Swimming to Catalina

effort to reach something he could hang on to. He could not get used to the cold of the water; it seemed to be right at the freezing point. Why were there no chunks of ice floating in it? He could hang on to an ice floe and rest his weary muscles.
    Cold water. The great white shark was a cold-water creature, wasn’t it? Didn’t fishermen catch great whites in these waters? Clips from the filmJaws flashedthrough his mind. A naked girl hanging desperately on to a buoy as the giant fish tore its way through her lower extremities. At least he wasn’t naked, though he knew he could swim faster if he were. He thought about kicking off his shoes, but they didn’t seem to be slowing him down, and anyway, he had paid six hundred and fifty dollars to have them made. He’d hang on to the shoes.
    He thought about making love to Betty the night before, but then he recalled that Betty was responsible for his being where he was, and he thought about Barbara Tierney instead. Where was she now Drinking champagne aboard Ippolito’s yacht, anchored at Catalina? Or was the yacht really there? Or was there really a yacht? Yes, there was; he recalled the bank manager telling him that Ippolito had a veritable flotilla—was that the word he had used? Stone had already been aboard two of Ippolito’s boats, albeit briefly.
    He tried a sidestroke but began sinking, so he went back to his crippled dog paddle. There was no way to rest—the chain prevented that—so he slogged on, stroke after stroke, kick after kick, gulp after gulp of air, on and on into the night. At this rate he might miss Catalina entirely and continue on toward Hawaii.
    The lights were closer now, but not that much closer, and he was fading. His strokes were getting shorter and slower, and nothing his brain could say to his muscles would make them work better or longer. Thank God there isn’t a sea running, he thought; I’d be dead by now. He thought about dying and discovered that he wasn’t ready to do it. The thought gave him new strength, but not much; you couldn’t call it a second wind, hardly that. He thought about Arrington and the child she carried inside her. Was it his? If hedied tonight, would there be a son to carry on the Barrington name, such as it was? No, he would carry on the Calder name, no matter to whom he owed his DNA.
    He lurched onward, but something was wrong. The mast lights were no longer visible. He turned his head and looked around; had he gotten off course? He was sure he hadn’t, so he paddled on. Then something very strange happened; he reached out in front of him with his bound hands, pulled the Pacific Ocean toward him and struck his head very hard on a very hard object.
    Dazed, he put out his hands and they met the object, too; it was smooth and dark, and he couldn’t hold on to it. With new, brief strength he turned and swam parallel to it, and he came to its end. It was a small boat with a black hull, and at its stem there was the most wonderful thing: a boarding ladder. He grasped it in both hands and laid his cheek against the hull, panting and whimpering.
    After a moment, he felt himself slipping into unconsciousness. He shook his head. “No!” he screamed as loudly as he could, and it wasn’t very loud. The ladder unfolded in his hands and the bottom rung fell into the water as it had been designed to do, for swimmers. He got his feet on the rung, which was about a foot underwater, and tried to stand on it, but his hands slipped and he fell sideways into the water.
    He had so little strength left now; he began to think that perhaps it would feel better if he just gave himself to the sea and let everything go. But he couldn’t; he had one more try in him, he was sure. He lurched toward the ladder again and got his feet on the bottom rung. Holding a higher rung with both hands, he pulled himself upward until he was standing with his kneeslocked. He stayed that way for a good minute, hearing the water running from his clothes, back into the sea. The next rung would be harder, since he no longer had any buoyancy.
    He reached up and grabbed the stainless stee railing above him with his two hands, then, holding on for dear life, he pulled his feet up and felt for the next rung. Miraculously, he found it. The deck of the little yacht was now at the level of his knees, and he could get his arms over the top steel railing. That allowed him to pull his feet on the deck, and with his last strength, he pushed himself over the