68 Knots

by Michael Robert Evans

  “Ridiculous,” Turner replied. “I gave you a tour of my ship, and I expect you to give me a tour of yours. And when I reach the room where this odd hermit is holed up, I’m going to pop in and introduce myself.”

  He stood up.

  Arthur stood up to his full towering height.

  “You can’t do that,” Arthur said in a dark voice. Shit, he thought. I’m doing it again. Taking charge. Not asking the others for advice or help. Still, there are times when decisive action is—

  “Why the hell not?” Turner asked. “He is on board, isn’t he? He is capable of communicating, isn’t he? He is alive, isn’t he?”

  Dawn stared intently at Arthur. Joy fidgeted with her spoon nervously, rubbing it back and forth across a small span of tablecloth with rapid movements. Arthur put his hand firmly on Turner’s arm.

  “Captain Turner,” he said, looking him straight in the eye. “I’m going to have to ask that you drop the subject. If you are unable to do so, I will ask you and your crew to leave our ship.”

  Turner returned his gaze. “Like hell. Nobody is going to—” Turner began, but the sentence was cut short by a shriek from high overhead.

  Everyone on deck looked up. High in the rigging, faintly visible against the evening sky, were two human shapes—tan, slender, and totally naked. One of the figures leaned off to starboard, crouched, and leapt out into space. She was followed by the other. They knifed headfirst through the cool air, arms outstretched and feet together, and cut through the surface of the water with a pair of crisp splashes.

  “It’s Crystal!” Dawn said.

  “It’s Jim!” Turner said.

  Both crews rushed to the starboard rail. The water was smooth, barely showing a ripple where the two had entered.

  A moment passed in silence. Then a splash and some whooping laughs sounded from the port side, and Crystal and Jim Greenfeather clambered up the ladder and scrambled high into the rigging once again.

  “They swam under the keel!” Arthur said.

  “Good God, he’s lost his mind!” Turner said.

  Crystal and Jim flung themselves back out into the sky, two naked cannonballs laughing for forty feet straight down and crashing into the sea with enormous splashes.

  “My navigator,” Turner said with a tight smile. “Ordinarily, quite a respectable young man.”

  Jim and Crystal swam through the waves in an endless game of tag, tussled with each other amidst splashes and laughter, disappeared beneath the dark waves for long counts, surfacing far away but always near each other. When at last they tired, they climbed the rail, scrambled up the rigging, and dried off in the chilly air before getting dressed. Eventually, they returned to deck.

  “Have fun?” Turner asked coolly.

  “Yes, sir,” Jim answered. He was tall and wiry, and he gave Turner a playful grin. Crystal did the same for Arthur.

  “Nice dive,” Arthur said with a small smile.

  “Thanks,” Crystal said, still catching her breath.

  “Nice dive?” Logan shouted, his cheeks a crimson red. “That’s all you can say? ‘Nice dive’? It was crazy! It totally was suicide! Crystal, you could’ve gotten yourself—”

  Crystal held up a hand. “But I didn’t, did I?” she said. “And taking chances is what it’s all about. But you wouldn’t know about that, would you?”

  Logan’s face went ashen. I’ve just taken a huge step toward making you like me, he thought. Didn’t you notice? Doesn’t that count for anything? He opened his mouth to speak, but then he turned and stormed down the gangway to the dining room below. Ishmael followed hopefully behind, her gray tail held high as she darted down the steps.

  Turner shook his head. “Jim, I must say I’m a bit surprised. I thought you had a more level head on your shoulders.”

  Jim flashed him an icy glare. “It’s as level as it needs to be.”

  “Hey, gang,” Crystal called out to the whole group. “Jim says there’s a band playing in town. At the Crustacean Lounge or something.”

  “The Compass Lodge,” Jim said. “I saw flyers in town. Starts in about an hour.”

  “The Compass Lodge?” Turner asked. “You’ve got to be kidding. You aren’t thinking of going, are you?”

  “Yes, sir,” Jim answered. “Want to come along?”

  “I don’t think so,” Turner answered frostily.

  “I’ll go,” Dawn said.

  “I’m there,” Arthur said.

  “Then I am, too,” Marietta said smoothly. “Wouldn’t miss it for the world.”

  Half an hour later, the Dreadnought crew was ready for a night on the town. Turner, for his part, decided not to press his desire to meet “the fellow in charge.” Arthur thought that showed an uncommon flash of leadership.

  The Lodge of the Fraternal Order of the Compass in Rockland was a large boxy brown building on the edge of town. A hand-painted sign out front read, “Tonight: The Susan Coffin Band.” Sounds of guitar, banjo, steel guitar, bass, fiddle, and drums escaped through the walls in three-four time.

  The air inside was warm and blue with smoke. The building was hollowed out to form one expansive hall. At one end was a bar, outlined in strings of small green lights. The sole bartender looked like he had been hired more for his ability to break up fights than for his skill at mixing beverages. Stretching from the bar to the dance floor was a maze of picnic tables filled with country-and-western-looking patrons: yoked shirts, snug jeans, ruffled dresses with low-cut necklines. The Dreadnought crew and Jim Greenfeather, dressed in their nicest outfits, took a large table along one wall and ordered drinks. The waitress didn’t look at them, and she didn’t ask them to prove their age. Logan had agreed to come along, but he ordered a root beer and refused to look at Crystal. Jim Greenfeather ordered grapefruit juice, and Crystal did the same. The cowboys and cowgirls at the picnic tables stared and pointed at Jesse and his technicolor face.

  Susan Coffin was dressed in a tight calico dress and played a plugged-in acoustic guitar. Behind her were five men, each in black T-shirts and indigo denim blazers, playing the other instruments. Susan was belting out the words to a foot-stomping country tune, and a block of dancers was moving in straight lines to identical steps, marching forward, spinning sharply, and stepping backward at right angles again. The song ended in a steel-guitar flourish, and the dancers applauded enthusiastically.

  “Thank you,” Susan said into the microphone. “I appreciate it.” She flashed a sweet smile to the people sitting and dancing in the haze.

  Marietta, sitting across the table from Arthur and Dawn, turned to Arthur and managed a brittle smile. “May I have the next dance?” she asked, fussing with her streaked hair.

  Arthur looked at Dawn.

  Dawn shrugged.

  “Okay,” Arthur said. He stood up.

  On stage, the lights shifted to a cool blue. Susan moved closer to the microphone.

  “This next song I’d like to sing,” she said, “has been one of my favorites for a very long time. It’s called ‘There’s Got to Be a Morning After.’”

  Dawn chuckled as Arthur slid by to join Marietta on the dance floor. She leaned toward the others. “It’s the theme to The Poseidon Adventure,” she said to the others as she stared at Marietta, “an old disaster movie about a ship.”

  Once on the dance floor, Arthur and Marietta swayed without saying a word. They had their arms around each other, but Arthur kept their bodies from touching. Whenever Marietta moved closer, Arthur backed away. It looked like she was leading.

  “Speaking of disasters . . . .” Crystal said, watching them.

  “Yeah,” Dawn said.

  As soon as the song ended, Arthur turned and walked back to the table. Once he was seated again next to Dawn, he thanked Marietta for the dance.

  “My pleasure,” Marietta said dryly.

  The Dreadnought crew sat around the table during the next few songs, chatting and laughing and enjoying an evening on land. Jim Greenfeather sat close to Crystal.
Then Susan Coffin ended a song and spoke into the microphone once again.

  “We’re going to take a short break,” she said. “Give us a chance to wet our own whistles a little bit. We’ll be back in about ten minutes to bring you more music here at the Rockland Compass Lodge. In the meantime, feel free to come on up and entertain us for a while. Anyone who wants is welcome to play up here and sing a little bit ’til we get back. Just do us a favor—please don’t sound any better than we do.”

  She smiled, and the band left the stage. The house lights came up, the noise from conversations rose, and Dawn nudged Arthur in the ribs.

  “Go on,” she said with a mischievous grin. “You heard her. Get up there and sing for us.”

  “Right,” Arthur said. “Why don’t you go?”

  “I never sing without my dulcimer,” Dawn said. “But I’ve heard you sing when you’re on bow watch. You sound great. Go on.”

  “No way.”

  Dawn faced the rest of the crew at the table. She picked up her glass and began to bang it on the table. “Arthur! Arthur! Arthur!” she chanted.

  The others joined in. “Arthur! Arthur! Arthur!” Only Marietta was silent.

  Finally Arthur gave in with a shrug. He stood up and worked his way toward the stage. He took his time—he strapped on Susan Coffin’s guitar, adjusted a microphone, cleared his throat. Then he looked up.

  “First, let me say thanks to Susan Coffin and her great band,” he said. The audience applauded. People milled about, lines formed in front of the bathrooms, but Arthur pressed ahead. “I’d like to sing a song that’s kind of slow and maybe not the right thing for a Wednesday night dance at the Compass Lodge, but what the hell—it’s pretty much all I know.”

  He strummed the guitar, listened, and began:

  The lights of the harbor

  Are getting close now.

  We’ve had a great journey

  And we made it, somehow.

  But the pull of adventure

  Tugs hard at our bow.

  I don’t want to go home just now.

  We weathered the storms

  And we sat through the calms.

  We sailed past the beaches

  Of coconut palms.

  We slathered our bodies

  With oils and balms.

  I don’t want to go home just now.

  He continued with the song, a slow portrait of good times, good friends, and the inevitable farewell.

  These last days of sailing

  The ocean with you

  Are filled up with laughter

  And some sorrow, too.

  But tonight we’ve got music

  And mugs full of brew.

  I don’t want to go home just now.

  The audience chuckled at the “mugs full of brew” line, and Arthur realized for the first time that some of them were actually listening to him. He glanced over at the Dreadnought table and was surprised to see his friends facing the stage, smiling and enjoying the show. He smiled back at Dawn.

  Then, out of the corner of his eye, Arthur noticed a denim-clad figure climb onstage and sit down at the steel guitar. Without missing a beat, this new performer slid into a solo that had all the right sounds: soft, slow, sad, but somehow comfortable and comforting. Arthur filled in the sound with a series of gentle chords. Then the fiddle player—Arthur hadn’t even seen him get on stage—started in with a sweet solo of his own. When he was finished, he nodded, and Arthur stepped up to the microphone once again.

  These last days of sailing

  The ocean with you

  Are filled up with laughter

  And some sorrow, too.

  But tonight we’ve got music

  And mugs full of brew.

  I don’t want to go home just now.

  I don’t want to go home just now.

  He finished with his guitar echoing the melody, and then he strummed the final chord. The audience was silent for a long, respectful moment. Then they applauded, slowly at first, then louder and more exuberantly. Arthur smiled, bowed his head, and put the guitar down.

  “Nice job,” the fiddle player said. He was tall and thin, and he had a big smile. “But you missed that seventh back in the second stanza.”

  Arthur grinned back. “Thanks for joining in,” he said. He shook the man’s hand, then he turned to step down off the stage. As he did, Marietta downed her drink quickly and wobbled unevenly through the jumble of tables.

  “Now it’s my turn,” she said too loudly.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  Marietta and Arthur passed each other in the aisle; she didn’t give him much room to get by. Then she took the stage, smoothed her hair, and strapped on the guitar.

  “That was nice,” she slurred into the microphone, “but now it’s time to get this place rocking! What do you say?”

  No one said anything. The fiddle player and the steel guitarist waited to see what she had in mind. Marietta paused for an awkward moment, as if trying to talk herself out of this, then she hit a G chord and turned up the volume on the guitar.

  “One, two, one two three four!” she chanted, and she launched into the song. It was “The Whole Cone” from the 1990s movie, Hot Fudge. In the movie, the song was a funny, campy, oversexed bundle of double meanings. But Marietta tried to sing it in a sultry tone as she gyrated around the stage.

  I like ice cream.

  I love ice cream.

  It refreshes me on a summer day.

  It cools me down in an exciting way.

  And gives me all the energy I need to play.

  So take me out to go and get some ice cream today.

  I like French swirl.

  I love French swirl. . . .

  Marietta had downed too many glasses of gin to perform anything well. Her left hand had trouble finding the chords, and her right hand had trouble keeping a rhythm. She was far too loud. She shouted the lyrics tonelessly, and she writhed and bounced around the stage in an embarrassing attempt at steamy sexuality. She wiggled her shoulders, she thrust her chest forward, she spun around and shook her hips. She pointed to someone in the audience and motioned for him to come forward while she sang. No one moved. The cigarette smoke seemed to settle slowly toward the floor.

  So take me out

  To go and get some

  She hit a final thundering chord.

  Ice cream today! she shouted.

  The audience was silent. Then some people applauded good-naturedly, and someone said something off in one corner. Several people laughed. The applause ended quickly, and Marietta was left to climb down from the stage, no eyes on her, no smiles directed her way, no requests to dance. She tottered down the aisle, sat heavily in her chair, and sucked down another drink. She looked at Arthur and started to say something—but then she turned to Logan.

  “What did you think?” she said. “Didn’t know I could do that, did you?”

  Logan shook his head slowly. “No,” he said, “I can totally say I didn’t.”

  Susan Coffin and her band reclaimed the stage, and Susan stepped up to the microphone. “I want to thank those brave performers,” she said. “Let’s give them a hand!”

  The applause was kind.

  “Now,” she said, “I know that every now and then a waltz just feels like a good idea, so I think we ought to play one. Let’s dim the lights, soften the mood—and fellas, this is the kind of song that you ought to dance to with someone you really, really care about. Now’s your chance for romance.”

  Marietta leaned across the table toward Arthur, her dress falling loose at the neckline. “So,” she said, “what do you say? We both can sing. Let’s show them we can dance, too.”

  Arthur stood up. “Marietta,” he said gently, “you’ve got to understand. I’m sorry if I hurt your feelings. Let’s just forget about it, okay? Let’s just forget about everything.” He offered his hand to Dawn. “Will you dance with me?”

  Marietta recoiled like she’d been slapped. “You—!”

&nb
sp; “I’d be honored,” Dawn answered quietly. She took his hand, and the two of them worked their way onto the dance floor. Most of the couples were older, and some had clearly been waltzing together for a very long time. They were synchronous. They were smooth. They were having fun. Arthur slipped his right arm around Dawn’s waist, and he held her right hand at shoulder height. A few missteps, a few false starts, and a few warm laughs. Then they began to move together, turning gently, their bodies following the rhythms of the music and each other. One-two-three, two-two-three. It was old-fashioned, silly, almost antiquated. But it also brought them close.

  When the song ended, the dancers applauded the musicians and the onlookers applauded the dancers. Dawn and Arthur kissed warmly and took their seats.

  Marietta glowered like an angry child. She locked her eyes onto Arthur’s, and she scowled, smoldering, dark, and bitter. Arthur smiled as pleasantly as he could.

  “You shit!” she yelled. She stood up, knocking the table so sharply that drinks nearly toppled. “You’ll regret this!” She turned to Logan. “Let’s go back to the ship.”

  Logan shook his head. “I’m staying here,” he said. “But like, thanks anyway.”

  Marietta held herself erect as best she could. She put on an icy smile and looked at no one. “Fine,” she said. She straightened her dress. “That’s fine.”

  She walked quickly out of the lodge and let the screen door slam behind her.

  The crew meandered back toward the shore at about one o’clock. They were talking and laughing, singing from time to time, arm in arm, side by side, friends and friends and lovers.

  When they reached the end of the dock, BillFi stopped.

  “It’s gone,” he said. “The dinghy. It’s gone.”

  The black ocean rippled in the moonlight. The odor of mud was thick. And BillFi was right again—the dinghy was nowhere to be seen.

  “Oh, great,” Crystal said, her arm around Jim’s waist and his around hers. “Marietta took it back to the ship. That little bitch. How are we supposed to get back on board?”