By the time I had swabbed the last of the blood the engines were going. Boyd and I got the hook up with the donkey engine and then I went up on to the bridge again and took the wheel in my hands.
“Slow astern both,” I ordered.
“Slow astern it is, sir,” came Boyd’s report from the engine room and I felt the screws bite into the water and the ship begin to go astern.
As the harbour wall slipped past I ordered, “Full ahead, port—full astern, starboard.”
The bows swung round. The little fishing village, white in the moonlight beneath the towering slopes of the island, revolved slowly round us and I headed the Trevedra along the rocky coast towards the open sea.
When we rounded the end of the island, I changed course, heading west for the Straits of Bonifacio between Corsica and Sardinia. I felt a strange contentment with the throb of the engines and the leap of the deck plates hard beneath my feet. I was my own master again. This was my ship and I was in command of her again. And I was homeward bound.
When the Giglio was just a dark mass astern beneath the great round disc of the moon and my wake was part of the silver path that led back to the island, Monique came out on to the bridge. She put her hand in mine, not afraid to touch me, and said, “I am glad that it is all right and that you have your ship again. You are happy, yes?”
She was looking up into my face, happy and child-like, yet with the eyes of a woman who understood my mood.
I slipped my arm round her and moved her body so that she stood against the wheel. Then I took her hands in mine and put them on the spokes of the wheel, holding them there beneath my own.
She leaned her body back against me and her hair was on my cheek as she flung her head back to look up into my face. She wasn’t laughing now. She understood, and her eyes were happy.
THE END
This ebook is copyright material and must not be copied, reproduced, transferred, distributed, leased, licensed or publicly performed or used in any way except as specifically permitted in writing by the publishers, as allowed under the terms and conditions under which it was purchased or as strictly permitted by applicable copyright law. Any unauthorized distribution or use of this text may be a direct infringement of the author’s and publisher’s rights and those responsible may be liable in law accordingly.
Version 1.0
Epub ISBN 9781448156894
www.randomhouse.co.uk
Published by Vintage 2013
Copyright © The Estate of Hammond Innes 1946
First published in Great Britain by Collins in 1946
Vintage
Random House, 20 Vauxhall Bridge Road,
London SW1V 2SA
www.vintage-classics.info
Addresses for companies within The Random House Group Limited can be found at: www.randomhouse.co.uk/offices.htm
The Random House Group Limited Reg. No. 954009
A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
ISBN 9780099577799
Dead and Alive Page 16