Jet could hear voices calling from the deck far above but couldn’t make out the words. The Saga no longer answered her tiller. Water was coming out of the hold covers and filling the space where Jet stood. Someone lowered a bright yellow rope from the deck of the Global Prosperity, but it was beyond her reach. The thrum of the ship’s propellers grew louder as she came closer to the stern.
Jet had seen ship propellers at the Maritime Museum. They were as tall as her house. The waters of the Columbia rose dark and cold in her boat. Could she swim for it? The coast guard wasn’t far, but she didn’t have her rescue beacon anymore. Would they see her? Hear her over the sound of the ship? Was she strong enough to swim clear of the propellers? Jet had never felt less strong in her life. She was amidships now, and she knew the sooner she abandoned the Saga, the better chance she had.
And then she saw the pilot’s ladder, right where it should be. Jet checked the straps on her life jacket. Took one last glance at her boat. Water came over the starboard rail. She kept an eye on the pilot’s ladder. It was about four feet above the waterline. She’d never reach it if she fell in the water. She’d only have one jump. The top of the mast scraped along the side of the container ship, leaving a line on its peeling paint.
“Almost there…,” Jet coached herself.
She’d seen videos of bar pilots making the jump. A pilot boat was huge compared to the Saga. There was a spot on the deck where the pilot stood to wait for the ladder to come in reach. It had special nonskid deck coating and a break in the rail to make it easier. No such luck for her. Jet gripped the port rail, ready to spring. There was a chatter of voices above her. The yellow rope was almost in reach.
Jet took one deep breath, gritted her teeth. She stepped from the port rail to the boom, swung her arms forward, and jumped with all her strength. Her hands found the sides of the ladder a fraction of a second before her chin slammed into the side of the ship. Her feet missed completely. She was dangling by her arms.
Her head throbbed from the bruising. She pulled her knees up and then pressed the soles of her sneakers against the side of the ship. She walked up the side, inching her hands upward until she could get her feet on the lowest rung of the ladder. The yellow rope was right beside her now. Jet looked upward, squinting, to see two faces leaning over the side, calling to her in a language she didn’t understand.
The Saga slid toward the stern of the ship, riding lower in the water every second. Jet watched, mesmerized, as the stern wake pushed it away from the Global Prosperity. Her boat drifted a hundred yards, heeled over, and sank.
KAI SPENT HIS first heart-stopping seconds aboard the Blue Dolphin turning it away from the path of the container ship, away from the bar with its treacherous currents, away from the bitter-cold ocean. He spent the next few seconds trimming the sails. As he scrambled for the new course, he checked off the boat’s working parts. Tiller and mainsheet first—because without them he couldn’t steer—and then the other systems one by one.
The Blue Dolphin was newer than the Saga, but she wasn’t as well kept. Rust in the pulleys made it slow work to turn her sails. On the first tack Kai found the problem. The hiking strap that held the boom at the bottom of the sail in place had broken, probably when the Viking cut them off and they had to make an abrupt turn. The strap was frayed at the edges to begin with, and the stress of the sudden swerve had snapped it.
There was nothing on hand to fix it. And even if there was, Kai needed both hands to sail the boat. He tried to coax the boy out of his curled-up position in the bow so he could hold the tiller steady while Kai fixed the boom. But the kid wouldn’t budge. Wouldn’t talk. Wouldn’t even look at Kai.
Kai promised the boy that his father was safe. Showed him where the coast guard was speeding away with his father on board. Promised that they’d be right behind them.
No response.
Kai sighed and turned his attention to the boat. They could sail with the broken strap, but it would take all his concentration. He trimmed the sails as best he could and headed for the finish line.
Once he got the hang of the new boat, they picked up a little speed, but every time Kai took a tack and the boom swung across the deck, the boy screamed in terror. The sound of it pierced Kai’s heart. He knew the boy was remembering how his dad had been swept overboard—seeing it happen again in that mental movie you get that’s more vivid than life and impossible to look away from. The boy was crouched with his arms wrapped around his knees, shivering.
The Red Cross woman who’d helped Kai at the airport when he was leaving Japan had said, “You’re going to be okay. You’ll be safe now.” At the time the words didn’t reach him, and he’d sat frozen with fear the whole plane ride from Osaka. Some things couldn’t be fixed with words. Kai could only bring the boy home.
They finally reached the finish line, long after the other boats in the race had zipped ahead. The coast guard was standing by. Beck and the boy’s father were waiting for them. Both of them were wrapped in warming blankets and were hovered over by a medic. When the boat touched the dock, the boy leapt into his father’s arms. Cameras flashed all around. The breath Kai didn’t realize he’d been holding whooshed out of him. His hands started to shake. They’d come so close to that container ship. He’d heard the thrum of its engines, felt the vibration of them on his skin, smelled the tang of rusted steel. A few minutes longer, and they would have been lost.
No. He wouldn’t think about that. He’d done the correct thing, and the boy had lived.
And he’d lost the race, he realized, seeing all the other crews congratulate the winning boat. He tied up the Blue Dolphin and made his way toward the winners to do the same. Halfway there a man in a coast guard uniform stopped him.
“Hey there! Crew of the Saga!” he boomed, extending a hand.
“Hello,” Kai said, shaking the man’s hand. “I’m Kai. Kai Ellstrom.”
“I know who you are,” the man said, continuing to pump Kai’s arm. “That was some incredible sailing back there. Grace under pressure. You are the man!”
“Oh, um…yes,” Kai said, a little flustered. “You pulled Beck and the man out of the river. That was amazing. Thank you!”
The Coastie smiled and thumped Kai on the back. “I train to do this stuff full time. You’re the amazing one. Listen—ordinarily my crew and I would buy you a drink.”
Kai blushed furiously.
“How about you come by the station tomorrow and tell us your story?”
He turned Kai around to look at the rescued man talking to reporters. The boy was clinging to his father like he’d never let go.
“That sight just never gets old,” he said. “You’re a lifesaver now, Ellstrom. You’ll always be one of us.” The coast guardsman thumped him on the back one more time and then walked away.
“Bring that cousin of yours along tomorrow,” he called over his shoulder. “Looks like she’s got a story to tell, too.”
Jet! The Saga! Kai had been so focused on saving the kid, he’d forgotten them. He looked back over the racecourse, confident that Jet would be right behind him.
The river was empty of sails.
JET LOCKED HER left arm around the rail of the pilot’s ladder. The river licked at her feet. She grabbed the yellow rope and threaded it through the straps of her life jacket. Using her right hand and her teeth, she made an anchor hitch to secure herself to the lifeline and then worked her way up. It had never been hard to climb the ladder when she was practicing in the barn, but with wet hands and muscles already tired from hours of sailing, her feet slipped, and every motion felt weighed down. Her dad had once described it as running up three flights of fire escape with an outside chance of drowning. It had sounded funny at the time, but now Jet felt every inch of the climb in her hands and shoulders and aching legs.
“One more step,” Jet told herself again and again. Resting a dozen rungs from the top, she turned and looked back. The Saga was gone. The coast guard lifeboat was stopped at the spo
t where Beck had saved the drowning man, and Kai and the rescued kid in the Blue Dolphin were speeding home, sails set wing on wing.
At the top a half-dozen deckhands helped her over the rail. One of them immediately draped her in a woolen blanket. Another untied the lifeline. They were grizzled and wrinkly and missing a few teeth, but Jet had never been happier to see anyone in her life. They spoke to her all at once in what sounded like Arabic. Jet tried out “thank you” in every language she could think of. When she got to “gracias,” she was met with approving nods and smiles. She glanced around for an officer. English was the language of international shipping, so there had to be a few people aboard who spoke it.
“Greetings,” came a voice from among the deckhands. The men parted, and Jet caught sight of a man only slightly taller than herself but wearing an officer’s cap. He was younger than the crew. Jet guessed he would be the second or third mate. He had a medical kit under his arm.
“Are you well?” he asked with a concerned look.
“Yes,” Jet said. She put on a smile. Her head ached, her chin was bleeding, and she was freezing cold, but no way was she going to complain.
“Your face is injured,” the mate said.
Jet put a hand to her chin and felt her rapidly swelling lip.
He took an ice pack out of the medical kit.
“May I present, Miss?” He pulled a handkerchief from his pocket and wrapped the ice pack in it before handing it over.
Jet took the pack and pressed it to her chin. The sting of cold made her eyes water. I made the jump, she thought. I did it! And immediately a picture of Captain Chandler in his wheelchair filled her mind. She could still hear the thrum of the propeller. She could feel it with her feet. It all could have gone differently.
“You are able to walk a little farther?” the mate went on earnestly. “My captain is eager to meet you.”
Jet followed the mate across the deck, past rows of stacked shipping containers, and into the interior of the ship. It was quite a bit farther than Jet thought it would be. She followed him through dim passageways and up more flights of stairs, but it was worth it when she reached the top.
The bridge was a bright room with windows all around, about the size of her school classroom. Every surface was covered with dials and gauges and data screens. There was a chart table and the wheel in the center.
A black man in a captain’s uniform turned away from the chart. “Salaam alaikum,” he said. “Welcome aboard, Miss. I am Captain Amrani.”
Jet wiped the river water off her hand and held it out. “Salaam alaikum. Thank you, Captain.”
She glanced at the crew in the room. The helmsman had his hand on the wheel. Another officer sat in front of a radio. The mate who brought her up stood by the door. The river pilot was at the helm. Jet wondered if she could be arrested for not yielding to a container ship. There were rules on the river. Lots of them. Jet stood up straighter.
“Sir, I apologize for striking your ship and for this unauthorized boarding. It was done in the course of a rescue. There was a man overboard and a little child left alone and unable to sail his boat, only a hundred yards off your port bow. It was all in your blind spot, and there was no one else to help.”
The radioman burst in with an urgent comment in Arabic. The river pilot called out the course as they hugged the curve of the Washington shore between Skamokawa and Three Tree Point.
“I have news you will be glad to hear,” Captain Amrani said. “Your friend is safe. The man he rescued will recover, and the two children in the sailboat are a hundred meters from shore.”
“My cousin,” Jet said, beaming. “Kai Ellstrom. He’s a brilliant sailor!”
“Ellstrom?” The river pilot said with a smile. “He wouldn’t be a relative of Captain Per Ellstrom, now would he?” He directed the helmsman to cross over to the Oregon side of the river.
“Yes, he’s—”
“You’re Jet Ellstrom, aren’t you?” the pilot said without taking his eyes off the river. “I’d know you anywhere.”
“You would?” Jet looked at him more closely, wondering if she’d met him before. River pilots spent more time in Portland than in Astoria, but her dad seemed to know every mariner under the sun.
“Blue eyes and bravado. Yeah, you’re Captain Ellstrom’s girl, all right.” He held out his hand. “Captain Gray.”
They shook, and then Jet took a look at the chart; the paper copy and an electronic one sat side by side. It was just like the one she’d been studying. She pored over the instruments. The compass was obvious, but there were a dozen unfamiliar displays in front of the pilot.
“Wind speed,” he said, tapping a dial in front of him. “Wind direction, radar, engine speed.”
Jet drank it in with eager ears. She asked one question after another. The pilot showed her the fathometer, the gyro compass repeater, and the rudder angle indicator. He explained how the engine order telegraph worked, while the captain continued his conversation on the radio. Eventually the captain came and stood beside the river pilot. “So you are learning to navigate?” Captain Armani said.
Jet nodded eagerly. “That’s my plan!”
“It’s a very long road from where you’re standing to where I’m standing,” the river pilot said.
“I can climb the ladder. That’s a start.”
“A fine start,” Captain Amrani said, beaming. “An even better start would be learning to use the helicopter.”
“What?”
“Much as we welcome your good company here on the Global Prosperity, your parents will wish for your safe return. Although the use of the pilot boat and ladder is customary here in the river, it is my wish that you leave my ship by helicopter. It is safer. The coast guard will retrieve you as part of their rescue operation.”
Jet stared at him, her mouth open, hardly daring to believe it. She thought she’d be an old woman before she even got a chance to ride a helicopter. The mate grinned at her like a little kid.
“This will allow your coast guard to demonstrate a rescue procedure in view of the many spectators at your sailing race today.” Captain Amrani smiled. “I believe cheering will be involved.”
“Oh my gosh!” Jet was breathless. “I would love that—more than anything!”
The river pilot gave the command to turn the Global Prosperity at Tongue Point. When they reached Astoria, the pilot boat pulled alongside. The mate scurried off to bring the bar pilot to the bridge so Captain Gray could hand over the command. A woman in the yellow-and-black jacket of a bar pilot came through the door a few moments later.
“Captain Dempsey!” Jet said.
“Jet Ellstrom, I hear you’ve had a hell of a race today,” Captain Dempsey said.
“Yes, ma’am!”
She greeted Captain Amrani, shook hands with Captain Gray, and then enveloped Jet in a quick hug.
“You know how long I’ve waited to come aboard and find another woman?”
“Um…forever?” Jet said.
“Am I going to see you up on this bridge someday?”
“Working on it.”
“Don’t listen to her, Jet,” Captain Gray said with a smile. “Be a river pilot—all the beauty of the Columbia and a fraction of the danger.”
“I think this one has a heart for danger,” Captain Amrani said.
“You take all that courage, add some knowledge and experience, and you’ll do just fine,” Captain Dempsey said.
“Plenty of time to decide,” Captain Gray added.
“Now about the helicopter,” Captain Dempsey went on. “Are you ready for that?”
Jet bounced on her toes with excitement.
“Listen, if you get scared up there, just look straight up the cable, and do exactly as the surfman tells you. They’ll take good care of you.”
“Good to know,” Jet said, grinning like crazy. She turned to Captain Gray and shook his hand. “Thank you!” she said, pointing to the instruments he’d shown her. “I won’t forget.”
She turned to Captain Amrani. “Sir, thank you for rescuing me. This was awesome!”
“Blessings on your journey, child,” Captain Amrani said.
Jet took one last look around the bridge, promising herself she’d earn her way back there, no matter what it took. She gave Captain Dempsey another quick hug and headed down the stairs with Captain Gray.
A few minutes later Jet stood atop the shipping containers. She could hear the coast guard helicopter almost as soon as it lifted off from Air Station Astoria. It gave Jet goose bumps to see it darting over the river like a big noisy dragonfly. It approached and hovered. The whop-whop of the rotors was so loud it made her teeth rattle, and the wash of air felt like it was going to push her right off the platform. A surfman in orange coveralls and a white helmet was lowered onto the deck. When his feet touched down, he waved Jet over. The noise and pulse of the air made Jet’s heart race.
“Ready for the ride of your life?” the surfman yelled.
He handed her a helmet and pointed up the cable to the helicopter, fifty feet above them. Jet looked up. The helicopter door was open, and she could just see another helmeted head leaning out and looking down the cable.
“Yes!” she shouted. “Yes!” She jumped and threw her hands in the air.
The surfman laughed and snapped her into the harness and helmet. “Ready?”
Jet grabbed hold of the cable and nodded. The yard or two of slack cable that was lying on the deck beside them rose up, and then with a breathtaking lurch, Jet and the surfman lifted off. They spun in circles like bait on a hook, and Jet waved wildly to the crew on the bridge.
The sunlight on the Columbia Bar made the water sparkle as if it were strewn with diamonds. The water was darker blue and smoother in the channels on either side of the bar. From directly above she could see that the bar was like a mountain of sand blocking the path up the river. She’d traced the chart a dozen times already. But seeing the real thing, seeing how small the Global Prosperity looked beside it, a thousand feet long—it looked like a toy compared to the bar that stood in its way. Under Captain Dempsey’s pilotage it was lining up for its crossing. Jet shivered. All those tons of cargo, the lives aboard ship—and nothing but the pilot’s word that safe waters lay ahead. She’d wanted to be on that bridge for so long, she couldn’t remember not wanting it, but today—right this moment—Jet was grateful for the years that would lie between her and her first command.
The Turn of the Tide Page 14