By the time we reached the beach, the water was a blur of churning blackness marked only by the crash of silver surf and the shattered light of moonbeams rising and falling with the waves. It was impossible to distinguish between the horizon and the sea, let alone make out the contours of the harbor and distant seawall. The Marawati was a bobbing cutout of stars and shadows marked by the faint light of a few torches burning on the warship anchored at her side. There
