Chapter 42

“’An honest heart deserves other honest hearts.’  Do you remember telling us that?” asked Samantha quietly.

Sailor nodded toward them both. “Oh, yes.  Yes.  I remember.  Your voices at that time were unsure and in need, yes?”

Max sighed and nodded.  “Yes.”

The three of them stood quietly on the rocks of the shallow corner of the cove that some months earlier had provided the newlyweds with their first up-close experience with Sailor’s dolphin family.

“So,” whispered Sailor in his playful conspiratorial voice, “are the two of you going to take a few more steps into paradise?”

For Max and Sam, donning wet suits and scuba gear was but a return to memories of their initial meeting.  For Sailor, getting into his old black skin and less than hi-tech gear, a gift from Pasolini some 30 years earlier, was another story.   The old man had lost weight and muscles that had once lifted hundred-pound bags of provisions for Pasolini’s many voyages were all but atrophied to what appeared like withering and wrinkled twists of hemp. 

Sailor cinched his air tank belt, lowered his mask and closed his mouth around the mouthpiece as he slithered silently into the quiet afternoon tide.  Sam and Max followed, maintaining a close proximity to the old man whose body moved about in the water like his gray friends who were now surrounding him.  Sam stopped and tread water as she watched Sailor beckon both Max and the dolphins to touch.  He swam beneath the larger of the three dolphins and stroked its underside.  The mammal acknowledged his friend by rolling over for a moment, allowing the old hand to stroke his skin and then turned his six hundred pounds toward Max for a quick peak.  Satisfying his curiosity, he then shot to the surface to purge his blow hole.  He quickly returned, this time gliding to Max’s side and playfully brushing against him, bringing smiles and kid like reactions.  Sailor gave Max a gesture and Max began stroking the gray.  Sailor took Sam’s hand and led her to the other side.  Max and Sam watched as Sailor bowed his head as if in prayer and placed both his hands on top of theirs.  The dolphin turned its head back, eyeing the three and held its gaze.  Beneath their masks, Max and Sam retained their eye contact with the seemingly still body of glistening gray for what seemed like a full minute.

As Sailor strode out in front leading them back up the dirt path to his shack, Sam gripped Max’s hand and brought it to her lips.  No longer able to contain the experience, Sam’s eyes welled up.  Max wiped her tears from his hand and wrapped his arm around her, continuing up the hillside.  “I miss the children,” said Sam. 

“I know,” answered Max.  “They are missing you as well, I’m sure.”  He brought her closer as they walked. 

Sam hesitantly asked, “Do you understand how close I am to them, really understand?” 

Max took a few more steps before answering.  “I think I must, for I miss them as well.” 

Sam gripped his hand and lamented quietly.  “I wish they’d accept the new home I offered.  The idea is still strange to them.” 

“Time, Sam.  Time will allow all to settle.  Be patient.” 

At the shack, they shed their wet suits and once inside, Sailor immediately broke the silence with, “Well… here’s a couple of towels and… I’m sure we could all use some tea, yes?

Max nodded and sat down with Sam on an old folded sail as they dried themselves off. 

“So…” sighed Sailor, “You come all this way with only a bathing suit, wet suit and the clothes on your back and request a visit with my gray friends.  Care to let me in on the quest?”

“Quest?” answered Sam.

“Search, quest, there’s definitely a journey going on here, yes?” smiled Sailor.

Sam draped the towel across her shoulders and inched closer to Sailor who was sitting on his favorite keg waiting for the water to boil.  “Max and I have been trying to have a baby, and…”

“Yes?” Sailor responded.

“Sailor… a few days ago, after, I don’t know, probably fifteen or twenty years of taking the pill, I saw my doctor.  Two months ago I stopped taking them and we started to aggressively make… well.”

“Love, babies.  It’s Okay.  I’m old, but still have a memory,” Sailor jested.

“The doctor warned that I might not be able to have children.”

“Because?”

“Because, well… over those years, I stopped a couple of times and got pregnant twice and…”

Sailor got up and poured the water into three cups.  “And had a couple of abortions?”  He turned back to Sam and Max with a kindly smile.  “So?”

Max broke the tension that had been building with an uncharacteristic boisterous laugh.  “I told her you’d understand.”

Sailor handed them their tea and went to one of his book shelves, retrieving a small leather bond book.  “Well, I don’t know if I understand what you mean, but I might understand what you’re trying to say.”  He sat down and quietly sipped his tea.

As Sailor walked beside them and their horses to the top of the hill that led back to the Castle, Max remained quiet, ruminating over the five minutes of tea sipping that had become fifteen minutes of silence—just the three of them sitting facing each other quietly—and suddenly the epiphany that neither expected.

As they reached the hill top, Sailor took from his shoulder bag of woven sail cloth scraps, the small warn leather book.  He handed it to Sam.  “Thank you for the visit.  I’d like you both to have this book of Keats’s poetry.  It has been a good friend to me and I’d like you to have it.”

“I couldn’t take a…” said Sam as Sailor continued.

“…And on page 43, an especially good thought for your day.”

“But…” interrupted Sam once again.

Sailor gripped both their hands.  “’But’ nothing right now.  Till the next time… perhaps after you give birth.”

Sam looked incredulously at Sailor.  “That may never happen, Sailor.”

“Perhaps it has already started,” answered Sailor with a wink.  “The grays are never wrong.”  He waved and turned back down the hill toward his shack.  “Enjoy your journey.”

The eyes of both Max and Sam drifted toward each other.  Max broke the silence.  “What if he’s right?”

Sam walked ahead a few steps and turned.

“Yeah,” Sam nodded.  “What if?”

The limestone glistened with wash of the rising tide.  The gray cleared its spout, “Whoosh.”  The raven hovered, then descended to an outcrop overlooking the bay.  Sailor sat on an old keg overlooking the water and hummed, his smiling eyes moving between the traveler above “caw… caw…” and the friend below, “whoosh… whoosh.”