Dense fog shrouded the water. Beyond the dock, where a small skiff was tied up, all I could see was a milky mist. It looked like it was a day better for holing up inside the lighthouse where my wife and I were staying than going out on the water.
There was a reason, after all, why the Little River Lighthouse was here, perched on a tiny speck of land off the coast of Maine, opposite the town of Cutler. The shoreline was rugged, littered with jagged, treacherous rocks.
But I didn’t have a choice. Marilyn and I were volunteering as lighthouse caretakers, a dream come true for lighthouse buffs like us. One of our jobs was to ferry overnight guests to and from the mainland, a mile away. As an experienced boater, I knew it could only be done safely at high tide.
Right now. I’d pushed the loaded luggage cart from the far side of the island, where the lighthouse, the keeper’s house and the foghorn were. Now I maneuvered the cart down the ramp to the 15-foot skiff. Marilyn and our visitors, Gene and Sally, trailed behind me.
They were counting on me to get them back to Cutler. I helped Sally into the boat and handed her a life vest. Gene put on his vest and climbed into the kayak he’d paddled over on.
“Follow close behind us, okay?” I said to Gene.
“Absolutely,” he said.
Gene was the one I was worried about, not me. Granted, we rarely had fog like this where we lived, on the Florida Panhandle. But I had a compass. I knew how to chart a course. I’d been a fighter-jet navigator in the Air Force.
At times like this, when you couldn’t trust your eyes, you had to trust your instruments to guide you.
Gene pushed away from the dock and waited for us to lead the way. I started the engine while Marilyn untied the lines and hopped in.
We crept through the water. Normally it was only a 10-minute trip to Cutler, and we’d have a clear view the whole way of its picturesque harbor, busy with hulking lobster boats, cabin cruisers, sloops and kayaks. Now I couldn’t make out a thing.
“Thank God that kayak is bright yellow,” Marilyn murmured.
Sally nodded. I could tell she was worried about her husband, but as promised, he was sticking close to us.
I shifted my gaze from the compass to the bow, straining to see through the haze.
Brumm. Brummm. Brummmm.
The deep rumble of a boat motor, from somewhere off our port side. My hand gripped the throttle tighter. The lobster boats were coming back from their morning run. If we were in their path they might not see us until it was too late.
I looked down at the compass. We were on track. But should I adjust? Which way? I spied a buoy to starboard, marking the location of a lobster trap below the surface. Too close and our motor could get tangled in a line. I gave it a wide berth, then quickly reset my course. There you go.
The fog seemed to grow thicker by the second. At least when we got to shore we’d be able to hang out in town for a bit, get a bite to eat, do some shopping. Hopefully by then it would begin to clear and the tide would still be in.
I could just barely make out the shadow of a lobster boat, a safe distance away. She pulled ahead, her wake rocking us, and then disappeared into the mist, like a ghost ship.
I inched the skiff forward, watching, listening for hidden hazards. We had to be getting close to shore, hadn’t we?
Finally, I saw the familiar outlines of buildings emerging, about 30 yards away. Hallelujah!
I steered us to the public boat ramp. Gene paddled ahead and got the kayak out first. Three local lighthouse volunteers were there to help us unload. One of them grabbed our line and tied up the boat. Another reached a hand out to Sally. I lifted our guests’ luggage onto the dock and turned to Gene.
“Hope you have a safe trip home,” I said. But Gene didn’t even look up. He was staring at the pile of luggage.
“We must have left one of our bags back on the island,” he said. “And it’s the one that has my wallet in it. Shoot.”
I glanced over my shoulder at the fog. Lobster boats were still coming in. Nuts.
“No problem,” I said. “We’ll go back and get it.”
“I’m sorry,” Gene said. “I can go with you if you’d like.”
I waved him off and helped Marilyn back into the boat.
“Are you sure about this?” she asked me quietly.
“We’ll be fine,” I said, hoping I sounded more confident than I felt. The compass could only tell me which direction we were going. It couldn’t tell me where the island was or, more importantly, where we were.
If I got even a little bit off course, if I took us past that speck of land, we’d be headed straight out to open sea.
Marilyn stood beside me, shivering. From the damp chill or fear, I wasn’t sure. I guided the boat out of the harbor, around one buoy, then another, then a lobster car, a type of holding cage. Resetting our course each time. Nothing but fog everywhere I looked.
It was kind of creepy, how it seemed to cling to us.
“Is this the right direction?” Marilyn asked.
I looked down at the compass. I was gripping it hard. “We’re heading southeast,” I told her. “That’s right.”
“Shouldn’t we be going more to the left?”
Left? We weren’t exactly driving down a road. But something didn’t feel right to me either. Could I have overcorrected?
I heard a roar. A boat practically on top of us. I was afraid to even move. The other boat emerged from the fog, heading away from us, toward the town harbor. Whew. That was close.
“Is that a tree line over there?” I pointed starboard.
“Honey, I don’t see anything,” Marilyn said.
Now I couldn’t see it either. I felt completely blind. Dread rose inside me. We should have been back at the island by now. But I didn’t know where we were. Which way to turn. The compass couldn’t help me. I was totally lost.
It was eerily quiet. Only the rumbling of the skiff engine, taking us deeper and deeper into the fog. Then came a voice. The words were unspoken, but unmistakable.
Listen. Just listen.
I cut the engine to idle. Waited. But there was nothing. What was it I was supposed to hear? I needed to see, not hear!
Then, in the distance, a faint, deep repeating sound. Like someone blowing a…
“The foghorn!” Marilyn exclaimed.
We stared at each other in disbelief. The foghorn could only be heard on the ocean side of the island. We were headed out to sea! How could that have happened? I’d made only the smallest of turns. Kept an eye on the compass. Trusted that I…
In that moment it hit me how I’d gone wrong. I’d been so certain that I knew what I was doing, never realizing that somewhere along the line I’d misread the compass. Every maneuver I’d made after that had taken us farther and farther off course.
It was okay to be confident in my abilities and in my instruments. But ultimately there was only one navigation system that would never steer me wrong. Or maybe I should say, one great Navigator.
I wheeled the boat around and pointed it toward the sound of the horn until the outline of the lighthouse came into view through the fog. Marilyn and I exchanged smiles. I circled the island until we found the dock. Finally we were back.
We tied up. I hopped out and ran the half mile to the keeper’s house. There was the bag, right where our guests had left it. I rejoined Marilyn in the skiff. No worries about making it to the mainland this time. I had all the direction I needed.
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