FRANKENSTEIN SYNDROME

On breathing new life into a worm-eaten corpse.

Icaught a whiff of her as they dragged her remains to the dock,” Bill said as he revealed — with reverence — the name of the recently departed sport-fisherman. She had been a legend, and I had known her well. The wooden warhorse had boated more fish than a Japanese factory ship. Bill, who has a nose for boats, had made an offer on the old girl.

Oh no, I thought. It’s alive!

How could this be?

Bill is a marine-industry veteran and a connoisseur of fine rides. With a single inhalation of a vessel’s odeur,

he can usually determine the yacht’s pedigree, age and condition. Febreze as you please, but he’ll still sniff out septic-saturated, diesel-soaked bilges and worm-eaten wood. And if man’s best friend has shipped aboard, he can tell you its size, if not its breed.

In the case of the sport-fisherman, the bouquet had arrived at the dock before the vessel. She’s a goner, I’d thought. Certainly, Bill knew he couldn’t cheat the Grim Reaper.

“Is the seawater above or below her boot stripe?” I asked suspiciously.

“Below it at the moment,” Bill said. “She’s on the hard. They just burped 5 yards of river bottom and a school of snapper from her gut.” “Is she holed?” I asked. “Times three, actually,” he replied. “Did I mention that her back is broken?”

Apparently, she’d recently had a bumpy ride during a blow and ended up snorkeling across the bottom. “The truth is she’d have passed on years ago if the termites hadn’t been holding hands,” admitted Bill.

At his insistence, I inspected the boat’s remains the following day. “It’s a sad thing to see a girl that was once a knockout wither and succumb to the harsh hand of time,” I offered thoughtfully. “It’s a shame she couldn’t have settled to the bottom peacefully.” “You might be surprised to know that there’s still life left in those old bones,” Bill said.

The situation was just as I had feared. Bill was intending to resuscitate her.

I’d seen this before: Frankenstein Syndrome. Grave robbers collect the patient’s remains from backwaters up and down the East Coast. Against all odds, these misguided souls open their hearts and wallets, trying to breathe life into dry, rotting corpses. In most cases, they fail. Anything of value is shipped off to nautical flea markets, where it’s peddled as a body part or a decorative tchotchke for some seaside pub.

I was concerned for Bill and his state of mind. I thought it best to be gentle.

“This old gal doesn’t need a ventilator,” I said. “She needs the services of Dr. Kevorkian, for God’s sake. She’s had it.”

Bill rattled off the names of several well-known classics brought back from the grave. “You know as well as I do that not one of those boats has a splinter of original wood,” I said. “They’re a hodgepodge. They’re Frankensteins!”

Bill laughed loudly. “Tell the villagers to put down their torches,” he said. “I only offered to buy her transom . ... It would make a hell of a desk.”

“THE TRUTH IS SHE’D HAVE PASSED ON YEARS AGO IF THE TERMITES HADN’T BEEN HOLDING HANDS.”