Read Lab Notes: a novel Online
Authors: Gerrie Nelson
Lab Notes: a novel (11 page)
He wondered if he was getting paranoid. He had read about solo sailors on long passages having hallucinations and delusions. But he never thought it could happen to
him
.
On the other hand, suppose somebody
was
stalking him? And what if he didn’t make it back home? “Damn! Damn! Damn!” he shouted to the wind. He should have told Diane about the notes. What if someone else found them before she did? After a moment’s deliberation, Vincent reached over and switched on the camcorder.
He spoke into the cockpit microphone as the camera turned slowly toward him. “Diane, Honey, this is for you.” He began singing
Funny Valentine
in a tremulous voice, altering the lyrics to suit his needs.
Just then, the VHF radio began broadcasting loud music. Vincent stopped singing and tried to remember where he had stowed the flare gun. He unclipped his harness tether from the lifeline and climbed below to look for it—
just as a precaution
.
Vincent was bent over, rooting around in the depths of the quarter berth when the radar alarm screeched out. He straightened up with a start, hit his head on a projecting bulkhead and went reeling out into the main salon. The proximity alarm continued blaring.
Vincent took a moment to blink his vision back into focus, then checked the radar. He couldn’t believe his eyes. A quick look through a starboard porthole confirmed what he saw on the screen. “SHIT!!!”
A large power boat, by now just a mile or so off his starboard beam, pushed a mountain of water in front of it as it sped toward
Woodwind
—the two boats were on a collision course. He had to change direction quickly.
Vincent leaped to the stairs and scrambled topside. The big boat was almost upon him. He lunged for the autopilot control. But his tether clip got hung up, jerking him backwards off his feet. He smashed his head against the starboard seat and crashed to the cockpit floor.
Vincent lay motionless. Through his shadowy awareness, he heard his brain throbbing to the rhythmic vibrations of a large engine. “
Alas! (thought I, and my heart beat loud)/ How fast she nears and nears!
”
Then came a jarring impact, followed by a gnashing, grinding, splintering upheaval. Then silence and sleep…
delicious sleep … Diane.
Returning from her early morning jog along BRI’s trails, Diane found Maxine waiting for her outside the locker room door.
“Do you have your cell phone with you?” she asked Diane breathlessly.
“It’s in my locker. Why?”
Maxine pushed open the door and stepped back. “You need to get it. The Coast Guard will be calling you.”
“Why would the Coast Guard…?” She didn’t need to finish the question; there could only be one answer. Fighting off a sense of alarm, she hurried to get her phone. But her jogging shoes had turned to lead, then the locker door refused to open.
Maxine came up behind her, gently moved her aside, and asked for her locker combination. She spun the dial and opened the door just as the cell phone struck up Mozart’s
Turkish March
.
Diane grabbed the phone off the shelf and pressed the button. “This is Diane Rose.”
The voice was young and male. The words were clipped and professional with a little Texas mixed in.
“This is the Coast Guard, Corpus Christi, Texas, Mrs. Rose. The Vera Cruz Race committee has informed us that the sailing vessel
Woodwind
has not communicated with them for the past twenty-four hours.”
Diane eased herself onto a bench and stared at the tan metal lockers. Maxine sat down beside her and placed her hand on Diane’s arm.
“I need to ask you some questions,” the young man said. Then, without waiting for a response, he started in. “Are you the vessel’s owner?”
“Well… my husband and I own it together.”
“How many people are on board
Woodwind
, Ma’am?”
“One—my husband—Vincent Rose.”
“Is there a life raft on board?”
“Yes.”
“A life jacket?”
“Yes.”
“Is the vessel equipped with an EPIRB?”
Diane hesitated.
The voice prompted her: “An emergency radio beacon.”
“Of course… Yes.”
The questioning went on. Diane could picture the young man: trim physique, short hair, white uniform; sitting at a gray metal desk, filling out a form. And she was quite anxious to help him get it right; probably a throwback to all her years in school—that special world where correct answers guaranteed good outcomes.
Diane pressed the off button, but didn’t move from the bench. Maxine sat quietly beside her.
Somewhere a wall clock was ticking. It reminded Diane of her third grade nun who told the class to observe a moment of silence contemplating eternity in hell. To help them understand the concept, she told the students the devil had a clock that chanted: “Forever, forever, never, never….” The exercise gave her nightmares for months.
Now, a sense of the dark infinity of her life without Vincent passed through her, propelling her to her feet.
Without looking at Maxine, she said, “The Coast Guard has the last coordinates Vincent reported. They’re going to fly out and look for him. I’m sure it’s just a radio malfunction.”
She turned and walked out of the locker room, forgetting to shower and change clothes.
Enrique Martinez paced in front of the expanse of windows in his Bogotá, Colombia office suite. It had been four weeks since he shredded the threatening letter and set it aflame in the Waterford ashtray on his desk.
To be exact, it had been twenty-eight days, two hours and thirty-seven minutes since he watched the orange and blue flames consume the paper full of deadly truths while his mind cast about wildly for any fragment of information regarding “The Knights of New Granada.” As far as he knew, they were just a very old legend.
As National Election Commissioner, he was accustomed to Colombian politics. But the past couple months had been particularly bad ones.
Eight weeks ago, leftist guerrillas had sent a message that his family would be kidnapped and tortured if he did not support their candidates. A week later, the right-wing paramilitary warned that they could no longer protect him from zealots in their ranks if he did not show favor to their cause. Five weeks ago today, his limousine and chauffeur had met with an incendiary demise outside his favorite cigar store. Subsequently, three different unwashed rebel groups claimed credit for the explosion, threatening further displays of might if their various demands were not met.
All these matters Enrique could handle. The things they demanded were easily dispatched with a quick payoff or a word through channels to a hired gun.
But one month ago came the paralyzing letter of warning with a scarlet sword on its letterhead.
Enrique had immediately recognized the symbol—the Sword of Damocles suspended on a slender horsehair—emblazoned across the top. He knew it meant imminent danger.
But his panic had come, not from the picture of a sword, but from the ultimatums and incriminating facts written beneath it: “You will sever all connections with the drug trade,” it had said. Then it gave an accurate accounting of times and places of secret meetings he had attended and exact balances in his Cayman and Bermuda bank accounts. The letter went on to demand that he divest himself of “the immoral enrichment received for supporting drug crimes against our country.”
Who were these Knights of New Granada? And how was it possible they knew these things about him?
The letter was written in perfect Castilian Spanish; they were obviously educated people. So they were probably reasonable men. When they made contact with him again, he would explain his untenable situation: Once entangled in the drug world, there were no neat options to rid oneself of that stigma.
And how could he possibly dump all that money in such a short time without drawing notice? Maybe these “Knights” had some suggestions for his deliverance from the dilemma he now found himself in. Maybe he could make a donation to their cause.
They had given him a month to begin corrective action. Enrique hoped to hear from them soon. The fear that these men would expose his wrongdoing to the world had driven him near-mad with anxiety.
For yet another day, he had been ineffective at the office. He might as well go to the club and drown his bad thoughts in good bourbon. Enrique pushed a button and asked to be picked up downstairs.
He felt for his sidearm, then emerged cautiously from the building’s private entrance. His new limousine and driver were waiting. Quickly, he slid into the back seat.
Enrique’s eyes darted from one side of the street to the other as the limousine pulled through the security gates and out onto the main thoroughfare. Then he turned and looked through the rear window. Seeing nothing unusual, he sat back and pulled out a cigar and lighter.
At that moment, the vehicle made an unfamiliar left turn. Enrique leaned forward and asked, “Why the detour?” Only then did he realize the man behind the wheel was
not
his new chauffeur.
Enrique reached for his pistol. But the driver’s reflexes were quicker. Enrique Martinez would never be heard from again.
The word spread throughout BRI: “The Coast Guard Corpus Christi was on the phone with Diane.” It had been more than two months since Vincent’s disappearance.
Diane thanked the caller, gently replaced the phone in its cradle and stared out the window at the bay.
David Crowley appeared in her office doorway. “Knock, knock.”
“Come in,” she said softly, without looking up.
David walked in, eased himself into a chair across the desk from her and studied her face.
“They think they might have found
Woodwind,
” she said in a flat tone.
“Where?”
“South Texas. A sailboat has washed up on a barrier island—Padre Island. Some sea turtle watchers reported it. It’s partly buried in sand, and most of the name is gone. ‘Wind’ is the only word visible on the transom.”
Diane continued without taking a breath: “The Coast Guard suggested I fly down there to identify the boat. They couldn’t give me anything more specific than: ‘On the beach, south of Corpus Christi.’ I need more information than that. Or what’s the point in my trekking down there? I’m not familiar with the area. But even if I were, how could it be
Woodwind?
Her last known coordinates placed her 400 miles south of there. And the officer agreed with me that probably half of all sailboat names have the word ‘wind’ in them—”
“Do you want me go with you?”
For a moment David’s kind offer threw her off balance.
Then she sucked in a ragged breath and blinked back tears. “Okay. Yes.… Thank you.”.
Padre Island National Seashore is the longest undeveloped barrier island in the world. It is separated from the mainland by the Laguna Madre, which stretches from Corpus Christi Bay in Texas to Rio Soto la Marina in Tamaulipas, Mexico.
Throughout history Padre Island has been a wilderness, with the exception of a settlement established by a Spanish priest in the early 1800’s. Before that time, only nomadic Native Americans, Spanish troops and survivors of three shipwrecks in the 1500’s were known to come to the island.
Padre Island has been owned by four different nations: Spain, Mexico, Republic of Texas and the United States. It was designated a National Seashore by the U.S. in 1968.
Of the island’s 65.5 miles of beach on the Gulf of Mexico, 55 miles are open to four-wheel-drive vehicles
only
.
The Padre Island National Seashore entrance booth was piling up with sand on its windward side. David lowered the jeep’s window and paid the fee. Then he took the beach permit from the park ranger and handed it over to Diane.
“How far y’all goin’?” the khaki-clad ranger yelled over the wind.
“”We’re gonna take a quick look at the surf, then duck back in again.” David said.
The ranger nodded. He knew about peoples’ fascination with storms. “That system out there’s s’posed to cause some unusually high tides. You could get cut off if you go down island too far.”
David nodded in appreciation of the warning, then put the jeep in drive. But the ranger wasn’t finished with them yet.
“This afternoon, I’ll probably have to evacuate a few hardy fishermen and some determined Kemp’s ridley sea turtle conservationists encamped down ‘ere past the five mile point. High tide’s around three o’clock, according to the chart. But Mama Nature’s gonna send us an unscheduled preview today.”
With that, he reached out and thumped the vehicle door. “ Y’all better get goin’ now if yer gonna make it back. Remember to stay in the tire tracks that’re already there.”
David gave a half salute, Diane waved and they pulled away, heading toward the Gulf. After a minute, David stopped and shifted into park. The rental jeep shimmied on its chassis from yet another blast of wind. He turned to Diane. “You sure we want to do this today? It’s your call.”
Diane glanced at her watch. She knew what David was thinking: They had been thrice warned. Last evening the Padre Island Visitor Center’s recorded message reported tropical storm development fifty miles offshore with deteriorating weather and beach conditions.
This morning, throughout Corpus Christi Airport, Diane heard fretting about the coming weather, in Spanish as well as English. And Maria, the car rental agent, had all but insisted that they purchase extra insurance after David requested a four-wheel drive vehicle that would handle well on the beach.
In a stern, motherly tone, Maria asked if they were aware the National Park Service did not tow vehicles. And the cost for a private wrecker could be several hundred, even a thousand dollars to come “down island”—that was if they could even call for help. Cell phone service out there was spotty at best. Then there was the possibility that the wrecker wouldn’t even be able to get to them.
Now, they had the park ranger’s assurance that it wouldn’t be just another day at the beach.
Diane rolled the permit into a cone shape, then rubbed it flat against her knee. “What are the chances the storm will wash
Woodwind
back out to sea? If, in fact, it is
Woodwind.
”
“We don’t know how far up on the beach the boat is. Of course, the higher the tide and the rougher the surf, the greater the chance she’ll be dislodged.”
Diane turned and made eye contact with David. “Then we’d better get to it today.”
“Here we go.” He reset the trip mileage log, put the jeep in four-wheel drive and headed out.
“David?”
“Yeah?”
“Have you ever driven on sand?”
“I grew up near here. Learned to drive on the beach.”
“Good.” Her voice cracked. “Thank you for coming.” She glanced at her watch again. It was 10:30 a.m.
The tracks the ranger spoke of were partly blown over with fresh sand. David watched for deep spots while Diane kept an eye on the columns of angry surf marching in from an inky backdrop on the distant horizon. Sand dunes loomed to their right, a reminder that they had limited space for retreat when the moon saw fit to pull the tide back in their direction.
A half hour south, the well-traveled path ran closer to the surf over teeth-jarring washboard sand. From time to time, they voted on whether to plow through the water or ford the uncharted sand above the tide line.
Ahead of the storm, hordes of suicidal Portuguese men-of-war smashed themselves onto the beach and flocks of worried sea birds paced at water’s edge rather than taking flight.
The jeep zigzagged through soft sand and splashed through water. All the while David recited the mantra: “Just keep moving, just keep moving….”
At eleven-thirty the trip log read five miles. Diane pulled the binoculars out of the back seat and scanned up ahead. She couldn’t make out anything but more beach and dunes and surf. She offered the binoculars to David.
He scanned one-handed, but the vehicle’s erratic motion made focusing difficult. Just as he handed the binoculars back to Diane, the front tires rolled off an edge and buried themselves in the sand. David weaved the jeep back and forth trying to grab some traction, but to no avail.
He muscled the door against the wind, jumped out and checked under the front tires. “Dammit,” he shouted. Diane climbed out of the jeep and was assaulted by a blast of sand. Her sunglasses protected her eyes, but her face stung and her teeth felt gritty.
David pointed behind the front tires. The jeep straddled a large tree trunk that was piled with sand on one side, which had made it invisible.
Diane zipped up her windbreaker and shouted over the surf and wind. “What can we do?”
“I know a few tricks. But first let’s climb the dunes and look down island.”
The wind played havoc with them as they stumbled up the side of a partially vine-covered dune. It was higher and steeper than it had looked from the jeep. Sliding sand filled their shoes and abraded their feet, making each step more painful than the last.
Arriving at the top, they felt they had climbed Everest. Except for the temperature, conditions couldn’t have been much worse. Sand blasted their skin, and the howling wind made hearing difficult and knocked them off balance at times.
David dug his feet in the sand and aimed the binoculars down the beach.
“There they are,” he shouted. I see two sets of campers. One pick-up truck. One Humvee. There’s a large form in the surf, not far from the Humvee. That’s probably our destination.”
David offered the binoculars to Diane who hesitated, then put them up to her eyes. She scanned the beach stopping at the dark shape in the surf. “Let’s get the jeep unstuck,” she shouted in a quivering voice.
Diane and David filled their shoes with surf water, ran it back and dumped it around the front tires, then wedged the floor mats under the rear wheels.
They climbed into the jeep, brushed the sand from their faces and gulped some of the water they had purchased on the other side of the causeway.
David started the engine and horsed the jeep around, spinning and weaving until it broke free. He pulled ahead to some hard-packed sand, and Diane ran back to retrieve the mats.
They were underway again. But driving hazards were no longer their primary focus. Diane sat quietly picking sand from her jacket, grain by grain. What if it
was Woodwind
down the beach? Despite pressure from Vincent’s family and her friends, she had been clinging to the belief that a memorial Mass was premature—what a joke if Vincent walked in on his own wake… But now…
David glanced over at her, then back to the beach ahead. “Why did Vincent go on that race?” His voice was gentle.
After a short silence, Diane said, “It was a lifelong goal.” She continued picking sand.
“How did you feel about that?”
“I knew that offshore racing had been his dream… and I had always been supportive of the idea…” Her tone was sad, resigned.
David waited.
“But when he chose that particular race…” she struggled with the words she had never said out loud before. “…the timing pointed to influences other than self-actualization.”
“Like what?”
“He was dissatisfied… suspicious.”
“About what?”
“You name it… the fate of
Peruvase,
Bellfort’s business practices in general. And he missed the University—his position there.”
“His suspicions, were they just hunches? Or did he have proof of some wrongdoing?”
Suddenly, Diane looked up from her labors and spotted a dark form just ahead. She grabbed for the binoculars and focused on the stern of the beached boat. Her breath caught in her throat. Her heart constricted. Her denial phase was over.
Diane stood beside the wrecked hull, unaware of the wind’s assault on her skin and the surf washing over her feet.
Woodwind
had met her lee shore. The boat lay heeled over to the starboard side, her stern angled in toward the beach. It was a somber sight.
David had gone over to thank the turtle watchers for reporting
Woodwind’s
beaching and for keeping an eye on her. Diane walked slowly past the stern, then around to the starboard side, which lay buried in sand. That’s when she saw the damage.
Part of the bow, just forward of the mast, had been chewed off. The leading edge of wood and fiberglass appeared as though some macabre vivisection had taken place with the use of a giant hacksaw. She covered her mouth to suppress a cry.
David reappeared. His arm reached around her shoulders. “Are you okay?”
Dazed, Diane leaned into him. “What in God’s name could have happened out there?” she wailed.
Diane felt the sudden need to get on board. Maybe Vincent had left some clue. Maybe the video camera was still there and in working order. She could see its brine encrusted case from where she stood. She freed herself from David’s grip and headed for the boat.
Using the steering wheel as a handle, Diane pulled herself up into the near-vertical cockpit. She looked around the devastated vessel, but nothing there evoked Vincent’s presence. Then she remembered the watertight compartments up under the gunwales.
Diane planted her foot on the wheel post and pulled herself up to the port seat. Unlatching the locker hatch, she was able to wiggle her arms and shoulders into the opening. Once inside, she knew exactly where to find the hidden latch.
The compartments on either side of the boat had been installed by drug runners, Woodwind’s former owners. It occurred to her that those watertight spaces were probably responsible for keeping
Woodwind
afloat long enough to get ashore.
Diane flipped the latch. The hatch popped open to reveal the dry clothes she had stowed as back-ups in case Vincent had a wet trip. She carefully removed one of Vincent’s T-shirts. Printed across the front of it were Louis Pasteur’s words—Vincent’s favorite quote: “…
chance favors the prepared mind
.” She pressed the shirt to her cheek and, for the first time since his disappearance, she wept.
Diane wiped her face with the T-shirt, replaced her sunglasses and eased herself out of the locker and down off the steering post, the shirt still clutched in her hand.
David stood beside the boat, calf deep in surf, holding a hammer and a screwdriver he had borrowed from the campers. He offered to make an attempt at the Lucite camcorder cover.
David made the climb up over the cockpit look easier than Diane had. But his first few whacks at the camcorder’s Lucite housing did not produce the desired result.
Diane braced herself in the growing surf, which now slapped up against her Capri pants, cuffed above her knees. She watched David’s efforts, then looked toward the missing bow. Conflicting emotions washed over her. Did she really want to view the last moments of Vincent’s life?
At 2 p.m. the Humvee led the way as the little caravan headed north. Storm-heightened waves advanced inland, pushing the group closer and closer to the dunes.
Each vehicle carried precious cargo from the sea. In the Humvee, Styrofoam boxes held endangered Kemp’s ridley sea turtle eggs cradled in Padre Island sand. They were headed to a Galveston laboratory for hatching and eventual release back into the Gulf.
In the pick-up truck, iced-down redfish and speckled trout were headed to San Antonio where they would be the highlights of a birthday barbeque.
In the jeep, a condensation-stained camcorder was on its way back to Houston from where it would spawn waves around the world.
South of the motorcade, a powerful undertow pulled
Woodwind
back out to sea.