“Yooww!” called Seth. “Ten o’clock to port!”
Mo’s voice bellowed “Yeah she’s there! There she is!”
First sight was a faint light that jiggled. Suddenly it swooped, jiggled again, then swooped in a different direction. Hank directed his beams, and the Robin J’s small dark outline took shape. A trough buried it, while crests tossed it nearly out of the water. As they watched, the boat pivoted, a wave hit its hull, and the light spun, flickered, disappeared. The boat was out of control. Its anchor line must have snapped. Without the ballast of fish it was being tossed like a trash ball by the wind and swells, caught apparently in an eddy.
The figures of Jones and Ham staggered over the washed deck hugging a net. Both wore yellow oilskins, but Ham had his legs in the orange survival suit and the rest apparently belted around his middle. It appeared they were attempting to put over the net. But whenever they advanced a few feet the deck slanted so far that all they could do was cling. Then with a swoop the boat careened, and the deck became nearly vertical in the opposite direction. Hank’s crabbing lights hit the Robin’s windows without reflection except on jags. It meant the glass was smashed. Pieces of white board surged around the hull. As he watched, a wave snapped off another piece of the cabin.
“Thirteen foot!” called Terry at the lead line.
Big swell. In its trough the Jody Dawn’s bow touched sand. Instant shudder and halt. It jerked Hank forward and his head hit the window. Terry on the bow, caught off guard leaning over with his sounding line, nearly tumbled overboard before clutching the rail. “Terry inside!” Hank cried over the speaker as he throttled reverse. His fear made him gasp. Keep hold. A few feet back and the fathometer showed safe water. What if his engine had failed? In old sail days without engines, that’s how the names piled for bell tolls. Terry looked up, waved his arms with a grin, turned to take another sounding. “Terry! Inside! Go!” Terry scampered aft to the housing, grip by grip on stationary handholds.
Hank called for anchor. When the anchor held, the boat spun half circle on the chain so that they faced Jones from the stem. It made the forward-beaming sodium lights useless. Hank turned them off and activated his searchlight. About three hundred feet of water roiled between the two boats. Too far for any kind of throw to reach. To Hank’s barked instructions over the speaker they tied a heaving line’s monkey fist to a drift line attached to floats. Mo, the strongest, threw it over and over. The wind blew the weighted ball toward the Robin, but as soon as the fist dropped short the current moved it far from target.
The helicopter arrived, to noise so great Hank needed to turn up the speaker. A basket dangled beneath it from a line being blown nearly horizontal. Swede’s voice: “Looks too rough for your boat to get in. Can’t get them on radio. What I’m going to do they’ll see. Basket for only one at a time. Can’t risk the weight of both in this weather. One of them’ll strap into it. John here’s on his belly tied in, looking out the bay to guide the tow as best he can. But John alone can no way hoist the man up. Have to drag him through the air to the closest beach camp. I’ll come back then, for the other. But I didn’t start with a full tank, just grabbed the machine. These fucking things gobble fuel, I’ve got to go refuel. Pray to hold tight.”
Hank and his men gathered dripping in the wheelhouse to watch as Swede’s chopper hovered down over the thrashing Robin J. The helicopter’s blade wash flattened water slightly around the Robin and steadied the deck on a starboard roll. But the basket blew beyond their reach. The helicopter circled unsteadily to face into the wind. It removed the boat’s downdraft stability and the deck bucked. Jones and Ham each gripped stanchions with one hand while they grabbed for the swooping basket with the other. On the fourth try, Ham made a flying jump and fell to deck with arms wrapped around the line. He disappeared in foaming water as the deck careened to a different angle. Jones released his grip and leapt into the foam.
“Oh shit don’t wash Ham over,” cried Mo. He fell to his knees. “Oh shit God, don’t let ‘em die.” Hank prayed silently, belief or not.
The water washed clear. The yellow figures remained, thrashing. Struggle for balance? Hank knew as he watched through binoculars. Jones was forcing Ham into the basket.
With the chopper directly overhead the Robin, its downwash eased the boat’s violent random thrash. But it held the starboard list in place. Glassy swells rolled over Jones and Ham and splashed against the hatches. Jones, Jones, thought Hank. You’re seaman enough to have battened everything, aren’t you, man? In answer, a wave rolled high enough to spill through one of the smashed windows.
Jones braced himself and waved up one arm toward the helicopter. The aircraft rose with Ham in the basket clutching the rim. The orange survival suit still encased his legs and the top was now pulled over one shoulder. For an instant the Jody Dawn’s searchlight illuminated Ham’s anguished face with mouth open crying out, and Jones’s calm gaze as he continued to signal with his arm. Sudden gust. The chopper dipped. A wave broke over the basket and pulled it underwater with Ham. Then with a roar the chopper rose and melded into the dark with the orange and yellow of Ham’s figure flailing.
“I take back all the way that I called him a pisser,” said Seth hoarsely. “He gave up their only survival suit.”
Hank forced his voice steady before speaking. “Jones has his values.”
With the downwash gone, the Robin should have rolled back to port, and begun spinning anchorless again, but she remained on a starboard list. Meanwhile flood current had increased enough to hold the boat broadside to the relentless wind and swells that blew in near opposition. Hank watched through binoculars as Jones crawled along the higher side of deck port-side with the net draped over his shoulder, gripping hatch covers for support.
“Do it, Jones,” muttered Hank. “Get that net in the water.” In malevolent answer a wave surged up the deck and covered Jones. When it receded, Jones lay flattened between hatches and the net had washed from him. Instead of trailing from the stem as intended, it stretched directly over the submerged starboard rail. As the current took hold, the net began to pull the Robin J further onto its side.
“Get the raft astern.” Hank freed an orange survival bag.
“No, Hank.”
“Do it!” Even Seth hurried to deck.
Alone in the wheelhouse Hank shook his survival suit from its bag, quickly wrapped plastic around his boots to slide rubber against rubber, and slipped into the thick legs. Focus, forget fear. Quick to Jody? No, bad luck, focus instead to be all right. Just the same, hand trembling, he scribbled on separate sheets:
“Dawn I love you. Dad.”
“Henny I love you. Da.”
“Pete I love you. Daddy Da—.”
Then, breathing heavily: “Jody I love you. Flower of my life. Stay free.”
Folded into envelope, “Jody” on the outside, tucked into the logbook. The survival suit, neoprene rubber coverall seamless from foot to chin when zipped, might float a man dry and warm, but worn out of water it was flapping and clumsy. Even the gloves were only thumb-palm. He stomped awkwardly in it to deck, clutching the bag of a second survival suit for Jones.
“No!” cried Seth.
Hank was calm. “Those oars in place?” He peeled one arm free and bent over the tubular side of the raft to check for himself. Flimsy oars, but locked so they wouldn’t detach.
Seth grabbed him. “This is one shit I ain’t taking off you. If he’s gotta die it’s his own business.”
Hank shook him off. He checked the bowline attached to the raft, retied it himself, jerked it to test. “Keep this tow bent on the winch all times, two or three turns no more so you can slack or pull in fast. Pay attention. Oh, portable radio.”
“I’ll get it,” said Terry and ran inside. Seth also disappeared, even though Hank called after him to come back for more instructions.
“You can’t do that alone, Boss,” said Mo. “What it looks like you’re doing needs four hands at least in the raft.”<
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“Alone, Mo.”
Terry returned with the portable radio, and: “Boss, Mr. Scorden just on radio, says Ham’s safe delivered but he’s got to go refuel. Says everybody hold tight till he gets back for Captain Henry.”
Seth came from the cabin with his legs in a survival suit as he struggled to pull his arms through the top. “Coming with you.”
“No you’re not. Your job’s here, to stay and handle this boat. You’re skipper now.” Hank squirmed his arm back into the rubber. Rain had already chilled through his exposed sweater and thermals. He threw the stiff orange bag of the other survival suit into the raft. Below roiled black water. Sky black. Wait another minute. If only Swede’s chopper . . .
Terry pointed. “Oh Jeez lookit, Jones’s boat. She’s flooding straight through the windows!” What remained of the Robin above water merely dipped as swells moved over it. Jones clung to the housing with an arm wrapped into one of the empty window openings. Swells rolled above his waist.
“Raft over, quick.” The flexible rubber craft bounced and skittered wildly.
Seth grabbed his arm again. “Jones is fuckin’ old! He brought it on himself! His fuckin’ stupid, not yours. Don’t make it another.”
“Let go!” Seth would not. Hank struck him. Seth fell on deck. Hank slipped into the raft. It bounced with his weight, then adjusted unsteadily. “Cast me off. Guard the line.”
“You’re all I got!” cried Seth.
As Hank settled to the oars and peered over his shoulder toward Jones’s boat, a bounce in the raft and there was Mo’s sheepish grin as he squatted beside him. “Get out,” said Hank.
Mo looked up calmly. Rain dripped from his eyebrows. “Needs four hands, Boss. Let me row.”
“Thanks. But get out. Risk one’s enough. I mean it.”
“Boss, Ham’s my buddy and that’s his skipper.”
“Get out!”
Seth and Terry helped Mo back aboard. Hank looked up at then-grave and frightened faces. “Tend that line, guys. I’m in your hands.”
“In God’s hands,” blurted Terry.
Hank started to joke the joker, instead quickly dipped with the oars and rode a swell to make distance before he changed his mind. Mo in the raft would have been comfort. He yearned to be back with them. Soon the blinding circle of Jody Dawn’s searchlight washed out their faces. Sudden panic. Alone in black seas. “The Lord my shepherd . . .” It eased nothing. “Jody be with me.” He kissed his wedding ring as the oar hand reached his lips, held her face and tried to row harder. The aluminum oars were mere sticks with small paddles, meant to hold way rather than make speed. His work with them was to buck the current that pushed abeam, since the wind by itself blew him steadily toward the Robin.
Faint call beyond the wind. It sounded like: “Sinking!”
He rowed wildly. The flimsy oars strained against grommets, but the rubberized material of the raft stretched to absorb the extra pressure. He was panting. The survival suit encased him like a steam oven and sweat gushed from his wool cap. Searchlight in his eyes gave flashed vision when he twisted to scan for the Robin in dark. Too blurred to see anything but the boat’s dim shape, no details. At least it hadn’t sunk. The rowing was work beyond his anticipation. Should have kept Mo. “Jody . . .”
Sudden gust. The raft bumped a hard object and bounced off. He tried to grab slick surface as the oar jerked from his grasp to sharp wrist pain.
Hands locked around his arm but began to slide. He looked up into Jones’s slitted eyes, with glistening hull behind. The Robin had overturned. He dropped oars and gripped Jones’s hand just as it began to slip away. Before he could counterbalance, Jones had tumbled across his knees, the raft upended, and they floundered in the water.
He clutched Jones’s shoulder while groping at the raft with the arm in pain. His feet touched ground. A second of relief, then current pulled at his legs and a wave covered his head. With footing lost, the buoyant neoprene of the survival suit tried to float his legs. In the trough, feet on ground again, he sputtered salt water, gasping. Helpless buffet with arms locked around burdens, but to give in to pain meant all lost.
“Let go. Save yourself.”
Without answering, Hank thrust Jones against the bottom of the raft. Jones instinctively clawed at its surface. During a moment with feet on ground Hank pushed him up enough to clutch the edge. It freed Hank’s hurt arm but he still needed to thrash it for balance. Quick assess. No way in rough water, lacking firm foothold, to right the overturned raft without dumping Jones. But no chance, with it overturned, for a safe pullback to Jody Dawn. Exposed land lay a hundred feet ahead in the opposite direction. Would it stay bare long enough for Swede’s chopper to return? There at least lay the only way to right the raft. He plowed step by step against the current, the hump in dizzy swing before his eyes, falling water-swept and regaining hold. Cold salt pushed sickening into nostrils and head. Each breath risked new slam of gagging brine. He gained inch by inch until the current lessened against shore and swells rolled far enough below his mouth to breathe without sucking water. When Jones’s feet felt the bottom he bore his own weight and slowly helped to walk the raft.
The sand sloped upward to the hump. When the swells rolled only below his thighs Hank dropped to knees and crawled. He stopped to vomit, dragged the raft farther with Jones now clinging to it at a slow crawl also. On firm sand, Hank vomited again while Jones disentangled himself from the raft an arm and a leg at a time and fell alongside.
The hump, while submerging, still rose three feet above the water’s grasp. Rain poured. Hank clumsily righted the raft, then draped his arms over the inflated rim and retched seawater. Why I’m not stronger than this? he wondered, annoyed, and drowsed into warm stupor. Arm pain restored focus. He forced himself awake. There lay Jones shivering in a ball. Hank groped for the bag with the extra survival suit. Gone. Floated off. And the radio. He peeled down the top of his own suit and with freed hands rubbed Jones’s chest. Wet clothing squished under the oilskin jacket. Cold wind twitched a tuft of Jones’s hair, gray in the glare from Jody Dawn’s lights.
“Jones! You hear me?”
Jones raised his head as sluggishly as a crab brought from cold depths and muttered urgently. Hank put his ear close. “My net. Tell Ham get it. Plugged. Prime reds.”
Startle warning of hypothermia, first slip into death. Hank shook him. “Make sense, Jones. It’s Hank!”
“Good. Good. Throw that grapple, son.”
Hank rose and peeled down the rest of his survival suit. As each sweated part of him became exposed the wind chilled it. The water had lapped closer to their feet, making it harder to keep Jones dry as he pushed him leg by leg into the floppy coverall. Rubber boot against rubbery material required pull and stretch. A wave leapt the mound and filled one leg of the suit. He lifted Jones’s leg to let the water gush out, then hurried to encase arms and zip the front. His own arm was turning numb with weakened fingers, but at least the pain had thus eased.
He stood, and his own shivering began. There lay his Jody Dawn only a few hundred feet away, the dash of half a minute on land. A thin rope from the raft still attached him to its deck. Line too thin now to risk against the longer distance from the bobbing, upturned Robin than in his initial calculation, not with wind unslacked and current still making. Their shouts came from aboard in a formless volley. All he could do was shout back and wave at their blessed light (his light, light of his ship!) as he listened for helicopter chum.
The water advanced further. “Jones. Can you stand?” He tried to help him up. Jones slowly cooperated but his weight fell limp in Hank’s arms.
Hank looked up at the sky. Jody Dawn’s lights reflected ochre against solid clouds. Not a sight or throb of blades. Somewhere to the southwest stood Jody and his children, probably helping Ham, even holding the big, slow crewman. Damn you, Ham! Safe and warm.
Jones sagged further. “Jump up and down, Jones. Increase your circulation, man!” Hank tried to jiggle him
as he forced motion for himself. The rising tide now licked around the soles of his boots.
“Doing thin, Hank,” Jones whispered. “But warmer, seems.”
Jones knew him! Coming back! “But you’ve got to keep moving.”
“Hank. Stayed . . . you . .. should stayed in boat. No friend when . . . I say . . . said . . . Hank’s no friend, said. Didn’t mean. Sorry . . . Hank. Cold. Mebbe . . . most stupid . . . whole life.” With a sudden jolt Jones raised his head and looked around. He clutched the sleeve of Hank’s jacket, felt it, then touched his own. “No. No Hank. Get this thing off me. Back on you.” Just as suddenly he collapsed. Hank laid him in the raft. Rain had already puddled inches on the bottom and there was nothing to bail with. He leaned over and tried to splash out water with his hand. The chill seeped further into his hands. Into bone.
Dark empty all horizon except for light of endless distant Jody Dawn and its gleam on the Robin’s rolling overturned hull. “Now what are you going to do?” Saying it aloud kept him company. Random shouts continued to wind-blow from his boat, his vessel, his ship, his own Jody Dawn separated by raging shallows. “Aiii,” he called. “Aii-ooo” for the sound of his voice alive.
Water now chilled the calves of his legs through socks and thin boot rubber. Old sweat iced against his chest. “Aii-ooo.” Their shouts came back. Image of their dear faces: “Seth. Ivan. Steve. No . . . Seth. Mo . . .” He struggled with it, frightened. “Oh, shit, Terry. Terry of course, no problem.”
The frigid water that sucked life trickled over the edge of his boot tops. It slowly invaded his thick socks, and started on his skin.
“I have Jody. And Henny, Hank Junior my namesake and shadow. I have Dawn to see into a woman. I have Pete who needs to grow against my leg.” He looked down at the shadowed figure of Jones Henry. “I have Jody.” The Jody Dawn’s lights flashed madly, riding glassy swells toward him like signals.
Breakers Page 36