Pengarron Pride
Table of Contents
Cover
Title Page
Dedication
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
The Pengarron Sagas
The Harvey Family Sagas
Copyright
Pengarron Pride
Gloria Cook
To the memory of my father, Ted, and my father-in-law, Percy.
Chapter 1
After five long days at sea, drifting for mackerel around the Wolf Rock, the Perranbarvah fishing fleet sailed back through a heavy swell and made its way into Mount’s Bay, heading for Newlyn’s fish market. As the black-stained luggers made their way past the inhospitable granite headland of Pengarron Point, the fishermen were in good humour. At regular intervals they soaked down the most recent catch with sea water to keep it fresh; an excellent catch was already salted down in the fishrooms of their boats. This meant food on the table and a few extra shillings to invest in the maintenance of the boats, or, if the vessels were rented, something to put by towards the dues.
The fleet came from a close-knit community of men and boys of three generations from fifteen families, of whom many had intermarried down the centuries. They put to sea together and returned home together. They kept a close watch on each other’s interests and shared the same griefs and fortunes. When one family ate, they all ate; more often they went hungry.
The fleet would soon tie up at Newlyn, the catch would be unloaded, weighed, and sold for either local or overseas consumption. Then the luggers could finally sail for home. They would be washed down, their equipment assessed for loss or damage and the fishermen could at last take a short, hard-earned rest.
The sky this morning was taking longer than usual to lighten and usher in the dawn. The wild coastline of the little horseshoe-shaped Trelynne Cove was barely visible.
A short time later, as the fleet neared its home village, the strong south-easterly wind that had been whipping up the waves suddenly dropped away, as though two giants quarrelling at the south and east ends of the earth had ceased their puffing and blowing. A dense fog swept over the boats with uncompromising speed.
All talk in the boats came to an abrupt halt, as though a mighty voice had cried ‘Hush!’ and the fishermen had obeyed it without exception. Within seconds the fog spread a shroud of chilled damp air in all directions, obliterating sky, landmarks, horizons and fellow vessels. The fishermen lit more lanterns against the gloom. Some of the men fidgeted with nets and tackle or tried to count the slithering mass of oily blue- and green-backed fish of the most recent catch. The older fishermen remained still, their weathered hands clamped into fists as they peered through the thick dank air and tried to locate a familiar landmark, looking for reassurance that they were not heading too close inshore towards the congregation of silent deadly rocks.
With the drop in the wind, which had been on their backs and driving them into Mount’s Bay, the boats were becoming increasingly difficult to navigate as they were tossed about on the heavy swell. The fishermen held on to masts and gunwales as the open vessels were swept up to the crests of high waves and bounced down seconds later only to repeat the stomach-churning motion. The sea smelled strong and salty. The malevolent fog swirled about the men as if it sought to cut off their air supply.
Uncertainty at setting foot safely on land again filtered into the minds of some of the younger, less experienced fishermen. Thoughts of the girl waiting on shore to welcome them home, a satisfying meal served on a table, or the night’s drinking ahead were all pushed aside. Their breathing grew heavier, sounding strangely inside their own heads. They relaxed slightly when they recognised the unique sound of the iron mooring rings on the short pier of the village being clanged by their womenfolk to guide them away from the dangerous cliffs. The wives, mothers, daughters and sisters of the Kings, the Drannocks, the Laitys and the others, all clanging the rings in turn.
Two of the fog-bound luggers riding out the heavy sea were the Lowenek and the Young Maid. The Young Maid was skippered by Samuel Drannock and crewed by his seventeen-year-old son Bartholomew, his close neighbour Jonathan King, and Jonathan’s three sons, Jeremy, Christopher and Josh. They could just make out the fuzzy outline of the boat in front of them, but they were unable to identify it as the Lowenek, manned entirely by more Kings.
Samuel Drannock watched the other lugger with anxious eyes. He hoped it would draw further away but did not attempt to alter the course of his own boat for fear of colliding with an unseen vessel to his port or starboard.
‘Damn this fog, why now?’ he muttered to himself, irritably pushing a lock of greying hair away from his colourless eyes.
The Young Maid was a brand-new lugger, expertly crafted in Mount’s Bay, working her first week at sea. Even though the lugger was owned by a wealthy man at Marazion who took the greater share of the boat’s profits, it was the consummation of the dreams Samuel had held all his working life. The last thing he wanted now was to have the craft damaged by ramming the boat ahead. When a few seconds later the hazy outline in front of him disappeared, his hard face relaxed a little.
‘Thank the Lord,’ he breathed, and Bartholomew, who had been watching his father intently, nodded his dark head in agreement.
But it was too early to thank the Divine. As the Young Maid was swept up to the top of the next wave, the Lowenek was in the deep gully below it. Lowenek’s skipper, Nathaniel King, known locally as Grandfather King, was the first to sense impending danger and the only fisherman on his family’s lugger to see the Young Maid tossed off the wave to plunge down on top of them.
His shout of ‘Look out!’ had barely left his thin, cracked lips when forty feet of heavy timber, masts, yards and sails and several stone of fish crashed down, snuffing out life, tearing off limbs and almost cleaving Lowenek in two. The noise was deafening over the turbulent waters. The fishwives paused in their clanging at that same moment, as though premonition of tragedy had stilled their hands.
At his shout Grandfather King had risen to his feet. He was swept overboard with the speed and grace of a swooping sea bird, hitting the cold, inky-black water with no more than a dull splash. He had no regrets at facing death now. Better to die at sea as a working fisherman than to end up as a slinger, left by old age and infirmity to watch on shore with the women and children for the return of the fleet.
His two sons, Jonathan, and Solomon with his left arm ripped off, were thrown out of their boats immediately after him. The waves swept them quickly away into the fog, their cries growing fainter and fainter until they were no longer heard. Both men fought for their lives, both lost them, not content as their father was to leave their fate to the elements and their Maker.
Terror and confusion possessed the survivors on the Young Maid as it rocked crazily on the rushing sea. Clinging to the mast after a desperate attempt to clutch at Jonathan King’s body, Samuel Drannock was brought forcefully to his knees. When h
e regained his feet the lugger was steadying itself, the sea was a little less angry, the waves had lost some of their awesome strength. Although grateful to have a stable albeit damaged boat under his feet, Samuel’s horror did not lessen. His inbred Cornish superstition rose to the fore at the uncanny changes in the weather and the sea.
‘We’ll pay for this, boy,’ he hissed to his son who was looking at him anxiously from his position at the bow.
‘What’s that?’ Bartholomew shouted above the moans and exclamations of the other survivors on the Young Maid. He saw with despair that nearly all their catch had been lost overboard in the collision. Five days’ tedious labour and sweat all for nothing. Bartholomew wiped blood off his chin where it had struck the bottom of the boat. Furious at what had happened, he swore profusely and for once did not care if his dour father heard every oath.
Samuel did not repeat his gloomy prophecy but looked about the lugger to count the heads of his crew. Bartholomew had survived, thank God, and thank God his younger brothers Charles and Jack were lying abed at home recovering from the measles. Jeremy, Christopher and Josh King were on board. Only Jonathan King had been lost. But how many had survived from the smashed vessel?
Samuel shouted for silence, straining hard to listen for cries of survivors in the water. He was rewarded almost at once. A muffled cry was heard through the gloom.
‘Sounds like Paul!’ shouted Jeremy King. ‘Sounds like my cousin.’
The Young Maid was swept into the next gully and the upper half of Paul King, clinging desperately to a length of spar and canvas lugsail, bobbed into sight. Tears of relief joined the salty wetness on the young fisherman’s face and with renewed strength he kicked his long legs, characteristic of the tall King family, to bring himself up to the hull of the boat.
Samuel and Bartholomew leaned over the lugger side by side. They snatched at Paul’s hair, neck and shoulders and struggled to haul him in between them. Paul stretched out one free hand towards his rescuers but fear kept the other hand clamped to the wreckage.
‘Let go of the bloody spar!’ Bartholomew shouted.
The lugger, its crew and Paul King, still holding on precariously to the spar, were swept up the crest of another wave and the volume of water that smashed into Paul’s face and filled his gaping mouth tore the spar from his grasp. He panicked. Without realising it he fought against Bartholomew’s grip on his shoulder and Bartholomew would have toppled into the water with him if Christopher and Jeremy King had not grabbed his legs and thrown themselves on to the deck, battening themselves down hard. Bartholomew screamed in agony at the over-stretching of his body until the King brothers could scramble to their knees and hold on to him more gently.
Samuel had managed to get a painful grip on Paul’s hair and with his legs braced against the side of the boat he used his other hand to cuff Paul heavily on the face. It brought Paul to his senses; he stopped fighting them and made himself go limp, and Samuel and Bartholomew were able to get a better grip on his coat and shoulders. As they desperately dragged him towards them, Paul’s body was slammed against the hull of the boat. With loud grunts and straining muscles they hauled Paul up until his torso was slung over the gunwale. Christopher and Jeremy let go of Bartholomew’s legs and grabbed their cousin’s body, pulling him fully into the safety of the Young Maid.
Collapsed in a water-sodden heap, Paul gave a hacking cough and gasped for oxygen. As the lugger hit the crest of the next wave he was thrown on to his back and stared up stupidly at the grim faces of his rescuers.
‘So it was the Lowenek we hit,’ muttered Samuel, wiping a wet, calloused hand over his stony face. He knelt at Paul’s side. ‘Are you hurt, Paul?’
Paul shook his head, but his hands travelled to massage at the red marks and bruises on his throat and scalp. Then his relief at being rescued vanished as quickly as the fog had first appeared. He was too breathless to speak but using Samuel’s body as a lever he prised himself up beside Bartholomew and scanned the short limits of the sea under the thick cloying air, looking for other members of his family.
A full five agonising minutes passed when a startled outburst came from Christopher King at the stern. ‘Somebody’s climbing in!’
Eager hands reached out to help another sodden fisherman to safety. It took the combined strength of all those on board, clinging to each other’s wet coats and avoiding slipping legs, before the exhausted body of Matthew King, Solomon’s eldest son, was safely on board. A giant in stature, Matthew King had used his massive strength to swim through the waves in the direction of the shore and had hardly believed his good fortune to find the stern of a lugger in front of him.
‘How… many… of us… have ’ee… pulled in?’ he rasped out moments later, granite-faced but hopeful, while gulping in lungfuls of chilled air.
‘Just you and your brother Paul,’ Samuel answered him gravely.
Shaking off his helpers, Matthew’s eyes eagerly sought his brother. ‘You all right, boy?’
‘Aye, Matt, I’m all right,’ Paul replied solemnly. ‘No need to worry about me. I’m ruddy glad to see you though, afraid I was goin’ to be the only one to…’ He didn’t finish the sentence and Matthew turned to Samuel.
‘Were it your boat who hit us, Samuel?’
‘Aye, it was,’ Samuel replied in a small voice.
‘Have ’ee lost any on board here?’
Samuel nodded. ‘Aye, Jonathan. He went over the side on impact.’
‘Ruddy hell!’ the big man exclaimed unbelievingly. He moved about the rocking boat as best he could and stared into the grim faces of each of the fishermen on board to reassure himself of their presence and safety.
‘Only five of you!’ he cried in anguish a moment later. ‘For heaven’s sake, Samuel! There’s only five of you here! Where’s Josh?’ Glaring wildly at Samuel, Matthew gripped his shoulder. ‘Where’s young Josh? Where’s the boy!’
‘But, but…’ Samuel wrenched himself free and whirled round to the bow, pointing agitatedly. ‘He was there, beside Bartholomew, I counted him. I did, he was there!’ Samuel appealed to his son. ‘Did you see him, after the accident?’
Bartholomew gulped. ‘I… I didn’t notice…’
Samuel’s thin mouth gaped open and his eyes glazed over. He had witnessed Jonathan King’s tall frame being hurled overboard and probably to his death. Had Jonathan’s youngest son gone over too and without anyone noticing? Samuel looked at each taut face in turn with the question etched on his features. In return he received either a shake of the head or a blank stare.
Matthew King grabbed Samuel again and shook him roughly. ‘Where is Josh!’ he screamed in sheer frustration.
‘For goodness sake, Matt!’ Paul shouted fearfully. ‘Leave him be or you’ll have this boat over too!’
Matthew heeded Paul’s plea shamefacedly. He let go of Samuel with a slight push then patted his arm in a gesture that said he was sorry for the outburst.
Bartholomew, who had been on the verge of coming to his father’s aid, spoke up firmly over the roar of the waves. ‘We may yet find the others, Matt. We mustn’t give up hope but we’re not going to hear their cries for help if we panic.’
The fog was gradually lifting, the waves becoming smaller and more manageable. The fishermen silently acknowledged the youth’s words and all turned about to lean over the gunwales to resume the search for signs of life.
Matthew brushed tears from his eyes and muttered prayers through his bristly brown beard. He had no idea where the Young Maid had been tossed to, no familiar clanging of rings could be heard, either from his own or a neighbouring village. Paul stood close beside him, his knuckles white as he gripped the gunwale. Though numb with grief, a small part of his brain marvelled that he was still alive and he found comfort that the sea had spared his amiable giant brother, who, if their grandfather, father and uncle were really lost, was now the head of their family.
Bartholomew nudged Paul’s arm. ‘Some of them may be picked up by the
other boats.’
It was a comforting thought. ‘Could be.’ Paul gave the other youth a grateful smile. ‘Never thought of that.’
‘Shush, you two,’ Matthew hissed through the corner of his mouth.
The sky was slowly clearing, soon the coastline would be in sight and the fishermen would be able to ascertain their exact whereabouts. Silence reigned on the Young Maid. Then Samuel Drannock’s voice came in a rasp, ‘Hark, I thought I heard something.’
The fishermen straightened their bodies and became alert, turning their heads this way and that to pick up any human sounds.
‘There it is again,’ said Samuel urgently. ‘Did any other of ’ee hear it?’
‘I b’lieve I heard something,’ Christopher King replied, hoping it would be his father Jonathan or his brother Josh.
‘There it is again!’ cried Matthew, jubilantly repeating Samuel. ‘To starboard. At least one more out there’s still alive. Someone get me a rope to tie round my waist. I’m going in after him before this lugger is swept too far away from him.’
‘Let me do it, Matthew,’ Samuel said, catching the giant’s arm.
‘Tes someone in my family out there, Samuel,’ Matthew returned solidly, taking the rope held out to him by Christopher. ‘Tes my place to go, and besides, I’m the strongest swimmer here. When you feel me jerking on the rope, pull us back in.’
‘Please, Matthew,’ there was an urgency in Samuel’s voice. ‘I feel partly to blame for what’s happened and as skipper of this lugger I’m the one with the right to say who goes and who stays.’
‘I don’t know about that—’
‘Let Samuel go, Matt,’ Paul broke in, frightened at the prospect of his brother leaving the safety of the boat and becoming lost with the other members of their family.
Matthew King hesitated for a moment but it was long enough for Samuel to snatch the rope from his huge hands and begin tying it in deft knots round his own waist.
Despite the rocking motion of the boat, Bartholomew was quickly at his father’s side. ‘Father, don’t,’ he pleaded, grabbing Samuel’s arm.
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