by Boyle, Gerry
“Cash for what?” Kelvin said.
“You’ll see.”
Fuller kept his gaze on the mirror, said, “They’re going back in.”
“Huh,” Kelvin said, playing Snake on his cell phone.
“You know what we need? We need another vehicle. Something different that he hasn’t seen.”
“To jump the guy again?”
“Kelv,” Fuller said. “You are four steps behind.”
CHAPTER 18
Lucky said his friend was cold, was taking a bath. But what if they had coffee. Met downstairs in an hour?
Brandon said that would be good, and went down the elevator. He crossed the lobby. Outside, he looked for Mia, spotted her in the doorway of a shop that sold fancy pots and pans. Mia saw him and left the shop entrance, walked to the corner and turned, out of sight of the hotel.
She turned. Brandon nodded.
“It’s him,” he said.
Mia hugged him, said, “Oh, my God. What did he say?”
“We’re having coffee in an hour. Meet downstairs. That’s what he said, anyway.”
“What about the woman?”
“I think she’s coming, too.”
“Then why did she say he wasn’t there?”
“I don’t know.”
A pause, then Brandon said, “You take the lobby, I’ll take the side door.”
“Okay. What about the garage?”
“It’s valet parking. They bring them to you.”
“So you don’t trust him,” Mia said.
“He seemed glad to see me, said I had my mother’s eyes.”
“Do you?” Mia said.
“Yes.”
“So that much is true.”
“He’s one for one,” Brandon said.
They waited, but saw no sign of Lucky making a run for it, of the woman slipping out the back. In an hour, Brandon and Mia met up in the lobby. A minute later, the elevator opened and Lucky and the friend stepped out. Lucky waved, came across the lobby, the woman a step behind. They both were in black, the woman in the same slacks but with a black filmy top over a black camisole. Lucky in black jeans, a black cotton sweater over a black T-shirt. Mia said they looked like film producers, actors on the way to an interview. Brandon thought they looked like some of the boat owners he knew, a certain relaxed confidence.
Lucky turned, took the woman’s arm, and brought her alongside him.
“Brandon, this is my fiancée, Irina.”
“This is Mia,” Brandon said. “My friend.”
Hands touched. They exchanged hellos. Irina said Mia was a pretty name.
“And where are you from?” Mia said. “You don’t sound like a Mainer.”
“My first time here,” Irina said. “It’s a lovely city. I’m from Warsaw, originally. But then I met this guy.”
She gave Lucky a squeeze. He smiled. She was striking. Mia was thinking that Irina’s shoes were very expensive, her makeup was perfect, the ring on her left hand a big blue sapphire with diamonds.
“Let’s go up,” Lucky said. “There’s a decent restaurant up top. Lovely view of the bay.”
They stepped into the elevator, the four of them and a couple with a little boy, about five. The little boy was turned back toward Lucky and Irina, the couple in black. He was staring up.
“You look like ninjas,” he said. “Do you beat people up?”
The parents shushed him, but Lucky said, “That’s okay.”
He bent down and said, “We are ninjas. But we’re on vacation. Unless we see some bad guys.”
The boy looked at him, wide-eyed. The dad picked him up. The elevator stopped and the door opened and closed.
“Lucky,” Irina said, with a false scold. “You shouldn’t.”
They emerged on the twenty-second floor, crossed to the restaurant. The hostess brought them through the near-empty room to a table by the window, facing southeast. They stood for a minute gazing out at the view of Casco Bay, the islands showing on a blue-green sea, the surface of the bay all ripples and swirls, like wind-shaped desert sands.
“I’d pay just to come up here and stare,” Lucky said.
“All laid out there, isn’t it,” Brandon said.
“Beautiful,” Irina said. “Look at all these islands.”
Brandon pointed. “Peaks, just to the left is Great Diamond. Behind that you can see Long and Cliff. Past Cliff is Jewell, but you can’t really see it.”
“You a sailor?” Lucky said.
“More a general boater,” Brandon said.
“Brandon lives on a boat across the harbor,” Mia said.
“Really,” Lucky said. “Power or sail?”
“Power,” Brandon said. “An old Chris-Craft. Wood.”
“A purist,” Lucky said.
“Boats, don’t let them get going,” Irina said to Mia. “Let’s sit. I need my coffee.”
They went to the table, still with a fifty-mile view. A waiter came and they ordered: espresso for Lucky, coffee for everyone else.
“A bad habit I developed in Rome,” Lucky said.
“That and cigarettes,” Irina said. “Everyone in Europe smokes. After living here, I go back, I can’t stand it.”
“So, Lucky,” Brandon said, “was Rome before or after Maine?”
The table went quiet.
Well, Mia thought. He gets right down to it. Brandon watched Lucky, his expression turning somber.
“Yes, well, it was after. I think I owe you an explanation.”
“Yeah,” Brandon said. “I think you do.”
A long pause, Irina’s smile frozen in place.
“First of all,” Lucky began, “I liked your mother very much.”
He looked up from the table, met Brandon’s gaze. “Nikki was a good person. So full of life, loved the ocean, the sun. Lived every day to the fullest. She was a good friend. I mean, we thought the world of her.”
The coffee came, the espresso. They all sipped, eyes still on Lucky, holding his cup in two hands.
“It was her great adventure,” he continued. “We’d crossed from Ireland, left from a place called Castletown Berre, this little fishing port way out in West Cork. Came across to Newfoundland, a little weather but no big problems. Spent a few days in St. Johns. Across and along the coast, down to Maine. Then we lost our engine. Threw a rod coming out of Northeast Harbor—better there than a thousand miles out in the Atlantic— so we came into Portland under sail, but Black Magic handled so well, a Hinckley Bermuda Forty. You know the boat?”
“Only by reputation,” Brandon said.
“They got it all just right, like Hinckley usually does. Lovely, responsive boat. And stable, too. Perfectly balanced. Ketch inherited her from his uncle in California, sailed her all over the world.”
“So from Northeast Harbor to Portland?”
“We called ahead for a mooring, got one out in front of DiMillo’s Restaurant. So we arrive under sail, like I said, Ketch brings her into the harbor, wind out of the east. It was about eight, all of the people out there eating. Ketch took her through the harbor, rounded up, we dropped sail. The boat stopped like a golf ball falling into the cup. I reached the mooring with a boat hook. Just like that.”
Another sip. Lucky gazed out at the view. Brandon caught Mia watching Irina. She was listening like she’d never heard this story before.
“Ketch, he was a pure sailor,” Lucky said. “A natural.”
“But that didn’t help him,” Brandon said.
“Nothing can, at a certain point. As you know, right? The ocean is a big, powerful thing. We’re just little ants out there, living on a little skill and a lot of luck.”
“So how did you meet Brandon’s mom?” Mia said.
“Well,” Lucky said, with a sympathetic look at Brandon. “Nikki was working in this bar on Commercial Street. The Wayfarer. A boat place, sailors and fishermen, mostly locals. We kind of camped out there while the motor was being rebuilt. In a day it was like we’d known Nikki all our liv
es.”
Brandon remembered that about his mother, how she collected friends. The clerk at the hardware store, the ladies who knew Nessa, neighbors. A big smile, an openness. He could feel it now, though he couldn’t explain.
“So we hung out, stayed at her place a couple of nights in the beginning, she had this roof deck. Sleeping bags spread out. Then we sublet this apartment on the wharf. Got into the partying, you know. We were young and the city was hopping and there was music and talk. Lots of talk.”
The waiter came back, asked if they wanted pastry. Without looking at him, Irina said, “Yes, please bring the cart.”
“So was there one of you who my mother was closest to?” Brandon said.
“You mean romantically? Well, I’d say she and Ketch really hit it off. He was a big, strong, handsome guy. A little older than us. He’d sailed all over the world. Lived for a couple of years in Cape Town, on the boat in the harbor. Malaysia, Indonesia. He was like something out of a movie, you know?”
“How did he support himself?” Mia said. “Boats like that cost a lot of money to keep up, don’t they?”
“Oh, yeah. But we’d work when we put in somewhere. Cleaning fish, washing dishes.”
“This guy Ketch washed dishes?” Brandon said.
“No, that was me and Timbo. Ketch, you know the same uncle who left him Black Magic? He left him a nice fat trust fund. He was always calling his bank in California, having them wire money.”
“So he never had a job?” Irina said.
“He used to say his job was to keep the boat shipshape and live up to his uncle’s expectations. Ketch said he was never going to grow up, not that way.”
Brandon could picture his bartending mom falling for this tanned adventurer. He reached into his pocket and took out the photograph. Handed it over to Lucky.
“My God,” he said, studying the photo. “There we all are.”
And then Lucky’s eyes began to moisten and he wiped at them with his fingers.
“I’m sorry. It’s just that … that they were all good friends. And Brandon, I’m very sorry about your mom. How old were you? Four?”
Brandon nodded.
“Like that little boy in the elevator. Such a shame. Such a damned shame.”
Irina reached over and patted Brandon’s arm, the sapphire glinting in the morning sun. Brandon noticed that her arms and hands were strong looking, slightly out of place with her outfit.
“So where were you going from Portland?” Mia asked.
“Well, as Timbo used to say, it was time we commenced a wanderin’. So off we went. It was September, we thought we’d make our way south along the coast. Hurricane season and all. You don’t want to get caught too far offshore.
“So our nominal destination was Key West, then maybe on to Aguadilla, on the west coast of Puerto Rico. Ketch had sailing friends who were gonna winter there and we thought we’d check it out.”
Lucky paused. Looked up from the table to Brandon.
“But really, we didn’t know. Nikki was going to go along for a couple of weeks, fly back from wherever we were at that point. I remember Ketch telling her, ‘Don’t fly back. We’ll just fly Brandon down. No better place for a kid than a boat.’”
“And what did she say to that?” Brandon said.
“She said something like, ‘I can’t just leave my mother all alone.’” There was a long, uncomfortable pause. It was Mia who said, “So you got down to South Carolina?”
“Yeah, we made our way. Stopped in Provincetown. New York City, motored right up the Hudson. Your mother had never seen New York from the water. I remember her sitting on the foredeck, just looking up, amazed.”
“It is a beautiful spectacle, New York at night,” Irina said. “I remember the first time I saw it. It was like a whole city of sparkling castles.”
“And then where?” Brandon said.
“A week to Charleston. Put in there to resupply for the rest of the trip. Only stayed three days.”
He paused. Finished his espresso. There was no need to ask the question.
“When they left, I stayed behind. I met a woman in a bar. I thought I was in love. Not sure that was the case. Maybe I just wanted to do what Ketch had done, you know? Find the girl of my dreams.”
“Is that what my mother was to him?” Brandon said.
“I think so,” Lucky said. “I remember we were sailing between Cape Cod and New York and we were both on watch, Nikki and Timbo sleeping. Ketch said, ‘You never know when two souls will join.’ He talked like that sometimes. Sounds weird, but it wasn’t, coming from him. I think he was talking about your mom.”
Another pause. Lucky looked out the window at the bay, spoke without turning back.
“So I leave the woman, big tearful goodbye. Get down to the dock, but Ketch has sailed. Always late, I guess Ketch decided to teach me a lesson. I walk out to the highway, start hitching down Route 17 for Beaufort ’cause Ketch said he was gonna put in there for a night, check out the history. Ketch loved the historical places.”
“I like history,” Brandon said.
“Hey, you would’ve hit it off with him. I mean I was pissed at him that day, but really a great guy. Interesting, always thinking. You’d be looking out at the ocean, cruising way offshore, and Ketch would say, ‘You know how Galileo figured it out?’”
Irina looked impatient, like she didn’t like where the story was going.
“Figured what out?” she said.
“That the earth revolved around the sun,” Lucky said.
“How did he?” Mia said.
“I don’t remember, but Ketch knew all about it. I think he loved sailing, loved being on the ocean, but mostly I think it gave him time to think.”
“What did he talk to my mom about?” Brandon said. “I don’t remember anyone saying she was much for history or that sort of thing.”
“Oh, they’d kid back and forth. She made him laugh, kind of took him off his high horse ’cause he could be pretty serious sometimes. She’d imitate him, stand there by the wheel and stare off into the distance and say, ‘Do you know why they call that bird a twit? Did you know the Figeroans could sail three thousand miles on a boat made of poison-ivy leaves?’ We’d just crack up. Ketch would try not to, but he couldn’t help it.”
Brandon smiled. That sounded like the Nikki he knew. Nessa said it was impossible to stay mad at her when she was little, she was so funny.
Lucky took a deep breath.
“I figured I’d be there at the dock when they put in, jump on just like I missed the bus. So I hung out, but they didn’t show up the next day. I stayed in this dive hotel, went down to the docks every day. Nothing the next day, either. Only about forty miles from Charleston to Beaufort.”
Part of Brandon didn’t want to hear it, this account of his mother’s death. But he had to hear it, had to hear this, the closest thing to a witness.
“I wait. Another day goes by. That night I call the Coast Guard, report Black Magic as overdue. I’m thinking they must’ve changed their minds, blew on through. But then a fisherman reports picking up a life jacket off Kiawah Island. Then a chunk of the dinghy washes up, flotation attached to it. What I think happened is they went four, five miles offshore that first night, swung southwest, got hit by a freighter or a tanker. ’Cause there was no mayday, no nothing. That happens, you get hit at night.”
Lucky paused. Looked at Brandon.
“There’s no time.”
The table was silent, the view of the bay paled in that moment.
“So what did you do?” Brandon said.
“I was in some bar when it came on the news. So I just started walking. Got a ride to the highway, hitched up to Columbia. South Carolina, I mean. Didn’t matter where anybody was going, I just went there, too. Caught the I-20 and went west. Wanted to be as far from that ocean as I could get.”
“Where’d you end up?” Mia said.
“Oh, jeez. Santa Fe, for a while. Then a little town called Jero
me in the mountains in northern Arizona. Just hid out. Stayed drunk and stoned most of the time, completely numb. I mean, these were my best friends in the world. Your mom, too, in a way.”
Lucky took a deep breath, let it out as a sigh. “I’m sorry, Brandon. I’m very, very sorry for your loss.”
“Thanks,” Brandon said.
“She was a great person, I can attest to that. Sweet and full of energy, like I said. And she was happy on that trip. Just effervescent.”
Irina looked at Brandon, smiled.
“But now you’re back,” Brandon said.
“Love affair with the sea, I guess,” Lucky said, giving a little snort. “Got in the investment business with these guys from Sedona. Didn’t set foot on a boat for ten years. Then I met a woman—not Irina, sorry honey— and she talked me into getting out on the water again. We did a couple of bareboat charters in the Caribbean, out of St. Thomas. That ended, the relationship, I mean, but it got me back on the water. Now it’s Irina’s turn to get a taste of it. That’s why we’re here.”
“You chartered a boat?” Mia said.
“Not yet. Just started looking.”
“What are you looking to do?” Brandon said.
“Just mosey up the coast. Nice and easy, stay inshore where we can grab a mooring. A nice easy sail. Get some sun. Lobster and white wine at the end of the day.”
“What size boat?”
“Bigger than two people need,” Lucky said. “I want something forty, maybe a little bigger. Hey, who knows if we’ll be talking by the time we get back. Might need some room.”
He grinned at Irina. Tapped her arm.
“Just kidding, babe.”
“I know of a boat that’s available,” Brandon said.
“You do?” Irina said.
“I work in a marina.”
He pointed across the harbor to South Portland, masts showing like trees in a flooded forest.
“One of our owners has a 46-foot Condor he wants to charter out.”
“Really,” Lucky said.
“How long you want it?”
“A week to start. We have a good time, take it again, maybe.”
“It’s three thousand a week,” Brandon said.