Ken Douglas - Scorpion

She cleated off the sheet, then ground some more of it in with the winch. “I’ll take the wheel now,” she said, and Earl let her have it. Then she reached over to the engine panel and pushed the ignition button. Earl heard and felt the rumble of the diesel as it started up. “I don’t think we can catch them without the main, but with the help of the engine they won’t have a chance of getting away.”

“ I don’t think that’s a problem,” he said.

“ Why not?”

“ I don’t think they want to get away.”

“ They’re turning around,” Broxton said. He was back at the wheel. Ramsingh had just come back up from below, after having replaced his damaged floor hatches.

“ I spend all of my spare time on this boat,” he said. He was talking loudly, but Broxton heard the sigh in his voice. “It’s more than a hobby.”

“ I’m sorry about hurting it,” Broxton said.

“ It’s not your fault,” Ramsingh said. “You were doing your job, but I’m taking over command now. I know you’re trying to keep me alive, but I don’t think Gypsy Dancer can take much more of your methods.”

Broxton nodded, meeting Ramsingh’s eyes. There was a grim determined set to his jaw, a sturdy, unafraid timbre to his voice and a sad, soulful look in those eyes. He’d made a decision and Broxton wasn’t sure he wanted to know what it was, but he had to ask. “What do we do now?”

“ We let them catch up to us.”

Ramsingh let out some of the mainsheet and the boat slowed from seven to five knots. “Look, there,” he said, pointing, “those are the Porpoises, right off our starboard side.”

Broxton turned to look. They were close to the rocks and he still had trouble seeing them. If Ramsingh hadn’t pointed them out he’d have missed them completely. He looked behind. “They’ve completed their turn.”

“ Look at the island ahead,” Ramsingh said. “We’re headed directly for the south coast. When I tell you, turn to starboard, to the right. Keep turning till the island is off the port side. That’ll be a ninety degree turn. Hold that position till I tell you differently.”

“ But the rocks?”

“ We should be by them by then.”

“ Should be?” Broxton said.

“ Should be,” Ramsingh answered.

Broxton checked behind them again. He didn’t have to tell Ramsingh they were getting closer. He turned away and eyed the coastline, looked again toward the rocks, but they’d moved past and he couldn’t see them through the rising swell.

“ What are you doing?” he asked, as Ramsingh let out more of the mainsheet.

“ Slowing the boat down even more.”

“ They’re coming awfully fast.”

“ I think she wants to ram us.”

“ Won’t she go down, too?”

“ Good possibility, but she’s thinking she’s got a steel boat. We’re fiberglass, she’s bigger. She probably thinks she’d survive a collision and we wouldn’t. She’d be wrong. Fiberglass is a lot tougher than it looks, and that thin skinned steel boat isn’t as strong as she thinks. Anything can sink, even the Titanic went down, and that boat’s no Titanic.”

Broxton looked over his shoulder. They weren’t far behind now and they were rapidly closing the distance. “Shit,” he said, staring at the stainless steel bow roller. Two heavy anchors rested in it and to his eyes they looked like great steel tipped battering rams charging up the ass end of their small boat. He gripped the wheel in a fit of panic.

“ Don’t!” Ramsingh yelled. “Not yet.”

And Broxton stayed his hand. He’d been about to turn out of the way, but there was something about the authority in Ramsingh’s voice that screamed out to be obeyed.

“ We don’t turn till the last possible moment. We want her to think we’re running like frightened jackals. If she even suspects what I have in mind we could all find ourselves swimming.” So Broxton kept a steady hand on the wheel as Ramsingh fiddled with the lines, making ready for the turn.

He grabbed another look behind. The twin anchors seemed to be aimed right between his eyes, chromed and glistening, so polished that they reflected, like a mirror, the few rays of sunlight that managed to sneak through the gray clouds.

“ Hold steady your course,” Ramsingh said, as the monstrous form of the boat behind filled his vision. “Eyes front,” Ramsingh said, and Broxton turned away from Sea King and faced Grenada’s south shore. “Steady, steady,” Ramsingh cautioned. Broxton felt like there were a million eyes shooting laser-like pin pricks up his back, but he held the boat steady as Ramsingh commanded.

“ Now!” Ramsingh screamed, and Broxton spun the wheel to the right as Ramsingh played the sheets. The wind from behind filled the jib and the boat heeled and picked up speed. Broxton risked a quick look back and shivered. Sea King slipped by, missing them by less than a yard.

“ Two strikes!” Dani yelled out across the space between their two boats. Broxton shivered again. She had been his friend his whole life through. He loved her. She was all he wanted. If only he could make her see the light. But the fleeting look he caught from her eyes as they flew past told his heart what he already knew in his head. There was no going back. Though he and Dani both lived, their friendship was dead. He loved her still, but there was nothing he could do about that.

“ We’re going to turn right again in a few minutes,” Ramsingh shouted, “so be ready.” He heard the voice, nodded to let Ramsingh know he understood, but he kept his eyes on Sea King and watched as Dani rushed around the wheel. The Texan took her place as she struggled at a winch, making ready to turn and give chase.

“ Did you make out what she said?” Ramsingh asked.

“ Two strikes,” Broxton said. “It’s from baseball.”

“ We play cricket here, but I know what it means.”

“ They’re coming around,” Broxton said.

“ And so are we. Turn now, right again, ninety degrees,” and again Ramsingh was at the sheets as the little boat bucked and turned through the churning seas. When the sail had come around to the other side and they had the land directly at their backs, Ramsingh said, “Turn a little more right, not too much.” Broxton obeyed as Ramsingh tightened sail. He stole a look at the knot meter. Seven and a half knots. The wind was across their left side now, blowing strong. They were heeled over, rails back in the water, headed back toward Trinidad, seventy-eight miles away, going full tilt, as fast as Gypsy Dancer was able to take them.

“ Will we be able to out run them?” Broxton said.

Ramsingh didn’t answer. His eyes were on Sea King as she made a clumsy and wide turn. But instead of stopping at ninety degrees as they had done, she kept coming around.

“ No!” Broxton screamed.

One second, Sea King was slicing through the water, a dangerously beautiful sight as she moved through the choppy seas, and the next she was stopped dead as she slammed into the rocks.

Ramsingh slackened sail and Gypsy Dancer straightened up and slowed to four knots. “Three strikes,” he said. “She’s out.”

And Broxton understood. Ramsingh had gambled that she would be so caught up in the chase that she’d forget about the rocks. While she was changing places with the Texan and struggling to turn the ship around, Ramsingh had him circling around the rocks. She’d been too busy to notice what they were doing.

“ We have to go back,” he said as the boat floundered.

“ No,” Ramsingh said, and Broxton watched in horror as a gaping hole opened in Sea King’s bow. In seconds she was on her side. Ramsingh looked away, tightened sail and cleated off the sheets. “We’re going back to Trinidad,” he said.