"A memorial flight for my friend Alejandro." Lomas grinned. "We are going to do a four-man jump on Spanish Galleon Cay."

Chapter 7

Chapter 7

A stinging lash of cold salt water flew over the canvas cockpit dodger and dashed Ellen in the face. It brought her to her senses. She was out of sight of land, the sinking sun at her back.

She had left Masthead Light far astern. She realized that she had been plowing mindlessly to sea for a full two hours.

Standing at the wheel in the cockpit, dressed in her swimsuit, she found herself shivering, still half damp from her sprint into the water after Thea.

Marching swells were all around her. The boom was creaking against its crutch. The water was sapphire blue. To the north a thunderhead was building; they would have an evening storm.

She had no idea what had possessed her to take the boat, or why she was here. Dimly she remembered being drawn by her rage to Masthead Point. Then she had been impelled to sea, by a crazy conviction that the evil thing was here and would return to kill her family if she did not confront it now.

Insane! What could she have done with a pistol, even if she'd found it?

She glanced at the compass on the pedestal before her. Gimbaled, it was the only horizontal object in a swaying, lurching universe.

Apparently she had been steering due east. If, in her madness, she had not swung off-course, she need only turn 180 degrees to 270 magnetic, power two hours back, and she would be back at Whiskey Cay.

She must have lost her mind.

The ketch was rolling heavily. She looked astern. She did not dare turn into the swells at full power. She eased the throttle back. The drone of the diesel eased, then died.

She pressed the starter button on the compass pedestal. She could hear the starter whining, but the engine would not fire.

Again and again she tried, until she began to fear that she would run the battery dead. She began to tremble, not from cold now, but from fear.

No one knew where she was. It would be dark in an hour.

The boom creaked, and the hull had come alive with a hundred squeals and screeches as the ancient planks protested against the sea.

Faintly she heard another sound: Boom... boom... boom...

She stepped to the deckhouse and peered in through the door. The computer screen glared at her greenly, and across it moved a stately procession of peaks.

Boom... boom... boom...

It was the rhythm Carla had turned off on Masthead Beach the night before. But this was not the heartbeat of a conch! It was deeper, slower, heavier, and very, very near.

Boom... boom... boom...

She lurched back to the wheel. Had Mike and Jake tagged the great white shark?

***