I WOKE on a Sunday morning in late May with such a heightened feeling of well-being that I should have known I could not sustain it through the day. For months, through the winter and now into spring, we had enjoyed a peace so thorough that we could hardly believe it. Nothing whatever had been heard from Denny O’Donnell and Maeve, although Denny was, presumably, still being sought for Donal’s murder, and once Major Primrose and Lord Coolmore had intervened on our behalf, we had gone unmolested by their local friends. The yacht was on schedule and due for launching in a couple of weeks, and she was living up to all our expectations. We would have time to try her extensively at sea before the race to the Azores, as we had planned.
Things had not gone as well in the interim for Derek Thrasher, though. Although charges had not been brought against him and he was, thus, not actually a fugitive from justice, the circumstances of his problems with the public prosecutor made it advantageous for him to stay out of Britain, and he had. I had spent another Rabelaisian weekend in Paris at Easter, and Jane had told me that his enforced absence had caused a number of harassing lawsuits to be filed against him by business competitors, and since he could not be present to answer them, he was faring badly.
Mark and Annie had had another couple of spats, and Annie had pulled her by now accustomed disappearing act for a week or so on each occasion, but all had been made up. Only my relationship with Concepta Lydon did not go well—in fact, was not going at all. She had declined to see me since New Year’s, and when we did meet accidentally she was cool and uncommunicative. She was polite, not even admitting annoyance with me, but she would not enter into a discussion of anything personal. Since I was congenitally a negotiator, this attitude drove me mad. On this Sunday morning Mark and Annie were out for a day sail in Toscana, and I had slept very late. Now, as I showered and shaved, the thought of the situation with Connie began to dissipate my feeling of well-being, and by the time I was dressed it was completely gone. I wanted a showdown, to thrash this business out once and for all. My visits to Jane Berkeley were fun but curiously unsatisfying; they did not displace my yearning to be with Connie. I missed her.
Determined to adopt a direct assault, I drove to Kinsale, intending to beard the lioness in her den, but as I passed the Spaniard, I saw her car parked out front. The pub was filled with Sunday brunchers, most of whom had just fled mass and were now making a joyful noise unto the pint. I saw Connie sitting, alone, at a small table across the room; I headed for her. She did not look up until I had nearly reached her, and then someone else reached her a tiny moment sooner. He was tall and slender and had a shock of carrot-red hair; he sat down next to her, and then I noticed that there were two drinks on the table. I stopped short but too near to change my direction. “Hello, Connie,” I said, as bravely as I could. I had a terrible, hollow sensation.
“Hello, Will.” There was a slight, polite smile; nothing more. “Have you met Terry? Terry, this is Will Lee.”
“How are you?” I stuck out my hand.
“Very well, thanks.” He took it.
I knew immediately that he not only knew who I was but a great deal more about Connie Lydon and me. I had a flash of them curled up before the fireplace in her cottage on long, winter nights, Connie telling him about the American who had treated her so shabbily. I knew, of course, that she must have been seeing other people, but now, confronted with the fact, I was shocked. I felt as though I had just gotten a Dear John letter.
“Are you all right these days?” I asked feebly.
“Very well, thank you.” She paused and took a sip of her drink. “How’s the boat?”
“It’s going well. We launch in a couple of weeks.”
“Good.” She didn’t seem to want to say anything further.
“Nice to have seen you,” I said and turned away. I walked to the bar, found a stool and ordered a pint. I wanted to flee the pub, but I could hardly walk in, say a few words to her and walk directly out. I was trapped there, and I had to make the best of it. I wasn’t doing it very well. I held onto the cool pint with both hands, afraid they would tremble if I removed them. I stared fixedly ahead, but I could still see her reflection in the mirror behind the bar. They chatted amiably. I shrank inside, and the cool lager didn’t seem to help. I felt mildly nauseated. I put my hand to my face and it came away cold and wet. I drank more of the lager. This was my first experience with serious jealousy. I seemed unable to form a coherent thought; my mind was one damp, squishy, emotional sponge; I wrestled to squeeze some rationality from it.
I finally was able to ask myself a question. Why was I so upset? No reasonable answer. This was a girl I had spent some time with—well, all right, a lot of time with—who now preferred to spend her time with someone else. This wasn’t the first time that had happened, wouldn’t be the last. Not a big deal. A bigger deal than I had thought, though, else why were my hands too slippery to hold onto the pint? Was I jealous? Sure. Why? I evaded the question.
Shortly, thank God, they got up and left, passing just behind me, laughing about something. About me? Not only jealous, paranoid. I waited until I heard her car drive away, then paid for my drink and left. I drove back to the cottage numb, stricken. By the time I reached home I was overwhelmingly sleepy, my mind seeming to cry out for unconsciousness. I flopped on the living room sofa and slept.
I was awakened by a familiar noise, a bumping sound, and I did not identify it until I heard Mark curse and Annie laugh. Their voices were ghostly, coming from a distance, and I tried to shake off my grogginess and figure out what was happening. Then I heard the quiet chug of Toscana’s engine, and I knew they were back. The noise was the fiberglass dinghy bumping against the hull of the boat as they picked up the mooring in front of the cottage; it always annoyed Mark to have anything colliding with the shiny topsides of the little yacht. Their voices floated toward me over the water.
They were just dragging the dinghy up on the foreshore when the telephone rang. I struggled to my feet and picked it up.
“Is that you, Will?”
The voice was distant and crackly. English accent. Female. “Jane? Is that you?” I was surprised to hear from her; we didn’t telephone much.
“Yes. Will, there’s a problem with the boat.”
I shook my head, still groggy. “No, there’s no problem here; everything is going great; we’re launching in a couple of weeks.”
“No, you don’t understand. There’s a new problem, something we’ve just found out about.”
“Hang on,” I said. Mark and Annie were just coming up from the river. “Mark, pick up the extension, will you? It’s Jane; she says there’s a problem.”
I heard the click as he picked up the phone on his desk. “How are you, Jane? This is Mark Robinson.”
I realized with some surprise that they’d never met. “Okay, what’s the problem?”
“D.T. is in the midst of a legal battle over a building project in Dublin. I won’t go into detail, because it doesn’t matter what the circumstances are; all that matters is they’re going to try to take the boat.”
“Take the boat? How can they do that?”
“They’ve somehow identified it as an asset of D’s, and I’ve just learned that a solicitor is flying from London to Cork tomorrow morning to meet with a Cork solicitor who is going to file to attach the boat. It’s just harassment, really. This whole business is nothing to do with the boat.”
Mark spoke up. “Well, can they do it? Can’t we fight it some way? Get a solicitor of our own?”
“Of course, but I’m told the likelihood is that they’ll ask that the boat be impounded by the court pending settlement of the suit, and that could take months. And no work could be done on it in the meantime.”
“So what should we do?” Mark asked. “Is there anything at all we can do?”
“The only thing you can do is to get the boat out of Ireland before court convenes tomorrow morning; preferably to the Channel Islands. There’s apparently a very good yard in Jersey. The process could be stalled long enough there to let you finish the boat.”
I covered the receiver and called out to Mark. “Jesus, would she be seaworthy enough for that?”
“Not a hope,” he called back. His voice came on the line again. “Jane, what are our chances of hanging onto the boat long enough to finish her if we appear in court tomorrow and try to make our case?”
“The best advice I can get is that you’d win in the long run and lose now; but if you can’t get the boat out of the country, I guess there’s no other choice.”
All three of us were silent for a moment. Finally, Mark spoke. “Jane, we’re going to have to hang up now and see what we can do. We’ll call you tomorrow and let you know; are you in Paris?”
“Mark, it would be better if I didn’t know anything. If I know, they might make a case that D. knows. Do you understand?”
“I understand,” Mark replied.
“All I can do is wish you luck, then.”
We hung up, and I heard Mark dialing in the other room. I joined him. He waited impatiently for the phone to ring, then hung up. “No answer.”
“Who are you calling?”
“Finbar.”
“Try the yacht club.”
Mark hurriedly dialed the Royal Cork. Finbar was found.
“Listen, Finbar, I can’t explain right now, but I need to meet you at the boatyard. Can you go over there right now? Good. Is Harry with you? Good, bring him, too. No, none of the other lads, just Harry. Will and I will meet you there as soon as possible.” He hung up and began flipping quickly through his address book while I watched dumbly. He dialed another number. I went and picked up the other phone.
“Is that Mr. Mulcahy?”
“Yes.”
“This is Mark Robinson, sir; we’ve met at the yacht club a couple of times.”
“Yes, Captain Robinson, what can I do for you?”
Mark quickly explained what was to happen the following morning.
“Does this Mr. Thrasher, in fact, own the boat?”
“That won’t be relevant if you will be able to do as I ask tomorrow morning in court.”
“What is that, Captain Robinson?”
“I would like you to simply appear representing me and say that you have been given to understand that the yacht has left the Republic of Ireland.”
There was a pause at the other end of the line. “Has the yacht, in fact, left the country?”
“It is my intention to move her tonight.”
“I understood you would not be ready to launch until next month. Does the yacht even have a “mast in her?”
“She has an engine, Mr. Mulcahy.”
“I won’t presume to advise you on seamanship, Captain Robinson, but you must understand my position as a solicitor and an officer of the court. If I tell a judge that the yacht has left the country, then I must be able to tell him that truthfully, to my best knowledge.”
“I understand that, Mr. Mulcahy; I promise you that the yacht will leave the country tonight, and that you will be able to tell the court that, in good conscience. If, for any reason, she does not leave the country, I will telephone you before ten o’clock tomorrow morning. You may … in fact, I suggest that you visit Cork Harbour Boatyard tomorrow morning and see for yourself that the yacht has gone.”
“I think that would be a good idea, Captain Robinson. All right, I will follow your instructions.”
“Thank you, sir. And if you can convince the judge that the yacht has gone, can you stop the opposition attaching it?”
“The judge will not likely grant an attachment of property he has reason to believe is not in his jurisdiction.”
They hung up, and Mark came into the living room, tossing my foul weather gear at me. “You’ll be needing this, Willie. The wind’s getting up out there.”
I could hear rain starting to spatter down. “Mark,” I said, struggling into my parka, “you said a few minutes ago that the boat wasn’t seaworthy, and now you’re talking about taking her to the Channel Islands, with the wind getting up?”
“We can’t get her to the Channel Islands, Willie,” he said, grinning at me and heading for the door, “but we can get her out of the country, and then we can make her disappear.”
I followed him at a trot, wondering what the hell I was getting into, now.