Morgan Stone - The Russian Factor

With peak oil pushing inflation, the financial collapse looming on the horizon, and political unrest heating up, the Eastern Mediterranean charter season was looking was dismal. The charter operator planning to buy that yacht, backed out at the last minute, leaving Omar stuck with it. It was a Beneteau, like the one on which I had placed the ill-fated offer, but this one was an Oceanis . The descriptive model name reeked of the high seas and ocean racing origins. Maybe the model started out on an ocean racer’s drawing board and if so, it was sure to get us home. I had decided on a boat in the forty-five to fifty foot range based on what I had read about the Vendee Globe yacht race. It also had something to do with what I could afford, or to be precise, was able to borrow.

Erdem provided me his phone to call my bank manager back in Vancouver. I needed to confirm the credit was available and find out how to wire that much money. The interrogation I got about insurance, licensing, planning and experience simply blew me mind. The manager, with whom I thought I’d developed rapport during my bungalow renovation, held nothing back when it came to how he felt about sailing a yacht home from Turkey. In the end, he told me the money would be available, insurance in place and that I was, “Nuts to even consider a venture that fool-hardily risky.”

Maybe it was our maniacal state of affairs, or perhaps Omar just wanted to make sure the deal went through, but he let us move aboard Shadow before the sale was complete. I was chuffed, and not just because staying at the apartment-hotel was running up the credit card, but because it smacked of adventure. Indeed, the first night aboard, drifting off to sleep, gently rocking at the dock in a real bed, as opposed to the wet sleeping bag over a flimsy foamy I was used to when backwoods camping, was heaven.

Anna moved into a cabin, making it her own with the few things she had left. She hung her coat in the closet, stuck a postcard of Marmaris on the wall and placed her scuffed boots by the bedside table. On her pillow she lay a small teddy bear her father had given her in better times. How it made it all the way to a sailboat cabin in Turkey is a mystery to me. Anna quite literally had nothing left, but there sat that cheap little teddy bear.

She loved having a room of her own and imagined it a first class cabin on the Orient Express. Paneled almost entirely in dark polished wood, the cabin just naturally invoked an air of luxury recalling 1930s steam transport. Or so Anna opined, every chance she got. Of course, in our present reality the train hadn’t left the station — or the yacht sailed, as the case may be. On deck in the blistering heat, Anna worked at familiarizing herself with the rigging and systems that would eventually make the boat go. She developed a rhythm of ship-board chores like, filling the water tanks, cleaning and oiling the teak decks, and studying manuals and information about sailing.

Buying a yacht is nothing like buying a car. With a car, you pay for the thing and drive it on home. But with a yacht, there are lawyers and conditions, registration, taxes, insurance; Erdem’s list went on and on.

“Next step is to remove conditions.” Erdem sat across from me at a patio table under an orange tree on the brokerage’s lawn.

I wasn’t really concentrating after having tried to eat one of the oranges. The tree was heavy with them and they looked delicious. But whoa, it tasted like some kind of insecticide. I thought I’d poisoned myself! I could swear my throat was swelling shut. Erdem had watched me peel a big juicy one and take a bite. When I started gasping and choking, all he did was raise an eyebrow and tell me they were only decorative, “Not for eating.” Then, unconcerned with the possibility of my imminent demise, he started in on those conditions .

“Whose conditions are they, and what do I do about them?” I wheezed.

“Well, they are standard conditions, in the contract for your protection and you need to remove them: a sea-trial and a survey. They ensure you will only buy the boat when you are satisfied with it.”

“I take it a survey is an inspection, right?”

“That’s right. The vessel must be surveyed by a professional surveyor to make sure there are no defects the seller didn’t know about or not tell about. Your survey report will help you decide if the boat is worth what you offered.” Erdem shuffled through papers in his leather folio.

“And the sea-trial?”

“That is like a test drive. I suggest you take Shadow for the sea-trial first because it does not require any expense. If you are unhappy with the yacht, there is no need to spend money on a survey and your deposit will be refunded.”

I was panicking, and it wasn’t just the aftereffects of that decorative orange. The oblivious young man in the three piece suit expected me to take that yacht out for a spin. I’d backed myself into yet another corner. Parking a neutral expression on my face, I racked my brains for some way out that didn’t involve my telling this kid, who was engineering the first yacht sale in his life, that I didn’t really know a thing about sailing a yacht of that caliber. After all, I had at least hinted to Anna, in his presence, that I was quite an accomplished sailor.

“Oh yes, the sea-trial,” I stalled for time. “Well, what time works for you?”

“Perhaps this afternoon is convenient?”

“Ah, no, that won’t work.” I was still cogitating. I needed more time. “Tomorrow, yes, that will be much better. Maybe there will even be some wind so we can sail. Really put that yacht through its paces.” Then an idea hit me. “By the way, since I want to be extra careful and make sure there is nothing I miss on the sea trial, would it be okay to hire a professional to sail it tomorrow? And, is there someone you’d recommend who knows Beneteau sailboats of this size and model?”

“That would be fine. I know the skipper from the charter company that was going to manage Shadow. He knows those boats. I believe he brought that one from France. He is a delivery skipper, so he will know what it sails like on the open ocean.”

“Delivery skipper… interesting.” The wheels were turning. “He delivers to North America?”

“No, very much less expensive and safer to send yachts across oceans by cargo ship. My uncle uses Dock Wise.”

That sounded divine, but my problem wasn’t getting the yacht to Canada, it was getting Anna there.

“Alors, bonjour!” The skipper was the first to show up. Typically Parisian, condescending, and rather put out. Barking orders in French, he jumped on board. He looked to be in his forties, wired and bean-pole thin. His face bristled with several days worth of stubble, and he puffed away on a foul smelling Turkish cigarette.

I looked around for Erdem.

“You are Canadian? Do you not speak French? Perhaps you are deaf?” The skipper flipped plastic covers off the instruments by the big wheel.

“I’m waiting for Erdem. We are not leaving without him.” I said in English.

“Why not? This boat, I can sail her blind. She was to be my boat, my job. Erdem, did he not tell you? You come and buy the charter boats and now I am without a job. Merde! Tell your boss not to do business around here.”

Anna came up from below, speechless at the antics of the Frenchman.

“Apparently, our captain.” The words left my mouth in Russian before I realized they were the same in French.

“Non, you are the cap-ee-tan. I am your humble servant.”

Craning my neck, I saw Erdem making his way down the dock and waved him over. He broke into a trot, arriving moments later, every hair in place, tie perfectly knotted, not even a hint of sweat. The skipper, in Turkish, initiated an argument with Erdem resulting in an immediate end to any communication in English or French.