Rite of Passage

When we got to the far side of the harbor, instead of coming directly back, as I somehow had thought we would, Ralph turned us so that we were traveling out at an angle toward the mouth of the harbor. Traveling that way, we were running at an angle through the waves, too, and the chop increased tremendously. We would go up in the air, and then quite suddenly down again, and after a few minutes of this, I was starting to feel queasy. It was a different sort of upset that I’d been suffering earlier in the day. This was nausea and accompanied by a whirling in the head.

I said to Helga, “Can’t we go straight back? I’m starting to feel sick.”

“This is the quickest way back,” she said. “We can’t sail directly into the wind. We have to tack, head into the wind at an angle.”

“But we’re going so slow,” I said. It was the slow way we rammed into waves, surged high, and then pitched down on the other side that threw my stomach off stride.

Ralph yanked on the line that was attached to the boom, and swung it over from one side of the boat to the other, turning the tiller at the same time, and we headed back in toward the quay in another slow tack. By that time, I was feeling miserable.

“Don’t throw up,” Helga said cheerfully. “We’ll be back soon enough.” Then she raised her voice. “You’ve had it your fair turn, Ralnh. Let me take over.”

“Oh, all right,” Ralph said, quite reluctantly.

Helga ducked back to the stern, taking the tiller and the boom line from Ralph. She nodded at me. “She’s feeling sick,” she said.

“Oh,” Ralph said. He came forward and sat down beside me.

He looked at me and said, “It takes awhile to get your sea-legs. After you sail for awhile you get used to it.”

He didn’t say anything while we completed that leg and part of the next tack. He just watched Helga a little wistfully. I began to think that this sailing thing — provided first that you were feeling well enough to enjoy it at all — was much more fun for the person actually doing the sailing than for the passengers. Helga and Ralph, at least, both seemed to he having much more fun when they were sailing than when they were sitting up front. Perhaps it was just that they felt they had to talk to me, and that was an effort for them.

Ralph said, “Uh, well, how do you think our fathers are getting along?”

I swallowed, trying to keep control of my stomach. I said, “I don’t know. I don’t even know what they were going to trade for.”

He looked at me in surprise. “You don’t even know that? We operate placer mines just to produce tungsten ore for you, we ship it all the way here, and you don’t even know it!”

“Why don’t…” I paused, and grabbed hard onto the side of the boat (gunwale) and fought hard to hold onto my composure as we dipped into a sudden trough. “Why don’t you mine this stuff, whatever it is, just for yourselves?”

Somewhat bitterly he said, “We don’t know how to reduce it. You Ship people won’t tell us how. When we trade with you, all you give us is little bits and pieces of information.”

We were heeling over into our last tack then, about to head down the last stretch to the dock.

I said, “And why not? We preserved all the knowledge through the years since Earth was destroyed. If we gave it all to you, what would we have left to trade with?”

“My dad says you’re parasites,” he said. “You live off our hard work. You’re Grabbies, and that’s no mistake.”

“We are not parasites,” I said.

“If things were the way they ought to be, we’d be the ones living like kings, not you.”

“If we live like kings, why were you saying earlier that we had to live all crowded together in barracks?”

He was nonplussed for a moment and then he said, “Because you like to live like pigs, that’s why. I can’t help it if you like to live like pigs.”

“If there are any pigs around here, it’s you Mudeaters,” I said.

“What?”

“Mudeaters!”

“Grabbie! Why don’t you take a bath?” He put his hand against my chest and gave a hard shove. In spite of our quarreling, he caught me unprepared, and I went tumbling overboard.

The feel of the water was shocking. It was colder than the air, though after the first moment not unpleasantly cold. I got a mouthful of water as I went under and it was very bad-tasting, dirty and bitter. I came up, coughing and spluttering, as the boat swung on past me. I got a glimpse of Helga with her head turned back toward me and a surprised look on her face. I treaded water while I coughed out the water that had gone down my windpipe, and some that had gone down the wrong way came up the wrong way and out my nose. It took several seconds before I was breathing properly. The shock and choking did settle my stomach, I found to my surprise, but it wasn’t the way I’d have chosen to do it if I had had a choice.

Helga had spilled the air out of the canvas and turned the tiller. The Guacamole was just rocking on the water and drifting. She stood up, looking back at me.

“Do you need help?” she called.

We weren’t really far from the dock, so I called, “No, I can swim in.”