All The King's Horses: A Tale Of Eternal Love (3 page)

CHAPTER THREE

“Alright, Mr. Matthews, I understand. Thanks for your custom in the past, and I hope next time you’re in the Bay of Islands the weather will be better for you.” Kent slipped the phone into his pocket and silently cursed his rotten luck. Steven Matthews was one of his best clients. He had been coming to the bay of Islands and hiring Kent to take him fishing for the past four years. Normally he would arrive for two weeks at the beginning of summer and Kent would take him out every day. Steven was a fanatical fisherman, but for some reason he had decided to turn up at the end of winter this time, and had been hit by the terrible winter. The upshot of it was he had just phoned Kent to inform him he was cancelling his bookings and heading off to the Gold Coast to do his fishing.

Kent fought hard to suppress his rising panic. What was he going to do now? He had been counting on that money to cover his mortgage payments. The bank was not going to be understanding about this. They weren’t known for their patience with mortgage defaulters.

His survival instinct went into overdrive. There was no way he was going to be able to replace this client at such short notice, especially at this time of the year. The bank wasn’t going to wait for their money. What was there that he could do?

If he was to give up the house and live on the boat that would save him three hundred and fifty dollars in rent each week. That might be enough to bail him out of trouble in the short term. But it was only a band aid approach to the problem at best. He needed charters to pick up soon or he was sunk, literally.

He stared solemnly out the window at the driving rain, its relentless pummeling of the coast continuing unabated. If only he had some alternative work he could do on days like this to keep some money coming in. Running a hand through his dark hair he uttered a despondent sigh. Why did life have to be so tough? It wasn’t like he wanted to be rich either. All he wanted out of life was to be able to pay his boat off, and maybe one day meet a nice lady settle down and have a couple of kids. It wasn’t much to ask really.

He would give his landlord notice tomorrow. Two weeks should be enough time to get the boat sorted for him to shift on to, and with spring just around the corner then surely business would pick up.

The phone rang again. “Kent here…”

“Kent…Bob Thomas here. I live opposite the marina. We met at the swordfish club prize giving a few months back.”

“Yeah, I remember you, Bob.”

“Look…I’ve got some bad news for you I’m afraid.”

A tight knot suddenly developed in the pit of Kent’s stomach. “Okay,” he said tentatively, “what kind of bad news?”

“I’ve just been looking out my window which overlooks the marina and noticed some of the boats have slipped their moorings.”

Kent knew what he was going to say next before he had even opened his mouth to say it, and his heart sank down to join that knot in his stomach.

“I’m afraid one of them is your boat, the Bonnie Lass.”

Kent held his breath. “Is there much damage?”

“Can’t tell from here, Kent, but she’s been banging up against a few others so my guess is there’ll be some.”

Kent exhaled slowly. “Thanks for letting me know, Bob, I really appreciate it.”

“Not a problem. And hey, if you need a hand getting her back onto her mooring I’m happy to give you a hand.”

“I’ll take you up on that offer, Bob. What’s say I meet you down at the marina in twenty minutes?”

When Kent pulled up at the marina the wind and rain was still lashing the coast with a violence he hadn’t seen in years. Parking the car he then spilled out into the storm.

She’s drifted in a bit closer,” Bob yelled out as Kent walked with head down and body leaning into the wind to join him on the jetty. “If we can get a line out to her I reckon we’ll be able to get her back on her mooring.”

Kent nodded. Getting a line to her was what they needed to do alright, but with the sea bucking and kicking up a fuss the way it was it was going to take a small miracle to pull it off.

“Got any ideas on how we might get a line to her?” Kent asked hopefully.

“I’ve got a decent sized grappling hook with me so I figured we might be able to snag the guard rails on her.”

“Might work,” Kent conceded. “If we can pull her in close enough I might be able to get on board and start the engine. That’ll make it easier to get her back on the mooring.”

Bob hooked the guard rail on his fourth attempt, and the pair used all their combined strength to pull the Bonnie Lass in closer and wrap the rope securely around a jetty pile.

“The winds blowing her in the right direction to keep the rope tight,” Bob noted. “She’s going to bang into that mooring pile…yep, she has. Hopefully she’ll stay there long enough for you to get to her.”

Kent dragged the dinghy down the slipway and with Bob’s help managed to launch off into the foaming melee. Grabbing hold of the taut rope he pulled himself hand over hand gradually working the dinghy closer to the Bonnie Lass.

A larger than normal swell swept in and lifting the small craft up wrenched his hands free of the rope, sending him spinning wildly off into the swirling cauldron. He could just hear Bob shouting something from back on the jetty but had no idea what it was.

Up he went, riding high on the crest of a swell, the Bonnie Lass coming into sight about ten yards away. Then with stomach sickening force he was thrust violently down into a watery trough, everything hidden from view by the walls of water that dwarfed him.

Suddenly, he was riding high again, and right beside him was the Bonnie Lass. With a wood splintering crunch he was smashed into her hull and had only a splint second to lunge for the guard rail before the dinghy disappeared from beneath him.

With every ounce of his strength he hauled himself over the guard rail and lay wet and panting on the deck of the boat.

Now, if only he could get the old girl started up he would have a fighting chance at saving her.

She fired up on the third attempt, and Kent was glad to see Bob had the foresight to cut the rope. Edging the Bonnie Lass clear of the mooring pile he waited for the present swell to pass over before he gunned the throttle and headed for his mooring.

Too late he saw it. A submerged yacht lay right in his path. Hauling the wheel hard to port he did his best to pass to the left of it but was rewarded with a sickening crunch.

The mast of the stricken yacht had passed underneath the Bonnie lasses hull, and he knew there had to be damage this time. He just prayed she would stay afloat long enough to make it to his mooring.

He was grateful the mooring was on the side of the jetty protected from the worst of the storm. What must have happened was one of the other boats came loose and slammed into the Bonnie Lass knocking her off the mooring. The swell then swept her around to the wilder side of the jetty. It was typical that it would be his boat that was affected. Some wealthy businessman no doubt owned the launch or yacht that had come free. Some playboy who only travelled up from Auckland once in a blue moon to go for a jaunt on his luxury vessel, disappearing back to where he had come from without a second thought as to how well he had secured his craft.

It made Kent furious to think he might lose the Bonnie Lass because of the stupidity of some rich landlubber. His livelihood depended upon this boat being seaworthy. It was nothing to the other fellow to repair or even replace his boat if something were to happen to it. Money was no problem to him. He probably had comprehensive insurance anyway. But what was Kent going to do? If the Bonnie Lass was unsalvageable he was staring bankruptcy right in its ugly face.

The next swell fortuitously swirled him around the jetty to the calmer water on the other side. Gunning the throttle he shot forward before the next swell reached him and quickly killing the engine hauled on the wheel to bring the boat side on to the mooring.

The swell picked the Bonnie Lass up and dumped her neatly between the mooring posts. This was his big chance and he was determined not to blow it. If he could pull this off he might just be in with a chance to save her.

Quickly fastening a rope from the bow to the first post he hung on tight as the wind swung the Bonnie Lass back off the mooring. This was certainly seat of your pants stuff, and now Kent could do nothing but wait patiently in hope that the receding tide would suck him back onto it again.

This time luck was on his side, and as the old girl was dragged back onto the mooring he managed to throw a loop over the other pole and securely fasten it to the stern.

Only now did he allow himself the luxury of taking stock of the situation. She was taking on water down below. Not bad enough that she would sink any time soon, but bad enough that he was going to have to leave the bilge pump running.

She was holed above the water line too, where she had been banging into other boats, and there was also some major damage to the bow. All in all it was going to cost him a pretty penny, because the insurance wouldn’t cover it all, he had set the excess way too high, counting on something like this never happening. He could kick himself for it now, but when all was said and done he had made the decision he thought was for the best at the time.

Bob had fastened a line to the jetty and was hollering something to him, and as Kent figured the plan was to catch the other end of the rope he held loft he gave him the thumbs up.

Snaking through the air and clearing the guard rail the rope landed neatly at Kent’s feet. Snatching it up he wasted no time in securing it to the mooring post. It had been a while since he had done the boy scout thing, and never in a storm like this, but if he was to get back to the jetty then the rope was his only option.

He started out with trepidation, the savage wind ripping at his body and swinging him to and fro as he went hand over hand towards the jetty. If his hands slipped he was a goner. The swell would dash him mercilessly against the jetty piles until there would be nothing left but a broken and bleeding pulp.

The rain drove cuttingly into his already sodden and bruised body, its icy drops like needle pricks on his bare arms and face. Every so often the salt spray would sting his eyes, and he had to fight the temptation to let a hand go of the rope to wipe them.

He was five yards from his destination and he could see Bob at the edge of the jetty, arms outstretched, ready to pull him to safety. Then he was there, lying spluttering and cold on the wet planks, glad that the ordeal was over.

“Let’s get you up to the house and warmed up,” Bob was saying, as he helped him to his feet.

Kent complied, and was soon sitting at Bob’s kitchen table with dry clothes on and a steaming cup of coffee in his hand.

“Did you manage to get a good look at the damage?”

Kent nodded. “Small tear in the hull that’s taking on water, and a larger hole above the water line,” he said, as he warmed his hands on the coffee cup. “There’s bound to be other damage as well but I just didn’t have the time to check it over properly.”

“You did well to get her back on her mooring. That was a nifty maneuver you pulled off.”

“Was luck more than anything else,” Kent admitted. “The swell pretty much pushed me back onto it.”

“All the same, you did extremely well considering the conditions. There’s going to be many a boat lost when this storm finally blows over.”

Kent had no doubt about that. There were more than a few mooring that had been emptied of their boat, the stricken craft sucked out to sea only to be smashed on a reef or driven back and broken up on some rocky shore.

“Thanks for everything you’ve done for me, Bob, Kent said tiredly, looking over the top of his coffee cup at his companion. “If you hadn’t phoned me when you did and given me a hand I’d never have saved the Bonnie Lass. I’ll forever be grateful to you.”

“Don’t mention it. I’ve been in the same position myself a few times in the past. Thankfully there was always someone on hand to help me out to.”

“Might be the end of the road for me anyway,” Kent said morosely. “I’m kinda light on the insurance end of things I’m afraid. I wasn’t counting on something like this happening you see. So I may have to sell her to someone who has more money than I have to fix her up.”

“Oh, that’s too bad,” Bob commiserated. “When this storm’s over I’d be happy to look the Bonnie Lass over for you. I’m a boat builder by trade, so I can give you a fair idea of what it’ll cost to repair her.”

“I’d appreciate that, Bob.” Kent took a sip of his coffee. “Hopefully it’ll all blow over by tomorrow.”

♥

Next morning both men were down at the boat before noon. The storm from the day before had gone, but the havoc it had left in its wake sure hadn’t.

“Looks like a graveyard out there,” Bob commented wryly, as they stood on the jetty and surveyed the half submerged yachts’ and launches’, and various pieces of timber and paraphernalia floating around the marina.

“It’s certainly an insurance assessors nightmare,” Kent agreed. “The salvagers will have a field day though.”

They made their way out to the Bonnie Lass, and Kent stayed on them deck gazing nervously out to sea as Bob made his assessment.

“What do you make of her?” he asked, when Bob finally came topside.