A Yacht Called Erewhon by Stuart Vaughan Read Free Book Online

painfully slow progress made each day. She wanted everything to happen yesterday, and it was only when Toby stepped in and banned her from visiting daily that labour relations took a turn for the better. On his suggestion, she restricted her visits to once a week.
    Months went by before the hull was ready to be turned, a mammoth exercise in itself, but by then Mercedes had become a little more patient. Looking into the open undecked chasm of the sleeping giant, she and Jack admired the beauty of the kauri and pohutukawa timberwork.
    ‘We can’t paint over that!’ said Jack. ‘Craftsmanship like that needs to be seen.’
    ‘What shall we do then?’ Mercedes asked.
    ‘I know it will mean a lot more work, but the topsides have to be varnished.’
    When Mercedes nodded her agreement that the one-piece planking of the outer skin of the hull was not to be hidden, the builders cheered. ‘I don’t care how long it takes. There is to be no compromise on the finish!’
    Six months passed. Mercedes and Mac occasionally talked about what they should call the yacht, but there was plenty of time, and they knew the right name would come to themeventually. One day, a month from the original completion date, their newly installed telephone rang.
    ‘What are we calling this thing?’ asked Jack. ‘She’s ready to launch, and I need to put her name on the hull.’
    For once, Mercedes was lost for words. ‘I’ll have to talk to Father. I’ll call you back.’
    She raced through the house looking for Mac, thinking about Jack’s call, which had come from nowhere. She hunted high and low for Mac, but he was nowhere to be found, so she raced out into the garden; again he was nowhere in sight. She tore around to the front of the house to find him walking up the path.
    ‘Where have you been? I’ve been looking for you everywhere.’
    ‘Nowhere—just getting the mail.’
    ‘Jack just rang. The yacht is nearly ready, and she needs a name. I think I’m getting close, though. In the last five minutes the word nowhere has cropped up all over the place, and I think the yacht is trying to tell me something.’
    Mac took his walking cane and wrote the word Nowhere in the fine gravel on the path. ‘Not bad,’ he muttered, looking at the word at his feet. ‘Let’s go inside for a cup of tea and a think.’
    As they turned to walk up the stairs to the front door, a ray of sunlight squeezed through the trees and reflected off the white path onto the window beside the front door. In the window was a reflection of the word Mac had just scratched: EREHWON.
    Mercedes and Mac looked at each other in stunned disbelief. Mac turned and took the few paces back down the path to where he had scratched the word. He smoothed it out and with his cane rewrote NOHWERE.
    ‘If we’re going to have a name like that, we’d better spell itlike that Butler fellow did,’ he announced, as he sauntered back to look at the reflection in the window.
    As she opened the door, Mercedes smiled at her father. ‘I’ll ring Jack!’
    So the legend of Erewhon was born. A week later, Mac and his daughter, dressed in their finest, boarded the Stanley Bay ferry for the jaunt across the harbour. Mercedes was buzzing with excitement. Jack had made progress reports, but it now appeared he had deliberately been understating the position, probably to keep Mercedes away until the project was complete. Inspection day had arrived about a month ahead of schedule.
    It was a magnificent spring morning and, despite being a little coolly dressed in the latest fashion, Mercedes was too excited to notice the lightest of zephyrs blowing across the harbour. They walked the short distance from the wharf to the boat-shed and, as they neared, Jack was on hand to meet them. He guided them around the shed to the huge front doors at the slipway end. ‘The gods are smiling with the weather, Mr McAlister,’ he said, as they stood in front of the doors.
    Two apprentices stood at the ready.