Coincidence - Alan May [20]
In mid-August, Phillip flew to Puntarenas and checked into a resort hotel close to the harbor. Looking out his third-floor window, he could see the Two Wise rocking up and down in the water. For seven days he pretty much stayed in his room, binoculars pressed to his eyes, observing activity around the boat.
On the seventh day, a Friday, an American family arrived around noontime. Phillip put on his pony-tailed cap and shades and headed down to the harbor. He always found it easy to strike up a conversation with a boat owner. Most of them enjoyed nothing more than discussing the ins and outs of their crafts with anyone who showed an interest, especially someone with a little knowledge of sailing. And that Phillip had plenty of.
He’d grown up around boats in Miami, and had said from the time he was five years old that he was going to be a sailor. As soon as he was old enough to take the test, he had gotten his captain’s license. He had met Stefano and Juan in Miami. All three had worked at marinas—Phillip to earn enough extra money to buy a Sailfish, and Stefano and Juan to help support their mother and sisters. They had started with grunt work on boats and around the docks, then had learned enough of the basics of sailing to shuttle boats from one dock to another as required.
Phillip had gone to college, earned a business degree, and moved on to an entry-level position with a firm in Chicago, but had continued to keep in touch with Stefano. When Stefano had called one raw February morning to ask if he’d be interested in helping him take a boat to the Virgin Islands, Phillip knew Stefano didn’t have a pleasure trip in mind. He was rattled by the idea; he had never done anything like this in his life. He was so uncomfortable with the idea of what he knew was behind the request—a drug run—that he’d simply decided to ask no questions.
How complicit could he be, really, as long as he surmised and wasn’t absolutely sure? And Stefano had offered an almost unimaginable sum of money for a few days of doing what he loved most, sailing—and to the Virgin Islands in the middle of winter at that. In the end, he called in sick. He told his boss he had the flu and was on his way.
He’d done a number of similar jobs over the years, usually with Stefano and Juan, occasionally with someone else he’d met on a run. After a while, he’d become comfortable enough with what they were doing to talk about it freely—and very comfortable indeed with the lifestyle it afforded him.
As Phillip had expected, the American was eager to show off his boat. When Phillip told him he was considering buying a similar one he’d seen in Fort Lauderdale, the man invited him to come aboard so he could see another version of the Real Ship 65.
“These are great boats, well built,” he told Phillip. “My baby here’s three years old, but they’re virtually identical. All Real Ships are equipped pretty much the same way.”
That was exactly what Phillip had hoped.
“They look exactly the same to me,” Phillip said as he looked around. “When we did the sea trial in Fort Lauderdale, the water was flat; how does she take the waves?”
“Ah, she’s a regular dolphin. There’s enough of a flare on the bow to throw spray away from the boat so she stays pretty dry, too.”
“Y’know, the anchor system was the one thing I didn’t get to see down in Florida. Does the windlass pull the anchor up okay?”
“Oh, yeah, absolutely. You can control it either from the pilothouse or with a deck button at the bow. It’s pretty heavy; there’s something like two hundred and fifty feet of anchor chain, but the windlass pulls it up just fine.”
“How about fuel? Diesel pretty easy to come by down here?”
“Well, you have to plan carefully on that score. Only places I know you can get it are here and a couple of marinas on the west coast of Costa Rica. Thirty-five hundred gallons will take you a long way, but the last thing I do after a holiday