(16)

On August 16, for the first time since Linda’s death and burial, the waves rose in ten-foot swells and the skies clouded gray and ominous. With the pocket compass, and by wetting his finger and sticking it in the air, Bob made an approximate wind reading. The winds blew strongly from the east throughout the day.

“It’s changed directions on us,” he told Jim dejectedly. This was the wind that Bob had been dreading. Often during their more than five weeks of survival, this wind had flirted with the Triton. But now it would push them away from the coast of California, or Mexico, or wherever they were, and carry them deep into the Pacific.

“If we had only saved a piece of the boom,” went on Bob, “just a little piece, and a part of the sail, then maybe I could have rigged up something. We could at least hold our own in this kind of wind.”

Taking his morning sip of water, Jim swallowed and looked momentarily uncomfortable. By now, Bob knew that look. How fortunate that Jim’s religion forbade gambling, for Jim possessed no poker face at all. Sooner or later the truth would come out, but there was no value in pressing the point now. Any serious argument might send Jim into the silence again, and Bob could not trust his reaction to that.

It would be best to change the subject, for Jim was obviously troubled by talk of boom and sail.

“It looks like rain,” said Bob. “Maybe we should try and catch some rainwater. You have any ideas?”

Jim approved of the notion. There was nothing wrong in trapping bounty from God. For an hour, the two men worked harmoniously, finding boards, cutting them to size, and nailing them together. Clever with tools and his hands, Jim was a splendid craftsman: Bob understood well how his brother-in-law had accomplished the enormous task of building the Triton with his own hands. And the boat was well built. Even in the storm and shock of capsizing, she had held together. No longer did Bob suffer the terror of lying awake at night and praying—figuratively—that the boat would hold together until sunrise. Now he felt the Triton was capable of sailing forever, upside down.

When they were done, the men erected the funnel with its wide top sticking out their exit hole, its bottom positioned inside a plastic water jug, the neck enlarged. But they caught no rain this day. For all the daylight hours, the winds blew and the skies frowned, but only salty spray trickled into their container.

Annoyed at the temperament of the weather, Bob dipped his cup into the sea beneath their beds and sipped at the salt water. Jim watched, shaking his head in amazement. For more than a week, Bob had been supplementing his fresh water ration by occasional swallows of the sea, despite Jim’s prediction that it would sour his stomach and probably damage his brain.

“I know it’s supposed to be bad for you,” said Bob, “but it seems to satisfy my thirst.” He could tolerate up to two cups a day. The best time to drink salt water, he discovered, was in the middle of the night when he always awoke thirsty. The only problem was that his bowels rumbled after drinking the water, and sometimes brought on diarrhea. But since his daily intake of food was so minimal, there was little to evacuate.

The rains appeared on August 19, and this being their fortieth day lost at sea, Jim took it as a small omen—or favor—from above. The parallel of Christ’s forty days in the wilderness was unspoken. Almost a cup of fresh rainwater dribbled down the boards into the container. The two men watched with the fascination of seeing diamonds dropping into a velvet-lined chest.

So elated was he by the rain that Jim asked Bob if he might pray aloud, something that he had not done since their abortive five-day evangelistic wait for rescue.

Bob assented, indifferent to whatever Jim did now, as long as he did not slip back into the unbearable silence of depression.

It was his usual prayer, up to a point, blessings asked for his wife and children, gratitude to God for the rain, and assurance that his faith was unshaken. Then he mentioned that the two passengers aboard the Triton were both repentant, both true believers, both patiently waiting for the will of God to be made known.

“Wait a minute,” said Bob, putting down his carving knife and shaking his head in disbelief. “I told you, no more of those prayers that accuse me of everything.” His tone was sharp.

There was no intent to accuse, answered Jim. Besides, his heart was never fuller than during the five days when Bob had joined him in prayer and collaborated in his worship of God.

“If you remember,” said Bob dryly, “that didn’t work out too well. I assure you I was never playing the Prodigal Son.”

Jim’s mouth opened in defense, but he elected not to speak. He watched Bob whittle on the model house. Today he was creating a chimney. After a time, Jim stirred again. Would there be discussion period this morning? he wanted to know.

“Sure,” said Bob. “But I’ve run out of subjects. Unless you’d like to talk about German philosophy or something. I know you told me you read Goethe and Nietzsche when you did your year in school there.”

“Had to. That’s the way I learned German.”

“Well, what do you think of them?”

“I didn’t pay any attention to what they said. Only their grammar.”

That, thought Bob, makes as much sense as reading the libretto to Mozart’s operas and never listening to the music.

After a few moments, Jim mentioned that he had a subject.

“Which is?”

“I know you’re touchy about this,” said Jim, very carefully, “and I’ve heard some of it secondhand from Wilma, but I’m really curious why you stopped going to church.”

Shrewd use of terms, thought Bob. Not why I quit the church, only why I “stopped going.”

“It’s a very personal thing,” answered Bob, pleasantly enough. “I will tell you one thing. It goes back a long while. It wasn’t a snap decision.”

If he knew the full story, said Jim, then perhaps he could better understand the man lying beside him. Besides, hadn’t Bob urged him to listen to other viewpoints? It was not, Jim insisted, an attempt to proselytize. Jim’s face contained no secrets at that moment, so Bob shrugged. And he told his tale.

Born into a devout Adventist family, Bob had inherited his religion. There was no choice. And his earliest memories were marked by the isolation indigenous to that faith. On his father’s two-thousand-acre farm in Montana, in an area settled by Russian immigrants in the early years of the twentieth century, many of whom were already converted Adventists by the time they left their native country, there were no frills. Work was long and hard, plowing fields for wheat, fattening cattle after the winters that turned the hard land into a frozen prison, praying that the vegetable crop would be bountiful enough to last in the root cellar until the spring that never seemed to come. Of the eight children, Bob was the third eldest, and he knew the insecurity of being a middle child. Attention was paid to the oldest and the youngest, but those in between—at least to their way of thinking—felt, on occasion, left out. Toys were not bought but made. Games were invented for practical reasons—who could pile the highest stack of potatoes the fastest. School, for the most part, was more churchly than scholarly. His father and uncle hired a teacher to preside over a one-room school converted from a bunk house. There the severe tenets of his church were taught. There Bob discovered that life on earth, according to his church, was but a prelude to the better life on the day that Jesus came again. “When Jesus comes” became the byword of his formative years. From his parents, from his elders, from his teachers, from his brothers and sisters, from all those that mattered, he heard the prophecy. On the long days when he plowed the field, sitting on the tractor from dawn until night, he found himself looking up, examining the clouds, hoping to be the first to see the bearded and benevolent man in white robes descend. Perhaps He would appear this day.

The most difficult hours for Bob were the Sabbath hours, when time suspended, when no work was done, no passions explored, nothing uttered but devotion to the Lord.

Jim had to interrupt at that. He well remembered those days. Life was not very different on his father’s farm. Only his face glowed in the memory.

Bob went on. “I guess the trouble began when I started asking questions. I was always the kind of person who had to ask questions. When we moved to North Dakota and lived in town for a while, I was interested in making friends. And these other kids would sometimes ask me to go to movies. I’d ask my mother and she’d say, ‘No.’ And I’d say, ‘But why not?’ And she’d say, ‘Because we don’t go to movies.’ That didn’t seem like much of an answer to me. And I began wondering why we were different from everybody else. Then in Sabbath school, I was always pestering the teacher how water could turn into wine, or how a man could rise from the dead, or how a virgin could give birth. Understand, I was a farm kid. I knew how babies were born. And always I’d get these blunt answers, or nonanswers. Always they would tell me, ‘Don’t ask those questions. Just believe. Accept. Do as we tell you to do.’”

When he became fourteen, Bob was sent 250 miles away from his home to an Adventist academy. It was to be an unpleasant experience for him. “I was just a kid, lonely, homesick. I can’t tell you how it tormented me. The regimentation nearly drove me crazy. Morning worship. Evening worship. Bible study. Friday night services. All day Saturday services. It was like being behind walls in a monastery.

“Back on the farm, I had always dreamed of the sea. I wasn’t sure I would ever see the ocean—it sounds funny now—but I dreamt of it, anyway. Somehow I found a copy of Coleridge and I memorized big chunks of ‘The Ancient Mariner.’ Then I visited an uncle and he had a copy of Moby Dick. I started reading it at his house, but we had to leave. Of course we didn’t have a book like that at our house. So when I was at the Academy, I assumed every great book would be waiting for me. You know what I found out? ‘The Ancient Mariner’ and Moby Dick didn’t exist there, either. I asked for them both, and the librarian shook her head, almost angry that I should ask.

“I had to work to help with the tuition, so I got a job as night fireman, steaming up the boilers. There was this little man about five feet tall who was my boss, and he harassed me constantly. He accused me of cheating on the number of hours I put in, of dreaming, of wasting time. I hated him. I’d finally get to sleep and he’d haunt me—him and the Catholics who were coming to get me. I’d see the Catholics moving at me in waves, creeping into my room, with the Mark of the Beast on their foreheads.”

Jim understood this, too. One of the beliefs of the Adventists is that the Catholic Church has perverted God’s Sabbath, changing it from Saturday to Sunday, and that these Papists—or anti-Christs, as Revelations names them—will bring about the final days of mankind. Those who trample on God’s law, goes the Adventist belief and Revelations, will receive the Mark of the Beast.

“I saw these terrible creatures in my dreams,” continued Bob, “rising out of the sea, three horns on their heads, coming to get me. Somehow the boiler room and the Catholics and the homesickness got to me. I’d wake up screaming. I was so tortured by all this that I actually got ulcers. A fourteen-year-old kid with ulcers!”

In the spring of his freshman year, Bob convinced his family that he should return home for his sophomore education, where he would be able to help his father with the farm chores and save money and be closer to his family. To his surprise, the family bought his ruse.

Jim smiled. They were coming to Bob’s famed “hell-raising year.” Wilma had spoken of it.

“I really didn’t raise all that much hell,” said Bob. “I just got accused of it. For example, we had this root cellar we stored the potatoes in. The week school started, my sophomore year at home, I borrowed Dad’s car. In the back seat were these pails of potatoes, ready to be stored for the winter. Well, you know how kids do when they get their dad’s car at the age of fifteen. They drive around and show off. We started throwing potatoes at each other. We were all farm kids. The others would catch my potatoes and throw them back at me. Some of them hit the car. The next morning, my folks came out, all dressed up in best bib and tucker to take my sisters to the Academy, and they saw potato mush all over the car doors. Only it looked just like puke, so they assumed I had been out drinking and throwing up on the family car. They didn’t exactly accuse me of it, but the assumption was that Bob was drunk. So later on, I did just that.

“It happened when the sophomore class gave its picnic for the junior class. I was on the committee to pick the site. One of my friends, Mike Jurgenson—his Ma owned the local bar—he borrowed the car and in the back seat was every kind of booze. We found the picnic site right away and spent the rest of the day drinking. Of course I bragged that I was experienced and could drink more than Mike. By the time we got back to school for the last period, we were bombed. I mean, bombed.”

Wincing, Bob paused. “Did you ever try booze, Jim?”

“I took a sip of wine once and satisfied my curiosity. It tasted terrible. I never tried it again.”

“Would you drink an ice cold beer if I gave you one this very minute?”

No hesitation. Jim refused even an imaginary beer.

“When I got home that day, staggering, my dad ordered me to load wheat. I had to back a pickup truck into a small loading space. Ten times I did it before I finally squeezed it in! My dad just stood there looking at me, shaking his head, as if I were a sinner, forever lost.”

Following his memorable year at home, Bob was predictably ordered back to the Academy, where he endured the remainder of his high school education. And it was during these years that he commenced an intellectual adventure that would consume him for almost a decade.

“I decided to determine for myself if what the Bible taught, and what the Adventists taught, made sense. I even enjoyed the Bible classes then because I was studying for a purpose, not just because it was something to do by rote. I asked questions; man, did I ask questions. I wouldn’t let the teachers get away with anything unless they satisfied my doubts.

“There would be days, even weeks, when I’d say to myself, ‘All right, this makes sense. I believe.’ But then something would come up, like the controversy over whether the Sabbath is on Saturday or Sunday, and I’d fall out with them. To me, it didn’t seem to make any difference whether a person observed Saturday or Sunday or Wednesday afternoon as the day of meditation and worship—or even no set day at all—provided he had some sort of principles that guided his life.”

Interrupting, Jim took issue. He could not bear this. “But this is God’s law,” he said. “This is basic to our religion.”

“Your religion,” said Bob. “Let me finish. You asked to hear it all.” He enrolled in an Adventist college with the intention of going, as he put it, “all out.” “I decided to major in theology with a minor in history and philosophy. I wrote my folks and told them, and naturally they were delighted. They right away assumed that I was going to become a minister. Well, I wasn’t sure about that. It was a possibility, but actually I was more interested in exploring religion as deeply as I could. I even studied Greek, with the express purpose of getting fluent enough so I could read the Bible in its original text.”

That study shored up the side of Bob that could not accept blindly the religion of his family. Too many contradictions became apparent. “It was obvious that the differences in the original Greek text were even more glaring than the differences in the King James version. And I related all this to the history I was learning, much of it on the side, from the public library. The papacy, for example. It didn’t really start out in history as an evil thing, Jim. Nor is it a continuing thread of evil. There were bad popes, true, and corrupt ones, and perverted ones. But there were also Renaissance popes who gave us art and music, and there were warrior popes who brought civilization to barbarians.

“By the time I was a senior in college, I had decided against becoming an Adventist minister—if, indeed, I had ever had that real desire. But I was still undecided about the church itself—whether I could, in all honesty, remain a member. I was racked with indecision. I literally stayed awake nights, going nuts with unanswered questions. So even though I had ruled out the ministry, I took a job teaching at an Adventist college. I stayed there two years, right amidst them, listening to them, watching them, talking to them. I even became an elder and you know that’s no easily achieved position in the church. Didn’t smoke, didn’t drink, didn’t dance, didn’t cuss, didn’t go to the movies. I did absolutely everything they demanded, but it simply did not work for me. I had always imagined college to be a place where ideas were discussed, issues were debated, where you could stretch your imagination. But at this college, high intentioned as it was, I became a prisoner again. You can’t enchain a mind, Jim. I can’t live inside walls. I’ve got to ask questions. I’ve got to stimulate myself.”

Jim pondered this. He seemed absorbed by the story, even though he often shook his head in disbelief at what Bob was saying.

“And so you dropped out?” Jim asked.

Bob nodded. “I wrote a very formal letter to the church headquarters asking that they remove my name from their rolls. It was deliberate. I didn’t want to just drift away, like some members do. And I never even got a reply from them! I didn’t have the heart to tell my folks about the letter, but somehow they heard. I knew this because our relationship suddenly turned cold. We didn’t get back together again until Linda appeared in my life.”

And that, thought Bob as he watched Jim digest the biography, is the first time I ever put all the pieces of my life together for anyone, even myself. He hoped he had been convincing, for he was a careful man and he wanted his actions understood, if not accepted. Often he had prepared himself to explain his beliefs at a family gathering, but in confrontation with the thick and towering fortress of God that surrounded their lives, he fell back to pleasantries. He could not cross their threshold with his soul exposed.

Now Bob waited for a response from Jim. He felt he was due one. But none came for several moments, long moments with nothing to intrude on the vast silence around them. Finally, softly, Jim spoke.

“Do you believe in God?” he asked.

The bottom line, thought Bob. I could answer a thousand questions, and he asks the one for which I do not yet have an answer.

“I don’t know,” Bob said simply.

“You don’t know?” Jim was incredulous.

“I’ve thought about it out here. I’ll admit that. But all I can conclude is that I neither believe in God nor disbelieve. Can we let it go at that?”

“I feel a little sorry for you,” said Jim, not unkindly. He moved to climb through the hole and go topside.

Bob threw out his hand in urgent need. “But didn’t you ever waver?” he demanded. “Weren’t there ever any private moments when you asked yourself some of the questions I did?”

“No.” Jim firmly shook his head. “Oh, maybe at the Academy there were some difficult times. The rules did seem hard. But I was just a kid struggling against discipline. I never questioned what was taught to me. I certainly never questioned the existence of God.”

Bob dismissed the subject, silently pronouncing its benediction. If they did not know and respect one another now, they never would.

The afternoon free period had been lengthened to two hours by mutual consent. Usually Bob carved or napped or tried to remember the plots of novels he had read. Whatever, he remained quiet on his bed, trying to ration his strength as carefully as the water in the next-to-last jug tied beside him.

But Jim grew restless in the long afternoons, and, more often than not, lay quietly for only a few moments before bolting up through the hole and to the outdoors, where he sat or watched the schools of silverfish or paddled about in his scuba suit.

On the day after Bob’s long explanation of himself, Jim dressed in his scuba suit. Bob frowned. “I don’t think you should do that,” he cautioned. “It wastes energy.”

“Exercise is supposed to be good for you.”

“Not when you’re eating three teaspoons of food a day and drinking half a cup of water.”

Not answering, Jim went through the hole. Presently Bob heard him drop into the water, calm after the previous day’s rain. The one precaution he took was to tie a rope as safety link between himself and the Triton.

An hour dragged by. Drowsing, Bob heard Jim cry out. Excitedly.

“Bob!”

He reared quickly and shoved his head through the hole.

Five ships were coming directly at them. A fishing fleet. One mother canning boat and four children flocked about her. If these did not find the Triton, thought Bob, then nothing ever would.