II

Knox set his anger with Rebecca aside, the better to concentrate on getting her safely back. He furled the mainsail and strode to the bow, held a coil of rope up high for her to see. He did it again and again until she acknowledged him. He fed one end through a hawse-hole, knotted it, then tied an orange life-jacket and a lead diving weight to the other end. He did everything with exaggerated movements to show her what he was doing, give her confidence in his ability to handle a crisis.

He went to the cabin, started the engine. It gave a dull, unpromising thump, then picked up smoothly. He swung the Yvette around parallel with the coral shelf, just the safe side of the breaking waves. When he’d drawn nearly level with Rebecca, he locked the wheel and hurried to the bow, picked up the lead weight and hurled it towards her, but it didn’t quite reach. A wave edged the floating life-jacket tantalisingly closer to Rebecca, but then backwash took it away again. He could see her steeling herself to dive for it, but her left arm was injured, and if she failed, she’d be in desperate trouble. He waved at her to let it go.

The sun had set by now, but it still reflected in thin bands of orange and pink off the undersides of the thickening cloud. The sea was growing bigger. Rebecca was having to hurl her hip against the waves to stay upright. He took the Yvette around for another pass, but couldn’t get as close again. He considered the VHF: but there’d be no one close enough to make a difference. He thought about going through the pass and trying to reach her inside the lagoon, but he wasn’t sure he had the time. He drew as close to her as he dared, stilled the engine, dropped anchor. The sea-bed was too sandy here for the anchor to hook on to, which meant that it would drag behind them as the breakers inexorably pushed them towards the reef.

He went below to put on jeans, boots and a sweatshirt. By the time he got back on deck, the Yvette had already been swung around by the waves, her bow barely fifteen metres from the coral. He untied the life-jacket and weightbelt, looped and knotted the rope around his own waist instead, stepped up on to the guard-rail and dived into the water, struck out hard, the coil of rope paying out behind him. He turned feet first, let the next wave take him in, bending his knees as he hit, rising up like a water-skier, then wading fast towards Rebecca across the coral. He turned his back. ‘Get on,’ he said. She did as he told her, clasping her right forearm around his throat, her legs around his waist. ‘When we get there,’ he told her, ‘don’t worry about me or the anchor. Just get to the cabin as fast as you can, give the wheel a full turn then throttle forwards. Okay?’

‘Yes,’ she said, pulling off and discarding her flippers.

The Yvette was being dragged closer and closer with every moment. Waves were crashing around her. Knox pulled the rope taut, braced against the next wave, then dived in and hauled them arm over arm through the swell. They reached the Yvette, just a few metres from the reef, every wave smashing her closer. Rebecca did as he’d instructed, clambering rudely over his shoulders and head, tipping herself aboard. He hauled himself up after her, ran to the stern, began to haul anchor. The engine stuttered but then failed. A wave pushed them on to the reef so that their hull scraped coral for a moment and their centreboard retracted and they listed violently, but then backwash took them off again and their engine caught and they began to turn. A last wave crashed against their side, water gushing over the deck with enough power to send Knox staggering, but Rebecca opened the throttle to its maximum and they began surging safely out to sea.