The Toll of the Sea

by Theresa Murphy

  Lionel opened his mouth to speak but had to wait until a mighty wind that shook the house from top to bottom had subsided.

  ‘Are you and your mamma all right, Bella?’ he asked, having to shout to be heard.

  Arabella nodded. ‘We’re fine.’

  When Ruth hobbled her way over to him on her club-foot, Lionel moved closer to Arabella, his lean and sensitive face anxious, the face of a man who would have been a scholar under the patronage of a more kindly fate.

  ‘I tried to get here before, Bella,’ Lionel explained, ‘but there is so much damage out there. I’ve been helping board up shattered windows and doors. We’ve been fixing walls, too, Arabella. Even the thickest of them have been breached. A tree fell on the Philpots’ house. It demolished half of it and we had to rescue young Tommy from underneath.’

  ‘Is he dead?’ Arabella enquired – wondering people expect the worst.

  Shaking his head, Lionel’s facial expression toldArabella that he was excited about something even before he announced enthusiastically, ‘There’s a ship aground, Bella! She’s a big ’un, and there’ll be lots of things to be had. We’ll get stuff to keep all of us through the rest of this winter and beyond. Get your waterproofs on and come with me.’

  ‘But Mamma!’ Arabella heard herself protesting, as she caught Lionel’s excitement.

  ‘Ruth’s come to sit with your mamma.’ Lionel used one hand on his sister’s back to move her forwards. Ruth gave Arabella a smile that lit up her plain, broad-nosed face.

  ‘But …’ Arabella attempted to find another objection but there wasn’t one.

  It was clear that she could do much more for her mother that night by pulling luxuries from the sea rather than sitting beside her bed as usual. She wouldn’t be abandoning or neglecting her in any way, for Ruth was an able person. Overcoming her handicap through sheer courage, Ruth Heelan brought in some money for her family with an arduous one-girl business collecting seaweed as manure.

  ‘If Mamma awakens,’ Arabella instructed Ruth, ‘it will only be for a drink. There’s water here. Are you sure you can manage?’

  ‘Trust me, Bella,’ Ruth said, looking up at Arabella with soft brown eyes that had a loveliness totally wasted in the round, bland face.

  Bending to kiss her friend on the forehead, a kiss of thanks as well as an unspoken plea that her mother was taken good care of, Arabella joined Lionel.

  The night outside was as wild as Arabella had anticipated. But it was much less dark than she had expected. There was only an occasional patch of stars in the sky where the wind would tear the clouds temporarily apart, but all the rushing movement seemed to have generated some kind of illumination so that it was possible for her to see the semi-ruined buildings all around.

  Clinging together, sometimes forced backwards by the wind, they made steady progress through dust-laden air. The debris from smashed tiles and slates made walking hazardous. Past experience told Arabella that the occupants of the storm-besieged houses would have been busy stashing away treasured possessions such as grandfather clocks, patterned plates, and china tea sets in places where they would be in least danger of being broken. Lights glowed orange inside the still intact windows that they passed. There would be no sleep this night in Adamslee. Arabella, born and raised in the West Country village, could not recall a previous storm in which Adamslee had been so drastically battered.

  Reaching the beach, they screwed up their faces against the stinging rain as they took a place in the line of watching villagers. It was a 1500 ton, three-masted, fully rigged ship that was in trouble. There would be spoils: items that the people of Adamslee could never afford to buy, to be gathered like an illicit harvest from the turbulent sea. But Arabella was starkly aware that Adamslee’s good fortune would be paid for in the lives of the seafarers aboard the stricken ship. There would be yet many more unmarked graves in the cemetery up on the hill behind the village.

  Recognizing them as new arrivals, a man yelled above the storm to identify the ship. ‘She’s the Paloma. She’s a trooper bringing the 38th Regiment of Foot back home!’

  This information warned that they could be looking at the start of a disaster of epic proportions in the loss of life. The winds had driven the ship hard into the Bluewater sandbank offshore. She had heeled over on impact and the decks were alarmingly aslant. Everything loose on deck was sliding into the raging sea. Arabella could see figures trying desperately to scramble up the angled deck, clinging to anything that might offer a fragile chance of safety. Looking away as a monstrous wave washed over the ship, Arabella forced herself to look again, to shudder when she saw there was not even one of the tiny figures to be seen on the deck.

  In the vain hope of being able to ‘claw off’, pull his ship back from the bank, the captain kept her under full sail. Experienced men among the Adamslee crowd said that this was a mistake. They were proved right when a thrusting wind pushed the ship further into the bank.

  A sad Arabella reached for Lionel’s hand and clung to it tightly. She prayed that there were no women and children on board. She had a terrible memory of a decade ago when the Sea Horse had foundered on the rocks that sided Adamslee’s beach and ran up jaggedly against the lofty cliffs. On that occasion it had been curiosity that had brought the young Arabella down to the shore. Half-believing it was a large doll she saw floating face down, Arabella had waded a little way into the water to discover that it was the body of a girl aged about five. She was wearing a nightdress, and Arabella watched as a man reached out to grasp the long skirt of this garment.

  Drawn by the horrific, and not old enough to realize she should protect herself from the harsher things of life, Arabella had continued to watch as the man lifted the little body from the water, its long fair hair drooping wetly over his arms. As the little girl was turned, Arabella, who had anticipated seeing a pretty face, saw that there was nothing but a bloodied red and blue pulp left. Turning away swiftly, Arabella had vomited. Ever since then that pitiful, faceless little creature had visited her in dreams on winter nights.

  She was seeing the vision again now, but it faded as a mighty cheer went up. Due to what had to be a miracle, a heavy swell rolled in to lift the ship clear of the sandbank and set it down safely and upright on the shore side. This time the captain’s error was the fatal one of ordering the anchors put out. Had he left well alone, then the sea would have brought his ship on into the beach with little or no further loss of life. But now one of the two anchors gripped before the other, causing the ship to slew in the wind and head for the rocks at the east end of the beach, both anchors dragging.

  Aboard the ship emergency plans were put into action under atrocious conditions. First a sea anchor constructed from a boom and several gun carriages was tried, but it failed to slow the ship’s movement towards the rocks. The two proper anchors and the makeshift one were all let go in the hope that the ship would move towards the beach, but the wind had her now and drove the vessel on relentlessly in the direction of the rocks.

  As she pitched and tossed, heroic sailors took in all the canvas. When she did strike the jagged stones it was at a point opposite to an immense cliff that was close to being perpendicular. The sea ran too high for boats to be launched, and the sheer cliff was within an oar’s length of the ship. Had it been possible to launch the boats they would have been instantly smashed to pieces.

  ‘Look, they could make it!’ Lionel shouted in Arabella’s ear as an ensign staff was laid across from the ship’s side to the opening of a cave in the cliff.

  But the ship heaved, breaking the staff in two. Even so, those on board were determined not to give up. A more substantial spar then replaced the ensign staff. This was left in position to test it while the ship rolled several times. The spar remained intact, and those on shore held their breath as a man worked his way out from the ship along the bar, a line coiled over one shoulder.

  The courageous fellow moved on steadily. If he could make it then many on the ship would have
a hope of reaching the cave before she broke up. Arabella clung tightly to Lionel. Around her she could hear prayers being said aloud.

  Then a rogue wave, squeezed to an astounding height between the ship and the cliff, plucked the man from the spar, carrying him along in its foamy crest, spinning his body round and round, rolling the doomed fellow head over heels before he was sucked down.

  The ship moved, its keel grating loudly on the fangs of rocks jutting out of the breakers all around it. In another try at easing the ship the mizzen-mast was cut away, but without any useful effect. Those on board were crowding onto the poop deck, the highest part of the wreck above water. But then a creaking and groaning told folk ashore that the stout hull of the Paloma was breaking up.

  The foretop-mast come crashing down as the ship snapped in two amidships, and the people ashore realized that this was the end. The stern section was held fast on the rocks while pounding waves split away the bow part. Crates and casks were washed out of the middle of the broken ship and thrown around in the waves.

  Relief came then for the sensitive in the guise of a sudden and violent squall that closed off all light from the heavens. It became so dark that Lionel was for Arabella just a blurred silhouette even though he was standing close beside her. The rain that had been uncomfortable as it beat against their faces was now replaced by hailstones so large and painful that the line of people protected themselves by kneeling and doubling over so that the hail could do no more than attack their bent backs. This turn for the worse in the weather continued for more than an hour before the squall eventually eased off. They were able to stand and watch it go twisting and writhing like a grey wraith wandering away.

  Most of the ship was still there, but it was being smashed relentlessly asunder by a sea that had scarcely abated. Some fluke of nature had altered the earlier violently chaotic scene into something approaching an eerie semi-calm. Puncheons of rums, kegs, and crates were bobbing in a raggedy but compact formation in the bay out from the beach, while bodies, in such a great number that they jostled each other like people on a busy street, were floating in among the rocks.

  At first light of day a second separation began on the beach, with the greedy forming human chains to go into the still restless water in pursuit of floating booty, while the caring made their way to the rocks where the first of the bodies neared the shore.

  For a moment Arabella was disconcerted by Lionel’s apparent hesitation, but then she saw that he was studying John Nichol, the Customs man who lodged at the Ship Inn in the village. With utter contempt on his face, Nichol watched men shouting excitedly as they waded into the sea, often pushing a floating corpse to one side in their eagerness to reach the treasure-trove that was carried on the waves. Although his duty was combating the smuggling that was prevalent in the area, Nichol had no real jurisdiction over shipwrecks, and the looting already going on was too large-scale for one man to deal with. Nevertheless, it was obvious to Arabella that John Nichol shared her feelings about the avaricious scum who were grabbing everything they could from the sea.

  She knew that she shouldn’t have doubted Lionel, even for a fraction of a second. The armada of bodies were beyond mortal aid, but the dead had no rights and it was up to the living to provide the respect that they deserved. Ready to go down to the rocks, Lionel shouted to her above the wind.

  ‘Are you up to helping, Bella?’

  Nodding vigorously, but uncertain deep down if she could stand the sights she was about to see, Arabella took the hand proffered by Lionel and allowed him to lead her down the beach to where high-rolling waves shattered themselves into fountains of spray against the rocks. Neither of them would be taking the gifts from the sea home to those waiting there expectantly, but neither Lionel nor she was capable of profiting in tragic circumstances such as this.

  From earlier, smaller shipwrecks, Arabella had learned the system. First the bodies would be pulled from the sea and laid on the beach to await being taken to the boathouse. From there they would be transported to the cemetery for Christian burial. This time it would be different. A mass grave would be needed. Those who had been known, had been loved, who’d had names and status, would be forever anonymous in a crowded grave.

  Nearer to the rocks, Arabella weakened momentarily. Men, nowhere near as many as those dragging goods from the sea, were carrying bodies ashore. Still holding her hand, Lionel was taking them into the sea, heading for the nearest body. Bracing herself, Arabella reasoned that she would feel better once she had met her first corpse.

  Soon they were waist deep, stumbling against slippery rocks as they were knocked about by waves that were both powerful and persistent. She looked at the body they were closing in on, and had to stifle a cry of relief as she saw it was a soldier with one uniformed arm round a rock, making jerky attempts to pull himself out of the water.

  Overjoyed at having found someone alive, Arabella released Lionel’s hand, wedged her feet at painful angles between rocks, and bent to grasp the booted ankles of the soldier as Lionel slipped his hands under the man’s armpits. They lifted together, turning the soldier on his back ready to carry him ashore.

  It was then that a stunned Arabella found she was looking into the face of a dead man. The pulling of the arm against the rock had been an illusion created by the movement of the sea. A dropped jaw had opened the soldier’s mouth so that both ends of a drooping moustache had been swallowed. The hooded eyes stared past her into the mystery that is death.

  Pulling herself together, she aided Lionel in getting the dead man on to the beach. Ludicrously, although earthly comforts no longer interested him, they made him comfortable when laying him out on the pebbles. Yet it had seemed the right thing to do, and Lionel was as guilty as she in this bit of crass stupidity.

  Then they were wading back into the sea together, hand-in-hand, arms stretched wide as they negotiated limpet-encrusted rocks that scratched and bruised them as each heavy wave rolled in to knock them off balance. She saw Lionel turn his back on a heavy wave then continue to stoop until he could grasp the bare arm of a woman with a small-featured, pretty face who was floating on her back. Her long hair was entangled in the seaweed that grew profusely among the rocks. The dead woman wore a scarlet dress that was unaffected by immersion in the water. It gave the appearance of elegance that belonged in a ballroom and Arabella couldn’t equate it with drowning in a stormy sea.

  This time it was Lionel who took the ankles. It was as if the two of them had agreed this was the fitting thing to do. Lionel was a decent fellow, but still it didn’t seem right for a man to place his hands where the woman would have strongly objected to being touched when alive.

  With the body suspended between them, and with Lionel doing a precarious backwards walk towards the beach, stumbling against the rocks, a mountainous wave came in unnoticed. Roaring and hissing it knocked them both off their feet.

  Landing with her back across a sharp rock, Arabella didn’t initially realize how deep under water she was. Looking up, she could see daylight playing on the surface far above her. All she could do was hold her breath until the giant wave had subsided. With her lungs beginning to burn as they were put under pressure, she was thankful that she was still holding the body of the woman, although the legs now floated free. Lionel had been pushed away by the force of the wave, and Arabella peered unsuccessfully through the dark-green translucency of the sea in the hope of seeing him.

  Then the swirling motion of the water was wrenching her around. Head pounding, arms aching, she clung on to the body as the motion of the water threatened to snatch it from her. Moving her right arm with difficulty, Arabella encircled the woman with it. Having gone through so much already she didn’t intend to lose her.

  But the exertion to secure the corpse had caused her to blow bubbles, and Arabella had to discipline herself not to ease her distress and clear the blackness that was growing inside of her head by breathing out. Even though she knew it would be the end of her, the temptation to a
ttempt to breathe was powerful. It was possible that the urge to find relief came from the knowledge that she couldn’t stay under water for much longer anyway. A split second and the choice of whether or not to breathe would be lost.

  Something began to happen, giving Arabella the resolve to hold her breath just a little longer. The wave was receding, but in doing so it had set up a whirlpool that rotated her body as it dragged her painfully along a rock-strewn route. At long last there was no water above her. Lying flat on her back, eyes sore, Arabella pulled in a deep breath. It hurt; hurt her chest terribly, but it was welcome.

  As more deep breaths cleared her head and brought her back to full consciousness, she discovered to her absolute horror that the body she was holding had been turned by the turmoil in the water. It was lying on top of her and Arabella found herself looking into a pair of unseeing blue eyes. The woman’s cold face was pressed against hers. They were as close as a pair of lovers.

  Struggling to push the corpse off, Arabella opened her mouth to release a piercing scream just as another wave rolled in. This was nowhere near as high or as forceful as its predecessor, but it filled her mouth with sea water, causing her to gag in a frantic effort to clear her lungs. A choking Arabella thought she could feel a pair of legs pressing against her, but then she experienced a terrible feeling of suffocation that mercifully ended in unconsciousness.

  When she came round she was on the beach, lying on her side. Something seemed to have awoken her as if she had been sleeping. At first at a loss as to what it could be, she then recognized it was her own retching and spewing out of seawater. Holding her as her stomach tightened and slackened alternately as it acted as a pump, Lionel then gently moved her into a sitting position. He kept himself close in front of her, using his body as a shield against the still raging gale.