The Lonely Sea Read online

  ‘If either your boat or yourself is in any way damaged, please accept my apologies,’ he said coldly. ‘But you must admit it is unusual, to say the least of it, to see a barge sailing broadside up a canal. I mean, one doesn’t expect that sort of thing—’

  Here George suddenly broke off. He had adjusted his spectacles and now saw the lady clearly for the first time.

  She was well worth looking at, George admitted to himself dispassionately. Burnished red hair, intensely blue—if unfriendly—eyes, long golden limbs, a sleeveless green sweater and very abbreviated white shorts—she had, he privately confessed, everything.

  ‘Sailing broadside, you clown!’ she snapped angrily, brushing aside his proffered hand and climbing painfully to her feet. ‘Broadside, he says.’ She flexed a speculative knee, while George stood by admiringly, and seemed relieved to find that it still worked.

  ‘Can’t you see I’m stuck right into the bank?’ she enquired icily. ‘It’s just happened and I haven’t had time to move. Why on earth couldn’t you pass by my stern?’

  ‘I’m sorry,’ said George stiffly, ‘but, after all, your boat is lying in a patch of shadow where these trees are. Besides—er—I wasn’t paying much attention,’ he concluded lamely.

  ‘You certainly wasn’t—I mean weren’t,’ retorted the redhead acidly. ‘Of all the inept and panic-stricken displays—’

  ‘Enough,’ said George sternly. ‘Not only was it your fault, but no damage has been done to your old barge anyway. But look at my bows!’ he exclaimed bitterly.

  The redhead tossed her head in a nice blend of scorn and indifference, swung round, picked her way delicately over the cruiser’s splintered bows and buckled rails and gracefully stepped aboard the barge. George, after a moment’s hesitation, followed her aboard.

  She turned round quickly, stretching her hand out for the tiller, which lay conveniently near. To George, her hair seemed redder than ever. Her blue eyes almost sparked with anger.

  ‘I don’t remember inviting you aboard,’ she said dangerously. ‘Get off my barge.’

  ‘I didn’t invite you aboard either,’ George pointed out reasonably. ‘I have merely come,’ he added loftily, ‘to offer what assistance I can.’

  She tightened her grip on the tiller. ‘You have five seconds. I’m perfectly capable of looking after—’

  ‘Look!’ cried George excitedly. ‘The tiller rope!’ He picked up a loose end, neatly severed except for a broken strand. ‘It’s been cut.’

  ‘What a brain,’ remarked the lady caustically. ‘Do you think the mice have been at it?’

  ‘Very witty, very witty indeed. The point is, if it’s been cut, somebody cut it. I don’t suppose,’ he added doubtfully, ‘that you go about cutting tiller ropes.’

  ‘No, I don’t,’ she replied bitterly. ‘But Black Bart does. He’d cut anything. Tillers, mooring ropes, throats—they all come alike to him.’

  ‘A thorough going villain, it would seem. Possibly you are biased. And who might Black Bart be?’

  ‘Biased!’ She struggled incoherently for words. ‘Biased, he says. A man who robs my father, puts him in hospital, steals carriage contracts, sabotages barges. Right now he’s on his way to the Totfield Granary to steal the summer contract from me. First come, first served.’

  ‘Oh, come now,’ said George peaceably. ‘Piracy on the Lower Dipworth canal. In 1953, England and broad daylight. I am, I have been told, a more than normally gullible character—’

  ‘Do you see any Navy around to prevent it?’ she interrupted swiftly. ‘Or any witnesses—this is the loneliest canal in England.’

  George peered thoughtfully at her through his bifocals. ‘You have a point there. Fortunately, you are not alone. Eric—my man—and I—’

  ‘I’m too busy to laugh. I can take care of all this myself. Get off my boat.’

  George was nettled. He forgot his well-bred upbringing.

  ‘Now, look here, Ginger,’ he burst out, ‘I don’t see why—’

  ‘Did you call me “Ginger”?’ she enquired sweetly.

  ‘I did. As I was saying—’

  Barely in time, he saw the tiller swinging round. He ducked, stumbled, clawed wildly at the air and fell backwards into the murky depths of the Lower Dipworth canal, clutching his precious bifocals in his left hand. When he surfaced, the redhead was no longer there, and in her place was the ever ready Eric, boathook in hand.

  An hour later the cruiser was chugging along the canal at a respectful distance behind the barge. George, clad in a pair of immaculate tennis flannels and morosely watching his duck trousers and jersey flapping from the masthead, had once again fallen prey to his bitter thoughts.

  Women, he brooded darkly, were the very devil. Three months previously he had been the happiest of men. And today—this very day was to have been his wedding day. The least his fiancée could have done, he considered, was to have switched her wedding date with the same ease and facility as she had switched prospective husbands.

  But women had no finer feelings. Take this redhead, for instance, this termagant, this copperheaded Amazon, this female dragon in angel’s clothing. Perfect confirmation of his belief in women’s fundamental injustice, unfairness and lack of sensibility. Not that George needed any confirmation.

  ‘Lock ahead, sir,’ sang out Eric in the bows. ‘And another boat.’

  George squinted ahead into the setting sun. The redhead was steering her barge skilfully alongside the canal bank and, even as he watched, she jumped nimbly ashore, rope in hand, and made fast. Just beyond hers, another and much more ancient barge was gradually disappearing behind the lock gate. One gate was already shut, the other was being slowly closed by a burly individual who was pushing the massive gate handle. This, George guessed, might very possibly be Black Bart. The situation had interesting possibilities.

  ‘Take her alongside, Eric, and tie up,’ said George. ‘The presence of a man of tact is called for up there, or I’m much mistaken.’ With that, he leapt ashore and scrambled up the bank to the scene of conflict.

  Conflict there undoubtedly was, but it was very one-sided. The man who had been pushing the gate shut, a very large, swarthy, unshaven and ugly customer with the face of a retired prizefighter, continued to close it steadily, contemptuously fending off the redhead with one arm. Such blows as she landed had no effect at all. An elderly and obviously badly frightened lock-keeper hovered nervously in the background. He made no attempt to interfere.

  ‘Now, now, Mary, me gal,’ the prize-fighter was saying. ‘Temper, temper. Assaulting a poor innocent feller like myself. Shockin’, so it is. A criminal offence.’

  ‘Leave that dock gate open, Jamieson,’ she cried furiously. ‘There’s plenty of room for two barges, and you know it. Cutting people’s tiller ropes! It’ll cost me an hour if you go through alone. You—you villain.’ The redhead was becoming a trifle confused. She struggled fiercely but to no effect at all.

  ‘Language, language, my dear.’ Bart grinned wickedly. ‘And tiller ropes’—he started in large surprise—‘I don’t know what you are talking about. As for letting your barge in…No-o-o.’ He shook his head regretfully. ‘I couldn’t risk my paint.’ He spat fondly in the direction of the battered hulk which lay in the dock below.

  ‘Can I be of any assistance?’ interrupted George.

  ‘Beat it, Fancypants,’ said Bart courteously.

  ‘Oh, go away,’ snapped the redhead.

  ‘I will not go away. This is my business. This is everybody’s business. An injustice is being done. Leave this to me.’

  Jamieson paused in his efforts and regarded George under lowered eyebrows. George ignored him and turned to the redhead.

  ‘Mary, me gal—er—I mean, Miss—why won’t this ruffian let your barge into the lock?’ he asked.

  ‘Because, don’t you see, it’ll give him an hour’s start on me. His barge is far older and slower. It’s sixty miles to the Granary yet. He’s determined to get there first, so
he’ll use any method to stop me.’ Tears of rage welled up in her eyes.

  George turned and faced Black Bart.

  ‘Open that gate,’ he commanded.

  Bart’s mouth fell open, just for a second, then tightened ominously.

  ‘Run away, sonny,’ he scoffed, ‘I’m busy.’

  George removed his yachting cap and placed it carefully on the ground.

  ‘You leave me no alternative,’ he stated. ‘I shall have to use force.’

  Mary clutched his arm. Her blue eyes were no longer hostile, but genuinely concerned.

  ‘Please go away,’ she pleaded. ‘Please. You don’t know him.’

  ‘That’s right. Oh please,’ Bart mocked. ‘Tell him what I did to your father.’

  ‘Silence, woman,’ George ordered. ‘And hold these.’

  He thrust his spectacles into her reluctant hand and swung round. Unfortunately, without his glasses, George literally could not distinguish a tramcar from a haystack. But he was too angry to care. His normal calm had completely vanished. He took a quick step forward and lashed out blindly at the place where Black Bart had been when last he had seen him.

  But Black Bart was no longer there. He had thoughtfully moved quite some time previously. Further, and unfortunately for George, Black Bart had twenty-twenty vision and no finer feelings whatsoever. A murderous right whistled up and caught George one inch below his left ear. From the point of view of weight and the spirit in which given, it could be in no way compared to the encouraging clap he had so recently received from the Minister of Supply. George rose upwards and backwards, neatly cleared the edge of the lock and, for the second time in the space of an hour, described a graceful parabolic arc into the depths of the Lower Dipworth canal.

  The girl, white-faced and trembling, stood motionless for a few seconds, then swung frantically round on Black Bart.

  ‘You swine,’ she cried. ‘You vicious brute! You’ve killed him. Quickly, quickly—get him out! He’ll drown, he’ll drown!’ The redhead was very close to tears.

  Black Bart shrugged indifferently. ‘I should worry,’ he said callously. ‘It’s his own fault.’

  Mary, colour returning to her cheeks, looked at him incredulously.

  ‘But—but you did it! You knocked him in. I saw you.’

  ‘Self-defence,’ explained Black Bart carefully. ‘I only stumbled against him.’ He smiled slowly, evilly. ‘Besides, I can’t swim.’

  Seconds later, another splash broke the stillness of the summer evening. The lady had gone to the rescue of her rescuer.

  ‘Get off my barge,’ she ordered angrily. ‘I don’t want your help.’

  George seated himself more comfortably on the counter of the barge and peacefully surveyed the wooden jetty where the three boats had tied up for the night. He appeared none the worse for the accident of a couple of hours earlier.

  ‘I will not get off,’ said George, calmly puffing at his pipe. ‘And neither,’ he added, ‘will Eric.’ He indicated his companion who then engaged in viewing the night sky through the bottom of an upturned tankard. ‘Every young lady—especially a young lady struggling to carry on her father’s business—needs protection. Eric and I will look after you.’

  ‘Protection!’ she scoffed bitterly. ‘Protection!’ George followed her meaningful glance towards the white shorts and green jersey on the line. They were still dripping. ‘You couldn’t take care of a wheelbarrow. Can’t sail, can’t swim, can’t defend yourself—a fine protector you’d make.’ She breathed deaply and with fearful restraint. ‘Get off!’

  ‘’Ere, ’ere, Miss,’ said the aggrieved Eric, ‘that’s not quite fair. The guv’nor’s no sissy. ’E’s got a medal, ’e ’as.’

  ‘What did he get it for?’ she queried acidly. ‘Ballroom dancing?’

  ‘The lady, I’m afraid, Eric, is annoyed,’ said George. ‘Perhaps justifiably so. All dragons,’ he muttered under his breath, ‘are in a state of perpetual annoyance.’

  ‘What was that?’ the lady demanded sharply.

  ‘Nothing,’ said George, courteously but firmly. ‘You will now please retire to your bed. No further harm will befall you or your boat. Eric and I,’ he finished poetically, ‘will watch over you to the break of day.’

  Mary made as if to protest, hesitated, shrugged her shoulders resignedly, and turned away.

  ‘Suit yourself,’ she said indifferently. ‘Perhaps,’ she added hopefully, ‘you’ll both catch pneumonia.’

  For some time, there followed sounds of movement in the cabin, then the light was switched off. By and by the sound of deep and peaceful slumber drifted up the companionway. It was in many ways a pleasant sound—infinitely so, indeed, in comparison with the obligato of snores already issuing from the two faithful watchers in the stern.

  Sleep, however, was not universal. Far from it. Black Bart and his henchman were not only awake, but uncommonly active. The latter had stealthily vanished into the engine room of George’s cruiser: Black Bart himself was squatting on one of the submerged cross-beams bracing the piers of the jetty. Looped over his shoulder were about sixty feet of slender wire hawser. One end was secured to the pier, the other to the rudder of the barge, immediately below the sleeping warriors. The coils he let fall gently to the bottom of the canal.

  At 7.00 a.m. the following morning, George and Eric left the barge in a hurry. The frying pan wielded by the redhead was daunting enough, but far more devastating were her scorn and derision.

  At 7.30 Black Bart’s barge moved off, chugged along the canal for a couple of hundred yards, then stopped. Jamieson wanted a grandstand view of the proceedings.

  At 8.00 a.m., Eric appeared on deck, luridly cursing the villain who had drained all the paraffin tanks and refilled them with water.

  At 8.02 George made his hurried way along the bank to Mary’s boat in urgent search of fuel. He was driven off by unkind words and a bargepole.

  At 8.05, Mary cast off, and at 8.06, with a terrific rending, splintering noise, the rudder was torn off. Immediately the barge slewed round and thudded into the bank.

  At 8.08, George had run along the towpath and leapt aboard to offer help. At 8.09 the redhead knocked him into the canal and at 8.10 she fished him out again.

  Two hundred yards away, Black Bart was bent double, convulsed at the results of his own genius. Finally he straightened up, wiped the streaming tears from his eyes, and journeyed on towards the famous Watman’s Folly, the last stopover of the trip.

  ‘Ol’ man, I’ve mishjudged you—mishjudged you badly, ol’ man. Sorry, Bart, ol’ man. But you unnershtand how it is. Women! Women! Tchah! Did you see what she did to me? Eh? Did you see it?’ George was incoherent with indignation.

  ‘Sure, sure, Doc, I saw it.’ Black Bart swore fluently. ‘She’s a bad-tempered young lady.’ ‘Lady’ was not Bart’s choice of word. ‘Better rid of her. Sorry about the scrap at the lock, Doc. All her fault, the wicked little so-and-so.’

  ‘It’s forgotten, Bart, ol’ man, forgotten. All my own fault. Pals, eh, ol’ man?’

  The new-found pals solemnly shook hands, then returned to the serious competitive business of deplenishing the Watman’s Arms available supplies of West Country cider. It was powerful stuff. George appeared to be winning by a short head: but then George was pouring nearly all of his into a convenient window box. Black Bart remained happily unaware of this. He was likewise ignorant of the immense care with which George had arranged this accidental meeting—the Arms was a favourite haunt of Jamieson’s. Striking up an acquaintanceship on a friendly basis had been easy—after what Black Bart had seen that morning, George’s friendliness came as no surprise. Besides, George was spending very freely.

  ‘’S ten o’clock, Doc,’ said Bart warningly. ‘Chucking-out time, you know.’

  ‘Imposhible, ol’ man,’ replied George thickly. ‘We’ve only been here ten minutes. Tell you what, ol’ man,’ he continued eagerly. ‘Lesh make a night of it. Eh? ol’ pal? Come on.’

&
nbsp; Ten minutes later the old pals were staggering erratically along the towpath, singing in what they frequently praised as wonderful harmony, and swinging a demijohn of cider in either hand. First they passed the cruiser, then Mary’s barge with the jury-rigged rudder—Bart meant to attend to that later on—and finally boarded Bart’s barge.

  Bart’s barge lay close by Watman’s Folly, which was only ten miles short of the Granary. The Folly was what is known as a blind lock. It had lock gates at either end, but the outer end led nowhere. It just stopped there, overlooking the Upper Totfield valley—an embryo canal killed by finance. Like most blind locks, it had been sealed by concrete.

  Bart’s henchman welcomed them eagerly, and the night’s festivities really commenced. At half past one the henchman slid beneath the table. At a quarter to two George followed him, and at two o’clock Bart, in the act of draining the last demijohn, crashed to the floor in a highly spectacular fashion.

  George rose briskly to his feet, dusted down his clothes and strode ashore. First, he boarded Mary’s barge and rapped imperatively on her door.

  A light immediately flicked on and in ten seconds a tousled red head and sleepy, rather scared blue eyes peeped round the door. When she saw who it was her expression changed to something curiously like gladness, then merely to relief, finally to exasperation.

  ‘I know, I know,’ said George. ‘“Get off my barge”. Well, I’m just going. I am not,’ he added hastily, ‘keeping a watch over you tonight. Just came to tell you to be prepared to move early tomorrow. I don’t think Black Bart will be feeling particularly friendly towards any of us in a few hours’ time.’

  ‘What are you talking about,’ she asked wonderingly. ‘And just what do you propose to do?’ she inquired suspiciously.

  ‘Wait and see,’ said George ungallantly. ‘Perhaps I’m no sailor, swimmer or boxer but—’ he tapped himself briefly on the forehead—‘possibly I am not completely useless in every department. Goodnight.’