At Rosebank, the Quarantine Station for the Port of New York, we were given another example of the unreliability of hearsay predictions. In St. Thomas we had been warned that it would be foolish to enter at New York City, since it was not only dangerous for sailing craft (a point we were now willing to concede) but because the treatment given yachts was high-handed and arbitrary.
On the contrary, we were cleared in less than half an hour, and invited by the officials to move to a more secure spot inside the docks where we could relax for a day or two before going over to Manhattan. We were happy to accept, especially since it included showers and a chance to get in touch with family and friends by telephone.
In no time at all representatives of various “communications media” got wind of our arrival and began beating a path to the main hatch. Also, the families at the Quarantine Station, which is a surprisingly isolated community, were interested in the Phoenix, and most of them came on board to pay a visit, sign the guest book, and more often than not, leave a youngster or two behind to climb the masts or chin themselves on the ratlines.
Our first act was to get in touch with Tim, who had come into New York to await our arrival and now lost no time in joining us. It was our first meeting with our older son since he had left us back in Japan in ’53, and naturally we had a great deal of catching up to do.
In spite of the bustle, the weekend at Rosebank was most pleasant. As the reports of our arrival began to appear, friends sought us out and telegrams and letters of congratulation poured in.
We had an overflow crowd as we set out on Monday for the momentous trip across the bay. It was a sparkling day and lower Manhattan was a spectacular sight, especially as seen from the deck of the Phoenix. We were under both power and sail, but the breeze was too light to do us much good and it took four hours to inch our way up the Hudson, against the outgoing tide, to the small-boat basin at West 79th Street. On the way we tried to stay on the fringe of the busy harbor traffic and did not forget to make our bow to the Statue of Liberty, as we passed her very close on the port hand.
At the commercial dock we settled down to ten days or so of combined business and pleasure in Manhattan. The dockage fee was higher than in any other port we had visited—5 cents a foot per day—but we had Riverside Park at our bow, a view of the Palisades across the river, and fast connections to midtown within a few minutes’ walk. There was no need to remind ourselves that a cheap hotel room would have cost even one of us several times what we were paying for all seven.
It was a hot and hectic time. Just a list of the things we did would be exhausting, but they included many of the rubbernecking activities that Barbara and I had experienced before, but which were new and exciting to Ted, Jessica, and the three M’s. In addition we had a good deal of business to attend to, including a series of conferences with Lurton Blassingame, our indefatigable agent, and a number of radio and TV interviews.
One of these—a half-hour interview-type program called “Night Beat” on which I was interviewed alone—was particularly interesting to me and, in retrospect, perhaps crucial, as it served to crystallize some hitherto rather amorphous thinking. I had no idea which of the many subjects we had discussed before going on the air would be emphasized, and was completely surprised when John Wingate, the interviewer, chose to ignore the yachting and travel aspect entirely and concentrated instead on my scientific work in Hiroshima and on the problem of radioactivity and our government’s foreign policy as a whole.
The program was well known for its controversial nature but Barbara, watching with friends, was as unprepared as I was for the series of very direct questions regarding my attitude toward nuclear testing and disarmament. She told me later that she actually had not the slightest idea what my answer would be when Mr. Wingate brought up the issue of the recently announced “clean bomb” and asked what I thought of it.
My first remark was almost instinctive. “A ‘clean bomb’ is like an antiseptic bullet. It kills you just as dead.” I went on to amplify my feelings, pointing out that even the “ideal” clean bomb described by Mr. Eisenhower, 96 per cent “clean,” would be twice as radioactive as the bomb dropped on Hiroshima, from which victims were still dying of long-term effects of radioactivity.
Questions followed in quick succession. I didn’t resent the fact that they were “loaded,” since I had come on the program of my own free will and was intent only on answering as honestly and frankly as possible.
“Dr. Reynolds, would you unilaterally stop the testing of nuclear weapons?”
A host of thoughts crowded into my mind. To have given the audience a fair and comprehensible survey of the thinking and knowledge that determined my answer would have taken at least an hour. Anything less than that would have seemed equivocating. I simply answered, “Yes.”
The interviewer continued smoothly, “You realize, of course, that President Eisenhower has stated that people who express that point of view are giving aid and comfort to the enemy?”
This, of course, was the climax of the show, and the spot toward which the interviewer had been building. Strangely enough, to me it seemed an anticlimax. The President’s statements were his, my statements were mine. I answered briefly that a man must speak and act as he believes and not tailor his thinking with no view but to oppose the enemy. The United States would be in a sorry state indeed if our only reason for saying “No” is because Russia has said “Yes.” This merely plays into the hands of an antagonist.
“A man must stand up for what he believes.” I finished, “even if this occasionally means agreeing with the enemy.”
Following the broadcast we were quite unprepared for the reactions it caused. Within the next few days I was (a) hailed as an individual of heroic courage, (b) regarded with suspicion as a fellow traveler or dupe of Communists, (c) chided for being so foolhardy as to “stick your neck out.” Frankly, I was amazed. I had been asked certain questions and I had answered them as honestly as possible. I didn’t think I knew all the answers but, on the other hand, neither did I consider myself completely uninformed, and in the area of radioactivity and human well-being I felt I could speak with some authority. I felt that I had the interests of my own country at heart as well as did most Americans, and better than some. Why all the fuss?
On June 22, after checking the tide tables carefully, we rounded the foot of Manhattan and started up the East River, with the tide in our favor. The trip was quiet and uneventful. In the late afternoon we dropped anchor off the west end of City Island, outside a small cluster of boats. Curious yachtsmen soon boarded us, and after dinner we spent a fine evening ashore as guests of the Stuyvesant Yacht Club, off whose pier we had chanced to drop our hook.
The next morning we had a good day’s run among the Sunday sailors on Long Island Sound. In the afternoon we were met by Barbara’s cousin, Dave Dorn, and his family, in their cruiser Grand Slam, and with a convoy of boating friends were escorted to an anchorage off the Sprite Island Yacht Club near Norwalk.
There we were introduced to the sociable custom of “rafting.” With the Phoenix in the middle and our anchor responsible for the entire flotilla, we found six launches tied alongside, to port and starboard. Hampers of food were unpacked, and ice and drinks materialized, and people began to drift back and forth from one boat to another. Without more ado we found ourselves in the center of as cheering a welcome party as I have ever experienced.
After several days here we moved to a small shipyard in Rowayton, up the Five Mile River, where it had been arranged that the boat would spend the summer.
Here Ted left us temporarily to join Minnetta in Madison and enter summer school at the University of Wisconsin, where he was accepted, in spite of his unorthodox schooling, on the basis of entrance exams. Tim, too, checked out in early July to enlist in the army, while Jessica and Barbara made a semipermanent home ashore at the invitation of the Dorns. The rest of us embarked on an extensive haul-out, including the installation of a new engine, courtesy of Universal Motors, who had offered to replace our doughty kerosene-burning model with a gasoline engine of the same type, even-steven. (Why they should want an old, slightly beat-up engine which had been over 35,000 miles and across three oceans is anybody’s—or maybe only an adman’s—guess.)
Using Rowayton as a base, we worked out a schedule which would permit us to do the necessary boat work and still visit friends and relatives in the Middle West. We planned to take Nick, Mickey, and Moto with us, so they could see as much as possible of the United States. To do this, I bought a very secondhand station wagon. But when we were ready to leave for Wisconsin, we learned that Mickey and Moto had decided to remain. Only Nick elected to go with us. To me it was another indication of the chasm that was widening between the men, but we said nothing and set off with Barbara, Jessica, Nick, and myself.
Back in Connecticut after this pleasant break (the longest time I had been away from the boat since the launching), we found a number of problems awaiting us. First, I had a bill from the shipyard for $914.92, a figure which will remain engraved in my memory. I was aghast, for I knew that the dockage had been without charge, the materials at a discount, and we had done most of our own work. “Labor,” however, was still the chief item on the bill, and I was forcefully reminded of an incident I had witnessed earlier that illustrated most vividly how labor costs can mount. While installing the shaft, one of the workmen happened to touch a spot of wet green paint on the engine. He stopped work immediately, with a curse.
“That does it!” he exclaimed enigmatically, eying the green spot with disgust. Throwing down his tools, he left the boat.
Half an hour later I went from the boat into the shed and saw him still sitting there, idly rubbing his fingers with a rag, while smoking a cigarette. I said nothing, but later, while checking over the bill, I figured that that little spot of paint had cost me about $4—the cost of the time needed for the workman to recover his mental composure and restore his fingers to their former pristine condition.
Under the circumstances, I was particularly interested in an article I read about that time, by a yacht owner who had kept a record of the work done on his boat over a period of thirty years. He pointed out that, labor costs aside, the time taken to do the same job had more than doubled, and as I thought of the pouting workman, lounging in the shop and contemplating a green smear on his finger, I could understand why.
Another problem was slower to become apparent, but no less real, and couldn’t be solved by paying a bill. During our absence, Mickey and Moto had become friendly with a very fine family in Rowayton, who on our return immediately extended their hospitality to us all. It was the first time in our travels that we had spent so long a time in one place and achieved such an easy intimacy with any one group, and perhaps we should have been prepared for the tragicomic consequences.
Mickey and Moto, quite unfamiliar with the camaraderie of American girls, became enamored of the daughter of the family. Jealous of each other, they promptly joined ranks against Ted on his return to the boat, while he, completely unaware of the situation, began to compete for the attentions of the young lady.
Not until the day before we sailed from Rowayton did we realize that we had been sitting on a powder keg. Ted came home from a sail with the girl, to be greeted with a torrent of loud and tearful abuse from our usually quiet Moto, who had obviously been drinking. The unleashing of this apparently long-buried hatred and resentment was an unnerving experience, since we had come to like and respect Moto very much. His very real torment was obvious, and although at this time we did not fully realize the cause, it was impossible to write it off as the empty rantings of one in his cups.
We took off the next day, September 7, with a rather subdued and introspective crew. During the next several weeks, only gradually did we fit the story together. Just how involved the various men of our crew had been we will never know, but there is no doubt that bits and pieces of a number of hearts had been left behind in Rowayton. How deeply embedded were the suspicions and bitterness only slowly came to light in experiences such as the following:
Weeks later, in the course of a violent outburst, Mickey accused me of “spying on him.” It took considerable patience and much probing to get at the origin of his belief, but eventually it was traced back to Rowayton and an incident that had occurred during our stay.
One evening, arriving late, and looking for Barbara and our hostess, I had wandered into the small sitting room reserved for television. All was darkened except for the TV screen, and I had asked, referring to the program, “What’s going on?”
Someone had answered and, not being attracted by the program, I had gone on to another part of the house. Now, weeks later, it developed that Mickey and the young lady in question had been watching TV together, and Mickey had interpreted my commonplace remark as suspicion of his actions and a desire to spy on him.
In any event, our trip up Long Island Sound, around Montauk Point, down to the entrance of the Delaware, and on through the Chesapeake and Delaware Canal into Chesapeake Bay was not noted for its jollity. Nick was moody and Ted and Mickey unusually withdrawn, but Moto was particularly pathetic. In complete contrast to his former cheerful, wryly humorous self, he sat for hours in the bow, staring moodily at the water, or wove rope into intricate designs with all the withdrawal symptoms of a paranoid. We felt that he had lost so much face by his outburst that he did not know how to get back to our former friendly relations, and we did everything we could to assure him that we wanted to let bygones be bygones. What we did not realize, yet, was that his spirit was completely broken.
This trip was an introduction to a different type of cruising, where we used the engine much of the time and measured our progress not by noon shots but by markers as frequent as street signs in a city. By night we anchored: at Reedy Point, Delaware; Sassafras River, Maryland; and finally, in Whitehall Creek, near Annapolis, where we lay just off the back yard of Bob and Billy Phelps, guiding lights of the American Yachtsmen’s Association. If anything was calculated to repair shattered morale and raise the drooping spirits of our crew, the two weeks we spent with the Phelpses was it. Their instantaneous, homely welcome, the freedom of their pleasant home, the effervescence of their two lively dogs, and the easy exchange of yachting reminiscences were all fine medicine.
During this period we made one more inland trip, to our old haunts at Yellow Springs, Ohio. Once again we had intended to take the entire group, but once again, at the last moment, plans were changed. Mickey decided he would rather go to “see friend,” who lived near Schenectady or Syracuse, or, at any rate, “somewhere in state New York.” And Nick, at the last minute, announced that he would remain on board to “write letters.” It seemed unlikely that he had enough letters to last a week, but we accepted his decision.
Our return to Yellow Springs, although hectic and far too brief, was a highlight of our stay in the States. We could recognize now how unique was the community spirit we had taken for granted during our eight years at Fels Institute and on the Antioch campus. When a public meeting was organized to welcome us “home” and permit us to meet old friends, as well as give a talk about our travels, we were very much moved.
Jessica and Joan had renewed their former friendship so completely that nothing short of a major operation could successfully separate them, so we postponed that problem by packing Joan into the station wagon with us and taking her back for a short trip on the Phoenix and a week of sightseeing in and around Washington.
At Annapolis we took on fuel and supplies and I gave a slide talk to the members of the Yacht Club. It was an enjoyable stay except for one fierce day with torrential rain, and wind speeds up to 80 mph, which shattered a large window on the club veranda. At the height of the storm, poor Joan and Jessica finally had to part, and the weather provided a dramatically satisfactory background as we put Joan on the bus for Ohio, as per arrangement with her folks.
On October 9 we left Annapolis, sailing down Chesapeake Bay. It was a quiet and pleasant interlude, during which we made four stops—at Oxford, where we picked up our new genoa jib, and at Solomon’s Island, Indian Creek and Horseshoe Shoals. At Hampton, Virginia, we stopped for a slightly longer stay. Here we discovered old friends—Hugh Gloster and his family, of Hampton Institute. Hugh had been in Hiroshima as a Fulbright fellow at the university during our stay.
Also, I’m sorry to say that once again we found ourselves in an area of segregation. When we visited the local Marine Museum, I was deeply ashamed to see the look on my men’s faces when they saw “White” and “Colored” on the rest-room doors, here in my own country.
The tension caused by such incidents possibly triggered another flare-up, which developed just before our departure from Hampton. It began as a fairly routine issue between Mickey and myself over one of his derelictions but quickly developed into a confusing verbal free-for-all. It was obvious even to the most obtuse that Nick, Mickey, and Moto were badly divided. Mickey and Moto accused Nick of being “troublemaker,” while Nick retorted that they did not really care about the success of the voyage, but were always complaining—of the food, of the routines, of the Skipper. Mickey and Moto demanded that Nick be sent home, and I myself, remembering the many times he had been my outspoken critic, wondered if he might not welcome an excuse to get out. When I asked him, however, he maintained he wanted to finish the trip as planned. It was a disturbing impasse. The three seemed to be at complete loggerheads, and I could see no compromise.
At last, after a heated debate, we emerged with a temporary course of action: (a) Moto, who confessed that he had not felt well for some time, would be given a thorough medical examination at the first opportunity—and here Mickey chimed in with “Me too! I not feel so good!” (b) We would continue without any crew changes, at least as far as the Canal Zone, at which time we would have another session.
Only after the conference had broken up did I realize, with a kind of baffled double-take, that I had started out by taking Mickey to task, and ended by putting Moto on the sick list and asking Nick if he wanted to go back to Japan!
From Hampton we sailed past numerous naval ships at anchor and into Norfolk Channel. At Great Bridge we pulled alongside a dock, told the attendant to “Fill ’er up!” and then docked nearby for the night, a procedure we were to repeat a number of times. Again we were experiencing a new kind of cruising, along narrow channels, into locks, and through drawbridges where maneuvering was quite difficult for our underpowered boat. Our only safety lay in making plans well in advance, knowing the chart perfectly, and anticipating problems. Even so, we had several tense moments when a bridge seemed to lift with agonizing slowness while we were bearing down on it, urged on by the current and a following wind, with our puny reverse doing no measurable good. Also, although we followed the channel faithfully, we ran aground three times between Hampton and Morehead City, North Carolina. Each time we were able to get ourselves off without help, using sail, motor, and kedge.
Our last grounding was, humiliatingly enough, right in Morehead City, only half a mile from our destination. Going by the chart, which indicated a sufficiently deep channel up to the Yacht Club, we entered and immediately grounded. With a strong tide setting across the channel and a fresh north breeze, we were unable to budge. While we relaxed and waited for high slack, a Coast Guard vessel came alongside and offered to pull us off. I admit I was tempted.
“Well ...” I said.
“You just sign these papers in quadruplicate,” the officer said briskly, handing them to me.
“Well,” I continued, “I’ll tell you. So far we’ve never asked for help—I’d like to try to manage by ourselves.” Somehow the sight of all that paper work seemed to turn a kindly offer into a government project.
In Morehead City we tied up for two weeks at a gas dock near the center of town while we made final preparations for heading back out to sea. Also, we gladly accepted an invitation from our good friend, Dr. Warner Wells, surgeon at the University of North Carolina Medical School in Chapel Hill. I had written Warner from Hampton about our health problems, asking about a medical checkup for Moto and Mickey. For several years Warner had been on the research staff of the Atomic Bomb Casualty Commission in Hiroshima, where he had been well liked and respected by the Japanese community. He now had Japanese-speaking doctors on his staff, and I knew that Warner, if anyone, would be sympathetic with the psychology of our ailing men.
Moto and Mickey entered the university hospital, where for three days they were given an exhaustive series of examinations. The results, except for a slight vitamin C deficiency, were negative. The charges, although I had written in my letter that I would pay all fees, laboratory expenses, X rays, and the like, also were negative!
We in the family were enjoying a holiday with the lively and interesting Wells family. We would all have been perfectly content if the examinations had taken a week or more. But I had one more trip to make, back to Washington. At the request of the National Academy of Sciences, I attended meetings at which ongoing and future research programs in Hiroshima were discussed. There it was finally decided that the prospective follow-up of my studies in Hiroshima would not be “reactivated,” due to a change in research emphasis and the presence of a new director of ABCC in Hiroshima. My understanding that I would continue my research program in Hiroshima, on our return, had been very clear, and all our plans had revolved around this fact. However, I had no formal, written contract to that effect, only a gentleman’s agreement—and now, apparently, a new gentleman was in charge.
I was advised, however, to consult with the new director when we reached Hiroshima, as he would be “most sympathetic” to my plan for a continuation of my study on the effects of atomic radiation on the surviving children of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. I appreciated the offer of sympathy, but I would have preferred something more definite, as I felt strongly that this promising line of research should be continued—if not by me, then by someone else.
We sailed from Morehead City on November 15, happy to be on the way once more. On a couple of mornings we had seen a light frost on deck, and the evenings had become too chilly for our blood and our wardrobes, both thinned by extended tropical living. Pulling away from the dock, we waved to the handful of friends we had made and headed out the channel, setting a course to the southeast as soon as we cleared the last buoy. By midnight we were well away from land and on our way to Jamaica, by way of the eastern Bahamas and the Windward Passage.
The two-week trip to the Bahamas was rather rugged, with a variety of weather that ranged from glassy calm to winds strong enough to cause us to heave to for half a day. The first part of the passage was mostly in southerlies, and not until the thirteenth day out did we have what might reasonably be called “trade wind” conditions. Even then, hesitating to tempt fate, I made the notation in the log in quotes.
On November 28, at 0900, we sighted Mayaguana Island, dead ahead, rounded the northwest point, and came to anchor just southwest of the lighthouse in five fathoms. We were fourteen days out of Morehead City and very glad to be back in the trades after a slow and vexatious passage. The direct distance was 763 miles, but we had logged over 1,000 due to the large percentage of adverse winds.
We spent the day—Thanksgiving—at Mayaguana. Like most of the Bahamas, it is low. The lighthouse, we learned, was automatic, with no sign of life around it. A wide sand road had been cleared through the surrounding growth of cactus and scrub trees, but our first shore party followed it for several miles without seeing any sign of habitation. They returned—having left me aboard to do some necessary work on the engine—with their arms full of booty: yellow fan coral, marble-white brain coral, a round fisherman’s float of blue-green glass, and numerous shells to add to Barbara’s collection, which she had persistently been building throughout our trip, in spite of our disinterest, gibes, and—when an occasional uncleaned shell smelled to high heaven—active protest. This time, however, no one said anything unkind, for we remembered that it was Thanksgiving and wanted our cook to be in a good mood.
She was. Relying entirely on canned goods, we had quite a feast, including shrimp cocktail, glazed ham, asparagus tips, potatoes (both mashed and sweet)—and, for dessert, mince pie! The prize dish, however, was neither the pie nor the ham, but a loaf of honest-to-goodness home-baked wholewheat bread which Barbara somehow managed to whip up in, of all things, a pressure cooker.
The next day Barbara and I went ashore to explore in the other direction, this time with more success. After following the road for four miles or more, we reached a small settlement—ten or twelve boxlike houses built of whitened coral stone, each with a wooden door and two wood-shuttered windows painted in blue, green or pink. The place looked deserted, but we could hear the voices of children at play and finally found a group of them. They stared at us for a moment with awe and then went tearing for the houses, yelling the news at top voice: “Ooooooh—white mon! Oooo—white mon!”
We gathered that Mayaguana was not a tourist island!
We were very hot and thirsty, but although there were some coconut trees growing in most of the dooryards, and all of them loaded with good drinking nuts, we had no coin of the realm and had not even thought to bring cigarettes or a candy bar. Several women came out to look at us and smile shyly, but no refreshment was offered and, as we had no bargaining power, we had to make the long walk back without refueling. How nostalgically we recalled the islands of the South Seas, where native hospitality had provided cool coconuts, open, ready and waiting, by the time the stranger had arrived!
In the afternoon we weighed anchor and set out for Great Inagua, some 70 miles to the south, arriving in Mathew Town late the following morning. It was Saturday, and the mail-and-supply boat had just arrived, so there was a considerable stir in the village. Five of us rowed ashore and spent several hours wandering around. As on most British islands, the buildings on Great Inagua were neat and freshly painted. The streets, paved with crushed white coral, were well laid out and carefully tended.
We found the one store overflowing with people who had just received their monthly pay checks from the town’s No. 1 employer, Morton’s Salt Company. We took our turn in line, and at last were permitted to purchase seven tomatoes and one (1) loaf of bread, both items having just arrived from Nassau.
On the way back to the dock we called—by request—at the office of the sole government official on the island, and forked out $8 (American money was graciously accepted) for “harbor and landing fees.” Clutching our unexpectedly costly purchases, we rowed back out to the Phoenix, and left for Jamaica the next morning.
The four-day trip, which took us through the Windward Passage between Cuba and Haiti, was uneventful from a sailing point of view, but climactic in terms of our crew relationships. Only a brief entry in my log refers to the incident:
Mickey refused to obey order to steer by standing in cockpit while boat was passing, so relieved him of duty.
The actual happening was somewhat less dry. In the afternoon while Mickey was on watch and I was below, I could hear a boat’s engines. I went up, and found Mickey lounging on the starboard side of the cockpit, steering with his foot. Overhauling us rapidly from astern was a motor vessel, probably a coastal trader, somewhat larger than we were. I spoke to Mickey.
“There’s a boat coming,” I said, indicating aft. He paid no attention, and did not move. “Mickey, stand up and steer.”
No movement. I repeated the order. Mickey said, without moving, “Why?”
I answered, “Because it’s dangerous and also it doesn’t look good.” No move. “Are you going to stand up and steer?”
“This is a yacht and I don’t have to.”
“Are you going to stand up and steer?”
“No.”
I stepped into the cockpit. “I will take the tiller.” Mickey left the cockpit, as I began to steer. The boat passed us close to port. I said, “Mickey, you are through.”
He went below. In a short while Nick appeared. “What is trouble?” he asked.
I explained the circumstances. “Unless Mickey is willing to apologize and make some effort to cooperate from now on, he is through,” I added.
This time I felt, and the family agreed with me, that the time had come for a showdown. Mickey knew how earnestly we hoped to finish the voyage with our original crew, but we felt that, more and more, he was taking advantage of this knowledge, confident that we would condone anything rather than break up the crew. Usually, however, his behavior took a more subtle form, such as shirking in his work, coming up late for “all hands on deck,” calling his relief watch five minutes early, and so on. He had seldom been, like Nick, openly in opposition, but on the other hand, I knew where I stood with Nick, although I didn’t welcome his spots of defiance. At least they cleared the air.
For the first time in our entire relationship we determined that Mickey must admit his error, apologize, and make some gesture of reconciliation. (In private I decided that even a very small gesture would suffice—but I, too, had my face to save.)
We completed the trip to Jamaica, with Mickey relieved of duty. By noon on the fourth day out we were off Kingston harbor but, rather than enter the busy harbor, we decided to pull in to the docks at Port Royal. We were still well out when a launch approached and we were boarded by officials who efficiently went about clearing us while we were still on the way in. By midafternoon we were safely tied up, had been cleared and given such a cordial welcome that we never did get around to moving the Phoenix over to Kingston.
But casting a shadow over the friendly ministrations of Sir Anthony and Lady Jenkinson, who were living aboard their yacht Fairweather while operating the hospitable Port Royal Beach Club, was the uncomfortable knowledge that the “clearinghouse session,” which I had put off until we reached port, would have to be held that night, and would be definitive. We all dreaded it, but unless Mickey was willing to meet me halfway, admit his error, and make a genuine promise to mend his increasingly insolent ways, we would have to part company. I said as much to Nick, who was doing what he could as go-between, but Nick brought word that Mickey would not apologize, that he considered it an “insult” for me to tell him what to do.
The meeting that night was brief and bitter. I stated my position, in clear and simple words. Mickey stood firm. I told him that in that case I would have to send him back to Japan.
He said, “Good!”
As had been the case in Hawaii, it was the other two who went to bat for Mickey. Their argument was that Mickey’s defection was harmless and that, since we were so near the end of our trip anyway, we should simply ignore the whole thing. I refused, saying it was neither safe nor prudent to continue with someone in whom I could have no confidence and who continued openly to defy me. As we talked, it developed that Mickey had given Moto a completely inaccurate version of the episode: (1) I had made an unreasonable demand; (2) he had complied with my order, but I had sent him below anyway, for some unknown reason.
There was only one flaw in Mickey’s account: Jessica, who had been in her cabin below, had heard the whole incident and remembered it perfectly.
I could only repeat that, under the circumstances, I had no other choice than to send Mickey home, by the first available ship.
There was a dead pause. Moto then said, in a low voice, that he would go, too, if Mickey went; then Nick, not looking at me, said he also would have to go. I said I was sorry that was their decision, but that I would make the arrangements. I left the boat and went ashore.
I walked aimlessly in the dark, in the vacant lot by the docks, trembling with frustration and disappointment. In a few minutes I saw dark forms approaching. It was the family, and I called out in blind anger, “I suppose you’re going to desert me too?”
They came over. “We just wanted to tell you,” Barbara said quietly, slipping her hand into mine, “that you were right and we’re with you all the way.”
“There was nothing else you could do,” said Ted, who had always been our mediator and balance wheel. “You’ve always put the safety of the voyage first and you mustn’t be influenced now by that dream of finishing the trip with the same crew. Even if we did give in, and take the boys back, it would be a kind of lie to pretend we had succeeded in finishing the trip as friends.”
“We’ll get along all right,” said Jessica. “I can take a watch.”
With tears in my eyes, I embraced them all.
The next morning, while I was making ready to go over to Kingston with Sir Anthony to see about boat schedules for shipping the men back, Nick approached me. “Skipper,” he began hesitantly, “if you would have me, I have changed my mind.”
“What do you mean?”
“I want to finish voyage. I want to stay on Phoenix.”
“I’ll talk to the family.”
I did, and we decided to accept Nick’s offer. So Nick stayed on with us, and from that moment an entirely new relationship began. Having thrown in his lot with us, breaking completely with his mates, Nick now came over wholly to our side, giving us unswerving loyalty and warm friendship. It was an amazing transformation.
Moto’s role in the case was a strange one. We still liked him very much; we felt strongly that he didn’t want to go but that some force stronger than himself compelled his action. He brooded for long hours, obviously miserable; and yet he either would not or could not revise his decision.
I learned in town that it would be almost impossible for me to send Mickey and Moto back from Kingston, as ships bound for Japan rarely called there. It would be far easier, I was told, to carry them on with us as far as the Canal Zone, where arrangements could easily be made. Mickey objected so violently to this suggestion that I told him he had full authority to go to town and make his own arrangements for the passage. He and Moto spent several days in town, but Mickey finally had to admit that my information was correct and they agreed to go on with us to the Panama Canal.
However, I made it very clear that they would travel as passengers and would have no hand in sailing the Phoenix. The family and Nick would handle the boat alone.
While here, it seemed wise to haul out once more, making use of the rather primitive (but cheap) marine railway in the old Naval Dockyard, instead of waiting until the Canal Zone, where prices, under American administration, were likely to be high. Sir Anthony enlisted the services of about twenty men from Port Royal to lend us a hand for a day—at 10 shillings apiece—and we all turned to on the huge cranks of the massive, hand-operated winch, taking an entire day literally to inch our thirty tons up the incline.
During our stay in Port Royal we went into the city only two or three times. There was no bus service between Kingston and Port Royal, and the tiny ferry-launch ran only one trip each way a day. The town was hot, dirty, and not too colorful. Although the Christmas season was in full swing, we found little that tempted us to buy.
Port Royal, however, we liked very much, and after a day’s work on the boat we would often take a stroll through the old town, with its ancient stone houses, narrow streets, and vital air of history. We knew that in the waters just off the dock, buried in the earthquake of 1692, lay the remains of most of the town, with its warehouses still full of booty taken by the pirates. Here, in the middle of the seventeenth century, was the city acknowledged to be the wickedest in the world.
Old Fort Charles was still active, now the training ground for the Jamaican constabulary. We recalled that Nelson was in command here briefly in 1779, and his quarterdeck, where he was wont to pace and watch for French ships, is still preserved.
At the church we had a chance to see a Jamaican wedding, which is often solemnized only after many years of preconnubial bliss and large families. As a matter of fact, the two little flower girls in flouncy white dresses, who escorted the bride with her magnificent ruffled train dragging in the dust as she came up the dirt road to the church, were daughters of the bride and groom. This state of affairs is due not to lack of morals but lack of funds, as a wedding must be celebrated in proper style. If the length of the procession that accompanied the bride was any indication of the length of the guest list, the financial outlay must have been staggering.
The party following the ceremony went on all night, just beyond the wall that separated the dockyard from the village of Port Royal, but the music, unfortunately, was not calypso or West Indian, but a particularly penetrating selection of canned American hit tunes.
We sailed for the Canal on December 18, hoping to make it in time to pick up our Christmas mail. Nick, Ted, and I shared watches, two on and four off, while Barbara and Jessica, between them, accounted for three hours during the day. The system worked very well.
Our two passengers remained below decks most of the time. Nick was patently being ostracized by them, but he refused our suggestion that he join the family at meals, stolidly eating in silence in the main cabin, ignoring and being ignored by his former companions. We all felt the strain. Since it was now too late to go back, and even surface formalities had ceased to exist, we looked forward to the time when we could part company.
On the morning of the 22nd we sighted land, very faintly, off the starboard bow. Later in the morning a number of ships passed in the early mists, all heading in the same general direction, so we knew we couldn’t be too far off course. We headed south-southeast to pick up the coast more firmly, then turned south along the coast to the harbor entrance. By midafternoon we had passed the breakwater, noting that the four buoys at the entrance, shown on our “up-to-date” chart, were not present.
Dropping anchor in the merchant anchorage near the channel, we flew our flags and awaited developments.