Mahura ignored her. She looked down at Taarii, who had slumped to a squat on the cabin sole and was staring dully ahead. Mitch thought she was going to slap him, but she bent suddenly, put her hand under his chin, and raised his face. Slowly, in ancient Polynesian style, she rubbed his nose with her own, patted his cheek, and straightened.

“Merde,” she said softly, to the rest of them. Shoulders back, breasts thrust, she moved to the companionway. She looked Jean-Paul up and down. "Popaa!"

Then she was up through the hatch and gone. Lindy rose to follow her. Jean-Paul shook his head. “No! Believe me, please!”

For a week they did not see her. When they did, she was lunching at the Pitate with a big blond Pan Am copilot. That evening she sent him back to the boat for her things. Jean-Paul packed them, handed them over, and shook hands.

“It is well, my friend. It is no good for her, aboard here.”

Mitch, lashing his dinghy topside, watched the flier leave Xanadu. Jean-Paul wandered forward, climbed to his bowsprit, and sat on his bagged jib. When Mitch finished he was still sitting there, but Taarii was squatting unobtrusively by the starboard shrouds, sketching him with long, swift strokes as he stared at the strange yellow sun.

Mitch went below and checked the clocks. They were pulling out tomorrow at dawn.

Chapter 11

CHAPTER 11

The flashing light had grown steadier, though no stronger. She rested, floating back in the water and staring straight up. The great golden star she thought was Antares was no longer quite overhead.

Lindy is alive and well, Mitch, and living under Antares, in the sign of Scorpio. She rang you once or twice, but you never picked up the phone. Her mind rose from the swells, leaving her body floating there. First she flew east, then north, then south, then in confused circles. Finally she found the pale, starlit sails. He was moving under jib and mizzen, far too slowly.

He slumped red-eyed and half-dead at the helm. Now she forgot where to tell him to go. She had lost herself. Antares! Steer for Antares before it is too late. Forget the charts, she screamed silently: forget everything but the big golden star, hurry. If you can’t find me, how can I?

She opened her eyes. The star twinkled down at her but the others were orbiting it. She was in a whirlpool of them.

She kicked upright, avoiding vertigo. Erect and treading water, she stared about. She was still disoriented and could not tell north from south. To drown would be bad enough, to drown directionless, in a void, was horrifying.

As she raised her head, the air and sea around her paled for an instant. The impression was so brief that she could not be sure that it had really happened.