“I’ll tell you what,” I said. “In the interest of allaying curiosity, why don’t you go below and look the interior over? Once you’ve had a good look around I’ll tell you all about her.”

“Now that’s the way to a woman’s heart,” she quipped. “I’ve been dying to see the inside of this boat since I first saw it at the dock.”

“Well, make the most of it, me lady,” I said with a theatrical flourish of the hand. “You enter through the companionway there on deck. Watch your head as you go below, and keep a hand in contact with something solid as you move around. You never know when we might hit a wave.”

Patricia gave me a grin of expectation. “Thanks,” she said as she practically skipped out of the pilothouse and went forward to the passageway. She took two steps down the stairs, turned and gave me a wave, and then disappeared below.

I held us on course down the Savannah. As we left Tybee Island behind to starboard I felt the first long heave of the open Atlantic Ocean. Ahead for the next thirty-five hundred miles or so was nothing but salt water. If you could hold this course and maintain this exact latitude, you would eventually run into the continent of Africa, very near the town of Safi, on the coast of Morocco. It’s a trip I’d like to make someday.

I picked up my binoculars and scanned to the north until I found the buoy marking the entrance to the channel for Daufuskie. I held course for another five minutes and then started to bring us on a heading that would carry us straight in over the bar at the channel entrance. It was high tide now, and there was plenty of depth, but I didn’t want to chance finding a newly formed shoal.

I was just beginning to wonder about Patricia when I saw her emerge from the companionway. She had a mug in each hand and made her way delicately the few steps from the hatch to the pilothouse.

“Here you go,” she said as she entered and handed me one of the mugs. “You have a stash of some really good tea in the galley. It was one of the many things that surprised me.”

I blew across the top of the mug and took a sip. “Thanks,” I said. “You must have read my mind.” I took another sip. “And this is my good stuff. I almost never serve it to company—most Americans wouldn’t appreciate it. I’m glad you know the difference.”

Patricia’s eyes smiled over the top of her mug. “Oh, that is good,” she breathed appreciatively as she lowered the cup before taking another sip. “Where do you get it?”