The Main Cages

by Philip Marsden

  Captain Maddocks’s voice came crackling over the address system. ‘Will the Golden Sands please stand off until the heat is finished!’

  Jimmy ignored it. He gave several loud blasts on his foghorn and the praams below him scattered right and left. Two race officers shouldered their way along the quay and stood on the steps as he came in. ‘Take your boat away, Garrett!’

  Jimmy checked his bows and stern. He then looked to the men on the quay. ‘You’ll have to move there – my passengers are coming through.’

  ‘Remove your boat at once, Mr Garrett!’

  Tacker jumped ashore with a line and Jimmy came out of the wheelhouse to lean on the rail. ‘You want fifty more mouths to feed tonight? More stern, Tacker!’

  Tacker shoved past them.

  ‘Five minutes, Garrett. We’ll give you five minutes. Then, I can assure you, we will come and untie your lines ourselves.’

  At the hotel, Mr Bryant went into the kitchens and had a word with his barman, Pearce. ‘Go and ask the cook – hurry, boy!’

  Cameron and Rose took it upon themselves to gather in the rest of the passengers. They went to the Racing Committee and asked to make an announcement.

  ‘Will all passengers for Polmayne please make their way to the quay! The Golden Sands will be boarding at once! Repeat – the Golden Sands will be leaving for Polmayne immediately!’

  On the beach Anna packed away her sketchpad and made her way round to the front. Birkin was slumped like a starfish on the sand, and Travers and Lee pulled him to his feet and led him to the quay. The elderly couples, the nannies with their children, the boy with the model yacht, the guests of the hotel, the non-residents – all hurried along the quay and down onto the Golden Sands. There they took up their former places on the benches. Some carried on through the deckhouse to the open stern where for the first time they were aware of the hostility of the crowd staring down at them.

  Tacker came and counted heads. They were all there, plus the Petrel skippers and crew. Cameron and Charlie Treneer stood ready to cast off.

  ‘Wait!’ called Charlie. A white coat was pushing its way through the crowd. It was Pearce. In one hand he had a wicker hamper and in the other a bag of ice. He jumped aboard.

  Jimmy put the engines into reverse – Cameron and Charlie Treneer brought the lines in and the Golden Sands backed her way out of the harbour, followed by a series of jeers.

  In the stern the passengers caught their breath.

  ‘What a palaver!’ sighed Mrs Hooper.

  Lady Rafferty found her place. ‘Hopeless, hopeless …’

  Sir Basil was muttering; he was still a little baffled.

  Parson Hooper looked astern at the cloudless sky. ‘It’s going to be a lovely evening! What nicer way to spend it than on a boat?’

  By the bar Tacker was talking to Bryant and Bryant was nodding. He stepped forward and opened his arms: ‘Ladies and gentlemen – please … please … I must apologise first of all for our rather hasty departure. Please ask at the bar for anything you’d like to drink. Thanks to the Kidda Head Hotel, we also have a little nourishment.’ Pearce was unwrapping two large fruit cakes from the hamper.

  ‘Good man!’ said Sir Basil.

  As the boat gathered speed westwards, away from Porth harbour, so the easterly wind appeared to drop and in the warmth everyone’s spirits rose. That morning they had come over as strangers, but now from the deckhouse rose the sound of a dozen conversations.

  CHAPTER 27

  At the allotments they were all slowly following the trenches, watering. The leaves behind them were dotted with tiny orbs of moisture. Double began singing again:

  So merry, so merry – so merry are we –

  ‘Dee-ee!’ shouted everyone.

  When they had finished they drained the rest of the tank into a big granite trough and pulled an old door over it. Jack harnessed Job but Tyler said, ‘I’ll take him back. I got to go that way.’

  Five minutes later Jack shouted, ‘Oh God!’ and ran off after Tyler and brought him back. ‘We forgot the Parson’s share.’

  So they pulled the door off again and transferred a few gallons back into the tank and Tyler and Job set off once more for the rectory.

  Croyden lit a cigarette and lay back on the bank. Smoke spilled out of his mouth, blew up over his face and away downwind. Jack retied his boot and stood to leave.

  ‘You’re in a hurry.’ Croyden squinted up at him.

  ‘Things to do.’

  ‘Down Ferryman’s?’

  Jack smiled. ‘Nine tomorrow morning. We’ll take the Station Bus.’

  ‘And if it’s still easterly?’

  ‘We’ll see.’

  Jack set off down the path. As he reached the fence he heard Croyden call after him, ‘If ’ee’s late, I’ll know where to come!’

  Jack turned and saw them all in a line on the bank. Croyden was sitting up with the others and Double was below him, wrestling with the Stephenses’ terrier. Stephens and his sons were to one side, waving goodbye.

  Jack pushed his hands deep into his pockets and carried on down the hill. It was late afternoon. The haze had cleared. The roofs of the town dropped towards the bay and one or two gulls glided out over them. At Bethesda he would pick up cord and timber and some nails for Anna’s paintbox, then up to Ferryman’s and Anna would be there painting on the foreshore or maybe inside in the kitchen or maybe lying in the sun. He quickened his step.

  Anna was on a bench across from the Hoopers. The sunlight came through the eyeholes in the awning and dots of it shifted across the folds of her jacket. The engine rumbled away below, shaking the deck and leaving a faint smell of fuel in the air.

  Parson Hooper stood to go to the bar. ‘Can I bring you anything?’ he asked Anna.

  ‘Some lemonade? Thank you.’

  Mrs Hooper moved her knees as her husband passed and said to Anna, ‘You’re down at Ferryman’s, isn’t that right?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘And – don’t tell me –’ She put a finger to her lips. ‘You’re from Finland?’

  ‘Russia.’

  ‘Russia! Of course!’ She sounded excited to discover Anna was Russian, but could think of nothing to say. ‘And you’re married to the painter, Maurice Abraham.’

  Parson Hooper returned with a tray of lemonade and some cake and handed them round.

  ‘She’s from Russia, dear. Mrs Abraham’s from Russia!’

  Parson Hooper sat down, tugging up the knees of his trousers. ‘Goodness!’

  ‘We lived in India once,’ said Mrs Hooper.

  The Golden Sands had left the shelter of Porth Bay and was just beginning to sway on her keel. Astern, through the open back of the deckhouse, the village had shrunk to a nugget of white buildings. Kidda Head glowed green in the late sun, its flanks spotted with sheep.

  The passengers had fallen quiet. Parson Hooper looked at those around him. ‘I trust everyone enjoyed themselves today?’

  He leaned forward to a girl with pigtails. ‘What about you, young lady? Did you like the boat races?’

  The girl turned and buried her face in her mother’s coat.

  On the other side of the boat, Lady Rafferty was holding court. She was seated on the front bench and in the open area before her stood Bryant and Sir Basil and some of the Petrel skippers.

  ‘What I can’t understand,’ she said to Lawrence Rose, ‘is why you let Major Cameron through.’

  ‘Mr Rose is a gentleman,’ explained Cameron.

  ‘He was on starboard,’ explained Rose. ‘It was his water. Rule of the road.’

  ‘Well,’ said Lady Rafferty, ‘it didn’t do either of you any good. And it didn’t do me any good. Now, Mr Bryant,’ she continued, ‘I was thinking. What do you think about a boat for the hotel?’

  ‘We have this –’

  ‘No, this is a workhorse. I’m talking about one of those yachts, a thoroughbred.’

  ‘But you hate boats, my dear!’ pointed out Sir Basil.

/>   ‘I wouldn’t have to get in it. We could let guests race it or watch. It would be an elegant advertisement for the hotel.’

  ‘Well –’

  ‘Penpraze can build one in three months.’ Lawrence Rose was always keen to swell the class.

  ‘What could we call her?’ asked Sir Basil.

  ‘Golden Sands II?’ suggested Lady Rafferty.

  ‘No good.’ Rose shook his head. ‘It must be a virtue.’

  ‘What about Thrift,’ quipped Cameron.

  ‘Yes, Mr Bryant,’ smiled Lady Rafferty. ‘How about building a boat and calling it Thrift?’

  Mr Bryant frowned. ‘I’m not sure. We’d have to look at the cost.’

  Lady Rafferty threw back her head and laughed.

  The wind had freshened. The seas were now pushing up under the Golden Sands, raising her stern and then dropping it as each one went through, rolling on to the west. As the boat began to pitch, so those people standing made their way back to their seats. Bryant was embarrassed and he left Lady Rafferty and the Petrel skippers and went and sat with Mrs Bryant. Cameron and Rose sauntered over and leaned against the bar.

  A woman in a yellow hat turned to look for her child; he had found the boy with the model yacht. ‘Come back, Edgar!’

  The awning lifted and the Master made his way aft. He had been up alone in the bows. He returned to the benches and, sitting down, propped both hands on his cane. Beside him was the elderly couple from Wales. They had taken the same seat as in the morning and were still smiling their benign smiles, still hand in hand.

  On the bench in front of them were the three cavalry officers. Travers and Lee sat impassively; Birkin was asleep between them. His head was lolling against his chest. As the boat’s pitch increased, he opened his eyes and tried to focus. ‘Urf!’ he said, then fell asleep. When he woke again, he said, ‘Bit squiffy.’

  ‘Come on, old chap!’ Travers and Lee took him forward, out under the flaps of the awning to the starboard companionway. Birkin sat down heavily on the box beneath the lifeboat.

  ‘Well done, Birks!’

  ‘Good show, Birks!’

  Birkin’s head lolled forward. ‘Be’s right as rain,’ he slurred. ‘Don’ mine me, jussa bit –’

  The boat lurched hard to starboard and Birkin lurched with it. He stumbled against the rail opposite, where he checked his fall and retched over the side. After a few minutes he turned and stood a little straighter. ‘All gone.’

  ‘Good man!’ said Lee.

  As they went back the Golden Sands dropped into a deep trough. They all grabbed at the rail and Birkin tripped, banging his toe against the fuel cap.

  ‘Ow! Ow-ow!’ He hopped around, gave the cap a kick and shouted, ‘You bastard!’

  ‘Come on, Birks!’ Travers took his arm and led him back into the shelter of the deckhouse.

  Loosened, the cap began to work its way off. It was soon swinging free on its short brass chain.

  The Golden Sands was pitching heavily now. In the blue light of late afternoon, the seas were breaking all around her. Anna tightened her headscarf and left the Hoopers and the benches and went astern, out into the open.

  A gull skimmed over the ridge of a coming wave, dived into the trough, then arced up high to hover above the ensign.

  She gazed out beyond it, at the endless plain of water. The waves were running behind and beside the boat, and as far as she could see they were rising into white crests that flashed above the blue and grew thicker towards the horizon. She thrilled at the sight of such seas and the vagrant motion of the boat beneath her. When the first wave slammed against the transom, she stepped back and watched a lazy column of spray rise above her, break into a thousand shards and splash into the boat.

  ‘Careful, Miss!’ In the corner of the stern were Red and Joseph Stephens in their ‘Grace’ and ‘Charity’ sweaters. They were smoking.

  She continued to watch the shifting seascape before her. Two, three, four waves back she could see the approach of the larger ones. She followed them as they came in, as the stern dropped into the valley before them and the dark scarp of water rose to block out the land behind and she felt the surge as it picked up the stern and drove them forward. Sometimes the waves were steeper and broke with a slow swish of white water on either side, and she learned to predict them, to move to right or left as the spray rose. Then came one that thumped hard against the stern and she could do nothing. A great curtain of water flopped down and soaked her. She took off her headscarf and shook out her hair – but her jacket and dress were wet through.

  ‘Best be in out of there!’ Red Stephens threw his cigarette over the side. He came over, peeling off his sweater and handing it to her.

  ‘No, no.’

  ‘Go on, take it – I have this.’ Beneath his ‘Grace’ jersey he wore another, a much older one, embroidered with the name ‘Ratona’.

  When the first sea fell into the boat, it sent a slosh of water forward which buffed against the bench uprights. It washed over the shoes of those too slow to raise their feet. Several people cried out as they felt it cool against their legs.

  Ralph Cameron predicted it. He stepped forward and picked Lady Rafferty’s handbag from the deck, calmly suggesting to those around her that they might like to raise their feet a few inches.

  Only Birkin did not flinch. His head was now lodged against Lee’s shoulder. The water submerged his shoes and ran on against the bar and out beneath the awning. There it flicked at the fuel cap and slopped in through its mouth.

  In the wheelhouse the Garretts saw the water. They saw it run forward into the bow, before falling back as the stern dropped again. It drained out through the scuppers. Tacker went astern and Bryant called him over.

  ‘Well?’

  ‘Twenty minutes, sir! Another twenty minutes and we’ll be in under the point – be calm as a duckpond in there!’

  Tacker looked up at the rows of heads around him. Then he bent down again. ‘Tell you what, sir.’

  ‘What, Tacker?’

  ‘I’ll sing ’em a song.’

  Bryant frowned.

  ‘Always like a song, sir. Keeps their minds off it.’

  ‘All right.’

  Tacker went and stood before the bar. He cleared his throat and looked out at them all. Over their heads he could the sea beyond. He began:

  Now what do you think I made of a red herring’s head?

  I made so fine an oven as ever baked bread.

  He was right. One by one the passengers turned to watch him and when Charlie Treneer joined him and their combined voices filled the space and rose above the sound of the engine, they were completely absorbed. The Stephenses came forward and joined in, and although Cameron and Rose had moved off to one side, they knew the chorus:

  Hark! Hark! How dost thou lie?

  And so do you as well as I.

  Why hast thou not told me so?

  So I did long ago.

  Well, well and well, well.

  And thinks I to myself:

  It’s a jolly herring!

  Lady Rafferty did not mind the singing but she did mind the motion. With each drop of the boat her gorge rose, and with the fumes from the engine she said to herself: ‘Dear God, don’t let me be sick, not here, not in public’ She closed her eyes and tried to focus on the lines of the song.

  Now what do you think I made of a red herring’s ribs?

  I made forty cow-stalls and forty ox-cribs …

  Anna had returned to her seat beside the Hoopers. She held her orange jacket over her arm. Across her chest were the white sewn-on letters ‘Grace’. She had rolled up the sleeves but the jersey hung heavy on her shoulders and reached down to her thighs. It smelt of pipe-smoke and work. She sat watching the singing for a while, then turned to look back out to sea.

  Now what do you think I made of a red herring’s tail?

  I made as fine a ship as ever did sail …

  Another wave rose above the stern-rail and fell on board.
The water flooded forward. Tacker, still singing, raised his hands, and the passengers lifted their feet. He saw it gush around his own boots and over those of Charlie Treneer and the Stephenses beside him. He left them to carry on singing and ducked out beneath the awning.

  As he climbed down through the hatch the engine’s thut-thut cut out the sound of singing. His feet landed in water. He flicked on the light and saw a pool of it swilling about in the bilges. He turned on the pump. It was still ten, fifteen minutes to Pendhu and they were shipping water at quite a rate. But the pump was a new one, and with each roll of the boat the pool shrank. When he heard the pump sucking on air, he turned it off.

  He was halfway up the ladder when he heard a knock in the engine. He paused on the rung, listening. Nothing – it was smooth again. It continued at its steady throb. He came back into the deckhouse and rejoined the singing. By now all those unaffected by the ship’s rolling had picked up on the final chorus, and Tacker stood at the front and waved his hands like a conductor.

  Why hast thou not told me so?

  So I did long ago.

  Well, well and well, well.

  And thinks I to my-self:

  It’s … a … jol-ly … HE-RRR-ING!

  ‘Bravo!’ said Parson Hooper, clapping.

  ‘Bravo!’ The Master tapped his cane on the deck.

  ‘Bravo!’ said the Dane Soren.

  The Welsh couple smiled.

  Charlie Treneer took off his cap and bowed to the audience and Tacker bowed too and the clapping grew louder before subsiding.

  The wind plucked at the deckhouse’s scalloped awning. A loose block banged against the rail. Apart from the sound of the sea, there was silence.

  Silence.

  CHAPTER 28

  In London, they were cutting the last half-acre. Ivor Dawkins, forearms red and sunburnt, shirt half-open to the wind, had been bouncing in the seat of the binder for hours, for days, for weeks. But here was the last half-acre of the last field, and the summer’s work was done.