The next morning Amanda took her father over to Earlene’s Kitchen for breakfast, then after that picked up Beffy at the motel and went over to the Rag Doll. When they got there, they were all surprised to see Ron and Cordy waiting for them. “What are you doing here?” Amanda asked. “I thought you were on duty today.”

“Well, I’m sort of owed some off-duty time under the table for all the work I put in on that oil spill,” Ron explained. “Cordy and I talked it over after we left you last night and figured that we might as well get that engine licked so you can work on carpentry. That way we can be around while you’re here.”

“Fine with me,” her father smiled. “I’d rather work on carpentry than engines any day.”

“It’s the other way around for me,” Cordy said. “But this shouldn’t be too big a deal.”

There was a lot of work done on the Rag Doll the next couple days. Parts of the carpentry went very well, and others needed some more cutting and fitting. By the end of the first day the work on the forecabin was done, and the walls for the hanging locker and the head had been replaced. The head Amanda had salvaged from the Sea Bright had been installed; it seemed to work all right, even though it couldn’t be used regularly at Sims Boat Yard. Her father had even pre-finished the wood for them, so it minimized the amount of time she would have to spend in tight spaces with a paint brush.

The rest of the cabin work went more slowly, since there was a lot of cutting and fitting, even though some pieces had been prefabbed. After a few days the new interior was more or less complete, except for some details, some of which might have to wait until next fall. There was going to be quite a bit of varnishing to do, but Amanda decided to hold off on that project until her mother came down; it would let her mother feel that she had been part of the project, too. Amanda’s mother had also “been volunteered” to do several cushions needed for the project, but it looked like that was going to wait for summer, too. That meant that when Amanda moved back into the Rag Doll after her parents left, she’d still be sleeping on the air mattress, but in the spiffy new cabin with a propane stove, the one she’d rescued from the Sea Bright.

Getting that done meant that something of a milestone had been passed, and there was another one going on at the same time. Ron and Cordy were making progress on the engine, although it was slow progress since the space in the engine compartment was so tight. They couldn’t both get in there at the same time, and sometimes only Cordy was able to wiggle into some of the places that needed to be reached. They were trying to clean the engine up and get it rebuilt as much as they could without taking it out entirely. It was a slow process.

In any case, the Moonshadow’s old engine setting out at the edge of the parking lot started looking progressively more naked, which Amanda thought must mean that Ron and Cordy were getting somewhere on the Rag Doll’s engine while she and her father worked on the interior.

After several days, as the work on the interior was near an end, both Zack and Shades had a day off on the same day and came over to see what they could do to help. Of course, there were things for them to do, and it was especially good to see Zack again – it had been a while thanks to his duty schedule. Amanda wasn’t paying a lot of attention to what Ron, Cordy, and the others were up to until she saw Shades coming into the cabin with the ends of a set of jumper cables. “What’s up?” she asked him.

“The battery down there is apparently dead, and we’re going to see if we can get the engine to start.”

Amanda had been aware that she was going to need a new battery – in fact, several of them for the electrical system – but hadn’t seen the need to do it until next fall. “You think it’s going to work?” she asked.

“Cordy seems to think so, but the way to find out is try to start it up and see.”

While several people watched both above deck and below, Cordy turned on the master switch, then hit the starter. The engine turned over for a few seconds, farted a couple times, let off a loud pop! and settled down into a rough idle that could barely be heard over the cries of delight from the audience. There were hugs and high-fives; several, including Amanda, had entertained some doubts about how well the mixing of the two old engines was going to work.

“Well, it’s obviously going to need some tuning,” Cordy said with a wide smile on her face. “I was sort of guessing on some of the settings when I rebuilt the carb, but damned if I don’t think I hit it pretty good, just by luck.”

The engine was stopped and started several times over the next hour, with Cordy and Ron fiddling with it, but soon they had it to where it would idle smoothly. They ran it a little harder with the prop both forward and in reverse just to put some load on the motor while the Rag Doll was tied to the dock, and everything seemed to work all right.

“You know,” Cordy eventually said, “the tide is high right now so we wouldn’t have any problem getting around here. Maybe we ought to take it out so we can see how well it really works.”

It didn’t take much more than the suggestion for the lines that had tied the Rag Doll to the dock for months to be cast off. With Amanda at the tiller and the rest of the crew on board, the boat moved under its own power for the first time in what had probably been a few years. It was still a long way from being able to sail – the sails were still in the storage shed anyway – but it was a happy moment for everyone. This whole thing was going to work.

They didn’t go over the sand bar and out of the mouth of the bayou, although it was tempting, but Cordy said they really shouldn’t try it. After all, if the engine quit, the battery wasn’t capable of starting it again. “Somebody would have to swim ashore and go get the push boat if that happened,” she pointed out.

“That somebody isn’t going to be me,” Amanda said. “There’s too many gators in this place.”

“They’re all curled up in the mud,” Cordy replied. “It’s too cold for them.”

“Yeah, but just suppose there’s one that isn’t sleeping. I’m not going to be the one to take the risk. Cordy, you’d better hope the engine keeps running.”

“That’s not all we ought to worry about,” Jake shook his head. “I mean, think about it. Here we are with all these Coasties with us and I don’t think there’s a life jacket on board.”

“Jeez,” Ron shook his head. “Let’s just hope Chief Barnes doesn’t hear about it.”

The little ride around the bayou only lasted ten or fifteen minutes before they took the Rag Doll back to the dock. “All right!” Amanda announced. “Let’s get the tools and stuff cleaned up and put away, then break out the beer. I declare a day of celebration!”

There were only a few beers in a cooler the guys had brought, and they didn’t last long. Since it was a coolish day and the six of them in the still-unfinished cabin was a little crowded, they soon moved the party to a steak house. The Rag Doll was still a long way from being completed, but a major milestone had been passed. It really looked like the whole thing was going to be a success. “It’s not going to get done enough this winter,” Amanda said. “But next winter, let’s all plan on going sailing somewhere, even if it’s a day sail out on the river. But I’m really looking forward to the day I can go somewhere with it!”

The next day things were getting back to normal. Zack and Shades both had duty, and Ron figured that his unofficial days off had better come to an end as well; besides, Cordy had work to do around the yard. That meant that Amanda and her father were busy working on the interior, which was getting close to done. “Another couple days, and I ought to be able to go home and let your mother see what’s happening down here,” he said. “I have to admit this has gone better than I was expecting it would.”

“I sure never figured I’d be this far along by this time,” she replied. “Especially when I first looked at the shape this thing was in when Ron took me over to see it. It’s kind of a downer that it won’t be done this winter, but even if it were I wouldn’t have the time to go anywhere with it.”

“I guess that means you ought to have the chance to have a good winter with it next year. There’ll probably be some things you’ll have to do, and it could take you a few weeks, but you at least ought to be able to get a few weeks out with it.”

“I sure hope so. It’s going to be a lot different than it’s been this year. But I think it’ll be worth it.”

“This is going to be a pretty nice boat for you. You’re still planning on being pretty much alone, I take it?”

“Probably,” she sighed. “I mean, I’m pretty sure I’ll have someone with me at least some of the time. You or Mom, probably. Ron maybe, Cordy maybe, and I wouldn’t be surprised if they rigged it around that they both go with me at the same time.”

“If they’re still seeing each other,” Jake grinned. “And if they are, well, that could get real interesting.”

“I’ll tell you the truth, it wouldn’t surprise me,” she laughed. “I mean, I don’t know what’s going on out of my sight, but they sure give me plenty of reason to suspect that something’s happening. And who knows what’s going to happen when we’re back up north?”

“Very true,” he snickered. “In fact, if anything I’d suspect that your and my being here might be slowing them down a little. But do you think you’re going to be up for extended cruising by yourself?”

“I ought to be. I’ll admit it would be more fun if I had someone with me, but if I don’t, I don’t. I can see what Adam means when he says he’d rather have someone with him for the sake of company. I’ll bet it gets a little lonely for him.”

“Yeah, maybe,” Jake sighed. “But we haven’t heard anything from him, so I guess no news is good news. Besides, I wonder how alone he really is.”

“What do you mean by that?”

“I’m just guessing,” he shrugged, “But you remember when he went to Georgian Bay last summer?”

“We didn’t know about it until fall, but yeah.”

“He never came right out and said it, but I don’t think he was alone for all that time. I mean, a couple times he sort of said ‘We did this or that’ and I don’t think he was talking about him and the Knick-Knack if you know what I mean.”

“You think he had a girlfriend with him?”

“It could be,” Jake shook his head. “I don’t know, and like I said, he never went into details about it. But that makes me think he might not be alone on his trip right now, either. If he had someone with him, a girlfriend maybe, it wouldn’t surprise me. And it wouldn’t surprise me if he didn’t tell us about it, either.”

“That seems a little strange. You’d think he’d say something about it.”

“Maybe not. I told you he’s the kind of guy who may not let his left hand know what his right hand is up to, and I think I understand why.”

“Why’s that?”

“Look, I know you met his ex-wife, Brittany. You know I used to go out with her when we were both pretty young, but as she got older she really got to be a pain in the neck.”

“Yeah, I saw that.”

“Don’t ever forget that Adam, even though he’s turning into a boat bum, was and to a degree still is a successful business executive. I’d be willing to bet money that he didn’t take his work home with him at the best of times, mostly because she wouldn’t understand it and could be a pain in the neck about it. That’s something a lot of men in his position would do anyway. But then, after Matt sailed off, Brittany was really on his ass about it, while he was trying to support Matt the best he could without letting her know about it. I mean, I know he went up to see Matt and Mary in Newfoundland one time and she never knew a thing about it. In fact, I do know he’s been trying quite hard to keep her from knowing that Mary and Matty are in Newfoundland at all.”

“I knew that. He seems to think that Brittany would like to start something to get custody of Matty, no matter what Mary says.”

“Yeah, that’s what he thinks, and he has good reason to think it. She doesn’t stand a chance of getting him but that wouldn’t keep her from trying and making a real pain in the ass of herself in the process. She has that character trait down pretty good. So, anyway, he was trying to keep Brittany from making a pain in the ass of herself with Matt. After he died, the deal with Mary and Matty came along and he had a real good reason to keep what he knew to himself, especially since she had detectives sniffing around him trying to get a lead on where Mary and Matty are. He’s always been a pretty private guy at the best of times, clear back to when I first met him, and he’s only gotten more private since all this came along. Hell, he could have a girl in every port and I don’t think he’d tell us much about it. I don’t think he does, but I do know that he had me put a modification into the Moonshadow so there could be a bed big enough for two aboard.”

“I guess that says something,” Amanda replied, her mind working in areas that she hoped her father wasn’t thinking about. “But maybe he’s hoping something will happen somewhere down the line, and is just getting prepared for it.”

“Could be,” Jake said. “And it could be it will come out in the wash. But if it does, I’ll bet it doesn’t come out until it’s pretty solid. Don’t try to read into it something that’s not there. After all, I built this one settee berth so it can be opened out wide enough for two people. I don’t think you have any intention of using it soon, unless it’s for you and Beffy, but then, you don’t know what the future will bring. I mean, you and Zack could get a fire lit under your tails and you’ll be glad you have it.”

“Not with Zack,” she said, her father’s surmises getting her a little uncomfortable – after all, she wasn’t denying the possibility that the berth was going to get used like her father was suggesting, but she didn’t have any prospects of it happening in the near future, either. “I sort of like the guy, but I don’t think it’s going anywhere. Maybe if he wasn’t in the Coast Guard things might be a little different, but even if he wasn’t I’m doubtful anything would happen anyway.”

“You never know,” he smiled. “Believe me, Amanda, you never know. You’re old enough that I could see it happening, and I hope you’ll be careful with it when it does, but you’re over twenty-one now and there’s a limit to how much your mother and I are going to watch over your shoulder about your love life. I hope you’ll be a little more open about it than Adam is being, if my guess is right at all, but at least to some extent it’s none of your mother’s and my damn business.”

The conversation gave Amanda quite a bit to think about, and at least parts of it were in areas she hoped her parents weren’t suspecting. Ever since Cordy had brought up the idea of her getting together with Adam a couple weeks before, the idea had been kicking around in her head, although not as a very great possibility. She didn’t think it was very likely, but a couple times she’d entertained the notion of getting with Adam after he got back from his trip around South Florida in a couple months – well, six weeks now – and not exactly sounding him out but testing the waters a little. Then, if her folks were amenable to her taking off for the summer, the trip that Adam had planned for the Moonshadow would be quite an adventure, and if something happened – something that involved that extra-wide bunk – she might not be totally opposed to it.

Other than the part about the fact that it would be a very fun cruise, she still had her reservations about Adam being as much older as he was, and the fact that he was a sort-of relative. But, when she thought about him a bit, he didn’t seem to be the kind of guy who would be looking for a young trophy girlfriend, let alone a young trophy wife. Now, someone his age . . . that would be a different deal. But even if that part didn’t get involved, what he had planned for next summer would be a hell of a trip that would be fun to be on.

In any case, it seemed like a pretty long shot if it happened at all. It had never been a huge potential in her mind, and now it seemed more and more a distant one.

By now Jake was running out of things to do on the Rag Doll, at least the things he’d come down to Florida for. “I guess it’s time to be getting your mother down here,” he said a couple days later. “I don’t think she’ll wind up being here for more than a couple weeks, but it’ll give her a break from winter when she really needs it.”

“Are you going to be back down here before I head back north, or is Mom going to drive your truck home?”

“At this point I’m planning on flying back down toward the end of next month. I know the plan is for you to get the Rag Doll out of the water before you go so you can get the hull cleaned. I think that maybe I ought to be here for that since there’s some things I probably ought to plan on doing while it’s on the hard. On top of that, you’re going to want to get all the crap off the hull, then sand out and paint it before you leave for the summer.”

“Yeah,” she sighed. “I haven’t done a thing on the hull since it would involve working over the side. I don’t foresee any major problems, but there could easily be some there.”

“True, and I’ll be here to help you if something like that crops up. Besides, you and I need to be heading back in the first part of the month, since there are some things on the Chinook and the Coho that need doing before we can get them in the water. It may be a bit of a rush to do it. On top of that, I’ll bet there will be more that’ll have to get done on the Moonshadow.”

“I thought you had it pretty well done.”

“I do have it pretty well done, but what do you want to bet that Adam will come back from this trip of his with a bunch of ideas for things he wants to add? After living on the Knick-Knack for two months, I’ll bet he’ll come up with a bunch of them, and as far as that goes, I wouldn’t be surprised if you pick up on some of them, too.”

“Well, in a way I hope so. I like to think I have things thought through pretty well, but I’d hate to get down here next winter and discover I’d forgotten something really important.”

“It always happens,” Jake shook his head. “That’s one of the downsides of doing a project like this as far away from home as you are. You’re not going to get much of a chance for a shakedown cruise before you have to do the real thing. But you ought to be able to work it out.”

“I sure wish you could stay longer,” she told him – and she meant it. He’d been able to do a lot of things quickly in the past couple of weeks that would have been major headaches for her, and they’d come out better than she probably would have managed, and with less fuss, too.

“It would be nice,” he said. “But there are a few things I need to do up at home before we get involved in the spring rush. Besides, like I said, your mother needs a break from the winter, and I’m sure that she wants to get a look at Cordy.”

“I can’t say that there’s anything there,” Amanda shrugged. “But I can’t say that there’s not, either.”

“To tell you the truth, it looks to me like something might be happening there. It’s not like you and Zack, which seems to be pretty much basic guy and girl nosing around with each other and not pushing it very hard.”

“That’s pretty much what it is with Zack and me,” she replied honestly. “And under different circumstances things might be different. But Ron and Cordy, that’s going to be a different story. There’s no telling what’s going to happen down here over the summer.”

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