And the Deep Blue Sea Read Online Free PDF Page B

case out of him, he thought, but they might have a case, at that. He was pretty well used up. He treaded water while he passed the line around under his arms and made it fast. Grasping the chains at the ends of the ladder treads, he started up, while the men above took up the slack in his safety line. It was a long way up, and he found he was weaker than he’d thought. Hands grasped his arms and helped him over the bulwark and down on deck. He shook with fatigue while water dripped from his body, vaguely conscious of an excited buzzing of voices from a number of the crew gathered in the well-deck. One of the cargo lights was turned on. Somebody unbent the safety line while two men continued to support him, apparently trying to lead him over to a seat on a hatch cover. He shook his head.
    “I’m all right,” he gasped.
    The blond giant who had hold of his right arm let go, grinned at him, and said, “I guess you are, at that. And I thought I had a patient to practice on.” He indicated the open first-aid kit on the hatch cover. Beside it was a pitcher of water. He poured a glass half full. “Easy does it.”
    Goddard drank it and returned the glass. “I had a little on the raft.”
    The only man present with an officer’s cap stepped forward. “I’m Captain Steen. Are there any others?”
    “No, just me.” Goddard grinned painfully, his sun-and-salt-ravaged face feeling as though it would crack. “I’m glad to meet you, Captain.” He held out his hand. “My name’s Goddard.”
    They shook hands, Captain Steen somewhat stiffly, apparently a man with very little humor. Steen turned to one of the crew, and said, “Tell Mr. VanDoorn he can get under way.”
    Goddard looked at the big man who had helped him aboard and given him the water. Though he was bareheaded and clad only in khaki trousers and a short-sleeved shirt with no insignia of any kind, he wore authority as casually as he did the bedroom slippers and the untamed shock of blond hair. “Mate?” Goddard asked.
    The other nodded. “Lind.” They shook hands, and he asked, “Yacht, I suppose, with that Mickey Mouse life raft?”
    “Yeah,” Goddard replied. “I was single-handing—” He stopped, overcome with another attack of weakness and shaking, and began to sway. Lind and another man caught him before he could fall. They led him toward the ladder to the deck above.
    Karen Brooke had been watching from the corner of the promenade deck as Goddard made his way up the pilot ladder, marveling that a castaway would have the strength to do it. Apparently he hadn’t been aboard the raft very long. Just as they helped him over the bulwark, Mrs. Lennox came out of the passageway on the starboard side and joined her at the rail.
    “Isn’t it exciting?” Mrs. Lennox asked. “A real rescue at sea. Who do you suppose he is?”
    “He must be off a small boat of some kind,” Karen replied. “It was a tiny raft, one of the inflated kind, and I don’t think ships have them.”
    “A yachtsman! And look how tall he is.” The older woman’s interest quickened. “Almost as big as Mr. Lind.”
    Karen was amused, now that it appeared the man was neither ill nor dying of thirst and no longer an object of concern. He had cheated one species of maneater, and now was being marked down by another. Mrs. Lennox had all the healthy interest in men of any normal, red-blooded, fifty-year-old widow, and she went to no great lengths to conceal it. She was still quite attractive, with a trim and sexy figure, smoky gray eyes, and a cascade of ash-blond hair. She was wearing pajamas, slippers, and a nylon robe, but the hair was neatly combed and she had put on makeup.
    Karen gazed musingly down into the well-deck where the man, surrounded by curious crew members, shook hands with the captain and then with Mr. Lind, and wondered if, in accordance with the old Chinese belief, she should try to summon up some feeling of responsibility for him. He really didn’t appear to