Sam threw Alice a look of sympathy but she knew her quiet brother was not going to intervene on her behalf. He steered well clear of domestic wrangling, preferring to keep watch over a volatile and unpredictable sea rather than try to calm the emotional storms in the lighthouse.
‘I’m not your lady’s maid,’ Alice called out. ‘If the dress is so precious you should wash it yourself.’
‘You know I can’t manage while I’m so heavy with child – and I’ve William to look after. Why can’t you be more helpful to your mam? I bet you’re up there readin’ again.’
Alice sighed and stood up, tossing her long hair over her shoulder. ‘Wish me luck going into battle,’ she muttered, rolling her eyes at Sam. ‘I’ll try to repulse the enemy before she reaches the lamp-room.’
‘What are you saying?’ Thomasina demanded. ‘Are you talking about me to Sam? You’re always plotting against me, the two of you. What have I ever done to deserve your name-calling?’
Alice could tell by her querulous voice that Thomasina was working herself up into a state. It would end with Effie siding with the highly strung girl, chiding Alice and giving in to William’s demands. It had been like this all winter, cooped up in the lighthouse all getting on each other’s nerves. Her father and Danny had argued endlessly over lighthouse duties and Thomasina’s spendthrift ways. Now spring had come, her father and Danny had taken the opportunity to go ashore and stock up on supplies. Arnold had wanted to take Sam but Danny had insisted on going and Sam didn’t mind.
Alice had longed to go with them – she had re-read all of George Gillveray’s books that she’d borrowed over the winter at least three times and was desperate for his company and conversation. She had been overjoyed when her benefactor had returned the previous year from a botany trip to the Continent without having procured a wife as had been rumoured.
But Thomasina had caused a fuss at the suggestion; why should Alice be given special treatment? Why was Mr Gillveray so interested in Alice? It wasn’t seemly now she was nearly seventeen. And if anyone went ashore it should be her, Thomasina, because she missed her mother more than anything.
‘Nobody’s name-calling,’ Alice said, meeting the other girl on the stair. ‘I’m sorry if I’ve spoilt your dress. I’m sure Mother can mend it. Come back in the kitchen and I’ll make a pot of tea.’
‘I hate that foreign stuff,’ Thomasina complained as Alice guided her down. ‘The smell makes me sick. I don’t know how you can drink it.’
‘Well, I’ll warm you some milk,’ Alice said, trying to placate her. She could hear her mother doing the same to a fretful William on the stairs below, chivvying him outdoors.
‘I don’t want milk.’
Alice was about to lose patience when abruptly Thomasina crumpled into a chair.
‘I hate it here! I wish Danny wasn’t a lighthouse-keeper. I wish we could live onshore like normal folk. The thought of being stuck here another winter and with two bairns . . .’ She hid her face in her hands and broke down sobbing.
Alice went to comfort her. ‘It’s been a long winter for all of us. But summer’s coming now and you’ll get out more – Danny can take you over to see your mother and perhaps you could spend a week or two with her?’
Thomasina looked up, her face puffy with crying. ‘Do you think so?’
‘Of course. Danny thinks the world of you – he’ll take you if you ask him.’
‘You’d like that, wouldn’t you?’ Thomasina was instantly suspicious. ‘You’d like nothing better than to get me out the way. Then you’d have Danny to yourself. I know you’ve always been jealous of me.’
Alice gave up trying to please her. She went in search of her mother and William, who had gone outside to watch for the return of the lighthouse boat. Alice was determined that she would be on the next trip to the mainland; she would row herself over if she had to.
‘Show me where India is,’ Alice said, spinning the globe with her long fingers, her face flushed with wonder.
George Gillveray grinned as he stood beside her at the table in the library window. He knew Alice would be enchanted with the globe and had been looking forward all year to showing it off. He’d had to wait impatiently till June before she had visited; bringing back his books, she gabbled out stories as if she had had no conversation since they’d last met. He had been struck anew by her blossoming beauty, her red-blonde hair pinned loosely back from her slim face, with its high cheekbones, dimpled cheeks and large blue eyes full of merriment.
‘Here,’ he said, stilling the moving globe, ‘this is India – and this is where we are.’
‘Halfway round the world!’ Alice gasped. ‘And how do you get there?’
‘When I first went to India it took five months to sail around the Cape,’ said George, pointing out the Atlantic route, ‘and then across the Arabian Sea and round into the Bay of Bengal to Calcutta.’
Alice traced her finger along the route, her lips parted in wonder. ‘And now?’
‘Two years ago, a ship went under steam and did the voyage in under four months.’
‘Steam?’
‘Yes, with coal-fired engines. But the quickest way to the Orient is via the Mediterranean and then travel overland through Egypt to the Red Sea. It’s rough going but it’s half the journey time compared to sailing around Africa.’
‘We are such a small country in comparison with the rest of the world, aren’t we?’ Alice marvelled. ‘Black Harbour Rock isn’t even a dot in the sea.’
‘It may not be important to the map-makers’ – George smiled – ‘but its lighthouse and inhabitants are very important to me.’
Alice glanced away, awkward under his scrutiny. For the first time she noticed how his hair was going grey and sparse at the temples and his once firm jaw was softening into jowls. Middle-age was robbing him of his good looks yet he was the same kind and interesting man. She knew he was fond of her and her family and it was partly for this reason that she had come seeking him out. Relationships at the lighthouse were strained to breaking point.
‘Mr Gillveray,’ she began and then hesitated.
‘Yes, Alice?’
‘I know I have no right to ask any more favours of you – you have done so much for us Browns – but I wouldn’t ask just for myself.’
‘You’re worried about Daniel? I can tell from the things you’ve said.’
‘Aye, I am, sir. He’s not happy in his work – and his wife isn’t happy living at the lighthouse – and my poor parents are worn out with all the arguing.’
‘But what can I do to help?’ asked George ruefully. ‘I can hardly conjure up another lighthouse just to keep Daniel and Thomasina happy.’
‘Not that,’ Alice said with a flash of a smile. ‘But what Daniel has always wanted is to have his own boat; he wants to be on the sea, not looking out at it day after day. He’s an active lad. And I was thinking – well – Black Harbour doesn’t have a lifeboat and it would be a good thing, given the number of ships that get into difficulty even with the lighthouse being here.’ Alice gave him a direct look. ‘Wouldn’t it be better to have lads like Danny on hand to rescue the drowning – and get paid for their efforts – than to leave the shipwrecked to their fate and the wreckers?’
George frowned, turning to the window and gazing out to sea.
‘So you are suggesting that I buy Daniel a boat?’
‘It would be your boat, sir, but Danny could be employed to steer it and he could live off the bounty money from any rescues; folk will pay generously if their lives are saved. And when the boat’s not needed for that, Danny can use it for fishing and the like – supply your kitchens.’
George turned and met her look. ‘Where do you get your wisdom from, Alice, for one so young?’
She blushed. ‘Not wisdom, just common sense – and a lot of reading, thanks to you, Mr Gillveray.’
‘You’re right, we should have our own rescue boat here, and not have to rely on waiting for the one from North Sunderland.
’ He nodded. ‘Leave it with me, Alice.’
She gave him a broad smile, hardly believing that her bold request had been taken seriously. But desperation had made her forthright; she did not think her family could endure another winter incarcerated with a mulish Danny and a bickering Thomasina.
‘Now,’ said George, ‘I want to show you this new plant I’ve been growing. It has the most spectacular red blooms – it’s a rhododendron tree from the Himalayas.’
Alice grinned, giving the globe a triumphant spin on her way out.
Danny leapt at the chance to run Gillveray’s lifeboat and was soon offering jobs to his friends as rowers. Alice did not tell him that it had been her suggestion but he guessed she had something to do with it and gave her a grateful pinch of the cheek.
‘Gillveray won’t be disappointed in me.’ He grinned. ‘Give me a couple of years and I’ll be buying the boat off him.’
Thomasina lost no time in moving out of the lighthouse and back to her mother’s in Black Harbour. ‘She’ll be glad of my help in the post office and she can give me a hand with the bairns.’
‘Would you like me to come and look after William at your lying in?’ Effie asked. ‘Your mother will have her hands full.’
‘I’m sure we can manage,’ said Thomasina, ‘but I’ll send Danny to fetch you if you’re needed.’
The days that followed their departure were eerily quiet, except for Sam’s soft whistling and Effie’s brisk spring-cleaning from top to bottom of their quarters.
‘I miss wee William.’ Alice’s mother sighed, once her burst of energy had subsided. ‘It’ll be silent as snow this winter.’
‘It’ll be bliss,’ Arnold said, and winked at Alice. They grinned at each other as they retreated behind their books to read.
At the end of summer, Thomasina’s baby daughter arrived early and Danny came rushing out to the island to summon his mother to help out. Effie returned two weeks later, exhausted and with an infection that lay on her chest and wouldn’t shift. Her coughing kept Alice awake at night yet Effie refused to send for a doctor. Slowly she recovered but as she did so, Arnold sickened. He wheezed like fire-bellows and his chest rattled and the energy drained out of him. Alarmed, Effie ordered him to bed and she and Alice took it in turns with Sam to watch the light through the night.
A week later – after a spell of calm, clear late September weather – Sam came down from the lamp-room, his fair face frowning.
‘Storm’s on its way. Rowing boat needs lashing.’
‘I’ll help you,’ Arnold wheezed, struggling to sit up in the truckle bed Effie had set up next to the range for warmth.
‘No, you won’t,’ his wife ordered. ‘You’re still weak as a kitten.’
‘I’ll go,’ Alice said, quickly following Sam down the spiral staircase.
Outside, she thought Sam was being over-cautious. Only a light breeze was blowing. But within minutes the wind had completely changed direction and was lifting her hair and skirts like sails. Quickly, she helped Sam secure their open boat more tightly to the iron rings along the man-made jetty. She rushed to make sure her pet sheep, Wellington the Second, and the family’s two goats were securely shut in the stone hut in the lee of the lighthouse and then retreated inside.
All evening the gales whistled and moaned around the tower. Although they felt much safer than they would have in the old rickety lighthouse – which would have bucked and groaned in such a force – their anxiety increased when the rain began. It hit the stone like gunfire.
‘Let’s pray that all the ships get safely to harbour this night,’ whispered Effie.
‘Let’s hope they didn’t set out,’ said Arnold, spitting phlegm into a basin and lying back exhausted from the effort.
Alice watched tensely. She had never seen her father ill like this or so despondent. She went over and kissed his glistening forehead.
‘Don’t worry; Sam and I will keep good watch tonight and make sure the lamp burns brightly.’
Alice took the first watch. To her, there was something exhilarating about being up in the lamp-room in a storm with the wind and rain battering on the glass and the brilliant light reflecting out into the black night, illuminating the tempest. Nothing was as destructive or magnificent as a storm at sea, and she and Sam were pitted against it, tending the lamp and defying its power. She marvelled at how engineers like Stevenson and enthusiasts like Gillveray had the imagination and knowledge to create such indestructible towers – and at the courage, muscle and sweat of the builders who had hewn it out of rock.
At midnight, Sam came to relieve her. She handed him the logbook, exchanged smiles and went below to snatch some sleep before the last watch.
Something woke her. An animal shriek. Alice sat up. Was it Wellington? But that was ridiculous; she would never hear a sheep bleating in this storm. It must have been a dream. Then she heard it again; a tearing, screeching noise.
‘Alice!’ Sam shouted down the hatch. ‘Alice, come quickly!’
She didn’t even bother to pull on her dress but scrambled up the steps in her undergarments. Sam was gripping the telescope, staring out into the dark.
‘What is it?’ Alice asked, but even as she did so, dread clawed at her belly.
‘Oh God!’ Sam moaned. ‘They’ve hit the Black Needle.’
Alice peered out at the hellish night.
‘I don’t see—’
Suddenly the light swung around and lit up the reef like a flash of lightning. A ship was impaled on the rocks, its bows pointing up to the sky as if in supplication. Its main mast was gone. Seconds later it was plunged into darkness again. But the noise – the terrible grinding shriek of splintering timber – could be heard above the gales.
‘It’s breaking up,’ said Sam.
Alice held her breath as they waited for the light to flash again. Waves the size of cliffs crashed over the reef and tossed the stricken vessel about as if it were as light as a toy.
‘Perhaps it will hold together,’ Alice whispered. But she knew in her heart that it wouldn’t. The storm was as ferocious as any she had witnessed. ‘Oh please God, save the people!’ she gasped, taking the telescope and searching the ship.
Minutes later, Alice and Sam watched in horror as faraway figures leapt from the sinking ship into the foaming, raging sea.
‘What can we do?’ Alice demanded.
‘Nothing,’ said Sam. ‘You know we can’t.’
She covered her face in her hands, unable to bear the sight of the passengers drowning and being helpless to prevent it.
Sam handed her the log. ‘Fill it in. That’s something you can do.’
Alice wanted to throw it at her brother. How could he be so callous? But as he set about tending the lamp she sat and recorded their work with shaking hands and found it calmed her nerves. What use were her tears or cries to the shipwrecked? She too had to weather the storm and pray there might be survivors to be rescued in the dawn.
‘Danny will go out and fetch them in, won’t he?’ said Alice. ‘Any who last the night?’
Sam gave her a sorrowful look and then nodded. ‘Aye, likely he’ll be out there as soon as he can.’
Weak grey light came with the dawn yet the sea still boiled like an overfilled pot and the rain continued to splatter at the windows. The ship had sunk below the waves. Alice’s heart ached at the sight. Sam went below to report the night’s tragedy to his parents. Alice heard their anxious voices and her mother’s cry of anguish. But she couldn’t go below – not while there was a chance of spotting survivors. Sam had been fatalistic.
‘They’ve gone. All we can do is report the wreck and pray for their souls.’
Stubbornly, Alice kept watch, her tired eyes straining at the telescope for any sign of life. Even if one passenger or crew member survived it would be worth Danny’s boat being launched to save them. As the sky lightened to a pewter grey, she circled the lamp-room and looked anxiously to shore. She wondered if George too had watched the shipwr
eck in misery from his mansion. But there was nothing stirring on the shore and no sign of Danny’s boat. Gillveray must think it too dangerous to send his men out to sea when the storm was still so severe.
Alice sighed. She would take one last look and then go below and try to sleep – if she could ever rid her mind of those desperate people jumping to their deaths.
Through the spray, something caught her eye. She raised the telescope and trained it on the low jagged rocks west of the Black Needle. Something was caught there; the mast that had sheared off before the ship had sunk.
Alice tried to steady her shaking hands. She gasped and nearly dropped the spy glass. ‘Sam!’ she yelled. ‘Sam, there are folk on the rocks. Quickly, come look!’
An incredulous Sam confirmed what Alice had spotted. ‘There’re six or seven of them,’ he gasped. ‘How in God’s name have they—’
‘They must’ve hung onto the mast and been carried onto the rocks,’ Alice cried. ‘We have to help them.’
‘We can’t.’
‘Aye, we can! In the rowing boat.’
‘Father’s not well enough and I can’t manage the boat on my own and pull people out of the water.’
‘I’ll help you.’
Sam’s look was doubtful.
‘The lifeboat is still nowhere to be seen,’ Alice said urgently, ‘and those people can’t hang on much longer. We must at least try.’ She took him by the arm. ‘Can you stand by and watch them drown like those poor souls last night, Sam? ’Cause I can’t!’
Sam nodded and without further argument they clattered downstairs to report the sighting to their parents. Effie shrieked at the idea of them putting their lives at risk so recklessly but Arnold supported them.
‘If there’s no sign of the lifeboat then you must go. It should be me doing it,’ he said, ‘but Alice will just have to take my place. We can’t stand by and let these people drown. It’s our Christian duty as lighthouse-keepers.’
In the Far Pashmina Mountains Page 8
