‘Just worry about yourself and Mrs Leyland, girl. We can’t look for too many miracles.’
‘But … they’ll be given a chance, same as the rest of us?’ Eliza persisted.
When the mate would not meet her gaze Eliza feared the worst and his reply confirmed her suspicions.
‘Having a couple of dozen terrified convict women running amok on the ship at a time like this would risk the lives of everyone on board. They have as much chance of survival in the hold as anyone else.’
‘You have had their irons taken off?’
Eliza was aware that if the women found themselves in the sea wearing their heavy fetters they would have no chance at all of survival.
‘Right at this moment I have every sailor on board fighting to save Cormorant. I’ll send someone to remove their irons as soon as a man can be spared – now hurry and get up on deck. We’ve got only one anchor holding us off the rocks now. When the rope breaks – and it will – we’ll need to act fast to have any chance of survival. So move yourselves!’
As the trio emerged from the hatch on to the open deck they were almost washed overboard by a wave which crashed down on the stricken ship with all the force of an avalanche.
Agnes was emerging from the hatch ahead of Eliza when the wave struck and had it not been for Eliza’s tight grip on her she would have been lost. As it was, they were both thoroughly soaked.
There was a great deal happening on the deck with men shouting and countermanding orders, voices vying – for the most part unsuccessfully – with the noise of the storm. The sailors’ activities were illuminated intermittently by lightning, which also showed heaving waves thundering against high cliffs, perilously close to Cormorant.
At that moment the bow of the ship suddenly reared up, and when it crashed down again the movement was accompanied by the frightening sound of splintering wood. This was followed by a writhing motion that brought to Eliza’s mind an incongruous memory of her early years, when, as a small child in the basement London room where she lived before being taken off to the workhouse, she had witnessed the death throes of a rat, caught in a home-made snare.
The memory brought back the same feeling of terror she had experienced on that occasion. Then, above all the other sounds she heard women screaming and, knowing from whence the sounds came, and their implications, the horror she felt had a frightening immediacy – but at that moment someone blundered against her in the darkness.
Staggering off-balance, she was caught by strong hands and Macleish’s voice demanded, ‘Where’s Agnes … Mrs Leyland?’
‘She’s here …’ Agnes had fallen to the deck but Eliza could feel her gripping the hem of her skirt as the captain’s wife struggled to regain her footing on the wet deck.
‘Hold on to her. Don’t lose her – and don’t lose me. We’re going to the boat.’
Eliza had noticed two boats on the deck at Cormorant’s stern, one on either side and she asked, ‘Which one?’
‘There’s only one … the other was washed overboard.’
Remembering the size of the boat compared with the giant waves battering Cormorant and the nearby cliffs, Eliza said fearfully, ‘We can’t trust our lives to a small boat like that in this sea!’
‘It’s our only chance, the ship is breaking up on the rocks and nothing can save it now … Hurry!’
As Eliza pulled Agnes to her feet, the captain’s wife, half-hysterical with fear, cried, ‘Where’s my husband? Where’s Arnold?’
Without slowing in his efforts to drag the two women along the wildly bucking deck towards the ship’s stern, Macleish, head down against the wind and blinding rain shouted, ‘He’s ordered me to get you into the boat and pull away from the ship. He’ll try to escape with the crew over the rocks to the shore. You couldn’t make it that way.’
‘I’m not going! I want to stay with Arnold….’
‘He’s busy trying to save his crew. Here we are – but be careful, the boat’s swinging about like a mad thing.’
Macleish was fully aware that neither the captain nor any of the crew remaining on board stood any chance of survival. Agnes knew it too but before she could protest any further, the mate bundled her and Eliza into the wildly swinging boat and scrambled in after them.
There was a sudden, stomach-churning drop as the seamen holding the ropes attached to the davits released their grip, sending the boat crashing into the sea. It immediately began bouncing around in an alarming manner, at the mercy of the waves.
‘Push away from the ship’s side!’
Macleish bellowed the order to the eight or nine seamen who were in the boat, his voice only just discernible above the din about them. Using oars, the sailors levered the boat clear of the stricken Cormorant, snapping two oars in the process.
Eventually, to the relief – and disbelief – of everyone on board the small craft they cleared the ship’s stern and suddenly the boat was in open water at the mercy of the sea and still far from safety.
‘Get the oars in the rowlocks and pull together. We have to get clear of Cormorant – and the rocks. Pull as you never have before … your lives depend on it! Come on … put your backs into it. In … out … in … out…!’
The mate of the stricken Cormorant shouted the time for the oarsmen in a desperate effort to make them pull on the oars together and power the small boat clear of the mother ship.
It was not easy. The boat was rising and falling with the mountainous waves, the blades of the oars digging into water at one moment, flailing the air uselessly in the next – and not all the water stayed outside the boat. Eliza had been aware of water soaking her feet when she climbed inside and now she felt it swilling about her ankles.
Macleish was aware of it too. Struggling to hold the tiller with one hand, he felt beneath his seat in the stern of the boat and from a small locker pulled out two dish-shaped objects. Kicking them towards Eliza, he said, ‘You and Agnes use these. Try to get rid of some of the water; we can’t afford to ride any lower than we are now.’
Eliza handed one of the dishes to Agnes who, ill and terrified of all that was happening about her, only feebly followed the example of Eliza who began baling out water as fast as she could.
The task was not easy. The boat was pitching and rolling wildly and, despite all her efforts, Eliza felt that only half the water she was bailing out reached the side before spilling back into the boat but she urged the distressed wife of the Cormorant’s captain to follow her example.
Suddenly, the movement of the boat changed perceptibly. It was still highly mobile but now the waves seemed higher, the rise of the small boat greater than before and the drop into every trough even deeper, with a longer time between the two.
‘We’ve left the lee of the land and are in open water,’ Macleish shouted to the seamen in the boat. ‘It’s as I thought, Cormorant must have struck the rocks on Lundy. If we can raise the mast with not too much sail the wind should take us towards the Cornish coast.’
‘The north coast,’ one of the seamen growled, ‘Most of that’s as rocky as Lundy.’
‘Most of it,’ Macleish agreed, ‘but there are harbours and beaches too. By the time we get there it should be light and we’ll be able to choose where we go ashore. Let’s get that mast up.’
The mast was raised and a modicum of sail set. Although the sail added to the boat’s speed and made it easier for Mate Macleish to keep the boat on course, it did nothing to help Eliza and Agnes with the bailing. Half-an-hour after clearing the comparative shelter of Lundy Island the amount of water inside the Cormorant’s boat had reached alarming proportions. It hardly improved when Macleish made two of the sailors take the balers, telling Eliza and Agnes to do what they could with cupped hands in a feeble attempt to help.
It was evident they were fighting a losing battle and Eliza asked, ‘How far are we from land?’
‘Your guess is as good as mine,’ the mate replied, ‘And that’s all I can make … a guess. It could be a mile �
� or it could be ten! What’s far more certain is that unless we get there soon we’ll be in serious trouble. We’re so low in the water it’s coming in faster than we can bail it out. I’ll raise more sail and hope to reach the coast before we go under.’
‘Is that wise?’ The nearest oarsman put the question to the mate. ‘The wind has strengthened and is likely to drive us straight into a large wave, instead of riding it.’
‘We have no choice. The water in the boat is already so high we probably have no more than a few minutes afloat. If I raise more sail you can all stow the oars and bail as best you can – and pray while you’re doing it.’
More sail was raised, but the oarsman was proved right. The wind had actually increased, making the boat far less manoeuvrable. Within minutes of the mate’s last order – disaster struck.
The boat was riding the crest of a wave when a sound like a musket shot was heard above the noise of the storm – and the mast snapped. In doing so it carried the sail and jib with it, sweeping three of the boat’s occupants into the sea.
One was Agnes Leyland, who had just straightened up to ease the pain in her back brought about by baling.
Eliza screamed as her late mistress disappeared over the side, but nobody was able to help those swept overboard now. The boat had become unmanageable. Nothing could save its occupants.
Suddenly, Eliza found the mate at her side, a knife in his hand. For a moment she cringed in terror, convinced he was about to kill her to save her from suffering in the water.
Instead, he shouted, ‘I’ve cut the sail away and am tying you to the broken off mast. Keep your senses about you in the water and cling to the mast as tightly as you can. Don’t let go of it, whatever else you do!’
With seamanlike efficiency he carried out his task, even as he was speaking. Moments later he uttered his last words as the boat sank from under the shipwrecked occupants, leaving them at the mercy of the raging sea.
‘God bless you, girl! If you make it to safety say a prayer for me and the others.’
Then she was alone in the water, clinging to the broken mast, her cry of terror cut short by a mouthful of cold salt sea water….
Chapter Nine
ALICE HAD JUST dragged the unconscious girl to a patch of sand, farther away from the fluctuating water’s edge, when a cry went up from the cliff top and was carried back down the line of weighed down pillagers toiling up the narrow cliff path with their booty. Coast guard officers had been seen hurrying towards the scene of the wrecked vessel.
There was an immediate flurry of activity on the beach. Those who had already gathered goods from the wrecked ship were eager to carry it to the cliff top and escape before the coast guards arrived upon the scene.
There had been a time when such officials were sympathetic towards Cornish coastal dwellers, most of whose lives were spent in abject poverty, but this had changed in the last decade, since the Admiralty in London had won the right to appoint Royal Naval officers and some ratings to the coast guard service.
In most cases the officers were men from outside Cornwall and, in the wake of rumours, not always exaggerated, of shipwrecked seafarers being murdered for their possessions, they showed little sympathy for those who felt they had a time-honoured right to anything that came ashore as a result of shipwreck.
A number of bitter battles had been fought along the Cornish coastline in recent years, resulting in casualties and fatalities on both sides. As a result the coast guards were hated by those who had once profited by smuggling and the pilfering of wrecks – but they had earned a healthy respect for themselves and their Service.
There was a mad scramble to evade the coast guards now, but a number of less agile scavengers had not made it to the top of the cliff by the time the uniformed men appeared at the top of the path.
Those still toiling to the cliff-top hastily jettisoned their booty, causing consternation and occasional injury to those still on the sand of the cove.
Most of this activity was lost upon Alice who, with Percy, was struggling to lift the rescued girl clear of the rocks and away from the incoming tide. They reached a spot that Alice considered safe, at the base of the cliffs and close to where the path met the beach, just as the first of the coast guards arrived there.
Those few hopeful looters who remained on the beach were mostly older men and women, standing close to the water’s edge, hoping to create the impression that they were concerned only with what was happening to the stricken ship, and had no interest whatsoever in the items being washed ashore around them.
Because Alice and Percy appeared to be the only two on the now near-deserted beach who were doing anything, they attracted the immediate attention of the uniformed arrivals.
One of two officers who hurried to them addressed Alice’s companion, saying, ‘Hello, Percy, I would have taken a wager that I would find you here, but I never expected there to be a young woman helping you, and by the look of that body you’ve carried here you’re not likely to get much of value from it.’
Alice realised that, soaking wet as she was, with lank hair hanging out of a waterproof hat belonging to her brother hiding much of her face, she must have looked no different to the dozens of other women the man had passed hurrying away from the scene … but she was not prepared to waste time explaining herself to him.
‘If you’ve come here to be helpful you and your friends can get the girl up the cliff and take her to the rectory at Trethevy as quickly as you can. She’s still alive but appears to be seriously hurt. While you’re doing that some of your companions might want to check those laid out further along the beach. It is quite possible some of those are still alive too.’
The coast guard who had addressed Percy was startled. He had previously merely glanced at Alice. Plastered with sand and wet and bedraggled, he had dismissed her as a local village girl, but her manner of speech was not that of a village girl and now he looked closer he could see her clothes were not home-made.
Addressing his companion, he said, ‘Stay here with them, I’ll go and have a word with Lieutenant Kendall.’
‘I have no intention of waiting here while you go off for a discussion with your friends. This girl needs urgent medical attention if she’s to survive and I mean to ensure she receives it.’
Her raised voice pursued the coast guard as he hurried away heading for a group of uniformed men standing on the beach, looking out to where the vessel on the offshore rocks was being unmercifully pounded to pieces by the relentless sea.
There were no visible signs of life on board the wrecked vessel and as the coast guard approached the group of fellow officers, two of them waded into the sea to retrieve the body of a man floating face down in the water, arms outstretched to his sides, being washed in with the tide.
The coast guard who had been with Alice and Percy spoke to a young man wearing the uniform of a lieutenant of the Royal Navy, pointing back the way he had come. Heads turned to look in the direction of Alice and the lieutenant, accompanied by two coast guards, began hurrying towards her.
When he arrived, the lieutenant looked at the wet and dishevelled girl kneeling beside the prostrate survivor and was no more impressed with her than the other man had been.
Addressing her, he said, ‘Coast Guard Pascoe says the young girl is a survivor from the wrecked vessel and he found you and your companion searching her….’
‘Then Coast Guard Pascoe has a vivid imagination,’ Alice retorted. ‘The state of the girl’s clothing makes a search unnecessary. The sea and rocks have not left her with enough to even satisfy decency. Percy and I found her among rocks at the far end of the beach, she is still alive – but only just. If she is not seen by a doctor very soon she’ll no longer be a survivor and will join the line of bodies farther along the beach.’
As had the coastguard who had been first to reach her, the Royal Navy lieutenant realised that Alice was not just another local young woman intent upon plunder and he reacted immediately. Turning to the
coastguard with him, he said, ‘Pascoe, collect a few men and something to support the girl then carry her to the top of the cliff.’
Turning back to Alice, he said, ‘I am Lieutenant Jory Kendall, the officer in charge of the North Cornwall coast guard. Where do you want the girl taken? I’ll have a doctor sent for but he can’t treat her out here in this weather.’
‘Have her carried to the rectory at Trethevy. I’ll go with her and settle her in a spare room.’
‘The rectory? I was not aware of a church at Trethevy.’
‘It has been unused for many years, at least, as a place of worship, but my brother has been appointed rector there and it will soon be serving its original purpose once more.’
Her reply satisfied a number of the naval lieutenant’s unasked questions, but he had more. ‘Why are you here and not your brother? This is hardly the place for a woman – a woman like you – in such circumstances.’
‘My brother needed to go to Tavistock yesterday and will not be back until tomorrow. Had he realised what would be happening he would never have gone, not that it would have made any difference. I would still have been on the beach with him. But we are wasting time, this girl needs help – and quickly.’
Stung by his implication that she, as a woman, had no place at the scene of a shipwreck, she added, ‘Had I not been here I doubt whether the young girl would have had any chance of survival – but what exactly do you and your men hope to achieve now you are here?’
‘We came in the hope of rescuing crewmen from the stranded ship if at all possible – but there doesn’t appear to be anything we can do. There is very little of the ship left, it has taken such a pounding from the storm. It is also part of my duty to ensure that anything coming ashore is saved for the vessel’s rightful owners and is not stolen.’
‘You have arrived too late to save everything,’ Alice commented, ‘but what about the bodies over there. There are five or six of them. Will you recover them before the tide is fully in?’
Beyond the Storm Page 5