V

The Wreck of the Madras

THEY WERE WORKING Grimble’s Ground. As often happens after rain, visibility was exceptionally good, and the headland of Stokes Point stood out as sharply as if it had been cut from cardboard.

‘Like your girlfriend,’ Grimble observed as they made their way towards the bar.

‘She’s not exactly my girlfriend,’ David said. ‘She and her father have been very good to me.’

‘Had some trouble at Combe Dean. Bad business about that chalice.’

‘Yes, a very bad business. And that’s partly why I’m there. The old man is very cut up, and Elizabeth thought it might take his mind off things a bit to have someone else in the house.’

‘He’s well spoken of, the rector. Can’t think what people are coming to, robbing a church like that. Worse even than those thieving skin-divers.’

In the clear air the coast inland from the rocks was as distinct as David had ever seen it. ‘They seem to have what looks like a permanent camp there,’ he said. ‘Huts and things.’

‘Aye. Chap started building the place as a holiday camp, but it never got finished. Don’t know if it ever will be, though there’s talk of getting on with it next year. This diving lot’s been down there most of the summer. They’re supposed to be working on an old wreck a mile or so this side of the point. Folk say there’s treasure still on board, but I don’t know about that. What treasure they get is from thieving our lobsters – couple of them have been going round Plymouth offering lobsters for half what we ask. Easy, if you don’t have to find your own pots, and don’t need to lay out any money for gear. The thieving bastards just use ours, and smash it up, often as not, as you’ve seen.’

‘What’s the wreck?’

‘Old East Indiaman – long before my time, and my dad’s, and my grandad’s, and his dad’s. Homeward bound she was, coming up Channel, when the wind went foul on her and she was driven inshore. Got caught in the bay this side of the point. She tried to anchor, but her cable broke. Then she tried to beat out, but she didn’t have enough room. Nearly made it, though – good ships, those were. But she couldn’t clear the point, and struck a ledge that runs out there. They got her off by throwing out cargo and the guns she carried, and they got sail on her again hoping to make Plymouth. But she didn’t get far. Too badly holed, she was, and she went down three or four cables beyond the ledge. Least, that’s how the story goes. One of her masts came ashore, and they say it’s built into a barn over towards Revelstoke. They didn’t have time to get any boats away. Half a dozen or so of her people got ashore, clinging to bits of wreckage, but the rest were all lost. This diving lot reckons to have found her, but what else is left to find after all these years I couldn’t say. They keep themselves to themselves, and don’t ask us for anything. Don’t even hire a boat – they’ve got their own rubber dinghies. They just pinch our fish and our gear.’

On the way home Grimble said, ‘My mate reckons he’ll be fit to start coming out again next week. If you like, we’ll go out in Lily tomorrow, and I’ll give you a hand laying some gear on old Tiddler’s Ground. Then you’ll be fit to start on your own.’

*

That afternoon saw David duly installed at Combe Dean rectory. Elizabeth drove him to the track below his camp, and took his kit in the car, while he followed on his bicycle. He insisted on paying a week’s rent in advance, and also on paying for petrol for Elizabeth’s two trips into Finmouth.

At supper that evening David asked if anything much was known of the wreck of an East Indiaman off Stoke Point.

‘Yes,’ the rector said, ‘quite a lot is known, although there are aspects of the affair which remain somewhat mysterious. It was one of the worst shipwrecks in this part of the channel. It happened in 1805 – the year of Trafalgar. The vessel was the Madras, one of the finest ships in the East India Company’s fleet. She was nearly new – she was coming home from her maiden voyage out to India. Because she was such a fine ship a number of high-ranking people in India chose her for the passage home – almost all of them were lost. She was embayed near Stoke Point, ran on some rocks and went down. Because there was such heavy loss of life, and because so many of those lost were important people, the shipwreck filled columns of the contemporary papers, and several pamphlets were written about it. The master, and all the officers, went down with the ship. There were various suggestions of negligence – none of them historically substantiated. She was supposed to be carrying a great deal of treasure from India, and I daresay she was, though nothing ever seems to have been recovered. One particularly wild story was that she was not sunk by hitting a rock, but was blown up by a gang on board in league with French pirates. They are said to have killed the master and the officers, and to have made off with the treasure in the ship’s boats, leaving the rest of the crew and the passengers to drown. There is no evidence of this. There were a few survivors, and their published accounts have nothing to say on the subject – it was probably just sensational journalism of its time. But the evidence is not very satisfactory. There were no survivors from the crew, and those who managed to get ashore were servants of some of the passengers – Indians who had scarcely a word of English, and a Danish botanist, who was more concerned by the loss of his plants than anything else. They were apparently asleep when the ship foundered, and woke to find themselves struggling in the sea amid the wreckage. They were saved by being carried ashore on floating timbers. They were all half-drowned, and were really in no position to know what may have happened on board. There are several puzzling features. The weather was bad, but it was not exceptionally bad for a well-found ship, and why was she so close inshore instead of being in mid-Channel? It also seems extraordinary that apparently so little effort was made to escape from the wreck. It remains one of the mysteries of the sea.

‘You may wonder how I come to know about a shipwreck that occurred more than a century and a half ago. I am not a marine historian, but I have been much concerned with other aspects of history, and I am naturally interested in all history. My friend George Dorrance is a Fine Art historian, and he has been much involved in the study and preservation of objects brought to light by new techniques of marine archaeology – he is president of a scientific body devoted to such matters. A few months ago it was reported that a diving syndicate had found the wreck of the Madras and were hoping to recover treasure from her. George and his colleagues are very much concerned – they feel that wrecks should be subject to the same protection as important archaeological sites on land, and that there may be irreparable loss to knowledge of the past if treasure hunters make free with whatever they can find from ships. There is now an element of Government concern in the matter, but legislative protection is thin, and a wreck has to be designated as being of particular interest before it acquires any protection at all. While Government departments are making up their minds a historic wreck may be gutted for private profit.

‘One would have thought that the Madras was an obvious case for protection, and when it was reported that she had been found George asked me to obtain as much local knowledge of the circumstances of the shipwreck as I could. I have not had time for detailed research, but there is a good collection of pamphlets and old newspapers in the Plymouth libraries, and I was able to give him much of the information he wanted. Unfortunately nothing has since happened, and the Madras has not yet been designated as a wreck of sufficient importance to merit Government action. Apparently, it is largely a question of money – the Government is reluctant to acquire responsibility for wrecks that may qualify for grants for salvage or research.’

‘Judging by the way they damage our fishing gear when they pilfer our fish, these divers would not seem a particularly scrupulous lot. The inshore fishermen of Finmouth have had a great deal of trouble from them,’ David said.

‘You do not surprise me. The syndicate, I understand, is a wholly commercial gamble, and its members are doubtless uninhibited about methods of contributing to their costs.’

‘Does anybody own a wrecked ship?’ Elizabeth asked.

‘In theory, certainly. The original owners of a ship and her cargo do not forfeit any of their rights if she founders; though they may not, of course, be left in a position to exercise them. Normally, however, a vessel is insured, and if a claim is made and met, whatever can be salvaged belongs to the underwriters – they have, as it were, bought the wreck. But time and circumstance shroud legal rights. The Madras belonged to the East India Company, whose rights were transferred to the Crown in 1858. The Madras herself was insured by a syndicate at Lloyd’s, which duly met a claim for total loss – whatever remains of the hull, therefore, will belong to the legal heirs of those 1805 underwriters. Whether they could now be traced I do not know; it would be a task of immense complexity. The cargo, and what may be more important after all these years, the personal belongings of the passengers, may or may not have been insured. Research could, perhaps, cast some light on this, but it would be of academic value only. The cargo, which seems to have consisted mainly of jute, pepper, and other spices, has long since perished. There may well have been bullion and jewels on board, some being shipped on the East India Company’s account, some belonging to the passengers. If any of this could be salvaged it would still be valuable – that, no doubt, is what the treasure seekers are after. It might be possible in certain cases – if a monogrammed gold snuffbox, say, were recovered – for the heirs of the original owner to establish legal ownership, but it would be difficult, and might require long and costly litigation. Legally, any object brought ashore from a shipwreck ought to be handed to an officer called the Receiver of Wreck, who is responsible for trying to establish ownership. If ownership can be traced, the finder will be entitled to a proportion of the value as salvage. If after a year no owner can be found, the object may be sold, and the proceeds go to the salvor, less certain dues to the Receiver and the Crown. Salvage can thus be very valuable. But legal salvage is one thing, treasure hunting quite another. A conscientious salvor may declare his finds – if they are particularly valuable it will pay him to do so, to acquire ownership in order that they may be sold openly. But gold coins and jewels are as likely to be pocketed; it would be hard to prove that they came from a particular wreck, even if the question was ever raised.’

‘It doesn’t seem a very satisfactory situation,’ David said.

‘It is not a satisfactory situation. British Governments always seem so obsessed with present problems that they have no time for the care of the past. How many archaeological sites in Britain have disappeared under the plough, or modern bulldozer? We know far more about ancient Crete than we do of ancient Britain. It is fortunate that individual scholars do care, and are able, sometimes, to arouse public opinion to protect a site of outstanding value. But it is the ordinary things of the past, the cooking pots and pins and buttons, that tell us most about our forbears. And these are as likely to be preserved on the seabed as on land – more likely, because there are no ploughs or new housing estates underneath the sea. But it would require an army of inspectors to protect every located wreck for scientific study, and a great expenditure of money. Or, perhaps, a public conscience in such matters; and that, alas, is rarely evident. The pursuit of knowledge has always been at war with Mammon, and Mammon is inclined to triumph. It is a matter both for humility and pride that scholarship has been able to achieve even the little that it has.’

*

The next week passed rapidly for David. It was a great day when he took out Lily on her first fishing voyage under his command. He worked over Tiddler’s Ground, and since the area had not been fished for a generation his hauls were exceptionally good. He was still a member of Jess Grimble’s partnership, and his catch was marketed with Grimble’s to the organisation which supplied hotels direct. He began to keep accounts again, and the accountant in him wondered whether they were really making as much as they could by selling as they did – it might pay the inshore fishermen of Finmouth to set up a distribution system of their own, to supply hotels and restaurants under contract instead of selling to a supplying organisation. He decided that he didn’t yet know enough about the business, but the thought stayed in his head.

His good catches made up for the fact that he was working singlehanded. Tiddler’s Ground was the most distant of the fishing grounds recognised as belonging to the Finmouth men, and it was mainly for that reason that it had been neglected. Deep-sea fishermen go much farther after fish now that they work powerful modern vessels, but the powered fishing-boat has tended to reduce the area covered by the inshore men. It costs no more to take a sailing-boat twenty miles than ten, but with fuel costs an important element in the modern fishermen’s economy they go no farther than they feel they have to. Of course, there are other social factors involved. When David’s grandfather had built Lily, a crew expected to be out all night as often as not, and to put up with dreadfully long hours. Men nowadays are reluctant to do so; and the younger wives expect their menfolk to come home regularly.

Working Lily under sail as much as he could, David reckoned that he increased his profit substantially. He was impressed by the evidence that sail could still be economic for a working boat, but he realised that there was a price to pay for this. He had to be out longer, and there was always work to be done on sails or rigging when he got back. For himself, he was prepared to accept the price, but he understood why so many nowadays were not.

The arrangement for staying at the rectory worked well. Elizabeth, he thought, was glad to have him there, and for reasons other than his rent. The theft of the chalice had hit her father savagely: he looked now in his late seventies instead of the late sixties, and as the days went by without any news his grief increased visibly. David couldn’t help much, but his mere presence helped a little – at meals he could sometimes get the rector to talk about his ancient Hittites, and this was at least a temporary therapy. Elizabeth said to him, ‘Meals were absolute hell until you came – I could scarcely get Daddy to eat anything. They’re still hell, but a little better – more like purgatory, perhaps.’

He invited her to spend a day on Lily. She was delighted at the chance of getting away from the rectory, but doubtful of her ability as a sailor. ‘I haven’t done much sailing,’ she said. ‘But I can swim.’

David laughed. ‘It’s a useful accomplishment, but not all that relevant to sailing. If we have to take to swimming I shall consider that my own seamanship has failed. I hope it won’t come to that.’

It didn’t. He took her out to Tiddler’s Ground, and she helped him work the pots, making him feel that he really missed a lot by not having a crew. She might know little about sailing, but she picked up things quickly, and mercifully she was not at all seasick.

‘Isn’t this somewhere near where the Madras went down?’ she asked.

‘I think it was a bit farther out. We can go and have a look if you like – we’ve got time. The wind’s in the south-west, and it will probably hold to take us back.’

David didn’t know precisely where the Madras had foundered, but the rock ledge on which she struck was marked on the chart, and he could estimate roughly where she must have sunk. The ledge was safely covered now, and Lily, not needing the depth of a big East Indiaman, could sail over it. At first they could see nothing to indicate a wreck, but after going a mile or so towards the point David spotted a buoy. ‘That’s probably where she is – it’ll be a marker buoy put there by the salvage divers, I expect.’ They sailed over to the buoy and looked into the water round it, but could see nothing. ‘You couldn’t expect to see anything of her,’ David said. ‘She’ll be lying on the bottom, half buried in sand after all these years – I think it’s mostly a sandy bottom round here.’

The market van was waiting for them when they got back. Elizabeth helped to unload Lily, and waited on the quay while David put her on her mooring and rowed back in the pram. ‘I have enjoyed today,’ she said. ‘Thank you ever so much.’

‘Well, you gave me transport into Finmouth, and you certainly earned your passage. This is yours.’ He counted out nine pound notes, and gave them to her.

‘What on earth is this for?’

‘It’s your share of the catch.’

‘But why should I have a share? I can’t possibly take it.’

‘I’m afraid you’ll have to. It’s the law of the Medes and Persians round here – two shares for the skipper, one share for the boat, and one share for the crew.’

‘Well, I’ve never been paid for enjoying myself before. I hardly ever have any money of my own, and it’s a lovely surprise.’

They took a lobster home with them for supper.

*

Thinking about the economics of his job, David concluded that he was wasting working-time, and sometimes petrol for his outboard, by coming in from the fishing grounds each day. Lily had a capacious fish-hold, and if he anchored out for the night he could be on the grounds at first light and bring back two days’ haul in time to catch the market van.

Lily’s somewhat rudimentary fo’c’sle needed a little work, but it was weathertight, and could be made into a comfortable little cabin. He had spent money so far only on things that mattered for a working boat, but now he gave the inside of the fo’c’sle a coat of white paint, and contrived a folding table to fit between the two bench bunks. Elizabeth took him into Plymouth one morning, and at a do-it-yourself shop he bought some odd lengths of foam rubber to make a mattress. He had his sleeping-bag and camp kit, and the Primus for a galley stove. He bought two hurricane lamps, and considered that his cabin was now adequately furnished. There was, however, one other piece of equipment that he wanted – a more serviceable dinghy for working singlehanded. Lily’s pram was a tough little boat, but she was built, like her mistress, out of grown planks – no plywood or plastic about her. This made her heavy, and although she could be carried on board, she was an awkward weight for one man to handle. She could be towed, of course, but a tow is often inclined to be a nuisance, particularly when line-fishing. David wanted an inflatable rubber dinghy, but he hadn’t enough cash to buy one. He was making money with Lily, but after paying his rent and providing for inescapable necessities he was paying over everything he could save to Grimble, to go towards Lily’s purchase price. His private aim was still important to him – to keep himself without drawing on his remaining capital. But he had given himself a dispensation in order to buy Lily’s outboard engine, and after much debating with himself he decided that the dispensation could be extended to cover a rubber dinghy – apart from anything else, it would be of real value as a life-raft should Lily meet disaster, an important consideration for a man working at sea alone.

So he bought a rubber dinghy. It fitted neatly aft of the mast, which meant that he did not have to re-inflate the dinghy every time he wanted to use it. The dinghy had rope hand-holds, and he devised an excellent system for getting it out of the water. Lily’s main halliard had a purchase, and by putting a sling through the hand-holds and attaching it to the halliard, he could get it on board without strain. Equipped with his rubber dinghy, he reckoned that Lily was now capable of extended cruising: he could get ashore when he wanted to, and could come and go as he pleased.

Elizabeth had come to look forward to David’s return each evening, and was sad about his plans to spend more time at sea. Although she knew everyone in the parish, she had no close friends – the rector’s daughter in a country parish tends to be regarded as a universal social welfare worker, the friend of all, but the intimate friend of none. Upkeep of the beautiful but rambling and inconvenient old rectory – built for a retinue of servants – was a strain both on her father’s modest income and her own time. She had no social life outside the parish, and visitors to the rectory from the world beyond Combe Dean were few. Those who did come were elderly academic friends of her father, or visiting clergy. David’s presence was undoubtedly a help to her father in his misery, but it was also nice for her. She did her best to share his enthusiasm for turning Lily into a cruising home, but she rather wished he wouldn’t. However, she understood the demands of his job, and helped as much as she could.

David, too, felt that he was missing something when instead of putting over Lily’s helm and turning for home he sounded his way cautiously inshore and let go her big fisherman’s anchor. The anchorage he had selected was off a small cove or dip in the cliffs, where there was a hundred yards or so of sandy beach. It was not far from the unfinished holiday camp occupied by the diving syndicate. There was a biggish motor cruiser at anchor in the cove, and some dinghies drawn up on the beach nearby. David put them down as probably belonging to the divers. The anchorage was sheltered from the west and north, and the run of the cliffs offered some shelter from the east. It was exposed to the south, but in anything but a southerly gale he reckoned that it would be safe enough.

He had been on Lily all day, and when he had anchored and snugged down her sails he felt like a walk ashore. This was where the rubber dinghy came in. He launched it without difficulty and rowed ashore. The tide was making, so he would not have to move it far when he wanted to get back. He hauled it just above the line of wrack that marked the normal range of tide, dug the small CQR anchor that he had bought for the dinghy into the sand, and walked up the beach.

It was good to stretch his legs. There was a path leading up the cliff, and he followed this. It took him up to the cliff road. The holiday camp was about a quarter of a mile to the east. About the same distance westwards there was an isolated building that looked as if it might be a pub.

It was. It stood at a corner where a lane from inland met the cliff road, and a large car park indicated a thriving summer trade. In this autumn evening, the car park was almost empty – almost, but not quite, for there was one car there and the pub seemed to be open. David had not so far allowed himself any money to spend in pubs. This evening, feeling lonely at not having Elizabeth to talk to, he told himself that self-discipline could become rather ridiculous: he had set out to keep himself, not to go through life wearing a hair shirt. He could afford to buy himself a drink, and he damned well would. He went in.

There were three other people in the bar, two youngish men and a girl in her early twenties. The girl was sitting on a stool at the end of the bar, with the men standing on each side of her. She was holding an open newspaper, and they were all looking at it. The barman gave him a polite ‘Good evening’, and David ordered a Scotch. ‘Come far?’ the barman asked as he pushed the drink across the counter.

‘Not very far, I’ve walked up from the cove,’ David said. ‘I’ve come off a boat.’

One of the men with the girl looked up. ‘I think I saw you come in. Gaff sloop with a long bowsprit – that your boat?’ he asked.

‘Yes, she’s mine. Only she’s not a sloop, she’s a cutter. But you wouldn’t know that – I came in under only one head sail. She can carry a big staysail, too, but I didn’t have it up.’

‘Nice looking boat.’

‘She’s sixty years old, but she’s all right.’

The man ordered a round of drinks and glanced at David. ‘Have one?’ he asked.

‘That’s very nice of you. Thanks very much,’ David said.

He moved over towards their end of the bar, and the girl showed him the newspaper. ‘That’s us,’ she said. She pointed to a column headed ‘Divers Strike It Rich’, and handed David the paper. It was a Plymouth evening newspaper, and the story reported the recovery of thirty-eight gold coins and several pieces of jewellery from the wreck of the Madras. ‘Phil Layton – that’s our leader – went into Plymouth to see about them, and I suppose that’s how the paper picked up the story,’ the girl said. ‘Phil said they’d have to be reported to the Customs or something, though I don’t quite know why. He found them on the wreck. I was with him.’

‘You have to report things, Sheila, in order to establish salvage rights,’ said the man who had stood David a drink. ‘And it’s not the ordinary Customs – it’s an official called the Receiver of Wreck. The point is that whatever goes down with a ship technically still belongs to somebody, though with a wreck that’s been at the bottom getting on for a couple of centuries it isn’t very likely that an owner will be found. Even if he is, you can claim salvage – if he isn’t, then the things become yours. That’s Phil’s job – he doesn’t want to keep the things, he wants to sell them. And you get a much better price for jewellery and such like if you can sell it legally at an auction.’

‘Well, it seems a lot of red tape to me. Phil said I could have one of the brooches.’

‘And I’m sure you will, my pet. Only you may have to wait for a bit.’

‘How do you work?’ David asked. ‘Are you all in the diving team?’

‘Phil Layton is a professional,’ the man said. ‘The rest of us are members of various sub-aqua clubs and come down a week or two at a time for the diving. We pay for our keep, and help with the work. It gives us a cheap holiday, and it provides Phil Layton with crews – it’s a good scheme.’

‘Bill actually helped to find the wreck,’ the girl said.

‘Yes, I was down earlier in the summer when Phil was looking for it. We knew roughly where to look, of course; even so, it’s some job to find a wreck that’s been on the bottom all those years. In the end we got her mainly by luck. Phil had his harpoon gun, and saw a big lobster which he thought he’d get. The lobster went into what looked like a crack in some rocks. Phil fired at it as it disappeared – and the harpoon went deep into wood. We didn’t bother any more with the lobster, but traced the outline of the wreck. It was the old Madras all right.’

‘And I was there when Phil got up the chest,’ the girl went on. ‘I was on Sea Venturer – that’s Phil’s cruiser – and I’d been down with Phil to have a look at things. Phil had been tunnelling into the wreck, and he came on this old wooden chest. It wasn’t very big, and I helped him to drag it out. Then I went back up and told the others on the cruiser. We sent down a grapple and a sling, Phil hooked it round the chest, and very, very carefully we got it up. There’s a crane on the cruiser, but we had to work it ever so gently in case the wood split, or anything. But it didn’t. And when we got the chest on board I thought it was in wonderfully good condition.’

‘Did you open it on the spot?’

‘We wanted to, but Phil said we’d better get it ashore first. He’s got special tools and things in a workshop in the camp – he was frightened of damaging anything that might be inside the chest. So we took it ashore, and Phil got to work on it. He wouldn’t let any of us stay with him – “It’s almost certain to be nothing but a disappointment, and I’d rather take it alone”, was what he said. But it wasn’t. He called us in a bit later, and there was the chest, open. Inside was a sort of mouldy grey mud that Phil said had been clothes, but underneath the first layers of mud there was something sparkling. He cleared away the mud and there was some lovely old jewellery – bracelets with rubies, and some big emerald earrings. And all those gold coins. The jewels and the gold shone like new as soon as they were cleaned up. It was wonderfully exciting.’

David bought drinks in his turn. No one else came into the pub, and he spent a pleasant hour chatting to the amateur divers. Then they said they must be getting back to their camp. ‘We’ve got a car, and we’ll drop you at the top of the cliff path,’ one of the men said. David accepted the offer.

‘Staying here long?’ the girl asked as he got out.

‘No, I’ve only put in for the night, and I shall have to be off in the morning. But I may come back – I like your pub.’

‘Yes, it’s not a bad place. We may be seeing you, then. Careful on that path as you go down – it’s steep, and horribly slippery in places.’

David waved as the car drove off, and then took to the path. It was dark, and he cursed himself for not having brought a torch – but he hadn’t set out for more than a short walk along the cliffs. There was a little moon, and some reflected light from the sea; and he was good on hillsides. He managed the descent without breaking anything, found his dinghy, and a few minutes later was safely back on Lily. He lit his hurricane lamps, got the Primus going and cooked himself a meal of fried mackerel. He washed up before turning in, and then lay on his bunk for a bit, enjoying the soft lamplight in Lily’s newly painted cabin, and the little talkative noises that she made as she rode gently to her anchor. Then he put out the light, and was soon asleep. As he dropped off something was nagging at his mind, but he couldn’t determine what.