Bloody Point by Linda J. White Page B

toward the Bay.
    After an hour or so, she walked over to the dinghy rack and
pulled out a sea kayak she kept there. Donning her life jacket and grabbing a
paddle, she launched the craft and set off down the creek. Perhaps the wheeling
gulls, or the whispers of the bulrushes, or the sound of the egrets crying from
their nests on the channel markers would tell her what she needed to know.
    Cassie stayed out for about two hours. The Bay was calm with
light waves. She stayed close to shore, near where Goose Creek entered the
larger body of water. She saw schools of little fish jump out of the water as
if something bigger were underneath them, chasing them. She saw cormorants,
dark duck-like birds with long necks, diving for food. And she quietly watched
a blue heron stalking minnows in the shallows along the shoreline, his long,
ungainly legs almost comical in their stilt-like form. She always found peace
on the water. The smell of the salt, the breeze on her face, the lapping sound
of the waves, the birds, the fish — they all touched a part of her soul that
otherwise languished. She needed the water.
    Then the wind came up strong, and the chop started to build
and Cassie began paddling back up the creek. Her arms began to ache but it was
a good kind of ache — from exertion, not emotional pain — and she welcomed it.
Arriving at the marina she beached the kayak, scrambled out, and tugged it up
on shore. She hefted it overhead, and put it back in the dinghy rack, securing
it with a lock. The wind, stronger now, whipped her hair. She got in her car,
and drove away. Where exactly she was going, she didn’t know.
    When she had driven half a mile down the road, a loud “boom”
rattled her car windows and made her jump. That’s odd , she thought, I
wonder what that was? Still, she kept on driving. Less than five minutes
later, a police car screamed past her, going the other way, lights flashing.
Then there was another, and another, two more “booms” and then she saw fire
trucks rolling out of a station, lights and sirens blazing.
    Curious now, Cassie wheeled her car around and headed back
toward the marina. Two more cop cars passed her, and then another fire truck.
She accelerated in her anxiety. A block away from the marina, she saw a dark
column of smoke billowing in the sky. She turned left, then right, and when the
marina came into view, she gasped. Black smoke billowed from burning boats. The
marina was on fire!
    Cassie parked the car and jumped out. Six boats were already
burning. The sloop next to the lift was fully involved. Flames were licking
hulls, lines, and docks. One fire truck had arrived and was laying lines,
others were arriving, their crews jumping off as the engines came to a stop.
People were streaming out of the Blue Goose restaurant.
    Cassie spotted her boat. It was five boats away from the fire.
Five boats. Could she save it? She had to. Adrenaline flashed through her and
she began running toward Time Out . The boat had been resurrected once;
she couldn’t let it be destroyed now.
    Boom! A boat exploded on the A-Dock, stopping Cassie
in her tracks. Already she was choking on smoke. Could she get there in time?
Could she save her boat?
    The smoke thickened as her feet hit the dock. Her eyes began
watering. She could hear the firemen yelling for her to stop. Time Out was halfway down the A-Dock. As she ran, Cassie went over in her mind what she
needed to do. Open the seacocks. Turn on the starting battery switch. Start
the motor. Disconnect shore power. Free the lines.
    A brisk wind was driving the fire. Tongues of flame were
leaping from boat to boat, and even the big, thick pilings were beginning to
burn. Boom! The boat four boats down from Time Out exploded.
Debris rained down around Cassie as she reached her slip. “No!” she yelled,
kicking a flaming piece of material into the water. She jumped onto her boat.
Already several sparks had singed the sailcover.
    Her hands were shaking. It took her