“Yup. Don’t understand it all myself, so I just accept. Before you take a boat, you better steal yourself a bunch of twenty-gallon cylinders of propane from other boats if you want those things to work.” He opened another beer and I realized I hadn’t yet tasted mine. I had been too entranced in what he was sharing. He was smiling and it looked good on him.
His eyes flicked to the little open windows behind me now and then, keeping watch on the driveway. “How did you know we were coming so you could set up your ambush? You set an alarm, didn’t you?”
“Well, besides hearing a gun-battle in my back yard, I placed a couple of pressure switches on the driveway and covered them with old pieces of plywood. Kicked a little dirt over them and the wires I ran to the buzzer.”
I was glad he was smarter than me with my shotgun alarms.
Sue sat on a small sofa next to him and asked, “You don’t seem upset that we’re going to take a boat.”
He finished off his second beer and said, “Stealing is taking something away from someone who owns it and doesn’t want you takin’ it. I suppose nobody owns most of those sailboats in the marina anymore. Not one in ten of them is still alive, by my count. And if they are, they’re too busy trying to feed themselves and avoid the blight to go for a leisurely sail.”
My lack of basic knowledge for so many things struck me hard. He’d explained more of what I needed to survive in a few words than all my planning. Making things cool with propane, twelve-volt lights, solar panels, and probably a hundred more things I didn’t even know what questions to ask next. The nameless old man in front of me had made an effective alarm system, blackened his windows for protection, and drank cold beer.
I hadn’t considered inviting a third person to join us, but I was wrong for that. His contributions to our survival would exceed both of us combined. I blurted, “Will you come with us?”
“I’m too old and sick.”
I continued, “Not to steal the boat. We can do that. What if we sail back by here and pick you up?”
“Why would you do that?”
“Because you can teach us so much.”
He lifted an arm and pointed to the water in front of his house. “Sailboats draw a lot of water. At low tide, there are mudflats from here to Everett. A few channels to drain the river, sloughs, and creeks, but mud as far as you can see. The water out there is often three feet deep or less. No way to get a sailboat through unless you know the channels and sail out into the bay and back up here again.”
The water looked deep enough for me.
He went on, “When you get yourselves a sailboat, take it out to the breakwater and go south to the end of the rocks, then sail directly west until you get most of the way to Hat Island. The water there is hundreds of feet deep and you’ll sail around the south end to Whidbey Island and then around it. You’ll turn north all the way to your San Juan Islands. Remember that.”
The thought of getting the keel stuck in the mud as the tide went out and left us exposed like a single fly on a white sheet of paper, helpless to defend ourselves, didn’t sound pleasant. I’d remember exactly what he said.
For lunch, Sue opened a can of pork and beans, his last bag of potato chips, and cooked his last hotdogs in a frying pan. He and I talked strategy and he taught me the essentials of how his stove, heater, and fridge worked. I paid attention to every word.
He took me outside and showed me how easy the solar panels worked, and the batteries, but what ran the system was a little controller box that changed light into battery power and managed the voltages. That was the key. I needed the controller-box and the panels. My mind was working at lightning speed.
He said, “Know why we’re looking at this?”
“So, I’ll know what I need to scrounge?”
“No. The solar panels are what you’re going to look for when you’re selecting a boat.”
I gave him a puzzled look.
“The sailboats,” he said. “When you’re picking out which one to take. First, look for solar panels on the roof of the cabin. Probably your most important item. Many will have them, especially larger, newer ones. If it already has them installed, you don’t have to mess with learning anything but how to use the power.”
I hesitated. “I’ve never sailed before. Only been on a few small powerboats, so I was thinking of taking a small one, then decided maybe a little bigger, but not too big.”
He opened two more cans of beer and handed me one. “You’re right to ask me along. You’re so ignorant you need help, but not from me. Best to go it alone and learn as you go, these days. Now, listen. A larger sailboat is probably easier to steer and will carry your supplies and all you need. Imagine trying to fit six propane tanks and fifty cases of bottled water into a smaller sailboat.”
“Fifty cases of bottled water?”
“In those islands you’re going to, where are you going to get fresh water to drink if you don’t take it there yourselves?”
My mind went to the image of a small cabin the size of my closet at home, to a boat stuffed with propane tanks and cases of water and God knows what else. Where would we sleep? What about all else we’d need? My initial ist would sink a small boat, let alone the real items.
“Okay, I see that brain of yours going like a racing jalopy and it needs to slow down a mite. You just went from picking a small day-sailer to something as long as a semi-truck, right? Now, let’s take it down a bit. Something in between. Ever start a diesel?”
“No.”
“Depending on a lot of things, remember this: many require up to thirty seconds before you can start them. Some have a yellow light that turns green when ready. But you have to wait—then they will start after heat builds up in the engine.”
“Maybe I should just look for a gas engine.”
“Gas fumes have a habit of settling in low places, like inside the hulls of boats where it can’t escape. There is more than one sunken ship out there in the bay you’re looking at that exploded from gas, so you want a diesel. A little nine-dot-nine horse-power outboard wouldn’t hurt, neither would a little tow-behind rowboat. But remember, all that can wait.”
“Wait?”
“There have been other sailboats out on the water in the last few days. You’re not alone in thinking it’s a good idea to get out of Dodge. Take whatever boat you can safely get, sail north and hide. Let all these local idiots kill themselves off before you consider replacing the boat you steal with a better one, but by then you’ll have a good idea of what will fill your needs and you’ll only face half the people you will now because it’s my estimation half these fools will kill the other half within a month.”
“That makes sense,” I agreed.
He opened two more beers. I refused and he kept both for himself. He downed one and turned to face me. “Think about this. You survive in baby steps. It’s late winter now, so you just have to last until spring. You do what it takes to survive the rest of the winter. After that is spring and summer and by then you will either be dead or know something about sailing and what you need for a better rig. There are other marinas up by Bellingham and other cities. You can use the small boat to scout out what you want for a long-term choice. Right now, it’s all about living for one more day and planning for a week. Do that, and you might make it. Take whatever boat you can get away with and survive a few more days. That’s the important thing.”
It was good advice.
CHAPTER NINE
The old man went to sleep on me while sitting in his recliner. Well, not on me, but in his chair, his head laid back, his mouth open, a beer near his outstretched hand. There was so much to learn from him. Sue and I expected to be up most of the night, and we took long naps so we wouldn’t fall asleep. He awoke late in the afternoon when Sue and I were getting ready to leave.