We Didn't Mean to Go to Sea, Page 6

  “Shut up, Roger,” said John.

  INSIDE THE GOBLIN

  “Don’t spoil it,” said Titty, and she did not mean Roger’s music.

  “Oh well,” said Roger, ending with a long-drawn note. “I’ll never learn if you don’t let me practise sometimes.”

  “All right,” said Titty. “But not now.”

  “There’s a lot of dew,” said Susan. “The cabin top’s quite wet. What are you sitting on, Roger?”

  “The usual place,” said Roger, feeling with a hand. “It is a bit damp.”

  “We’ll get up early tomorrow,” said Jim, “and go down to the harbour mouth with the last of the ebb and have a look at the sea.”

  “Come on to bed, you two,” said Susan.

  *

  For a little while longer, Jim and John stayed on deck, Jim smoking his pipe in the cockpit, standing on a seat so that he could lean comfortably on the boom. Down below in the cabin they heard the small noises of people moving about, and one squeak on the penny whistle, which came to a sudden end. Presently Susan’s voice called up, “We’re all in bed. But I didn’t know how to fold Captain Jim’s rugs. He’s going to be awfully uncomfortable.”

  “Coming,” said Jim. “I’ll deal with them.” He shook out his pipe, and John heard the ashes hiss as they met the water.

  For a few minutes John stood in the cockpit alone. Almost the Goblin might have been his own ship, and he at peace after a long voyage, taking a last look round before turning in.

  “John,” came the skipper’s voice from the cabin, and John jerked back to real life. “Your watch below. Come on down. I’ll be asleep the moment I put my head on the pillow, and it won’t be much fun to be waked by you trampling about on the top of me while you’re getting into your bunk.”

  John went down. Roger had been tucked up on the port bunk, but in the light of the cabin lamp John could see a bright and wakeful eye. Jim was sitting on the starboard bunk, where John’s blankets were waiting for him. Looking through into the fore-cabin, John could see a lump under the blankets in each bunk … Titty and Susan ready for sleep.

  “Sorry,” he said, “I won’t be a minute,” and while the skipper went up on deck to make sure that all was well with the riding light, he tore off his clothes, got into his pyjamas, stuffed the clothes into a heap under his pillow, and wriggled into bed.

  The skipper came down and took his shoes off.

  “Aren’t you going to undress?” said Roger.

  “No,” said Jim.

  “Gosh!” said Roger.

  “Somebody’s got to be on hand,” said Jim. “I’m anchor watch really. But I’m going to sleep just the same. Where’s the big torch?” He found it, blew out the cabin lamp, lay down, and rolled the blankets about him on the cabin floor.

  *

  They slept. The night was so calm that it was hard to believe that the Goblin was afloat. It was an hour later before they were reminded that they were sleeping in a ship and that she was very near the open sea.

  A drumming noise broke the stillness. Suddenly the Goblin seemed to be picked up, flung aside, and picked up again. Everybody was awake in a moment.

  “What’s happened?” said Roger.

  The white light of the big torch shone upwards from the cabin floor.

  “Steamer going out from Parkeston,” said Jim. “Sorry. I forgot to warn you. There’ll be another in a minute or two … There she goes … One for Holland and one for Denmark … They go out every night.”

  Again the Goblin was violently rocked in the wash as the second steamer went by. Roger, kneeling in his bunk, holding on by the shelf behind it, caught just a glimpse of the steamer’s blazing lights.

  “I wonder if those porpoises’ll be seeing them,” he said, as he settled again under his blankets. No one answered him. A few minutes later the Goblin had stopped rolling, and the only sound to be heard in her cabin was the quiet breathing of her sleeping crew.

  CHAPTER VI

  “NOTHING CAN POSSIBLY HAPPEN”

  SPLASH! SPLASH! SPLASH! Splash!

  It was seven o’clock in the morning and they had been waked by a shout down the forehatch, “Rouse up there, the watch below. Anybody want a dip? No time to spare, if we’re going down the harbour before the tide turns.” Jim was already on the foredeck, in bathing things. There had been a hurried rush to join him.

  “Now then,” he said, and dived.

  But there were four splashes only. John, Susan, Titty and their skipper came up with the taste of salt water in their mouths, shaking their heads and blowing like seals.

  “Come on, Roger,” said John.

  “It’s waste not to use the ladder,” said Roger.

  Jim had slung a rope ladder over the side, and fastened it to the shrouds to make it easy for people to climb aboard again. Roger meant to use it both ways.

  “Go on, Roger! Head first!” said John.

  But Roger was already on the lowest step of the ladder and was feeling the water with the toes of one foot.

  “It isn’t very cold, really,” he said.

  “It’s boiling,” said Titty. “Come on.”

  Roger lowered himself into the water, let go of the ladder, and swam to join her.

  “Don’t forget the ebb,” said Jim, bobbing up close beside them. “Keep close to the ship, and keep swimming. I don’t want to have to come rowing after you in the Imp if you get swept away. Go on. Swim hard, against the tide. Just a dip and out again. We can have another later on … There’s no time now. We ought to be sailing.”

  MORNING DIP

  Susan was already at the ship’s side, hanging on to the ladder.

  “Out you come, Roger,” she said. She climbed up with the help of the shrouds, grabbed one of the towels she had left on the foredeck, and began a rub down.

  One after another they joined her, and the foredeck ran with water.

  “Come on, Titty,” said Susan. “We’ll get into our clothes in the cockpit. No good bringing half the North Sea into the cabin.”

  “It isn’t the North Sea,” said Titty. “It’s only the river.”

  “Just as wet,” said Susan cheerfully. She had been a bit bothered about that bathing from the anchored Goblin. Roger had been able to swim for some time now, but swimming in deep water, with the tide ready to carry you away if you gave it a chance, was very different from swimming in the lake. She was a good deal relieved to have everybody safe back aboard. Now she would get those burners lit and make them start the day properly with a solid breakfast.

  But that was not to be. She was hardly dressed and down in the cabin filling the kettle before Roger, a pink savage with a towel round his middle, crawled aft along the cabin roof and looked down at her through the companion-hatch.

  “I say, Susan,” he said. “Please pass up my clothes and John’s. Jim’s got into his already and they’re just going to hoist the mainsail.”

  “Oh, look here,” said Susan. “They can’t start with nothing to eat after bathing.”

  “I thought so too,” said Roger. “But Jim says there isn’t time to wait for it.”

  Susan put her head out, to see Jim, fully dressed, and John, a kilted savage like Roger, busy with the ropes at the foot of the mast.

  “You must have breakfast first …” she began, but they were thinking of quite other things.

  “Good,” said John. “Susan’s ready.”

  “Hang on to that crutch, Mate Susan,” called Jim, “and slack away a little mainsheet.”

  In a ship, orders are orders, and Susan took hold of the crutch, and Titty, who had been squeezing bathing clothes over the side, let out some mainsheet, and they saw the boom cock up over their heads.

  “Breakfast,” began Susan again. “You must have something to eat before starting.”

  “Have it when we’re under way,” called Jim. “Here you are, John, hold on to that while I get the main up. Susan! Can you just cast off that tyer, just above your head?”

  The
mainsail, fold on fold, was lifting off the cabin top. Roger had scrambled out of the way. The sail was up. Susan heard Jim say, “Slacken away the topping lift. That’s right …” and then, “Hullo, there, Mate Susan. Stand by the tiller, will you? A.B. Titty, will you be ready to harden in the port jib sheet …? No. No. Not until I’ve got the anchor off the bottom. Where’s that mop, A.B. Roger?”

  The next moment she heard the rattle of the chain coming in. It was no good talking to them about breakfast. The chain was coming up, fathom after fathom. Roger had untied the mop, and John was dipping it over the side and washing the Shotley mud off the cabin. “Now then, Roger, let the jib unroll. Yes. That’s it. Just cast it loose. She’s up and down now.” Jim was looking over the bows. He was hauling again. “Anchor’s up,” he shouted. “Back the jib, John.” The chain was coming easily now, hand over hand. There was a sudden clank. “That’s right. Hold the jib out to starboard till she pays off. That’ll do. Let draw. Haul in your jib sheet, A.B. Titty.”

  They were off. The boom had swung across, the mainsail had filled and the Goblin was sailing. Susan, at the tiller, was steering out to clear the Shotley piers, past which the tide was carrying them. Jim, wiping the mud off his hands on the wet mop, raced aft, cast off the mainsheet and pushed the boom out by hand.

  “Not enough wind,” he said.

  “But we’re moving,” said Titty.

  “Mostly tide,” said Jim. “Look at the mainsheet.”

  The boom was swinging in again, and the mainsheet hung in loops, dragging in the water. There was not wind enough to pull it straight. Still, the Goblin had steerage way, and the tide was helping her, sweeping down towards the harbour.

  “Can’t somebody else steer?” said Susan. “They’ve simply got to have their breakfasts. It’ll be all right if they have just cornflakes and milk, to begin with …”

  “Not down in the cabin,” said Titty.

  “You can have it in the cockpit,” said Susan.

  “I say, Jim,” said Titty. “Do you think I might steer just for a bit.”

  “Go ahead,” said Jim. “You can’t do much harm with the wind like this.”

  But Susan had hardly slipped down the companion-steps, to get plates and spoons and cornflakes, before she remembered something else that ought to come before breakfast.

  “Nobody’s cleaned their teeth,” she said. “Can they have fresh water for it?”

  Jim laughed. “Half a glass each,” he said. “But salt water to spit into. Aboard ship fresh water’s liquid gold.”

  So a bucket was dipped overboard, and, while Susan was ladling cornflakes into the plates, the crew of the Goblin cleaned their teeth, John taking the tiller when it was Titty’s turn.

  “There’s lots more to do, Mate John,” said Jim. “We haven’t half got the mud off the foredeck. Better not put your shoes on till we’ve done washing down.”

  No one could have guessed, looking at the Goblin sailing slowly past Harwich out of the mouth of the Stour, what a lot was being done aboard. There was hardly a ripple on the water. A misty sun was climbing over Felixstowe. Smoke was rising from the chimneys of Harwich, where people ashore were cooking their breakfasts. The smoke climbed almost straight up and then drifted idly away. The movement of the tide shook the reflections of the anchored barges and of the ships in the harbour and of the grey jetties and houses of the town.

  “If you’ve done with that bucket,” said Jim, “we’ll have it forrard for sloshing water on the deck.”

  “There’s a barge with its riding light still burning,” said Roger.

  “Sleeping late,” laughed Jim. “They’d be up and moving if there was a bit of wind. But I dare say there’ll be wind later. Or fog. Or both. You never know what’s coming with a day that starts like this.”

  As he spoke a long wail sounded from out at sea.

  “Beu … eueueueueueueu!”

  “Cork lightship,” said Jim. “They’ve got enough mist out there to give them their twopence an hour.”

  “Twopence an hour,” said Roger.

  “They get twopence an hour extra while that row’s going on in their ears.”

  “First course. Cornflakes and milk,” said Susan, passing up the filled plates one after another. “Who’s ready?”

  “I am,” said Roger.

  “Everybody,” said Jim. “What about yourself?”

  “I want to get the stove lit … Tea and eggs,” said Susan.

  “No hurry,” said Jim. “We’re not going to start our breakfast if the cook isn’t tucking into hers.”

  So Susan came up too, and deck-washing came to an end, and the crew of the Goblin made themselves comfortable, sitting on the cabin top and in the cockpit, with deep plates full of milk and cornflakes.

  “Beu … eueueueueueueu …”

  Every fifteen seconds that long wail sounded from somewhere beyond Felixstowe, somewhere out at sea.

  “But it isn’t foggy here,” said Roger.

  “It may be outside,” said Jim. “It’s nothing like as clear as it was last night. You won’t be able to see the lightship even when we get down to the Beach End buoy. On a clear day you’d see it easily. And we ought to be able to see the Naze from here.”

  They had passed the Guard buoy now, and were heading down as if for the sea. Now and again a gentle little puff filled the mainsail, and by watching floating weed they could see that they were moving through the water as well as past the land. A seaplane roared overhead and came down on the water in a long swoop, sending the spray flying. “Like a swan coming down in Rio Bay,” said Titty. Far ahead of them they could see the two buoys, Beach End and Cliff Foot, that marked the way out for the steamships. Beyond those buoys the sea seemed gradually to lose itself in mist. It was hard to tell where sea ended and mist began, though here, in the harbour, they could see quite clearly the houses of Felixstowe on one side and Harwich on the other.

  “It doesn’t look as if it could ever turn into waves,” said Titty, staring across the wide stretch of almost oily water.

  “I’ve seen it just like glass,” said Jim. “And then, an hour or two later, I’ve been taking in reefs and having a job to keep the sea where it belongs.”

  “Where’s that?” said Roger.

  “Not in the cockpit,” said Jim with a grin.

  Not in the cockpit. They looked at the cockpit, comfortable and deep, with its high coamings, with the deck outside them and the water so far below. It seemed impossible that ever the sea could come heaping up and throwing itself aboard.

  “Has it ever come in here?” said Titty.

  “Hasn’t it?” said Jim.

  “What do you do when it does?” asked John.

  “Pump it out,” said Jim, and he showed them the small square lid in the seat, and the pump handle just below it, and let Roger pump for a little, just to feel what it was like.

  Light though the wind was, and fitful, the last of the ebb took them down the harbour at a good pace. Those outer buoys, at first dim black specks in the distance, were now clearly different. One, with a pointed top, was the Beach End buoy. The other, flat-topped, was called Cliff Foot. Roger was told he had earned full marks by remembering that Beach End must be the starboard hand buoy and Cliff Foot the port hand buoy for vessels coming in. Not even Susan wanted to go below deck just now when they were coming nearer and nearer to the place at which harbour ends and sea begins.

  “Are we going right down to the buoys?” asked John.

  “I promised you shouldn’t go further,” said Jim, “and it really isn’t worth while going so far on a day like this. There’s nothing to see …”

  “But sea,” chuckled Roger.

  “Not much of that with this mist,” said Jim. “Never mind. We’ll go up to Ipswich this morning, and it may be clearer when we come back.”

  “Did you mean it when you said we’d signal to them as we go by?” asked Titty.

  “Why not?” said Jim. “We’ve got the flags … But Mrs Walke
r won’t have a code book.”

  “She knows the flags,” said John.

  “Good,” said Jim. “We’ll hoist o and K to the cross-trees to show her that everything’s all right.”

  “May we look at the flags?” asked Titty.

  “They’re in a roll in the shelf over your bunk,” said Jim, and a minute later Titty had brought up the white canvas roll and opened it, and they were looking at the neatly folded flags, each in a labelled pocket of its own. She found the o, red and yellow, and the K, yellow and blue.

  “Do you ever use them?” asked John.

  “Only for fun,” said Jim. “Uncle Bob likes to have them just in case he wants a pilot or something.”

  “What’s the flag for a pilot?” asked Titty.

  “S,” said Jim.

  Titty pulled out the s flag, a dark blue square with a wide white border.1 She folded it and put it away. “We shan’t want a pilot flag on this voyage,” she said regretfully.

  “I never take a pilot anyhow if I don’t have to,” said Jim, thinking of something else. He stood up and looked round the sky.

  “We’ll have to get that staysail up without waiting for the deck to dry,” he said. “And we’ll have to turn back in a minute. There’s hardly enough wind to beat the tide, and I don’t want to drift out beyond the buoys …”

  “Let’s turn now,” said Susan.

  “Oh I say, let’s go as far as the buoys,” said John.

  “Clang!”

  “What’s that?”

  Susan, Roger and Titty all asked at once, in different tones.

  “Somebody ringing at us?” said Titty.

  “Breakfast gong,” said Roger.

  “It’s the Beach End buoy,” said Jim. “There isn’t enough of a ripple to set it properly booming. Look here, John. I’ll have that staysail up. Will you go through the cabin and pass it up through the forehatch?” He went forward along the side deck.