Castle Dreams

Twenty-one Alecto Wharf

She was a little schooner, two-masted, patched sails and all, bulky and awkward as the worst of them. She didn’t sail well to windward, he was told. Best to wait for a beam or following wind; but the wind didn’t ordinarily oblige in the environs of Port of Dreams. He wouldn’t wait, being too eager to get under way. He’d take her out on the tide.

The sky was dark, as it always was. But in the “morning hours” there was sometimes a sense that the dark roof had lifted. This was such a morning. The first morning of his eternity.

He stood astride the foredeck. He was the skipper. He even had a crew, four deckhands to pull the jib sheets and lash the boom and do the complete nautical thing.

“Do the complete nautical thing,” he commanded.

“Aye, aye, sir.” The one in front saluted with two fingers and turned to the crew.

“You heard ’im!”

They fanned out to do their various appointed tasks. They busied themselves with jib tack, mainsail lashing, shrouds and gaff jaws; with jib hanks and jib halyard and mainsail halyard; with burgee, peak, sail battens and pockets; with leech boom mainsheet and lifting rudder; tiller, extension, fairlead, and jib sheets; daggerboard, thwart, gooseneck, and tack; kicking strap, luff, mooring cleats, and pushpit.

“Bend on the sails!”

“Clip jib hanks on the forestay!”

“Attach the halyards!”

“Hoist the mainsail!”

“Tighten the boom vang!”

“The boomerang?”

“No, you pinhead. The boom vang!”

“Oh.”

He watched appreciatively. They were a good crew. They were his, crew. They were charging him a mint.

But they were worth it (they had told him). Boom vangs aside, they knew their mooring cleats from their cockpits, their foresail winches from their backstays, their steering compasses from their halyard winch and cleats. And, boy, did they know from tack downhaul, kicking strap, mainsheet, clew outhaul, topping lift, boom, tack, reefing points, leech, spreader, foresail hanks, shrouds, inner forestay, stanchion, toe rail, and fin keel![22] These guys, like, knew all that stuff.…

A wind was rising, and the rivers flowed.…

(There was more than one river emptying into the Bay of Desires; in fact, the Bay was the confluence of no less than six rivers, making it the biggest fresh-water estuary in the afterworld. Rather, in this particular afterworld.)

The waters of the bay churned and boiled. The land fell away behind them. The roof of the sky lifted to a milky crepuscular darkness. Choppy waves thumped against the hull, and freshwater spray blessed their faces. They sailed on a close reach to the wind.

“We’re under way, sir!”

“I noticed. Course, due west. Into the sun. Which there isn’t.”

“I noticed, sir.”

“I’ll brook no impertinence!”

“Sorry, sir.”

“Or it’s the crow’s nest for you, swab.”

“Sir, we have no crow’s nest. This is a yacht, more or less.”

“Well, see that you keep a respectful tongue in your head, or I’ll clap you in irons and throw you in the brig.”

“We have no brig, sir.”

“Oh, shut up. Get below and brew me some coffee.”

The shipyards boasted all manner of sailing craft. Many were of ancient design. There were barks and barges, galleys and longboats; but he had preferred a classic vessel from the zenith of the epoch of sail — humble as she was an example.

“Gods! I need a name for this ship.”

He’d quite forgotten.

“The Perilous will be her name,” he announced to the crew.

He had no idea why he’d chosen it.

“Good name, sir. Uh … though not exactly felicitous. Sailors are a suspicious lot. Could be trouble with the crew.”

“Screw ’em if they can’t take a joke.”

“Aye, sir. Sir, did you get up on the wrong side of the hammock this morning?”

“Something’s wrong with this whole deal. It’s wearing thin.”

“What’s wearing thin, sir?”

“This afterlife. It’s silly. For another thing, I don’t belong here.”

“You don’t, sir? Where do you belong?”

“In another universe. This one … well, it —”

“It sucks, sir. Yes, many of the departed say that.”

“You agree?”

“Well, sir, it’s just a job to me. I’m not mortal, so I really don’t know what death is. I should think it’d be a bit of nasty business, sir. Not pleasant, I assume.”

“It could suck a bowling ball through fifty feet of garden hose.”

“Striking image, sir.”

“Thank you. But something tells me that I just don’t belong in this cosmos. Something’s wrong. Something’s out of whack.”

“Couldn’t help you, sir.”

“No, I guess you couldn’t. Where’s that coffee, by the way?”

“Steward’s coming with it, sir.”

“I smell salt!”

“There she lies, sir, dead ahead. The open sea.”

“The Sea of Oblivion!”

The skipper took deep gulps of salt air. Above, a lone gull circled.

Or was it an albatross?

“What’s out there?”

“We’ll soon find out, sir.”

“I cannot rest from travel; I will drink life to the lees.”

“This isn’t life, sir.”

“Be quiet for a minute. All times I have enjoyed greatly, have suffered greatly, both with those that loved me, and alone; on shore, and when through scudding drifts the rainy Hyades vexed the dim sea.”

“Nicely put, sir.”

“Thanks. I read it in a fortune cookie.”

“Do tell.”

“Where’s that damned coffee, Telemachus?”

“Here it is, sir!”

The steward gave him a steaming cup. He took it and drank. It burned his tongue gratifyingly.

“And may there be no moaning of the bar when I put out to sea.”[23]

Clouds gathered, blotting out the lightening sky. Darkness hovered. They sailed past the last spit of sand that stood between the estuary and the sea. The great foaming waters wailed against it in the darkness.

“So much for the no-moaning thing.”

“Don’t take too much stock in omens, sir.”

“Right.”

The Perilous sailed on into deepest night.