Free The New Madrid Run by Michael Reisig Page B

tangible. He did, however, begin to show interest in the conversation, and when dinner was over, he lay down beside Ra on the floor. His tentative strokes to the animal’s flanks were answered by a huge, sticky tongue licking his fingers—an exchange that appeared to please both participants.
    The sensei retrieved his swords from behind his bunk and performed his ritual cleaning. He brought the cloth back and forth across each blade and spoke, for the first time, of his personal life in Japan. The boy and Carlos, fascinated by the swords, listened intently as the modern-day Samurai told of his school, his home, and, with a touch of sadness, his family. He had left a wife, two sons, and three grandchildren in Japan, hoping to return to them by late summer.
    “Now,” he said, as he paused and his gaze fell away, “I must learn patience and practice faith while I await the judgment of powers greater than my own.”
    An hour later, they extinguished the two oil lanterns and everyone retired to his berth.
    While the occupants of the sailboat slept, two people fought a desperate, losing battle with rising water in a badly damaged 32-foot Chris Craft, ten miles to the north. The overworked, hand-operated bilge pump was failing and, with it, their chances of survival. They were bruised and bloodied, and weary to the point of collapse. Still, they refused to give up.
    If not for the cuts and the grime, one would have said they were a handsome couple. Both of them were tall; he was six feet, and she, about five-nine. He was slim, with the well-defined muscles of a runner, or a racquetball player. He was in his early forties and wore his styled blond hair straight back. His aquiline nose and intense blue eyes gave him a handsome, sophisticated look—perhaps a little roguish .
    She was in her mid-thirties, nice tan, hair a tawny strawberry blonde, thick and long. She was, beyond a doubt, attractive, but it was more the overall appearance than the individual parts that made her beauty work. If one studied her, there was a sense of contradiction in her features. There was perhaps too much height to her cheekbones, which lent a superciliousness, an aloofness that wasn’t necessarily earned. Her hazel eyes countered that, offering a hint of wit and spirit, but her mouth turned downward just slightly, diminishing the softness of her smile. Still, it all worked, and it was complimented by a remarkable figure—something she had enjoyedas a younger girl, but found distracting and appreciated less as she had grown up and entered the world of business.
    They were well-tanned, well-endowed, and well-connected— yacht club material—equally at home at a cocktail party or on the tennis court, but as they struggled grimly in the water-filled cabin of a foundering boat, that life was a million miles behind them.
    The engine was ruined, the electrical system down, radios broken. Their food and water were running low – the life raft was untied and ready.
    He levered like a machine on the manual bilge pump. She bailed with a bucket, filling it from the cabin, taking it up to the deck, and dumping it overboard. They both knew the water was still rising, regardless of their efforts, but neither would be the first to admit defeat. That was the way they were with each other. It epitomized the time they had spent together for the past few months. There was always an underlying sense of competition: neither showing weakness to the other. It wasn’t that they didn’t care for one another—they did. In fact, the challenge that each represented made it all the more intriguing. The relationship had evolved into a pleasant contest of wills, generously seasoned with great sex, but neither had offered more—there had been no commitment given or received, or really desired at this point. They both recognized that they made an attractive couple, and in the world of business lunches and country clubs, looking the part had its advantages. But at that