Robin and Richard were still discussing the impressive but slightly unsettling view when Nic, Liberty and her crewmates arrived. No sooner had they settled in their chairs than the menus and wine lists were presented. Robin was charier tonight and settled for an alcohol-free evening like her teetotal husband. The sailors were also careful — the last thing in the world they needed when they got underway in the morning was a hangover. Nic cheerfully fell in with the general abstemiousness and the sparkling water flowed.
As it was with the wine list, everyone was careful with the menu, thinking less about having a great gastronomic adventure tonight than about whether they might regret it tomorrow. They all settled for asparagus soup and Caesar salad. A certain amount of oysters Rockefeller and seared Ahi had been consumed last night, so the table settled for blue lump crab cakes, jumbo shrimp and, on Liberty’s recommendation, truffle pommes frites. Then they got to work on the main courses.
For Richard this meant Colorado rack of lamb, heirloom carrots, Brussels sprouts, spiced croquette potatoes and mushrooms. Robin went for the veal chop with mushrooms, carrots and asparagus, while big meat-eater Nic chose rib-eye with more asparagus and yet more truffle pomme frites, with no thought at all for the health of his cardiovascular system, thought Robin. A decision he would have had a hard time making were he not a widower bereft of a solicitous life partner’s good sense. The crew of Katapult8 variously went for pasta, salmon and black cod. From the dessert menu, those thinking of their waistlines choose the chef’s trio of sorbets, while the rest went for the ‘chocolate therapy’.
The conversation was about the view and the ambience to begin with, then about the menu and the food. But Liberty soon started needling her father about tomorrow. ‘That fat gin palace of yours won’t stand a chance,’ she announced. ‘It could have twice as many Caterpillar diesels and pull horses by the thousand but it won’t even see Katapult8 after an hour or so, except on radar maybe, let alone keep up with her.’
The gauntlet she threw down so calculatedly included Richard and Robin, who were also due to be aboard Maxima for the run down to Puerto Banderas. Nic smiled indulgently and remained silent, but Richard rose to the bait. ‘OK,’ he said. ‘It’s put your money where your mouth is time. What do you bet?’
Liberty’s eyes went wide, then narrow. ‘What do you know?’ she demanded.
‘Nothing you don’t know.’
‘It’s the weather, isn’t it? It’s this ARkStorm — if it ever arrives!’
‘If it arrives,’ interrupted her father forcefully, ‘then we’ll all be running south of it as fast as it’s possible to sail or motor.’
‘That is part of the point,’ added Robin. ‘Your father wants you, Katapult8, Maxima and all of us well out of the way before the heavens open.’
‘But I can’t see how a storm, even a once-in-two-centuries event, is going to make us go slower and you go faster,’ persisted Liberty, paying no attention to Nic or Robin, focused entirely on Richard and his challenge.
‘That’s for me to know and you to guess,’ he answered blandly.
‘There’d be winds along a storm front,’ persisted Liberty, glancing at crewmates, Florence Weary and Emma Toda. ‘It’s the calms we need to worry about.’
‘Maybe that’s it,’ said Flo thoughtfully. ‘Maybe he’s reckoning that if the ARkStorm streams in here there’ll be light winds or dead calms to the south of it. What d’you think?’
All four yachtswomen looked at Richard. He raised his eyebrows and presented his blandest face. After a moment he took a mouthful of lamb and began to chew slowly and silently. As he did so, suddenly but spectacularly in the background, the Tino Productions orchestra went into their opening number. Aptly enough, it was Billie Holliday’s ‘Stormy Blues’.
The table rather split into two camps after that. Liberty’s crew went into a huddle, whispering among each other, and even started to make obscure notes on a folded napkin, letting the astonishingly good food go cold while they tried to second guess what Richard was up to — and to come up with something that they could put up against him in the wager.
Robin tried to brighten things up between Richard and Nic by describing in exhaustive detail everything she had seen aboard Maxima, including a long and detailed description of the ‘pictures’ of Dahlia Blanca. But when it became clear that neither man was paying attention, she turned her own attention to her recently arrived chocolate therapy dessert and let them all get on with it. The orchestra moved on to Buddy Holly’s ‘Raining in My Heart’.
Halfway through dessert, Liberty looked up. ‘You’re on,’ she said. ‘What’s the wager, Richard?’
‘Winner’s choice,’ he answered easily. ‘I trust you, and you know you can trust me. Whatever the winner demands of the loser.’
The band moved on to Wynonie Harris’ ‘Stormy Night Blues’. ‘Within reason,’ said Flo and Emma together.
‘Oh ye of little faith,’ laughed Richard. ‘Reason is my middle name.’
‘Right!’ decided Liberty with a captain’s authority. ‘Winner’s choice.’
‘Given,’ added Robin severely, ‘that the last thing Richard and Nic had us all race against each other for turned out to be worth several million dollars.’
‘That’s another story altogether,’ said Nic. ‘Though I still get letters of thanks from all the charities it went to — and the Tokyo University’s Earth Sciences and Climate Change department.’
‘Me too,’ added Richard. ‘And from the British Antarctic Survey.’
‘Right,’ said Liberty, taking control once again, noting that the dessert plates were empty and the hour was getting late. ‘That’s all for now. Bedtime, ladies. We’re up early tomorrow.’
‘Up and out early,’ added Flo with a meaningful glance at Richard.
‘That’s what I’d recommend,’ he advised easily. ‘But the tide will be against you until ten, so I’d spend the early hours getting ready for a Le Mans racing start then or thereabouts.’
The orchestra segued into Arlen and Koehler’s ‘Stormy Weather’.
‘What in heaven’s name was that all about?’ demanded Robin as she, Richard and Nic rode down in the Sky Room’s lift a quarter of an hour later with T-Bone Walker’s ‘Call it Stormy Monday’ echoing out of the restaurant behind them.
‘Making assurance double sure,’ he answered.
‘He’s lit a fire under the girls’ tails,’ said Nic. The lift stopped, the doors opened and they began to cross the lobby.
‘That’s not a mental image I want to hold on to,’ said Robin as they approached the door out on to South Locust. ‘But …’
‘They’ll be off as fast as humanly possible tomorrow. The second the tide stops running against them, as near as I can judge,’ Nic said.
‘That’s the plan. I thought you wanted them out from under this as early and as fast as possible,’ said Richard as they stepped out on to the pavement and a cab pulled up in front of them.