The White Ship

by Nicholas Salaman

Since there was nothing for it but to sit it out and wait for the tide to turn, I made myself as comfortable as I could (which was hardly at all), drew my sheepskin coat about me, and set myself to thinking of my plan of action. I could hardly be in a better place to contemplate it. I put the moral dilemma aside for one moment and tried to treat what was manifestly the most horrible crime as an academic project. Yes, a part of me still thought at this stage that there was precious little chance of Juliana’s mad scheme ever happening. That is what I still told myself.

  If a ship were to come this way in darkness at just past high water on the ebb tide, the rock could doubtless be avoided if you had a good pilot and a hawk-eyed look-out, and even then you could not be sure. But what about navigating to hit the rock at night, what would you do if that were your game?

  There would be help from the current and the stars, so long as the stars were not covered by cloud and you knew which star to steer by. In fact, as the rock was due north of Barfleur harbour, it would be the Pole Star. That was simple enough. I would have to watch the weather, and do a reconnaissance under cover of darkness. Come to that, perhaps I could put a white marker on it, using one of the fishermen’s buoys, and could steer for it – that was assuming I could get hold of that rudder thing old FitzStephen was so pleased about, and was free to use it at the critical moment.

  Alternatively, there were various ways of scuppering a ship other than driving it onto a rock, and I imagined myself performing them. I could stove in a plank of the ship below the waterline before she sailed, assuming I had the requisite equipment and would not be seen or heard while I was using it. Or perhaps the application of a rather large gimlet might do the trick, not perhaps the most unobtrusive thing to take on board – or else I could bore a hole in the hull beforehand (if I could bring myself to desecrate a thing of such beauty), cover it with wax, and then unstop it once we were under way. It would be slow to admit the ocean and could be caulked in no time by a passing sailor, but it had been known to work.

  When I considered all these other stratagems, though, I concluded there was nothing quite so clever at sinking a ship as a good, simple rock like this big fellow I was now sitting on. He had the makings of tragedy written all over him, and no questions asked.

  I patted the rock as if he were a horse. I tried to be insouciant, making an entertainment of my reconnaissance, for there is no point in being a jelly-boy nor yet a hang dog, but I was overcome once again by the most dismal foreboding. It is a large matter to sink a vessel full of people, and it weighed on me, not that it was going to happen, you understand, because something would come up, I was sure of it. Yet, I could not see how Juliana’s plan could be averted. She had it all – and me – worked out like the machinery of Fate itself.

  Sitting on the rock in the sunshine now, looking out at the prospect in front of me – the distance from the land, the hungriness of the sea – I tried to imagine a shipwreck at night: darkness would add terror, confusion, isolation; the water would be icy cold; there would be no hope, no help, nothing but the sudden realisation that this was the end, often considered, never expected. There would be noise and commotion, of course, but the whole thing would be far enough from land for it to be mistaken for seabirds, or not be heard at all. It was something that I could never, in my right mind, wish on my worst enemy. On Comte Eustace, if he were on board, or Amaury de Montfort? I decided not to answer that.

  Clouds came up and the sun went in. I was cold now, even with my sheepskin coat on, though not as cold as I would have been without it – six hours is a long time when you are sitting on a wet rock in the middle of the sea. A small crab, lodged in a little rock-pool, had appeared. The creature regarded me with an impassive eye and started nibbling at my toe. I lifted my foot up but the creature hung on. I put my foot back in the water. The crab returned to its feast.

  No ships or boats came by, though I saw some beating about in the distance. I had been told by FitzStephen that it was considered prudent to approach the harbour with a strong incoming flood, so it seemed we were all waiting for the tide to turn, and a long wait it was. It had been high water at nine that morning and it would be low at around three. The crab grew tired of his nibbling and I grew tired of waiting. It was the cold, and the fear of what I had to do, and the intrinsic uncertainty of the sea that really took the spirit out of me. It might be that I would have stories to tell Alice, or Juliana – or my grandchildren whoever they might be – at some later date, over a roaring fire with a glass of sack in my hand. Then, I would cut a fine figure as I told of my exploits, but now I was a sad creature. I huddled in the no-shelter of the rock. I was wet, the sun was hidden by a further sequence of clouds, and the wind was not a drying wind; it was a wind that simply tickled the wet and made it feel wetter.

  More crabs appeared and I noticed one or two shrimps. There were a few mussels on the rock and a selection of limpets. At one stage, I saw several small fish and, further out, a shoal of what might have been pilchards, which surfaced and dived. I set two of the crabs to have a race, but they went in opposite directions. Out in the dark water under a ledge of rock, something big moved that I thought might be a lobster – and indeed, I saw that it was when it emerged a little way from its shelter, driven perhaps by curiosity, or indignation at my encroachment of its habitat. We eyed each other. Lobsters are scavengers, and doubtless it was wondering whether I might be dead. I felt cold enough to be.

  ‘You shall have feast enough before the month is out,’ I told it.

  Mollified perhaps, it withdrew. Patience is everything in the sea.

  I was by now beyond cold. Grateful though I was for the sheepskin coat, it had become sodden through my various flounderings. Exercise was virtually impossible. I grew thirsty, but there was nothing I could do about that. Slowly, slow as the shadow on a dial, the water subsided. As I fell to ruminating on my two ladies and the entwining of our fates, all precipitated by that oaf of a comte, the contemptible self-pleased drunkard who is no longer Lord of Breteuil (and serve him right), I had rashly untied Perrine’s painter from my wrist – it was beginning to chafe – and my hand must have slackened and unclenched. I came to my senses just in time to see her starting to bob away. I plunged into the water, soaking myself anew, and grabbed the painter as she floated past the island, scarcely preserving my hold on an overhang of rock as I pulled her in.

  I tied the painter in a knot once more around my wrist, and lost myself in thought again, imagining myself back at Breteuil, living again that beautiful, distressful dream.

  At last, I noticed the pace of the water began to slacken. My island was now, as I guessed, thirty paces round. I was told later that you could walk on sand here at a really low spring tide. The breeze dropped. The chafing of the sea subsided. The sun came out again.

  It had become a perfect late autumn day. I was beginning to warm up now so I waited a little longer, stretching out in the sun; there was no point in going until the tide had really turned, and I confess I was a little nervous about the reception I would get. Soon, the backward quirk of a ripple or two and an eddy curling under the brown wriggle of a seaweed, told me it was time. I steadied myself and, holding each of Perrine’s generous sides, I scrambled onto the seat, and pushed off. The boat held steady in the water for a moment, and then turned obediently towards the shore.

  ‘What the hell did you think you were d-d-doing?’ said FitzStephen, I thought rather ungraciously, twenty minutes later, when I finally made it back, carried sweetly with hardly more than a gesture at rowing home on the incoming flood.

  ‘I got caught by the tide.’

  ‘I warned you about that.’

  ‘No you didn’t.’

  ‘How can I work with you if you do not listen? You will have to go. You are a danger to us all.’

  ‘You thought I had gone to Guernsey, didn’t you?’

  ‘Yes. And I wasn’t going to come and look for you. I’m not taking the White Ship out before her trials.’

  �
��Don’t you want to know what I did?’

  ‘No.’ The man was sulking.

  ‘I landed on the rock.’

  ‘The rock? Which rock?’

  ‘The Quilleboeuf.’

  ‘You’re joking.’

  ‘I scrambled out and held on to Perrine. Then we sat and waited.’

  ‘Impossible.’

  I could see he was impressed.

  ‘Well, I never heard of that before. I can see you can handle a boat,’ he said, ‘and a rock. You had better come inside and get warm.’

  Somehow my misadventure had turned into an advantage.

  LXVI

  The trials and testing of the White Ship were due to start in a week’s time, but first we had to have the launching ceremony, a tradition at Barfleur. FitzStephen invited me to attend, as long as I kept out of the way.

  Thirty ruffians from Caen – they looked like jailbirds, but I was told they were regular oarsmen – turned up the day before with a mountainous keeper who was to be the galley-master. They had all rowed before under various captains, most of them piratical ones by the look of them.

  It was considered good luck to splash a jugful of wine across the bows and for someone to christen the vessel. There was no titled lady in residence in the town, so we used the prettiest girl we could find, Lisette, the barmaid at The Seabass.

  A crowd gathered for the launching: fishermen and foragers and quartermasters from the armies; and publicans and sinners like me. The priest turned up too, because priests never like to be kept out of things, and a couple of friars who happened to be passing. There was rumour that there would be wine later.

  Lisette grasped the jug of wine and cracked it across the lovely blonde prow of the vessel. ‘I name this ship the White Ship. May God bless her,’ she cried.

  Then the priest said a prayer, and the two friars said two more prayers, and Lisette kissed everyone, and the great ship slid into the water, causing a big wave to form that nearly pulled over the men who were holding the ropes. There was more cheering when she was finally tied up at the jetty and FitzStephen declared her ready for action. Then it started raining and we all went back to the inn.

  The following week, we all formed up again on the jetty for the first day of the trial. FitzStephen had explained to me that they do not normally trial a ship, they just put her in the water and if she doesn’t sink, they sail her, but this was a special ship – a ship for a king: everything had to work perfectly.

  The White Ship was trim and taking in no water. She sat there easily in the harbour, like a seabird. The oarsmen – looking surprisingly fresh considering the amount they had been putting away the night before – were first on board followed by their enormous galley-master who, with a practised eye, allotted each man his particular place.

  ‘It is a great s-s-skill,’ FitzStephen whispered, excitedly, ‘the ordering of the rowers. You don’t just sit them down any way. This Sigebert is the best galley-master I know. He could drive his crew across dry land if I told him to.’

  ‘He looks as if he could scull the ship single-handed,’ I replied.

  We walked on board. The rest of FitzStephen’s crew was assembled – some forty useful-looking men, most of them sailors, but interspersed with carpenters and fitters. He addressed them and I could see the respect he commanded. He did not suffer fools gladly. He told them to look sharp and do their duty. It would be their honour to take the highest in the land as passengers.

  Finally, telling me to stick close to him, he took the tiller. His foreman cast off, the sail was raised, and we were away. Soon the regular chanting of the galley-master, calling the time for the oarsmen, could be heard above the mutter of the sails and we were moving through the water at speed. You could feel the power of her as she sliced through the water, making for the open sea beyond the Raz de Barfleur.

  ‘The ship is incredibly fast,’ I said to FitzStephen, caught up in the excitement of the moment. He let me take the helm, and I felt her quiver under me. It really was the most beautiful ship; more than mere wood, she was like a racehorse. She trembled to go faster.

  ‘We are only using half the complement of oarsmen,’ he said. ‘It is safer to take things slowly as we try her out. We will sail close to the wind, we will sail into the wind, we will turn fast about, we will run with the wind behind us at more speed, we will sail on a lee shore, we will manoeuvre, we will stop and start again, we will run with tide and outstrip the incoming flood; we will practise every eventuality, and only when I am confident will I offer her to the Duke.’

  And so we tried her, that day and thereafter, on fair days and foul days, sometimes with me at the helm under his watchful eye, when great waves curled around the prow and the spray punched our faces, back and forth, round the Sound, across the Bay, starting and stopping, taking the wind side on and fully behind us, defying it with our oars. One day we even ventured as far as Alderney, this time with a full complement of oarsmen so that I felt the ship almost take to the air she was so quick through the water. The craftsmen tinkered with the ship when we returned, making little alterations which they first discussed with FitzStephen, and then addressed far into the night so that the vessel was ready for her trial next day. We lived with the smell of wood and paint, of sailcloth and sweat – for the men below decks were less fresh than a fish and twice as smelly.

  FitzStephen addressed the galley-master on this issue for, said he, we shall be taking gentlefolk and fair ladies who must not be offended with rank odours. They were instructed to wash under the pump both before and after each voyage, which instruction indeed occasioned some muttering. The galley-master was so impressed next morning, he called in his daughters for a sample ride, and both young women expressed themselves well satisfied, especially at the sight of all those brawny midriffs.

  Finally, at the end of the first ten days in November, the shipwright declared that he was happy.

  ‘I have word,’ he said, ‘that the Duke is now at Gisors, talking to the Pope’s legate and concluding business there. He will shortly leave Gisors and make his way slowly, with his oldest friends and advisers, across Normandy to Barfleur. He should arrive here by the twenty-fifth of the month. Then let our business begin! I shall surely be the happiest man alive.’

  He would also, with any luck, be able to pay off some of his creditors. His accounts were in a fearful muddle, and I had tried to make some sense out of his tangled affairs. I had seen some of the figures that he was in hock for, and I was nervous for him, but if the Duke smiled on the White Ship there was no doubt that all would be well. It was a gamble, but it would surely be worth it.

  LXVII

  All I had to do now was ask a fisherman for a buoy and somehow attach it to the Quilleboeuf rock one night. Finding the buoy was easy for anyone with a little money. I located an old man called Jérôme who had given up fishing because of his back. He was only too happy to make a little cash, and he had a big, white, corky buoy with thirty-five feet of rope and a weight to attach it to the seabed. I told him I was after lobsters, and he tried to sell me his boat, but Perrine was all I needed – Perrine, and a calm night with a good moon, if possible.

  I waited three nights and there was cloud, and then there was rain, and then there was a strong wind so the sea was too rough.

  A week later, the weather turned mild and calm. The wind dropped, the clouds dissipated, and it was near low tide at around nine o’clock when most honest people were in bed.

  I crept out of the inn and made my way to the lean-to where the old fisherman kept the buoy and the tackle. Taking them up soundlessly, I went down to the jetty and placed the cargo in Perrine. I climbed into the boat, when a drunk came lurching by with a skinful of wine. The last thing I wanted was discovery, even by a drunk, so I crouched low over the buoy, embracing it like a bosom friend until the disturbance had gone. And then I set off under the harbour lights, muffling the sound of my oars as best I could. It was all quite different at night. As I pulled away from the moor
ing on the jetty, past the White Ship, pale as a ghost, and the company of all the vessels in the harbour, I felt scared. Yes, I must admit it; who knows what monsters lurk in the deep? Perrine was stout, but she was a little boat; you could tip her up in a second, broadside to a stiff sea or a leviathan. But none of that was going to happen.

  As I pulled away from the harbour, I entered something like a waking dream – sea flat as a looking-glass, moon on the wane but still plenty of it, making a moonpath right up to Perrine, light bouncing off the water from the moon and a million stars. Far away a bell was tolling, solemnly. Perrine swam gently down the current, the lights on shore passing like ships. It was only for a few moments but I had a feeling of mysterious and universal union, and then it was over. I rested on my oars and took a draught from a flask of wine I had brought with me in case I became marooned – or thirsty.

  Enough of mysticism, I said to myself sternly, there is a job to be done, and I will never see Alice again unless I do it. To start with: how was I going to find the rock? I could row around for ever and get hopelessly lost.

  I knew that the current had previously taken me almost directly to the Quilleboeuf without any navigation necessary on my part. Indeed I had been told that the current here flows due north, which was why the Quilleboeuf was so dangerous to shipping. Follow the Pole Star too closely and you hit the rock; I had been told that many times by the old salts and sailors of Barfleur.

  All I had to do was drift and paddle, drift and paddle, and in ten minutes I would turn Perrine’s bow towards the shore, keep a close look-out for the rock over the stern, and hope to see it somewhere in the vast and silent dark. No, don’t be a funk, I would see it.

  There was a sudden splash over towards the starboard, or was it the port – harder to tell when you’re facing the wrong way. I have always, as I say, had this slight problem with left and right. Oh, I know where they are intellectually when I have time to think, but in emergency I sometimes get it wrong. Anyway, there was a splash and it momentarily spooked me. What would splash like that unless it was a shark or giant squid? I began to form the impression that I was not alone; someone was following me in a small dark boat, a shape I could almost see, I was certain of it, over there to my right, yes, right…