Landfall: Islands in the Aftermath

by Scott B. Williams

  Tara wasn’t going to like it, but Larry was determined to take the careful and smart approach even if it cost them several extra hours. With this in mind, he studied his Bahamas charts in the gradually increasing daylight and considered the options for making his landfall. The main anchorage at Staniel Cay was definitely out of the question. The sizable town ashore there probably already had its share of problems, and he had no way of knowing how the local authorities may have responded or if there were even any present at all.

  A short distance to the south there was a better option. Bitter Guana Cay was uninhabited (at least in normal times, though maybe not now) and there was a semi-protected anchorage near the beach on the west side. He felt okay about sailing there, but would approach with caution and an eye out for the masts of other vessels that might already be there. If he could find someplace reasonably remote to secure the boat, he had an idea of what he would do next to find Russell and the Sarah J. It was going to take a little bit of work to get ready, and he was certain too he would catch some flak from Artie and the rest of the crew, not to mention Tara, when he laid out his plan. He already knew how Artie felt about splitting up, but dammit, sometimes these things just couldn’t be helped.

  Nineteen

  WHEN REBECCA FIRST REALIZED something strange was going on, she thought it was some kind of a joke. She had been reading in her bunk to pass the time while her mom and the others worked on the catamaran, and the last thing she expected was to see the weird guy that had been living on the island suddenly aboard their boat. When he closed the hatch over her head, she was sure that he was just messing with her and that he would open it right back up. But when she asked him what he was doing, he said he was going for a sail. That didn’t make a bit of sense because she knew there was still a lot of work to be done on the other boat before they could go anywhere.

  She tried pushing the hatch up but he was standing on it and wouldn’t budge. He wouldn’t move either, even when she yelled at him to get off of it and open it up. When she tried to open the door and go out into the main cabin, she discovered that it wouldn’t open either. Pushing on it with all her might, Rebecca was able to open it about an inch; just enough to reveal that it was lashed shut with rope. When she turned back to the hatch, he was still standing on it and pulling a length of rope back and forth over the top of it to lash it shut as well. Why he would keep doing this after she told him to stop, and why he didn’t want her to get out of her cabin, she did not understand. If it were a game, some of the others would be in on it too, but when she called out to Casey and Jessica and Grant to see if any of them were aboard with him, no one answered.

  Despite that, she was still convinced it had to be some kind of joke until she heard the clanking of the anchor windlass over her cabin at the bow. She could see enough through the hatch to see Russell bent over it, working away with the long handle to crank in the rode. The slow rattle of chain falling down the hawse pipe and piling up in the chain locker was unmistakable proof that he was weighing anchor. Had her mom or Captain Larry really asked him to move the boat closer to the beach or something? Was he just doing that and having a little fun at her expense by joking around in the process? It was possible, but he had said going sailing, not just moving the boat. She didn’t believe for a minute that her mom would let a stranger like him take the Sarah J. out for a sail, especially not with her alone on board with him. She felt the boat slowly moving forward in the direction of the anchor and tried desperately to see what was going on.

  There were two small port lights in her cabin, one on the starboard side and one to port. She could see out of both of them, but since they were so small her field of view was limited to what was directly abeam of the boat on either side. Since the boat was being pulled up to the anchor, which was dead to windward and away from the island, she couldn’t see in the direction of the beach where her mom had landed the dinghy. All she could see was open water to starboard and the far end of the island to port.

  She tried kicking the door to see if she could break her way out but the rope he’d tied it shut with gave enough with each blow to absorb most of the impact. She knew it was a solid door and she could see enough of the rope to know it was the good kind, the same kind used for all the running rigging that controlled the sails. There was no way the rope was going to break and she didn’t have anything in her cabin with which to cut it. If she had her shoes she thought she might be able to break the wood itself, but she’d left them on the cabin sole on the other side of the door and kicking it with her bare feet was too painful to keep up for long.

  When the sound of the windlass stopped and all the chain was aboard, she could hear Russell running back and forth across the deck, working to get the sails up. A few minutes later, she heard the sails flapping in the wind and felt the boat heel over and begin moving. He really was taking the boat sailing, but where to and why? Her yelling of these questions got her no answers, but she could hear the sound of water rushing past the hull as the boat picked up speed.

  The next thing she heard was the sudden crack of a rifle fired from so close that it made her ears ring. She knew then that something really bad was happening. Russell was stealing the Sarah J. and her mom and some of the others on the island must have seen what was going on. Now he was shooting at them!

  “MOM!” she screamed at the top of her lungs, as the shooting continued. She counted five shots before it stopped but she kept up her screaming until he answered.

  “Nobody got shot!” he yelled back at her. “They turned around and went back to the beach. Just chill out and relax. I’m not going to shoot anybody and I’m not going to hurt you!”

  Rebecca didn’t know whether to believe him or not. She had her faced pressed to the port light and now Russell had changed course enough that she could see. The dinghy was drifting several hundred yards from the island and she could see there were three people in it, one she was sure was her mom. She watched as one of them began rowing and saw it moving slowly back towards the beach. She couldn’t be sure, but it didn’t look like any of them were hurt. She had not heard any other shots other than the five Russell had fired, and was kind of surprised no one had shot back at him. She thought that maybe Larry and whoever was in the dinghy with him and her mom didn’t have a gun with him or that they were simply too far away. Whatever the reason, it was too late now, and it was obvious that they weren’t going to be able to catch up to the Sarah J. She knew the catamaran was in no condition to sail and she wondered what was going to happen to her now if Russell didn’t turn around and take her back to the island. She assumed he was taking the boat because he wanted to get off the island after all that time he was stuck there, and he didn’t want to go to Florida with Larry, but why was he taking her with him? Was it just because she was already on board? Did he think he needed her for a hostage or something? Or did he have something even worse in mind for her?

  Rebecca had not paid much attention to Russell since he’d surprised them all by walking to their end of the island that morning. He’d been hanging around the catamaran ever since, but he’d not been aboard the Sarah J., nor did he seem all that interested in it. She knew he was getting on Larry’s nerves and that he’d been bothering Jessica with his constant leering at her. Grant had put him in his place over that and Larry had said no to his continued pestering as he begged to join them as part of the crew when they eventually left to go wherever they were going. Even though Rebecca had little interaction with him, from what she had seen and what her mother and Casey and Jessica said, Russell was a stoner and a drunk looking to get by doing as little as possible. Her mom said he didn’t get that way just since the blackout either. It was a way of life for him and probably all he’d ever done.

  Larry offered to take him to Florida, but that wasn’t good enough. So now he’d stolen her grandpa’s boat and taken her along for the ride. She kicked the door again as hard as she could in frustration, wincing at the shock of the impact transmitted through her
bare heel. She wasn’t going to be able to get out of there on her own, and he continued to ignore her pleading to let her out. Rebecca yelled so much it hurt her throat, then she curled up and began to sob.

  Why were so many bad things happening to her? All she’d wanted to do was simply stay home in Gulfport and go to school with her friends like every other normal person she knew. Why did the lights and phones and everything else go out and make them have to leave home on a stupid sailboat? When they met Larry and the others on the catamaran, it was even worse, because he convinced her mom they had to sail all the way to the Bahamas to find someplace safe. She had wanted off the boat so bad she’d decided it wasn’t worth living any more if life was going to be like that.

  But she’d made a terrible mistake. Leaving the boat and being out there on the dark, scary ocean at night was a lot different than she thought it would be. She was floating on the kayak, and though she wanted to drown, she couldn’t bring herself to slip over the side and let it happen. It was going to be all together too slow and too frightening. So she clung to the tiny plastic boat even after the wind tore the paddle out of her hands and the hours passed by with no end to the terrible night in sight.

  Captain Larry had found her in spite of the conditions and after her rescue he gave her renewed hope and convinced her that life was worth living after all. But now this had happened despite what he said. He’d been wrong about it being safe in the Bahamas because now after all she’d been through, she was taken captive by a stranger who lied to Captain Larry and her mom and everybody else. There was no telling where he was taking her and no telling what he would do next. He would probably kill her if she didn’t do everything he told her to, and there was no way she would because she knew what that would probably be. She’d rather kill herself than let that happen, even though she’d promised herself she would never think that way again after her failed attempt to drown in the Gulf.

  As she lay there crying, with these thoughts running through her head, she could tell by the motion and the sounds that the boat was sailing at a steady speed, taking her far away from those who loved her and could help her. The light streaming in through the Lexan hatch and ports eventually changed to the reddish color that told her it was nearly sunset, and finally Russell stopped the boat, taking the sails down to let it drift. She knew he was eating because he’d offered her food, but she didn’t want anything from him. Darkness fell and he started the engine, even though she told him that Larry said it was broken.

  It seemed to be running fine anyway, and the longer she heard its relentless throbbing, pushing the boat on and on into the night, the more desperate she became. How would anyone ever find her now? If the motor kept working, Russell could take her so far away they wouldn’t even know where to look. Rebecca decided right then and there that she had to do something to save herself. She couldn’t depend on Captain Larry to do it this time. She knew that what she had to do was take the boat back from this pirate who’d stolen it. She thought and thought as she lay there, coming up with all kinds of crazy schemes, but none of them seemed possible. As the hours passed, she finally had to go to the bathroom so bad that when Russell shut the engine off to sail for a while, she begged him to open the door so she could. After all her thinking and planning, the best idea that she could come up with was to simply trick him into thinking she would go along with him. It was the only way, as she was too small to fight him and overpower him, even if he didn’t have the gun he’d fired to make her mom and Captain Larry turn back. She would play along, pretending to accept her fate, and when the time was right, she would do what she had to do.

  Twenty

  SCULLY HAD KEPT A reef in Intrepida’s mainsail through the night, even long after the thunderstorms that had given them a thrashing had cleared out the wind dropped. The boat was slow even under full sail, but he wanted to sail slower still as they neared the dark coast of Andros Island in the dark. There were plenty of shoals and reefs close to the island to worry about, so he was content to sail at four knots until daybreak. Thomas was asleep on the leeward cockpit bench and Mindy was curled up down below. Both of them had been terrified during the storms, but after the weather passed their worries went away and getting no sleep the previous night when they were attacked, they both passed out in a deep slumber.

  Scully watched the kayak trailing behind on the towline as he sat there at the helm, fighting his own drowsiness. Looking at it clipping along in the wake, he knew that if he were paddling he would be going even slower than this little 17-footer under reduced sail. He would not have been able to take a break of any length while crossing the Gulf Stream current and he would likely be completely exhausted by the time he made it to this side, if he ever did. It was a good decision to help the American couple, saving him from a major expedition he might not survive.

  When dawn came and the coast of Andros was in sight, Scully’s next task was figuring out exactly what part of the huge island he was looking at. Andros stretched nearly a hundred miles from north to south, but the convoluted shoreline and its shallow bights that cut across it made for many more hundreds of miles of coastline. As he spread Thomas’ Bahamas chart book out in the cockpit and studied the area, Scully considered all the feasible routes. According to what Larry had said, it was even possible to cut across the big island by sailing the bights, if one had a shallow draft boat such as the Casey Nicole or Intrepida. But as tempting as such a short cut might be, Scully didn’t think it was worth the risk. The creeks and estuaries were mostly uninhabited, but there were small villages that such a route would take them quite close to. And he knew that many islanders by now might have relocated to isolated places like the bights to find better fishing and safety from the violence that now pervaded human settlements both large and small.

  That left the other two options: going north, in the direction away from where they needed to go to sail around that end of Andros to reach the established routes that led down island, or following the coastline south until they were clear of it and then beating to weather to make the required southeasterly heading. Looking at the chart, Scully could see that either way would require extensive sailing to weather, it was just a matter of where they were starting from that would determine which made more sense.

  He closed on the coast while comparing what saw before him to the charts, and then after finding a channel marker to confirm it, determined their position to be just south of Gold Cay, the westernmost point of the island. They had done well on the crossing and managed to avoid being swept farther north than necessary. Thomas woke as Scully sailed closer to land, the morning sun on his face becoming too bright and too warm to ignore any longer. Mindy soon came on deck as well, and both of them were visibly thrilled to be in the Bahamas and close to land.

  “So that’s Andros?”

  “Yes, mon. Biggest island in all de Bahamas.”

  “There’s nothing there,” Mindy said.

  “I’ve heard it’s mostly wild,” Thomas said, “just a few small settlements, but nothing like the more popular tourist islands over here.”

  “It might be a safe place to stay for a while then. Look how clear the water is here! It’s amazing! Even clearer than it was at the Dry Tortugas. I’ll bet there’s plenty of fish to catch!”

  “De fishin’ good all in de Bahamas.” Scully said.

  “Then if we could find a good little hidden place to anchor, we could stay!”

  “You know we can’t do that, Mindy. We promised Scully we’d give him a ride to the Jumentos Cays in exchange for helping us get to the islands.”

  Scully studied Mindy’s face as she considered this. He didn’t know if she was having serious second thoughts or not. If so, he would gladly leave them here if that’s what they wanted and go on in the kayak. It was still a long way to the Jumentos, but he was closer now than he was before he met them. He could make it, he was sure, but he was glad it didn’t come to that.

  “No, I know we can’t really stay. Of cours
e we have to take Scully where we promised. It’s just wishful thinking, that’s all. It’s so beautiful here, and I was so scared out there in those storms yesterday. I just want to be somewhere quiet and peaceful like this.”

  “It’s gonna be de same where we goin’, and maybe better. Dat Larry he know de best place in de island to go. Not to worry so much.”

  “So how do we get there from here?” Thomas wanted to know.

  Scully pointed out where they were on the chart and then showed him and Mindy the options. He said he thought it made sense to turn south and follow the coast as closely as they could. They would be sailing in mostly smooth waters in the lee of the island, but far enough out to avoid the shallows and to find a good breeze. They could roughly parallel the coast until they cleared the south end and then it would be an open water passage across the banks to the Jumentos.

  * * *

  Because of its shallow draft and small size, the Montgomery 17 was the perfect vessel in which to sail down west coast of Andros. Twice along the way, they entered into shallow tidal estuaries where there was nothing around them but sand and scrub forest. These remote anchorages made it possible to catch up on their sleep, and each evening they caught enough fish to have a filling meal on the beach. Although there was no sign of human presence, Scully slept in the cockpit with the AK-47 in easy reach.

  During the daylight hours as they sailed the length of the island, they saw several small boats in the distance, most powered by sails or small outboards. Scully could tell they were local native craft, and according to Larry, the inhabitants of Andros had a reputation as skilled wooden boat builders. The people in the boats they saw were all occupied with fishing; none of them seemed threatening, but Scully steered well clear of them all so that they had no close encounters.