Even in Kuching there was a screening computer on his phone system that would not allow a call unless the computer recognized the phone number of the caller or unless the caller knew a code. He picked up the phone.
“Yes.”
It was Roberto, insisting that Chellis hear the story of Anna Wade’s tumble into the saltwater rapids. Chellis could feel himself being dragged into something and he didn’t like it.
“Are you certain the scrambler is on?”
“Yes, we checked.”
Roberto told the story twice, repeating each and every detail and taxing Chellis’s patience.
“Get the CD back or make sure it’s gone for good.” Chellis interrupted when Roberto tried to respond. “If she had an accident, that would be…”
“Yes, an accident,” Roberto said.
“And don’t forget who you are dealing with here. Even in Canada this won’t go away quickly if something else happens to her.”
“The currents here are fierce.”
Immediately after he hung up Chellis knew he had made a mistake. This was happening too fast. He shouldn’t be involved directly with this.
Four
While fidgeting for the want of another smoke and on the verge of surrendering to Anna temporarily, Sam heard the splash-a body hitting the water? He ran to the stateroom and tried the door. Locked.
Damn it. She had climbed out of the hatch.
Harry barked and ran to the companionway. Sam jumped over Harry and hit the third stair and one other before making the top. He dashed through the wheelhouse and made the aft deck in three strides.
No rubber boat.
“It leaks!” he shouted. “Come back. It’s dangerous.”
“Help me.” In the wind he heard nothing more. With only a piece of his rudder it would be difficult to drive the boat after her and there was no time to pull anchor or don a dry suit. He had seconds to decide. He could feel himself drawn into the old life as surely as his boat had been drawn into that wave. His mind sat on a high wire, contemplating the possible opposing forces, the risk of falling and losing what little peace he had left. His son was dead. His hero days were over. On the other hand, dying might just be easier than living.
“Damn her.”
Reaching under a hinged seat, he grabbed a life jacket. For a second he rummaged around until he found a large waterproof light that he snapped to a ring on the jacket. Then he thought about the drag and figured he could make shore without the jacket, so he snapped the light to a belt loop instead. He had to move fast and catch her before she got headed in the wrong direction. If she missed the point, about two hundred yards off, she would no doubt drown. Dumb woman.
Harry whined.
He needed waterproof matches. She was getting too far away. Taking off his topsiders, he tied the rawhide laces into his belt loops so he could swim with bare feet. “Stay, Harry.” Then he dived neatly over the lifelines and as his head emerged, gasped from the frigid water. He forced himself to focus, creating a perfect rhythm to his stroke that melded with his breathing, losing himself in motion. He imagined himself in a pool and thought of his mind as a warm light that retreated deep within. Soon the cold was far away. Clouds drifted, but he was sure he found the North Star and kept it a bit to his right.
Every third stroke he saw the trees of the ridge against the stars and kept himself straight. After a time he slowed to hear the splashes of her paddle, and with the thought of it came the cold, driven away only by reclaiming the rhythm. The current was running enough that he knew they would be swept up Heron Bay. It appeared she would miss the point. He had to catch her. Once more the barely audible splash of her stroke drew him on and once more the cold invaded his mind. He was a powerful swimmer in superb shape. Steadily he gained until he saw her-nearly sunk.
“Get out. It leaks. You’re barely moving. Wrong direction.”
“Okay,” she said. “Thanks for coming.”
“Tie your shoelaces to your belt.”
She also swam well. It took him minutes to guide them to the point and the shore. It was too far even to think about getting her to swim back. His foot touched bottom and he grabbed her around the waist. She was very weak from two major dunkings in the frigid water. The last fifty feet he carried her. On dry land he put her down and they put on their shoes.
“Come on,” she said, wobbly but obviously determined to go someplace. He caught her and grabbed her shoulder.
She turned.
“What are you-” he began.
“Took you a while,” she said through ragged breaths. Turning back toward the trees, she kept going.
He followed. “You could have killed yourself.”
“Thanks to you once again, I didn’t, though, did I?”
“What the hell does that mean? You are one frustrating-”
“Frustrating what?”
“Just how were you gonna keep from freezing to death?”
“That was your department.”
“What made you think I’d be stupid enough to follow you?”
Astounded at her grit, he trudged with her down the beach next to the trees. He had no dry matches, no smokes, and he would have to make a fire.
“There’s a cabin inland over on Greene’s Bay,” she said. “It’s almost two miles. We can break in.”
“How do you know?”
“I saw it a couple days ago. Jason and I crossed over to Sonoma with Nutka and went for a walk. She’s a native.”
He filed away the names for future consideration. “Are we looking for a trail?” He snapped on the waterproof light.
“Turn it off!” she said. “Wait until we’re out of sight of the Windham Island shore.”
“Who’s on the Windham shore?”
“If we walk along this beach there is a tiny creek. I’ll recognize it. If we go up the channel about three-quarters of a mile, we’ll come to this concrete box with a pump at a spring with a plastic pipe going into it. We follow the pipe.”
“They have a generator?”
“I guess they must. They have a pump.”
Just then an eerie rushing sound echoed across the channel. He turned toward the boat as it erupted in a ball of fire.
“You can thank me later,” she said.
“You should have said something.”
Neither spoke for a moment as they stood with the heat of adrenaline moving through their bodies.
“Give me a break,” she said. “You weren’t listening.”
“You weren’t talking.”
“Why are we arguing? You would have been dead.”
“I liked the damned boat,” he said. “And I loved the dog.”
“I’m sorry,” she said.
“Not as sorry as the guy with the rocket launcher.”
Within two minutes the boat was gone to the bottom.
“Who did it?”
“We’ll discuss it. I’ll make everything right. Better boat, everything.”
“You can’t give me what I lost!”
“I’m so sorry. I didn’t know they’d do this.”
“Do they have a boat?”
“Yes.”
The words weren’t out of her mouth before they heard the sound of whirling rotors, the thump of metal beating air, and saw a brilliant light skimming the water.
“Do they have a chopper?”
“They have one. I didn’t know it was here now.”
“So you don’t know if the chopper is friend or foe.”
“I don’t know who is friend or foe.”
“Move,” he said in a harsh whisper as they ran up the beach and into the trees.
For a moment they watched as the brilliant beam of an incandescent light skated over the wind-crinkled black surface to the spot where the boat had been lying at anchor. Like a mad mosquito the copter searched the area.
He noticed that in addition to the shaking, Anna was starting to lose her balance.
“So now do you want to tell me what’s going on?”
She stood silent, with her teeth chattering while she rubbed her arms.
“Let’s go,” he said, frustrated that she still wasn’t talking.
Until they heard the copter leave they walked just inside the trees with no light. By the time they found the creek, they were turning blue around the lips and she was shaking to the point that speech was difficult. He had been similarly cold before and had a few layers of muscle to help. Anna had very little womanly fat. If she was right about the distance, they had a long way to go.