“I should hope so. You forget, I’m a painter. I notice things.”
He leaned through the door and pecked her on the cheek. “I’m just going to stow the fenders. Back in a minute.”
“No. I’ll do it. I’m the crew. Where do you put them?” She motioned him to take back the wheel.
“In the lazarette.”
“Sounds like someone out of the Bible. Give me a clue.”
“There are two hatches on the afterdeck. If you lift them up you’ll find a stowage area under them. It’s called the lazarette. The fenders can go in there.”
“Aye-aye, sir.” She mock-saluted him and went about het duties.
♦
They had been out for about an hour, and Amy had observed how relaxed he was. She had been prepared for him to shout at her, as that was what most men in charge of boats did, but he had simply asked her to do things clearly and firmly.
Will felt a sense of release and vindication: release because of his new-found ability to escape the land, and vindication in that Boy Jack handled like a dream. He patted the wheel as if it were a well-behaved dog, and put his arm round Amy as she stood beside him.
“Better be getting back, I suppose.”
“Suppose so. Not that he seems bothered at all.”
Spike had hardly moved since the voyage had begun. He had eased forward a few times and looked over at the bow wave, but decided against leaping down and chasing it. He had ignored his two shipmates, which was not unusual, explained Will.
Will looked ahead as they began to round Bill’s Island. It rose up out of the sea like a giant humpbacked whale, its rocks alive with chattering gannets and guillemots, its grassy slopes dotted with sea pinks and yellow vetch. They watched as the sea splashed on its shores, where sandpipers and oystercatchers paddled and prodded for food. “Who was Bill?” asked Amy.
“He was Prince Albert Rock’s lighthouse keeper in the nineteenth century. Did a bit of a Grace Darling. Rescued a family in a storm. Just like Ernie.” His voice lowered. “Except that he survived.” He felt the keen sense of loss again. How different the sea was today. Like another country. He was brought to earth by a sudden grinding sound. The boat juddered and slowed dramatically. Amy was thrown against the bulkhead and cried out as she bumped her head. Will braced himself against the wheel and pulled the gear levers into neutral.
“Are you OK?” he asked.
“Fine. What happened?”
“I don’t know.” Will leapt out of the wheelhouse door as the cat scampered in, frightened by the noise and the unexpected jolt.
The boat rocked gently from side to side as the engines continued to tick over. Will walked astern.
“What is it?”
“Something round one of the propellers, I think. Or both of them. I bet it’s a bloody lobster pot. Damn. I should have been looking.”
“Sorry.” She felt guilty at having distracted him.
“Not your fault.”
He leaned over the transom and looked down into the water. “Bugger.” He could see it now: a lump of rope floating in the water with a dark grey plastic container at the end. The sort of cheap float fishermen used to mark their lobster pots.
“If they used proper fluorescent ones they’d be easier to pick out from a distance. Look at that. Bloody dark grey and half submerged. Nobody’s going to spot that until they’re on top of it. Shit!”
“Can you untangle it?”
“I’ll have a try, but I bet it’s bloody cold in there.”
“Can’t we just fish it out with a boathook?”
“No. It’ll be wrapped round the propeller. I’ve got a diving mask. I’ll jump over and hang on to the side and see if I can do it from there.”
He stepped into the wheelhouse and turned off the engines. They were both aware of the silence, broken only by the gentle lapping of waves on the hull and the distant cries of seabirds on Bill’s Island.
The sky was pale blue streaked with wisps of cloud. Amy suddenly felt the urge to reach for her paints. She watched him slip over the side clad in a pair of shorts and a face mask. He held on to a knotted rope secured to a stanchion and lowered himself over the transom. He came up several times, then at last raised his hand above the surface triumphantly with a coil of battered rope.
He scrambled aboard, tied the rope to a cleat and pulled off the mask, panting for breath. She looked at his body, running with rivulets of seawater and spattered with kelp. His chest heaved as he took in massive gulps of air.
“Not wound round too far – only one propeller…The other’s OK.” He bent double, his head between his knees, and she laid her hand on his back.
He raised his head, flinging water from his black curls, and smiled at her.
She gazed at him, her eyes speaking volumes.
He looked down at her in her oversized jeans, rolled up above her bare feet, at her body encased in the baggy sweater and the lifejacket, and at her hair tied back from her face. He wound his arms round her, dripping water over her clothes.
“I’m getting awfully wet,” she said softly.
He eased away from her, grinning. “Shall we see if there’s a lobster for our trouble?”
“Are we allowed to?”
“It’s damn near taken off our propeller and it isn’t properly marked. I think the least it owes us is a decent supper.”
He untied the rope from its cleat and between them they hauled up the pot. But it did not contain a lobster. It contained a plastic food container, sealed in a polythene bag.
Twenty-Two
Trinitas In Unitate
“What is it?”
“I don’t know. Pass me the knife.”
Amy handed him the one that was kept in a sheath by the helm, and he cut away the polythene to expose the plastic food container, which was sealed with waterproof tape. He ran the knife round the seal and lifted the lid to discover several plastic bags filled with white powder.
Amy was the first to speak. “Oh, my God!”
Will looked up at her face, from which the colour had drained.
“Don’t ask me how I know this,” she said, “but it looks to me like heroin.”
Will swore. Then he said, “The lowest drawer in the chest to one side of the helm – there’s some waterproof tape in it.”
Amy disappeared into the wheelhouse and returned with it. Will resealed the plastic box, shivering as the breeze brought up goosebumps on his wet skin. Then he replaced the container in the lobster pot and lowered it back over the side, allowing the dark grey float to bob away from them on the water.
He stepped into the wheelhouse and returned with a nautical chart, then walked to the foredeck and motioned Amy to follow him He laid the chart on the deck, weighting it at each corner with their shoes, and looked about to get his bearings.
“If I had my GPS…”
“Your what?”
“My GPS – a navigation system that uses satellites to fix your position. If I had it I could get a precise bearing on where we are to within fifty metres or so.”
“Impressive.”
“Yes. But I haven’t got one yet so we’ll have to guess.” He looked at the sun and at his watch, at the position of Bill’s Island and at the mainland, then took a pencil and made a cross on the chart. “I reckon we’re about here.” He looked around him at the sea. “Can you make out any more lobster pots with dark grey floats?”
“They’re difficult to see.”
“I know. That must have been the idea.”
“What do you mean?”
“Fishermen with lobster pots generally lay a string of them. They use individually coloured floats so that they can identify their own pots. That stops them pulling up pots belonging to other fishermen.”
She looked at him and the significance of what he was saying became clear.
“So Christopher Applebee used dark grey floats?”
“Exactly.”
“Which were difficult to see…”
“Unless you knew precisely where to look.”
“And other fishermen would leave them alone?”
“That’s right. He made them even more difficult to find by part-filling the floats so that they didn’t stick out of the water too much.”
Amy looked out across the water towards Bill’s Island. “Is that one over there? Directly in line with that big rock.”
“Probably.” He screwed up his eyes and scanned the water. “Yes. And there’s another one there – see? Just in line with the end of the island. All his pots are round this side, so nobody could see him from the mainland when he emptied them.”
“Clever trick.”
“Yes. But simple, really. It’s surprising that the police haven’t cottoned on to it. But, then, they were looking for booze, not lobsters.”
“Or drugs. So what do we do now?” she asked.
“Head back. I’d better go into St Petroc and explain to my friendly sergeant what’s happened.”
“Are you sure you want to?”
“What do you mean?”
“Do you think he’ll believe you? You said he was questioning you as though you might have been involved.”
Will paused and looked at her. “Don’t sow seeds like that in my head. What’s the alternative? That I turn detective and stake out the lobster pots until someone comes and pulls up the booty? No, thanks. I think I’d rather face the music with a detective sergeant than with the West Country Mafia.”
“I suppose so.”
He felt the chill of the onshore breeze. “Earghhh! I need to get dry. Towel me down?”
“Towel yourself down!” She smiled at him. “We’ve got to get back. No time for pleasure. I have a studio to open and you have some explaining to do. Wait till Hovis hears about this. He’ll wish he’d come along.”
♦
The sun rose slowly in the clear, pale sky, glinting on the soft peaks of the ripples that shimmied on the surface of the water. They said little as they motored back but stayed close, Amy with her arm on his shoulder as he steered for the Crooked Angel.
“I know this sounds stupid, bearing in mind what’s just happened, but I’m desperate to paint,” she said softly, as the jetty grew closer.
“Mmm?”
“I’ve been doing nothing but shop-keeping – I’ve been tied to that till for too long. And with the holiday coming I’ll need more stock.”
“But who’ll mind the shop?”
“Primrose has a niece in St Petroc who helps her out sometimes. She said she doesn’t need her at the moment, so I thought I’d ask her.”
“What if the girl takes after her auntie? Gossip-wise, I mean?”
“Well, I’ll have to decide that when I meet her. But I’m just desperate to paint.”
He ruffled her hair, amazed that after their startling discovery she could still be thinking of painting. He didn’t say anything, but felt a great surge of love for her, and a dawning realization that now he could remember Ellie without feeling guilty.
They rounded the corner of the jetty and the sound of powerful engines met their ears. Jerry MacDermott’s boat was on the move and coming directly towards them. Will swung the helm of Boy Jack to starboard so that the boats would pass, according to the nautical rules of the road, port to port. But MacDermott was still clearly driving on the left and the two boats began to make a bee-line for each other. Deciding in a split second that a chance of salvation was better than the certainty of being crushed against the harbour wall, Will pushed both throttles forward and spun the wheel anti-clockwise, shooting Boy Jack across MacDermott’s bows with inches to spare. His heart thumped in his chest as the great white iceberg of a boat rumbled past them, close enough to nudge their fenders, with the MacDermotts waving merrily from the top, unaware of the disaster that had nearly befallen their titanic Tupperware.
Amy looked at him with incredulity etched on her face. He looked back apologetically. “Close.”
She gulped. “Very close.”
They gently chugged round the boatyard to pontoon number three, to discover that Hovis was already there, waiting to catch their lines. He was shaking his head. “I don’t reckon that man has a clue about boats.”
“That’s the understatement of the year. He’s a bloody liability,” confirmed Will. “Thank God he doesn’t come here often.”
“Yes, well, I think that’s about to change,” remarked Hovis. “How was she, by the way?”
“She was a dream, apart from a little local difficulty. But what do you mean ‘that’s all about to change’?”
Hovis tied off the four mooring warps of Boy Jack and then reached into his back pocket for a white envelope. “There’s one of these for you inside Florence Nightingale.” He waved the envelope aloft.
“What is it?” asked Will, shutting down the engines.
“An invitation.” He read: “‘Jerry and Trudie MacDermott will be at home on Sunday 24th May and request the pleasure of your company for lunch-time drinkies, 12 noon till 2 p.m. RSVP Benbecula, Bosullow Lane, Pencurnow Cove, Cornwall’.”
“Lunchtime drinkies?”
“That’s what it says.”
“Lucky you,” chirped Amy, mockingly.
“I think you’ll probably have one, too,” said Hovis.
“Oh, God!”
“Yes,” said Will. “And you can’t risk upsetting your customers, can you?” He grinned at her.
“I am not going on my own.”
“Don’t look at me.” He raised his hands in front of him in self-defence.
“I don’t really have to go, do I?” Amy moaned.
“Well, that all depends if you want to slight one of your patrons. Not really advisable, I’d have said, when you’re new to the area. Not with a man who’s spent as much as he has at your studio.”
“Come with me?” She looked at him beseechingly.
“Can we talk about more urgent things? Like out there just now?” he teased.
“Yes, of course. Sorry.” She perked up and looked in Hovis’s direction. “We’ve had a very interesting voyage.”
“Er…I think we ought to nip inside.” Will motioned her and Hovis towards the wheelhouse of Boy Jack. “Cup of coffee, Hovis?”
♦
“So what will you do?” asked Hovis, his face displaying the sort of excitement more associated with the children in Swallows and Amazons than with grown men.
“Go to the police.”
“Best thing, I suppose. Not right to keep that sort of thing to yourself. Be careful, though.”
“What do you mean?”
“Don’t breathe a word about it to anyone else. Best if it’s kept between us three – and the police, of course.”
“Well, I wasn’t thinking of knocking on the door of Gryler’s Portakabin and saying, ‘Guess what I’ve just found’.”
“No. Of course not.” He paused. “Clever idea, though. The smuggling thing. I mean, dreadful but clever.” He took a gulp of his coffee. “Much safer to bring the stuff over from the continent and pass it on down here in sleepy Cornwall. It’s quicker to nip it across the Channel at the shortest point, but that’s also the busiest point, isn’t it? Kent. Sussex. Coastguard always on the lookout. Customs hot on anything untoward. Makes more sense to get it over here in a little fishing boat, round the back of Bill’s Island where a small boat could be relatively inconspicuous.”
“Mmm,” grunted Will, thoughtfully.
“Except to observant lighthouse keepers, of course,” remarked Hovis, pointedly. “Shame about your diaries.”
“I’m relieved they’re gone, in a way.”
“But not in another?” asked Amy, who until now had been listening quietly.
“No. I wish I could go through them and check. But then…” He thought of the past life he would have to wade through, and the emotional turmoil of reliving his recovery. “Perhaps it’s for the best. Fate.” He looked at Hovis. “Pointless worrying about the things I can’t change.”
&n
bsp; Hovis drained his coffee cup. “I’d better get on.” He rose and so did Amy. “Me, too.”
“Good luck with Primrose,” said Will. “I’ll catch up with you later.” He gave Amy a hug and kissed her, then watched as she walked towards the village. As usual he found it impossible to take his eyes off her until she was out of sight. Then he made sure that the boat was secure and set off to catch the bus for the police station at St Petroc.
♦
“Do you mind if I hang on to this, sir?” The detective sergeant folded up the chart.
“No, not at all.”
He blew his nose loudly on a large tartan handkerchief, then stuffed it back in his pocket. “It was just the one lobster pot you hauled up, was it?”
“Yes. The one that caught my propeller.”
“Mmm. I see.” He looked thoughtful, as though struggling with his conscience. “We carried out a search, you know.”
“Sorry?”
“We searched the lad’s room in the village. Young Applebee’s room.”
“I see.”
“We found the usual sort of stuff – dirty magazines…”
Will found himself wondering if the sergeant meant Loaded and FHM.
“…and we also found some bottles and some weedkiller.”
For a split second Will mused on the unlikelihood of Christopher Applebee being interested in gardening, then realized what the policeman was getting at.
“According to Forensic, there’s no doubt that he was responsible for the fire at the lighthouse.”
“Oh.” The pieces of the jigsaw fell into place, and the conclusion now seemed obvious.
“Whether or not Gryler knew anything about it we’ve been unable to discover. But I thought you ought to know. It clears things up. The fire, that is. At least we know who started it. What we don’t know is if he was acting off his own bat. Maybe we never will.”
“Yes.” Will hardly knew what to say. The implications whirred in his mind.
It was Christopher Applebee who had set fire to the lighthouse. It was Christopher Applebee whom Ernie had been trying to save when he lost his life. Where was the justice in that? But Will knew better than to expect fate to mete out justice.
“I know how it must seem, sir,” the sergeant spoke compassionately, “but I think it’s best to just try to forget it.”
The Last Lighthouse Keeper Page 17