This is an invented story, containing an account of a true one. The 1939 lifeboat disaster at St Ives, Cornwall, really happened. William and Margaret Freeman and John Stevens are or were real people. The great kindness to me of Mrs Margaret Freeman, who told me her story, and of Barry Cockcroft who lent me a copy of his film Take a Lifejacket has made it possible to enter the real people into the story almost entirely in their own words. Anyone who would like to read a non-fiction account of the 1939 lifeboat disaster will find the story well told in Barry Cockcroft’s recent The Call of the Running Tide (Hodder & Stoughton).

Apart from the passing mentions of established artists and lifeboat men, all the other people in this story, including Thomas Tremorvah and Stella Harnaker, are imaginary. They have been conjured out of thin air and bear no resemblance to any real person living or dead.

I would like to thank John Rowe Townsend, Peter Davison and Bill Scott-Kerr, who know best what help they gave; Mr Graham Care for introducing me to Margaret Freeman; Mr Philip Moran for information on the current organization of the St Ives lifeboat; David Bass, Gillian, Brendan and Aidan McClure for playing me Alice’s music; and finally the people of St Ives, among whom, although I am a stranger and they are much beset by strangers, I have found only friendship and kindness all my life.