SV - 05 - Sergeant Verity and the Swell Mob. (15 page)

What
it was that the officer hoped, Joe never discovered. The plank was upended and
he felt himself going backward, head first. The shroud hit the water, with the
force of an explosion in his ears. Desperately, he drew a deep last breath,
filling his lungs until they ached. Then the creamy twilight was gone. There was
darkness, sudden and bitter cold, the roaring and booming of unfathomable
depths.

9

Like a madman in a
strait-jacket, Stunning Joe fought against the heavy swathes of wet canvas. The
thick cloth plastered itself over his face and round his arms as he sank deeper
and more slowly into the dark tide. A noise of thunder filled his ears as the
blood gathered in his head and he pressed the air frantically back into his
lungs. In the moment of hitting the water he had somehow lost his grip on the
smooth pearl handle of the razor. Now, in a convulsive frenzy, he scrabbled
against the wet canvas to find it again.

His
fingers touched the hard smoothness. To ease the pain in his lungs he released
the first precious bubbles of air as he jacked the blade open. He stabbed at
the canvas and found to his horror that the thin steel made no impact. The
folds of sailcloth were so wet and slack that they presented no resistance to
the edge of the razor. Vomiting air again, he clawed at the canvas stitching,
found it, and then began to cut desperately at the waxed thread.

At
length he managed to thrust his head clear of the open shroud, kicking and
wriggling to free himself from it completely. The struggle had seemed to last
for several minutes but it was a far shorter time. He was nowhere near the sea
bed. Below him, the weighted cloth peeled away, sinking to its last resting
place. Stunning Joe had always imagined the depths of the sea to be a
wonderland of green and blue, like the water-show at the Britannia Theatre in Hoxton.
Instead he found himself in the darkest night, choking as the first taste of
brine entered his mouth and scorched his lungs. He struck upward to the
surface.

Abruptly,
he broke the waves and drew in the cold air, retching to clear the salt water
from his windpipe. He had feared that the men in the cutter would be close
enough to see him. But they had buried him almost in the last of the twilight,
and in any case the drift of the sea had carried him from them as he sank. Joe
could make out the shape of the cutter across the darkening water. It was fifty
yards or more away, pulling for the gloomy sides of the hulks which rode
against the dusk sky. The officers, sitting in the stern, had their backs to
him. At their oars, the first-class convicts were too preoccupied by their
labour to scan the surface of the flood tide. Had they done so, they would have
seen nothing but a small dark shape bobbing among the waves as Joe's head
appeared above the surface. In any case, the thought of a corpse released by the
shroud and floating on the tide would have been enough to keep them rowing all
the harder.

At the
age of eight, Joe O'Meara had been a 'mud lark', scavenging the muddy shores of
the Thames at low tide. His first companions were watermen and sailors. Before
he was full grown, he had learnt to swim with the best of them. That alone
might prove his salvation now.

For
several minutes he trod water, taking care not to splash the surface until the
cutter was well clear of him. At the same time, he tried to get his bearings.

At his
back he could still hear the distant roaring of The Race. Yet with the shadows
gathering and the wind growing chill, the burial party had dropped him short of
it. Even in a cutter with a full crew they had no wish to be caught in the cross-tides
after dark. Instead of taking him out beyond Portland Bill, they had gone to
one side. He was just as far from the convict hulks but in the calmer water
which was enclosed by the right angle of Portland with its isthmus and the main
sweep of Weymouth eastward to Melcombe Regis.

Stunning
Joe located the red lights of Portland quay and the new breakwater, measuring
them against another blob of red which he judged to be the pier at Weymouth
itself. Between them and beyond, the gaslights of the esplanade made golden
paths over the crumpled water. He began to calculate his chances.

The
Weymouth shore was further off, perhaps two miles away, but it was a secure
landfall. By dawn he would have entered a house, helping himself to clothes and
money as easily as if they had been laid out for his choice. The dark rock of
Portland, which rose closer at hand, promised recapture and vengeance. Even if
he could get safely ashore and find clothes or money, the guards across Chesil
Bank stood between him and the mainland. The body in the bunk of the
Iphigenia
might be buried next day as
his own. Or it might not. If Surgeon Doyle was sober enough to notice the deception,
there would be no road out of Portland for Joe O'Meara.

Slowly,
conserving his energy for a long ordeal, he struck out towards the further blob
of red light, where the mainland esplanade of Weymouth and Melcombe Regis
began. The distance was far beyond any which he had swum before. Paddling like
a dog, he had learnt to stay afloat for half an hour at a time in the waters of
the Thames. To cover so great a distance in a specific direction was another
thing altogether.

Yet as
he moved, Joe felt the tide bearing him on its flood into the great bay of
Portland harbour and the Weymouth shore. For the time being it was running in
his favour. He had no idea when it might turn, carrying him further out to his
death in the churning currents of The Race. Even at the flood, it was not
taking him in the precise direction he had chosen. The long channel swell broke
across Portland Bill, its waves swept eastward, so that Stunning Joe found himself
carried along the shoreline rather then towards it.

From
time to time he stopped, easing his tired arms by treading water and letting
the sea bear him unresistingly. At first it seemed that he was no closer to
land than when he had begun, and then he saw that he was moving in, under the
lee of Portland. The line of golden light along the esplanades had now
fragmented into separate points of brilliance, like an embroidered pattern.
Still it was too far, a distance beyond anything he could cover before the
first menacing pull of the receding tide.

Earlier
he had thought the summer sea was warmer than the evening air above it. Now, as
he struck out wearily again, his arms were chilled and growing numb from cold
and fatigue. He stopped to rest them, treading water again, much sooner than he
had intended. But this would never get him safe on land. Grinding his teeth,
prepared to weep with the frustration of it all, he thrashed forward with his
arms again, thrusting their slow and aching discomfort from his thoughts.

It was
no use. A few minutes later he had stopped again, his limbs in a shimmering
dance just keeping him afloat. For all Stunning Joe's agility, his small wiry
body was ill-suited to the long endurance of the sea. He was nearer, much
nearer to land, than when he had begun. But there was a mile of dark and restless
water between him and the pinpricks of golden light, where men and women dined
or took their ease. The reflections danced on the sleek shifting surfaces of
the waves, as though mocking his fatigue and terror.

With a
roar that carried anger as well as desperation, Joe struck out again, clawing
away the water in a last fury of physical effort. It .carried him a hundred
yards, perhaps more, before he could go no further. Then he knew he was done
for. He had heard that the gentle slope of the Dorset sands enabled a man to
get his footing quarter of a mile out to sea, and stand with the water no
higher than his chin. However that might be, there was no ground under him now
and none that he could ever reach. His head lay back on the water as his arms
and legs paddled feebly.

'Help me!' he
shrieked. 'Help me!'

But
his voice sounded tiny, even to him, in the great vast-ness of the sea. He
turned on his belly, clawing again but making no progress. And then a wave
slapped against his face with enough force to drive the water into his mouth.
He choked and spat, still snatching at the flood as though it would offer him support.
Another wave broke over his head, and then another with greater force. He knew
suddenly that the tide had changed and that, for all his struggling, it was
carrying him further and further out to sea. If he could stay afloat long
enough, he would hear presently the roaring cross-tides of The Race growing
ever louder at his back. But he could hear nothing for the moment above his own
screams which were draining him of strength and breath simultaneously.

'Help me! For the
love of God! Help me-e-e!'

But the
waves slapped harder across his face and he felt the first pull of the tide
that would draw him backward and downward. He cried out again and listened for
the roar of the currents crossing.

‘I’ll
help you, Stunning Joe,' said a quiet voice. 'That's what I'm here for.'

10

He was dead then,
he thought, hearing either the voices of heaven or the last flickering madness
in his own brain. In a vision, it seemed that the arms of mercy were lifting
him from the cold sea and laying him at last on something firm. And then the
vision faded as he began to retch again, spewing out water where he lay. No
one spoke again. There was a steady creaking, like a tavern sign being swung in
the wind. The sea had gone and there was darkness everywhere. Stunning Joe
felt himself sliding into unconsciousness and made no attempt to resist it.

When
he opened his eyes, two men were lifting him by his arms and legs, carrying him
across shingle which crunched under their boots. He could not see clearly
enough to make out who they were or where they were taking him in the darkness.
Indeed, it was only piece by piece that he recalled what had just happened to
him — the shroud, the burial and the long ordeal of the tides. A gate opened,
he smelt hollyhocks and wallflowers in the warmth of an enclosed garden.

Dazzled
by lights, he felt himself carried upstairs and laid on warm linen. There was a
scent of lavender and a girl's voice among the others. Soon it was dark again
and he was alone. The warmth overcame him with the ease of chloroform. He
could not have stirred a limb to save himself from being returned to the
Indomitable.
The weight of his eyelids
seemed greater than all the power of the sea. He heard a tiny sound, the
turning of a key in a lock, and then he slept deeply.

No one
came to wake him. He opened his eyes the next morning in a sunlit room, still
alone. There was little enough furniture. A china basin and pitcher stood on a
plain table, and there was a small wooden chair beside the bed. It was a
servant's attic, he guessed, the boards uncarpeted and the window small. He got
to his feet and walked unsteadily across the floor. There were bars on the
little window, quite as formidable as those on the portholes of the hulks. Not
that Joe could have made his escape even if the window had opened. Either the
trousers of his prison clothes had been lost in the sea, or else they had been
taken from him by his rescuers. At all events, he was now completely naked.

He
looked down at the scene below. The house was one of the Georgian villas which
lined the shore beyond the regimented grandeur of the esplanade. There was the
little garden, as he had remembered it, with a high wall and a wooden door
leading to the pebble beach. At intervals, on either side, were similar
detached houses, imitated from Regency designs with pilasters and wrought-iron
balconies. To the west lay the grand front of Weymouth and Melcombe Regis, the
bathing-machines drawn up by the water's edge and several striped tents along
the top of the beach. The stone paving which edged the shore was now shimmering
in the summer heat and the sea sparkled like tinsel.

Further out rose
the great rock of Portland with the dark prison hulks moored in its shelter.
Joe turned away from the sight and went back to the bed. He sat down and
thought that whatever lay in store for him here, it could hardly be worse than
the obscenity of the convict transports.

His
movements had evidently been heard. A key scraped in the lock of the door and
the handle turned. The forehead of the man who entered the room was creased in
a frown of bewilderment, though the yellowed mouth hung open in what might have
been a smile of welcome. He scratched the close, dark crop of his head and
grinned at the man who had been saved from the sea.

'Well
now, Stunning Joe!' said Old Mole thoughtfully. 'What trouble you have caused
your friends!'

He
walked slowly towards the bed, tapping the back of one hand into the palm of
the other. Stunning Joe stood up, his hands folded over his loins in an
instinctive gesture of decency.