We followed him up the open timber steps, across a porch balcony and into his kitchen. Mabry grabbed four bottles of beer from the fridge and passed them out. The living room was large and comfortable, with a single plate-glass window facing north to the open water. Outside, a metal shutter that served as an awning today could be lowered down for hurricane protection. The view was another perfect Bahamas postcard, with Mabry’s Whaler at anchor between palms and casuarinas.
The living room walls were covered with framed pictures of our host and some other men and women. Yance Mabry and I guessed his sons, wife and many friends were grinning over big sailfish in the cockpits of sport-fishing boats. In other pictures they were wearing colorful offshore racing suits while holding up trophies. Some high-angle shots of boats leaping waves were obviously taken from helicopters during races.
Mabry followed us into the living room and gestured for us to sit around his glass-topped coffee table. There was a gray leather sofa facing the ocean view, and several matching upholstered chairs. We sat and passed around a bottle opener. We enjoyed a few sips while staring at the sparkling Little Bahama Bank framed between the palm trees swaying outside. After a quiet minute, our host got back to “bidness.”
“That boat is everything I said and more. It’s my son’s pride and joy, but I’ve sold everything else and I need the gold to pay the lawyers. He loves that boat, but he can’t use it in the Atlanta pen. I have to get him out of Atlanta—that place is a goddamn hellhole. He has five more years to do, and he could die in there easy. I’m working on a transfer to FCI Orlando. That’s minimum-security federal correction and it’s supposed to be safer, but everything costs money. You have to grease some lawyers’ palms to make the wheels turn. So you take the boat, it’s all yours, and that’s that. You can sell it easy for more than twenty ounces in Florida.”
****
So Harry had told him how much gold I’d brought. I was glad I hadn’t told him I had thirty ounces. I put my beer down and said, “Well, I agree it’s a nice boat, but I can’t go twenty. I can’t use it all up just to get into the States. I’d have nothing left to operate on.” This wasn’t true, but I believe in always negotiating.
Our host shot a pained look at Harry, who shrugged, leaned back and sipped his beer.
Mabry said, “That boat is worth way more than twenty ounces. Double that, triple that! Hell, I’ve got more than that just in the engine. That isn’t some old chopper-gun lake boat with a 350 Mercruiser. That’s a Pantera with a 502, with a Corsa exhaust and Latham steering! The prop is a Bravo 1, and it’s matched perfectly. We tried three other wheels before we got it just right. Why, that boat’s got tricks I ain’t even told you about yet, and it’s a turnkey operation. That boat is perfect. That boat is dialed in. Trust me—that boat was made for what you want it for.”
I nodded agreeably and said, “Hey, I’m sure it is, but twenty ounces is still too much. I can’t go to Florida broke. And I think it’s the wrong boat for what I need. I’d rather have an open fisherman. A center-console boat like the one you have anchored out back, only bigger. I want to blend in with the fishing crowd when I’m near Florida. I think a Pantera just stands out too much, even painted basic blue like yours. It still looks like a little Cigarette boat. It has that go-fast profile the law likes to stop and board.”
“What, you’re some kind of boat expert?”
I didn’t want to get into a whose-is-bigger contest. “I’ve made the trip a few times. And I don’t like the idea of only one engine for crossing the Gulf Stream. If that motor blows up, then what? Do I call SeaTow or the Coast Guard? Either way, I’m screwed. No offense, but I don’t want to meet your son in Atlanta Federal.”
Mabry narrowed his eyes. Experience was speaking to youth while trying not to come off as lecturing. He didn’t have my gold yet. “Well, let me tell you something, son, you don’t have to worry about that engine. Not any more than Harry worries about having one engine in his Cessna. You just flew across the Bahamas on one engine, didn’t you?”
“Well, that’s true, but…”
“Look, son, I am an expert. I ran with the best. See that picture behind the big silver trophy? Well, that’s me and Don Aronow, who founded Donzi and Cigarette and a bunch of other high-performance boat companies. See that one? That’s me and Pepe Nuñez, the guy behind Pantera Boats in Miami. My sons made the trip across the Stream more times than I can remember in this boat. It’s got a Florida registration number, copied from another Pantera. It’s so low freeboard that it’s almost invisible unless it’s flat calm. And once you’re inshore, it’ll outrun just about any damn thing you can name. I hate to let it go at all, but the lawyers are killing me and I need the money, so I’m willing to do a deal with you for twenty ounces.” He took a long pull of his beer, studying me across the table. I remained silent, had my own sip, and stared back.
He spoke first. “Look, if you really want to buy a center console with a pair of outboards, fine, you just go on down to Lucaya. Look around and see what you find ready to go, right now, this afternoon.” He sighed, exasperated.
“Son, I know every boat this end of Grand Bahama. Anybody you talk to about buying an offshore boat for gold will call the Customs hotline one minute after you walk out of their sight. They’ll be looking for a reward. I won’t. And this boat is ready, right now, here, today. Now… do we have a deal?”
“Twenty ounces is still too high. At least it is for me.”
Mabry rolled his eyes and blew out a sigh. “Twenty ounces is not high for that boat! This boat is worth over twice that. You’re stealing it at that price. You’re taking advantage of my situation, of my love for my son. This boat is so much better than stock—”
Harry broke the impasse, saying, “Dan, you and Nick go on down and check out the boat some more. Crawl around in-side it. Kick the tires. Let Yance and me have a little parley. We’ll come down in a few minutes. Okay?”
We went downstairs and did indeed crawl around the boat. Five minutes later, they returned to the under-house boat garage. Harry brought a small gym bag, set it on a work-bench, unzipped it and removed a white plastic object about seven inches long, three wide and one thick. It was unmarked, just a smooth white mini-brick.
Harry said, “Here’s a tracker like I was talking about. Yance will throw it in with the boat for the whole twenty ounces. If you can get it onboard the, ah, vessel you’re interested in, you’ll know where it is for the next six months. It’s already set to send a GPS signal up to a satellite once an hour.”
“How do I check it?”
“It’s posted on an internet site. Latitude and longitude. Can you check your email at sea?”
“I’ve got an Orbcom.”
“An Orbcom will work,” agreed Harry. “There’s a website where you check your account. Just set it up to send the tracker’s location to your email address. The location will be sent once an hour.”
“What about its security?”
“No problem. There’s a million of these things out there beeping away. They’re on trucks, they’re on cargo containers, they’re on ships. Hell, husbands even put them in their wives’ cars. They’re everywhere.”
“Where do I have to stick it? Does it have to see the sky? What if I have to hide it inside a boat?”
“Inside fiberglass, no problem,” said Mabry. “But not metal. Is your target vessel steel or aluminum?”
“No. It’s composite.”
“Good. Just don’t bury it too deep. The less between it and the sky, the better.”
It was tempting. The tracker was a hell of a sweetener.
Mabry asked, “So, do we have a deal or not? I’ll even fill the tank. One of those drums out there is full. That’s fifty-five gallons of clean Shell ninety-two octane.”
“Is it fresh?”
“Last month.”
“I want a fuel bladder too.”
“You won’t need a bladder to get to Florida.”
“I know. But I mig
ht need it later. How much does that one I saw out there hold?”
“Forty gallons, but I don’t have much more gasoline. Just that one drum. The others are empty.”
“I’ll take the bladder empty. But with the transfer lines and everything else it needs.” The bladder was useless without a way to get the fuel into the main tank feeding the engine.
“You got it,” Mabry said and reached out his right hand. “So, do we have a deal?”
****
“We have a deal.” He had the calloused hand and powerful grip of a lifelong mechanic.
While still clutching my hand, with his eyes locked on mine, he said, “Can I see the gold?”
“Sure.” He released his grip and I reached in my pocket. Riding from the airport in the back of the pickup, I had transferred ten ounces to each of my front pants cargo pockets. Ten Krugerrands fit into a white plastic tube with an end cap. The short containers were almost small enough to hide in my closed fists. I handed a tube to Mabry. He popped off the cap and spilled a few of the heavy coins into his hand. I expected him to smile, but he didn’t.
Instead, he quietly said, “You know, there was a time when I wore more gold than this around my neck. There was a time when there were four or five boats here all the time, fully rigged. Not little ones like this Pantera. Big ones like the bare hulls out back. We used to do the Miami to Bimini race, Miami to Key West, all of them.”
Mabry sighed. His light green eyes reflected the sea behind him, and I thought I saw them tearing up but he looked away to the horizon. “Well, those days are long gone. Just like my wife, and my sons…and now my last race boat. Gone. My first son drowned and the other one is in prison for a tenner. And now I need the gold to pay for lawyers a hell of a lot more than my son needs this Pantera. He sure can’t use it where he’s at now. Don’t worry; this boat won’t let you down. Not if you know what you’re doing. When do you plan on leaving?”
“As soon as we can. As soon as you gas it up and get it launched. We just need a cooler with something to drink and maybe some sandwiches, and we’re out of here.”
“All right. That’ll work.” He turned back to me and held out his open left hand, and I gave him the second ten ounces. Both containers disappeared into his pants pockets.
“Once I’m across the Stream, what’s the best inlet to run?” I had my own ideas, but I wanted to hear his opinion.
“Straight across. Lake Worth. That’s the Palm Beach inlet.”
Harry, standing to the side with Nick while the deal was struck, nodded agreement.
“I have a friend with a dock further south,” I said. “I was thinking about Boca Raton, or Hillsboro.”
“No,” said Mabry. “Too small. Too much of a crapshoot when you’re going in. Most of the time they’re clear, but a few times a week Customs puts a forty-foot Interceptor on the little inlets. When they do, they check almost every damn boat coming in. Only a few boats come in each hour, and they have the time. So if you use those smaller inlets, you’re just rolling the dice that Customs isn’t sitting there, waiting. You don’t do it that way unless you have watchers on the shore, and I’m guessing you don’t. The Coast Guard and Customs can’t do it that way at Lake Worth. They have so many boats coming in that they can only pick a few to check. They even have cruise ships going in and out, and then everybody just gets out of the way. Follow a cruise ship, that’s always a good bet.”
“I thought the economy was in the crapper. They still have cruise ships running?”
“Sure,” he said. “It’s a cheap vacation, and the cruise ships are safe compared to most places. People pay for a cruise just to not worry about getting robbed.”
“So you think the Lake Worth Inlet is the safest?”
“That’s right. Just blend in with the afternoon crowd and you’ll have no problem. And there’s a few more things you need to know. The tank takes sixty gallons. Use ninety octane or better if you can get it. Eighty-nine octane is okay if you can’t get better, but that’s it. Keep her at fifty miles an hour, that’s her best cruising speed. There’s no reason to go faster unless you’re trying to outrun somebody, but if Customs has an Interceptor on your ass, then they already have planes and helicopters up on top. Count on it. When you see their boat, it’s already game over.”
“Okay.”
“Use just a little trim tab at fifty.” He leaned into the Pantera’s white cockpit to show me. “It’s all marked on the tab indicators; my son had all the best settings worked out. See, it’s all written on the tape alongside that slider. The best outdrive and trim angles for each rpm. Of course, it depends on sea conditions too, but those numbers will get you in the ballpark. After that, it’s all up to you.” He raised an eyebrow, his doubt in my ability to run the boat clear. But he had my twenty ounces of gold. What I did with the boat would now be up to me.
“How far can I go on the fifty-five gallons in that drum?”
“I’ll fill it to sixty—I have a little extra here and there. She’ll get better than two miles to a gallon at fifty, which gives you a solid hundred-twenty-mile range till she sucks dry. Plenty for Florida.”
“What about with the throttle wide open?” I asked.
“Throttle wide open?” He laughed. “You don’t want to know! Once those throttle plates go vertical, she’ll suck the gas down like a pig. You’ll be into gallons per mile, instead of miles per gallon. Save that for your last resort.”
We stood by the cockpit while he pointed out and explained all of the gauges, knobs, buttons, and rocker switches on the instrument panel. The single throttle was on the right side, next to the wheel. The wheel was covered with grippy black rubber. The chrome throttle lever was topped with a blue billiard ball, the number two on top.
Two deeply padded white bolsters with drop-down seats dominated the cockpit. The U-shaped bolsters allowed the driver and navigator to stand with their entire backs and sides enveloped and cushioned, with their weight supported on bent knees to absorb the landing shocks like snow skiers negotiating moguls.
The bolster seats must have come out of a thirty-five-footer. A man could fit between the seats and get back to the engine compartment only by turning sideways to squeeze between them. The bolsters extended so far aft that the rear bench seat against the engine compartment was a joke. There was no place for anybody sitting in the back to put their legs, except jutting forward between the two bolsters. A big white Igloo cooler occupied the left side of the seat, fitting snugly between the bolster and the seat back. Cords tied to the handles on each side were secured to rings on the deck. The cooler wasn’t going anywhere, an important consideration on an offshore boat. The attention to detail impressed me.
At the front end of the cockpit, a pair of narrow vertical doors hinged apart to permit small children or flexible midgets easy access to the cuddy cabin below the forward deck. Except for the oversized padded bolster seats, the Pantera was obviously not built for comfort but purely for speed on the ocean.
Mabry said, “Don’t go faster than the sea conditions allow. Weather should be fine this afternoon; just some thunderstorms, normal settled June weather. A low is coming, but today and tomorrow will be fine. In swells under three or four feet, you can keep it at fifty easy. That doesn’t mean you won’t catch some random wave that’ll send your bow straight up, so you have to be careful every second. And if you trim it wrong and stuff the bow, you’ll go from fifty to zero in zero seconds, and that’ll ruin your day too. Never be casual is what I’m saying. Remember, the offshore racers have rescue divers on helicopters ready to jump in and save their crazy asses. You don’t. Okay?”
“Okay.” I was used to working up high without a net. I just hoped my reflexes and learning curve were up to the task.
“Then I’ll get my big truck and hook her up. Oh—I’ll throw in a pair of hot batteries too. I want to make it right. You’re stealing this boat from me, but nobody will ever say that Yance Mabry put a boat out to sea that wasn’t ready.”
> “I appreciate it.”
He looked at me evenly. “Son, I’m still a professional, even if my profession is dead and buried in the past. I can’t do boats any other way but the best way. You boys get up there and make some sandwiches while I launch her. Take anything in the fridge you want. Once you’re ready to leave, I’ll go out with you to show you how to run her on flat water and make sure she’s running just right. Then I’ll take my Whaler, and you can follow me out to the ocean. Nobody who didn’t live here all their life can find the deepwater ocean from this place. Not unless they’re behind somebody who knows the way.”
****
We followed Yance Mabry’s center console at low speed through an intricate series of turns in shallow water that ranged from lime to turquoise. The sun was still high to the west and the water ahead was mostly reflected glare and dazzle even through my polarized wrap-arounds. We passed exposed coral heads that were close enough to spit on. At low speed, the Pantera’s 502 popped, rumbled and shook the boat. I pushed the rocker switch to force the hot exhaust gases out underwater and the sound diminished by half. It was still a loud growl, but much more bearable. I switched the exhaust back to the straight pipes through the transom and the full roar returned.
Our bags and gear were stuffed into the low and narrow cuddy inside the bow. At my request Nick crawled forward and dug foam earplugs out of my kit bag. The front dozen feet of the Pantera was only a crawl space. All the way forward was a V-shaped mattress with just enough overhead space to permit sitting. According to the race boat crowd, girls would get so turned on while taking rides on these rockets that they wouldn’t want to wait for a nicer bed ashore. After going for a thrill ride on a thirty-foot roaring vibrator, anything soft and horizontal with minimal privacy would suffice. I had never personally tested the theory, but it seemed plausible.
Castigo Cay Page 16