Plum Island (66 page)

Finally, she seemed to come alive, and looked back over her shoulder. Without a word, she got out of the chair and went to
the rear of the boat. I glanced at her and saw her take up a kneeling position in the stern as she drew her 9mm. I looked
out at the sea behind us, but saw only the walls of waves trailing the boat. Then, as the Formula rode up on a big wave, I
could see the fly bridge of the Chris-Craft behind us again, not more than sixty feet away and closing fast. I made a decision
and cut the throttles back, leaving only enough power to control the boat. Beth heard the engines rev down and glanced back
at me, then nodded in understanding. She turned back toward the Chris-Craft and steadied her aim. We had to meet the beast.

Tobin had not noticed the sudden difference in relative speed and before he knew it, the Chris-Craft was less than twenty
feet from the Formula, and he hadn’t gotten his rifle into position. Before he did, Beth began a steady volley of fire at
the dark figure at the window of the cabin. I watched all of this, dividing my time between keeping the bow of the Formula
into the waves, and looking back to be sure Beth was okay.

Tobin seemed to disappear from the cabin, and I wondered if he’d been hit. But then, all of a sudden, the Chris-Craft spotlight,
mounted on the bow, went on, illuminating the Formula and also revealing Beth kneeling in the stern. “Damn it.” Beth was slipping
her last magazine into the Glock, and Tobin was now back at the windshield, aiming the rifle with both hands and letting the
wheel go.

I drew my .38, spun around, and jammed my back against the wheel to hold it as I tried to steady my aim. Tobin’s rifle was
pointing right at Beth from less than fifteen feet away.

For a half second, it seemed as if everything was frozen— both boats, Beth, Tobin, me, and the sea itself. I fired. The barrel
of Tobin’s rifle, which was clearly lined up on Beth, all of a sudden swung toward me and I saw the muzzle flash at about
the same time that the Chris-Craft, with no hand on the helm, lurched to port, and Tobin’s shot went wide. The Chris-Craft
was now at right angles to the stern of the Formula, and I could see Tobin in the side window of the cabin. In fact, he saw
me and we made eye contact. I fired three more rounds into the cabin and his side window shattered. When I looked again, he
was gone.

I noticed now that trailing behind the Chris-Craft was the small Whaler that had been in the boathouse. I had no doubt now
that Tobin intended to use the Whaler to land on Plum Island.

The Chris-Craft bobbed around aimlessly, and I could tell there was no one at the helm. Just as I was wondering if I’d hit
him, his bow came around very deliberately, and the spotlight again illuminated us. Beth fired at the light, and on the third
shot, it exploded in a shower of sparks and glass.

Tobin was not to be foiled, and he gunned the Chris-Craft’s engines. His bow was closing on the stern of the Formula. He would
have rammed us except that Beth had pulled the flare pistol from her pocket and fired it right into the windshield of the
cabin cruiser’s bridge. There was a blinding white explosion of phosphorus and the Chris-Craft veered off as Tobin, I imagined,
let go of the helm real fast and dived for cover. In fact, maybe he was burned, blinded, or dead.

Beth was yelling, “Go! Go!”

I had already opened the throttles and the Formula was picking up speed.

I could see flames licking around the bridge of the Chris-Craft. Beth and I looked at one another, both wondering if maybe
we’d gotten lucky. But as we watched Tobin’s boat behind us, the flames seemed to subside. At a distance of about forty feet,
we again heard the hailing horn crackle and again the little bastard had something to say.

“Corey! I’m coming for you! And for you, too, Ms. Bitch! I’ll kill you both! I’ll kill you!”

I said to Beth, “I think he means it.”

“How dare he call me bitch.”

“Well … of course he’s just taunting you. He doesn’t know you, so how can he know that you’re a bitch? I mean,
if
you’re a bitch.”

“I know what you mean.”

“Right.”

“Haul ass, John. He’s getting close again.”

“Right.” I gave it more throttle, but the extra speed made the Formula unstable. In fact, I hit an oncoming wave so hard the
bow pitched up at too steep an angle, and I thought we were going to back-flip. I could hear Beth scream, and I thought she’d
been pitched overboard, but when the boat came down, she rolled across the deck and dropped halfway down the companionway
stairs before she came to a stop. She lay on the stairs, and I called out, “Are you okay?”

She got up on all fours and crawled up the companion-way. “I’m all right….”

I cut back on the throttles and said, “Go below and take a break.”

She shook her head and positioned herself between her seat and the dashboard. She said, “You watch for waves and channel markers.
I’ll watch for Tobin.”

“Okay.” I had the thought that maybe Beth was right, and I should try to circle around and come up behind him, rather than
him coming up behind us again. Maybe if he was sitting in his nice dry cabin, he wouldn’t see us and we could board him. But
if he saw us, we’d be looking down the muzzle of that rifle again.

The only advantage we had was our speed, but as we saw, we couldn’t take full advantage of it in this weather.

I said to Beth, “Nice going. Good thinking.”

She didn’t reply. “Do you have any more signal flares?”

“Five more.”

“Good.”

“Not really. I lost the flare gun.”

“Do you want to go back and try to find it?”

“I’m tired of your jokes.”

“Me, too. But it’s all we’ve got.”

So, we continued on in silence, through the storm, which was getting worse if that were possible.

Finally, she said, “I thought I was dead.”

I replied, “We can’t let him get that close again.”

She looked at me and said, “He passed me up to get you.”

“That’s the story of my life. Whenever somebody has only one shot, I’m the one they pick.”

She almost smiled, then disappeared below. Less than a minute later, she came back and handed me another beer. She said, “Every
time you do good, you get a beer.”

“I don’t have many tricks left. How many more beers do you have?”

“Two.”

“That should work out.”

I contemplated my options and realized I’d run out of most of them. There were only two possible harbors left now—the ferry
slip at Orient Point and the cove at Plum Island. Orient Point was probably coming up to the left by now and Plum Island was
two miles farther. I looked at the gas gauge. The needle was in the red but not yet touching E.

The sea was so bad now I couldn’t even see the channel markers for long periods at a time. I knew that Tobin, sitting high
in his cabin bridge, had a better view of the markers and of us. As I thought about that, it suddenly struck me that he must
have radar—ship-hazard radar, which was how he’d found us. And he must also have a depth-finder, which made navigation much
easier for him even if he lost sight of the channel markers. In short, the
Sondra
was no match for the
Autumn Gold
. “Damn it.”

Every once in a while with increasing frequency, a wave broke over the bow or sides, and I could feel the Formula getting
heavier. In fact, I was sure we were riding lower in the water. The extra weight was slowing us up and burning more gas. I
realized that Tobin could overtake us at the speed we were going. I realized, too, that we were losing the battle against
the sea as well as the naval engagement.

I glanced at Beth, and she sensed me looking at her and our eyes met. She said, “In case we capsize or sink, I want to tell
you now that I actually like you.”

I smiled and replied, “I know that.” I looked at her and said, “I’m sorry. I never should have—”

“Drive and shut up.”

I turned my attention back to the wheel. The Formula was moving so slowly now that the following sea was coming over the stern.
In a short time, we would be swamped, or the engine compartment would be flooded, and/or Tobin would be on top of us and we
weren’t going to outrun him this time.

Beth kept looking for Tobin and, of course, she saw the sea washing over the stern and couldn’t help but realize the boat
was lower and slower. She said, “John, we’re going to swamp.”

I looked again at the gas gauge. The only chance we had at this point was to gun the engines and see what happened. I put
my hand on the throttles and pushed them all the way forward.

The Formula moved out, slowly at first, then gathered some speed. We were taking on less water from the stern, but the boat
was slamming hard and heavy into the oncoming waves. So hard, in fact, it was like hitting a brick wall every five seconds.
I thought the craft was going to break up, but the fiberglass hull held.

Beth was holding on in her seat, rising and falling with each encounter with a wave.

Leaving it at full throttle was working, as far as keeping control and keeping from getting swamped, but it wasn’t doing much
for fuel economy. Yet, I had no choice. In the great realm of trade-offs, I had traded off the certainty of sinking now against
the certainty of running out of gas shortly. Big deal.

But my experience with fuel gauges—ever since I had my first car—was that they show either more fuel than you have left, or
less fuel than you have left. I didn’t know how this gauge lied, but I would soon find out.

Beth said, “How’s the gas?”

“Fine.”

She tried to put a light tone in her voice and said, “Do you want to stop for gas and ask directions?”

“Nope. Real men don’t ask directions, and we have enough gas to get to Plum Island.”

She smiled.

I said to her, “Go below awhile.”

“What if we capsize?”

“We’re too heavy now to capsize. We’ll sink. But you’ll have plenty of warning. Take a break.”

“Okay.” She went below. I took the chart out of the open glove compartment and divided my attention between it and the sea.
Off to the left in the far distance, I caught a glimpse of a flashing strobe light, and I knew that had to be Orient Point
Lighthouse. I glanced at the chart. If I turned due north now, I would probably be able to find the Orient Point ferry slips.
But there were so many rocks and shoals between the ferry and the lighthouse that it would take a miracle to get past them.
The other possibility was to go on another two miles or so and try for the cove at Plum Island. But that meant going into
Plum Gut, which was treacherous enough in normal tides and winds. In a storm—or hurricane—it would be … well, challenging,
to say the least.

Beth came up the companionway, lurching from side to side and pitching forward, then back. I caught her outstretched hand
and hauled her up. She presented me with an unwrapped chocolate bar. I said, “Thanks.”

She said, “The water’s ankle deep below. Bilge pumps are still working.”

“Good. The boat’s feeling a little lighter.”

“Terrific. Take a break below. I’ll drive.”

“I’m okay. How’s your little scratch?”

“It’s okay. How’s your little brain?”

“I left it onshore.” As I ate my chocolate bar, I explained our options.

She understood our chances clearly and said, “So, we can smash up on the rocks at Orient Point or drown in the Gut?”

“Right.” I tapped the fuel gauge and said, “We’re well past the point where we can turn back to Greenport.”

“I think we missed our opportunity there.”

“I guess so….” I asked her, “So? Orient or Plum?”

She looked at the chart awhile and said, “There are too many navigation hazards between here and Orient.” She looked out to
the left and added, “I don’t even see any channel markers leading to Orient. I wouldn’t be surprised if some of them haven’t
broken loose and floated away.”

I nodded. “Yeah….”

Beth said, “And forget the Gut. Nothing less than an ocean liner could get through there in this storm.” She added, “If we
had more fuel, we could ride this out until the eye passes over.” She looked up from the chart and said,

“We have no options.”

Which may have been true. Tom and Judy once told me that the instinct to sail toward land in a storm was often the wrong thing
to do. The coast was treacherous, it was where the breaking waves could pulverize or capsize your boat or drive you into the
rocks. It was actually safer to ride out the storm in the open sea as long as you had fuel or sail left. But we didn’t even
have that option because we had a guy with a rifle and radar on our ass. We had no choice but to press on and see what God
and nature had in store for us. I said, “We’ll hold course and speed.”

She nodded. “Okay. That’s about all we can do…. What—?”

I looked at her and saw she was staring toward the stern. I looked back, but saw nothing.

She said, “I saw him … I think I saw him.” Beth jumped up on the chair and managed to keep her balance for a second before
she was pitched off and onto the deck. She scrambled to her feet and shouted, “He’s right behind us!”

“Damn it!” I knew now that the son of a bitch definitely had radar. I was glad I hadn’t tried to get around him. I said to
Beth, “It’s not that our luck is so bad, it’s that he has radar. He’s had a fix on us from the start.”

She nodded and said, “No place to run, no place to hide.”

“No place to hide for sure, but let’s try to run.”

I opened the throttles all the way, and we picked up more speed.

Neither of us spoke as the Formula cut heavily through the waves. I estimated we were making about twenty knots, which was
about one third of what this boat could do in a calm sea and without a bilge- and cabinful of seawater. I guessed that the
Chris-Craft could do at least twenty knots in this weather, which was why he was able to catch up to us. In fact, Beth said,
“John, he’s gaining on us.”

I looked back and saw the vague outline of Tobin’s boat as it crested a huge wave about forty feet behind us. In about five
minutes or less, he’d be able to place fairly accurate rifle fire on us, while my .38 and Beth’s 9mm pistol were really useless
except for the occasional lucky shot. Beth asked me, “How many rounds do you have left?”