Offshore (7 page)

‘Where’s Mr Stephen, please?’

Without waiting for or expecting a reply, Martha and the reluctant Tilda walked through into the back office. Here no conversion had been done to the wretched little room, once a scullery, with two steps down to a small yard stacked high with rubbish. Mr Stephen, sitting by a paraffin heater, was also writing on pieces of paper, and appearing to be adding things up. Martha took out the two tiles and laid them in front of him.

Well used to the treasures of the foreshore, the dealer wiped the gleaming surfaces free, not with water this time, but with something out of a bottle. Then, after carefully taking off his heavy rings, he picked each of the tiles up in turn, holding them up by the extreme edge.

‘So you brought these all this long way to show me. What did you think they were?’

‘I know what they are. I only want to know how much you can pay me for them.’

‘Have you any more of these at home?’

‘They weren’t at home.’

‘Where did you find them, then?’

‘About the place.’

‘And you’re sure there aren’t any more?’

‘Just the two.’

Mr Stephen examined the gold and silver bird through a glass.

‘They’re quite pretty tiles, dear, not anything more than that.’

‘Then why did you take your rings off so carefully?’

‘I’m always careful, dear.’

‘These are ruby lustre tiles by William de Morgan,’ said Martha, ‘with decoration in gold and silver – the “starlight and moonlight” lustre.’

‘Who sent you in here?’ Mr Stephen asked.

‘Nobody, you know us, we’ve been in before.’

‘Yes, but I mean, who told you what to say?’

‘Nobody.’

‘Mrs Wilhemina Stirling,’ Tilda put in, ‘ninety-seven if she’s a day.’

‘Well, whoever you’re selling for, I’m sorry to disappoint you, but these tiles can’t be by de Morgan. I’m afraid you just don’t know enough about it. I don’t suppose you looked at what’s left of the lettering on the reverse.
NDS END.
William de Morgan had his potteries in Cheyne Walk, and later he moved his kilns to Merton Abbey. This is not the mark for either one of those.’

‘Of course it isn’t. These are part of a very late set. His very last pottery was at Sands End, in Fulham. Didn’t you know that?’

Dignity demanded that the dealer should hand the tiles back with a pitying smile. But he could not resist holding the bird up to his desk lamp, so that the light ran across the surface and seemed to flow over the edges in crimson flame. And now Martha and he were united in a strange fellow feeling, which neither of them had expected, and which they had to shake off with difficulty.

‘Well, I think perhaps we can take these. The bird is much the finer of the two, of course – I’m only taking the dragon to make a pair with the bird. Perhaps you’d like to exchange them for something else in my shop. There are some charming things out there in front – some very old toys. Your little sister here …’

‘I hate very old toys,’ Tilda said. ‘They may have been all right for very old children.’

‘A Victorian musical box …’

‘It’s broken.’

‘I think not,’ said the dealer, leaving the girls and hastening out front. He began to search irritably for the key. The woman sitting at the table made no attempt to help him.

‘Tilda, have you been tinkering about with the musical box?’

‘Yes.’

Martha saw that discovery, which could not be long delayed, would reduce her advantage considerably.

‘We’re asking three pounds for the two De Morgan lustre tiles. Otherwise I must trouble you to hand them back at once.’

Tilda’s respect for her sister, whom she had never seen before in the possession of so much money, reduced her almost to silence; in a hoarse whisper she asked whether they were going to get the records straight away.

‘Yes, we will, but we ought to get a present for Ma first. You know Daddy always used to forget to give her anything.’

‘Did she say so?’

‘Have you ever actually seen anything that he’s given her?’

They walked together down the King’s Road, went into Woolworths, and were dazzled.

T
HE
same flood tide that had brought such a good harvest of tiles heaped a mass of driftwood onto the Reach. Woodie looked at it apprehensively. He wouldn’t, of course, as he usually did, have to spend the months in Purley worrying about
Rochester
, and wondering whether she was getting knocked about by flotsam in his absence. There were only a few weeks now before she went into dry dock. Perhaps he half realised that the absence of worry would make his winter unendurable. As though clinging to the last moments of a vanishing pleasure, he counted the baulks of timber edging darkly towards the boats.

His wife had already arrived from Wales. He had in prospect a time of truce, while Janet, an expert manager, in a trouser suit well adapted to the task, gave him very real help with the laying-up, but at the same time made a series of unacceptable comparisons between the caravan and
Rochester
. These comparisons were never made or implied once they were both back in Purley. They arose only in the short uneasy period passed between land and water.

As he crossed
Grace
’s deck Woodie looked up with astonishment at
Dreadnought
, which was a bigger boat, and, having much less furniture on board, rode higher in the water. In the lighted deckhouse he could not only see old Willis, fiddling about with what looked like tins and glasses, but Janet, wearing her other trouser suit.

‘It’s a celebration,’ said Nenna, coming up to the hatch, ‘they’re only waiting for you to come. It’s because Willis has sold
Dreadnought
.’

‘A provisional offer, I should call it. Still, it’s not my object to spoil things. Aren’t you going to come?’

‘No, it’s our turn tomorrow. The deckhouse only holds four.’ And Woodie could see now that Maurice was in there as well. He never quite knew what to make of Maurice. Mrs James seemed to talk to him by the hour, in the middle of the night, sometimes, he believed, and so did the children. ‘I left your two at an antique shop in the King’s Road,’ he said. ‘They seemed to know exactly what they wanted.’

Nenna put on her jacket. She knew the Bourgeois Gentilhomme, and always feared that one day Martha might get into difficulties. If they weren’t there, they were pretty sure to be in Woolworths. She started out to meet them.

Willis had noticed Woodie’s return, and could be seen gesturing behind the window of the deckhouse, expressing joy, pointing him out to Janet, and waving to him to come on in.

Woodie was not feeling very sociable, as he had had, of course, to return his car to the Surrey side and walk home across the Bridge. But the deckhouse was certainly cosy, and the door, as he pulled it to behind him, cut out, to a considerable extent, the voices of the river. It was the only door on
Dreadnought
which could be considered in good repair. Even the daylong scream of the gulls was silent in here, and the hooters and sound signals arrived only as a distant complaint. For Willis, indeed, it was rather too quiet, but useful this evening when he had guests. ‘We want to be able to make ourselves heard,’ he said. Evidently he had toasts in mind.

In preparation, he had opened several bottles of Guinness, and one of the cans, which contained Long Life – the lady’s drink – in compliment to Mrs Woodie. But he was distressed that he had no glasses.

‘I shouldn’t let Janet have a glass anyway,’ cried Maurice, never at a loss. He explained that the lager was manufactured by the Danes, an ancient seafaring people, to be drunk straight out of the can, so that the bubbles would move straight up and down in the stomach to counteract the sideways rocking movement of the boat. To Woodie’s surprise his wife laughed as though she couldn’t stop. ‘You never told me it was so social on the boats,’ she said. He tried hard to get into the spirit of the thing. Why should a boat be less social than a caravan, for heaven’s sake? He’d never seen Janet drinking out of a can before, either. But he mustn’t forget that it was a great occasion for old Willis, who must be getting on for sixty-five, ready to take the knock any day now.

‘It’s good of you to come at such short notice, very good,’ said Willis. ‘I’d like to call you all shipmates. Is that passed unanimously? And now I’d like to ask how many of you go regularly to the fish-shop on Lyons Dock?’

At this moment the electricity failed, no surprise on
Dreadnought
where the wiring was decidedly makeshift. They were all in the dark, only the river lights, fixed or passing, wavered over cans, bottles and faces.

‘A bit unfortunate,’ said Woodie.

‘Forty years ago we wouldn’t have said that!’ Willis exclaimed, ‘Not with the right sort of woman in the room! We’d have known what to do!’

Once again Janet and Maurice laughed uproariously. The place was becoming Liberty Hall. Woodie put his hand at once, as he invariably could, on his set of pocket screwdrivers, but before he felt that it was quite tactful to offer help, Willis had lit an Aladdin, which presumably he always kept ready, no wonder. Fixed in gimbals, the lamp gradually extended its radiant circle into every corner of the deckhouse.

Maurice sprang to his feet, slightly bending his head, so as to avoid stunning himself on the roof. Although the four of them were practically knee to knee, he made as if speaking in a vast auditorium. ‘Can everybody see me clearly? … you at the back, madam? … can I take it, then, that I’m heard in all parts of the house?’

Willis opened more bottles. His spectacles shone, even his leathery cheeks shone.

‘Now, I was saying something about the fish-shop on Lyons Dock. If you don’t ever go there, you won’t have had the chance of sampling their hot mussels. They boil them in an iron saucepan. Must be iron.’

‘The river’s oldest delicacy!’ Maurice cried.

‘Oh no, they’re quite fresh. I’ve got some boiling down below. They should be just about done now.’

‘Surely mussels aren’t in season?’ Woodie asked.

‘You’re thinking of whitebait, there’s no season for mussels.’

‘I’m under doctor’s orders, to some extent.’

‘First time I’ve heard of it,’ Janet cried.

‘Mussels are at their best in autumn,’ said Maurice, ‘that’s what they continually say in Southport.’

Encouraged, Willis offered to fetch the mussels at once, and some plates and forks and vinegar, and switch on the radio while he was gone, to give them a bit of music. Woodie was surprised to learn that there were any plates on
Dreadnought
. ‘May I have the first dance, Janet?’ Maurice asked, up on his feet again. Couldn’t he see that there was hardly room to sit?

As Willis went to the afterhatch it struck him that
Dreadnought
was rather low in the water, almost on a level with
Grace
. He looked across to see if he could catch a glimpse of Nenna and the girls, and ask them what they thought about it, but everybody seemed to have gone ashore.

The hold was very dark, but not quite as dark as Willis had expected. In fact, it was not as dark as it should be. There were gleams and reflections where none could possibly be. Half way down the companion he stopped, and it was as though the whole length of the hold moved towards him in a body. He heard the faintest splash, and was not sure whether it was inside or out.

‘What’s wrong?’ he thought.

Then he caught the unmistakable dead man’s stench of river water, heaving slowly, but always finding, no matter what the obstacle, the shortest way home.

How bad was it?

Another step down, and the water was slopping round his ankles. His shoes filled. He bent down and put a hand in the water, and swore when an electric shock ran through his elbow and shoulder. Now he knew why the lights were out. A pale blue light puzzled him for a moment, until he realised that it was the Calor gas stove in the galley. He could just make out the bottom of the iron saucepan in which the mussels were still boiling for his guests.

The main leak had given way at last. And Willis had it in his heart to be sorry for old
Dreadnought
, as she struggled to rise against the increasing load of water. It was like one of those terrible sights of the racecourse or the battle field where wallowing living beings persevere dumbly in their duty although mutilated beyond repair.

There was a box of matches in his top pocket, but when he got them out his hands were so wet that he could not make them strike. The only hope now was to reach the hand-pump in the galley and see if he could keep the level within bounds. About a foot below the outwale there was a pretty bad hole which he’d never felt concerned him, it was so far above the waterline. He could see the shore lights through it now. If
Dreadnought
went on sinking at the present rate, in ten minutes the hole wouldn’t be above the waterline, but below.

Willis set out to wade through the rolling wash. Something made for him in the darkness and struck him a violent blow just under the knee. Half believing that his leg was broken, he stooped and tried to fend the object off with his hands. It came at him again, and he could just make out that it was part of his bunk, one of the side panels. That, for some reason, almost made him give up, not the pain, but the familiar bit of furniture, the bed he had slept in for fifteen years, now hopelessly astray and as it seemed attacking him. Everything that should have stood by him had become hostile. The case of ice that weighed him down was his best suit.

He lost his footing and went right under. Totally blinded, his spectacles streaming with water as he bobbed up, he tried to float himself into the galley. Then he realised that there was no chance of finding the hand-pump. The flood was up to the top of the stove already, and as the gas went out the saucepan went afloat and he was scalded by a stream of boiling water that mixed with the cold. There was no hope for
Dreadnought
. He would be lucky to get back up the companion.

Above in the deck-cabin the guests, for a while, noticed nothing, the music was so loud, and Maurice was so entertaining. It was said by his acquaintances in the pub that he gave value for money, but there was a touch of genius in the way he talked that night. With a keener sense of danger than the others, and finding it exhilarating, as they certainly would not, he had noticed at once that something was wrong, even before he had rubbed a clear patch on the steamy windows and, looking out into the night, had seen the horizon slowly rising, inch by inch. He made a rapid calculation. Give it a bit longer, we’re all enjoying ourselves, he thought. Maurice had never learned to swim, but this did not disturb him. If only there was a piano, I could give them ‘Rock of Ages’ when the time comes, he said to himself.

Woodie’s complaints had died down somewhat. ‘Don’t know about these shellfish. Taking his time about it, isn’t he?’

‘Never mind!’ Maurice cried. ‘It’ll give me time to tell both your fortunes. I just glanced at both your hands earlier on, just glanced, you know, and I seemed to see something quite unexpected written there. Now, you won’t mind extending your palm, will you, Janet? You don’t mind being first?’

‘Do you really know how to do it?’

Maurice smiled radiantly.

‘I do it almost every night. You’d be surprised how many new friends I make in that way.’

‘I’ve got a copper bracelet on, that I wear for rheumatism,’ she said, ‘will that affect your reading?’

‘Believe me, it won’t make the slightest difference,’ said Maurice.

The door opened, and Willis stood there, like a drowned man risen from the dead, his spectacles gone, water streaming from him and instantly making a pool at his feet.
Dreadnought
’s deck was still a foot or so above the tide. He was able to escort his guests, in good order, across
Grace
for Maurice, while the Woodies retreated over the gangplank to
Rochester
.

It is said on the river that a Thames barge, once she has risen with the tide, never sinks completely. But
Dreadnought
, let alone all her other weak places, had been holed amidships by a baulk of timber, and before long the water poured into her with a sound like a sigh and she went down in a few seconds.

The loss of
Dreadnought
meant yet another meeting of the boat-owners on
Lord Jim
, more relaxed in atmosphere than the former one, because it seemed that Mrs Blake was away, but hushed by the nature of Willis’s misfortune. And yet this too had its agreeable counterpart; their boats, however much in need of repair, had not gone down.

One glass of brown sherry each – the best, there was no second best on
Lord Jim
– restored the impression of a funeral. Richard consulted a list. He wrote lists on special blank pages at the end of his diary, and tore them out only when they were needed, so that they were never lost. With care, there was no need to lose anything, particularly, perhaps, a boat. The disaster having taken place, however, the meeting must concern itself only with practical remedies.

Grace
had already taken in all that could be salvaged of Willis’s clothing, for drying and mending. The nuns, Nenna’s nuns, what a very long time ago it seemed, in a class known as plain sewing, had taught her bygone arts, darning, patching, reinforcing collars with tape, which at last found their proper object in Willis’s outmoded garments. Richard congratulated
Grace
. Nenna thought: I’m pleased for him to see that I can make a proper job of something. Why am I pleased?

Far greater sacrifices were required from
Rochester
, who volunteered to take Willis in as a lodger. At a reasonable rent, Richard suggested – but the Woodies wanted no payment. It would, after all, only be for a week or so, after that they were due back at Purley.