He took them all sailing. It was amazing to Gerald how clumsy Tom and Milly were, unable to find the natural locations on deck or in the cockpit where one could sit comfortably while the yacht heeled or pitched gently, how often they got in the way of the tiller, sheets, or the swinging boom, grabbed the wrong things, almost fell overboard. "Well, that was exciting!" said Milly when she stepped carefully onto the stone quay afterward, "And I'm jolly glad it's over!"

Lulu, on the other hand, asked him to take her out again. She was like a cat aboard the boat, small and quick and balanced. Right away she got the hang of pulling the sheets when Gerald tacked. Under way, she liked to sit on the bowsprit over the creaming bow wave. At other times, Gerald would find her below, sitting on a settee, looking around the cabin. She lay down experimentally on the settee berths and looked up at him. "I love this little boat."

She asked him to show her how to work the Primus stove, and she quickly learned to preheat the burner with alcohol, pump the tank, and ignite the pressurized paraffin as it vaporized in the burner. She made them tea. "So exciting," she said.

"But why don't you have an engine?" she asked him. Gerald explained that in a boat as small as Nereid, there was little room for fuel tanks, so that an engine could not be run for long, only a few hours, which would hardly help much on a long passage. Engines were useful for getting a yacht in and out of harbors, but again, such a small boat sailed almost as well as a dinghy and he could maneuver it handily in the lightest of airs. Without an engine, he had more room, no noise, no engine breakdowns, no smell of oily fumes.

"So you can just go," she said, marveling, "by untying your ropes and pushing off. Anywhere that's touched by water, can't you?"

"Yes, that's the idea."

"You could sail from here-from Cala Marsopa-to the Caribbean, then?"

"Yes."

"What would you do for food? And water?"

"Well, you stop here and there. Like here. The world's not a desert."

"And you're going from here to Greece?"

"Yes."

One afternoon they sailed to Cala Gat, the small cove with a tiny beach smaller than a tennis court below the lighthouse on the very eastern tip of Mallorca. Gerald anchored and Lulu made them lunch: bread, sardines, cheese, wine, olives, peaches. Then she took off her clothes and dove overboard. "Come in!" she insisted. Gerald put on his swimming trunks, hung the rope boarding ladder, and joined her in the water. They swam and then they climbed back aboard up the rope ladder. She went up first; Gerald's eyes involuntarily followed her lean hindquarters swaying above him until he forced himself to look away. He was amazed and touched by her unself-consciousness, by her trust. "Come and lie down," she said as she stretched herself out in the sun on deck.

As he lay beside her, he had a view of the beading seawater drying on her stomach, and much else.

Then she sat up and looked at him, pushing her hair out of her face. "God, Gerald, look at how you live. This is glorious."

"It's not for everyone."

"More fool they. Then everybody would live like this."

She grinned.

"What?" he said.

She kissed him. Then she took his hand and led him below and made love to him. Even that first time, it was beyond anything Gerald could have imagined.

Later she said, "Can we spend the night here? Do we have to go back to the port?"

"Tom and Milly will be worried about you."

She laughed softly at him. "No they won't, darling."

She made them dinner: bully beef and asparagus from Gerald's tins, bread, wine, cheese, the rest of the peaches. Gerald watched her, surprised by her ease and enjoyment of what she was doing.

As they ate, she asked him to show her where he was going.

He cleared the tiny saloon table, put their plates on the settees beside them, and spread out beneath the light of the paraffin lamp his creased small-scale chart of the Mediterranean. Look, here's Troy, he said. What, the real Troy? she asked. Yes, right here below Istanbul; it was discovered by a German about seventy years ago. And here's Ithaca, the home of Odysseus; about six hundred sea miles between them. Two weeks' easy sail, depending on conditions, but it took Odysseus ten years of unintended detours. A lot of famous trouble. This island, here, Jerba in Tunisia, I think, is the Land of the Lotus-eaters-"

"Shall we be Lotus-eaters?" she said, pulling him toward her.

The next afternoon, when they sailed back to Cala Marsopa, Lulu asked Gerald if they could anchor off Villa los Roques. She wanted to swim from the boat to the rocks on the shore and climb up them to the villa. The sea was almost calm, there was little swell. Of course, said Gerald.

"Come on," said Lulu, when he'd let go the anchor, and she dove overboard.

Gerald lowered the ladder before following her.

When he reached the rocks, Lulu was already climbing.

"Careful," he said.

Lulu turned to look down at him, paddling below, and smiled. "Darling, I do this every day." Perhaps she didn't turn away and look down every day, or for whatever reason, she slipped. Her arm shot out for a handhold but she missed it. Gerald watched her fall: she arched forward and he clearly saw her chin strike a projecting nub of sharp limestone. Her head snapped back as she came away from the rock face and fell backward into the water beside him.

When he pulled her up, she was facedown. He rolled her over, got an arm under her head, and lifted her face clear of the water. Her eyes were closed, but she was breathing easily. Blood streamed from a gash on her chin, swirling in the water around her face like red ink. Otherwise, she looked peaceful: asleep; as if she might open her eyes at any moment. Kicking to support them, Gerald used his other hand to smooth away the hair from Lulu's face. He could see that it was already shot through with premature gray. He had never seen anything more beautiful.

But she was quite unconscious. He looked up: no way to climb up that lot with her. He adjusted his arm, wrapping it around her and keeping her head on his chest, and struck out with the other arm toward the boat.

When she awoke, Lulu looked up and saw Gerald's face.

"What happened?"

"You fell. You've cut your chin-no, don't touch-" He stopped her hand and wrapped it in his own. "I've got a bandage on it. It's all right, though you might need a stitch or two. It threw your head back quite sharply. How do you feel?"

"Bit of a headache. I can feel the chin, now that you mention it." She looked beyond him, her eyes ranging over the interior of the little boat, then back to Gerald's face. "How on earth did you get me aboard?"

"Put you over my shoulder. I had the ladder down. Wasn't difficult. No getting you up those rocks, though. We'll go ashore in the dinghy when you feel up to it."

Her eyes looking at him grew large and still. "You saved me."

"Yes. Well, I wasn't going to go off and leave you." He grinned at her.

Lulu lifted her arm and placed a cool hand against Gerald's cheek. She moved her thumb across his mouth, looking at her hand, her thumb, his face. "Gerald," she said, "take me with you."

"Where?"

"Wherever you're going. To Greece."

He imagined it again. "I'm not sure how long I'll be. I mean, I won't return soon."

"Marry me. Then we won't be in a rush."

He stared at her, all thought falling away except the phrase: Why not?

"I'll make you happy, Gerald. I'll make you as happy as I feel right now."

He knew he should think for a moment, but what was there to think about? What if all the years ahead could go on as the last two days had been?

"Gerald," she said, very quietly, as if she were about to point out a hummingbird nearby and didn't want to scare it away, "I love you."

"I love you too."

"Then it's simple. Take me with you."

"All right," he said.

She pulled his face down. "Watch out for your-" he said as she kissed him.

Tom and Milly thought it a splendid idea. Well, why not? they said. Milly shrieked and hugged them both. Tom, in loco parentis, had a friendly chat with Gerald. He reported to Lulu and Milly that Gerald had little or no money, but he was intelligent, well educated, his idea about The Odyssey was really quite smart-but never mind all that: Lulu, you're never going to marry some duffer in a bank. I'm sure it'll be all right.

While Lulu's chin was being stitched in the doctor's office, Milly told Gerald that although Lulu probably wouldn't mention it, not right away, she'd had a beastly time of it growing up: neglectful parents, who at one point had actually lost her while traveling in Belgium, then died; a succession of indifferent relatives; boarding school in Scotland-well, it had all been jolly unpleasant for her until Milly and Tom had discovered her as a ward of friends in London and taken her on, initially as a cook. . . . Anyway, all she really needed was absolute trust and safety. If he gave her that, they'd have no problems.

Go on, the both of you, Tom and Milly said, sail off in your little ark and please come back and stay with us next summer.

It all happened very quickly. Lulu and Milly made a simple, summery white wedding dress. Gerald had a blazer, his old school tie, and presentable flannel trousers folded away on his boat. Tom made the arrangements and drove them into Palma where Gerald and Lulu were married at the British consulate. Tom stood them a wedding dinner of suckling pig at La Fonda in Cala Marsopa.

For a wedding present, Gerald gave Lulu one of several copies of The Odyssey he carried aboard the yacht. "This is quite an interesting translation." He opened it. "You see, it says it's by T. E. Shaw-the pen name of T. E. Lawrence, of Arabia. He knows his way around a good story. He's got some interesting things to say about Homer in his Introduction. I don't have anything else to give you, but I can promise you an odyssey."

"Oh, darling! That's all I want." Lulu hugged and kissed him fiercely. "We will have an odyssey, won't we!"

And they sailed away.

She was a strong swimmer; unable to catch her up, he followed her all the way in to the shore. They could see rocks beneath them against the pale sand in the moonlight. Lulu walked out of the water and lay flat on the sand, faceup, legs and arms spread.

"Come and lie beside me," she said. "Nobody's here to see you now," she said.

Gerald was not yet a blithe naturist. He'd learned to enjoy swimming naked in the sea with Lulu, but not where anybody might see them. She was completely indifferent to such a concern, and he'd had to caution her when she wanted to leap overboard in anchorages where other craft were anchored or might appear.

He sat down beside her. He heard a bell somewhere above them-sheep or goats.

"Is that your cave up there, then?" she asked.

"That black hole we saw coming in? I think so. We'll see."

"So this is where the Cyclops lived?"

"Perhaps-if he lived."

"Tell me again," she said, "it's to do with some fog, right?"

Gerald's heart swelled every time she asked him questions about his investigation of The Odyssey; how she wanted to understand what he was doing. No one else had. "That's right." He told her how Odysseus and his men had sailed from the land of the Lotus-eaters and landed in the morning at an island in fog, where they'd found a spring coming down to the port. There wasn't much fog in the Mediterranean, especially in the south, but it could occur here off the west coast of Sicily. The island of Favignana-"where we were yesterday, you remember the spring"-was where Gerald believed Odysseus encountered fog and then sailed on a short distance, exactly as they had in Nereid, to the mainland of Sicily, where both Odysseus and now Gerald and Lulu had found a cave.

"How do you know it happened?" Lulu asked.

"Well, no one knows for sure. But I think it's like any faith. You could say the same about the Bible. You believe in it, or not, depending on whether you have faith, regardless of reason or lack of absolute proof, because it makes-"

"Look," said Lulu, rising on her elbow, "another boat's come in."

Gerald turned his head from Lulu and the shore. The navigation lights were dim, but against the moon-splashed water he could make out a sagging, neglected-looking fishing boat, forty feet or so long, coming around the headland to the north, moving sluggishly into the slight scalloped bay off the beach.

"Guardia Costiera," Gerald said, quietly, as if to himself.

"What's that, darling?"

"Italian coast guard."

"It looks like a decrepit fishing boat."

"It probably was. Beggars can't be choosers. But even in this light you can see by their ensign. The little flag on the stern."

The boat was still moving slowly forward and the loud rattle of chain running through a hawsepipe came across the water.

"They're not the best seamen either." Gerald could never have brought himself to let go chain while a boat was moving forward and have it scrape down the side of the hull, a most slovenly bit of mismanagement. It bespoke slovenliness in other things, an entire attitude to life. "I think we should get back to the yacht."

"Oh, do let's lie here, darling. They're not going to see us."

"They'll see the boat and the anchor light. They can be officious little men. They'll be very bored, and we're a foreign yacht. Almost certainly they'll come alongside to see our papers."

"Not tonight, surely?"

"They may. And if we're not aboard, they may board the yacht. Come on."

Gerald stood, crouching, as if to remain unseen, for in the pale light he thought they might be visible on the beach from the Guardia vessel. He moved quickly into the water. "Lulu, darling, do come now. We must get back to the boat."

They were not far off the beach when Gerald saw the rubber tender coming away from the Guardia boat, making toward Nereid. Several figures ineptly deploying short oars like paddles; voices across the water. The rubber boat had no directional stability and crabbed along, half spinning with each of the paddlers' efforts counteracting the others. But slowly it drew closer to the yacht. It would be awkward without clothing; their nakedness would be visible. "Quick as you can, darling," he said.

The voices in the rubber boat quietened, then grew more animated, and Gerald realized that they'd been spotted. The boat's zigzag course altered, grew jerkier as it moved faster, and he saw they would be intercepted before they reached Nereid.

"Buonasera," called Gerald, with the cheerfulness of an English holidaymaker.

"Buonasera," came the reply, with a measured vacancy.

The men in the boat-there were three of them, Gerald now saw-continued talking in a more subdued tone. He could understand nothing. He spoke a modicum of Italian, what he needed to obtain food, drink, supplies in Italy, but they were speaking Neapolitan, the dialect he'd heard in southern Tyrrhenian ports. As they drew to within a few feet of them, the men ceased paddling and drifted. Their eyes were shadowed but he could tell they were looking at the swimmers. The rubber boat was some sort of ex-military life raft, oblong, with no discernible bow or stern; the air chambers sagged under the weight of the three occupants, indicating a leak in the rubberized canvas or at a valve.

"Inglese?"

"S," said Gerald. He and Lulu continued swimming toward Nereid.

More talk in the boat, a real conversation now. Gerald could now make out the paddlers: not officious little men, but youths in filthy, ill-fitting uniforms. Not seamen or sons of fishermen but city boys ignorant of boats and the water beyond basic training-perhaps one of them knew something about engines. Gerald had seen them in every poor Italian port he had visited since the war, singly and in groups, unemployed, staring incomprehensibly at his small boat, and at him as he moved about and came and went. In these ports he had paid a small fee to the designated unofficial watchman who, somehow, kept such boys from pilfering anything stowed on a boat's deck or looting its contents below. These three were the lucky ones: employed and given uniforms and authority and let loose in a leaking tub with a vague mandate of enforcing maritime- The jabbing oar caught Lulu's shoulder. "Ow!" she said, with unconcealed annoyance. A young man in the rubber boat giggled and the others commented in tones as if critiquing a bocce toss. All three began using their oars to pull Lulu closer to their boat, as if she were a tortoise. Gerald shouted something and pushed an oar away. An oar hit the back of his head with force, making a crunching noise that he heard in the middle of his brain. Another oar hit his face with a blinding, stunning smack.

He was rolling underwater. For a moment he couldn't determine which way was up, but he understood everything very matter-of-factly.

He surfaced to an empty view of water and coast, heard noise, turned in the water, and saw Lulu, clearly naked in the moonlight, wriggling, emitting hoarse grunts, fighting as she was pulled aboard the rubber dinghy by the three men as if she were a large struggling fish. The men were laughing, one of them barking excitedly like a man baiting a dog. They were thirty feet away. Once they had her flopping in the bottom of the boat, they sat on her and began paddling back toward the Guardia Costiera vessel. Gerald heard noises from Lulu, he saw the men struggling, and heard slapping sounds, then angry shouts from Lulu.

He swam as fast as he could after the rubber boat. It moved jerkily, rocked by tremors, but the men were now paddling with urgency, heading toward the Guardia boat. Then he heard a splash-Lulu had managed to jump overboard. He could make her out, swimming strongly, pulling ahead of the dinghy. A minute later he saw her climbing out of the water just before the dinghy reached the beach. Her white form in the dark moving up the steep rocky bank, and the three men jumping out of the dinghy in the shallows, climbing after her.