Gulf Coast Girl

by Charles Williams

  I was about to call Barclay to take the tiller so I could light the running lights when Shannon came up through the hatch. After I’d shown her briefly how to handle it, she took over while I attended to them.

  When I came back she slid forward and sat there near enough to touch, but not touching, saying nothing. Sunset was a bad time of day if you had trouble, but I could sense she didn’t want any help with it, at least not yet. There was an odd awkwardness between us. It would go away after a while, but until it did there was nothing we could do about it. I tried imagining that this was the Java Sea and we were alone aboard, two people who had forgotten the rest of the world and had been forgotten by it. For a moment it was very real, and the longing was almost unbearable.

  There was just enough light in the afterglow to see her face, and when I looked around again she was crying. She was doing it quite silently with her head tilted back a little and not trying to put her hands up to her face or wipe away the tears or anything. The crying just welled up in her and overflowed.

  “I’m sorry, Bill,” she said after a while. “This will be the last time. I got to thinking of him all alone there in that big house, with it getting d-dark outside. He was afraid of the dark. For months he was terrified of it. B-But always before I was there with him—”

  He was leaning on her. She held him up and kept the sawdust from leaking out while he planned to double-cross her and leave her. And when it blew up in his face he went back and leaned on her some more. I didn’t feel anything for him, nor care a damn if it did get dark outside, but it was a gruesome picture if you couldn’t keep your mind off it—a dead man lying there alone in all that Swedish modern with one bridge lamp burning day in and day out and a phonograph still going if it hadn’t shut itself off. He probably wouldn’t be found for over 24 hours yet. She’d said Tuesday and Friday were the days the maid came. When they did, they’d pick up her car out at the airport almost immediately and know they had it made, all except finding her.

  There was nothing I could do. I let her cry. It was a helpless feeling.

  After a while she got it under control, and she said quietly, “I wonder why nothing is ever simple and clear-cut. Why can’t things be completely black or completely white, instead of all mixed up? What he did amounted to deliberate betrayal; so that should make it easy, shouldn’t it? There’s your nice, pat answer. It’s routine. It’s a cliché. She was in love with him, but he wasn’t in love with her. That’s fine, except it was the other way around. He was a heel. That’s simple and easy, except it wasn’t true.”

  I waited, saying nothing. She was trying to tell me about it, or maybe trying to straighten it out in her own mind, and she didn’t want me mixed up in it. Not yet, anyway. She was talking to a psychiatrist, or a priest, or to herself.

  “He was driven to it. It’s easy to say it was his own fault, that he was old enough to know it was wrong, and that he began it deliberately. But people have been tempted by easy money before, and it’ll go on happening as long as you have people and have money. What I’m trying to say is that in the beginning there was no question of running out on me. Maybe he even thought he was doing it partly tor me. He liked to give me things. Expensive things.

  “You don’t dive or fall into something like that all at once. It’s gradual. It was simple at first, and then it failed and it was more difficult, and in the end it was an obsession. And he was afraid. There’s no way I can make you understand fear like that, probably, because it’s something the human race has forgotten. Being hunted, I mean. It’s been too long. It’s an individual experience now, and you have to go through it yourself to know what it’s like.

  “So that brings us to another easy answer. All he had to do was forget the stupid diamonds and get word to Barclay where they were so they’d go recover them and quit trailing him. And all a heroin addict has to do is make a New Year’s resolution and quit. And how did he know they’d stop trying to kill him even if they got them back? He’d stolen from them, hadn’t he?

  “So in the end he was driven into a corner and he knew the only way he would ever be free of them was to make them think he was dead. And to make it convincing he had to leave me and let me think he was dead, too. Send me out as a decoy. Sacrifice me, or something. So condemn him. But before you do, try to remember that he was already beginning to break. The carrousel was whirling like a centrifuge now, and he was no longer the same man who’d got on back there when it was a children’s ride.

  “I wasn’t in love with him—not the way I know it can be. I liked him, and I admired lots of things about him, and he was wonderful to me and I owed him everything. But that’s not love, is it? So when I learned what he’d done, or tried to do, all I had to do was walk out. Wasn’t it? You see? Simple again.

  “Listen, Bill. My father was a vaudeville-skit Irishman, with all the props. He was little and pugnacious and he got into fights and he was lovable. He worked on the docks when he wasn’t in trouble with the union bosses or drunk or in jail for disturbing the peace. We never had anything. I didn’t finish high school. I was a big, awkward, slangy, sexy-looking blonde who didn’t have anywhere to go except bad. I couldn’t speak English, and I didn’t know how to walk or wear clothes or have the taste to buy them if I’d had the money to do it with. When I met him I was twenty and working in a night-club chorus. I couldn’t dance and I couldn’t sing, but there was a lot of me to look at in the costumes we wore, so nobody complained. He asked me to marry him, and I did, realizing it probably wouldn’t happen twice in one lifetime. I mean that anybody that nice, with taste and discrimination, would fall in love with what amounted to just a lot of bare skin, even if it was smooth.

  “He came from a very nice family; his grandfather had been a United States Senator. He wasn’t particularly rich, but he had a good job. He was fifteen years older than I was, but it didn’t matter. It wasn’t that sort of thing at all. He was wonderful to me. I’m still a big, sexy-looking blonde, and I’ll never know anything startling, but if I’m not as awkward and slangy and brassy as I was at twenty I owe it all to him. He had a knack for teaching me things without hurting my feelings or making me feel he was ashamed of me.

  “In a lot of ways he was a very gentle person, Bill. He was nice, until that fear started eating him up. He’d never told me a lie before. I thought he was entitled to one. So I stayed.”

  She stopped and sat with her head tilted back a little, looking at the sky. Then she said quietly, “So I ruined everything for you.”

  “No,” I said. “I would have come, anyway, even if you’d telephoned me. And nothing’s ruined. We’ll get away.”

  She shook her head, still not looking at me. “I’ve been doing this a little longer than you have. There’s no escape.”

  Fourteen

  The breeze held steady out of the northeast, day after day, and the miles ran behind us. I’d bought time for us, but I hadn’t bought much, and every day’s run was bringing us nearer the showdown. I knew what would happen when we got down there and couldn’t find any shoal. Something had to happen before then; we had to get a break. But days passed and we didn’t. I watched them. I studied the pattern of their movements, looking for the flaw in their complete mastery of the situation, but there was none. When one was asleep the other was watching me, never letting me get too near. And there was always Shannon Macaulay. They had me tied, and they knew it. It was unique, a masterpiece in its own way; we were at sea in a 36-foot sloop, so all four of us had to be sitting right on top of the explosion if it came. I couldn’t hide her or get her out of the way.

  Shannon was silent for long periods when she sat in the cockpit with me on the night watches. The wall of reserve was still there between us. Perhaps it was because of the others there, never more than twenty feet away, or perhaps it was Macaulay, or both, but I could sense she wanted to be left alone.

  When Barclay had the helm, from midnight to six, I slept in the cockpit—when I slept at all. Most of the time I lay aw
ake looking up at the swing of the masthead against the sky while my thoughts went around in the same hopeless circle. There had to be a way to beat them. But how?

  It was noon the fourth day out of Sanport. I had taken a sight and was working out our position at the chart table in the cabin. Barclay was at the helm, and Barfield lounged shirtless and whiskery on the other settee, eating an apple. Shannon stood near the curtain, watching me silently to see where I put us at noon. She realized what those little crosses meant, marching across the chart. They were steps, going to nowhere.

  I was nearly finished with my figures when Barfield tossed the apple core out through the hatch and leaned forward. “How about it, Admiral Drake?” he asked. “When do we get there?”

  I glanced at the chart, about to mark the position on it, and then paused. An idea was beginning to nudge me. We wouldn’t pass near enough to Scorpion Reef to sight it, so they had to take my word as to where we were. Barclay knew approximately, of course, because he checked the compass headings against each day’s position, but he had to accept my figures for the distance run.

  I was thinking swiftly. It might work.

  Twenty or twenty-five miles beyond the point where Macaulay was supposed to have crashed lay the beginnings of the Northern Shelves. If there was a shoal or reef in a hundred miles it would be out there. The chances were a thousand to one that it was somewhere in that vast shallow area that he had actually gone into the drink, even though they were about a hundred billion to one against our ever finding where. So if I put us out there when they thought we were on the location she had given me—We might find a shoal. And any shoal would do. “Oh,” I said to Barfield, as if I had just remembered his question. “Have it in a minute.”

  I set the little cross down 15 miles to the westward and a little north of our actual position and tore up my work sheet. Subtract ten miles tomorrow noon and I’d have it made without exciting Barclay’s suspicions. We’d be twenty-five miles ahead of where Barclay thought we were, right in that shoal area of the Northern Shelves when he thought we were 50 miles north-northeast of Scorpion Reef, the position Macaulay had given her. We would also run through Macaulay’s position in getting there, so we’d have two chances instead of one of finding something. Taking up the dividers, I stepped off the distance. “Let’s see, this is Wednesday. Sometime Friday afternoon, if this breeze holds.”

  He nodded and went on deck to tell Barclay. Shannon was watching me. “That means,” she said quietly, “that by Saturday night or Sunday, if we don’t find anything, the animals will be growing ugly.”

  I started to tell her what I was doing. The words were almost out of my mouth when I stopped. I couldn’t. The object of the whole thing was to get her off the boat, and if she knew why I wanted her off she wouldn’t go. She’d have some foolish idea about not letting me face it alone, and I’d never convince her that alone was the only way I had a chance.

  I looked down at the chart. “Maybe we’ll find the shoal,” I said.

  “If we don’t, I’m going to jump. Don’t come after me.”

  I had to say something. “No,” I said. “When they start it, climb on Barfield. Just hang on. Bite him. Anything. I’ll try to get to Barclay. He’ll have the guns.”

  It was a stall, and I knew it. They’d slug me and tie me up before they started to work on her. But maybe she hadn’t figured that out and it might give her something to live with.

  * * *

  I worked star sights at dusk, and again just at dawn Thursday, checking our leeward drift and course made, trying to pinpoint our position as closely as possible. At noon I dropped our ostensible position back the other ten miles.

  Barclay apparently suspected nothing. He merely nodded, seemingly satisfied with all the effort I was making to put us over the right spot.

  Friday morning was clear again, and the breeze was dropping a little. I took a series of star sights just at dawn and worked them out while Barclay took the helm. Barfield smoked a cigarette and watched me, surly at having been awakened so I could come down into the cabin.

  My sights checked out within a mile of each other. We were right on the nose, 45 miles northeast of Scorpion Reef. I marked the position on the chart as being 20 miles northeast, and went on deck.

  “We’re far enough south,” I said, “but still setting too far to the westward. Have to come a little north of east.”

  “I don’t think she’ll sail that close to it,” Barclay said. “Have to tack.”

  I took the helm, relieving him, and we came about on the starboard tack. It was lucky, I thought; we’d cover that whole area pretty thoroughly beating up against the wind. The sun was coming up now. Barclay went below, and I heard him telling Barfield to start making some coffee.

  It was a beautiful morning. A very light sea was running, not breaking now in the gentle breeze. The deck was wet with dew. I lit a cigarette and kept watching the horizon, looking for white water. It was the same unbroken blue as far as the eye could see, with not even a tinge of shoal-water green. But it was all right. We had two chances this way, instead of one, and I didn’t really expect to find anything around here. Macaulay had been completely haywire in his reckoning. By late afternoon, when they thought we were arriving on Macaulay’s position, we’d be on the edge of the Northern Shelves and in much shallower water. The chances should be reasonably good for seeing surf somewhere. And when we did, the odds might swing, ever so slightly, in our favor.

  Shannon came up from the cabin and brought me a cup of coffee, carrying another for herself. Her face was pale, and she was very quiet. It would be even worse for her, I thought, if she realized that this empty blue expanse of water we were tacking across right now was the position Macaulay had given her.

  We beat slowly to the eastward. At noon I worked out another sight. We were already beyond the area Macaulay had thought he’d gone down in. I put our position on the chart twenty miles to the westward.

  “Sometime this afternoon,” I told Barclay. “Or early tonight. Depends on the wind.”

  He merely nodded. He was growing quieter now, colder than ever, and unapproachable. You could feel the tenseness in the air. We had to sight something, and soon.

  The breeze kept threatening to die altogether, but held on, dead ahead. We tacked, and kept on tacking. When I wasn’t being watched I experimented to see how close to the wind I could sail her, and she was a dream, but I didn’t hold her there. I wanted to cover as much water on each side of our course as possible.

  The afternoon wore on and sunset flamed, and we saw nothing. Barfield’s face was ugly as he watched her now, and several times I saw him glance questioningly at Barclay. We were all in the cockpit. I had the tiller.

  “Listen,” I said harshly. “Both of you. Try to get it through your heads. We’re not looking for the corner of Third and Main. There are no street signs out here. We’re in the general area. But Macaulay could have been out ten miles in his reckoning. My figures could be from two to five miles out in any direction. Error adds up.”

  He was listening, his face expressionless.

  I went on. I had to make them see. “When Macaulay crashed, there was a heavy sea running. There’s not much now but a light ground swell. There could have been surf piled up that day high enough to see it five miles away, and now you might think it was just a tide rip. We’ve got to crisscross the whole area, back and forth. It may take two days, or even longer.”

  Barclay studied me thoughtfully. “Don’t take too long.”

  It was dusk. We came about and headed due north. Three hours later we came up into the wind and beat our way eastward again for an hour, and then ran south. Nobody said anything. We listened constantly for surf and strained our eyes into the darkness. The hours went by.

  I was growing desperate. Our only chance lay in making them think we had found the place. Their vigilance would slacken a little. If we actually found a reef, any reef, and started dragging and diving I could ask for help. We had two aq
ualungs. If Barfield went over with me I could come back on some pretext and I’d have only Barclay to contend with. If she went over, I’d have her out of the way, so I could make a bid for one of those guns. Anything to get the four of us split up.

  We ran south until after midnight, beat our way east a few miles, and swung back to the northward again. It went on all night. There was no sound of surf, no white relieving the darkness of the horizon. Dawn came. The sea was empty and blue as far as the eye could see.

  The breeze died completely and we lay becalmed, the sails slatting. We lowered them.

  “Start the auxiliary,” Barclay said.

  “We’ll need the gasoline to drag with,” I protested, “when we find the reef.”

  “Might I point out that we don’t appear to have found any reef,” he said icily. “Start the engine.”

  I started it. The sun came up. We went on. The strain was bad now. You could feel it there in the cockpit.

  Barclay took the glasses and stood up, scanning the horizon all the way around. Then he said, “Perhaps you’d better make some coffee, George.”

  Barfield grunted and went below. In a few minutes Barclay followed him. I could hear the low sound of their voices in the cabin. She sat across from me in the cockpit, her face stamped with weariness. When she saw me looking at her, she tried to. smile.

  The voices in the cabin stopped. I slipped a lashing on the tiller and stood up, easing my way softly to the forward end of the cockpit. I could see them below me, inside the cabin. Time had run out on us at last.

  Barfield had taken a coil of line from under one of the settees and was cutting a section from it with his pocket-knife. He cut off another, shorter piece. I saw Barclay hand him one of the guns.