Lifeboat!

by Margaret Dickinson

  Five hundred feet and the bumpy line of sandhills was so much clearer but still about six miles away. Knowing now that he would have to ditch, Mike checked that the undercarriage was retracted and operated the flaps to try to land as slowly as possible. At the last possible moment, only feet above the waves, he purposely stalled the glider so that it dropped as flat as he could make it on to the surface of the water. But still the impact jolted him, jerking his head in a whiplash movement, his body still held rigidly by the safety harness.

  Inside the cockpit the man sat motionless, his head lolling to one side as the sailplane settled into the water.

  Miraculously, Toby heard that last desperate message. Though he could not make the glider pilot hear him in return, faintly he had picked up Mike’s signal which, though weak and distorted by interference, was coming through.

  Toby heard, ‘The sea—I’m over the sea.’

  ‘Where, man, where?’ Toby yelled into the radio, but it was no use. Obviously Mike could not hear him.

  ‘Nev—Nev! It’s Mike. He’s coming down. Over the sea!’

  Neville Grey’s mouth dropped open and he just stood and stared for a few precious seconds. ‘The sea?’ he repeated stupidly. ‘What’s he doing over the sea, for Christ’s sake?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ Toby almost shrieked. ‘What the hell do we do?’

  ‘Ring nine-nine-nine and—and—er—yes, ask for the coastguard.’

  Relief flooded through Toby. ‘ Of course, of course. I should have known.’

  Still muttering, he began to gallop across the grass to the nearest telephone. The operator wasted no time in connecting him and the coastguard took his breathless message with calm efficiency, though Toby felt extremely foolish that he could not be more helpful, could not guess where Mike was actually coming down. All he could do was to give the coastguard the time and place of takeoff. As he replaced the receiver and leant against the side of the phone booth, he realised that there was nothing else he could do now.

  It was all in the hands of the rescuers.

  Chapter Eleven

  The slate-blue thundercloud from the southwest broke over Saltershaven just after two o’clock. The holidaymakers ran for shelter and in a few moments the beach was empty. Tim watched the storm from the boathouse now crammed with people taking refuge from the rain.

  Children crowded round the souvenirs table. ‘Buy me a toy lifeboat, Mum. I want that toy lifeboat.’

  ‘Dad, I wanna pencil—it’s gorra lifeboat on it. Oh an’ there’s a car sticker. Let’s ’ave a sticker for t’car, Dad.’

  Above their heads Tim grinned at Macready. At least the thunderstorm had brought them into the boathouse. Tim served the customers as hands reached out for toy boats and pens, tea-towels and mugs, brushes and rulers, badges and diaries, and the money clinked into the box.

  The thundercloud covered half the sky, yet all around its edges the sky remained a tantalizing brilliant blue and to the south, the sun shone through the clouds in pale yellow streaks. Hail-stones spattered the roads and pavements and running holidaymakers covered their heads with towels, newspapers, beach-bags, anything they could find. The deckchairs in the gardens were left where their fleeing occupants had been sitting. No customers queued for the miniature railway, or for the rowing-boats or for the clock-golf, and in the children’s play park, the swings moved idly, emptily, to and fro, the toddlers tricycles were strewn along the pathways abandoned at drunken angles. The hall pitted the sand beneath the climbing-frame and drenched the seats of the red rocking-horse and the see-saw.

  The hail turned to a fine rain and then ceased. As the thundercloud passed over the town and rolled out to sea, the sun shone down again and the holidaymakers emerged once more.

  Jack Hansard received Toby’s message at two forty-six. The lifeboat secretary approved a launch and Macready began his telephone calls to his crew. Tim Matthews was away and running across the road, over the railings and across the wet grass of the putting-green to the circular slab of concrete to fire the maroons. One. Two.

  As the flares snaked into the sky and cracked almost in unison with the thunder out at sea, the lifeboat collecting boxes in the pubs and clubs along the seafront were rattled under the noses of the lingering drinkers.

  ‘Just your coppers we ask for,’ the landlords said. ‘ No, madam, no silver, thank you. Just whatever copper you have in your purse or pocket.’

  ‘Christ!’ muttered one man. ‘I just won all this—a quid’s worf—on the slot machines!’ But good naturedly he grinned and fed it into the box.

  ‘Many thanks, sir,’ the barman said. ‘You never know when it might be your turn to need the lifeboat launched for you!’

  Pete Donaldson was having a most peculiar dream. He was driving a fire-engine, the bell clanging loudly in his ears. He was driving up the main street through Saltershaven, round the fountain and straight down Beach Road and on to the sand and straight into the sea, the bell still ringing only it wasn’t really a clanging fire-bell, more like a telephone bell.

  Pete surfaced from the depths of sleep to find that the insistent telephone bell was a reality.

  Another service!

  The launch was one of the fastest on record.

  Macready never sacrificed smooth efficiency for hectic, uncalculated rush, but occasionally the very urgency of a particular service gave impetus to each and every man. All the practice launches paid off, all the teamwork came together in perfect harmony, and the lifeboat was in the water in a space of time little short of miraculous.

  This was one such time.

  Each member of the crew knew that the glider would sink in minutes. If the pilot were trapped, or sick, or injured, he would go down with the plane. Even if he managed to get out of his craft before it sank, if he had no life-jacket—and glider pilots scarcely ever envisaged being plunged into the sea—the weight of his water-logged clothes would soon drag him under.

  The Mary Martha Clamp entered the water thirteen minutes after leaving the boathouse, despite the fact that it was low water. At that precise moment, Jack Hansard received a message from the police that a holidaymaker had reported seeing a light plane go down into the sea.

  Two hundred yards out to sea, Pete called up Breymouth coastguard on the radio/ telephone and reported the conditions at sea, stated that the crew list was as normal and asked for the usual radio and time checks.

  Jack Hansard’s landrover, with ‘H.M Coastguard’in black printing on a yellow background, appeared at the end of Beach Road. Over the radio, still crackling with interference from the storm, he relayed the recent message to Coxswain Macready. ‘… A report has been received of a light plane ditching about five or six miles out and from the details given, I estimate he’s somewhere in the region fifty-three degrees ten minutes north, zero degrees thirty minutes east. Over.’

  ‘Saltershaven mobile, this is Saltershaven lifeboat. Proceeding on course bearing zero six zero. Out.’

  The lifeboat plunged through the choppy seas at a maximum speed of eight and a half knots and Pete Donaldson tuned in his radar and sat hunched over the screen.

  Mike Harland became aware of the curious motion of the glider, a gentle rocking, of a cold wetness about his legs and the sound of lapping water. He moaned as one waking from a deep slumber and moved his cramped limbs. He opened his eyes and blinked rapidly.

  ‘Christ!’ he muttered and panic surged up inside him. The glider in which he was still tightly strapped was sinking. His numb fingers began to grapple with the fastenings but at the same time in his fear he was straining against the straps, making it harder for the release catch to work. He felt the bile rise in his throat. Fear or sea-sickness from the rocking motion of the sailplane? He couldn’t tell. All he knew was that he must get out.

  He—must—get—out!

  He heard a click and felt the straps loosen. The water was already lapping over his knees as the nose dipped beneath the surface. Mike unlatched the canopy and threw it op
en. Then he tried to heave himself up, but the glider rocked alarmingly. Levering himself up by his hands on either side, he drew his legs up until he was squatting on the seat. The water now covered the seat and washed at his ankles. He sat on the top edge of the back of the seat and wriggled out of the parachute harness and tossed the package into the water. All the time the glider rocked and rolled with the swell of the seas, threatening to pitch him into the water.

  He was pulling off his anorak and thick sweater when a wave, bigger than the rest, smacked against the side of the sailplane. Mike lost his precarious balance and felt himself falling, his arms still awkwardly pinioned half in, half out of his coat. He plunged forward into the water.

  It was only a matter of twenty minutes after the launch before Pete Donaldson, his gaze fixed on the blipping screen said, ‘Cox’n—there’s an object in the water about two miles away.’

  Macready took a quick look at the screen and then altered course slightly three degrees to port and reached for the binoculars. The lifeboat sped on at full throttle.

  Fred Douglas was already in the bows and the rest of the crew in their usual positions when they all saw, about half a mile away, the tail-fin of the Blanik rise in the air and then slowly slip beneath the waves.

  The lifeboat approached the spot where they estimated the glider had disappeared. Macready slowed right down and anxiously all eyes scanned the water around the boat.

  ‘God—if he were still trapped in the bloody thing!’ Fred muttered to himself, but no sooner were the words between his lips than he raised his voice and shouted, ‘There, Cox’n, to port. Is that him?’

  Fred Douglas might be the oldest, except for Macready, aboard the lifeboat, but his eyesight was probably the best. Years of searching for objects out at sea had shown him what to look for and how to look.

  Macready eased the lifeboat in close to the dark shape in the water.

  ‘It’s him right enough!’ Fred said and signalled to Macready, directing him to inch closer and closer.

  The pilot was clutching the packaged parachute which was giving him a little buoyancy but he was only semi-conscious and a bad colour. Each wave lapped into his open mouth and he could hardly keep his nose and mouth above water.

  Tony Douglas and Chas Blake climbed over the side of the lifeboat and down the scramble net. In unison they reached down towards the man in the water hooking their hands under his armpits.

  ‘One, two, three, lift!’ Tony said and together they heaved him upwards. But the weight of the pilot’s sodden clothes, the dead-weight of his helpless body, was almost too much even for the two fit young lifeboatmen.

  ‘Again,’ Tony gasped. ‘ One, two, three— lift!’

  They hauled him on to the net and then heaved him up once more whilst from above Phil Davis and Alan Gilbert pulled him over the gunwale. Swiftly they carried him to the bows and as Tony and Chas came up over the side, Macready turned the lifeboat full circle and headed for home at top speed.

  In the for’ard cockpit Phil and Alan attended to the unconscious glider pilot. After clearing as much water as possible from the man’s lungs, Phil started to give him artificial respiration whilst Alan prepared to insert the Brook Airway equipment into the casualty’s mouth.

  Pete was busy on the radio sending a message to the coastguard. ‘… Request ambulance standing by to receive casualty. ETA approximately thirty minutes. Over.’

  When they beached the launchers were still waiting for them on the shore. This time, when they had known it was likely to be a short service, the launching crew had remained on the beach. As the lifeboat approached the shallows, pale, hesitant sunlight filtered through on to a drenched landscape and the launchers made ready to beach the boat. The tractor positioned the carriage at right angles to the water’s edge and the tow-rope was attached. The tractor, engines revving, began to haul the boat up on to the beach, the water from the ballast tanks flooding on to the sand.

  Carefully, the glider pilot was passed down from the lifeboat warmly wrapped in blankets and a plastic sheet and strapped to the stretcher. He was a better colour now and had regained consciousness. Jack Hansard’s landrover approached the lifeboat, turned and reversed. Chas Blake and Pete Donaldson placed the stretcher in the rear of the vehicle.

  In a hoarse voice that scarcely seemed to be his own, Mike croaked, ‘ Thank you, thank you.’

  Chas raised his hand in acknowledgement and smiled. ‘ You’ll be all right, mate.’

  As the crew watched the landrover move steadily up the beach towards the waiting ambulance, Fred Douglas was saying to Macready, ‘ I thought he was, a goner when we pulled him out of the water, but Chas and Alan brought him round.’

  ‘Aye,’ Macready agreed. ‘We only just got there in time.’

  The launchers began their methodical placing of the wooden skeats, running in pairs, each carrying the board by a loop of rope at either end from the stern of the boat to the bows as the Mary Martha Clamp inched forward towards the iron roller skeat and then on to the rear of the launching carriage itself.

  Thunder still rumbled in the distance, way out at sea, as Macready guided his team. The bows rose and the boat slid up the ramp and on to the carriage, the restraining chains were secured and the sand cleared of all the beaching gear. The tractor released, swivelled round and was coupled to the towing gear. The small trailer carrying all the skeats, ropes and poles was attached to the rear of the carriage and the whole party moved off up the beach towards the roadway, the small band of interested holidaymakers parting to allow the lifeboat through.

  Back at the boathouse the crew and launchers had hot soup and tea and then began the work of hosing down the boat.

  At a little after five-thirty Macready telephoned his RNLI headquarters to report that the Saltershaven lifeboat was back on station and once more ready for service.

  In the hospital Mike Harland was comfortable, glad to be alive and grateful to his friends at the Gliding Club and to the crew of the Mary Martha Clamp. Thanks to them all, there would be another day.

  Ironically, unknown to Mike, eleven fathoms under the sea the barograph trace showed that during that last strong thermal carrying Mike high in the cumulo-nimbus, when his instruments were out of action in the storm and the glass iced over, he had topped a height of twenty-seven thousand feet. He had indeed earned his diamond award, but could not prove it.

  Somehow, though, it didn’t seem quite so important now.

  Before going home. Jack Hansard drove out to Dolan’s Point again. As the sun slipped down behind the Lincolnshire Wolds to the west, along the coast road he passed a few cars coming back towards the town, their occupants having spent an afternoon at the Nature Reserve following the paths through the marshes and along the beach, exclaiming over the names of the marsh plants, clearly labelled, listening to the grasshoppers, watching for the different species of bird.

  From behind a clump of elderberry bushes near the bridge, the two youngsters, three flares already in their hands, saw the landrover cross the bridge and take the road towards the flats.

  ‘Come on, Mel, we’d best leave it tonight. I reckon he’s goin’ to keep watch.’

  ‘Aw, can’t we wait a bit and see, Vin?’ the girl whined in disappointment.

  ‘No—besides, I’m tired. Come on, let’s get back to the tent.’ He put his arm around her.

  ‘But we’re off home tomorrow night. We won’t get another chance.’

  ‘We can ’ave another go tomorrow. Mebbee if ’ee sees nothin’ tonight, he’ll not bother in the day time.’

  ‘S’pose you’re right.’

  Before Jack came back across the bridge, the scooter had disappeared towards the town.

  Macready’s last act before he left the boathouse in the evening was always to reset the barometer in his office.

  Even before he had reached his home that Sunday evening, the level of the mercury in the barometer had begun to drop by an imperceptible fraction.

  Out in
the Atlantic the depression deepened to 984 millibars and moved towards Valencia.

  The detailed weather forecast broadcast at fifteen minutes past midnight said, ‘… winds mainly southwesterly four, locally six, increasing six, locally gale eight soon …’

  Amidst the flashing lights and the blaring music of the Nite-Life’s disco, the last thing Howard, or, for that matter, Julie, was thinking about was the midnight weather forecast.

  And after thirty-eight hours on duty Macready was asleep.

  Chapter Twelve

  It had been a busy Bank Holiday Monday morning at the boathouse. Too blustery for sitting on the beach, the holidaymakers had come looking for entertainment on the foreshore: the amusement arcades, the putting-greens, the bowling-greens, the kiddies’ corner, the boating-lake and the lifeboat station. They had streamed into the boathouse to gain ten minutes or so out of the wind that whipped up the sand into their eyes. They studied the pictures on the walls of the present and past crews, read of the brave rescues over the years but could not grasp in those few idle holiday moments the anguish, the courage and sometimes the suffering that lay behind those rescues.

  ‘Four lives saved.’

  ‘Three lives saved.’

  Just the bare facts giving nothing about the turbulent emotions of fear and hope and final, joyful, success.

  Macready stood by the table of souvenirs watching the visitors as they climbed the wooden steps to the platform level with the side of the lifeboat. They leaned over the rail peering into the illuminated interior of the boat, asking questions, pointing, marvelling. Then down they clattered, sometimes to make their purchases of souvenirs, often to drop coins into the lifeboat-shaped collecting-box and then out again on to the seafront in search of fresh amusement.

  ‘Morning, Mr Macready.’

  ‘Hello there, Tim.’

  Tim Matthews jerked his head backwards towards the sea. ‘Bit blustery today out there. There’s one or two out in boats, and, would you believe, a wind-surfer. Reckon he’ll spend more time in the water than on it!’