The Feather and the Stone

by Patricia Shaw

Genres: General Fiction; Historical Fiction

Synopsis

A dramatic test of bravery and strength... Young, orphaned and English, Sibell Delahunty searches for a place to call her own in Australia's Northern Territory in The Feather and the Stone, a stunning epic saga from bestselling author Patricia Shaw. The perfect read for fans of Colleen McCullough and Fleur McDonald. Tragically orphaned at sea, cast adrift in an alien land, Sibell Delahunty applies for the post of secretary-companion to Charlotte Hamilton and undertakes the arduous journey to Black Wattle Station in the Northern Territory. The rigours of an isolated cattle station come as a shock to the gently brought-up English girl, who is viewed with suspicion by Charlotte's sons. Only Charlotte's own kindness makes life tolerable, helped, in time, by increasing interest from the unmarried son, Zack. When disaster deprives the station of its mistress, Sibell is forced to take charge and eventually earns the grudging respect of the family. She also discovers within herself an unsuspected strength and resilience. But her courage and endurance will be tested to the utmost before she can ever call her adopted country home... What readers are saying about The Feather and the Stone : ' Marvellous book!' ' Impossible to put down until finished' 'Wonderful story '

Release date: October 27, 2011

Publisher: Headline

Print pages: 580

Sample

At first it was rain. Blessed, cooling rain that washed the salt from the decks and sent passengers and crew alike rushing to collect it in all manner of vessels, from tubs to pans, and even hats.

After the limpid haze of the long summer crossing from the Cape of Good Hope, their ship, the sturdy Cambridge Star, stirred and shook like a dog from a bath. Sails lost their stiffness and billowed forth because with the rain came new winds, bracing winds that would send them speeding towards the coast of Western Australia.

Captain Bellamy’s grin split his trim dark beard as he grasped the wheel. This was his first voyage to the Antipodes and he had advanced into the Great Southern Ocean with trepidation, heeding the warnings about the savage winds, the Roaring Forties, that would speed his ship but could hurtle into wind-strengths of ninety knots and drive the waves into massive craters. Instead, though, the ocean had been kind to him, almost too kind, for there was no heavy weather during all those long weeks, not even a squall to speak of, just the relentless drift eastwards that had placed him behind schedule and, worse, had caused a severe shortage of fresh water.

But now the worst was over. The passengers could stop grumbling and drench themselves in the rain if they wished, while this fine wind would push the ship on to Perth. He calculated that they should reach Fremantle at the mouth of the Swan River within four days.

Twenty-four hours later his optimism turned to apprehension as a storm developed. Rain lashed the ship in torrents, winds were building and the barometer falling, and he began the struggle for mastery of his vessel. For two days the Cambridge Star battled the storm while the crew fought, high in the masts, furling and unfurling the sails to keep her on an even keel. By night the ship thrashed on through the raging darkness.

Below decks, the officers assured cringing passengers that they would be through this bad patch in no time, so the women prayed as timbers smashed above them, and the men rushed to assist with the pumps. And then, mercifully, all was calm. On the third day a hush fell on the seas, the sky cleared to a yellowy tinge, as if the sun were striving to offer relief from the steamy air. Cabin-class passengers, the élite few, strolled forward, eyeing the damage with interest, looking for the Captain to congratulate him, but he was unavailable.

He was resting, they were told, and so he would be, they agreed. The ship was hardly moving now. In a doldrum perhaps. They had heard of doldrums.

But in his cabin, Bellamy and his First Mate, Gruber, were studying charts.

‘We’re way off course, sir,’ Gruber told him. ‘Too far north.’

‘And not a bloody thing we can do about it,’ Bellamy worried. ‘Not a breath of air out there. And we’re so close,’ he lamented. ‘How much time do you think we’ve got?’

‘Hard to say with these things. Could be a couple of hours. Maybe a full day.’

‘Then get all hands working to repair what they can while they can,’ the Captain groaned. ‘We may have escaped.’

Gruber looked at the barometer and shook his head.

The three members of the Delahunty family were among the passengers on deck, but the stifling heat was too much for Mrs Delahunty. ‘James, I must go back to the cabin. I am broiling up here.’

‘Yes,’ he admitted, ‘the sun may be hidden but there’s power in it.’ He pulled his white panama hat down to shade his face and peered out at the milky sea. ‘Settled in this great millpond one feels like the Ancient Mariner. You are right, my dear. The heat is appalling. A retreat is in order.’

‘It’s worse down there,’ Sibell said, but her mother disagreed. ‘Nonsense. There’s no shade here. I already have a pounding headache.’ She lifted her heavy skirts to negotiate the steep steps, relying on her husband for balance and Sibell as train-bearer.

‘I must lie down,’ Mrs Delahunty said. ‘Now don’t you go back on deck, Sibell, you’ll ruin your skin with the reflection from the water.’

Her daughter sighed, wishing she had a penny for every time her mother had warned her about the ruination of her skin on this dreary interminable voyage with all these boring people. She was seventeen and there was no one else in her age-group among the cabin passengers, only older people and six atrocious grizzling children. Her parents’ new friends, companions of the voyage, had often commented on Sibell’s fair skin and good looks which, to her mind, was rather a waste since there was no one on board who really mattered to appreciate those good looks. Below decks, in intermediate and steerage, she had observed quite a few young people, but one could hardly associate with them; and, secretly, she had experienced some small satisfaction when members of the crew, rough fellows though they were, had nudged and grinned in her direction. Sibell had pretended not to notice these little flatteries but they did serve as tiny pinpoints of brightness to break the monotony of the dull days. She adjusted her bonnet and skirt and made for the saloon. At least the voyage would soon be over and the Delahuntys could begin their new life in the sunny land ahead.

James Delahunty was a gentleman farmer from Sussex who had become increasingly worried by a succession of severe winters and the economic malaise in rural areas. Just when he had reached a state of depression as to their future, though, a letter had arrived from his friend Percy Gilbert, inviting them to join him in the new British colony of Perth.

‘In this country,’ Percy advised, ‘we can run, not hundreds, but thousands of sheep. The climate is excellent, with temperate winters, snow being unknown. There are fortunes to be made, beginning with the purchase of great tracts of land at only 2/6 per acre. To date I have taken up several blocks and am faring exceeding well, with a house in the township to boot, but if the two families combine resources we could obtain large estates that would set us up for generations.’

To James, the letter was a godsend and he wasted no time in selling the farm and arranging to emigrate with all their goods and chattels.

‘Be sure to bring your own people,’ Percy had warned, ‘for decent labour is hard to come by down here. Freed convicts are lazy and insolent and the blackfellows refuse to co-operate.’

So, also on board the Cambridge Star were two servants and two shepherds who had loyally volunteered to accompany Farmer Delahunty to the new world.

There were only four people in the saloon when Sibell entered, since most of the others were still recovering from the ravages of seasickness brought on by the storm. A fortunate few, including the Delahuntys, had suffered only the discomfort of queasiness which had passed quickly as the seas subsided.

Mr and Mrs Quigley were seated at a table, playing cards, and they invited Sibell to join them.

‘Don’t look over there now,’ Mrs Quigley, eyes down, said to Sibell. ‘But those two women in the corner don’t belong here.’

Sibell, blinkered by her bonnet, hadn’t taken any notice of the other two ladies in the room, but now she was curious. ‘Who are they?’

‘They’re from steerage, Miss Delahunty,’ Mrs Quigley hissed. ‘I saw them down there when the steward accompanied me to the baggage room. I’ve just been telling Mr Quigley he should ask them to leave. Don’t you agree?’

Sibell was bursting to look around but did not dare. ‘They’re not allowed in here,’ she whispered. ‘What would the Captain say?’

Mr Quigley, a mild-mannered gentleman, blinked behind his spectacles. ‘One would not wish to bother the Captain now. The poor fellow must be very tired.’

‘That’s true,’ his wife said. ‘And so it is up to you, sir, to request them to depart.’

‘I’m sure that if you remind them this is the first-class section they’ll understand,’ Sibell offered primly.

‘There!’ Mrs Quigley said, pleased to have Sibell’s support. ‘I insist you speak to them, Mr Quigley.’

‘Oh, very well,’ he replied, straightening his black silk cravat before lifting himself from his chair. He stepped quietly over to them and Sibell took the opportunity to turn.

‘Excuse me, ladies,’ Mr Quigley began, ‘but perhaps you are not aware that this area is reserved for first-class passengers.’

‘So what?’ one of the women replied sullenly, and Sibell gaped. They were young women, dressed neatly, but nothing could disguise their commonness.

Taken aback, Quigley could only stutter his reply. ‘I’m afraid I shall have to ask you to leave.’

‘Why should we?’ the same woman asked, and her friend joined in angrily. ‘It’s slopping wet downstairs and like an oven, and we’re fed up with it. We’re staying right here.’ She reached over to a shelf that contained books and packs of cards, selected a pack and calmly began to set out a game of patience. Her companion watched her, laughing defiantly.

Quigley retreated, but his wife gained courage. ‘If you wished to travel cabin class, you should have paid for it,’ she called. ‘You do not belong here. If you stay we shall have to report you to the Captain.’

The women ignored her. They didn’t even look up from their game, which seemed to Sibell to be a worse insult than any bold reply. She was astonished.

Back in his chair Quigley whispered to the ladies, ‘I fear this is shades of things to come. I have been told we might have to face similar incivilities in the colony.’

But just then two gentlemen came in, old Mr Freeman and his pompous son Ezra who had been appointed a magistrate with jurisdiction in the colony.

‘Ah! Quigley!’ Mr Freeman said. ‘Just the man I want. I’m having a difference of opinion with young Ezra here . . .’

Despite the recent row with the female intruders, Sibell giggled and Mrs Quigley’s mouth twitched. Ezra was all of forty years.

‘It is my considered opinion,’ the old man continued, ‘that this storm is by no means over. I believe we have seen only the half of it.’

Ezra frowned. ‘Nonsense, Father, you worry too much. And you must not upset the ladies.’

Obviously the argument had raged for a while, because Mr Freeman thumped his cane on the boards in frustration. ‘I don’t wish to upset the ladies,’ he told his son angrily, ‘and if you please, I am addressing Mr Quigley here. I ask you, sir, have you ever heard of a cyclone?’

‘Yes, I have heard of such things, but surely, Mr Freeman, you can’t believe that storm was a cyclone?’

‘Not was, sir. Is!’ the old man exclaimed vehemently. ‘And we are in its centre. We should be making preparations for a worse storm . . .’

Never short of a word, Mrs Quigley intervened, taking Ezra’s side, and dismissing the very idea of the storm turning back on them. Sibell was fascinated. She pictured their ship in a cyclone, spinning around in a tight circle like a doomed minnow in a storm drain. The first storm hadn’t spun them around, so it seemed hardly likely that, if it came back, it could suck them into a huge whirlpool.

Ezra was putting up much the same view, but the old man shouted at him. ‘Don’t you understand? It isn’t a case of the storm turning about. We are in the eye of the storm, dead centre where it is calm. We should be ready for the lifeboats if need be, such as they are. There are only two aboard.’

‘He’s right,’ one of the strange women called to them. ‘That’s what they’re saying down below. Some of the men, they say there’s more to come.’

‘Too right!’ her friend added. ‘That’s why we’re not shifting from here until we see what happens.’

It was Mrs Quigley’s turn to ignore them. ‘I’m sure the Captain understands the weather quite well,’ she said to Mr Freeman, to reassure him. ‘He got us through the last tempest; if it returns, we are in good hands.’

‘Bah!’ the old gentleman spluttered. ‘You’re a pack of fools! The foremast is split and half the sails are in shreds . . .’ He stamped over to the two women. ‘Would you ladies care to join me in a bottle of claret? I have some excellent stuff to hand. We might as well go down smiling.’

They were delighted to accept, which put Mrs Quigley in a huff. ‘Come, Miss Delahunty,’ she said. ‘This is no place for a young lady now,’ and Sibell dutifully followed.

The storm struck again that night with a roar, bearing down on them with torrential rain and deafening winds of terrifying ferocity. Whether it was the same storm or not seemed beside the point to Sibell, but people were still arguing about it as they huddled in the saloon, taking refuge from swamped cabins. Deep into the night she clung to her father as the ship bucked and crashed and the passengers screamed in fear. The saloon was in pitch darkness and foul from the stink of vomit, and as she tried to control her nausea, Sibell could hear the furious rush of the waves. She wondered if they really were spinning in circles.

They heard a mast crash down and were hurled together in a scrambled heap of shouts and screams as the ship plunged on to its side and water surged about them; then the vessel righted itself. In the panic she lost touch with her father. She could hear him calling her, but slithering among the throng, she couldn’t reach him. Everyone seemed to be making for the door, so she went with them, fighting her way up to the deck which heaved and fell beneath her feet. She clung on to anyone and anything in the blinding rain, reacting to the shouts of ‘To the boats!’

Out of curiosity she had gone to look at the two lifeboats Mr Freeman had referred to, and knowing the ship well after all this time, she was able to feel her way to the nearest one. Hands grabbed her, a crewman shouted, ‘In you go, lady,’ and she was pushed, stumbling, into the arms of men and handed on like a sack of soaking potatoes. She wondered, incongruously, how they could see in this darkness. But then she began screaming for her parents. Where were they? Who were these people clutching her, falling on top of her? She was in the bottom of the boat as it crashed, swamped, into the sea, and the impact jarred every bone in her body, but she was in the safest place. She heard the screams around her as others were tossed into the churning ocean and tried to close her ears to the frightful, piteous cries for help, cries which were futile because it was impossible to see anyone in the dreadful dark sea.

Sibell could make out some people in the boat; men were shouting, cursing, pulling on oars. ‘No,’ she screamed. ‘My parents! Mr and Mrs Delahunty! You must know them!’ She was babbling, dragging at one of the men. ‘We can’t leave them. We have to go back for them.’

‘Get off me, you stupid bitch!’ an ugly voice shrieked at her. ‘Let go of me or I’ll chuck you overboard!’

Firm hands grasped her now, pulling her away, holding her down.

‘Be still,’ a woman warned her. ‘Don’t cause any more trouble, they haven’t got time for you.’

‘But the ship! We have to get back to the ship, it’s dangerous out here!’ It was madness, she felt, to be out in this tiny boat with the waves slamming over them, when they should be back on that big ship with all those people.

The woman shrieked, ‘She’s going down! Oh, God help us, she’s sinking!’

‘Where? Where?’ Sibell cried frantically.

‘Back there,’ the woman sobbed, and as the first shreds of dawn cast a pale grey tinge on the terrible morning, Sibell saw the shuddering silhouette of the Cambridge Star as she dipped behind the shifting horizon, never to reappear.

A great wail went up from all around her, from ghostly voices that Sibell was sure she would hear for the rest of her life, and then the woman beside her began to pray . . . ‘Our Father, who art in heaven . . .’ and Sibell joined in, praying that her mother and her father were in that other lifeboat.

The cyclone, they said it was a cyclone, had passed on by, and Sibell sat silent and numb among these strangers as they struck for the coast, congratulating themselves that they were not stranded at sea without food or water, for the landmass of Western Australia was clearly visible. There were only fourteen people in the boat and room for many more, so Sibell resented them all. In her grief she blamed them for not rescuing her parents. As she looked out now across the gloomy sea, she saw a man clinging to a spar and imagined it was her father.

‘Over there,’ she screamed suddenly. ‘It’s my father. Row that way!’

And they did. They turned the boat towards him, straining at the oars, but as they closed on the man in the sea she saw it was a young man, not her father. He waved to them, urging them on to him, and suddenly the four oarsmen were working frantically, as if against time itself. Sibell saw their muscles bulging and the sweat on their faces before she realised that they were racing after a sharp black fin that was cutting through the water ahead of them. And then the man screamed, a terrible, agonised scream which was suddenly shut off as he threw up his hands and disappeared. A circle of churning blood coloured the sea.

Shocked by what had happened and conjuring up images of her dear parents at the mercy of sharks, Sibell began to scream hysterically until someone slapped her. ‘Shut up,’ he snarled. ‘You’re more trouble than you’re worth.’

‘But my mother and father,’ she wept. ‘They might be in the sea too. We have to look for them.’

A woman, soaked and distraught, suddenly grabbed Sibell’s hair and pulled her back. ‘You’ve got my children!’ she shouted, her eyes wild. ‘Give me back my children!’

Men prised her away and shoved her to the back of the boat where she sat muttering to two elderly couples who must have stumbled into the lifeboat by a sheer miracle. At their feet a man groaned, clutching at a bloodied gash across his chest, but he was ignored as the men turned their attention to a woman with a broken arm, binding the limb with a torn cloth. Sibell stared in horror at her companions, still unable to grasp what she was doing in this boat.

Sunrise lifted a curtain on the desolate scene, and she rubbed her eyes, sure that this was some awful conjuring trick and that when she looked again the Cambridge Star would be there. It had to be! But the horizon was clear and the evidence lay on the surface around them, drifting wreckage of the doomed ship. And there was no sign of the other longboat.

As they drew towards the coast the four oarsmen became wary. ‘Do you hear it?’ one asked, and there was fear in his voice.

Sibell couldn’t understand why. All she could hear was the welcome sound of sea breaking on shore; she recalled it from family holidays in Devon. She had thought it was romantic then, but now it was just respite from this nightmare of sodden heat and confinement before the real fears surfaced. Had her parents survived? And what about their servants, Maisie and Tom, and the two shepherds, father and son? Where were they?

While the oarsmen talked, the other passengers lay listlessly under the gruelling sun. Sibell knew something was wrong, although she couldn’t imagine what else could happen to them. She leaned forward and tapped an arm. ‘Is it sharks?’ she asked.

‘Not if you stay in the boat,’ the man replied with a mad grin which frightened her.

The coastline became clearer. Sibell saw a long white beach, miles and miles of it spread out like a welcome mat before red-ochre land slightly tinged with tufts of green. The noise of the sea was louder.

‘I can’t swim,’ one of the men said.

‘It won’t matter here,’ another replied glumly. ‘We’ll have to ride the beast in.’

They were resting on their oars behind the breakers, rocking with the swell. A man with curly black hair and a dark beard squinted under the shade of his hand. ‘God Almighty,’ he muttered, peering along the coast, north to south, ‘those breakers are dangerous. We’ve got to get out of here.’

‘And where do we go?’ another asked. ‘’Tis the longest beach I ever saw in me born days. There’s no end to it. We can’t row on forever, we ain’t got no water. I say we give it a go.’

The bearded man looked nervously at their passengers. ‘We can’t afford to spill them, they’d never survive.’

The surf ahead of them sounded like a constant roll of thunder, and a sailor sneered at him. ‘Since when did you care? He’s only worrying about his own skin.’

‘What are we waiting for?’ Sibell asked, and the men turned to stare at her. ‘We can’t stay out here all day,’ she said. ‘Why don’t you just row to that beach?’

Suddenly they were laughing. Even the ugly one who had threatened to throw her overboard. ‘The princess has spoke,’ he chortled. ‘She’s made the decision. We go.’

‘Just a minute.’ The bearded man turned back to Sibell. ‘Will you shut your mouth. You don’t know what you’re talking about!’

‘Of course I do. You’re worried about waves when we’ve come through worse ones in this very boat.’

‘It’s not the same thing,’ he snapped impatiently. ‘That’s surf ahead, not just waves, and it’s my guess they’re riding at about twenty feet, as high as a two-storey house. We could all get smashed up. Best you back out of this argument.’

‘Why should I?’ she declared. ‘You people don’t seem to be able to make up your minds. All the others are probably on shore by now.’

‘Oh, Christ! She’s away with the pixies,’ the bearded man said. ‘Let’s row south for a while.’

‘Why south?’ a man they called Taffy wanted to know. ‘Perth is to the north.’

‘No, it’s not,’ a sailor argued. ‘Gruber said we’d been blown off course and were to the north of Perth.’

Sibell listened to their arguments while the dazed old people held hands and the befuddled woman began shrieking again. The decision was sudden. She heard the shout: ‘To the oars, mates!’ and the bearded man shrugged, spat on his hands and grabbed an oar.

Quickly, Sibell moved about, rousing their companions. ‘Wake up!’ she yelled at them. ‘Wake up and hang on.’ She took hands and clasped them to the sides of the boat. ‘Hang on tight,’ she told them. ‘The men are taking us in to shore and I think it might be difficult.’

They turned the boat shorewards with purpose, skimming merrily towards that shimmering sand, and at the first big swell, with everyone clinging on, they rode high, glimpsing the lilac-hazed mountains in the distance. Then they were down in a trough, but it wasn’t too bad, except that the rowers made no leeway against the outward rip, their oars almost dragged from their hands.

Again they mounted a swell, riding high again, oars wasted in space, fielding only salt spray, and Sibell experienced the thrill of speed as they were borne safely homewards on the muscles of a huge wave, racing to the shore at an incredible pace, warm seas brushing, foam flecking. But like a spent horse, the foam told its tale. They plunged into yet another deep trough, losing sight of the shore.

Sibell wasn’t afraid. This was the most exciting ride of her life, a journey that belonged in the void between life and death, in no man’s land, cut off from everything she had ever known, beyond civilisation. Beneath her the crystal-green sea was so clean and tempting that in her euphoria, she had to fight off the impulse to leap over into its inviting depths.

A family of dolphins joined in the fun, matching their skills against the power of the four oarsmen who were now dipping deep, jamming their oars into the fast-moving sea to climb the heights of the next breaker, desperate to reach the peak before it disintegrated into just another wave, for each one, closer now to shore, could be their salvation.

The dolphins leapt, dipped, dived and flew ahead of them, encouraging them to stay just behind the crest of the huge wave, balancing high above the dunes and enjoying a dolphin’s-eye view of the land.

Sibell looked down at these joyous creatures with their knowing eyes; she could have reached out and touched them, stroked them, had they not all been travelling so fast. Then she saw them pull back: she saw them balk, squeaking their warnings as the oarsmen took on the summit. She watched them dive deep just as the boat shot skywards over the top of a massive breaking wave. No slide to a trough here, this wave carried them fast, foaming, belligerent, rushing forward with such awful power that oars were snatched away and the rowers clung on with their terrified companions. On and on they went, roaring at the shore like an invading horde, their flimsy boat held aloft as they flew, a winner’s trophy high above the rest.

It was their last triumph. That wave, normal on the West Australian coast, did its duty, flung itself at the sands as waves had done from infinity, and having performed its task drew back in sucking rips to re-form and become just another roller, gathering green depths for a renewed assault on an anonymous shore.

Sibell knew it was too fast. She hung on as they swept up that wave. Before her the deceptive sea looked as dangerous as green jelly; they seemed to be enticed to slide up there, right to the foaming tip, and once again to join the hayride ever onwards. But something went wrong . . . the crest of that towering wave fell apart and their boat dropped headfirst into an abyss. The real strength of the wave loomed lower, catapulting forward, capturing the boat and tossing it like a matchstick into the sea-laden air.

Sibell was thrown, before she had time to gasp for air, into a long tunnel of green. Death rolled above her, a massive froth-laced curl of ocean that hung suspended for a few seconds before it thundered down on her, and she was pounded into the depths.

She fought for the surface, not knowing where it might be found and then the charge began. She was caught in a current that swept her to precious air but would not let her go, and her frail body was bundled, bouncing, crashing, twisting, turning, into the sand-logged shallows, and dumped unceremoniously, unconscious, on the shiny beach.

The bearded man waded through the surf, still unable to believe that moment when his feet touched firm ground and he could propel himself away from the churning green cauldron. As the last wave crashed about his shoulders he stumbled and allowed himself to collapse on to the smooth sand to watch the sea withdraw. Then, gasping with relief, he staggered up the hot, dry beach.

Taffy was standing there grinning at him. ‘See! Weren’t so bad after all.’

‘I thought I was drowned for sure,’ the exhausted man replied.

‘You’d have plenty of company, mate. The boat’s all splintered to hell and the passengers went to the deep. Can’t find Leonard, he was on the oars with us, but Jimmy’s down there throwin’ up gallons of sea.’

‘No one else?’

‘Nope. There’s a couple of dead ’uns dumped down there at the water’s edge and another one further up. You was right, it were too rough to tackle.’ He looked up in wonder. ‘By Jesus, look at them breakers! Can’t see past them, so I reckon if there are any more right out there, the sharks’ll have them.’

The bearded man shook his head trying to establish reality. Taffy seemed unconcerned that so many had drowned, and he himself couldn’t muster distress for them either in his relief at having survived. The others didn’t seem relevant any more.

‘On your feet, then,’ Taffy said. ‘We’ll burn up in this heat. We’re heading for Perth.’

Soon they were arguing again, the three of them. North or south? Taffy and Jimmy were set for north, and in the end he let them go, stubbornly certain that Perth lay to the south. For some strange reason he was pleased to be rid of them, to be left alone. Feeling light-headed, he slumped down on the beach not ready yet to make a move. It was as if the ocean had set him free, given him the chance to begin his life again, and he wanted to savour his luck.

There’d been Belfast. And a fool of a job for a lanky lad, all bones and joints, wedged into the office of that factory, being ogled by girls at their machines and never game to ogle back. He’d seen himself, that adolescent dope, as a great lover, but had had neither the wit nor the beauty to succeed. He laughed, listening to the whistle of the wind above the creamy waves. Nature took its own sweet time but he’d made up for the slack when his body filled out, his skin cleared and his jaw firmed, and the ogling was no longer a tease and a bluff.

But he’d moved on by then, working at all sorts of jobs, even as a bank clerk. He blamed women for his problems; they cost money to romance, and a bank full of cash had been too much for a poor man. He’d quit fast when the rumbles began, quit Belfast, too, and not sorry.

Liverpool was a raw place. Worse than Belfast. Hard on strangers, he mused, thinking back on those years. Never any work, but a man had to live: so, with the help of the bog-Irish girl, he’d found cash in the purses of fancy women, who were easy enough to charm. Then there were other matters, which he didn’t care to recall and which had brought him to the decision that it was time to quit Liverpool.

Just his luck to choose that damned ship, the Cambridge Star, but he always kept his ears open. He’d heard the warnings of the men with him in steerage that this was no ordinary storm, and it had put the fear of God in him. To hell with shipboard rules –