Voyage of the Dreadnaught: Four Stella Madison Capers (9 page)

Now, Cole straitened to his full height and
declared, “I'll find her if I have to—”

“
You, mister,” said the Captain, in no
uncertain terms, “are an illegal alien in this country and will
stay aboard ship. Be prepared to fire up the engine in one big
hurry, though, in case we have to drag her back kicking and
hollering.”

“
But, Cap, I—”

“
No buts. We can't afford the local
laws in on this mess. By the hoagie! Do we even have a birth
certificate on this kid? They don't take kindly to people dragging
other people's kids across borders around here.”

A statement which produced another grave
silence.

“
Mason's right,” the colonel agreed.
“We need a plan.”

“
Well,” said the Captain, “seeing how
it will be mostly a land maneuver, I'm all for deferring the
details to Mase. You're the best expert on how she thinks,
anyhow.”

“
What do I know what she's got in that
mixed-up head of hers?” Mason grumbled. “All I know is, if she
thinks she can get away with something like this, she's got another
thing coming.”

By the time the
Dreadnaught
pulled up alongside the courtesy
dock in Campbell River, nearly eight hours had gone by since Lou
Edna had left the boat. So, it was a sombre group that headed off
to scour near-by hotels and cafes, where one might while away hours
waiting for a flight back to the States. Not being able to catch an
immediate flight out was really their only hope, considering the
girl always had a stash of emergency funds for a quick
escape.

It was a habit left over from living in so
many dreadful places before Mason (who had done his banking where
Lou worked), noticed she was all alone in the world, facing a
terrible situation, and took her home to Millie. The two years she
had been with “the family” were the longest she lived anywhere in
all of her twenty-three years.

Considering how many boardwalks, malls, and
shops were a short walk away from the waterfront, each of the five
searchers chose a separate street, and agreed to “reconnoiter”
after investigating four blocks. A thorough plan that would have
cast a sufficiently wide net throughout the vicinity. Only they
didn't need to carry it out. No sooner had they started up the
docks to take up their positions, a frantic Lou Edna came flying
down the ramp, hollering, “Pop—oh, Pop!” before she flung her arms
around Mason's neck and cried, “You came back for me—you came
back!”

“
What did you expect, girlie? You left
something important behind!”

“
Cole said he'd be better off without
me. And it's true!” She was dressed for obscurity (Stella knew a
lot about runaways): jeans, navy-blue sweatshirt with tennis shoes
and backpack. Little of her face was visible under a ball-cap and
sunglasses. “But I just felt worse the farther I got away from him.
Then I couldn't get back fast enough—you already left!”

“
Had to leave early to catch the right
tides,” said Stuart.

“
Cole didn't tell us you were gone
until he got off watch, at ten!” Millie sniffed, as the girl flew
into her arms, next (like a chick returning to a mother hen). “What
a scare you gave us, honey—what were you thinking?”

“
I don't know. I was just trying to do
right for my boy!”

“
Two wrongs don't make a right,”
Stuart declared, in a tone loud enough to call all hands. “You
jumped ship. No crew of mine ever pulled that on me before, and I
don't take kindly to it.”

“
Maybe we should talk about this when
we get back aboard,” said the colonel, noticing several onlookers
nearby. “Especially since Gerald might slip into apoplexy the
longer we're gone.”

The engine roared to life as soon as they
approached—evidence that Cole was taking his part in the plan as
serious as the rest of them had. Stuart left briefly to untie dock
lines and set a course back toward the narrows, where they would
pull over into a nearby cove and wait for the tide to turn. Again.
Meanwhile, the rest of the group settled around the large wooden
dining table in the galley to talk things over.

It had a brass lantern hanging above it that
Stella had originally thought was simply for decoration. However,
it was a fully operative kerosene lamp that gave off quite the
cheery glow when it was lit. Something of a rarity on this trip,
because it stayed light until nearly bedtime around here. So, at
the moment, there was plenty of light filtering in through the
several large portholes in various places around the area. Gerald
came in to join them, after Lou checked in on the baby, who was
taking a late afternoon nap in the miniature swinging hammock his
Uncle Gerry had set up for him in his own stateroom. In fact, they
all had accommodations for the baby in their rooms, since his
mother was forever needing someone else to watch him.

“
You should have at least talked it
over with somebody,” he was saying as the two of them returned to
the galley, “got a second opinion and all that. A decision made in
haste almost never works out.”

“
I'll try to remember that next time I
feel like jumping ship.” Lou Edna sank down onto the edge of one of
the upholstered benches and didn't take off her sun glasses, only
pulled her ball cap down lower over her eyes. Another warning sign,
as far as Stella was concerned. People only wore sun glasses inside
when they wanted to hide something. More lies, probably. She turned
on one of the propane burners on the large iron cook-stove and set
a huge stainless steel kettle on to boil. A cup of tea always made
times like these go smoother, in her estimation.

“
All right, let's have it.” Mason
removed his fisherman's cap and set it on the back of the seat.
“And take those glasses off. I don't like talking to someone I
can't see.”

“
I'd rather not,” Lou Edna
replied.

“
Why in heaven's name?” Millie asked,
and then gasped at her own unspoken answer. “Lou, you aren't—you
didn't—”

“
Girlie, you better not be,” Mason
interrupted. “We been through that, already, and once was
enough.”

The girl sighed and rested her head in her
hands for a moment. “Sometimes, I just wish I was dead.”

“
Don't say that!” said Millie, who
must have experienced similar thoughts during her own lowest
moments and could identify. “Next thing you know, that's all you
can think about.”

“
You've got a boy in the other room
whose sun rises and sets on you,” the colonel reminded her gently.
It was the first time Stella could remember him saying anything
encouraging to Lou Edna. “In his eyes, you're perfect.”

“
It's true,” Stella agreed. “The
greatest influence on any child is their own parents. It's a proven
fact.”

“
He'll never forgive me,” she
mourned.

“
What's to forgive?” Gerald argued.
“He's so little he doesn't know the difference.”

“
Oh, somebody will tell him, they
always do.”

“
Unless somebody else...” It was
Cole's voice instead of Stuart's coming from the doorway as he came
through. “Straitens up and makes some changes. So the kid at least
has a mother he can look up to.”

“
Nobody can change what they don't
feel, Cole.”

“
Who needs to feel it? Just find out
what's normal and do it.”

“
You should talk. Right?”

“
Well, he's right about that, anyway,”
the colonel pointed out. “Doing right is a precursor to feeling
what's right. It's the way one learns to judge between right and
wrong. Good and evil, you might say.”

“
Are you saying I'm evil, now, Mr.
Colonel?”

“
Don't get sassy, girlie,” Mason
warned. “And take off those sun glasses. You got people who care
enough about you to try and help figure things out—show a little
respect.”

“
I don't feel like it.”

In answer, he reached across the table,
lightly knocked the bill of her ball cap up and snatched them off.
Only to reveal a glaring bruise that circled her left eye and the
bridge of her nose. An audible gasp escaped Stella. Millie said,
“Oh, no!” And Gerald leaped to his feet so fast he teetered before
darting at Cole.

“
Hey, wait a minute...” The younger
man stood up to his full height and pointed a warning finger at the
ridiculous figure coming at him in his half serape hanging over a
green sweat suit “You just wait one minute!”

“
Put 'em up!” Gerald danced back and
forth on his feet in front of him and began to circle his fists.
“You woman beater!”

“
Don't make me pop you one, old man.
You hear me?”

“
Nobody's gonna pop anybody,” said
Mason. “Sit down, Gerry.”

About three seconds before Gerald surprised
everyone with a lightning-quick punch that knocked Cole DeForio in
the nose so hard it started to gush blood, and sent him sprawling
backward onto the floor.

Somebody hollered, and the men got up to
intervene. But it was unnecessary, as Gerald staggered back at the
realization of what he had done, and sank down onto the nearest
edge of the dining table so he wouldn't slip into a dead faint.
Stella hurried to get a cold cloth to stop the bleeding, as
everyone else hovered around Cole and tried to get him back on his
feet, again. Which wasn't having much effect since he wasn't
responding.

“
Good grief—” Gerald pulled his
watch-cap off and ran a hand through his thinning brown hair.
“Isn't dead, is he? Didn't mean to do all that. Oh, I
say!”

“
He's out cold,” Mason pronounced.
“Where'd you learn to fight like that, Gerry?”

“
Alarming number of people liked to
beat up on me, when I was young, so I took boxing lessons. Don't
know what came over me to hit him so hard. Must have done it in a
blaze of anger.”

“
I'll say you did,” said Lou Edna.
“Serves him right!”

“
He's coming to,” the colonel observed
just before the victim moaned and uttered a muffled
curse.

Suddenly, there were two bells in rapid
succession, and then another two, and the young man struggled to
get to his feet.

“
You better stay put till the bleeding
stops,” Mason suggested. “It's just Stuart wanting to drop the
anchor outside those narrows and wait for the tide to change,
again. And don't anybody go anywhere,” he added as he started for
the door that led out to the decks. “We're going to get to the
bottom of all this, one way, or the other. You hear me,
Shortcake?”

“
Pop, I came back—isn't that
enough?”

“
No.”

“
Well, I don't approve of any of it.”
Millie returned to the table and stirred three spoons of sugar into
the tea she had poured from the things Stella set out earlier.
“Resorting to physical violence is no way to solve
problems.”

“
I agree,” said Stella. “Cole, have
you ever thought of taking a course in anger
management?”

“
Anger management—tell that to Lou. It
was self-defense. She was hammering my gut like she was contending
for some heavyweight championship.”

“
I don't have an ounce of fat on my
body! Hit him, again, Gerry.”

“
E-gads—I'm still shaking from last
time. I detest it when things get bloody, I really do.”

“
Lou Edna Wilson!” Millie set her mug
down so hard tea sloshed out. “What on earth has gotten into
you?”

“
I'm regretting smuggling somebody
aboard, that's what's got into me. Been all high and mighty ever
since Cap promoted him. Like nobody else is good enough, anymore.
I'd have taken the Senator with me if I didn't have to get another
job and find a place to live, first. I wasn't really leaving him. I
was going to send for him as soon as I got settled.”

“
And where were your going to send
to—general delivery, Alaska? We don't know exactly where the lodge
is, we have to find it first. Then maybe it won't even be livable,
and we'd have to go somewhere else.”

“
Cap would have told me when he got
back.”

“
Maybe he won't want to go all the way
back. He's part of the family, now. But I have to tell you, Lou, it
practically killed me you would leave without saying anything.
After everything we've been through!”

“
I'm not leaving you, Millie, I'm
leaving him.” She pointed to where Cole was still sitting on the
floor with the wet cloth against his face. “What kind of mother
would stay with somebody violent? But I knew you all needed him for
crew, so I didn't think I should say anything.”

“
Lou, if you tell one more lie, you'll
be sorry,” Cole mumbled from behind the cloth.

“
Truth is the basis of all genuine
relationships,” the Colonel pointed out. A remark that caused
Stella some discomfort, because she still hadn't made time for that
heart-to-heart she felt she owed him, yet, either. Even though she
intended to.

“
Keeping plans to yourself is not
lying, Cole—I do not lie to this family!”

A statement that brought her young man up
off the floor so fast, no one was ready for it. But instead of
going after Lou Edna, he snatched the backpack she had set on the
upholstered bench beside her, instead.