Donisha would soon be on her way up from Los Angeles to retrieve us, so there�d be no rest for the warm and dry. The rudder had to come off.
I donned the wetsuit; it was much like squeezing into a neoprene womb. Dangling feet in the water to prepare I winced at my shipmates. Their heartfelt pity was expressed with comments like: �I�m sure glad it�s not me,� and, �shrivels the balls, huh, captain?� It occurred to me to threaten them with keelhauling, but that was tantamount to what I was about to undergo�
Water never feels as cold once you get your head under, and especially when you�re distracted. So once I was upside down and yanking on the rudder for all I was worth with my feet braced against the hull the only thing that slowed the process down was lack of oxygen. Surfacing every thirty seconds or so was necessary until I�d broken two of the bolts on the lower rudder attachment, leaving one final, tenacious, screw. At this point I was cold. The coming-up-for-air part of the process was wearing me out.
One last time, I told myself. Eric began looking nervous: he knew he�d be in the water if I reached the breaking point.
Ducking below the stern, I braced with my hands on the hull, got both feet on the now horizontal rudder, and jumped on it, kicking until it came free. A crude method, perhaps, but effective enough. The rudder floated to the surface and I followed it.
Brian had a warm cup of coffee waiting.
We stood back to admire the wreckage of our steering device. Encouragingly, it had withstood quite a bit of punishment coming off. Now it lay on the dock like the rotting carcass of a beached sea creature. I looked back to the boat with parental concern. The poor thing. Without her rudder, Faith was a floating cabin with a big recreation area in back. I shuddered. Only partly from the cold.