Sea Lord

  “You’re a very destructive man.” She ignored my plea of mitigation. “In previous times, my lord, you’d have been sent to a forgotten corner of the empire as a remittance man. Doubtless your family was very relieved when you and your friend decided to sail away. Oh, I know about Mr Barratt, too. What was his attraction for you? Was it simply that your family hated his influence on you, so naturally you flaunted him in front of them?”

  “No,” I said, “he’s a friend.”

  “But he’s settled down, which must leave you friendless, and doubtless not a little short of cash as well. Is that why you’re here, my lord? Do you want some money to hire your own thugs who’ll protect you while you double-cross your former accomplices?”

  Her tone was deliberately offensive, but I did not answer. I had been staring at the green pastures, at the slow tractor, and at the long hedgerows which were bright with stitchwort and campion. I was suddenly assailed by the strangest notion that I didn’t want to go away again. I wanted to stay. I’d had my adventures, and it was time to put down some roots. I’d seen the ending of the sea-gypsies, I’d seen them dying of fevers and the pox, I’d seen them selling their bodies in lousy little towns, I’d seen them crawling home in boats that were lashed together with fraying coir and untarred manila, and I suddenly felt lonely. I disliked the feeling. I forgot it as I made one last attempt to convince Jennifer Pallavicini of my innocence. “Do you really think,” I said, “that if I’d stolen the painting, I’d rock the boat now? If I’d sold it to someone, and was now trying to get it back, I’d probably end up in jail myself! Why should I risk that?”

  “Because doubtless you don’t believe that you are in risk of a jail sentence.” She pushed herself away from the balustrade. “Do you know where the painting is?”

  “Of course I don’t. I’ve already told you that.”

  “Did you steal it?”

  “No!”

  “Can you tell me anything that might help us to recover it?”

  “Beyond what I’ve told you, no.”

  “Then I fail to see how you can help us. You’ll find the car park is through that gate. Good day to you, my lord.” She walked away.

  “Where’s my sweater?” I called after her.

  She did not turn round, but just waved in negligent reply. It was just possible, I thought, that she raised two fingers as she waved. She was very beautiful, and I was very wretched.

  So go back to sea, I told myself, where nothing matters except the wind and the waters and the cold high stars. Because here, on land, I was everybody’s scapegoat, but there I was as good as the next man and better than most. And it was there, despite my sudden wish to stay ashore, that I belonged, so it was there that I would have to go.

  Charlie was sharpening his chisels when I got back to his yard. “What’s got up your nose?” he asked.

  I told him about my visit to Buzzacott’s gallery, and how the girl I had been chasing worked for Buzzacott. Charlie was scornful of my amateur sleuthing. “You’re a berk, Johnny, a prize berk” – he stropped a blade on his palm and gave me a long-suffering smile – “you should know better than to get involved.”

  “I offered to help her find the painting,” I explained.

  “What painting? It’s gone, Johnny. If you miss it, buy yourself a tin of yellow emulsion and paint another.” He tested the newly sharpened chisel by slicing away a sliver of his thumbnail then, satisfied, dropped the blade into his toolbox. “I made you a new chart table. Say thank you.”

  “Thank you,” I said. Behind us Sunflower was shrouded in a canvas tent ready for the professional shot-blasters who were coming the next day. I hated to think what the work was going to cost, and said as much.

  “That’s my problem,” Charlie said. “I’ve told you I’ll pay, and I will. You did enough for me in the old days, so you don’t need to feel embarrassed now.”

  Yet I was embarrassed, because Charlie was clearly spending a small fortune on Sunflower’s repair, but as the days passed I also saw how much pleasure he was taking from the work. “I’d forgotten how much fun you can have in getting a boat ready for sea,” he told me more than once. He threw himself enthusiastically at the task, so enthusiastically that it seemed at times as if Sunflower was his boat and not mine. Whatever she needed, he was determined to supply, but only the very best. He would leave the house at dawn, drive down to the yard, and start work. He found rust under the transducer plugs, so nothing would serve but that the fittings were drilled out of the hull and new steel fairings made for the depth-sounder and Pitot log heads. Charlie welded the new fairings into place himself and afterwards, in his old fashion, congratulated himself on a well-done piece of work. “Proper job, that.”

  In the next busy days there were dozens of ‘proper jobs’ performed on Sunflower. Her shot-blasted hull was anti-fouled and, above the blue bootline, painted a dazzling white. Her liferaft was sent away to be repaired and restowed in its canister. The guardrail stanchions were replaced, and new lifelines rigged from bow to stern. Her cabin joinery was repaired with a lovely pale oak, but not before Charlie had rewired the whole boat. “I needed a holiday,” he told me when I wondered how his business was managing without him, though in fact Sunflower simply became Charlie’s temporary office. He had a cordless telephone in his tool box and, if a problem would not yield to bullying on the phone, he would drop down from Sunflower’s gunwales and stride across to his real office. I was grateful for his continual presence; just to be with Charlie gave me a sense of being physically protected from Garrard and Peel, while working with him brought back memories of happy days.

  The biggest difference between our old days and these new ones was the amount of money we now lavished on Sunflower. A new VHF radio was installed, one that was pre-tuned to all the American and European frequencies. Charlie wasn’t content with such a lavish toy, but insisted on installing a short-wave radio as well. “So you can listen to all those posh voices on the BBC.” He patted the panel which he’d made to house the twin radios. “Proper job, that.”

  I had to dig my heels in and refuse some of his suggestions. I was tempted by a Satnav set, which snatched position reports from passing satellites, but I have a fear of too many electronic toys on a boat, so I wouldn’t let him buy one. He had a Decca set which he claimed to have taken off one of his old boats and which he insisted on installing over Sunflower’s chart table. I couldn’t refuse the gift, but as Decca will only give positions in a limited number of waters I did not fear that I would become too used to its electronic magic and forget how to use a sextant. Charlie wanted me to have a radar set, but I adamantly refused; they drain too much electricity and their aerials look too ugly. I won that battle, but Charlie won others: he insisted that the new mast should have an electronic wind direction and speed vane which would display on twin dials in the cockpit and above the chart table. He made new chart drawers, and filled them with brand new charts. He took a small boy’s pleasure in surprising me with new purchases: danbuoys for the stern; a radio direction finder; a stripper for the propeller; a sun awning for the hot latitudes; and bright red canvas dodgers with Sunflower’s name sewn large in brilliant yellow letters. Best of all he bought me a new fibreglass tender with a small outboard. “You can burn that scabby inflatable,” he said.

  It all cost money. So much money. Embarrassing amounts of money. I tackled Charlie about the cost, but he simply dismissed my embarrassment. “I’m enjoying it, Johnny. That’s all that matters.”

  “You must let me pay you back.”

  “What with? Bottle tops?” He grinned. We’d been working till well past nine o’clock and had driven over to the Rossendale Arms for a good-night pint. Some hotel guests from Stowey sat at the bar and sneaked surreptitious looks at me; the landlord had probably told them they were staying in my ancestral home, but I could see from their faces that they weren’t sure whether to believe that the paint-stained scruff truly was a belted earl.

  “What is Sunflowe
r costing you?” I pressed Charlie.

  “I’m not counting.” He leaned back on the settle and stretched his long arms. “I’m enjoying myself, Johnny. It’s been too long since I did a proper job. I spend too much of my time on the bloody phone these days, or in the office. I like working with these.” He held out his hands, big and scarred. “Besides, it’s a way of making up to you.”

  “Making up to me?” I said with astonishment.

  “Fetch me a pint, and I’ll tell you.”

  I fetched two pints. That was something I’d miss, I thought, the good taste of proper ale instead of the gassy piss-weak lager that the Germans had persuaded the rest of the world to drink.

  Charlie lit himself a cigarette. “I always felt guilty about deserting you,” he said in explanation.

  “Don’t be ridiculous.”

  “It’s true.” He was entirely serious. “When we flew back from Australia I was really looking forward to going back to sea. We had some good times, you and I. But then I got Yvonne pregnant so, like a fool, I did the decent thing.”

  He was speaking of the time after my brother’s suicide, four years before. It had been a bad time for me; trammelled with accountants, lawyers and bank managers. I had thought then that I would be trapped by all those responsibilities and, though Charlie and I had often talked of going back to sea, I had never been certain that it would be possible. I used to escape Stowey’s hopelessness by delivering yachts in the Channel, but I had doubted whether I could ever afford to sail far oceans again; Stowey’s problems were too comprehensive for such luxuries. Charlie felt guilty that he had abandoned me, but he had never known that I had been considering abandoning him. I confessed as much to him now, but Charlie shook his head dismissively. “Of course you were going back to sea! I knew that. You were never going to stay with all those pin-striped wankers for longer than you had to!” He laughed. “Could you see yourself living with your mother?”

  I smiled. “No.”

  “There you are, then. But I should have gone with you, Johnny, I really should.”

  “No regrets, surely?”

  “I’ve made some money, I suppose.” He sounded rueful. He looked at his watch. “We’ve got an early start in the morning, you and I, so drink up.”

  A week later Sunflower was taken to Kingswear where she was craned into the water. Next day Charlie and I drove to the marina where one of his mobile cranes was parked on the quay. “Lower it now!” Charlie took competent command as soon as he stepped out of the Jaguar’s driving seat. He shouted up at his crane driver, “You take care, Tom! Gentle with her now!”

  We were stepping Sunflower’s mast; a brand new foil-shaped beauty of extruded aluminium. Charlie had paid for it, of course, just as he had paid to have all the sails cleaned, and a new trysail made. He insisted on glueing a silver sixpence under the mast’s foot for luck, but after that ritual he was content to let the riggers get on with their job while he and I moved to the greater comfort of Barratry.

  Barratry was Charlie’s boat. A few days earlier, in anticipation of these days on the River Dart, he had moved her to the Kingswear marina. She was a fifty-four-foot motor cruiser with a flying bridge, twin monster diesels, and the hot tub which had so impressed Rita. Her name was a pun on Charlie’s surname, but the word also meant any fraudulent maritime act. To Charlie it carried overtones of piracy, which he liked. “Mind you, I’d have preferred to call her Wet Dream,” Charlie laughed, “but none of the girls liked it.”

  At midday one of those girls arrived on Barratry’s pontoon. Charlie introduced her as a business colleague, but offered me a broad wink at the same time. Her name was Joanna and she was ordered to make lunch on board. “A proper dinner, mind you!” Charlie warned her. “No bloody salads, girl. Johnny here’s going to sail to the West Indies in a few days so he needs feeding up.”

  Joanna was a redhead, lithe as a whippet in skin-tight jeans and an expensive shirt. She seemed not to resent Charlie’s unbridled caveman chauvinism, but Charlie had always treated his women thus. It worked for him.

  We ate lunch on Barratry while the three riggers tensioned Sunflower’s stays and shrouds. Joanna had carved two cold roasted chickens. One was solely for Charlie who, though he had the appetite of a horse, never seemed to put on an ounce of fat. “Are you really going to the West Indies?” Joanna had picked at a chicken wing, and now painted her fingernails while we ate.

  “Probably.” In truth I was too late for a good trade-wind passage, but I might yet make the crossing before the hurricane season. “I’ll go south first, then make up my mind.”

  “When will you leave?”

  “As soon as he’s provisioned,” Charlie answered for me. “And no difficulties there, eh, Johnny?” Charlie had opened accounts for me at a half-dozen Dartmouth stores. Whatever I or Sunflower needed, we were to have: food, equipment, clothing, anything.

  “Where will you go in the West Indies?” Joanna persisted.

  “Probably one of the French islands. The food’s better.”

  “And the girls.” Charlie was in high spirits. The sun was out, he was well fed, and Joanna had changed into a wispy bikini. “I’ve got half a mind to fly over there and join you,” he said. “We could have some good sailing, eh?”

  “Do you still remember how to sail?” I teased him. “My God, Charlie, to think you’ve bought a motor boat!”

  “It’s less trouble than rag-hanging,” he shrugged. “Mind you, I miss the sailing sometimes, but there’s a lot to be said for a good motor yacht.”

  “Tell me one thing.”

  “The beds are wider,” he grinned. Despite his professed nostalgia for sail, he was clearly proud of Barratry. “She’s a good sea boat,” he claimed with a fervour that made me suspect it wasn’t true. He gave me the guided tour, proudly showing me her radar system, the twin state rooms with their king-size beds and television sets, the immaculate engine room, and finally the famous hot tub. “I hardly ever take the damn thing’s cover off,” he said apologetically, “because it’s a bugger to fill up, and there’s hardly room for two in it, but the bloody salesman sold me on it.”

  After lunch we fired up the motors and took Barratry out into the Channel. It was a warm bright day and Charlie opened up the throttles so that the twin propellers whipped a path of cream across a sun-glittering sea. The boat banged across the small waves, jarring from crest to crest, but, despite the discomfort, it was still an impressive display of power. “What’s her top speed?” I shouted.

  “I’ve had thirty-eight knots out of her.” He throttled back, letting the hull settle into the water. We were already out of sight of land, but the Decca repeater on the flying bridge offered us a course straight back to Dartmouth. Charlie let the big boat idle while he opened two bottles of beer. Joanna came out of the cabin beneath us and went to the foredeck where she casually discarded her bikini top before stretching out on deck.

  “Not a bad looker, eh?” Charlie wanted my approval.

  “Every boat should have one,” I agreed.

  “She works for a construction firm I do a fair bit of work for. She tells me how much to tender, and if her boss wonders why she’s got the money to buy a BMW then he’s got too much sense to ask. I might bend the rules a bit, Johnny, but I provide a damned good service. Hey! Joanna! We can’t see you properly! Come closer!”

  “Get lost, Charlie.”

  He laughed. He looked immensely happy. He sat on the helmsman’s chair, stripped to the waist, and I could see that he was as muscled as ever. He had always been tough, with immense stamina, and monetary success had not softened him. His skin was flecked with welding burns and scars, making him look as strong and battered as one of his beloved hand-tools, but, in the days I’d worked with him on Sunflower, I’d seen a new wariness in his eyes. Some of Charlie’s toughness had become mental and I guessed he was now a ruthless man to do business with, but I was an old friend, so the ruthlessness was never turned on me. “I might just do that, you know
,” he said suddenly.

  “You might do what?”

  “Fly over to the West Indies. I’ll need a break soon, and I could take a week or two with you. We’ll drink some whisky, find some women, sail some blue water.”

  “Sounds good, Charlie.”

  “Like old times.” He had taken his eyes off Joanna and was staring moodily at the southern horizon. “My God, but things have changed. Do you remember our first boat?” It had been a fifteen-foot clinker-built wooden dinghy with a gaffed main and a pocket-sized jib. Charlie laughed suddenly. “You remember those two scrubbers we picked up in Cherbourg? Bloody hell, but I thought we’d have to push them overboard to get rid of them.”

  I smiled. “I remember their boyfriends chasing us.”

  “We saw them off, though, didn’t we?” Or rather Charlie had seen them off. I’d helped, but Charlie’s strength was awesome. We’d been eighteen then, cocksure and cockfree, lords of the Channel. We’d crossed in the dinghy to France on a night as cold as charity and we’d been ready for mayhem when we arrived in Cherbourg. “It was a good weekend,” I said.

  “We had lots of them, my friend. Lots of them.” He lit a cigarette. “And we had some bad ones, too. Do you remember the food poisoning?”

  Charlie had nearly died after eating some fish we’d caught off the reefs in French Polynesia. I’d nursed him back to health, but it had been a close thing. He grimaced. “I haven’t eaten fish since.”

  “You remember the Tasman Sea?” I asked. That had been another bad time, a bitter ship-killing storm which had threatened to overwhelm us, but Charlie’s extraordinary stamina had seen us through. I had been at breaking point, past it in truth, but Charlie had sung his way through.

  He smiled at the memory, but didn’t comment. Instead he shook his head wistfully. “I do envy you, Johnny.”

  “I can’t think why.”