Ghosting Home (Strong Winds Trilogy)

by Julia Jones

  “B-A-D-E-N-P-O-W-E-L-L. Er, thanks Anna.”

  He put the phone down and returned to his sofa. Anna was too quick sometimes.

  Rev. Wendy closed the study door as if she was finished for the day.

  “You know I’ve never have been able to do crosswords, dear. But I do like having them explained. How did you get, um, this one, here, for instance?”

  She sat down next to her husband then leaned forward and sort of snuggled up alongside him. Gerald looked at her, blinked a bit and then smiled. He spread the paper over both their knees and put his arm round her. “Well,” he said, “Miss Snufflebeam. If I were Wizard Whimstaff ...”

  This was obviously a private joke. The boys stared; they’d never seen their former foster-carers behaving like this. Gerald brushed a lock of Rev. Wendy’s grey-flecked hair away from her lined forehead and pulled her closer.

  “Help!” thought Donny, “He’s about to kiss her!”

  After a single horrified glance, the three boys turned and legged it.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  Tiger on the Prowl

  River Orwell, Sunday 15 April 2007

  They woke very early. So early that it wasn’t light outside the tent. It wasn’t dark either. It was as if both light and dark had gone absent without leave. Night had finished its shift before day was ready to start. It was a strange sort of nothing time.

  Donny guessed that it must be about four in the morning. The tide would be flooding again now and it felt as if the wind had changed. He suggested that they should put on their trainers and fleeces and go down to the seawall to take a look.

  The tent had only been meant for two people so they’d slept close together. It had been cold too. When each one woke, he’d tried to lie extra still so’s not to disturb the others. When they were truly asleep they’d muttered, snored and wriggled.

  It had been fun when Lottie and others came for supper. Gerald and Wendy had stayed behind at the vicarage to spend time on their own – but Mrs Everson had come stomping across to supper on two stout metal sticks. She’d cheered Liam loudly when he’d demonstrated the Ronaldo Seven: left foot, right foot, left knee, right knee, left shoulder, right shoulder ... HEAD! It was the sequence that he’d been practising earlier when he’d knocked down Luke’s tent.

  Most times the ball bounced away into the twilit field or scraped past the glowing barbecue but Liam succeeded more than once. Mrs Everson had glared at the first person who suggested he should give up and sit down.

  “He’s very good,” she announced.

  Liam stopped kicking for a moment.

  “He wants to be best player in the world. He was signed for Man U in 2004 and he’s won loads of awards already.”

  “He was FPA Young Player of the Year,” she agreed. “But I didn’t mean Cristiano Ronaldo, I meant you. You’re very good.”

  “Do you support Man U? Did you see ’em in the UEFA cup last week? I wasn’t allowed but they beat Barca 3-0! They were against Chelsea today. I reckon you could catch the highlights if you stay up.”

  “I often sit up late. Or wake early. I’m an old trout and I like to know which way the stream is flowing.”

  Donny glanced across the field as he and the boys crawled out into the pre-dawn greyness. There were no lights in the cottage but that didn’t mean there were no eyes open. You could never be sure with Mrs Everson.

  It was okay. They weren’t doing anything wrong. They’d said that they were planning to get up early.

  They kept close together as they crept down the field and found the plank-bridge across the dyke. Then they scrambled straight over the river wall and headed for the patch of beach.

  It was lighter here but in odd ways. The contrasts seemed different. There was no colour anywhere but, further up in the anchorage, boats with white hulls stood out with startling clarity while others were no more than deeper shades of charcoal. Rather like a negative.

  The younger boys weren’t saying much – except for the occasional “Spooky!” or “Wicked!” Donny didn’t think they were scared. They were concentrating.

  “Do you reckon we’re the only ones awake in the world?” Liam breathed.

  “ ’Course not,” Luke whispered back. “There’ll be evil spirits creeping home to their tombs and vampires winging it to hang upside-down in the old church tower, their fangs dripping warm with blood.”

  The moon was still up, shapeless and hazy behind moving clouds. A harder outline in the east showed that the sun was also on its way. When you really listened you could hear the rustle of wind over water and occasional cries from shorebirds. There was an owl hunting somewhere in the Pin Mill woods and there were sudden snatches of daytime song, cheerful trills and chirrups that stopped as abruptly as they’d started.

  Then, from downstream, Donny heard a boat engine. It didn’t sound like a cargo ship heading up river for Ipswich, but it didn’t sound yachty either. There was a growl to it.

  He motioned Luke and Liam to crouch down. There was no reason why they shouldn’t be there. He knew that. He also knew he didn’t want anyone to spot their early-morning silhouettes, dark against the not-dark sky.

  “Dirty your faces,” he whispered. “Or keep your heads bent. Pale and vertical reflects.”

  Between the beach and the wall they were camouflaged by scrub and tall grasses that merged indistinguishably in the absence of light. The tide was out and river was far away, held at a distance by the long soft slope of mud.

  Nevertheless, when Donny saw which boat it was, slipping stealthily up river in this dead hour between night and day, he crouched lower and motioned the others to do the same. Then he lay completely flat.

  No precaution could be too extreme. The Hispaniola had left her mooring.

  The tips of her three tall masts were only partially visible above the high woods of the opposite shore but the white band of her red-and-white-painted hull was weirdly luminous in the surrounding grey.

  She showed no other lights at all: no mast-head steaming light, no low red light to confirm that she was port-side on, and, once she had passed them, there was no white stern light as she followed the curve of the marked channel through the anchorage and disappeared from view. The muffled sound of her engines lingered but the wind was picking up again and had blown it out of hearing before she could even have reached Woolverstone.

  This new wind was from the south-west – a 180 degree change. He and Vexilla would have another beat on their hands when they tried to return to the Stour.

  “The Tiger’s on the prowl,” he whispered. “When it’s properly morning we’ll explore up river and track him to his lair. Anna’ll be on for it. Time spent on reconnaissance is seldom wasted, as Gold Dragon always says.”

  “An’ he won’t know we’ve spotted him. Not if he was trying to do a dodge and get past while he thought we wasn’t looking.”

  There was a reverberation from those engines – yes, engines, he was sure now that the Hispaniola had more than one – that was ruffling up memories that weren’t directly his. Great Uncle Greg had been in the Navy and now Donny had heard that muffled, throaty purr, he knew that Great Aunt Ellen had been right. Whatever the Hispaniola looked like on the outside, deep down she was still a gunboat. What was her story?

  “Let’s get a bit more kip. Anna said she’d meet us at the hard between half eight and nine. Gives us plenty of time to get up again, strike camp and thank Mrs Everson. We might even manage some breakfast.”

  They’d only been out of bed for maybe half, three quarters of an hour. Already there was colour creeping back across the landscape and the distant birdsong was getting stronger. They stood outside Luke’s tent a last few seconds.

  Donny was just thinking that this was why people went on about the loveliness of dawn when there was a sudden, terrified squealing.

  “No!” said Liam, pointing.

  “Drop it!” yelled Luke, running forward.

  Two small, prick-eared fox cubs were hurtling towards
them. The first cub had a baby rabbit in its mouth and the second one wanted it.

  The rabbit was only tiny but it must have been quite a weight for the running cub to carry. And it was making such a noise! You’d never have thought that anything so small could shriek so loudly or continuously.

  Not unless you’d grown up with Vicky for your baby sister, as Luke said afterwards.

  That was much later, when he was feeling better enough to joke about it.

  “Drop it!” he yelled, running at the cubs. “Leave it alone. Drop it right now. I’m telling ya!”

  He’d picked up a bit of stick down by the foreshore and he chucked wildly. Amazingly it connected. The leading cub was almost knocked down. It hesitated.

  Luke didn’t. He was rushing forward, yelling like a maniac. The fox-cub saw him and opened its mouth, dropping the rabbit.

  Then the second cub saw its chance, seized the trophy and dashed on towards the woods. The first one chasing after.

  The rabbit’s screams continued on and on. Then stopped.

  Luke was almost in tears as he crawled back into the tent.

  “Poor little feller,” he kept saying, “poor little feller.”

  Donny didn’t know what to say. The two cubs had been so jaunty, so delighted. He’d admired their energy, their neat small size, the hint of fluffiness that gave away their youth. Luke made him realise that he’d been callous.

  Liam reached out a consoling hand.

  “Foxes gotta eat, Lukey.”

  Luke nodded but ignored the hand. He sniffed a bit then got into his sleeping bag and pulled the top over his head. Donny and Liam looked at one another, shrugged and did the same.

  CHAPTER SIX

  An Empty Lair

  River Orwell, Sunday 15 April 2007

  They slept late and woke uncomfortable. Striking camp wasn’t fun. In the end they bundled everything up and put it in the wheelbarrow. Pushed it with them to Swallow’s End to thank Mrs Everson.

  “Um, sorry if we made a bit of a rabbit last night,” Donny mumbled. He felt thick-headed. The younger boys were looking at him.

  “I meant racket. There was a rabbit, you see ... and foxes.”

  “It screamed,” said Luke. He was pale and had grey shadows under his eyes.

  “They do,” she said. “Why shouldn’t they? They’ve got a place in the food chain but they don’t have to like it. I don’t expect you’ll come again. Goodbye.”

  She turned and stomped back into her cottage, shutting the door.

  The boys didn’t want to go through the woods. They took turns shoving the barrow along the foreshore and met Anna who was getting fed up waiting for them at the hard. They used the public toilets then loaded most things into Vexilla and set off up river to Ipswich.

  The breeze was fresh and favourable. Anna’d brought generous supplies of food. But they couldn’t find the Hispaniola anywhere. Began to wonder whether they’d dreamed her passing at that dead hour.

  There was a marina on the west bank of the river. They landed scouting parties to run round it in all directions until they met again. She was too big for the New Cut. The most likely place was Ipswich Haven, a wide renovated space entered through lock gates. The Customs and Excise launch, HMRC Valiant, was there, festooned with whippy aerials and radar receivers and with what was unmistakably a gun on her foredeck. She was open to the public but the children didn’t have any money. They hung back and stared from a distance.

  “What’s that gun for?” asked Liam.

  “Smugglers,” said Anna. “You know, people bringing in drugs and stuff. I expect it makes them stop when they’re told to. So the excise men can go on board and search for ... whatever.”

  She looked at Donny. The gun was shocking.

  Luke and Liam had cheered up a lot.

  “Stand and deliver!” they yelled.

  “Your money or your life!”

  Their Ipswich Haven search was thorough. They even sneaked round the sheds where power cruisers like Flint’s sharkboat were built. They couldn’t believe the prices on the sales board. No wonder Xanthe had suspected him from the start.

  But there was no Hispaniola.

  “She must be somewhere on the East Side,” said Donny. “Cliff Quay. Where the grain ships go.”

  “And where we’re so not allowed,” said Anna, checking the No Mooring notices and 24-hour security signs.

  “No harm in drifting casually past having a good stare though, is there?” Donny suggested. “There won’t be anything else with masts like hers.”

  “S’pose not.”

  Putting the mainsail up was a mistake. The tide had turned and the wind had freshened even further. Drifting was not on Vexilla’s agenda. She went plunging down-river, heeling at such an angle that it took all their weight to steady her. They hardly had time to glimpse the leeward bank, let alone scan it for masts.

  Luke and Liam had gone into white-knuckle mode, gasping with delight every time a fresh gust threatened to lay her over. They grumbled when Donny turned the day-boat into the wind, took down her mainsail and motored back the way they’d come, painstakingly checking every inch of quayside and even the smallest sluice gate.

  “It’s getting incredibly late,” said Anna. “I’ve got loads of work and you’ve got to get all the way back to Gallister Bay.”

  “I know,” said Donny shortly. These semi-derelict warehouses, these underused docks, the security fences and warning signs – prime territory, surely, for the Tiger?

  “Are you certain that you saw her? You said the light was pretty strange. Maybe it was some other boat with tall masts. A sail training ship or something?”

  The sound of those engines had run right through him.

  “’Course Donny saw her,” said Liam. “We knew it was the Tiger because we all dived down and hid. Then we put mud on our faces and I shut my eyes.”

  Anna rolled hers.

  “Okay, okay, I give up. Let’s all go home. But first we’re going to put a reef in that mainsail. Even Anna can’t do six GCSE maths papers before bed if she’s been tipped overboard in the path of a freighter.”

  “Actually, it’s GCSE French papers that I need to work at. That’s the scholarship level. They say they’ll give me an exemption for the Latin because I’m taking it from a comprehensive school. But I’m still going to have a go.”

  “You’re seriously planning to leave? Go to some posh place where they wear all-wool kilts and dry-clean-only blazers? Just because you’ve got rich?”

  Anna’s face went a bit rigid.

  “What I’d like, for once in my life, are some choices. Then I’ll make my own decision in my own time. If that’s okay by you, of course.”

  They didn’t say a lot after that.

  The ebb was sluicing down the river so he landed them as far along the hard as he could, then pushed off quickly, before Vexilla could get stuck. He could see Lottie and Vicky already waiting on the bench near the pub. Rev. Wendy’s little car was there too so they’d have plenty of help getting back to the vicarage. They’d even fit the barrow in, probably.

  He saw Lottie stand up. She looked as if she was going to come right down the hard. Then he saw Vicky trip over. Lottie had to scoop her up, cuddle her.

  She might have been calling but the wind blew her words up and away. She made big arm movements with her Vicky-free hand. Possibly she was waving some papers?

  Donny set sail hastily. Maybe she was going to yell at him about making Anna late for her pluperfect prep. Anyway he had a home of his own to get to and a mother who would be wondering where he was, even if she couldn’t shout across the mud at him. Vexilla surged down river to Harwich Harbour.

  The Hispaniola hadn’t gone back to her Shotley mooring. Donny knew he had been right. He was certain she was up in Ipswich. He didn’t know why. Or how they’d managed to miss her.

  He didn’t have any time to think about that now. Wind and tide were hard against him and he was longing to be back to the comf
ort of the junk’s main cabin and one of Skye’s warm suppers. Even a pile of spaghetti or two tins of beans would do as long as he could just shovel it in and keep on eating until he was full.

  Strong Winds wasn’t in Gallister Bay.

  He’d used the outboard to get round the low headland of Erwarton Ness, keeping close to the northern shore. Then the motor had begun to splutter and he realised he was low on fuel. So it was up again with the sails and bearing right away across the river. The Copperas Bay mudflats were uncovered but he’d stood in as far as he could before bringing Vexilla’s head around in the happy conviction that he’d be able to make his home anchorage in a single close-hauled tack.

  Gallister Bay was empty. Not even a single Sunday fisherman. Had Gold Dragon brought up on the Essex side of the river to take shelter under the Wrabness Cliffs?

  No.

  Donny struggled to rationalise.

  Skye and Gold Dragon must have enjoyed themselves so much that they’d stayed an extra tide. Then, once the wind had shifted, they’d thought it best to wait and come back with the first of the flood. Or maybe they’d had engine trouble. Or run aground.

  Or something.

  There was no reason to think that the non-appearance of Strong Winds and the disappearance of the Hispaniola had any connection with each other. There was nothing to worry about except his empty stomach.

  He found a mooring under the lee of the cliffs on the Essex side and scoured Vexilla for any remnants of lunch. Two mini scotch-eggs and an apple. He wished he hadn’t let Liam throw his crusts to the gulls. There was some fresh water but nothing else, except the emergency chocolate and handful of boiled sweets. Donny took a green one then reached in his rucksack for the book.

  He got cold after a while so he rearranged the mainsail. If he loosed its ties and pulled it down from the boom into the bottom of the boat, it would give him shelter and something to lie on. He allowed himself another sweet and got into his sleeping bag. Vexilla’s hull was so much roomier that Lively Lady’s. Donny imagined himself as a mountaineer bivouacking for the night between rocks.