Ariel (22 page)

* * *

We were at the Woodrow Wilson Bridge. It made me nervous: no place to go except toward an opponent or back the way you came—by which time, if they were even moderately smart, there'd be a greeting party there, too. Unless you wanted to dive over the side. I looked at the massive concrete of the car-filled bridge and wondered. In the cars? Possible.

"How 'bout it, Ariel?"

"Feels okay. Which is why it feels wrong."

I nodded. "It says a lot when you can't trust a safe feeling anymore. Keep your eyes peeled." She stepped alongside me, followed by Shaughnessy, who held the crossbow with the butt clamped under her right arm, hand on the trigger guard, other hand on the stock. She'd been silent for the past few hours. I made her follow a different path through the cars than the one I took, then began threading my own way through, trying not to think about her. I concentrated on the cars, looking intently into their interiors as I came up on them.

I kept glancing at both banks of the Potomac to see if perhaps we were being watched. I just couldn't shake the feeling. Motion out of the corner of my eye caused me to bring Fred up to guard position. I relaxed. Shaughnessy, looking nervous but resolute.

We crossed the bridge without incident. Ariel was already waiting on the other side. All was still and quiet. I sheathed Fred, reached out, and gently dislodged Shaughnessy's hand from around the crossbow's trigger guard.

* * *

We made camp well out of sight of the Interstate. Ariel assured me she would keep the night vigil, and Shaughnessy and I collapsed on our sides of the sleeping bag.

We reached the Chesapeake about two-thirty the next afternoon. We smelled it long before we saw it; something in the very atmosphere, in the feel of the landscape, changed as we neared it. Weathered houses indelicately pulled their skirts up against the eventuality of flooding. The bay was deep blue and serene.

"Nice, huh?" I asked Shaughnessy, hoping to get some sort of enthusiasm out of her. I was rewarded by a broad smile.

"Yes! I'd be happy just to stop here and sit around for a decade or so."

"I like looking at this," said Ariel. "It looks  .  .  . serene. Timeless, or something. As if your civilization could start up again tomorrow and I'd disappear, and this would still be here. And things could Change again, and again, and that—" she nodded at the indigo horizon "—would still be there, regardless."

I realized then that she'd never seen the ocean before. All that wandering we'd done in Florida, and we'd never been to a beach. I wanted to see her on the beach in moonlight, waves unfurling behind her with foam on them like the fluff of her mane, her silver hooves firmly in the wet sand and she a ghostly silhouette against the eternal crescendo of wave after wave.

We did nothing but look at it for a long time. It was Shaughnessy who finally broke the spell. "Well, what now?"

I looked at Ariel. "Find a marina, I guess. You can forget about any boat in the water, but a boat in dry dock might not be in bad shape."

She nodded. Shaughnessy and I got up, slapping sand from our pants, and the three of us walked along the beach.

* * *

Its name was
Lady Woof
and it hung twelve feet above the water. It was at least forty feet long and held from a crane by steel cables.

"Good-looking boat," remarked Shaughnessy. "How do we get it from there to there?" She pointed from the crane to the water.

"Let's just count our blessings," I said. "At least we've found a seaworthy boat—I hope. After so long she might ship water like a clothes basket, for all we know. The sails may have dry rotted."

"Most sails are nylon, not canvas," said Shaughnessy. "Nylon won't dry rot in six years." She grinned. "Besides, there's no rigging on that boat, in case you didn't notice. They had to remove the masts when they raised her."

* * *

The
Lady Woof
turned out to be in good shape. I clambered up the framework of the crane and lowered myself down the cable and onto the deck. Boat fixtures are built to be waterproof, so half a dozen years' worth of storms had barely affected her. There was a lot of birdshit crusted on deck. Surprisingly, the wheel and rudder moved freely. The cabin was luxurious. Dust had settled about the rich wooden cabinets and countertops. The plush green sofa-bed was faded. I found a few hurricane lamps tucked away, and a bottle of lemon-scented lamp oil. Whoever had owned her had, to coin a phrase, gone overboard on the interior. Varying tones of wood were everywhere, and the musty air smelled of cedar. Yellow curtains trimmed the left and right windows—I mean, the port and starboard hatches—drawn in at their centers.

I returned to the deck and leaned out over the starboard side. Ariel and Shaughnessy looked up at me from the dock. "Looks seaworthy," I said. "But how we'll get her to sea I don't—"

"We'll do it," Ariel insisted.

"How come you're Miss Mystery all of a sudden?" I asked. "You got an antigravity device tucked away somewhere?"

Shaughnessy interrupted and suggested I check out the interior of the crane—perhaps there was some kind of release lever. I climbed down.

The crane's mechanisms wouldn't work. Big surprise there. Well—"If it doesn't fit, use a bigger hammer."

I found a ballpeen hammer and lugged it back from the deserted boatyard. I had to stand in an awkward position with one leg braced against the side of the crane in order to swing it against the gear holding the winch in place. I was relying on the combination of six years of salt air plus no lubrication or maintenance. Sure, the weight of
Lady Woof
was locking those gear teeth in place—but nothing supported the gear if I smashed it from the side.

I pulled back the hammer and swung. The solid steel impact made me blink involuntarily. I swung again, and again, the gear gonging in belltower rhythm.

On about the tenth swing there came a faint, sustained squeaking which rapidly grew to a nerve-rending metallic shriek. I swung once more and the small portion of the gear that still bit into the winch gave way before I hit it. The winch began turning quickly. I was tugged toward it as it caught the hammer and ate it; I let go quickly. Steel cable began spilling from the winch. I ducked, rolled, and got the hell out of there.

Next thing I knew, my back was soaked with cool water. There was the long, wet hiss of a huge splash. I turned around.

Bobbing and rocking slowly, the
Lady Woof
settled herself into the waters of Chesapeake Bay.

Sixteen

Ultima Thule! Utmost Isle! Here in thy harbors for a while We lower our sails; a while we rest From the unending, endless quest.

—Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, "Dedication to G.W.G."

Shaughnessy applauded. Ariel cheered. I grinned, bowed, and clambered aboard the boat. Not that I'd be able to tell if there was any hull damage from the fall, but it wouldn't hurt to look. Everything seemed all right, though.

Aboard were two large coils of rope. Ariel made me take a third from another boat and Shaughnessy helped me carry it to the
Lady
. I didn't ask what they were for, though I had my suspicions.

The breeze cooled as night fell, and we brought our gear aboard. Shaughnessy tied us securely to the dock for the night. I went to the cabin and fell upon the sofabed. Shaughnessy and Ariel could do what the hell they wanted—I was going to sleep.

* * *

I awoke to gurgling noises and Ariel's insistent prodding. "Come on, get up," she urged. "The tide's going out." I was disoriented: the sea sounds and faint rocking motion were unfamiliar. My hand went automatically for Fred. I clasped air and remembered that I had left it by the backpack on deck the night before.

"Pete," said Ariel again. She had to crane her head in the cabin to keep from hitting the ceiling with her horn. Only her head and neck were in the little room; her body wouldn't fit through the door. "Wind and tide are in our favor," she continued. "We've got to put to sea."

"I don' wanna go to school," I muttered to her blurry image, and stepped past her and onto the deck. Early morning yellows lanced my eyes.

"Good morning," said Shaughnessy cheerfully. She sat against the bulkhead, wearing a yellow tanktop and cut-off jeans. "I found these in the cabin," she explained to my raised eyebrow. "There were a few other things, but they didn't fit."

Shaughnessy and I lowered the
Lady
's dinghy into the water—which sounds pretty suggestive, I admit—and I settled myself slowly into the little rowboat, keeping my weight in the center, picked up the oars, and held them over my head threateningly. "Where's me faithful cutlass Fred?" I bellowed. "Tie the scurvy dog to the yardarm! Hoist the Jolly Roger! Arrrh!"

"Oh, Captain," called Ariel, "don't you think we'd better cast off first?"

"You have in fact anticipated my next command—cast off!"

Shaughnessy pushed us off and the
Lady
moved slowly from the dock. Shaughnessy scrambled aboard.

We maneuvered the
Lady
by kedging. Once we had her away from the dock and able to head out to open sea, we took one coil of rope and tied it to a bow cleat, passing the end through the ring in the stern of the dinghy. I lowered myself back into the little rowboat, positioned myself, and began rowing. After twenty seconds the
Lady
began to move toward me, and I began rowing away until the connecting rope went taut. Shaughnessy waved encouragingly. I gritted my teeth and began to put some muscle into it. Towing a forty-foot boat with oars and a dinghy isn't impossible.

Being possible doesn't make it easy. I felt every ounce of her twenty thousand pounds on the blades of the oars as I strained to keep us at our snail's pace. Humphrey Bogart and the
African Queen
. I was beginning to appreciate why the boat was named
Lady Woof
.

Ariel stood on the bow to provide moral support. Ah, she was a sight! Standing nobly behind the rail, horn catching the light, wind rippling her mane, land so very gradually receding behind her.

Around ten-thirty I shipped oars and forced my hands to unclench. They felt as if they were burning off. I stuck them in the cool water and screamed. Burning salt water dripped from my hands and ran down my forearms. The
Lady
was beside me, her momentum having carried her a little farther. I grabbed her rail and stifled a cry: the metal was searing cold-hot, as if I'd grabbed dry ice. I straddled the rail, swung my other leg over, and fell on my ass. I lay back until I was looking at the sky, lacking the strength to get up, right forearm shielding my eyes from the sun. An unmistakably-shaped blot appeared above me and I smiled tiredly at Ariel. "Well, so far so good. What now, Skipper?"

* * *

The three lengths of thick, strong hemp sank lazily into the water and began to lag behind
Lady Woof
. Ariel had had me tie the three coils of rope into huge nooses, tie their other ends to the two T-shaped metal cleats in front, one rope on the left and two on the right, and toss them overboard. We'd been drifting out to sea for an hour but were hardly making progress. We were still well within sight of land, so I was at least sure of our direction. The sun was almost straight overhead. I watched the three ropes slanting beneath the
Lady
. "Well," I said, leaning back to prop myself up on one elbow, the other hand holding onto a bright metal cleat, "now we just wait for three good Samaritan killer whales to wander into the nooses and pull us merrily on our way, right?" I squinted at Ariel. She'd spent most of the last hour deep in thought, focusing her concentration. This was the only time I'd interrupted her; watching the three ropes trail languidly along made my curiosity itch. "Actually," she said, "I'm hoping for humpbacks. But killer whales would do."

I sat up.

Ariel rose unsteadily, trying to compensate for the boat's hardly noticeable pitching. She had a keen sense of balance but seemed quite out of her element at sea. She stepped cautiously to her left and looked out over the rail. "I need to get closer to the water."

"Whatever for?"

"I need to touch it."

"Oh. Of course." I stood. "Whatever you say, Cap'n Skipper Ma'am. How do you propose to do that? Jump overboard? Can you swim? Could you get back on board? Or would you rather I leaned the whole boat a little—my arm muscles ought to be capable of that by now."

She glanced back at me. "Don't try to make me feel guilty. It won't work."

"What are we doing?" asked Shaughnessy. She'd snatched the Coppertone from my backpack and was greasing herself liberally.

I shrugged. "'Ours is not to reason why  .  .  .  .'"

"Quiet," snapped Ariel. She craned her powerful neck forward to look at the water and dipped her horn. Flash: it caught sunlight. Shaughnessy squinted just before I did. Ariel was thoughtful a minute. I tried to picture her pursing her lips. "Get a bucket and some rope," she ordered.

"Aye-aye, sarr." I fetched a bucket from the cabin and a length of line from my backpack. She ordered me to tie the line to the bucket, lower it into the water, and bring it up full. I complied and held the bucket of seawater before her. "Set it down," she said. Her eyes narrowed in concentration, and she lowered her head until the first six inches of her horn were immersed in the bucket.

Landward was a flock of seagulls, their greedy cries reaching us like the sound of a hundred rusty gates swinging in the distance.

A muscle rippled in Ariel's neck. It spread to her shoulder like a small wake in a silken pond. She closed her eyes tighter and let out a long, silvery breath. She raised her head. "There," she said. A few drops of salt water dripped from her horn; a few more traced an incomplete spiral down its length.

I looked into the bucket. It still looked like seawater to me. "'There' what?"

"That ought to do it. Just toss it overboard."

I eyed her doubtfully, but picked up the bucket and emptied it over the side.

The gulls stopped crying. For a few seconds everything—the sea, the wind, the birds—was silent and still. Then it passed and the gulls resumed their searching, hungry calls.

Ariel walked gingerly back to the center of the deck and lowered herself to it, front legs and bottom-most rear leg tucked delicately. A reddish-gold glimmer of sunlight traced the graceful length of her right hind leg, becoming reflected magma at the hoof. "Well," she said in answer to our unspoken but obvious next question, "now we wait."

"For humpback whales." Shaughnessy was skeptical.

Ariel regarded her blankly. "We'll see when they get here."

I sat on deck with my back against the curving bulkhead. "Pass the Coppertone," I said. Shaughnessy tossed me the brown plastic bottle.
Tan, Don't Burn!
Right. I squeezed a healthy glop onto my left hand, rubbed both hands together, and spread the stuff over my face. It felt cool at least. Ten minutes later Shaughnessy shielded her eyes from the sun and looked out on the water. "Something's coming," she announced. "No, correct that—a bunch of somethings."

Ariel got up carefully. I shaded my eyes and squinted in the direction Shaughnessy was looking. Bright flashes, a half-dozen, now a dozen, now nine, leaping in silver arcs from the water. "Dolphins!" I grinned at Ariel. "Dolphins!"

"Hmph. The call was for whales, but this might do."

They jumped from the water in well-timed groups, performing intricate maneuvers that made the best Olympic-level divers look palsied. Shaughnessy grinned, too, looking all of eight years old. Then they were by the
Lady
and we could hear the razzing noise of their playful chatter. They moved like shadows through the water, gliding gray torpedo shapes that left almost no wake. One nudged a trailing rope playfully with its snout. Ariel watched it a few seconds, then—I found out later—called to it. The call was ultrasonic, above the normal human hearing range. Though she stood in the center of the boat, she was large, and it must have seen her. "Seen" is the wrong word; I later discovered a dolphin has terrible eyesight. More correctly, it perceived her with its echolocational ability—a sense no human being can quite imagine, as it is alien to our physiology. It must have signaled its comrades, for when Ariel "spoke" to it, it stopped playing with the rope, shook its head from side to side, and dove below the surface with a flip of its tail. The rest did likewise. The water was calm again, as if they'd never been there. The gulls cried in the distance.

"What'd you do, insult it?" I asked.

"Him. No. Wait."

All at once they sprang from the water, a precise circle of two dozen dolphins diving for air. Simultaneously, they executed a complete backflip with a half twist. I could hardly distinguish the splashes; they were so well timed it sounded like one big splash, and again the water was still.

"What just happened?" I asked.

"I said hello," said Ariel. "They said hi back."

"Oh."

Presently they surfaced again, blowing air in bull snorts from the top of their heads, frolicking, nudging one another like elementary school kids at recess. The leader separated himself from the group. He rolled left, looking up at us with his dark and intelligent right eye. His mouth was molded in a natural, friendly smile. He raised his right flipper, almost as if in greeting, and slapped down hard. A jet of water hit Shaughnessy in the face. She brought a hand to her eyes, sputtering. The dolphin let out a Donald Duck-ish exclamation and dove beneath the surface.

"They love to play," said Ariel.

"Noticed that, did you?" asked Shaughnessy, drying her face with the tail of her shirt. She saw me regarding her with a too-innocent smile, looked down, and tugged her shirt back down to her waist.

I laughed and turned to Ariel, who wasn't laughing. "You know they can't pull this boat all the way to New York," I said, changing the subject.

"I know. But they're great messengers."

"How do you know? You never saw the ocean before yesterday."

"We're birds of a feather, so to speak. We understand each other. There's a lot more to it than that, but it goes beyond words. We're  .  .  . friends. Allies."

"How is it you can talk to them?"

"Language is language. Now be quiet; I need to talk with the bull some more."

I stood out of the way and watched while Ariel palavered with the dolphin. It was a silent, five-minute exchange. Ariel turned away at the end of it and the bull submerged to join his herd.

"So what's the story?" I asked.

"They're checking the area. Be patient."

Fifteen minutes later I saw it and nearly shit my pants. Beneath the water a shadow moved toward the
Lady Woof
. It looked like a frigging submarine. It broke surface a hundred yards from us, slapped its huge tail on the water, and dove again.

"A humpback whale!" Shaughnessy shouted in delight.

"Ariel, that thing's bigger than this boat!"

"Yes. Beautiful, isn't it? There ought to be one or two more on the way. We should make good time."

My jaw ached; I shut my mouth.

The leviathan circled and came at us from beneath and behind. I tensed, waiting for the impact, but none came. It was an effort to fight the urge to shut my eyes. I compromised and held a tight squint. It was hard to accept the reality of a living thing bigger than our forty-foot boat. Oh, sure, the dragon had been bigger—but we'd been on our element, on dry land, at the time. The sea was alien territory to me.

One of the trailing ropes began to swing forward. I watched as the blue-gray shadow sped silently ahead of us, almost creating the illusion that the sun was setting alarmingly fast and our shadow was lengthening before us. Then the rope grew taut and my knees buckled as we surged forward.

"Thar she blows!"
yelled Shaughnessy, and it was true. A white geyser shot up from the whale.

My heart pounded wildly. I was frightened and exhilarated at the same time. "Your friends seem to have connections in high places," I said.

Ariel said nothing. Instead she inclined her horn to the sea. I looked. Out beyond the humpback pulling us along, two more leviathan shapes broke surface with Brobdingnagian majesty.