BY SUNRISE THE SECOND DAY after leaving Isleta Palominito, the Casey Nicole had sailed some 220 miles in just under 24 hours and made landfall off the Samaná Peninsula, on the rugged north coast of the Dominican Republic. Scully insisted on keeping their course several miles offshore, and from that distance it was impossible to tell in daylight whether or not the electricity was out on the first part of the island they could see. But from what Artie could glimpse of the land they were sailing past, there might be little indication even at night. Much of the coast here appeared to be a rugged wilderness of steep, jungle-cloaked mountains, with jagged cliffs of gray rock looming like the walls of a fortress over the sea. In only a few places were there breaks in those cliffs, and in some there could be seen the openings to small bays or coves, where Scully said there were a few tiny villages and farming settlements.
“Dem Dominican in some of dis place got no light even before Jah strike down de technology of Bobbylon,” Scully said, as Artie scanned the wild-looking coast with Larry’s binoculars. “Lot o’ dem livin’ de simple life. Catch de fish, grow de coconut, spend time wid dem family. Livin’ de way Jah people supposed to live.”
“That looks like a village we’re passing now. I can barely make it out, even with the binoculars, but it looks like a bunch of small houses or huts under that grove of palm trees beyond the beach there. I can see smoke too. I wonder what that’s all about?”
“Always fires in dem village like dat. Cooking fire, burning some brush, making charcoal.”
“So that’s not a sure sign the lights are out?”
“No, but by dark we sailin’ past de big cities on de island. Puerto Plata got about 150,000 people. Lot of light in dat place. But I t’ink all de lights made by man, dem out all over de world.”
“Well, I hope you’re wrong, but we shall see tonight then. I guess it doesn’t matter much one way or another to those villagers. I suppose you can’t miss what you don’t have. But tell me, Scully, do you really think people would be better off without technology? I know modern civilization is not perfect, but still, isn’t life the old way a hell of a lot harder?”
“Life in de island not so hard as you t’ink, Doc. In dis place we got de sun. Nevah cold all de year. Good weather for a mon and good for crops too. In dis place we got de sea an’ all de fish it provide, and wind to make de boat go. Not so hard dis life in de island, but bettah in de old days when all Jah people livin’ dis way. Now dem got big city even here. Cut down de forest, catch all de fish, an’ pushin’ Jah people into de bush to build de big hotel and casino on de beach. De youth of de island, now dem don’t want to live de simple life. Now watchin’TV an’ computer too, an’ want de flashy cars of Bobbylon. Too much stealin’ goin’ on and killin’ too, because dem not content wid de ganja herb. Want de cocaine and de money dem get to sell it. I t’ink it’s good now de TV, it can’t play.”
“Well certainly there are some ill effects brought about by technology and civilization, but still, there’s a lot of good too. Look how much freedom and opportunity we have now. Never before in human history have individuals had access to as much knowledge and as many choices in how to live their personal lives. I continue to be amazed by all the changes brought about in my lifetime—but especially most recently, with the advent of the Information Age.”
“But where dat information now, Doc? De radio, it don’t talk. GPS, it don’t track. Cell phone, dem don’t call. Airplane, dem can’t fly…. All dat technology…gone away wid a flash of light. But de wind, she still blow…. De sun, it still shine bright…. Fish, dem still swim…. An’ dis simple boat, she still sail.”
“You’re right, of course, but all that will be fixed. It’s just a matter of repairing or replacing the damaged parts. The knowledge and technology is still there.”
“But what dem forget is de useful knowledge. Knowledge to live in de world of Jah creation widout all dat technology. Not many in de islands, but some of de roots Rasta dem choose to live de simple life in de bush, just like de ancestor dem in Africa. I spent time in dat life too, deep in de Blue Mountains. Growin’ de food on de land, an’ de ganja too, watchin’ de sun come up each day an’ go down too. Not to worry ’bout de money or t’ings it can buy. Jah will provide if a mon is just willing to learn.”
“But isn’t that just getting by, Scully? Sure you can grow enough to eat, and keep a shelter over your head. But how long can you live that way before you get bored out of your mind? You didn’t stay there, did you? You’ve been out seeing the world with my brother. Would that have been possible without modern technology? Sure, this is a simple boat, based on a simple design that is thousands of years old, if what Larry said is true, but what about the modern epoxy used to hold it together? The fiberglass covering the plywood hulls? The synthetic Dacron sail cloth? The stainless steel hardware? All these things are better than anything you could fashion from nature, right?”
Scully just shrugged and grinned as he stood at the helm and steered. “Good stuff, dat—not to argue. But all I an’ I sayin’ is maybe now some people gonna have to learn to live a more simple life. Only time will tell, Doc.”
“Yeah, we’ll see. Let’s just get to Casey while we’ve still got a new boat to do it. I don’t plan on having to carve out a dugout on the beach just yet.”
Ten hours later, as darkness fell on the coastline they were sailing past, it became apparent that the electricity was indeed out all over the island. They passed several larger towns, and finally, Puerto Plata, which should have been brightly lit by city lights, but instead they could see scattered campfires against the dark silhouette of mountains. At Larry’s insistence, they adjusted their course to put more distance between themselves and the land, as insurance against the possibility of a collision with some small, unlit fishing boat or other vessel operating near shore. There wasn’t much point in risking sailing in closer anyway, as there was little to see in the darkness and they had no compelling reason to stop anywhere in the Dominican Republic.
“Luperon is a great place to drop the hook,” he said, pointing out a harbor entrance they passed a couple of hours west of Puerto Plata. “At least in normal times, there are always a lot of cruising boats there: American, Canadian, and European. It’s well protected in all weathers there too. The rum is cheap, the food is great, and the girls are beautiful. What more could a sailor ask?”
“Sounds like your kind of place for sure, little brother.”
“I’ve been known to stay there a few weeks at a time, between delivery jobs.”
“Ah yes, the life of a delivery skipper, I know. Like I said, most of us have to work for a living.”
While Scully steered the boat, Artie ordered Larry down into the galley cabin where he could change the bandages on his arm and inspect his wounds for signs of infection. He was pleased to see that there were none so far and that the deep cut was in the early stages of the healing process, although it would be a long time before he could leave it unwrapped. He had fashioned a sling for the arm from some canvas and webbing material Larry had on board, as it was pretty much useless at this point, and securing it in a sling would make it easier for his brother to avoid further injury while getting around on the moving boat.
“It still hurts like hell, Doc. I can’t even move my fingers on that hand.”
“That’s normal. I told you it was going to hurt. The swelling will gradually go down in your hand and fingers. Like I said, you’ve got nerve damage too. You have a long road ahead of you.”
“Good thing I don’t play the guitar for a living, huh?”
“Yes. Good for you and for your audience!”
“Damn, that hurts worse than the cut, Doc. You know how hard I tried to learn.”
“Well, at least you figured out you didn’t have an ear for it before it went too far. Anyway, I don’t think any lasting damage you might have from this will affect your present career too much.”
“Nah, even if I lost the whole arm I could always get a hook. Sure beats a split skull any day of the week.”
“I’ll say. And that’s what would have happened if you hadn’t put that arm up.”
“How do my stitches look, Doc?
“Beautiful! You’ll always have a visible scar, especially considering how dark you stay working out here in the sun all the time. But I don’t think it’ll detract too much from your dashing good looks, and like Scully said, it might even add to your appeal as a rugged, adventurous boat captain. One of these days, in one port or another, some pretty little lady is going to set the hook and drag you aground permanently, and your sailing days will be through.”
“That’ll never happen to me, Doc. I’ve steered clear of those reefs this long; I’ll be damned if I’m going to wreck my ship now.”
“Well, couldn’t you at least find another one who wants to sail with you? I know they’re out there. Colleen hung with you for three years. Surely you’ve thought about finding another one?”
“Nah. What I finally figured out, Doc, is that bringing a woman on a boat is like bringing sand to the beach. Kinda redundant, if you know what I mean. Best to leave ’em on the dock and look forward to the next landfall.”
“So it’s true what they say about a girl in every port?”
“Absolutely,” Larry grinned. “And what about you, Doc? It’s been, what, seven years now? Casey’s out of the house now; you’ve got to be lonely.”
“Just dating occasionally has been enough for now. I don’t want to live alone forever, I know that, but it wouldn’t be fair to get married for that reason alone. I just can’t stop comparing every woman I meet to Dianne, no matter how hard I try. It just doesn’t seem real to me that it’s been seven years. It seems more like seven months or so to me.”
“I know you miss her. I can’t imagine. You’ve done a great job with Casey, though. And I know she knows it too.”
“I just can’t lose her too. You know that, little brother.”
“I do, and you won’t. That’s why I’m here. We’re going to get you to her and we’re going to keep her safe.”
“I’m sorry it’s already cost you so much,” Artie said, looking at his brother’s arm again. “I could never do this without you and Scully. I don’t know what in the hell I would do, still stuck in St. Thomas with no way to get back to the mainland. I would go insane worrying about her. I’m worried as hell now, but at least we’re doing something about it. At least we’re in motion, thanks to you, and I can feel hope that she will still be okay and will be there when we get there.”
“I’m sure she’s fine, Artie. The campus is probably one of the safest places to be in New Orleans. Casey’s got a lot of sense. She’s not going to go wandering around town getting in trouble in a situation like this. I’ll bet she and Jessica are hunkered down at home with their friends, keeping a low profile and waiting to see if help is coming. They’ll be okay until we get there.”
“What’s your best estimate at this point? How many days?”
“Given that we can count on favorable winds this time of year on this leg of the trip, I’m going to say we’ll reach the Keys in three and a half more days, give or take a few hours. We’re going to shoot straight up the Old Bahama Channel, just north of Cuba. That will keep us from having to thread our way around all the reefs and islands in the Bahamas, other than the Cay Sal Bank. There is a place on the bank I want to stop at though. The spear-fishing there is some of the best in the world.”
Artie looked at the chart Larry showed him. The Cay Sal Bank was a huge area of shallow water far to the west of the main Bahamas archipelago, situated between Cuba and the Florida Keys. Larry said it was one of the few coral atolls in the Atlantic, and like the atolls of the South Pacific, it consisted of a lagoon of shallow water protected by an encircling fringe of reefs and low islets.
“I’ve never even heard of it,” Artie said. It’s amazing how many of these places, not all that far from Florida, I’ve never heard of. It sounds interesting, but do we really have time to stop and fish?”
“In this case, we can’t afford not to. See that tiny string of islets and cays there?” Larry pointed to a line of specks on the edge of the shallow bank labeled Anguilla Cays. “That area sees so few human visitors that the grouper and yellowtail hardly know what a diver looks like. It’s also so far from Nassau and Bimini that even in normal times the Bahamians rarely patrol there. We won’t have to worry about clearing into the Bahamas and all that hassle. Just drop the hook and go hunting. With my arm out of commission I don’t think I would do much good, but give Scully a speargun and he can load this boat with a few hundred pounds of fish in a couple of hours. And he can show you how to help. Think about it, Doc. We only have so much food on board, and the local Winn-Dixie in New Orleans ain’t likely to be open when we get there. And the muddy water up there doesn’t exactly offer the promise of spearing fish there if we get hungry.”
“Yeah, but assuming it is that easy to spear them, how will we keep all that fish fresh? It’s not like you have a deep freezer or even refrigeration on board.”
“No problem, mon. You see how much wind and sun there is out here at sea, and all the open deck space we have around us, being that we’re on a cat. We’ll preserve the fish the old way. We’ll dry it. People in the islands still do it all the time. Anyway, you’ll see. A brief stop to anchor there for a few hours will hardly make any difference in the grand scheme of things and will hardly affect our arrival time in New Orleans, but it will make a huge difference in our provisions.”
“Okay, fine with me if you say so, but you never did answer my question. How long do you think it’ll take to get the rest of the way, from the Keys on up to New Orleans?”
“Five days, tops, assuming we have wind. Weather in the Gulf is more fickle than here. We won’t have the trades, but we might get a lift from the Gulf Loop Current, and the wind should still generally be out of the southeast or east unless there’s a northern blowing, and that’s not likely this late in the year. We’ll leave the Anguillas after we take on our fish and cut right through the middle of the Keys under the Seven Mile Bridge at Marathon. I don’t plan on stopping there at all for any reason unless we run into some Coastie or Florida Marine Patrol boat and get pulled over. Once we clear that bridge and get in the Gulf, I aim to set a straight course for the Mississippi Sound, just east of the entrance to Lake Pontchartrain.”
“The direct route then, that’s good. How far is that?”
“About 550 nautical miles. It’s wide open sailing until you get to the oil fields about a hundred miles off the north coast. Normally, that’s a dangerous area, with all the crew boats and other vessels that serve the rigs running 24-7. There shouldn’t be any activity at all out there now, though.”
They passed the border that separates Haiti from the Dominican Republic later in the night, and by dawn were north of Tortuga, a Haitian island Larry said was made famous by the buccaneers who used it as a base of operations in the seventeenth century. After another jump of roughly 80 miles out of sight of land, they were abeam of the eastern end of Cuba. It was now late afternoon on their third day of sailing since the attack at Isleta Palominito. Larry said they would parallel Cuba for some 350 miles to the Cay Sal Bank. The trade winds were holding steady, and by staying 20 or so miles off the coast of the island, they would avoid the land effects that would interfere with the wind and be able to maintain an average speed of 10 knots as they had been doing since they left. Larry calculated this would put them near the southeast corner of the bank and the Anguilla Cays at dawn the day after tomorrow.
“If we happen to reach the banks before daylight, we’ll just have to heave to until there’s enough light. Even with just two feet of draft and a working GPS, that would be a risky area to enter without good light. The coral heads just about reach the surface in a lot of places, and they’re everywhere.”
For the most part, the waters they had traversed north of the island chain had been deserted except for a few sails spotted on the horizon off Puerto Rico and near Samaná Bay. Cuban waters were no exception. Larry said that no sailing vessels leaving the U.S. were likely to be seen this far south, as it was a dead beat to windward to go from Florida to the islands in the Old Bahama Channel. He figured a lot of people on the mainland who were lucky enough to own cruising boats would indeed leave for the islands to get away from the chaos, but most would cross the Gulf Stream to Bimini or the Abacos since they wouldn’t likely have the benefit of a working engine to help them motor-sail a more direct course to windward.
Other than an occasional visit to the cockpit to get some fresh air and look around, Larry stayed below in the port cabin most of the time, reading or sleeping in his bunk. He was still in a lot of pain, and Artie insisted that he take it easy and not try to do too much. By now, Artie had adapted to a four hours on, four hours off routine of alternating watches with Scully. But there wasn’t a whole lot to do while on watch. The wind vane took care of the steering, and the steady trade winds allowed them to sail a downwind run with the sails set wing on wing—the jib poled out to starboard, and the main eased out as far as possible against the port shrouds.
Cuba, by far the longest of all the islands in the West Indies, seemed to go on forever. The main island was out of sight by night at their distance, but the following day Artie caught occasional hazy glimpses of the higher mountains inland.
By carefully recording their dead-reckoning position each hour in the logbook and marking off a rhumb line on the chart, Artie and Scully were able to keep track of their progress along the island coast. They were able to check their calculations against charted landmarks, especially along the long outlying island of Cayo Lobos, which they passed much closer to than the main island. One more night at the consistent speeds they were sailing put them at the Cay Sal Bank around dawn, just as Larry had estimated the day before. As they neared this area of reef-studded shallow water, Scully reduced sail at around 0400 hours to slow the boat down to six knots, a speed that felt to Artie like sitting still on the catamaran, but still a respectable average on many sailboats. Scully told Artie that this would ensure they would not arrive at the banks too early.
“Got to wait for de sun come up to enter dat bank, mon. Only one way to navigate de banks—dat’s by de eyeball. Even when it’s workin’, de GPS no good in a place like dat.”
“I thought it wasn’t that big of a deal on a catamaran. Isn’t our draft so shallow we can hardly hit anything anyway?”
“Shallow draft, but on dem bank de reef sometime all de way to de top. Even a skiff got to find de channel. Coral like dat tear out de bottom on a plywood boat. Dem banks no place to get in trouble like dat. No watah on dem cays and even before now not many people going dat place.”
“So the diving is really good here, huh?”
“Bahamas best diving in de world, mon, and Cay Sal best in de Bahamas. Fish in dat place not afraid because most of dem nevah see a mon before.”
When the sun did come up, Cuba was no longer in sight to the south and the only visible land was a sliver of a low-lying cay of rock and sand roughly three miles ahead. The transition from the ocean to the edge of the bank was marked by a dramatic change in water color, from deep indigo blue to transparent aquamarine green through which Artie could see every detail of the sand bottom 20 feet below. The water over the bank was impossibly clear, the underwater visibility far exceeding even that around the coral reefs of Isleta Palominito. When they passed over an isolated patch of coral formations that reached to within 10 feet of the surface, Artie could clearly see that it was teeming with a dazzling array of tropical fish. A large black-tip shark darted away at right angles to their course as the catamaran’s twin bows passing overhead startled it. Larry was clearly excited to be here, and had come on deck to eagerly scan the line of cays ahead with his binoculars.
“Where are we going to anchor, near the island?” Artie asked.
“No, just past it, off the north end, on the edge of the banks. There’s an extensive patch of reef there you won’t believe, huge elkhorn and brain coral formations, lots of deep crevices and canyons, all in about 30 feet of water. It’s thick with big grouper and yellowtails. We can clean up there in short order. Damn, I just wish I could dive!”
“Sorry, little brother, but you’re going to have to sit this one out—doctor’s orders. I’d like to try it myself, but I don’t know after seeing the size of that shark back there.”
“Plenty shark,” Scully said, as he steered them closer to the cays, “but not to worry too much. Best t’ing is to spear de fish and get dem on de boat quick.”
“Yeah, that’s a good idea, diving in shark-infested waters and then calling the sharks to dinner by poking bloody holes in a bunch of fish!”
“They don’t usually mess with you if you don’t hang around too long,” Larry said. “Like Scully said, as soon as you spear a fish, get it out of the water as fast as possible to minimize the blood.”
Artie was still skeptical a half hour later, when, anchored over the reef, he put on a mask and snorkel and sat on the edge of the deck with a pair of fins. Scully was already in the water, and Artie could see him free-diving effortlessly into the winding and convoluted canyons between the coral, his dreadlocks streaming behind him as he cruised 20 feet below, with his speargun at ready.
By the time Artie was in the water, still swimming by the boat and looking around beneath the surface with his mask, Scully was on the way back to the boat with a two-and-a-half-foot long, heavy-bodied fish impaled on his spear. Artie found out later it was a Nassau grouper, a reef fish much sought after in the Bahamas that is much more scarce near the populated islands. The Anguilla Cays were so far from the rest of the Bahamian islands they may as well have been in another country, and from what Artie could see as he snorkeled along the surface, Larry had not been exaggerating about the possibilities for stocking the boat with fresh fish. The only problem was that, for Artie, handling the awkward Hawaiian sling spear gun underwater was difficult enough, on top of the fact that to get within range of the fish, it was necessary to hold your breath and swim down to at least 15 feet or deeper to reach the coral. Artie had little experience using the snorkeling gear, and even less free-diving to any depth. By the time he got close enough to start looking for potential prey, he invariably felt the need to return to the surface for air. When he did get a shot at a grouper, the stainless-steel spear missed by a wide margin and went into a patch of sand on the bottom, a good 25 feet deep. He tried twice to reach it, each time having to abandon the attempt and lunge for the surface for another breath before he could reach the bottom. Finally, Scully came to his rescue and got the spear. By this time, Scully already had more than a half-dozen fish on the decks of the Casey Nicole, and when Artie saw a 10-foot shark swimming around just on the edge of his visibility limit, he made for the boarding ladder as fast as he could.
“Sorry, little brother, but I guess we would starve to death if we were dependent upon my abilities as a hunter.”
“That’s all right, Doc. It takes practice. You’ll get your chance again.”
Artie marveled at the array of fish Scully had lain out on the teak slats of the forward deck. When he finally came aboard and took off his gear, he had one last prize—a huge spiny lobster, which he held up for Larry with a grin.
“You’re the man, Scully!” Larry was ecstatic about the lobster. “Scully won’t eat lobster,” he explained to Artie. “But he got one for us, since I couldn’t do it myself.”
“Dat’s not I-tal, mon,” he said when Artie asked if he did not like lobster. “A Rasta don’t to eat dem lobstah, crab and animal like dat—only fish. But if I an’ I got not’ing to eat, not to worry ’bout dat, gonna eat dem too.”
“Well, too bad for you, Scully, but the Doc and I are going to have lobster tail for breakfast, so we need to get going.” He said to Artie, “I told you this place would be worth a short stop, didn’t I?”
An hour and a half later, with drying fillets of fish spread out on the decks, they were underway again on a broad reach, sailing over the smooth waters of the banks just inside the reefs that break up the swell from the open ocean. This was some of the best sailing of the whole trip, the wide, stable form of the catamaran gliding over a transparent sheet of smooth crystalline water that stretched as far as they could see over the shallow, sandy bottom of Cay Sal Bank.
They were approaching the Damas Cays, the next islets north of the Anguillas on the rim of the atoll, when Scully spotted a sail out on the banks to the southwest. Closer inspection through Larry’s binoculars, which they all passed around for a better look, revealed that it was not just a single sail, but rather a two-masted schooner. It didn’t take long to ascertain that the distant vessel was coming their way, and Larry said it appeared to have adjusted course to intercept them if they continued on their present heading.
“Who do you think they could be?” Artie asked.
“It’s still too far away to tell, but it doesn’t look like your typical cruising yacht to me,” Larry said. “I’d say it’s over 60 feet, and probably built somewhere in the islands.”
“Could be dem Cuban, mon.”
“You’re right, Scully. Or Haitian. Or from the west, maybe Honduras or Belize. It’s been long enough now since the pulse that people who are able are probably starting to get on the move. There’s just no telling, but I don’t like the looks of this. Let’s bear off and get all the speed we can out of these sails while I look at the charts. There are some dangerous shoals just to the south of those cays ahead.”
Scully eased the genoa sheet and adjusted the mainsheet traveler to leeward. They were on a broad reach, which was generally a faster point of sail on a catamaran than a dead downwind run. The morning breeze had been light while they were anchored over the reef, but now, as it was getting toward noon, the trade winds had freshened to 15 knots again. Artie glanced at the distant schooner and then at the wake behind their twin sterns. At its fastest speeds, the Tiki 36 created quite a bit of turbulence astern, and Larry estimated they were hitting 16 or 17 knots. The schooner wouldn’t be able catch them in an even race, no matter how much sail they piled on, but it had an angle advantage on them in relation to the wind, and it appeared it would intersect their course if they continued to the northwest inside the reefs of the bank. Artie could tell that Larry and Scully were both getting nervous about the situation, and he felt knots in his stomach thinking about the attack at Isleta Palominito.
“I don’t like this,” Larry said, as he stared at the schooner through his binoculars. “They’ve adjusted their course again to account for our increased speed, and it looks like they’re trying to cut us off before we can reach the north end of the bank.”
“What can we do?” Artie asked.
“First of all, you can get my shotgun and bring it up on deck. There’s a couple of extra boxes of buckshot and slugs in the locker under the chart table.”
This was the last thing Artie wanted to hear. The thought of having to use the gun again twisted the knots in his stomach even tighter. “How do we know what their intentions are?”
Larry handed him the binoculars. “Take a look. It’s definitely not a family cruiser or vacation charter boat.”
The schooner was now within a mile of the Casey Nicole, and with the binoculars, Artie could see that it was anything but a modern yacht. It looked as if it had been built back in the days when all ships harnessed the wind, and its peeling paint and stained and patched sails proved it was an island fisherman or cargo vessel, probably from Cuba. Despite its condition, it had obviously been built from plans that came from the drawing board of a skilled naval architect, evidenced by its graceful lines, raked masts, and purposeful bowsprit. It was clearly well sailed by its unknown crew, and Artie could see that if they didn’t do something different, they would be cut off soon. He handed the binoculars back to Larry and went below to get the gun as his brother had asked. When he came back on deck with it, Larry was grinning as he studied the chart while Scully steered. His new excitement had nothing to do with the gun being on deck.
“You look too happy for a captain about to be run down by pirates, little brother.”
“I’ve got a plan now, Doc. I’m about to show you why catamarans rule. Then you’ll know why I spent so much time building one.”
“Aren’t we already going about as fast as she will go?”
“I’ve got more tricks than speed up my sleeve,” Larry said. “Hang on. Just another quarter of a mile and we’ll be home free.”
“Dat boat full of Cuban, mon.” Scully had the binoculars now while Artie took the helm and kept them on course. “Must be ten, maybe twelve on de rail. Probably got dem AK too. I hope you got a good plan, Copt’n.”
“Just pray to Jah the wind holds, Scully. We’re almost there.”
Artie couldn’t see what “there” was. There was nothing ahead but more of the same pale green water and white sandy bottom clearly visible beneath it, while to their starboard side there were occasional rocks and crashing breakers where the open Atlantic was separated from the bank by reefs. He looked at the schooner again and was shocked to see how close it appeared. Just as it seemed hopeless to try and outrun it, he found out what Larry had in mind as his brother took the helm with his one good hand.
“Okay, Scully, get ready. Just past those two rocks ahead I’m going to put her hard over to starboard. We’ll jibe and run off to the northeast straight outside. Artie! I need you on the forward deck. Help me look for coral heads. The chart shows an area with about two feet of water over the reef at low tide, but that’s still six hours away. We should be able to slide over as long as we don’t hit something sticking up where it’s not supposed to be.”
Artie scrambled forward and crouched low on the deck as Larry brought the stern through the wind and Scully sheeted the genoa on the other tack. For a moment, the boat slowed dramatically, and seemed to be coming to a stop, but as soon as the wind filled the sails from the other side, it surged forward as only a light multihull could, and was quickly up to at least 10 knots again. Artie stood and hung onto the forestay where he could look around the luff of the sail and study the waters ahead. There were breaking waves outside the reef and dark patches of brown under the clear water all around them. He held his breath as they passed over rocks that looked like they would tear the bottoms out of the hulls, but depth was deceptive in the clear water and they never touched bottom, despite the appearance that it was only inches below the surface.
He heard a series of loud cracks that had to be rifle shots from the schooner, but didn’t dare take his eyes off the course ahead to look back. Pointing with his free hand, he motioned for Larry to adjust course to dodge a rock just close enough to the surface to hit, and when they skimmed past it, he saw that he had been right to do so. It was a near miss, but now the water color had changed to sapphire blue and the reefs were astern. The bows pitched as they sliced into a four-foot swell, and Artie hung on to the forestay with both hands to keep his balance. At this point, he could relax and look back.
The schooner was dead astern and coming right at them, having altered course to follow the catamaran off the banks. Artie wondered if such a big vessel could possibly clear the reefs over the route they took, then he began to understand why his brother had been grinning. If the crew of the schooner were not familiar with the area and did not have proper charts on board, they might have assumed that if their prey was able to sail off the banks at that point, they could too. He rushed back to the cockpit where Scully and Larry were also watching to see what would happen next. Someone on board was still shooting in their direction, but Larry said the range was still too great for ordinary rifles.
“Come on, baby!” Larry said as they sailed east. “That’s right, just keep on coming and try to catch us!”
“Dat copt’n is a fool!” Scully said. “Got no chart and no common sense too!”
“He’s still coming,” Artie said. “How much does a boat like that draw? It’s got to be more than Pete and Maryanne’s Celebration that we were on.”
“Actually, no. These fishing schooners were designed to work the banks and are considered shallow-draft vessels at four feet. That’s a lot more than us, though, and they’re about to get a surprise!” And soon after he said it, when the Casey Nicole was nearly a half mile east of the reef, the big schooner came to a sudden stop with a sound of splintering and breaking wood. With the bow plowed up on the reef, the stern swung around until the hull was nearly at right angles to the direction it had been sailing, then heeled over until the masts were leaning at a 30-degree angle to the horizon.
“Yes!” Larry shouted, shaking his fist in the direction of the wreck. “Serves you right, you stupid son of a bitch!”
“Damn! They hit the rocks at full speed.”
“Dat boat is finished, mon. Nevah gonna get dat hull off de reef again!”
“I love it, Doc! See what I told you about Wharram catamarans? Fast under sail, seaworthy, and shallow draft too! What’s not to like?”
“That was scary, though. They almost got within rifle range before we crossed that reef.”
“Almost, but almost doesn’t count, does it, Doc? We’re home free, for now at least. Let’s point this vessel to Florida and get out of here.”
“Sounds good to me. I never wanted to stop, anyway, but I guess it was worth it to get all this fish.”
Larry gave Artie the course to steer while Scully moved the drying fish from the forward decks to the netting stretched between the sterns behind the cockpit. There it would be safe from getting washed overboard by the occasional large wave and be out of the spray from the bows. To avoid the reefs and the possibility of running into other aggressors on the banks, Larry wanted to head nearly due north for another 20 miles before setting a northwest course directly for Marathon, in the middle of the chain of islands making up the Florida Keys.
“It’s nearly noon now. That’s good and bad at the same time,” Larry said. “It’s nearly 90 miles to Sombrero Key light, which is where I want to make landfall. The good news is that we’ll get there after dark. The bad news is also that we’ll get there after dark.”
“I don’t understand, the logic, but go ahead.”
“Well, we need to cut through the Keys just west of Marathon to get to the Gulf for two reasons: one, it’s a more direct route than sailing all the way around Key West, which is another 70 miles west, and two, we have to cross the Gulf Stream between here and the Keys, and its current will be setting us to the east of our rhumb line. Trying to sail directly to Key West or points west of there would be even more difficult. Anyway, going through the Keys at night might be a good thing because we won’t likely be noticed and it will give us a look at how things are in U.S. waters, and whether everything is totally blacked out or not.”
“And the bad?”
“It’s a treacherous area to be sailing through at night—especially with no working channel markers or other aids to navigation, and no GPS. I wouldn’t even attempt it in any kind of deeper-draft sailboat. And I also wouldn’t attempt it if I weren’t intimately familiar with that area. There are reefs, rocks, wrecks, derelict boats, and no telling what else on the Atlantic side of the chain, and about a million crab traps with their floating buoys scattered all over the Gulf side for miles and miles. But the good thing is, I’ve been in and out of Boot Key Harbor in Marathon in more conditions than I can count: day, night, squalls, approaching hurricanes, you name it. So considering all the pros and cons, I’m willing to risk it, especially since we’ll have nearly a full moon tonight.”
By mid-afternoon, Cay Sal Bank was far astern and they were once again sailing off-soundings through an inky-blue sea with empty horizons for a full 360 degrees. Larry had plotted a course that would compensate for the lateral drift they would experience crossing the Gulf Stream, and he calculated they would reach the outlying reefs of the Florida Keys by 1800 hours, considering they were still averaging 10 knots throughout the afternoon. By the time the sun was approaching the horizon to one side of their course, the almost-round moon, just two days from full, rose from the sea on the other, and with only a few scattered cumulus clouds in the sky, promised to light their way through the night.
All three of them were still wound up from the encounter with the schooner, and with another landfall approaching fast, no one wanted to leave the deck to take a turn off watch. Sleep could come later, once they were clear of the Keys in the wide-open waters of the Gulf of Mexico. As the last hint of twilight disappeared, the moon lit a silvery path across the waves and a pod of dolphins joined them, leaping and broaching ahead on both sides of the boat and between the bows, seemingly delighted to lead them home to U.S. waters. As the distance to land had to be closing, according to Larry’s dead reckoning, he constantly scanned the horizon ahead and through 180 degrees to port and starboard with his binoculars.
“There it is!” he said at last. “Another half mile to the west and we’d have run right into it!” He handed the binoculars to Artie. It was incredible how much light these high-quality German-made navigation binoculars gathered even on nights lit only with starlight. Under the moon they had tonight, looking through them was almost like viewing in daylight. He saw what Larry was pointing at: it was a steel tower rising out of the sea, the 142-foot Sombrero Lighthouse. Larry said it was the tallest light in the Keys. While the flashing white light that would have enabled them to see it from much farther out had been extinguished, the tower itself was an adequate landmark on an otherwise empty sea to mark their position. More significantly to Artie, it was a major milestone in their voyage. It meant they were back in mainland U.S. waters and that he was that much closer to Casey.
“I don’t know how you do it, little brother,” he said, as he handed the binoculars back to Larry. “That was an incredible feat of navigation with nothing but a compass.”
“Nah, no big deal. I just followed the dolphins,” Larry said, but as he looked around, he saw that they had disappeared. “The good news is we made it to the U.S. It looks like the bad news is that the lights are out here too. From here you would normally be able to see a whole string of towns lit up along the Overseas Highway, dead ahead. You’d also see the glow of Key West off to port and the glow of Miami way up there to the northeast. But I don’t see anything. This is truly bizarre.”
“I guess every place we come to that has no lights just proves how incredibly widespread this event was, whatever it actually was. I don’t guess there’s any reason to hope it’s not the same in New Orleans.”
“Nope, I wouldn’t think so. We all need to keep a sharp lookout now. There aren’t any reefs to worry about if we hold this course, but there could be other obstructions. We should be able to see the Seven Mile Bridge soon. It will be to the left of the closest key we’ll pass on this route, where Marathon and Boot Key Harbor are located. We want to aim for the high-rise span in the bridge that’s about three miles from the eastern end. The vertical clearance there is 65 feet, so we don’t have anything to worry about there.”
Though they had no working depth sounder, it was obvious from the change in the wave patterns when they crossed into the shallower waters of Hawk Channel as they passed the Sombrero Key light tower. From the edge of this area of somewhat protected waters inside the scattered reefs that paralleled the Keys, it was less than five miles to the Overseas Highway, a road that consisted of numerous bridges stringing the island chain together from Key Largo to Key West.
“There’s only a few places in this part of the Keys where a boat with a tall mast can get under the bridges,” Larry said, “and this is one of the highest spans.”
Artie could see the bridge looming ahead out of the darkness as they closed the gap. Scully eased the sheets to spill some wind and reduce speed as they approached the channel under the elevated section of the span. It was a surreal scene after being so long at sea and among less-developed islands. Here was a modern concrete and steel highway bridge that was totally silent in the absence of traffic and totally dark without the lights on its lampposts lit or the headlights of cars shining. As they drew nearer, they could see parked vehicles spread out at intervals on the roadway overhead.
“They’ve been there since they stalled out, I suppose,” Artie said.
“Yeah, I’m sure. All the traffic to and from Key West has to come this way. It wouldn’t be the best place to be right now, unless you had a boat.”
“My God, can you imagine how many cars must be stuck on the Causeway? It’s much longer than this. I hate to think of what it must be like for anyone to get stuck in the middle of a bridge like that and have to walk to the shore.”
“It would be a nightmare for sure,” Larry said. “But you don’t have to worry about Casey being in a mess like that, at least. From what she and Jessica told me during their vacation last summer, most of their life in the city revolves right around the campus and the immediate area nearby.”
“Yeah, unless she tried to leave. After this many days without electricity and phones, I don’t know if she and Jessica could sit still that long.”
“Just try not to worry; we’ll be there in just a few more days now. Soon as we pass under that bridge, we’re in the Gulf!”
Artie was elated to be back in U.S. waters, two-thirds of their voyage behind them. But he still couldn’t help but worry about Casey, especially now as he saw the reality that even a country as modern as the United States was shut down and blacked out. Looking up at the rail just before they sailed under the bridge, he was startled to see movement. There were two people leaning over to look at them.
“Hey! Stop that boat and give us a ride!” one yelled. The other one threw something at them that they could not see, but a couple of seconds later there was a huge splash in their wake as something heavy hit the water.
“Rock! Watch your heads!” Larry said.
“Fockin’ kids, mon.” Scully said as he looked up.
Just then they moved out of danger as the boat slid under the overpass and was hidden from the view of anyone above. Scully hardened the sheets as soon as they were between the pilings, and the Casey Nicole accelerated out from under the other side, but whoever had thrown the rock didn’t follow up and in a few minutes the bridge was receding astern.
Larry said there were still several scattered keys and shoal areas to the north of the bridge that they would have to be careful to avoid as they made their way to the open Gulf, but he knew the waters, and the moon was now high enough to provide good visibility, especially in the absence of lights ashore. The crab traps he had mentioned before were evident everywhere on this side of the island chain, marked by floating white buoys that were so numerous Scully had to constantly steer around them. With no inboard engine and consequently no prop in the water to hang up on the buoy lines, the markers were really no threat to the Casey Nicole, but since they showed up clearly in the moonlight, Scully avoided them anyway out of long habit on other boats. By midnight, they were back north off the extensive shallows and shoals on the Gulf side of the Keys and in the open sea once again. Larry went back below to retire to his bunk now that they were beyond the navigation hazards of the Keys, and Artie and Scully took turns keeping watch. Artie stayed on deck to rest even when he was off duty, the night being so nice with the light of the moon and the barely perceptible swell of the Gulf as the boat moved north at eight knots in a light breeze. He was elated that no other major obstacles stood between him and New Orleans. If all went as planned, they would be sailing into the waters of Lake Pontchartrain in four days or less.