The Crimes of Jordan Wise

'You are. Control, careful, sensible, safe. What happened to all the excitement you promised me?'

'Haven't you had enough already?'

'No! I'll never have enough. I told you a long time ago how it was with me. I can't stand the way we've been living, all safe and careful. I want to take risks again, live on the edge again. Feel alive again.'

'There's a big difference between living on the edge and crossing the line. We're fugitives, for Christ's sake.'

'You're a fugitive, not me. I don't know anything about what Jordan Wise did, I only know Richard Laidlaw. Remember?'

'If we're cought, no matter what you say or I say, you could still be convicted as an accessory. You think your life is dull and confining now? Imagine how it'd be in a prison cell!'

That was the first big fight we had, but not the last. She was contrite when she sobered up, and for a while she reined herself in. She still hung out with JoEllen, but there were no more drunk-driving incidents; I told her I'd take the car keys away from her and cut off her access to the joint bank account if she ever came home loaded again.

But then the holidays rolled up, and there was the night of the Verrikers' annual Christmas party.

Annalise didn't want to go, which would've been all right with me, but at the last minute she changed her mind. She and Maureen were stiff with each other when we arrived, avoided each other after that. At one point I asked Verriker what the problem was between them; he shrugged and said, 'Beats me.' Usually at parties Annalise was animated and charming, and restrained in her drinking. At this one she kept refilling her glass at the punchbowl, and the more she drank, the more erratic her behavior became.

I didn't realize how drunk she was until she dropped and shattered her glass on the floor tiles and then upset somebody's plate of hors d'oelivres. I was trying to ease her out of there without making a scene, when she said, in a voice loud enough for Verriker and some of the other guests to hear, 'Oh, for Christ's sake, why can't you just let me enjoy myself? So I spilled a drink and some food, so what? I'm not gonna spill the beans, you know. Secrets are safe with me, yours, everybody's. My Ups're sealed.'

'Be quiet!' I snapped at her.

'Whoops,' she said. 'Oh, shit.'

Verriker said, 'Maybe you'd better take her home, Richard.'

'Yeah. Right away.'

I dragged her out of there. When I got her into the house I cought her arms and shook her, hard. 'Are you crazy? Are you trying to get us cought?'

'God, no.' She wasn't fighting me. The night air had sobered her a little; she seemed horrified by what she'd done. 'I don't know what happened. . . . It just slipped out. . . .'

'How many other times has something just slipped out'? To Maureen, to JoEllen, to Christ knows who else?'

'Never—never! First and last time, I swear.'

'It better be the last time,' I said. 'I mean it, Annalise. Don't ever get drunk enough in public to make a slip like that again. If you do . . .'

She swore she wouldn't. Over Christmas and New Year's she controlled her drinking, stayed home most evenings. We still weren't spending a lot of time in each other's company—work on the yawl was nearing completion and I was putting in long hours at the marina—but when we were together, she seemed to make an effort to be reasonable and good-natured. No more pressure about moving, no more bitchy behavior, a couple of sessions in bed that she didn't treat as duty fucks. I felt relieved. It looked as if she'd gotten her perspective back and the bad patch was beginning to smooth out at last.

Work on Annalise was finally done at the end of January.

She was a thing of beauty by then, a sight to make you catch your breath when you stood off on the stringpiece and looked at her in the slanting rays of the sun. Her spars and brightwork, her hull and deckhouse gleamed with thick coats of varnish and blue and white paint, her brass was shined to a high gloss, her new Dacron sails had a freshly laundered dazzle when unfurled. The ship-to-shore radio worked fine. The overhauled auxiliary diesel ran without a hitch during every ten-minute test run. In the cockpit, all the gauges and dials were in perfect working order and the new compass sat bright and shiny in its gimbals. Belowdecks, the marine refrigerator and primus stove in the tiny galley were in order, the ventilators and new bilge pump worked fine, every fitting and connection had passed muster.

And she was mine, all mine.

January and February are usually optimum cruising months in the eastern Caribbean. Clear weather, light winds, calm seas. I picked an arbitrary sail date, the twenty-eighth, which fit into Bone's schedule. Then I gave Annalise a full week's advance notice. She wasn't thrilled at the prospect of four days on a thirty-four-foot yawl, but when I reminded her of her promise, she agreed to honor it. I asked her if she wanted to come down to the harbor early and see what all the months of hard work had accomplished; she said no, she'd wait and be surprised on the twenty-eighth. I thought about inviting Jack Scanlon and the Kyles for a look, decided it could wait until after the shakedown voyage. The only people I really cared to share the yawl with until then were Annalise and Bone.

I plotted out a course that would take us south around St. John, up through Flanagan Passage into Sir Francis Drake Channel, along the east coast of Virgin Gorda and out across the Hawks Bill Bank; we'd swing north by northeast near Horseshoe Reef and run due east through deep water outside the dangerous coral heads that ring Ane-gada, then drop down across the Kingfish Banks and home to St. Thomas through the Virgin's Gangway. Bone approved. It would be a good long test of Annalise's seaworthiness, and there were anchorages on Tortola, Guana Island, and Virgin Gorda, and a safe harbor at Ane-gada for emergencies or if any of us felt like an overnight stop.

The long-range forecast promised perfect sailing weather for the four-day period beginning on the twenty- eighth. The day before, Bone and I loaded in stores, topped off the fuel and water tanks, put fresh linens on one of the vee bunks up forward for him and on the double berth in the main cabin for Annalise and me. I ran the engine for ten minutes one more time, even though there hadn't been any tendency toward overheating; the gauge held steady at 140 degrees. Fussily, I even rechecked the gland nut in the stuffing box for any looseness that might cause leakage.

At six that night, the yawl was ready for sea.

At six the next morning, Annalise refused to go along.

She didn't feel well, she said. She thought maybe she was coming down with something, she said. It made her seasick just thinking about being out on the water, she said. I suspected that she was faking, but she sounded so apologetic and sincere, I didn't call her on it. I offered to postpone the trip; she said no, she felt bad enough as it was, she didn't want to deprive me of my pleasure. Why didn't Bone and I just go ahead, she'd come along next time, swear to God she would. I was disappointed and a little upset, but what could I do short of branding her a liar and shanghaiing her? She kept urging me to go, and so finally I went.

As soon as the yawl was out of the harbor and under sail, tacking up against a light southeasterly breeze, I forgot my disappointment and I forgot Annalise. Reality isn't always as wonderful as the anticipation of it, but in this case it was even better. Annalise handled like a dream. There is no other feeling like standing at the helm of your own boat, the wind in your face and the sea smell in your nostrils, listening to the hiss of the water and the wind-fattened sheets singing and the lines, shrouds, and stays thrumming in accompaniment. It's more than just exhilaration, a rush or a high. It's freedom and wonder and a kind of pure and innocent joy. I've never put much stock in religion, but there's something spiritual about it, too, an almost mystical connection of man to nature. If there is a God, the closest I've ever gotten or will ever get to Him is the days and nights I spent on that yawl at sea.

We were out four full days, and it was superb sailing the entire time. Running down the trades at four and five knots, the deep water an ever-changing mosaic of blues and greens topped by foaming crests, puffy white trade-wind clouds that never banked or darkened. Even the routine of sea-keeping—checking the chafe points on sheets and sails, restowing shifted supplies, all the other little chores—was a pleasure. We stood watch and watch, four hours on and four hours off; the man on watch steered and trimmed sail, the man off watch did the cooking and bilge-pumping and slept when he could.

We didn't talk much; there was no need for conversation. All your senses are heightened at sea, your