by W. S. Antony
Ash slumped over her and the pair of them lay still, lost in the afterglow of nature’s most primal solace. For a few precious moments they had rejected the thrall of the endless fog and unmoving sun.
‘Thank you,’ Jeni said softly.
Engines roaring, the Galatea drove through the fog at top speed.
Jeni, still naked, was bent forward over the fly bridge windshield. Ash was steering with one hand. The other was between Jeni’s legs, his thumb in her anus, his fingers buried in her slippery cleft. When he pinched her she yelled at the top of her lungs, a living foghorn.
What they had done was mad, what they were doing now was madder. It was a last defiant gesture before whatever fate intended their end to be. If there were something within the grey shroud they would either crash through it or run out of fuel in the attempt. They did not care what Rebecca and Devereaux, still below in their cabin, thought of these wild manoeuvres. Perhaps the pair of them were dead drunk, perhaps they had sought the same release as she and Ash. It did not matter now.
Ash threw the boat into a turn that had Jeni grasping at the rail; charging at the taunting changeless orange sun that receded before them. Then they swung round again away, propellers churning the water and sending up a foaming wake. Ash’s hand pinched Jeni’s intimate flesh and she yelled again. Anything to relieve the dreadful silence, to make something change, to shatter the changeless limbo in which they were trapped.
They tore on and on into the grey void that seemed to have swallowed all time and space.
The engines coughed fitfully, briefly recovered, then spluttered and died. The Galatea lost headway and glided to a gentle halt. Grey silence enveloped them once more.
‘I guess that’s it,’ Ash said quietly.
‘We tried,’ Jeni said. She sank down against his legs, resting her cheek on his knee. ‘Please hold me. Don’t let me go... whatever happens.’
‘I won’t, kid. I promise.’
They sat together for a timeless period. At least Jeni had been honest with herself for once, she thought. How long would the brief contentment last? She nuzzled closer to Ash, drawing comfort from his strong presence as he patted and stroked her as one might a dog, her hair ruffling in the gentle breeze...
The breeze?
Jeni sat up quickly. Ash was already looking around in wonder.
For the first time in days, though the boat was motionless, there was a breeze!
Wind was stirring the cloying fog, turning it into restless billows and sending ripples across the hitherto glassy water. It was getting darker. Even as they watched a ragged veil closed over the ghost sun that had held them in its pallid glow for so long. Jeni felt a moment of nausea and doubled over. When she looked up again it had completely vanished.
Ash grasped Jeni by her hair, possessive yet also comforting. ‘This is it, one way or another.’
The Galatea rocked as a larger wave struck it. The fog was being torn to shreds about them, revealing an empty ocean. The sky above was heavy with dark, billowing clouds, picked out by the golden rays of the true sun low on the horizon where only moments before the changeless orange globe had hung.
A cold wind whipped foam off the top of the waves, making the boat rock more violently. The sun winked out from its cover of inky cloud. Lightning played about thunderhead peaks. Jeni shivered, suddenly conscious of her nudity. They were back in the real world once more – and in the path of another storm.
Suddenly Ash cursed, looking at his watch.
‘What’s wrong?’ Jeni asked.
‘It’s evening. The sun’s setting. West is behind us. All this time we’ve been going east! We’re nowhere near the US coast, we’re in the middle of the Atlantic!’
Chapter 4
The storm tossed the powerless Galatea about like a toy boat in a bath.
The four of them huddled inside the main cabin. Blue-white lightning blazed in at the windows where the pearly haze had glowed only a short time earlier. Devereaux and Rebecca, looking sick and hollow-eyed, sat together on the couch. Ash manned the helm. Jeni clung to the back of his seat, bracing herself against the pitching of the boat. Close to Ash seemed the proper place to be.
‘The radio’s working again!’ Ash shouted over the rush of waves and boom of thunder. ‘At least, I can get static. I’m sending a mayday. Don’t know if anybody can hear us though.’
With the lifting of the fog the gyro and magnetic compasses had also started to work. The satellite navigation system was live, but displayed error messages suggested they were somehow out of signal range.
As the storm had raced towards them Jeni ran from the fly bridge to her own cabin to put on fresh clothes. She had said nothing to Ash, but both knew things would never be the same between them again. They would talk more about what they had shared later. Now they must concentrate on survival.
Jeni had roused Rebecca and Devereaux, still clinging together in a drunken slumber. As they looked about them in bleary confusion she wondered how much they recalled of their earlier treatment of her. The sea rose and the Galatea pitched and yawed sickeningly. Jeni heard the hull creaking and practically forced the pair into their lifejackets. As the reality of their situation finally impinged on Rebecca she desperately snatched up her jewellery case and hugged it to her chest. Then the two staggered down the corridor after Jeni to the lower helm where Ash was already seated.
The storm worsened by the minute, increasing in ferocity as quickly as the one that had cut short the race to Nassau.
‘Without the engines there’s no way we can ride this one out,’ Ash shouted to Devereaux, who nodded dumbly. A huge wave broke over the bow, pounding against the hull like a giant hammer. From somewhere forward Jeni heard a tearing, splintering sound.
‘She’s coming apart!’ Ash shouted. Some of the displays on the helm dash began to flicker and wink out. The main cabin lights died. Ash snapped on a flashlight. ‘That’s it,’ he said decisively, hauled himself out of his seat and staggered across the tossing deck to the rear saloon doors. ‘I’m getting the life raft ready.’
‘I’ll get the reserve water,’ Devereaux roused himself enough to say, and picked up another flashlight and headed for the galley.
Ash slid back the saloon door onto the darkening night, letting in a spray of water and the full howling fury of the storm. He clawed his way across to a large metal cylinder mounted by the stern rail and twisted and tugged at its latch. The cylinder split apart, forced open by billowing fluorescent fabric, swelling and taking shape before their eyes as it inflated.
Devereaux reappeared carrying two plastic carboys of water. Jeni took one from him and they staggered towards the saloon door, with Rebecca following still clutching her jewel case. The deck of the saloon was slowly tilting towards the bows, quite independently of the storm-induced pitching.
The Galatea was sinking.
Fully inflated, the life raft bounced and swayed on its tethers off the stern rail, a red beacon flashing on the top of its domed canopy. Ash, already soaked by the driving spray, was working his way along the rails back to the doorway, and in a few moments he had strung a line between the saloon door across the deck to a large eyelet set in the side of the raft.
A wave broke over the deck, washing into the saloon over their ankles and almost knocking Ash off his feet. Rebecca eyed the gap between the door and the weather flaps of the bucking inflatable and shrank back.
‘I can’t do it!’ she cried.
‘There’s no choice!’ Devereaux shouted. ‘Look, I’ll get in first, ready to help you.’ He hauled himself along the safety line over the streaming deck and dropped into the raft, then turned about and beckoned to Rebecca.
‘You’ll need both hands!’ Jeni shouted. ‘Forget your jewels!’
‘No!’ Rebecca stubbornly refused. ‘I’m not losing them!’
In desperation Jeni snat
ched the box out of Rebecca’s hands and threw it to Devereaux, who miraculously managed to catch it, then she pushed Rebecca out onto the deck. Ash caught her arm, closed her hands over the safety line and shoved her towards Devereaux who reached out towards her. Jeni felt the bow of the yacht dropping away behind her and sprang for the line. Ash’s strong hands caught her and helped her along.
Jeni was right behind Rebecca when she saw a wall of water emerge from the storm-lashed night. For a moment it seemed to hang suspended over the doomed yacht, then it crashed down with a roaring hammer blow that blotted out every other sensation.
The next thing Jeni knew she was breaking the surface supported by her lifejacket, retching and gagging and gasping for air. Lightning flashed, illuminating the Galatea twenty metres away, her stern lifting into the air. Ash was clinging limply to the handrail. To one side was the life raft, bobbing freely on the waves. Of Rebecca there was no sign.
Then the flash faded, leaving purple afterimages in Jeni’s stinging eyes.
When the sky lit up again she saw nothing about her but rolling black waters laced with foam. She floundered about, lost and confused and sick with fear. A wave rose under her, carrying her up to its crest as though trying to toss her to the clouds. For a moment she thought she saw the raft’s beacon flashing in the far distance, then it was gone as she was plunged back into a trough once more.
For an age it seemed that the ocean played with her as she struggled ever more feebly against its pounding waters, fighting to breathe air thick with spray. Finally, numbed by despair and beyond hope, Jeni gave herself up to the sea. It had won. She could fight no more.
The pounding faded as all sensation slipped away and exhaustion claimed her.
Jeni woke to the rhythmic swish and rush of waves breaking on a beach.
Gradually she became aware of other things; the sun on her back, salt drying on her skin, sand beneath her. There was also a throbbing ache throughout her entire body as though she had been mercilessly pummelled all over. She realised she was sprawled half on her face. Her lifejacket bulked awkwardly under her, but for the moment she did not even have the strength to open her salt-gummed eyes, much less to roll into a more comfortable position.
Fragments of memory returned. From out of her exhausted delirium she vaguely recalled the storm becoming a booming of breaking waves. Then had come rushing bubbles, dreadful pressure on her chest and the sensation of being rolled over and over.
But she had been washed up on a beach. Solid ground. She was safe!
But where was she? And where were the others?
With an effort she forced her aching limbs to move. Groaning she sat up, rubbed her eyes open, ignoring the salt-sting, and looked about.
A blue sea lapped about a beach of fine golden sand, backed by a green wall of palms rising over a tangle of lesser shrubs. From over this fringe of verdure the morning sun shone hot and bright from between a few puffy white clouds. A morning sun? Had it been that long since the Galatea went down?
Unsteadily, Jeni climbed to her feet so she could see further.
Judging by the sun, the beach ran roughly north/south in an almost straight line, broken only by a few scalloped bays, until it faded into the distant blue haze. It was quite beautiful, but completely deserted. Again she wondered where the others were. But above all, where was Ash?
Jeni tried to call out, but could only produce a strangled croak. Her throat and tongue were salt-burned. Before she did anything else she had to find fresh water.
With stiff fingers she managed to release her lifejacket, which she dropped to the sand. Then she headed unsteadily up the beach and into the cool shade of the palms. There were a few fallen coconuts lying on the ground and she picked one up. Now if only she could find a stone to crack it open. But the ground seemed to be a sandy soil mixed with nothing larger than pebbles. She must be able to find a rock somewhere! In desperation she pounded the coconut against a palm trunk, but it stubbornly refused to split.
Jeni stumbled on along the tree line feeling increasingly sick and light-headed. How much salt-water had she swallowed last night? She must open her coconut somehow or else find fresh water. It was ridiculous that she should survive a shipwreck only to die of thirst with sustenance in her hand.
Then she heard a splash of water from somewhere ahead that was distinct from the wash of the sea. Was she imagining it? No, it was real. She broke into a tottering run.
Cresting a slight rise she came upon a tiny inlet overhung by palms. A clear stream ran out of the forest over a pebbly bed and across a furrow cut in the sand to empty itself in the ocean. Jeni plunged into the stream, splashing and scrabbling her way up into the trees until she was clear of the salty beach. Then she cupped the water to her mouth and drank and drank. The finest champagne could not have tasted more wonderful.
For some minutes she lay still letting the cool water revive her. The stream had exposed and polished smooth a few substantial rocks, and against one of these she finally managed to crack open her coconut. Then sitting in the stream chewing the crisp white flesh she tried to get her thoughts in order.
Now she had established a supply of food and water her next priority, once she regained her strength, must be to search for the others. She thought despairingly of her last sight of Ash, but then told herself to be positive. Even if he had not made it to the raft he’d been wearing a lifejacket. He was a strong man. He would survive if anybody could. If she’d been washed up then there was a good chance he, and the others, had as well.
But where was she?
About her birds twittered and chirped in the trees, and insects flitted through the bars of sunlight, but there was no sign of any larger animals, much less human habitation. The sun was rising from behind the land, suggesting she had landed on the western side of a moderately large island, judging by the length of the shoreline. If they had actually been heading east instead of west whilst lost in the fog, might this be somewhere in the Azores or even the Canary Islands? But could they have travelled that far with the fuel they had? On the other hand, where else could it be?
As the water and coconut milk washed though her system, Jeni found herself needing to pee. She scrambled out of the stream and made her way cautiously into the shelter of the bushes until she found a spot where she could squat down. As she relieved herself she became aware of a lingering soreness in her vagina, reminding her of the strange events of the previous day.
Though she could recollect what had happened perfectly clearly, it all seemed like another world away now. She knew it had told her something important about herself and her darker desires. Where it might lead in time she could only guess, but for the moment she must put all that aside.
She made her way back down to the beach and looked about her.
If there had been any sign of habitation she would have made for that first to raise the alarm about the shipwreck. But the coastline as far as she could see was completely deserted, nor were any vessels visible out to sea. She could of course head inland until she found a road or settlement, but that might take some time. She felt she should make her own search first while there was a chance of finding the others close by.
Very well, then, the stream would be her base. With that as a focus she would search the shore methodically in both directions. If she had no luck by the end of the day she would think again.
But which way first: north or south? One was as good as another. And what if one of the others passed by the stream from the other direction while she was gone?
Gathering some dead palm fronds, Jeni laid them out in the shape of a large arrow in the sand, indicating the direction she was travelling, and wrote JENI beside it. She took another drink from the stream, wishing she had a container to carry more water with her, and then set off north along the beach.
She kept to the shade under the trees as much as possible while scanning the sand fo
r any trace of the others. She saw no footprints or, what she most dreaded, bodies; but she soon came across inanimate evidence of the wreck. There was a sunbed cushion of the sort carried on the Galatea, a little further along some teak flooring slats and, rolling in the waves, a section of splintered superstructure moulding.
These sad remains of a fine vessel depressed Jeni and she plodded on with a heavy heart. If the storm had been powerful enough to smash the boat apart, what chance was there that the others had survived? Was she the only one left?
She had been walking for almost an hour and was wondering if she should turn back when, over the crest of a spit of sand, she saw a figure heading towards her. For a moment she hesitated, wondering if it was a local inhabitant. Then, as their steps brought them warily closer, she gave a shriek of relief and broke into a run.
It was Rebecca!
Rebecca, however, did not seem to take any notice of her calls. Jeni saw she was still wearing her lifejacket and was moving with a loose, shambling step, head down, lolling on her shoulders.
Jeni caught hold of her employer as they met, feeling her knees giving way. ‘All right, miss, I’ve got you.’
Rebecca mumbled something incoherent, turning her head sightlessly towards Jeni. Her face was red from the sun, her lips cracked and eyes crusted tight.
Jeni stripped off Rebecca’s lifejacket and laid her down in the shade. No time to take her back to the stream. She needed fluid immediately. Searching through the undergrowth she found a suitable stone and cracked another fallen coconut across it. Supporting Rebecca’s head she managed to get some of the milk between her lips. Rebecca spluttered at first, and then took it down greedily. With the hem of her T-shirt Jeni wiped Rebecca’s eyes clean as best she could.
After a few minutes Rebecca recovered her senses enough to blink at her and ask thickly, ‘Jeni... is that you?’
‘Yes, miss.’