenty minutes behind. When he hung up, even though he'd made good money on his short selling, he was even more depressed. As he rose and began to gather his things for the boat he remembered his own favourite axiom with a strange sense of irritation .. .

  `The stock market never lies ..

  By late afternoon the Chesapeake had become as still as a pond. Only the tiniest breaths of wind occasionally hinted at movement, while Captain 0lly and his son Chris worked steadily in the clear sunshine, enjoying the luxury of the calm water. They were working their last oyster bed, using the long wooden shafts of their rake-like metal tongs with practised ease. Both Captain 0lly, a small wizened old man, wrinkled and bald, and his twenty-year-old son, a thickset, husky youth, had huge forearms and biceps from their years of working the oyster beds. Their twenty-six foot fishing smack, the Lucy Mae, with only a small deckhouse forward and a huge area aft for depositing the oysters, was old and paint-chipped and heeled groggily as both men worked. The two men had been at the beds since one o'clock that afternoon, starting a couple of hours before the three P.M. low tide and planning to quit a couple of hours after the tide turned. In all that time their work proceeded in a casual persistent rhythm, 011y talking away occasionally in seemingly free-association monologues, Chris, quiet, steady, always puffing on a cigarette, now and then grunting a comment or asking a question. When 011y would lapse into silence or lean on his rake, Chris would continue his oystering, working the heavy long tongs until he could feel them full, then raising them to the surface and depositing the contents on to the aft deck. Most of the sorting would come later. 0lly's monologues and silences succeeded each other in a mood as relaxed as the becalmed bay. Chris would occasionally down a bottle of beer, his father a glass of water, sometimes 'coloured' with a dash of whisky. They never had to speak about their work; they knew their routine so thoroughly they could have oystered efficiently from dawn to dusk and not uttered a word. Smith Island, their home, lay to the east of them, Tangier Island to the south and Point Lookout and the wide mouth of the Potomac River to the west.