Stuart Woods - Cold Paradise

Dino blinked. “Well, do something, for chrissakes!”

Stone pressed the button on the microphone again. “Any ship, any ship, this is the yacht Toscana, in need of assistance. Anybody read me?”

Nothing. Silence.

“It’s three o’clock in the morning,” Dino said. “What did you expect?”

Then a voice came over the radio. “Toscana, Toscana, this is Winddrifter. Do you read?”

“ Winddrifter, Toscana . I read you loud and clear.”

“What’s your problem?”

“We’re adrift in the Waterway with no power, and we need a tow, fast, to keep from hitting a bridge.”

“Sorry, Toscana, I’m halfway to the Bahamas. Afraid I can’t be of any help. Good luck.”

“You get the feeling we’re all alone?” Dino asked.

“Well, shit, we’ve got to do something ,” Stone said.

“I’m wide open to suggestions.”

Stone looked outside the bridge and saw a large inflatable dinghy on deck. “There,” he said. “We’ve got to get that thing launched right now.”

“You mean we’re going to abandon ship?” Dino asked.

“No, no. Come on, follow me.” Stone opened the outside door and left the bridge. He ran forward to the dinghy, which appeared to be a good seventeen feet long. A big outboard motor was bolted to the stern. “Look, it’s already hooked up to the davit,” Stone said.

“To the what?”

“The davit, the cranelike thing.” Stone yanked a cover off a pedestal. “Here we go,” he said, switching on the electric motor. He tried the up switch, and the dinghy rose six inches, bringing its cradle with it. “Thank God it’s got its own power.” He set it back down on deck. “Quick, let’s get this thing unlashed.” He glanced at the bridge. It was beginning to look very large.

Dino fumbled with the ties. “Got this side undone,” he said.

“Mine, too,” Stone said. “Now, I’m going to get into the dinghy. You raise it higher than the rail, there, and use this joystick thing to swing it over the side. Then you push the down button.”

“I’ve never operated anything like this before,” Dino said.

“Think of it as a computer game.”

“I can’t do those, either.”

Stone hopped into the dinghy “Okay, let’s go.”

Dino started to work the controls. He raised the dinghy three feet off the deck.

“Right, now use the joystick.”

Dino did something, and the dinghy began to move sideways at an alarming rate. Stone nearly fell out. “Slowly!” he yelled.

“I thought you were in a hurry,” Dino said.

“Gently. Don’t throw me out of the dinghy.”

Dino tried again, and this time the dinghy moved smoothly over the rail and hung, suspended, six or eight feet above the water.

“Great, now with the down button.”

Dino found the switch, and in a moment the dinghy was in the water. Stone unhooked the cable and was adrift. “Put the davit back in the same position we found it in,” he called to Dino.

Dino followed Stone’s instructions. “Now what?” he called.

A light breeze had sprung up, and Stone was drifting rapidly away from the yacht. “Find a long rope!” he yelled, “and go to the bow!”

“Where?”

“Up front to the pointed end.” Stone felt around the instrument panel for the ignition key and found it. He tried starting the engine. It turned over but didn’t start. He made his way to the stern of the dingy, found a gas tank with a fuel line leading to the engine, and pumped the attached rubber bulb a few times. Then he returned to the controls and tried again. The engine started.

Stone put the thing in gear and headed for the bows of the yacht, which was now turning sideways. Then he glanced over his shoulder and found that, in the time it had taken to launch the dingy, they were nearly to the bridge. The yacht was about to hit not one, but two of the bridge’s supports.

He did the only thing he could think of. He gunned the engine and attacked the bows of the big yacht, as if the dinghy were a tugboat. Gradually, the bows of the yacht began to turn upstream, and a moment later she passed, backward, under the bridge.

Stone could see Dino standing on deck. “Did you find a rope?”

“Yeah, a big one, too.”

“Make one end fast and throw me the other end.” A moment later, a large coil of heavy rope hit Stone in the back of the head, knocking him down.

“You trying to kill me?” he yelled at Dino. He struggled back to his feet.

“You said throw you the other end.”

“I didn’t mean two hundred feet of it!” Stone paid out forty feet of rope, then made it fast to a stern cleat. “Okay, I’ve got it,” he yelled.

“What do I do now?”

“Go back to the bridge and steer the boat.”

“Steer it where?”

“Just keep it headed upstream behind the dinghy!”

“Okay, okay.” Dino went aft toward the bridge.

“And when we pass back under the bridge, don’t let the yacht hit it!” Stone screamed.

“Thanks,” Dino called back. “I needed to be told that!”

Stone put the engine in gear and slowly went forward until the rope was taut. For a long moment nothing happened. He applied more power and finally, the dinghy began to move forward an inch at a time, then a foot. The bows of the yacht fell into line behind him, and he aimed at the center of the bridge.

Slowly, with the outboard engine making a loud racket, the yacht moved under, then away from the bridge.

“What now?” Dino yelled from the bows.

“Go back to the wheel! I’m going to try to bring the yacht alongside where we were tied up before. Find some more ropes, and as soon as we’re by the seawall, make one end fast to the yacht and jump ashore with the other end!”

“Okay!” Dino yelled, and went aft again.

The seawall came into sight now, illuminated by a dock light and the lights on the garden paths ashore. Stone could see Juanito and the yacht’s skipper standing on the wall, looking at them. He towed the yacht past the seawall, then, very slowly, made a 180-degree turn and started back toward the yacht’s berth.

“Easy!” somebody yelled from ashore. “Cut your power, and she’ll drift in.”

Stone did as he was told. Gradually, the big yacht drifted toward the seawall, then Dino was throwing ropes to the men ashore. Five minutes later, the yacht was secure.

Stone scrambled up a ladder to shore and tied the dinghy to the ladder.

The skipper approached. “What the hell happened? Did you decide to go for a cruise?”

“Don’t be ridiculous,” Stone said. “I was asleep, and somebody cut our lines.”

“Untied them,” the skipper said.

Dino walked over. “Yeah, they were just hanging in the water.”

“I tried to start the engines,” Stone said, “but we couldn’t find the ignition key.”

“In my pocket,” the skipper said, holding up the key. “Well, she’s secure, now. Why don’t you go back to bed, and we’ll try to figure this out in the morning.”

“Good idea,” Stone said, and he and Dino trudged back aboard.

“Are you thinking Dolce?” Dino asked as he paused at his cabin door.

“Maybe. Or maybe our friend Manning.”

“Some friend.”

“Yeah.”

The two men said good night and went to bed. It took Stone a long time to get to sleep.

Stone and Dino barely made it on deck in time for lunch the following day. They had the afterdeck to themselves, and they had just finished their omelettes when two men in suits emerged from the house and made their way toward the yacht.

“Ten to one they’re FBI,” Dino said.

“No bet,” Stone replied. He knew how Dino hated FBI agents, and his own experience with them as a cop had not been wonderful.