A Rogue by Compulsion by Victor Bridges (top fiction books of all time TXT) 📖

It's only a mile from your place, and then either Joyce or I can come down and see you without running the risk of being spotted by your charming pals. Besides, at a pinch it might be precious handy for you. If things got too hot on shore you could always slip away by water. It's not as if you were dependent on the tides. Now I've had this little engine put in her she'll paddle off any old time—provided you can get the blessed thing to start."

"You're a brick, Tommy," I said gratefully. "There's nothing I'd like better. But as for you and Joyce coming down—"

"Of course we shall come down," interrupted Joyce. "I shall come just as soon as I can. Who do you think is going to look after you and do your cooking?"

"Good Lord, Joyce!" I said. "I'm in much too tight a corner to worry about luxuries."

"That's no reason why you should be uncomfortable," said Joyce calmly. "I shan't come near you in the day, while you're working. I shall stay on the Betty and cook dinner for you in the evening, and then as soon as it's dark you can shut up the place and slip across to the creek. Oh, it will be great fun—won't it, Tommy?"

Tommy laughed. "I think so," he said; "but I suppose there are people in the world who might hold a different opinion." Then he turned to me. "It's all right, Neil. We'll give you two or three clear days to see how the land lies and shove along with your work. Joyce has got to find out where George is getting that cheque from, and I mean to look up Latimer and sound him about his dinner at Parelli's. You'll be quite glad to see either of us by that time."

"Glad!" I echoed. "I shall be so delighted, I shall probably blow myself up. It's you two I'm thinking of. The more I see of this job the more certain I am there's something queer about it, and if there's going to be any trouble down there I don't want you and Joyce dragged into it."

"We shan't want much dragging," returned Tommy. "As far as the firm's business goes we're all three in the same boat. We settled that last night."

"So there's nothing more to be said," added Joyce complacently.

I looked from one to the other. Then I laughed and shrugged my shoulders. "No," I said, "I suppose there isn't."

Through the interminable slums of Plaistow and East Ham we drew out in the squalid region of Barking Creek, and I looked down on the mud and the dirty brown water with a curious feeling of satisfaction. It was like meeting an old friend again after a long separation. The lower Thames, with its wharves, its warehouses, and its never-ceasing traffic, had always had a strange fascination for me; and in the old days, when I wanted to come to Town from Leigh or Port Victoria, I had frequently sailed my little six-tonner, the Penguin, right up as far as the Tower Bridge. I could remember now the utter amazement with which George had always regarded this proceeding.

"Are you feeling pretty strong this morning?" asked Tommy, breaking a long silence. "The Betty's lying out in the Ray, and the only way of getting at her will be to tramp across the mud. There's no water for another four hours. We shall have to take turns carrying Joyce."

"You won't," said Joyce. "I shall take off my shoes and stockings and tramp too. I suppose you've got some soap on board."

"You'll shock Leigh terribly if you do," said Tommy. "It's a beautiful respectable place nowadays—all villas and trams and picture palaces—rather like a bit of Upper Tooting."

"It doesn't matter," said Joyce. "I've got very nice feet and ankles, and I'm sure it's much less immoral than being carried in turns. Don't you think so, Neil?"

"Certainly," I said gravely. "No properly-brought-up girl would hesitate for a moment."

We argued over the matter at some length: Tommy maintaining that he was the only one of the three who knew anything about the minds of really respectable people—a contention which Joyce and I indignantly disputed. As far as I can remember, we were still discussing the point when the train ran into Leigh station and pulled up at the platform.

"Here you are," said Tommy, handing me a basket. "You freeze on to this; it's our lunch. I want to get a couple more cans of paraffin before we go on board. There is some, but it's just as well to be on the safe side."

We left the station, and walking a few yards down the hill, pulled up at a large wooden building which bore the dignified title of "Marine and Yachting Stores." Here Tommy invested in the paraffin and one or two other trifles he needed, and then turning off down some slippery stone steps, we came out on the beach. Before us stretched a long bare sweep of mud and sand, while out beyond lay the Ray Channel, with a number of small boats and fishing-smacks anchored along its narrow course.

"There's the Betty," said Tommy, pointing to a smart-looking little clinker-built craft away at the end of the line. "I've had her painted since you saw her last."

"And from what I remember, Tommy," I said, "she wanted it—badly."

Joyce seated herself on a baulk of timber and began composedly to take off her shoes and stockings. "How deep does one sink in?" she asked. "I don't want to get this skirt dirtier than I can help."

"You'll be all right if you hold it well up," said Tommy, "unless we happen to strike a quicksand."

"Well, you must go first," said Joyce, "then if we do, Neil and I can step on you."

Tommy chuckled, and sitting down on the bank imitated Joyce's example, rolling his trousers up over the knee. I followed suit, and then, gathering up our various belongings, we started off gingerly across the mud.

Tommy led the way, his shoes slung over his shoulder, and a tin of paraffin in each hand. He evidently knew the lie of the land, for he picked out the firmest patches with remarkable dexterity, keeping on looking back to make sure that Joyce and I were following in his footsteps. It was nasty, sloppy walking at the best, however, for every step one took one went in with a squelch right up to the ankle, and I think we had all had pretty well enough by the time we reached the boat. Poor Joyce, indeed, was so exhausted that she had to sit down on the lunch basket, while Tommy and I, by means of wading out into the channel, managed to get hold of the dinghy.

Our first job on getting aboard was to wash off the mud. We sat in a row along the deck with our feet over the side; Tommy flatly refusing to allow us any farther until we were all properly cleaned. Then, while Joyce was drying herself and putting on her shoes and stockings, he and I went down into the cabin and routed out a bottle of whisky and a siphon of soda from somewhere under the floor.

"What we want," he observed, "is a good stiff peg all round"; and the motion being carried unanimously as far as Joyce and I were concerned, three good stiff pegs were accordingly despatched.

"That's better," said Tommy with a sigh. "Now we're on the safe side. There's many a good yachtsman died of cold through neglecting these simple precautions." Then jumping up and looking round he added cheerfully: "We shall be able to sail the whole way up; the wind's dead east and likely to stay there."

"I suppose you'll take her out on the engine," I said. "This is a nice useful ditch, but there doesn't seem to be much water in it for fancy work."

Tommy nodded. "You go and get in the anchor," he said, "and I'll see if I can persuade her to start. She'll probably break my arm, but that's a detail."

He opened a locker at the back of the well, and squatted down in front of it, while I climbed along the deck to the bows and proceeded to hand in several fathoms of wet and slimy chain. I had scarcely concluded this unpleasant operation, when with a sudden loud hum the engine began working, and the next moment we were slowly throbbing our way forwards down the centre of the channel.

The Ray runs right down to Southend Pier, but there are several narrow openings out of it connecting with the river. Through one of these Tommy steered his course, bringing us into the main stream a few hundred yards down from where we had been lying. Then, turning her round, he handed the tiller over to Joyce, and clambered up alongside of me on to the roof of the cabin.

"Come on, Neil," he said. "I've had enough of this penny steamer business. Let's get out the sails and shove along like gentlemen."

The Betty's rig was not a complicated one. It consisted of a mainsail, a jib, and a spinnaker, and in a very few minutes we had set all three of them and were bowling merrily upstream with the dinghy bobbing and dipping behind us. Tommy jumped down and switched off the engine, while Joyce, resigning the tiller to me, climbed up and seated herself on the boom of the mainsail. She had taken off her hat, and her hair gleamed in the sunshine like copper in the firelight.

I don't think we did much talking for the first few miles: at least I know I didn't. There is no feeling in the way of freedom quite so fine as scudding along in a small ship with a good breeze behind you; and after being cooped up for three years in a prison cell I drank in the sensation like a man who has been almost dying of thirst might gulp down his first draught of water. The mere tug of the tiller beneath my hand filled me with a kind of fierce delight, while the splash of the water as it rippled past the sides of the boat seemed to me the bravest and sweetest music I had ever heard.

I think Joyce and Tommy realized something of what I was feeling, for neither of them made any real attempt at conversation. Now and then the latter would jump up to haul in or let out the main sheet a little, and once or twice he pointed out some slight alteration which had been recently made in the buoying of the river. Joyce sat quite still for the most part, either smiling happily at me, or else watching the occasional ships and barges that we passed, most of which were just beginning to get under way.

We had rounded Canvey Island and left Hole Haven some little distance behind us, when Tommy, who was leaning over the side staring out ahead, suddenly turned back to me.

"There's someone coming round the point in a deuce of a hurry," he remarked. "Steam launch from the look of it. Better give 'em a wide berth, or we'll have their wash aboard."

I bent down and took a quick glance under the spinnaker boom. A couple of hundred yards ahead a long, white, vicious-looking craft was racing swiftly towards us, throwing up a wave on either side of her bows that spread out fanwise across the river.

I shoved down the helm, and swung the Betty a little off her course so as to give them plenty of room to go by. They came on without slackening speed in the least, and passed us at a pace which I estimated roughly to be about sixteen knots an hour. I caught a momentary glimpse of a square-shouldered man with a close-trimmed auburn beard crouching in the stern, and then the next moment a wave broke right against our bows, drenching all three of us in a cloud of flying spray.

Tommy swore vigorously. "That's the kind of river-hog who ought to be choked," he said. "If I—"

He was interrupted by a sudden exclamation from Joyce. She had jumped up laughing when the spray swept over her, and now, holding on to the rigging, she was pointing excitedly to something just ahead of us.

"Quick, Tommy!" she said. "There's a man in the water—drowning.
They've swamped his boat."

In a flash Tommy had leaped to the side. "Keep her going," he shouted to me. "We're heading straight for him." Then scrambing aft