by Julia Jones
“Well, she can’t be dead if she’s sending ETA messages, can she, muppet?” Xanthe stood up. She hadn’t finished her food or her apple juice but she had an announcement to make. “Donny-man, we are not having either Miss Polly Lee or Miss Ellen Walker given one ripple of trouble from that maritime pollutant. Tell us what we need to do. Shall we all bunk off on Monday and escort her vessel into Felixstowe with gongs and whistles?”
Donny gaped at her. Then he took a look at Anna and pulled himself together.
“Um, well, there are maybe a few things against that,” he started carefully. “First, there are at least four container ships that day that might have come from Shanghai and some that have been to other places as well. Second, two of them are scheduled to arrive when it’s dark. Third, those ships are so huge that, even if she was on one of the daytime ones, she probably wouldn’t notice us if we were whizzing around like gnats in dinghies – or even in Snow Goose. Fourth, this is England so, if what you say is right, she’s going to be a bit tense. If we mess up now she might just chuck a few more firecrackers and head back to China ...”
Xanthe sat down again. She seemed to notice how much food she had left.
“Fifthly,” said Anna brutally, “we have to remember her first message. We don’t just need her to escape Flint, we also need her to decide that Donny and his mum aren’t total landlubbers and that she wants to stay here and look after them – which sounds like something she’s not going to find easy. Especially if ...”
“ ... if the first thing she sees is you two being RYA Young Sailors of the Year in your Laser 4.7s and me bobbing along in Lively Lady trying to work out which way the tide’s going. Thanks a lot, Anna.”
“I’m sorry.”
“No, seriously, you’re right, I know you are. Didn’t you have some sort of a plan?”
“Only the beginnings of one ...” She faltered. They were all watching her. “There was something I noticed when I was on Snow Goose. I asked your mum about it. Something called the International Code of the Sea? They were pinned up by the chart table. Flags and things with different meanings.”
Xanthe and Maggi nodded vigorously but didn’t interrupt.
“And Shotley marina had flags at the entrance. National flags – like Holland and Belgium. I figured that was how they showed what boats were visiting. So then I wondered whether we couldn’t send Great Aunt Ellen some sort of message like that ... ?”
“Hoist the Chinese national flag, ’cos that’s where she’s come from,” said Xanthe, thoughtfully, “and it’s really unusual so people would look at it.”
“Plus the two-headed dragon from Strong Winds.” Maggi was holding the sketch. She looked up from it, beaming, “And a signal flag ... which one, Xanth?”
“U – Uniform, ‘you are standing into danger’. Anna that is such a cool idea!”
Anna looked pleased but not totally satisfied. Other students were starting to come back into school from lunchtime sports practices. There was a clatter of studs, a thud of bounced rugby balls. They needed to move.
Donny was feeling bad. Anna, Maggi and Xanthe had organised everything: his contribution had been nil. Twice he’d been called a girl as an insult. Right now he wished he was one.
“Where are we going to fly them?” Xanthe was thinking aloud as she scraped out the last of her yoghurt. “The marina people would never let us put a danger flag beside their lock gates – and anyway she’s coming to Felixstowe first. That’s where Flint’ll lurk and that’s hot security. There’s a humungous flagpole up above the marina, where HMS Ganges was. But how do we get Donny’s great aunt looking across the harbour before she’s even docked?”
“Was HMS Ganges to do with the Navy?” asked Donny. His brain felt fogged. “I think Granny’s brothers might have been in the Navy. And they would have been Gold Dragon’s brothers as well. Maybe one of them was posted there? If that’s right ... if she’s looking out when she comes into the harbour ... and if it’s daylight, then surely she’d glance over in that direction? It’s a lot of ifs ... Anyway, I might only be muddled with Swallows and Amazons. There’s Navy in there.”
Swallows and Amazons – Granny’s book. He’d been reading but he still hadn’t got the secret – whatever it was.
Xanthe frowned as if she was about to object but Maggi wasn’t giving her any more time. She collected all their rubbish and trays.
“So, listen, are we going to do Anna’s plan or not? Because there’s the bell and Xanth and I’ve already been late once today.”
“At last – the Kraken wakes! Of course we’re going to do it! I’ll go down with Donny to launch the dinghy after school and give him as much sailing as I can. You two start knocking up the flags – I hope you’re good at drawing, Anna. Mags will struggle cutting out red and white quarters for the ‘U’. And so would I,” Xanthe added hastily, seeing the outraged look on her sister’s face.
“Oh, CAD – Computer Aided Design. I was just planning to scan the dragon in from the sketch, plot the co-ordinates and then enlarge. They’ve got some good programs in textiles, you know,” said Anna happily.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
A Forgotten Hispaniola
Thursday, September 21st, afternoon
Xanthe easily outran Donny down the road to Pin Mill. She and Maggi both had mobiles so she’d been able to phone ahead to the boatyard owner asking him to make sure that the shed was unlocked when they arrived. She’d rung her mother as well and checked that she was okay to pick up Maggi and Anna late from school. Then she and Donny had caught the bus and got off at the nearest set-down to the river.
After that, they’d run. There’d be less than two hours to low water, she said – and it was going to be a low one.
“What do you mean a low, low water?” puffed Donny. “What’s the difference?”
“Between neaps and springs? It can be more than a metre.” Xanthe answered, breathing as easily as if she was still lounging on the bus. “Springs are when the earth and moon are in line. There’s sort of more pull – high tides are higher and lows are lower. That’s where we’re at now. It’s why you couldn’t get off the end of the Hard yesterday.”
“We’ve got to do it today ...”
“Too right we have. We’ll luz everything into Lady, get her into the water however we can, then put up the mast and rig her when we’re on the river. Land her on the other side where the mud’s hard.”
So Donny learned to row. But as he’d deep down guessed, it wasn’t any problem. Dip and pull, dip and pull. He settled into the rhythm immediately. His body understood what his mind hadn’t known; he could row steadily and without fuss for miles and miles if necessary.
“As you might have to one day – if you’ve gone too far down river and the wind dies.”
“Does Lady have an anchor?”
“Sure – though it’s not exactly the biggest in the world.”
“But it would keep her safe on a beach or somewhere? If she wasn’t on her trolley?”
Xanthe looked at him. “You’re thinking ...?”
They had reached the other side of the river now and had pulled the dinghy onto a patch of mud that was sandy and hard, quite different from the dark sticky stuff that had sucked Donny’s leg down yesterday. Blazers, ties and shoes had been bundled away and Xanthe’d produced kagouls and hi-fits as well as a couple of buoyancy aids. There were rubber dinghy boots as well, though hers were a bit small and Donny’s a bit big. He was impressed by her advance planning.
“Mags and I aren’t total bimbos. Even dinghy sailors can die of cold and exposure. ’Specially in the winter when the water chills down.”
“If not duffers ...”said Donny, quoting.
Xanthe laughed. “Yeah, well ... Ransome rocks! What bothers me is that I think your granny’s put you onto the wrong book. There’s two different ones about this area and a Chinese one as well.”
“But she didn’t know we’d be coming down here ... Shotley is Great Aunt Ellen’s plan.
”
“Polly Lee!” said Xanthe. “To think we might be going to meet her! Unbelievable! Come on, Donny, let’s go sailing. I’m going to tune this dinghy up a bit. See how good you really are!”
She’d stepped Lively Lady’s mast now and was doing complicated things with a multi-tool. Donny’s confidence ebbed a bit.
“It’s only my third time,” he reminded her.
“Tell that to the crabs. Anyway I reckon you’re much more likely to fall off the HMS Ganges flagpole than finish up in Davy Jones’s locker. I don’t see how you’re going to do that last bit either. It’s a long way to walk and we’re away racing and I don’t exactly assume that your carers are going to give you a lift ...”
“Well, yes,” said Donny. “But she’s your boat ... and your mum and dad have been really kind ...”
“It’s okay. We’ve sussed that you’re going to have to use her. Not the how and when. And maybe you don’t want to tell because what you’re thinking isn’t 100 per cent health and safety-checked. Also, you possibly don’t want me and Maggi having secrets from our parentals ... and you’re not entirely sure how much they’d wave past?”
Donny nodded.
His only plan was to get himself down river in Lively Lady late at night before the 25th and find somewhere to lie in wait. Anna’s flag plan was brilliant but he was the one who was going to have to put them up. And that would have to be done in the dark. There’d been a lot of adult trouble in Swallows and Amazons when John had gone night-sailing.
“So ... let’s go check it out,” said Xanthe. “We’ve at least an hour of ebb left and the wind’s good. It often dies in the evening but it feels as if it’s freshening today.”
“It did when I was down here with Vicky.”
“You might have your hands full then. Let’s head down to Shotley right now and come back with the flood. We’ll be seriously late but I’ll ring Mum and she can tell your lot that you’re staying at ours to eat. We won’t make the meal but, tough, I could do with losing the weight.”
Donny looked at her tall athletic shape and didn’t comment. He was hungry already.
“You’re on,” he said.
Xanthe made him sail as if he were in a race, pushing all the time, looking for opportunities to take advantage. Every bend in the river mattered; every change in the shoreline. The texture of every single ripple was of intense significance and, if Donny had had time to think – which he didn’t – he’d have understood that this was the real Xanthe. She was a competitor. Lively Lady felt different too: quicker, more urgent, less forgiving.
Once they reached the harbour the full force of the wind hit them. It was coming straight in from the sea and there were white wave tips among the harsh, grey-brown expanse.
“Bear away towards those navigation posts and get ready to sit right out. If you think she’s going to capsize, luff or spill your wind. My mobile’s in my pocket, I don’t fancy getting it soaked.”
“Do you want to take over?” Lively Lady was rushing along at a startling angle. Not even both their weights could keep her flat. He had to shout to make himself heard.
“No, you’re good,” Xanthe shouted back. “Go for that red schooner. We’ll get under her lee.”
They’d left the River Orwell and were heading up the Stour towards the marina entrance. Harwich town was to port with pilot boats bustling to and fro and a North Sea ferry setting out from Harwich International.
The Shotley side, in contrast, was bleak and still. No one was queuing to enter the marina this evening and almost the only vessel moored nearby was the three-masted sailing ship that Donny had vaguely noticed on the previous Saturday.
“I need a breather. Bring us alongside. We’ll find something to grab hold of.”
Donny obeyed. She needed a breather!
Suddenly Lively Lady was in calm water, the wind banished from her sails as the sheltering side of the red schooner rose above them. Xanthe was clinging to the protruding edge of the bottom row of portholes. She gestured towards a rope which was dangling further for’ard and they edged along until she could reach it.
“What is this boat?” asked Donny.
He couldn’t see a name. She was like something out of a history book, with three masts and a long bowsprit and things that looked like ... yardarms? But they were maybe only wide cross-trees and Donny could see no sails. Close up the schooner looked sad, almost derelict.
“Sounds dumb but I don’t actually know,” said Xanthe. “She’s been here for ages. Maybe she was something to do with the Navy as well?”
“If that’s right,” said Donny, “if she was ... What do you reckon about me flying Anna’s flags on her – if there’s no-one about – then I wouldn’t need to land and go up the hill to that mast. It looks much further away now we’re here ...”
Okay, so he was gutless. He just knew he didn’t want to have to go ashore and risk running into fences and security men and that kind of trouble. Afloat was his best place.
“That could well be cool. Even if this boat’s nothing to do with the Navy, she’s plumb in the eye-line. And she’s so ... bizarre. How would you get on board?”
“There’s the mooring chain ... I could maybe scramble up? Then onto her bowsprit?”
“Like Jim Hawkins in Treasure Island! Go, Donny!”
That was okay then.
“I could bring the flags already fixed on a line. Your dad sent me knot instructions. As long as she’s not lit up ...”
“I’ve never noticed that she is. I don’t think she even has a riding light. But don’t totally trust me – I’ve only ever seen her as an obstruction that might take my dinghy’s wind.” Xanthe glanced at her big sports wristwatch. “We’re out of time. Look up her masts to see if she’s got any signal halyards. Though they’ll probably be rotten.”
Donny was getting used to walking into an atmosphere of suppressed disapproval every time he returned to the vicarage.
This time was no different. It was only just after half past seven when Joshua Ribiero dropped Donny (neatly in his school uniform) and Anna (wearing her most withdrawn expression) back to Erewhon Parva, but they were made to feel that their unplanned absence from the supper table had inconvenienced everyone.
“I’ll finish anything you’ve got left,” offered Donny, trying not to look as ravenous as he felt.
This was not acceptable. He knew he was supposed to have been eating supper at the Ribiero’s – not storming back up the River Orwell with the beginnings of a spring flood under them and a force five wind astern. Donny had had no idea that a small dinghy could travel so fast. When Xanthe had set the spinnaker as well, he’d wondered whether Lively Lady could stand it.
“This is nothing,” she’d said. “I’d be planing if I was in my Laser. The wind’s behind us which makes it okay to crowd on. And we’ve got racing sails. They’re much stronger. Her rigging’s good too. I checked.”
Donny let himself thrill to the power of Lively Lady’s surge forward. Would she take off? There was a tight adrenaline knot in his belly that had stopped him thinking of food. Only when he’d changed back into his uniform and sunk onto the back seat of Joshua’s car had the feeling of tension and excitement begun to disperse.
“Good sail?” Xanthe’s father had enquired.
“Unbelievable!” He’d found he was trembling slightly. It must be a reaction.
“How’re you doing with those knots?”
“I’m only reliable on about four. I’ve got parcel string to practise with but, for the splices, I think it would be better if I used something thicker. I meant to look around the boatyard today and see if there was any old stuff thrown away.”
“And the Laws of the Sea?” Joshua had been kind but implacable.
Somehow Donny hadn’t wanted to make excuses even though he’d only been given the photocopied pages two days ago.
“Um, well, I’ve read what you gave me but I found it pretty complicated. There were some bits that weren’t qui
te the same as what I thought Maggi and Xanthe said. It’ll be me being dim of course – ”
“Do you remember which they were?”
“Yes, because it was about who gives way and ... that was what I sort of read the hardest.”
“Carry on ...”
“Well, there’s loads of detailed instructions for ships and fishing boats and what noises to make in fog ... but the bit I noticed being different was about sailing boats. The pages say that running-free gives way to close-hauled but I thought Maggi said it depended which side the wind was coming from – not what angle you were at.”
“That’s right,” said Joshua. “You’re doing well. There’s a lot of history there and I’d like to talk about it with you. I hope we’ll see you soon. Keep studying.”
“I guarded and guarded our Treasure. But you didn’t never come.”
Vicarage atmospheres were no big deal but the disappointment in Luke’s voice was something else. The younger boys’ lives must feel so endless and empty. Luke and Liam had no adventures to keep them looking ahead, as far as he knew. No Rescue Myths that had sent them telegrams.
“I’m really sorry, Luke. Would you like me to ...” (What could he offer? What would Granny or Skye have done for him?)“Tell you a story before you go to sleep? Something exciting?”
Even Gerald looked more agreeable.
“I’ll come right now,” he said, trying to avoid Anna’s gaze. She probably wanted to talk about the flags, show him what she and Maggi had done. Get a bit of thanks even.
She waved casually in his direction before heading upstairs to her bedroom where Vicky’s cot was now permanently installed.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
The Black Spot
Thursday, September 21st, after supper (none)
“Once upon a time,” Donny began, desperately trying to remember how Treasure Island started, “there was a boy, probably about my age, called Jim Hawkins, who lived with his mother in an old pub. His father had died and Jim and his mother were pretty sad about that. And they were worried about how they were going to manage the pub and carry on earning their livings. If they couldn’t earn any money, they’d go hungry.”