with himself, after he put a shoulder against the outriggers and heaved mightily, proclaiming them solid and rigid with no indication of give.
As they sat around the fire at dawn, warding off the early morning chill of the southern latitudes, Pitt pored over York’s navigational and plotting charts. At noon he took sights of the sun with the sextant, and later, at night, he shot several stars. Then with the aid of the nautical almanac and the “Short Method” tables that cut trigonometry calculations to bare bones, he practiced fixing his position until his figures accurately matched the known latitude and longitude of the Misery Islands on the chart.
“Think you can hit Gladiator Island on the nose?” Maeve asked him over dinner on the second evening before the launch.
“If not the nose, then the chin,” Pitt said cheerfully. “Which reminds me, I’ll need a detailed map of the island.”
“How detailed?”
“Every building, every path and road, and I’d like it all to scale.”
“I’ll draw you a map from memory as accurately as I can,” Maeve promised.
Giordino chewed on a small thigh from a frigate bird Pitt had managed to shoot with his miniature automatic pistol. “What do you make the distance?”
“Precisely 478 kilometers as the crow flies.”
“Then it’s closer than Invercargill.”
“That’s the beauty of it.”
“How many days will it take to arrive?” asked Maeve.
“Impossible to say,” answered Pitt. “The first leg of the voyage will be the hardest, tacking to windward until we pick up friendly currents and easterly breezes blowing off New Zealand. With no keel to carve the water and prevent them being blown sideways, trimarans are notoriously inept when it comes to sailing into the wind. The real challenge will come after we set off. Without a shakedown cruise we’re in the dark as to her sailing qualities. She may not tack to windward at all, and we may end up being blown back toward South America.”
“Not a comforting thought,” said Maeve, her mind clouded with the appalling implications of a ninety-day endurance trial. “When I think about it, I’d just as soon remain on dry land and end up like Rodney York.”
The day before the launch was one of feverish activity. Final preparations included the manufacture of Pitt’s mystery kite, which was folded and stowed in the deckhouse along with 150 meters of light nylon line from York’s boat that had retained its integral strength. Then their meager supplies of foodstuffs were loaded on board along with the navigational instruments, charts and books. Cheers erupted over the barren rocks when the outboard motor coughed to life after four decades and nearly forty pulls on the starter rope by Pitt, who felt as if his arm was about to fall off.
“You did it!” Maeve shouted delightedly.
Pitt spread his hands in a modest gesture. “Child’s play for somebody who restores antique and classic automobiles. The main problems were a clogged fuel line and a gummed-up carburetor.”
“Nice going, pal,” Giordino congratulated him. “A motor will come in handy during our approach to the island.”
“We were lucky the fuel cans were airtight and none of the contents evaporated after all these years. As it is, the gas has almost turned to shellac, so we’ll have to keep a sharp eye on the fuel filter. I’m not keen on flushing out the carburetor every thirty minutes.”
“How many hours of fuel did York leave us?”
“Six hours, maybe seven.”
Later, with Giordino’s help, Pitt mounted the outboard motor to brackets on the stern section of the cockpit. For a final touch, the steering compass was installed just forward of the tiller. After the woven-mat sails were attached to the mast, gaffs and booms with spiral lacing, the sails were raised and lowered with only a minor bind or two. Then they all stood back and stared at their creation. The boat looked reasonably businesslike, but by no stroke of the imagination could she be called pretty. She sat squat and ugly, the outriggers adding to her look of awkwardness. Pitt doubted whether any boats that ever sailed the seven seas were as bizarre as this one.
“She’s not exactly what you’d call sleek and elegant,” mused Giordino.
“Nor will she ever be entered in the America’s Cup Race,” added Pitt.
“You men fail to see her inner beauty,” said Maeve fancily. “She must have a name. It wouldn’t be fitting if she wasn’t christened. What if we call her the Never Say Die?”
“Fitting,” said Pitt, “but not in keeping with mariners’ superstitions of the sea. For good luck she should have a woman’s name.”
“How about the Marvelous Maeve?” offered Giordino.
“Oh, I don’t know,” said Pitt. “It’s corny but cute. I’ll vote for it.”
Maeve laughed. “I’m flattered, but modesty dictates something more proper, say like Dancing Dorothy II.”
“Then it’s two against one,” Giordino said solemnly, “Marvelous Maeve she is.”
Giving in, Maeve found an old rum bottle cast off by Rodney York and filled it with seawater for the launching. “I christen thee Marvelous Maeve,” she said, laughing, and broke the bottle against one of the beech logs lashed to the buoyancy tubes. “May you swim the seas with the speed of a mermaid.”
“Now comes our fitness exercise,” said Pitt. He passed out lines attached to the forward section of the middle hull. Everyone looped one end of a line around their waist, dug in their feet and leaned forward. Slowly, stubbornly, the boat began to slide over the tree trunks laid on the ground like railroad tracks. Still weakened from a lack of proper food and their ordeal, the three quickly used up their depleted strength dragging the boat toward a two-meter precipice rising from the water.
Maeve, as was to be expected by now, pulled her heart out until she could go no further and sagged to her hands and knees, heart pounding, lungs heaving for air. Pitt and Giordino hauled the great deadweight another ten meters before casting off the lines and dropping to the ground ahead of Maeve. Now the boat teetered on the edge of the ends of two beech-log ways that angled down and under the low rolling waves.
Several minutes passed. The sun was a quarter of the way past the eastern horizon, and the sea was innocent of any sign of turbulence. Pitt slipped the rope loop from around his waist and threw it on the boat. “I guess there’s no reason to put off the inevitable any longer.” He climbed into the cockpit, swung the outboard motor down on its hinges and pulled at the starter rope. This time it popped to life on the second try.
“Are you two up to giving our luxury yacht a final nudge over the edge?” he said to Maeve and Giordino.
“After having gone to all this work to stir up my hormones,” Giordino grumbled, “what’s in it for me?”
“A tall gin and tonic on the house,” Pitt replied.
“Promises, promises. That’s sadism of the worst kind,” Giordino groused. He slipped a muscled arm around Maeve’s waist, pulled her to her feet and said, “Push, lovely lady, it’s time to bid a fond farewell to this rockbound hell.”
The two of them moved aft, stiffened their arms, hands against the stern, and shoved with all their remaining strength. The Marvelous Maeve moved reluctantly, then picked up speed as the forward section dipped over the edge onto the ways, and the stern lifted. She hung poised for two seconds, then dove into the water with a heavy splash that flew to the sides, before settling flat on the surface. Pitt’s rationale for starting the outboard motor now became apparent as he had instant control of the boat against the flow of the current. He quickly circled it back to the edge of the low cliff. As soon as the bow gently bumped against the sheer rock, Giordino held Maeve by her wrists and gently lowered her down onto the roof of the deckhouse. Then he jumped and landed on his feet, as agile as a gymnast, beside her.
“That concludes the entertainment part of the program,” said Pitt, reversing the outboard.
“Shall we raise my sails?” asked Maeve, personalizing the pride of her accomplishment.
“Not yet. We’ll motor around to the leeward side of the island where the sea is calmer before we test the wind.”
Giordino helped Maeve step past the deckhouse and into the cockpit. They sat down to rest a moment while Pitt steered the boat through the channel and into the swells sweeping around the north and south end of the two deserted islands. They no sooner reached the open sea than the sharks appeared.
“Look,” said Giordino, “our friends are back. I’ll bet they missed our company.”
