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Thinking on how well they had sur-vived this recurrent menace, Jim hauled
himself back on board, stowed his hat within easy reach, dried off and ordered
sail hoisted again.
"The enemy has been met and& consumed," he muttered, grinning to himself at
his paraphrase as he unlashed the helm that had been on a course diagonally
away from the main Thread rain. But, oddly, he felt the better for that short
brush and Theo's company. She was a sort of& comfortable person. He grinned
again. That was not the sort of compliment a woman would appreciate.
The second emergency was more life-threatening  a burst plank below the
water-line nearly sank a six meter ketch, save for the quick action of the
dolphins who all but swam it into shore on their own backs. As the cargo of
the ketch was mainly irreplaceable orange coded supplies, its timely rescue
was a double blessing.
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They anchored early that day so that they could not only find a replacement
plank from those that Andi Gomez had extruded during the layover at Paradise
River but also check sails and lines for Thread score. No human had received
injury and even those who had doubted the efficacy of 'coolies' against Thread
had been reassured by the experience.
Though the ketch crew worked all night with the plastic experts, the flotilla
did not make sail until noontime. A good wind helped make up lost time and
certainly relieved Jim's frustrations. He missed Theo's company in the cockpit
but she had this first watch off and was sleeping. It was a shame she was
missing the best part of this fine day. Nothing, but nothing on any world,
could be a more stimulating and satisfying occupation than sailing a good ship
in a brisk wind down sparkling clear blue-green coastal waters. He wondered if
Theo could appreciate that, too.
At Malay River Stake, they had to take time for major repairs to sail, sheet
and hulls, then rearrange cargoes again  to Desi's dismay. Crews put up with
his fussing and checked and double-checked the bar coding until all records
were to his satisfaction.
* * *
The tropical storm, brewing up sud-denly as they neared Boca, drove them back
towards Sadrid.
Jim's nautical instinct had been warning him since early morning as they
sailed westward on the gentle swells. Wade Lorenzo had reminded him only the
night before of the suddenness of squalls on this stretch of coast. So he was
watching for those little signs the experienced sailor knows: a smudge on the
horizon that wasn't Thread, the sudden drop of the barometer, a change in the
color of the water, a sultry feeling of pressure in the air around him. He
just had time to notice the alteration from blue-green to greyish green and
the rippling change of the wave patterns.
"Theo," he began as she was once more his cockpit companion, "I think& "
The storm struck with a ferocity and suddenness he had rarely encountered on
any previous seas. He had the impression of black suit and bare legs going
over the side into the suddenly heavy sea as he tightened his hold on the
helm. He didn't even have time to get the bow turned into the huge comber
bearing down on them but the Cross had answered so that she wasn't hit
broadside with four and five meters waves. His crew struggled to bring the
sails down, reefing them even though they were all but washed off the deck 
only the life-rails preventing their going overboard. As it was, young Steve
Duff, struggling to tie down the boom, barely missed the lightning that
flashed across the ship, slicing through the mast two thirds of the way up its
length, snapping the mainstays into lethal lashes until they fell over the
monel life-rail. With the help of Peri Cervantes, Jim managed to keep the bow
turned into the towering seas as once again the Cross thudded into a trough
left by the latest monumental wave. What was happening to the more vulnerable
small craft of his fleet drove terror into Jim's heart until the more
immediate threat to the lives of himself and his crew banished all thought but
survival.
Now and then, during the brief but thoroughly devastating squall, he caught
sight of dolphins, hurtling mid-air across a seething watery surface, purpose
in every line of their sleek bodies. Sometimes their partners clung to the
dorsal fins, other times the dolphins seemed to be acting independently, but
certainly in accordance with their training.
Twice the Cross's crew threw lines and hauled people rescued by the dolphins
out of the water to the dubious safety of the plunging deck. Once they overran
the upturned hull of a capsized ship, feeling the grind as their keel sliced
across plastic hull.
As abruptly as it began, the storm vanished in the distance, a roiling dark
vortex pierced by bolts of lightning.
Exhausted and somewhat amazed to be alive, Jim was suddenly aware that his
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right arm was broken and he was bleeding from a variety of cuts on both arms,
chest and bare legs from wind-flung debris. None of his crew were totally
unscathed. One rescued girl had a broken leg and the boy was concussed, his [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]

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