‘Why don’t they jump?’ one of the pilgrims shouted above the roar of the flames.
‘They can’t swim, that’s why,’ another voice grunted. ‘Poor devils, they’ll fry!’
All the boats were quickly put in the water and half a dozen or so bobbed about on a sea of reflected fire.
Master John was in one of the first and could be heard shouting at the oarsman to put his back into it. ‘My cargo!’ he roared. ‘I’ve lost my ship! Save my cargo or I’m a dead man!’
His oarsman dug the sweeps deep into the running tide with all his strength.
Southampton Water was swollen, bank to bank, and running powerfully in its deep channels with the surge of the incoming tide. In places, dancing in the light of the torches, shallower waters ran over the sand-banks that lay in drifts under the surface. Only a local man could find a way through such labyrinths. Hildegard could still hear Master John weeping and praying and cursing in turn as the boat with what must have seemed like agonizing slowness picked its way through them towards the St Marie.
‘He cannot think of going on board?’ someone said beside her. It was Gregory.
Hildegard looked round. ‘Where are your brothers?’ she asked, expecting to see a crowd of monks coming out to help get the crew off. Only the lay-brothers were down on the beach along with pilgrims and guests and others with interests on board the stricken vessel.
‘Didn’t you hear the Matins bell? They’ve gone in to pray.’ He made no other comment but his tone made her glance sharpen. ‘And Egbert?’
‘He’s here, of course.’He glanced down the beach to where a figure in a white habit, knee-deep in the water, had just pushed off one of the boats. ‘How many on board, do you know?’
‘Not many. Maybe half-a-dozen or so.’
Egbert came up just then and Gregory said, ‘We need more boats. We can do more by rowing out to pluck survivors from the water than by standing here.’
‘They say there are boats in that shed along the beach. Come on!’
The two men sprinted over the shingle towards some trees.
Hildegard watched them go, and, undecided, called after them, ‘I’ll only take up space if I come with you. I’ll find another one.’
Of the half-dozen or so already leaving the beach a one-man coracle remained and she started to run for it only to find herself in contention with someone else. When she saw it was Hywel she gasped,‘Do you want it?’
‘I do. I have goods on board.’
‘Do you need help?’
He barely shook his head as he began to haul the vessel over the shingle.
Hildegard conceded the point and helped him push it right into the water. He scrambled for the paddle. In the lurid light from the stricken cog his face looked stark with fear.
By now the St Marie was surrounded by a flotilla of rescue boats but they were small, barely able to take more than one or two passengers at a time. She watched them circle and struggle to keep steady in the inrushing tide. The lightning had hit the main mast and a smell of burning tar and pinewood filled the air as it blazed like a gigantic candle.
The ship’s bows faced upriver and the anchor chain in the stern was pulled taut by the tide. A figure too distant to make out was hanging from it by both hands and as she watched the figure swung up and began to climb towards the deck. A rope ladder had been let down amidships and lines thrown over the side so the crew could escape but instead of swarming down to the safety of the boats, they jostled about above the surface. Shouts broke out. After a moment, fearing fire more than water, one of them jumped and vanished in the reflected fires. He surfaced and began to flounder in a mirror of flame.
A rescue boat reached him just as he was being swept under the ship and somehow they hooked him from the water and dragged him on board. Others began to jump then and more confusion followed as the men were picked up one by one and brought into the smaller boats.
Master John was visible, standing in the bows, as his oarsman neared the ship while John bellowed something, too far off to be intelligible.
Clearly seen in the lurid light, a couple of sailors grasped the sides of his boat, tipping it in their panic and as it began to go over she saw the master grab an oar from his boatman and bring it down again and again onto the fingers of the men hanging on. The boatman flung his other paddle into the bottom of the boat and, unaided, dragged the two men onboard.
The ship-owner took it as an opportunity to stride across onto another boat nearby and from there was able to reach out for the ladder and begin to climb onboard.
Despite the blazing deck he didn’t pause when he reached the top but, instead, clambered over the gunnels and disappeared. His desperation was understandable. The ship and her cargo represented his entire life. And it was about to be destroyed by the fiery hand of God.
‘That you, domina?’ Jankin came up beside her. ‘I only knew you by your voice when you spoke to the magister,’ he said. ‘You sound quite calm.’
‘No point in hysterics even though it’s a catastrophe. Let’s hope nobody’s lost.’
‘Nor their precious goods,’ he derided.
He gave her a quick glance but she didn’t reprove him, merely saying, ‘One obviously more valuable than the other.’ They both turned to stare out towards the bobbing rescue boats. ‘I think they’ve got everyone off now, praise be,’ she added.
While the cog blazed, the light it cast over the surface was enough to show the boats, laden low in the water, winding through the sandbanks back towards the beach. There was no sign of anyone trying and failing to swim nor grappling to be allowed into a boat. Hildegard felt a sense of relief sweep over her. ‘I think they’ve got them all,’ she repeated.
It was all confusion but above it all they could still hear Master John, shouting and cursing, as he was rowed back to shore.
‘I was asleep, dreaming of ghosts, when I heard shouting,’ Jankn told her. ‘I’d hate to be out there in that black water.’ He shivered.
‘Where’s Alaric?’ She glanced round at the by-standers. A group of nearby lay-brothers, standing waist-deep, were guiding the first boats to shore. The white habits of the two Cistercians stood out in the darkness. She saw them run down to the water’s edge with a coracle between them.
‘Row this one back to the ship and make sure everybody is off,’ Gregory instructed. ‘We’ll go back for another.’A few shapes leaped into action almost as soon as he finished speaking.
‘What are they going back for?’ she called.
‘The ship man is still onboard!’ the oarsman of the first boat shouted back. ‘He’s sent his crew off but refuses to leave the ship himself.’
‘We’ll persuade him!’ called Egbert, turning to follow Gregory as he ran back towards the store.
Hildegard went down to grab the bows of the first boat as it beached. Three people were on board but while the oarsman and one of his passengers climbed straight out into the water as soon as the shingle grated under the stem, the third passenger, hood up, refused to move.
‘Get out, I’m going back!’ urged the oarsman. ‘Come on!’ he roared when they didn’t move. ‘You heard what they said. The ship man is still onboard.’
Putting out a hand he tried to push the passenger out of the boat. ‘Move, will you! They’ve got to get him off!’
In the struggle the two of them fell in a heap and the hooded figure scrambled away, crawling blindly up the beach and collapsing above the tide-line among a drift of weed and shells.
Hildegard went over.
Nobody was close by now. All hands were pushing the boat back into the water with the oarsman at once pulling away from the shore as soon as a couple of conversi were aboard. By now the other boats were crowding into the shallower water near the shore with the crewmen they had rescued and, in the clamour of the hero’s welcome each was given, the scene became a blur of bodies lit by the torches and by the more brilliant though distant illumination of the burning ship.
Its
timbers were being consumed more fiercely than ever. The sails flared, ripped apart by the conflagration, and small pieces of sail-cloth sparkled in the sky like dancing angels carried on the up-draft caused by the fire until they vanished into the darkness. The great pole of the main mast was a flaming brand of monstrous proportions.
Looking down at the figure at her feet she saw only an undistinguishable bundle of dark fabric. Whoever it was seemed unaware that the danger of drowning was over. Hildegard bent down and twitched the hood back.
A frightened face stared up at her.
It was Delith.
With no explanation necessary Hildegard stooped to offer her hand. ‘You’re on dry land. Give praise for your deliverance. Come, stand up if you can.’
Without speaking the widow rose to her feet. She tried to straighten her clothing, brushing the sand off it, smoothing its creases, but her hands were shaking. She did not look at Hildegard again. She took a step but would have stumbled if Hildegard had not reached out.
‘Hold onto me. When you’re ready maybe you’ll want to go back to the abbey? I‘m sure the kitcheners will be preparing something for the survivors of such a calamity.’
Delith linked her arm in Hildegard’s and together they headed back up the bank. When they reached the wooded track leading to the gatehouse Delith muttered, ‘I can manage now, domina. My gratitude for your help.’
Hildegard watched the slight figure, hood already concealing her identity again, make her way towards the abbey gate. ‘Well, well,’ she thought. ‘So that’s how it goes.’
Chapter Eleven
Standing at the top of the bank she watched the scene below. Boats were still plying back and forth. Some were laden with goods, others with reluctant crew. Cries of relief rose as yet another sailor stumbled ashore. Lissa and Simon appeared belatedly on the scene from between the trees and Lissa came over to where Hildegard was standing on the bank.
‘I couldn’t get Simon out of bed and didn’t want to leave him behind. It looks as if we’ve missed it all, domina.’
‘Not quite. They haven’t brought the ship man off yet. He’s refusing to leave her. And then there’s the cargo. They seem to be bringing some of it off already – although I would imagine that’s the last thing to worry about when lives are at stake.’
‘Is John out there?’ asked Lissa.
‘He went on board to see what he could rescue but was brought back to the beach as the fire took hold,’ Hildegard told her. ‘His ship man is still on board.’
‘It’ll be John’s ruin.’
‘He may yet have saved something,’ Simon said in a consoling tone. ‘Never lose hope. That’s what I always say.’
‘Yes, you do, Simon, my wise old owl. You always say that.’ Lissa was staring out towards the ship with an unexpected look of dismay on her face. Before she averted her head Hildegard was sure she had caught sight of a glistening tear rolling down her cheek.
In one of those sudden reversals of weather which, to the superstitious appear to confirm the value of prayer, if that’s what they’ve been asking for, a cloud burst overhead. Rain began to course down in torrents. It was all-embracing as if funneled from the spout of a giant acquifer.
At once the hiss of steam from blackened timbers was heard and the sickening smell of burning floated across the water. One by one the boats with their drenched occupants returned.
Still the ship man refused to leave. He could be seen on deck arguing with those in the two or three rescue boats that had returned, and apparently refusing to desert the now steaming and blackened wreck. Hildegard could see the two Cistercians urging him to come off but now the rain was beginning to quench the flames he looked even more inclined to stay. It was only with some shoving from what looked like the ship’s boy and the combined shouts of those circling in the boats that at last – at last – he was persuaded to leave.
The final boat was carried rapidly on the flood as the tide raced under it and the rain hissed like a million serpents all around. Even those well-wishers who wanted to cheer the ship man ashore went running for shelter under the trees although, when at last he staggered up the beach, a triumphant mob braved the torrent to hoist him onto their shoulders and carry him every step of the way back into the abbey.
Hildegard was glad of her waxed cloak. Still wearing it she went to join everyone in the warming house. There was a sense of triumph in the air now that everyone had got off safely but an imminent sense of wonder at the cost to be borne by the shiip owner, Master John, was palpable.
He was white-faced. He could not speak. His eyes seemed to calculate loss beyond anything anyone could imagine.
Only because of his wet clothes was he persuaded to remain in the warming room with everyone else. Then, with a beaker of warm wine in his hand, he gradually came to himself. Even so, it was plain to see his spirits were like lead under his bluff exterior.
‘Gone,’ he muttered in everyone’s hearing. ‘All gone. Finished.’
She wondered about the wealthy backer they had imagined when they first heard him talking about his activities and hoped it might be true. Poor man, she thought, ignoring the memory of him smashing the paddle down onto the hands of the men trying to climb aboard his rescue boat. If he was imprudent not to insure his cargo he had no room for complaint, but why would he not do that? Was his confidence in this possible backer such that insurance was unnecessary?
A sympathetic crowd gathered round him and tried to cheer him up. His drinking vessel was filled and refilled. It was the newcomers, Hildegard noticed, the ones whose names she had not yet learned, who were most concerned. The two sisters made comforting noises but had not seen the fire as they regretfully admitted so were unaware of the sheer scale of his loss. Simon made a contribution, urging him to seek comfort in prayer, but the others, the core group who had sat out the heat-wave together the previous day were mainly silent.
Master John’s ship man himself was in tears.They poured down his weather-beaten faced without let. For someone who had day-to-day courage above the ordinary in every kind of weather he was in a state of incredible collapse. Nothing would console him.
‘I loved her!’ he sobbed. ‘My heart is broken. I loved that ship.I shall never love another as much as I love her. She was my home, my light, my life!’
Lissa turned to Delith who was warming both hands round her cup of wine. ‘Listen to him. Who’d believe it?’ She glanced at Simon. ‘Would even you, my darling owl, wail for me as loudly as the ship man wails over his wooden boat?’
‘My little lark,’ murmured Simon with his gentle smile. ‘I would set up such a wailing if you left me that heaven would weep with me. But mock him not. I fear you do not understand a sea-farer’s mind. They love their ships because she saves them from harm and is their mother, their Virgin saint and all the angels of heaven combined. Of course he mourns her. She is a being above and outside the world and human love cannot encompass that feeling of grief the poor man feels.’
Lissa gave a sort of flounce but the derision in her eyes was enough to end this, for them, quite sharp exchange. She only added, ‘That is an answer and no answer, my old owl.’
Delith was standing mutely by. Unusually she had no opinion to offer.
Before anyone ventured to suggest returning to their sleeping chambers the door edged open, and with a gust of rain sweeping him inside, a stranger entered. As everyone turned to stare, he began to shake the rain from off his cloak and slick back his pale, sparse hair.
Delith, standing next to Hildegard, must have decided she had had enough and pulled up her hood, crossed her arms over her chest as if cold, and headed for the small door leading into the undercroft of the dortoir. It gave a small snick as she closed it.
Everyone’s attention was on the new-comer as he eventually threw off the cloak to reveal a bright velvet cotte the colour of dandelions.
He glanced round the group. ‘Good people, I’ve come to find my wife. She’s absconded with my life saving
s. I’m told she’s here, intending to take ship to France in the guise of a pilgrim.’
Part II
Chapter One
The previous night’s storm did not clear the air. Even as early as Prime, the heat bore down on Netley with renewed ferocity. The air was swamp-like, liable to spread a miasma of plague throughout the precincts. People sweated and pulled at the necks of their clothes to allow in a breath of air. Already two or three guests and a monk or two waited outside Hywel’s workshop to ask for a preventative dose of whatever he could prescribe.
In the middle of Southampton Water, the St. Marie still rode at anchor. She was a black shell, like a death ship, but miraculously afloat. Now the tide had turned she seemed to strain towards the open sea.
Prime was well attended given the late night and the excitement that had preceded it. The monks looked content in the sufficiency of their support. The merchant, Master John, wore the mantle of a ruined ship-owner, his grieving ship man, the pilgrims thwarted of their adventures overseas and hoped-for absolution at the foreign shrines, and even the man searching for his absconding wife, prayed more fervently, it seemed to Hildegard, with even greater belief in the power of prayer than before.
Afterwards she made her first visit of the day to her lord abbot. He was wide awake this time, looking stern, with a frowning monk sitting beside him. Both turned as she approached. The monk found her a stool.
‘I have heard all,’ Hubert told her. ‘Or maybe not quite all?’
‘None of us knows the whole story,’ the monk interrupted. ‘The work of the devil is apparent in every aspect.’ He gave a nod in Hubert’s direction. ‘I will not encroach on your visitor’s time. Send one of the lay-brothers along if you need anything more, my lord. I will keep you informed, as instructed.’
The Alchemist of Netley Abbey: Eighth in the Hildegard of Meaux medieval mystery series Page 13
