Lifeboat! (15 page)

‘Shall I take the trailer back to the compound?' he shouted to her but before she could answer Howard said, ‘Oh thanks, old chap. Put it near my car, would you?' Howard turned away and began to haul up the mainsail.

For a moment the amiable Sandy stared at Howard's back. Then, without another word, he re-hitched the trailer to his tractor and drove away up the beach.

As Julie fastened her life-jacket around her, she said, ‘ We should be all right if we keep to within half a mile of the shore. It's comparatively sheltered for that distance. Beyond that, with this offshore wind, it wouldn't be safe. Howard—your life-jacket.'

‘What? Oh don't fuss, Julie. I don't need that thing on, especially if you're planning to keep us pussy-footing around in the shallows.' There was an edge of sarcasm to his tone.

‘Howard, you need your life-jacket on,' Julie persisted.

‘Look, I'm a strong swimmer …'

‘It makes no difference if you could swim the Channel. If you end up in that sea today, you'll need a life-jacket. Besides, you're wearing a dark sweater so you need something on that can be seen easily if you're in the water.'

‘I've no intention of being in the water.'

‘And whilst we're on the subject, you'd have been better in shorts, not slacks. They'll end up saturated round your legs.' Julie herself was wearing shorts and a warm, lemon sweater.

For a moment they glared at each other, but Julie was determined not to give way on a matter of safety—she had been too well-trained—even if it angered Howard.

Suddenly he laughed and capitulated with good humour. It had been these swift flashes of charm that had captivated Julie when she had first met him. ‘ Oh all right, I'll wear the blessed thing, but only to stop you nagging me.'

Julie glanced seawards, narrowing her eyes, watching the choppy surf over the Saltershaven Middle, the sandbank lying parallel to the shore about half a mile out.

For a brief moment she hesitated. Instinct told her that today needed experienced sailors and she was beginning to be more than a little unsure of the true extent of Howard's experience. But he had assured her that he had spent a lot of time sailing, surely …?

The wind had caught the mainsail and it was flapping furiously before Howard had secured it. ‘Come on, Julie, lend a hand, old thing.'

Burying her apprehension, Julie moved forward to help him.

The offshore wind caught the sails and they drifted sideways in a south-easterly direction. Soon they were far enough offshore to bring the boat about and to begin sailing in a southerly direction on a reach parallel to the shore with the wind blowing at right-angles to the boat, the centre-board half up and the sails well filled.

‘Right, I'm helmsman. You'll have to crew, Julie.'

Howard, seated starboard with his back to the wind, the sails to port, was in command at the helm, the tiller in his left hand, the mainsheet in his right. It was Julie's task to move about the boat to carry out all the jobs as crew: to keep the jib roughly parallel to the mainsail and to act as ballast to help Howard keep the boat level.

‘My word,' Howard laughed, the breeze catching his words and tossing them overboard. ‘ This is the life. Do you know, I'd forgotten how jolly this sailing lark is. Come to think of it, I've never been on the sea before, only on the Lakes. This is great, I must say.'

With the wind drumming the sails, the sheets humming and the waves smacking against the boat, Julie, struggling with the jib, did not hear what Howard had said.

They sailed the
Nerissa
southwards, parallel to
the shoreline for a couple of miles, then, by pulling up the helm and
slackening off the sheets, the boat turned seawards away from the wind.

Howard, ducking beneath the boom, brought the mainsail round to starboard
and slackened the mainsheet. The jib remained on the port side and Julie
withdrew the centreboard fully. Now they were running free before the
wind.

Half a mile out to sea, they turned on a port gybe, reaching northwards
now, then two miles further on going about and beating to windward in a
zigzag pattern to complete the rectangle and bring them back almost to
their starting-point. Then once more Howard swung the tiller, switched
sides, brought the mainsail across to port, whilst Julie tussled with the
jib, yet again reaching southwards.

Above the thrum of the wind, Howard shouted, ‘Is there anywhere along the
coast we can pull in for the picnic? That bottle of Asti must be about to
pop with all this shaking.’

‘We’ll moor at the Haven. It’s about a mile and a half down the coast
from where we are now.’

The Haven proper of Saltershaven was some two miles down the coast from
the town itself. As the houses petered out and the golf-links ended, the
land gave way to sandhills, saltmarshes and mud flats which had become a
nature reserve and bird sanctuary. Through this the River Dolan meandered
towards the sea, its mouth just south of Dolan’s Point, the final
promontory of land before the ground became the treacherous marsh which
bordered the Wash.

As they reached the outer marker, Julie looked towards the shore to see
the flocks of birds wheeling and swooping against the white and grey
clouds scudding across a fitful sun. Beneath them the green marram grass,
which grew in abundance on the saltmarsh, moved in gentle waves in the
wind.

‘Do you know if it’s deep enough for us to get there?’ Howard shouted, as
the red-and-white entry marker came into view.

‘Should be—it’ll be low water any time, but it should still leave us
enough draught.’

Julie, busy with the jib in readiness to tack to starboard, missed seeing
Howard’s eyes cast heavenwards in an exaggerated expression of boredom of
her use of the language of sailing. ‘Just tell me—in plain language, if
you don’t mind—can we get far enough up river to moor at a decent place?’

Julie glanced at him. ‘ Yes,’ she said shortly.

‘Good,’ Howard said. ‘That’s all I asked for—not a lecture on sailing
terms!’

They passed by the yellow-topped beacon and then followed the series of
port and starboard buoys. Then the markers became taller as the narrowing
channel was outlined by slim poles, a can on the port hand and a cone on
the starboard hand. A sharp bend to port was quickly followed by an
equally sharp bend in the opposite direction.

‘Good God—where the hell are you taking us?’

‘Nearly there,’ Julie panted. ‘One more bend and we’re there.’ And indeed
as they passed by the starboard markers set to mark the almost
right-angled turn, Howard saw the moorings along the river-bank.

‘Thank God for that!’ he muttered. The River Dolan curved gently through
the marsh towards the sea, with green grassy banks on each side. Every so
often mooring-posts were set and wooden step-ladders gave access to the
banks.

‘This’ll do,’ Howard said and without warning he swung the tiller sharply
so that the boat almost hit the bank and Julie lost her balance.

‘Hey—mind what you’re doing.’

‘Oh, sorry, old thing.’

He tied up the boat and leapt up the steps to stand on the bank above
her, gazing at the scenery, whilst Julie let down the sails completely.

‘God, but it’s flat!’ Howard’s voice floated down to her. ‘Flat and
uninteresting!’

Julie clambered up the steps to stand beside him. ‘Flat it may be,’ she
retorted, ‘ but uninteresting—never!’ She flung out her arm to the right.
‘All this area is a nature reserve. It just teems with life. We ring birds
here that end up all over Europe—even Russia …’

Howard held up his hands, palms outwards as if to fend her off. ‘Oh spare
me a geography lesson, darling, please. Come on, let’s get the picnic
hamper up.’

They found a sheltered spot a few yards away from where they had moored
the boat. They crossed the road leading to the car park from the bridge
over the river. Turning left, towards the sea the marsh was dotted with
sand-dunes and behind one of these it was sheltered from the westerly
wind.

Howard opened the bottle of sparkling white wine with a loud bang, the
bubbly liquid flooding over the top. He laughed, ‘There, I bet you’ve
never feasted like this before out here, Julie.’

Julie bit into the smoked-salmon sandwich which Howard had insisted was
the only thing he could eat at a picnic.

‘No, you’re quite right, I haven’t.’ But the tone of her voice wasn’t
quite what Howard had hoped for. He couldn’t know that she was thinking of
the last time she had picnicked in this area. Then it had been coke and
sausage rolls—with Tim. They had joked and laughed and teased each other,
and suddenly Julie felt an acute pang of guilt and almost of longing.

With a shock she realised that she had been far happier on that afternoon
than she was at this moment.

The scooter buzzed along the coast road towards the
Point, past the Nature Reserve, across the bridge over the river and
taking the sharp left-hand bend in the road that now ran alongside the
winding river. Above the river-bank were the tops of the masts of boats
moored there. The road ended in a car park and gave way to the saltmarsh.

Today there was no sign of the coastguard’s dark-blue-and-yellow
land-rover. They left the scooter and walked towards a low dune about two
hundred yards away. They dropped down into the sand, out of sight of
anyone on the car park or on the river-bank. Vin tipped the three flares
out on to the sand.

‘Eh Vin, let me fire one today—please?’

‘Well, I dunno. They’re a bit dodgy.’

‘Aw please, Vin. You’ve let ’ em all off so far. Let me have a go.’

‘All right then. I’ll show you how to do it with this first one.’ The
flare began to smoke and the boy held it out in his right hand until it
exploded and shot up into the air. Two pairs of eyes followed the line of
the flare until it died and the red smoke drifted away.

‘Now let me ’ ave a go, Vin.’

‘Wait a bit. Don’t let’s waste ’em. These are all we’ve got.’

‘Oh come on—you’re just trying to stop me ’aving a go.’

‘No, I’m not.’

Mel made a grab for one of the flares. Her fingers closed round it and
she twisted it out of Vin’s hand. She pulled the cap from the base of the
black canister and stripped the top off as she had seen Vin do. Then she
struck the top with the cap. Immediately the flare ignited and began to
smoke and splutter.

‘Hold it away from you,’ Vin shouted. ‘It’ll burn you.’

The magnesium began to boil out of the canister, a burning shower of red.

‘Ouch!’ Mel cried as it spat on to her hand and she flung the flare away
from her, not looking where she threw it.

The flare hit the boy on the chest and exploded into his face.

Sea-birds rose from the ground in alarm as the marsh echoed with the
sound of his screams.

Howard lay back, replete and content. It was sheltered
and out of the wind it was quite warm, drowsily warm. For a while they
both dozed.

Whilst they slept the BBC weather forecast was broadcast at 13.55: ‘
…
The area forecast for the next twenty-four hours … Tyne, Dogger, Fisher,
German Bight, Humber … south-westerly five, increasing seven to gale
eight, perhaps locally severe gale nine, then veering westerly and
decreasing five. Heavy rain at times, then showers. Poor becoming
moderate or good …
’

Out in the North Sea, Captain Karl Schlick heard the
lunchtime BBC weather forecast for shipping.

He was making for the Lynn Well Lanby and from there through the Freeman
Channel into the Deeps to be met by the pilot vessel in time to catch high
water at 21.54 into the Port of St Botolphs. He had made this arrangement
with the Port Authority twelve hours earlier over the radio.

So far it had been an uneventful trip and the medicinal bottle of rum had
remained untouched in the locker on the bridge. But now, hearing the
forecast, Schick’s hands gripped the wheel tighter, the sweat standing in
beads on his forehead. He swore softly in his native German. That was the
last thing he needed—bad weather. The pain gnawed at his gut and he
shivered. He opened the locker, reached for the rum-bottle and took a gulp
of the auburn liquid. This ship was a bastard to handle in rough seas with
her fifteen-second roll, and more so than ever with the full cargo he was
carrying of steel and paper and a deck cargo of packaged timber.

Schlick spoke through the intercom to his engineer. ‘ Ludendorff—I must
have full speed.’

‘That is suicide, Captain,’ came back the swift retort from the engineer,
an experienced man of twenty-five years at sea on all kinds of ships. A
man who knew ships’ engines, a man whose word should be heeded.

The pain stabbed again in his stomach as Schlick snapped back, ‘We’ve got
to make the Deeps or at least the Lynn Well. The weather is worsening
rapidly. Full speed.’

‘Full speed it is, Captain.’ The engineer’s clipped tone told Schlick
that he was not pleased.

The Captain’s mind was already troubled by the last interview he had had
with his employers, the shipping company who owned the
Hroswitha.
When they had ordered him to take a cargo to Gothenburg and then bring
this one from there across the North Sea to St Botolphs and another cargo
back to his home port of Bremerhaven in West Germany, he had argued. ‘The
ship needs a refit. The engines have been causing trouble these last two
trips.’ He had thumped the agent’s desk. ‘She is not safe, like she is.
And …’

He had been on the point of telling the man of his own problems, how his
wife had begged him to see a doctor about these recurring stomach pains,
but pride had prevented the words from being spoken.

Karl Schlick—a big and burly West German, disdainful of weakness—refused
to admit to his ill-health. So many times he had brushed aside his wife’s
warning promising her yet again, ‘Next time, next time I am home.’