“A man at the marina office said you were leaving, and I just ran,” she explained her breathlessness, “and I can’t believe I caught you! Wow! This is some boat! Is it yours?” “Yes, mine.” I ushered Jackie into Stormchild’s cockpit where I introduced her to David and Betty, who, alone of the rather bemused crowd who had come to bid me farewell, had returned on board the yacht. My brother now behaved with an excruciating gallantry toward her. He invited her down into the saloon, enjoining her to watch the stairs and not to crack her skull on the companionway lintel. “I tried to telephone you from London Airport”—Jackie talked to me all the way down into the saloon—”but they said your home number was disconnected, and then I telephoned the boatyard and they said you were leaving today, and I would have been here hours ago, but British Rail is some kind of joke. They just pretend to run a railroad. Anyway I caught a bus in the end, which was kind of interesting.
