Soon a dark hull loomed above them, with lamplight glowing reassuringly from her open hatch. They scrambled on board into the snug warmth of the cabin, where coffee was already brewing on a hissing Primus stove. Tired and content, Henry and Emmy drank coffee and brandy, and were nodding drowsily even before the two green sleeping bags had been stretched out for them on the hard floor of the fo’c’sle. As their heads touched the rolled-up sweaters which served as pillows, they were both engulfed in a dreamless, utterly satisfying sleep.
CHAPTER TWO
HENRY WOKE NEXT MORNING to the sound of sausages sizzling in the pan, and a delicious smell of newly fried bacon. Through the dispersing mists of sleep he became aware of a steaming white mug of tea beside his face, and then of Rosemary, grinning at him through the curtains that separated the fo’c’sle from the main cabin.
“Come on, lazybones,” she said cheerfully, “It’s a gorgeous morning. We’ve been up for hours. Breakfast’s nearly ready.”
She withdrew into the cabin again, like a retreating snail, and reappeared a moment later with a blue enamel bowl.
“Hot water for washing,” she said. “You’ll have to share it. Can’t spare any more. No need to shave unless you feel like it. And if you want to spend a penny, use the bucket.”
With that, she disappeared. Henry struggled stiffly out of his sleeping bag into a sitting position, took a gulp of tea, and looked around him. Last night he had been too exhausted to take in the details of Ariadne’s living accommodation. Now he saw that he and Emmy were ensconced in a narrow, triangular section in the bows of the boat, where there was just room for two sleeping bags to be laid side by side. The frames and timbers of the boat, which formed the walls, were painted gleaming white, and hung with coils of rope: beyond Henry’s feet, in the tapering bows, bulging canvas sailbags were stacked: between Emmy and himself, a stout anchor chain ran down from a hole in the decking to disappear through another opening in the floor boards. Overhead, sunshine slanted in through the square forehatch, which had been prop
ped slightly open for ventilation. There was just enough room to sit up in comfort.
Henry woke Emmy, and when they had washed and dressed, they pulled back the curtains and crawled through into the main cabin.
Here it was possible to stand nearly upright, thanks to the fact that the level of the floor was lower, and the roof built up. Sunshine flooded in, through the skylight in the ceiling and through the open hatch which led to the cockpit. The cabin was about ten feet long by eight feet wide, and its layout followed the traditional pattern which contrives to cram an amazing amount of comfort and storage space into such limited dimensions. Two bunks—now made up for the daytime into settees, with bright red covers and blue cushions—ran down the sides, while in the centre a folding table was set up for breakfast. Between the bunks and the cockpit, there were, on one side, a small galley containing a doubleburner Primus stove, with a plate rack above it and a cupboard below, and on the other, a large locker for storing food, saucepans and crockery. On the wall above one bunk was a neat rack for books, in which Henry noticed Reid’s Nautical Almanack, a well-thumbed copy of East Coast Rivers, The Yachtsman’s Weekend Book, The Venturesome Voyages of Captain Voss, Joshua Slocum’s Sailing Alone Round the World, Peter Heaton’s Sailing and Cruising, and a battered and outdated copy of Lloyd’s Register of Shipping. A similar rack above the other bunk held a selection of charts, rolled up neatly and secured with elastic bands. Another rack held a small fire extinguisher, and a fourth, a portable wireless set.
On the varnished bulkhead, a shining brass oil lamp swung in gimbals, and this was flanked on one side by a white-faced, brassbound clock, and on the other by a matching barometer. As in the fo’c’sle, white paint alternated with bronzed varnish: the effect was spruce, comfortable and exceedingly attractive.
Rosemary was sitting on the step that led up to the cockpit, breaking eggs into a frying pan.
“Won’t be a moment,” she said. “The coffee’s just percolating. Why don’t you go out and have a look at the morning?”
“What time is it?” Emmy asked.
“Late,” said Rosemary. “Eight o’clock. We woke early to catch the tide, and then thought better of it. After all, we’re not trying to get anywhere special today, so we thought we’d have another couple of hours in bed.”
She moved aside to let them pass, and they clambered into the open cockpit.
Berrybridge Haven was putting on a fine show for its weekend visitors. The sun blazed from a sky the colour of a robin’s egg, and danced merrily over the deeper blue water, which—since it was little more than an hour after high tide—stretched dazzlingly from the whitewashed walls of The Berry Bush on one bank to the distant greensward of the other. The dinghies, which had been mud-stranded the night before, now bobbed and curtsied like coloured shells on either side of the grey concrete hard. The main channel in the centre of the river was marked not only by two rows of buoys (pillar-box red and cylindrical on one side, black and conical on the other), but also by two parallel lines of moored boats. The sun, glancing off the rippling water, threw up shifting gleams of light on to their gaudy hulls—white, red, green, blue, black or gold-shimmering varnish. In the channel, several boats were already under sail.
On shore and on the boats, things were stirring. Henry could see besweatered figures in yachting caps carrying cans of water and sailbags down the hard: canvas began to flutter whitely from moored boats, as their crews hoisted sail and prepared to put to sea. Alastair, who was sitting cross-legged on the foredeck of Ariadne splicing a rope, waved cheerfully as a decrepit grey motor launch hiccoughed past—and Henry recognized its occupant as Herbert Hole, going about his official business of collecting mooring fees and cups of tea from visiting boats.
On the next mooring to Ariadne, slightly upriver, there was a small, black-hulled boat with a short mast and an excessively long bowsprit.
Emmy said, “Look, that’s Pocahontas. David’s boat. I can see her name on the back.”
“On the stern, if you please,” said Alastair. “Good-morning. Sleep well?”
“Like logs,” said Henry. “What a wonderful morning.”
“Not bad,” said Alastair. “Not enough wind, really. Still, can’t have everything.” Suddenly he opened the forehatch and bellowed down it, “Rosemary! Where’s the whipping?”
Rosemary’s head emerged into the cockpit. “In the after locker, of course,” she said. “At least, it should be. I’ll look.” She scrambled into the cockpit and pulled open a locker door under the tiller. “Oh, blast,” she added, “I remember now. We used the last bit on the main halyard. I meant to buy more.”
“Have I time to row over and borrow some from David?”
“No,” said Rosemary firmly. “For one thing, breakfast’s ready. For another, David won’t be up yet, if I know him. And for a third, he won’t have any. He never does. He’ll be over to borrow some from us soon—he told me he wanted to renew his jib sheets and topping lift today.”
“This,” said Henry, “is exactly like talking a foreign language. Are you going to translate for us?”
“You’ll learn,” said Rosemary. “It’s not as difficult as it sounds. Come and eat.”
They did—hugely. Even Emmy, whose usual idea of breakfast was a cup of coffee and a roll, worked her way through cornflakes, eggs, sausages, bacon, fried bread and tomatoes, and then accepted toast and marmalade. Henry began to see the reason for the two massive picnic-baskets.