One for the Gods (The Peter & Charlie Trilogy) (22 page)

Peter flashed him a dazzling smile. “You sure know how to turn a fella’s head.”

Charlie’s arm was around his shoulder once again as they went down to dinner. After they had eaten, and drunk two bottles of wine, Charlie slumped over the table in mock collapse. He pulled himself up with a smile.

“I’m really feeling the let-down. It’s probably not even nine yet, but I think I’m going to have to go to bed.”

“You’ve had only three hours sleep since yesterday morning. That’s—my God, it’s over thirty-six hours. I’m dead too.”

“OK, mate. Let’s see if I can get out of this chair.” The brooding look that had become familiar to Peter in the last week returned unexpectedly and dismayingly to Charlie’s eyes. “That’s what you are, isn’t it? My mate?” he asked with curious intensity. “I’ll say.

“I’m counting on you. Especially in the next few days. I’ll never trust Jack after last night. I want you to learn how to handle the boat as well as I do. The hell with watches. I want us to stay on the wheel as much as possible. We can sleep together in the cockpit and spell each other. We’ll give the passengers a hell of a cruise.”

Peter didn’t understand why he laid such stress on it, but he felt a thrill of response. They were in league together. A whole new dimension in their relationship was opening up before them.

They climbed up to their room and threw off their clothes and fell into bed. Peter rolled over on his side and Charlie put his arms around him and pulled him close until they fitted together like pieces in a puzzle, Peter’s back to Charlie’s front. Peter wriggled his hips back until Charlie’s powerful, inert sex was pressed against his buttocks.

“I’m asleep already, my baby,” Charlie murmured.

“My Charlie. Darling. Dearest. Me too.’ They slept, too exhausted to profit further from their night of privacy.

At a conference the next morning, during which Jack seemed to have recovered his aplomb, it was agreed to spend a quiet day while some necessary repairs were made below to locker fastenings and other odds and ends and leave again in the evening. Bonifacio was at the southern tip of the island if they needed a port of refuge; otherwise, they would sail between Corsica and Sardinia and take an easterly course for Capri. When these details were settled, Charlie stood at the rail and studied the sky. Martha moved in close beside him.

“What about those clouds?” she asked. “What do they mean?”

There was a bank of fluffy, white clouds low in the west. Charlie chuckled. “I haven’t the slightest idea. They’re very pretty.”

“Aren’t you really ever frightened? Not even last night? I mean, the night before?”

“Good God, I was scared out of my wits. But there’s always the law of averages. That won’t happen to us again.”

Their hands brushed against each other at their sides. She held his and entwined his fingers in hers. “I really wouldn’t go on if it weren’t for you and Peter. I don’t understand it, but you make the boat feel much safer than it ever has before.”

“I’m glad.” He gave her hand a squeeze and drew his away. “You’ll see. It’s going to be great.”

“Maybe you can make it seem that way. You don’t know how much I hate it. It’s Jack’s toy. Now that we’ve committed so much money to it and rearranged our lives around it, I don’t see how I’m ever going to get away.”

“It sounds like a problem.”

“It is, but probably not a very interesting one. It may explain why it means so much to me to be with two people who seem to enjoy everything they do together. It must be wonderful to have a friendship like that.”

“It is.” Was she trying to pump him? He didn’t think so. She spoke straightforwardly and seemed to choose her words to say exactly what she meant. “I certainly want you to enjoy it all with us,” Charlie said. “I can’t do anything about the weather but I promise not to go out if it looks at all tricky. How’s that? Just let me know if there’s anything we can do to make it better for you.”

She looked at him with clear blue eyes in which the light of adoration still shone. “You’re a very nice man.” She put her hand briefly on his arm and moved away.

Even Charlie felt little tremors of apprehension around his heart as they made preparations to weigh anchor that evening. It was too beautiful; he would never again trust the Mediterranean’s smiling face.

The night turned out as perfect as he had hoped the first one would be, with just enough favorable breeze to keep them moving. Jack went to bed soon after they were out of port, having consumed his usual quantity of pre-dinner martinis. Martha sat on in the cockpit for a while, alone on a bench, while Peter and Charlie shared the seat behind the wheel. Charlie’s big, square hand was planted firmly on Peter’s body. As much as he loved it, Peter continued to wonder about it. He was wearing a black sweater and the hand was very visible even in the dark. It didn’t do anything much, just moved about on his chest and sometimes massaged his neck and shoulders. Peter was in charge of the wheel and Charlie pointed out falling stars to Martha with his free hand. When she left them, he put both hands on Peter, moved him forward slightly, got his leg up on the cushion again and pulled him close. Peter briefly dropped his head back against Charlie’s.

“Oh, God, hold me like this always,” he murmured. He took a hand off the wheel and felt behind him for the bulky bunched up sex. “Am I allowed to unfasten your pants?”

“Better not, baby. It’s too risky. Besides, you’re supposed to be concentrating on sailing.”

“Teacher’s being a big help.”

Charlie ran his hands over Peter’s thighs and covered his crotch with them and pulled him closer. “That makes two of us. Let’s just stay like this. It feels good.”

“Good? It’s my idea of heaven. The sky and the sound we make moving through the water and the breeze and you holding me. Like you said, peaceful and thrilling. I’m so damn happy I want to cry.”

As the night wore on, Charlie insisted that Peter should get some sleep and he did so, stretched out on the bench beside Charlie, a hand flung out on his knee. When Jack appeared at four, reporting for his watch for the first time, Charlie passed on his navigational information and let him take over. He roused Peter and they both went below. He didn’t intend to stay away long. He was back on deck soon after dawn urging Jack not to waste time by putting in at Bonifacio. Because the weather was fine there was no argument, and they passed through the Strait and headed for Capri more than two hundred miles away.

Normal time was suspended. Their time was governed by the demands of the boat and the rhythm of their alternating watches. They ate ravenously when they were hungry and slept at odd hours when they had no duties to perform. The weather remained fine, so that Martha was smiling and apparently content. The winds were variable and never strong, so they didn’t make very good time. When the wind was against them, Jack plotted a course, proceeding from the compass reading they were able to follow close-hauled and giving them mileage indications when they were to come about. With no preconditioning, Peter had no difficulty following Jack’s method. Charlie, trained to racing tactics based on tacking whenever it was possible to take advantage of the slightest shift in wind, found it confining and couldn’t resist going about, with all its attendant labor of retrimming sheets, when he felt that enough could be gained to justify it. He kept scrupulous hour and mileage notations so that Jack couldn’t complain. The latter prided himself on being able to point out their exact position on his beautifully kept charts. Peter’s long runs and Charlie’s zig-zags showed up like something from a Madison Avenue product-performance report.

Martha and Charlie and Peter spent the days in the briefest swimming costumes, turning a deep, ruddy mahogany. Martha’s body was lovely, all curves and smooth, glowing skin. During particularly calm hours, Charlie took to sketching her as she lay about the deck. The bits of bikini spoiled the line; he wished he could do her without them. Her little-girl adoration had perhaps acquired an element of desire; he didn’t know for sure. He frequently caught her eyes on his body. She would look up and meet his eyes unwaveringly, a little smile on her lips. It was so open and relaxed that it didn’t bother him. After all, he looked at her body a lot too, without wanting it. Whatever the nature of her feeling for him, it made her an admirable companion. She laughed at his jokes. She took his side in any discussion. She didn’t make the mistake of trying to monopolize his attention. She included Peter in their conversations. Only Jack led a life slightly apart. He spent a lot of time with his charts. He slept more than the rest of them. Once, he came up on deck in his frayed shorts and did something very professional-looking with his sextant. Charlie supposed it was good that at least one of them cared where they were.

When Charlie turned over the wheel to Jack early on the third morning, he had begun to spot lights ahead of them, whether land or boats he couldn’t tell. He came back on deck a few hours later and found that they were sailing among islands. Jack was looking pleased with himself.

“Right where you expected them to be?” Charlie asked amiably.

“Yep. That one up there is Ischia. Capri’s ahead of us somewhere. We should be in by midafternoon.”

Jack’s prediction proved reasonably accurate. They were tied up and shipshape in the crowded port of Capri by drink time. The fringes of the main town were visible far above them. Peter and Charlie had packed a bag with their finest summer finery and were eager to be off. Neither of them had been to Capri before. They had a duty drink with the Kingsleys and rose to go.

“You’re going up to town?” Jack asked.

“Of course.”

“It must be nice to be a tourist.”

“Aren’t you going?”

“Somebody has to watch the boat. I understand the people here will strip you down to your spars if you give them the chance.”

“Are you suggesting we should take turns or something?” Charlie demanded.

“No, no, no. We agreed you’d go ashore in the evening. Strictly speaking, we agreed you’d stay in hotels at night. It might be reasonable for us to go up and have dinner and let you go up later.”

Charlie wondered if he had a point, but Martha relieved him of a decision.

“No, darling,” she said soothingly to Jack. “Don’t let’s bother this evening. As I remember, it’s terribly crowded and touristy. We might have a look around in the morning if the boys come back early enough.” She looked at Charlie and he gave her a gratified smile.

“Fine. We’ll be back by nine if that’s all right.”

They left it at that and Peter and Charlie found a taxi and went looping up the steep road to town.

“I was worried there for a minute,” Peter said. “I guess he could have made a case.”

“Balls. There’s harbor police on duty. He was just trying it on to see how we would take it. Bully for good old Martha.”

“It helps for her to be in love with you.”

“You think she is?”

“Think it? She’s obviously mad for you. It takes one to know one. I know exactly how she feels.”

Charlie put his hand on his knee and they laughed together. They were deposited at a big square on the edge of a cliff. A street led off it into what was apparently the town. They were barely out of the taxi before a horde of small boys in uniforms bearing the names of hotels swarmed over them, shouting and snatching at their suitcase. They laughed as they tried to ward off the attack.

“Do we have any idea what hotel we want to go to?” Charlie asked.

“Let them fight it out. The winner gets us.”

The driver of the taxi was gesticulating at them and shouting something. Charlie gave him a dollar. The driver did a conjuring trick with it and continued to shout and gesticulate. As if he had been waiting for them, Guy de Sainval appeared before them. With a few authoritative words, he stilled the din. He looked at them and smiled.

“The fates favor us. I’ve never seen anything so beautiful in my life. What have you done to yourselves?” He turned to Peter. “I obviously haven’t been paying enough attention to you. You’re superb.”

They pumped his hand and greeted him as if he were a long-lost friend. They both felt that they hadn’t seen him for weeks. “What are you doing here?” they asked in unison.

“Harry didn’t come back. My friends thought I should console myself. I came yesterday and may stay the rest of my life. Wait till you see the beauties. One understands poor old Tiberius so well. But you two? Speaking of gods, why aren’t you in Greece?”

“We’re getting there. We’ve only been out less than a week.”

“Tell us what hotel we should stay at,” Peter said.

Guy looked at him for a moment, cocking his aristocratic bird’s face from side to side. “Divine words issuing from a divine head. Why not stay at mine? At least, I’ll have you under the same roof. That’s a start.” He surveyed the jostling boys and snapped his fingers at one who apparently had the right label. He sprang forward and seized the bag from Charlie and raced off with it as if he were afraid the others might wrestle it from him. Guy clapped his hands together and pointed them at Charlie. “How extraordinary. I was talking about you last night with an old friend of yours. Heaven knows how your name came up. I won’t say more, except that you’ve apparently always had impeccable taste.”

“What are you talking about?”

“One of the beauties, my dear. Perhaps
the
beauty. I’m speaking of resident fauna, of course. I don’t include exotica like you. Apollo rising from the sea. It’s distracting to be confronted by two of you, especially since Apollo never went near the sea, as far as I know. That was that other one. That dreadful Poseidon.”