Aboard the Sunrise, as the sun sank in the west on Wednesday evening, Matt stared intently at the water.
‘Take a look at this, Granfer,’ he said quietly, using the name all the crew applied to their dirty-faced skipper. ‘It looks dark and oily, just right, wouldn’t you say?’
Rufus nodded. The condition of the water meant it was a good place to shoot the nets and with any luck they’d have a catch as large as the last two nights.
Daniel, alert and ready as always, picked up the head-rope of the first net. He glanced round to make sure Matt had made his way to the leech, then the two of them skilfully began to shoot the nets, twenty of them, each one a hundred and twenty yards long. Fred enviously watched their swift, rhythmic movements. The white buff of the first net curved out in a low arc from Daniel’s hand and hit the water with a dull splash, while Matt steered. Every five fathoms along the headrope, Daniel used his muscular arms to jerk a coble – bunches of twenty-five corks secured together and attached to the headrope by a three-fathom stop – and send it spinning on to the water. Every now and again he glanced astern, pulling the headrope straight, before nodding to Curly in the wheelhouse to give the lugger a ‘kick-ahead’.
When the last net was shot, Matt took the spring rope and secured it forward. Curly switched off the fuel and the engine died after a splutter or two and all was silent. There was an expectancy in the air. Hopefully, in a couple of hours’ time they would be hauling in a bumper crop of pilchards.
The men were in thoughtful mood, watching the light of the hurricane lamp which was fitted to a dan buoy on the white buff of the hotter net, the first to be shot, so they could spot its whereabouts if the wind changed. They hoped the hurricane lamp wouldn’t go out. All watched except for Fred who was feeling nervous. He’d have to shoot the nets tomorrow with Rufus and if he made a botch of it the old man would threaten to throw him in for shark bait. Sharks haunted the pilchard nets and Fred was frightened of the very thought of them. Ten years ago when he’d been tossed out of Rufus’s tosher, he’d been convinced a shark would eat him.
The wind was fresh and the mizzen sail flapped and creaked with the swaying of the boat. Daniel and Matt lit cigarettes then passed the packet and box of matches to Rufus. Rufus put a fag between his ragged lips and shook the box at Fred.
‘I don’t smoke, Granfer,’ Fred reminded him.
‘Of course, I fergot,’ Rufus sneered, taking a half-eaten meat and pickle sandwich he’d been saving out of the fold of his sea-boot. ‘Makes ’ee feel sick, don’t it?’
Fred turned away miserably and stood alone, not in the way Matt did, content with his own thoughts and company, but horribly, wretchedly alone. Fred didn’t have a friend in the world. All of Porthellis knew of his cowardice on the day the Wynne had capsized. Even Mitch had hardly spoken a word to him since the day of the tragedy. After a while Fred took refuge in the warm galley to make mugs of tea and fresh sandwiches.
Curly stayed in the wheelhouse, attending to the instruments, and the three other men stood in the bows, puffing smoke into the darkening, salt-laden damp air, listening patiently. Time passed. They heard the unmistakable splash of a fish turning. Glanced at one another. It was followed by a flurry of water, sounding like a running stream – music to a seasoned fisherman’s ear.
There was another good sign. Gulls were settling on the nets, then flapping up heavily into the air and dropping down again further along the nets. Their mirrs intermittently filled the great space of sea and air, each too intent on its own feeding prospects to become quarrelsome with its neighbour.
There was nothing more the men could do for an hour or so. Rufus took his tea and food from Fred and joined Curly in the wheelhouse. Fred left Daniel and Matt in the bows and went back to the galley.
‘Half a week gone already,’ Daniel said conversationally, taking a long deep breath of fresh air into his lungs and massaging his broad chest as if to energise the rest of his body.
‘A good start,’ Matt replied matter-of-factly, chewing on a cheese sandwich, remembering fondly when he had eaten one with Hannah.
‘Missing her, are you?’
‘I take it you mean my mother?’
‘You can be an awkward sod when you’ve a mind to be, Matt Penney,’ Daniel returned, but he was grinning. ‘I didn’t mean Mrs Wallis Simpson either. Do you think the King will marry her?’
‘I don’t know and I don’t much care.’ Matt took a gulp from his mug, his eyes on the distant lights of another boat. ‘Yes, I’m missing Hannah.’
‘You want to be careful,’ Daniel joked. ‘She might have her wedding dress all stitched and ready for when you get back.’
‘She’d make me the happiest man in the world if she did.’
Matt had spoken with such depth, a catch in his throat, that Daniel moved so he could see his face in the lantern light strung up on the mast. ‘Are you in love with her?’
Matt turned his head towards Daniel. ‘Yes. Hannah’s a woman for marrying, for looking after, not for messing around with.’
Making a face, Daniel drained his mug, ate his last morsel and said thoughtfully, ‘You’re right, it’s never crossed my mind to mess around with her. You’re an odd mixture, Matt. For years you’ve kept your feelings hidden, then you declare your intentions in a matter of days.’ Daniel tapped his arm. ‘I meant what I said, mind. No trying anything with her.’
Matt breathed deeply, just that, but Daniel knew he was being told to mind his own business.
Daniel glanced along the length of nets, stretched out and lit up like a celestial path by the moonlight. He was waiting patiently for the moment to start hauling in the nets yet itching to get on with it at the same time. ‘So, what do you think about Hannah being offered that job? Damned strange thing, if you ask me.’
A dark look passed over Matt’s stern features. He didn’t like it one bit that Hannah had confided something to Daniel and not to him. ‘What job?’ he asked harshly, standing stiff and straight.
‘Don’t you know about that?’ Daniel replied, deliberately being tactless. Since Matt’s interest in Hannah, he had found himself feeling quite possessive about her. He spun out the tale to show just how much she’d told him. ‘It happened on the day of Lizzie’s wedding, the day you first asked me about Hannah. Jeff Spargo insulted her at the wedding and she left, first to visit Edwin’s grave – her father won’t let her go there, you know, she visits it in secret – then she went to Hidden Beach. Strange thing was, someone you’d never think to find there was already there. Patrick Opie from Roscarrock, and he offered her the job of housekeeper up at the house. Just like that! Well, I told her I was worried he might be after her. They’re a funny lot up there, haven’t had anything to do with the village for years, so why the sudden interest in her? And why was he on Hidden Beach anyway? Said he was looking about because he wants to paint it. Sounds a likely story to me. Hannah told him she already had a job, he left and that was that,’ Daniel paused dramatically, ‘until…’
‘Yes?’ Matt demanded, his face full of shadows.
‘When Spargo was nasty to her last Sunday, he spat out that he knew about Patrick Opie and the job and he told her she must take it and get out of the village or he’d make terrible trouble for her.’
‘And that’s when you came up to me and suggested we frighten him off, but you didn’t tell me everything,’ Matt commented sourly. ‘And?’
‘Well, nothing really,’ Daniel said, casually lighting another cigarette, ‘except I got the idea she was seriously thinking about Opie’s offer.’
Matt held out his hand. Daniel offered him his cigarette packet. ‘Your mug,’ Matt said gravely. ‘I’ll take it back to the galley with mine.’
Daniel watched him walk away, soon a dark looming profile. He felt a louse for what he had said, then shrugged it off and grinned.
Matt was seething. He knew Daniel had been taunting him but that didn’t really concern him. Obviously he didn’t mean very much yet to Hannah, and although he consoled himself that she’d responded warmly to his kisses, he was worried about his noncommittal goodbye wave to her on Monday morning. He hadn’t wanted to spend the week having to put up with Rufus’s vulgar mouth. If he’d blown her a kiss and made his feelings obvious, Rufus would probably have made lewd remarks and Matt didn’t want to quarrel with him. Now he hoped Hannah hadn’t taken his restraint as lack of interest. He slipped into a morose silence.
At the end of the hour, Rufus went up to the prow and, lying back on the spring rope, with Daniel’s help he began to pull the lugger up to the nets. The old man wanted to take a look. If the net closest to the boat contained pilchards, there would be plenty in the outer nets. Rufus gave a satisfied grunt as they caught sight of the silvery fish.
The men rapidly pulled up their heavy, leather sea boots, donned their long yellow oilskins and took up their positions. As one by one the nets came up over the roller, the gulls hovered like a great white mass, shrieking just out of reach, swooping when a shimmering fish fell from the net into the sea. The men worked with great skill and swiftness to get the pilchards smacking and squelching into the fish berth, those caught in the mesh quickly freed with dexterous flicks of the wrist. They had to fend off the troublesome, clamorous birds with yells and missiles.
It was laborious work and over three hours later they were still at it, but they were not tiring, not even Fred who, in the excitement of the big catch, a heavy ‘splat’, had forgotten all his fears. There was at least another three hours’ work to be done before they could rest.
‘Make a fisherman out of un yet!’ Rufus yelled to Curly, at the same time tossing him a small medicine bottle that had come up in the net for Curly’s collection.
Their hands, toughened to a leathery texture, didn’t feel the needle-sharp bones and spurs of the pilchards. As they stowed the leech of one net they hauled in the next, and the next, until they got to the eleventh one and Matt felt a vicious tug on the net.
‘Shark!’ he called out.
Fred froze. Daniel patted his shoulder and threw a nine-inch hook attached to a chain and baited with a large mackerel over the side. Then he fastened a bucket to the line that ran from the chain to the mizzen mast. A few minutes later the bucket gave a metallic clang as the shark took the bait and the chain was pulled taut. Fred headed for the cabin. Daniel pulled in the chain, bracing himself against the lugger’s stern.
The blue shark he hauled in was six feet long and weighed about one hundred and eighty pounds. Matt stunned it with a heavy weight as its head appeared over the transom, cut its throat to retrieve the hook, and watched grimly as the shark fell back into the sea. As they hauled up the net they saw the black space where the shark had torn the mesh and stolen their fish.
The rest of the night they worked unhampered. When Fred rejoined them, no one said anything, their silence more humiliating than any scornful remark. As time went on they slowed a little as muscles tired, backs ached, and breathing became a little heavier. They worked in a concentrated silence, eager to get the job done. When the last white buff had been lifted aboard, the stars had disappeared and dawn was streaking the sky, the fish berth was deep in pilchards, and the fishermen were exhausted but pleased. They had made good money tonight and looked forward to a huge fry-up for breakfast.
Now the work was over, most of the gulls had deserted them and only a few persistent ones remained. Matt looked up and saluted them with a nod; he could be persistent too.
He turned his gaze north-east towards the Wolf Rock which towered an awesome one hundred and ten feet above the sea. The place had got its name from the sound of the water that had howled like a wolf through the holes in it, until wreckers had filled them up to stop it warning ships of the danger of circling tides. Pilchards could be found in plenty for several miles around it. It provided six weeks to two months’ livelihood to the fishermen of Porthellis, and fleets came also from Plymouth, Looe and Polperro, Newlyn and Mousehole, St Ives, Newquay and Padstow, and Porthellis’s near neighbour Mevagissey. A few boats were still about, but many had gone on to Newlyn to sell their catch.
As the Sunrise, too, got underway for Newlyn, her crew knew that after the long journey there was more hard work in store, with around nineteen thousand pilchards to unload, the lugger to wash down and the next night’s fishing to prepare for. It would be long past midday before they could get their heads down, and four hours later they would be heading out again. Daniel was as quiet as the others at the prospect but he had a smile of anticipation on his handsome face. It wasn’t one of the five bunks in the lugger he was planning to sleep in.