Nailed by the Heart (6 page)

Were
the people nice or nasty?

Kind
or mean?

Living
or dead?

He
stared at the big faces with their wide, surprised eyes.

He
couldn't tell. The faces were growing faint. The arms began to move.
But they were all blurry. You could not tell them from the fronds of
seaweed that drifted to and fro.

Time
to sleep. So tired. He didn't need to breathe anymore.

His
brother John was playing with his plane, the model of the Flying
Fortress bomber Uncle Walt had built. He was playing too near Mark's
bed. Mark told him not to-it was too close.

Hell.
The plane hit him on the forehead. That hurt, you ...

It
happened again.

Spluttering,
Mark opened his eyes. He was in the middle of a great wash of white
foam. With an effort he remembered where he was. In the middle of the
sea.

Jesus.

Why
wasn't he dead yet?

End
it, for Christsakes, end this torture ...

The
sea battered him. It tugged and pulled and rolled him over and over.

He
went under.

This
time there was no sense of falling. His head buffeted sharply against
something. He thrust his hand out, clutching at it. Shingle. Sand. It
felt like ...

Beach.

A
wave hit again and shoved him roughly across a bank of sand.

He
tried to stand but once more he was out of his depth.

Wearily,
arms and legs feeling as if they were encircled with iron bands, he
tried to swim.

In
front of him something rose out of the water. A dark silhouette
against the silver moonlit clouds.

It
was massive. An enormous square block of darkness.

A
ship so near to shore?

It
looked like one but it had to be enormous. And there were no
navigation lights.

He
tried to swim toward it but found himself slipping under water.

"We
sail our vessels on the sea, we are under power, we steer a
deliberate course. But, you know, every so often the sea takes
control. And when it does, don't fight it. Go with it. Surrender
yourself to its will. Because if you don't, it will destroy you."

He
remembered the Skipper's words. He made a conscious decision to leave
himself to the mercy of the sea. If it wanted him, so be it.

The
surf pushed and pulled him. All he could do was keep his head above
water at least part of the time.

Bitingly
cold brine repeatedly flooded his throat or drove into his nostrils.

Then
he hit the shere.

This
time as each wave receded it left him clear of the water-at least
briefly before the next one. Then another roll of surf came roaring
up the sand and carried him, this time fairly gently further up the
beach.

The
water slid back, sucking sand and shingle from beneath his hands.

He
wasn't going to drown after all.

Mark
stayed there on his hands and knees, wearily shaking his head.

"Safe."

The
word oozed from his lips like something half solid.

"Safe."

The
tide began to retreat. The next wave only licked the soles of his
bare feet.

Unable
to walk, he moved up the beach on his hands and knees until clear of
the surf, his hands crunching on sand and pebbles.

At
last he stopped and looked back. The moonlight revealed long lines of
surf rolling in with a low continuous roar.

The
wind was dropping. But he was bitterly cold.

Rising
unsteadily to his feet, he walked to and fro, searching the beach for
something to protect him from hypothermia. He knew that wet clothes
allowed body heat to bleed away from the body, which would kill as
surely as severing a main artery. At last he found a piece of
tarpaulin the size of a bed sheet.

His
numb fingers were useless things now, like bent sticks that did not
belong to his body. It took a full five minutes to wrap the tarpaulin
around himself with a piece over his head like a monk's cowl.

There
he sat for an hour, perilously close to passing out from exposure.
But he had to wait until he could see the ocean properly. The mental
picture of the terrorists escaping the Mary-Anne by lifeboat still
hammered in his brain.

Gradually
dawn came, sending streaks of gray edged with red up into the sky.

Two
hundred yards to the left he could see that the huge thing he had
taken to be a ship was an old seafort. It had probably been part of
the country's coastal defenses for centuries.

Which
country? Holland? France? England? He could be anywhere.

As
soon as he could he forced himself to his feet. Gathering the
tarpaulin around his shoulders like a cloak, he walked down to the
water's edge-now at low tide-and looked out.

No
ship.

No
terrorists. They were all dead. Somehow he was certain of that. The
ship had gone down so quickly.

His
friends were dead too. But somehow he could feel no sadness. He could
think only of the old Skipper, blind, but with the heart of a lion,
beating that steady tattoo on the iron wall of the ship as if it were
a massive drum.

His
clothes were drying and his blood drove its way back painfully into
his limbs and face. His nose began to ache where it had been smashed
by the terrorist three days ago.

Mark
Faust turned his back on the sea and began to walk slowly up the
beach. Above the softening roar of the surf he fancied he could hear
the distant, distant sound of metal beating against metal. A slow
rhythm; almost like the heartbeat of a sleeping giant. He didn't look
back.

"Keep
beating the drum, Skipper," he murmured. "Keep beating the
drum."

The
boy carried on, limping up into the dunes. The cold breeze made his
eyes water. The slow, regular beat continued, only growing fainter
and fainter as he limped slowly inland away from the restless ocean.

After
a hundred paces he could hear the massive beat no more. But somehow
an echo of it continued in his heart.

"You've
copped for a cracking black eye there, me old cocker. Who's tha' been
scrapping with?" asked the man as he piled up the concrete
blocks for the caravan.

David
hopped toward him, happy he could tell his story again. "I
wasn't fighting. I was flying. I was sitting on top of the elephant
at the hotel."

"Elephant?"
exclaimed the man. "They've got a zoo, then?"

"No-wer,
an elephant slide."

The
man efficiently wedged more concrete blocks under the caravan. "A
slide?"

"Ye-ess.
Anyway, I got the black eye when I was flying."

"Flying?"

"Ye-ess!"

The
man laughed heartily.

"Nobody
believes me. They keep saying I fell in the

stream.
But I was flying. Then I banged my face on the tree."

"You
were flying too fast, then?"

"Suppose
so."

Chris
leaned forward against the car, elbows resting on the roof. David had
told the story of how he got his black eye to anyone who would listen
to him. By now he was getting touchy if anyone doubted the truth of
the story, so he and Ruth decided it best to humor him.

Now
the six-year-old repeated the flying episode to the workman. Chris
looked over the caravan, feeling pleased with himself. Within six
hours of being told by the old git in Out-Butterwick that the caravan
was no longer for rent, they had found this one for sale on a caravan
site down the coast. It had two bedrooms, kitchen, bathroom, lounge
and dining area. A regular home from home.

Now
in its setting, he could have kissed it. They had positioned it on
the edge of the seafort's courtyard which was big enough to avoid
being claustrophobic, even though on three sides of the cobbled
square the walls soared up twenty feet. Behind him, the seafort rose
a good thirty feet in its butter-colored stone. The dozen or so
windows set high in the walls reflected the evening sunshine.

Entrance
to the courtyard was through a set of huge double timber gates set in
the wall. They were so big you could drive a bus through them. The
hinges had corroded badly on one of the gates; it rested uselessly
against the wall. Just one more job among the thousands of others to
be completed before the seafort opened next spring.

In
one corner of the courtyard, a narrow flight of stone steps ran up to
the walkway that ran around the top of the wall.

"Your
lad's got a fair old imagination," chuckled the caravan man as
he walked across to Chris, wiping his oil-black hands on the seat of
his overalls. "Flying? He makes the flipping head spin. Right,
you've got the, er ... doings."

It's
funny how some words in certain situations are taboo, thought Chris.
The man obviously considered it vulgar to say the word "check".

He
tore the oblong piece of paper from the stub. "Thanks for all
the help. Now at least we've got a home."

The
man looked around the courtyard. "Solid-looking place." He
shot Chris a look. "Don't you reckon you might find it a bit...
spooky?"

"You
won't recognize the place in twelve months. New windows, swimming
pool, soft landscaping, a few climbing vines along that wall. And
we'll have plenty of company ... paying company, I hope. This time
next year, call in for a drink. It'll be on the house."

The
caravan man leaned forward and shook Chris by the hand. "I'll
hold you to that, me old cocker. Thanks for the... doings." He
pocketed the check. "See ya, son," he said to David.
"Remember, go steady with the flying. No more of them black
eyes." He strode away to his truck parked on the causeway.
Already the tide was sliding in to lap at the boulders that raised
the roadway above the beach.

"Okay,"
said Chris, ruffling David's thick hair. "Let's see what Mother
has to say about the new home."

Ruth
had started to unpack. Boxes of food, cutlery, pans, detergents,
toilet rolls, shoes and David's toys covered the floor.

On
the dining table stood the fishbowl that contained Clark Kent. The
fish swam listlessly, its mouth clamped to the undersurface of the
water like an upside-down Hoover. All this moving from house to hotel
to caravan hadn't done the poor beggar much good.

Ruth
slung a cardboard box through the caravan door onto the courtyard.

"What
do you two want?" Her face was pink with exertion. "There
won't be any tea for a long time. And it'll be sandwiches, cake and
pop. We haven't got any gas bottles yet."

"Have
we got electricity?" asked David.

"Sure
have, kidda." Chris switched on a light to emphasize the point.
"Just like home."

David
smiled. "I like it. It'll be like being at home but being on
holiday at the same time."

"That's
right. We'll be living at the seaside-forever and ever."

"Amen,"
added Ruth, then smiled to disguise any cynicism.

"Anything
we can do?"

"Yes.
Go. Give me an hour to get this place in shape, then you can come
back and give me a hand to make tea."

"You're
the boss, Ruth. Come on, David. Let's explore."

Chris
and David walked toward the double timber doors that led into the
seafort.

"Dad?"

"Yes?"

"I
might do some more flying tomorrow."

Chris
groaned inwardly. David was in a happy, prattling mood.

"You
know when I was on top of the elephant, Dad? I felt really light like
one of those soap bubbles. Then I was flying."