It had all started at a fête at St Vincent's where Bruce Dalling and Voortrekker had been the star attraction. It amazed us that the little boat cradled in its trailer could race across the world's oceans. He'd come home excited by the idea of learning how to build one like it so we could all see America together.
His father knew the man who kept renewing the one relevant book in the library. He was building a Mirror class dinghy. We learned from him how to stitch together sheets of marine ply with copper wire.
His daughters didn't share his interest, so we got their lessons about sailing instead. He'd taught the three of us how to scoot reaching ice-cube wedges along the lip at the back of his workbench, and to tack and gybe matchboxes across the sanding dust ripples on his garage floor. But only Marco and I enjoyed Sundays that summer and much of the next wearing their life jackets on Wemmer Pan. Henry's family had moved away by then.