Love is Always Write Anthology Bonus Volume

surface of the water, and they soon went out.
    Something slammed into Daniel from behind and then slid roughly along his arm. He hooked his fingers into it, and found he had hold of a rough wooden crate. It was battered and empty, but still rode high on the waves. He hauled his chest up on the uneven boards, glad of the chance to get his face further clear of the foul water. But even from that perch nothing was visible nearby.
    He wondered if anyone had got the rafts or the boats launched. Drills made it seem easy, but drills didn't include fire and wounded men underfoot and decks slick with oil and steeper than San Francisco streets. If any of the boats were out there they might be sweeping the area for survivors.
    Daniel figured he was probably better off than many of the men who had to be out there in the dark water. The fall that had rung his bell had been a minor thing. He wasn't hurt. He had a life-jacket and even the crate for added buoyancy. He tipped his head skyward and forced his eyes open, letting the rain rinse them. After a moment of thought he opened his mouth too, rinsing and then swallowing.
    Rescue was surely coming. The Gageway hadn't been sailing in convoy, so it wouldn't be immediate. But surely even with how fast she'd gone down, there had been time for a radio operator to get off an SOS. And if she didn't show up at her destination, there would be a search. They only had to hold out for a few hours. Maybe a day. The kapok vests were good for forty-eight hours or more before becoming waterlogged. The ocean temperature at this latitude wasn't the killer it was in the seas around Europe. He would be fine.
    Others wouldn't though. He couldn't see them in the dark, but Daniel knew that out in that sulfurous, debris-strewn water, men were dying. He'd seen men in those last minutes on the crippled ship who clearly had injuries and burns. Some of his shipmates had no doubt failed to grab life-jackets, like that poor slob on the deck, and without one they would last only as long as they had the energy to stay afloat. And he couldn't think about them, couldn't let his thoughts go there, because somewhere out among those men was Jacob. Hopefully he was unhurt and cocooned in grey kapok, or even better on a boat or raft somewhere. Somewhere.
    It wasn't just Jacob. So many names and faces flashed through his mind. But they came back down to that one... God. Trip.
    For a minute Daniel just put his face on his crossed arms on the damned crate and shook. Daniel had made it off safely. There was no reason Jacob couldn't have, and yet... There was Jacob and George and Clarence and Tom and Rog and Syl and even Badger with his damned stories, and they couldn't all be alive out there in the dark, filthy water. And if one of them was dead, any one of them, then it might be Jacob, and Daniel wasn't sure how he would survive that.
    The rain slacked off minutes, or maybe hours, later. With the easing of the wind and rain, Daniel could hear the sound of men's voices in the darkness. He oriented as best he could and began kicking in that direction, propelling himself and his unwieldy crate forward. The first man he came across was dead.
    At least there was no doubt. The body bobbed, kept afloat in its life vest, but half the face was missing and no blood flowed. The hair was short and blond and unfamiliar. The arms trailed limply. Daniel was about to swim past and then thought better of it. He swam over closer. The corpse was wearing a life vest and there would be men out there without one who were still alive.
    It was gruesome work getting the vest off the corpse. Daniel almost gave it up twice, especially when his crate threatened to float away. But eventually he had the thing freed. Clutching a strap in one hand, he resumed his awkward progress without looking back. He wasn't sure if the body would sink or float, but he knew he didn't want to see it.
    The next time he crested a wave, there was a hint of light in the sky. He thought he could make out shapes in the water ahead, although it was still hard to tell men from debris. Over the next fifteen minutes the light gradually brightened. There was no doubt some of those dark forms were men.
    Daniel kicked his way forward steadily. His legs were beginning to feel numb, and sometimes he wondered, in the ebb and wash of the waves, if he was actually making progress. Sometimes he heard a shout or whistling, as the men ahead tried to communicate over the distances. He