The Main Cages (23 page)

Into the throng stepped the passengers from the
Golden Sands.
They climbed the quay steps and spread out into the crowd.

‘This way, dear,’ Sir Basil Rafferty steered Lady Rafferty towards the Kidda Head Hotel. The Hoopers and the Frankses followed them; the Master was telling Parson Hooper about his recent walking tour of the Auvergne.

Anna had planned to lose herself somewhere along the front. She wanted to take out her sketchpad and sit alone in the shade and wallow in the warmth that had followed her every step that day and that had nothing to do with the sun.

‘I say!’ Birkin fell into step beside her. ‘My friends and I – we would like to invite you to luncheon.’

‘That’s kind, but –’

‘We’d be so pleased, Miss. You wouldn’t have to stay for long.’ Birkin sounded hurt. ‘It’s just that it would make us happy. Men on their own often make rather boring company.’

She smiled. ‘All right. Just for a while.’

The dining room of the Kidda Head Hotel was dominated by a large and gloomy painting of a ship in a storm: A buffet lunch of ham in aspic and salads and cold beef was arranged beneath it, afloat on its own sea of white damask. In the middle of the table were two large fish mousses moulded in the shape of lobsters.

Lady Rafferty set herself up at one end of the bay window. Relieved to be ashore, she ordered champagne. When it came, she took from her handbag a folded envelope and tapped some powders into the glass. She then scrutinised her fellow guests.

‘Who are they?’

Mr Bryant bent to follow her gaze. ‘Mr Harris and Mr Williams, Porth Parish Council –’

‘And there?’

‘Yachtsmen. They have –’

‘Will they be racing?’

‘Yes, I believe so.’

‘Bring them over, will you?’

Conversation rose in the room and merged with the sound of laughter and the chink of knives and forks on plates. In the far corner, Anna pretended to eat but in truth she had no appetite. Birkin had rediscovered his high spirits. He was telling a story about a boating trip with some soldiers in his regiment, or maybe it was his brothers, Anna wasn’t sure. He and the others had lapsed into a private dialect that she did not understand.

Lee tried to include her. ‘So, what do you eat in Spain?’

‘I’m not Spanish. I’m Russian, but –’

‘Ah! Good food in Russia?’

‘I don’t live in Russia.’

‘Told you,’ said Birkin. ‘She’s Spanish!’

Anna suddenly wanted to leave. ‘Actually, where I am from everyone eats nuts and berries. We roast wolves. Sometimes – ‘ she dropped her voice to a whisper and the men leaned closer to her ‘– people eat their own babies.’

‘Lord!’ Birkin blinked. Travers looked down. Lee blushed.

‘I think I will go outside.’ She thanked them and left the dining room.

Bryant returned to Lady Rafferty, bringing with him Ralph Cameron and Lawrence Rose and the Dane Soren.

‘So, gentlemen,’ she looked up at them in turn. ‘What’s the form?’

‘It’s been pretty tight all season,’ volunteered Cameron.

‘What he means, Lady Rafferty, is that he’s been winning –’

‘Everything,’ said the Dane Soren.

‘He wins here and he’ll have won the season series.’

‘Again.’

Cameron flashed a smile. ‘In these light airs, really it’s anyone’s race.’

‘So, Mr Cameron, what are your colours?’ Lady Rafferty was beginning to look forward to her afternoon.

‘Pea-green,’ said Lawrence Rose. ‘And mine is –’

‘Splendid! Does anyone have a book on it?’

They each looked at each other, embarrassed at the mention of boats and betting. ‘Well, not exactly.’

Outside, Anna paused on the hotel step. She blinked in the sun. The front had emptied somewhat and she made her way down to the beach. There she took out her sketchpad and gazed at the sparkling bay and the boats lying motionless in its shelter. It was very bright. She closed her eyes and listened to the gulls and the gentle kiss of seas on the sand and the distant barking of a dog and soon she was asleep.

At the dam, all was quiet. The Stephens boys had not returned. Croyden was leaning against the wall, his beret pulled down to his eyes. Stretched out beside the well, Tyler was scratching at a piece of slate with a stone; he blew away the dust and there, in full sail, was a mackerel driver.

Jack had wandered up from the spring. He stood on one of the stumps and surveyed the damage. Sawdust ringed each of the stumps and the entire top of the valley was scarred from the weight of the trees falling and being cut up and dragged over the ground. He carried on up the slope and sat in the grass. Far to the south, in the V of the valley was a triangle of blue sea below Kidda Head. He lay back and squinted at the sky and all that broke his vision was a tiny feather of high cloud drifting in from the east. He gazed at it for some time and soon forgot the destruction all around him. He felt the warmth of the sun on his face, then he too fell asleep.

Some three miles to the south-west, through the gateway to London, came lunch. Around the open sides of a wain sat women and children from Crowdy Farm. In their laps were baskets of sandwiches and saffron cake. The dogs ran up to bark at the wheels and the legs that dangled from it. Ivor
Dawkins brought the binder to a halt and everyone laid down their forks and scythes and converged on the wain. They all sat in a row, in its shade. Having eaten, they rested for a while and the dogs lay beneath the axles and some of the children lay with them, half-listening to the low hum of adult talk.

Polmayne too paused. On Pritchard’s Beach the visitors had sought out the shade. The shops were closed; few people were out along the front. Parliament Bench was empty.

In Porth Bay, not even the gulls were moving. The wind had died and the Petrels lay rafted together, their sails loosely stowed. The anchor chain of the
Golden Sands
dropped vertically into the silky waters. Tacker was stretched out, face down on a bench. Jimmy sat in the wheelhouse, looking out to sea and idly passing a pebble from hand to hand. On Pendhu Point, Captain Williams had pulled closed the louvres of his hut and his head rested on the table. It was just for a little while, he told himself; he’d been feeling strange that morning but if he rested for a few minutes he’d be better. It was very hot in the watch hut and stripes of sunlight came through the shutters and lay across his bare forearms where his skin was covered in the first tell-tale rashes of the Reeds.

At two-twenty exactly the first puff of smoke rose from Porth’s breakwater. A moment later, its loud report bounced off the façade of the Kidda Head Hotel and echoed around the harbour.

All over the village, people stirred. They packed away their picnics, pulled shut the doors of their cottages, and made their way down to the harbour. On board the Petrels they had raised their sails, dropped their moorings and were drifting across the bay. There was still very little wind.

In the hotel many of those having lunch had made their way to the first-floor lounge. With its large balcony, it offered the best view of the racing.

The three officers, awash with gin, stumbled out of the
hotel and into the afternoon sun. Birkin spotted the T. Wall tricycle. ‘Anyone care for an ice?’

From beside the hotel, the St Blazey Prize Silver Band started up with the hymn ‘Grace’.

Five minutes after the first gun came another. The Petrels were already close to the start-line, crossing and recrossing before each other in a slow parade. The air was so light that the cries of ‘Ready about!’ and ‘Lee-o!’ and ‘Gybe-o!’ could be clearly heard ashore. The haze had thickened; Kidda Head was now no more than a grey shadow in the brightness.

Anna was leaning over her sketchpad, drawing in lightning sweeps of the page. She was looking up and down at the boats as they manoeuvred offshore. She had no idea what they were doing, but she saw in their silhouettes and their movements an arcane ballet whose steps she was trying to submit to paper. By the time the start gun sounded and the boats fell into line beside each other, she had covered a dozen sheets.

On the hotel balcony, Lady Rafferty was equally baffled. But in Major Franks she had found a fellow racing enthusiast and they had discreetly exchanged five-guinea wagers – he on Lawrence Rose and
Grace;
she on Ralph Cameron’s
Harmony.

‘Have they started?’ asked Lady Rafferty.

Franks had his binoculars on the boats. ‘Yes.
Grace
is down to leeward, but she’s being luffed already –’

‘Speak English, man!’

It was becoming hard to see. The boats were moving away from the harbour, out towards Kidda Head, and the sky and the water and the sails all coalesced in the white haze. Anna watched them become fainter. She looked at her drawings and was pleased.

On the hotel balcony, with the race out of view, silence fell. Parson Hooper, who found silences embarrassing, looked down on the heads of the crowd and exclaimed, ‘Well! Everyone seems to be enjoying themselves!’

Lady Rafferty glared at him.

Major Franks was still just able to follow the race through his binoculars. ‘They’ve rounded the mark … they’re on their way back!’

‘Who’s winning?’ demanded Lady Rafferty.

‘Harmony
 – half a length over
Grace
!’

She smiled.

The boats were reappearing from the mist. The two front-runners were together. Fifty yards astern was
Chastity,
the new Porth boat. Five or six others were bunched behind her. There were a couple at the rear. They were all moving so slowly that they seemed almost stationary. Their sails hung in loose folds, the bight of their mainsheets brushed the water – but yard by yard, they were narrowing the gap to the line.

Harmony
was keeping her advantage, but
Grace
was closing. As they came closer to the village, everyone could see clearly their two hulls, green and yellow, and then the white of
Chastity.

Along the front and on the quay, the Porth supporters were urging on their boat. ‘Bear away,
Chastity
! Bear away!’ Those from Polmayne were crying out ‘
Grace
’! and ‘
Harmony
!’

On the balcony, Lady Rafferty was now standing. She had told Bryant to support Ralph Cameron’s
Harmony,
and he too was shouting ‘
Harmony!
’

‘Luff her,
Grace
!’ hissed Franks. ‘For Pete’s sake, luff her!’

On the quay was Captain Maddocks. He alone maintained a judicious calm, co-ordinating his spotters and waiting with the gun for the first boat’s bow to cross the line.

There were only three in contention now. With a hundred yards to go,
Chastity
was third but beginning to close the gap. Ahead of her,
Grace
drew level with
Harmony
– then pulled ahead.
Harmony
had borne away a little, seeking the tide. She lost ground at once, and Franks nodded with satisfaction.

No one saw it coming. They were all watching the three lead boats. They did not see it as it crept around Kidda Head, peeled back the haze and darkened the sea-surface.

It reached
Hope
first, the back marker. Dr Jones and his crew had long since given up and were lying with their legs up over the combing. When the sails suddenly filled and the boat leapt forward, they were caught unawares. The breeze pressed on towards the bulk of the fleet. As it reached each boat, the helmsman felt it and he watched the sails fill and everyone sat up.

When the wind came to
Chastity,
it drove her through the water and she at once gained twenty yards.

The Porth supporters raised their voices.

Grace
was still in front. The wind reached
Harmony,
slamming her boom to port; she began to bear down on
Grace.
Cameron pushed her upwind until
Grace
too caught it and tried to get ahead of
Harmony’s
bows. Cameron had right of way and held his course. The points of the boats’ bows sliced through the water towards each other. The heeling shape of their sails converged. The crowd fell silent, waiting for the collision.

A few yards short, Lawrence Rose could see he was not going to make it.

‘She’s gone ahead!’ said Franks. ‘Dammit –
Harmony’s
ahead!’

‘Yes!’ hissed Lady Rafferty.

Grace’s
bow passed harmlessly astern of the green-hulled boat and
Harmony
surged on to the line.

But as they duelled,
Chastity
had gone through. She came in ahead of
Harmony
by a length and the Porth supporters raised such a shout that the sound of the winning gun was almost drowned out.

On the balcony, Lady Rafferty and Major Franks avoided each other’s gaze.

I
t wasn’t the racing guns that woke Tacker – those he could sleep through. Nor was it the yachts which before their start had come so close to the
Golden Sands
that their sail-shadows slid over his sleeping form. Nor was it the shouts of the skippers or the clamour from the harbour that had been rising in tempo throughout the race. It was a much slighter sound – the very faint creak of timbers.