Chapter 5

Sailing South, they threaded their way through from Horsey, known as Horsey Mere rather then Broad for no apparent reason. Out into Candle Dyke, out onto the Thurne, sailing all the while. It was brilliant. The wind was good, the boat was responding well. They wished they’d brought a thermos flask so they could make coffee and drink it on the way; there was no way they would use the gas as they heeled over.

The biggest thrill, or risk, was when Rupert disappeared below for a pee. “Rupe! Rupe! There are houses, chalets. Are we at the bridge?” He rushed up, a dark patch around his fly indicating that he had failed as Amelie had; she said nothing, but she was pleased.

“No, a way to go yet. Oh ... I’m wrong. Doesn’t take long, does it?” The wind was getting stronger, and there seemed nowhere to pull in. “Start the engine, just in case.” Though he knew it would not give enough power if the wind caught the sails at the wrong moment. He was just starting to panic when a large cruiser pulled out in front of them. Normally he would have been furious, but that was the gap they needed, the whole bank was full of cruisers, even the part designated as reserved for sailing boats. Another cruiser coming the other way started to turn, but he held course and announced “Topping lift up, Abi on the forward rope, tie it loosely so we can swing to the wind a bit. Scissors out, no, the small ones. No! The other ones, the small ones.” You needed everything as low as possible for this bridge, he’d read that. The cruiser was still edging over, hoping it’s superior size would cow him into submission. “NO, SORRY. WE ARE MOORING HERE!”

This time the mooring came with a bump, the wind pulled them round, they were too close to the motor cruiser down river, and in danger of swinging into it. “Mary, go onshore and help Abi, move us along up the bank a little.

NO! YOU CAN’T MOOR HERE! WE NEED THE SPACE.” The cruiser thought they could edge into the gap. “Amie, can you catch the boom and drop it into the scissors? Yes, you two walk us up slowly, wrap round each mooring post and pull us in a bit, then move up again. NO NO NO. ARE YOU DEAF! YOU CAN’T GET IN HERE!” He rushed to the mast, unhitched peak and throat and let them down a couple of feet, then unhitched the topping lift and let that off to drop. The boom swung and nearly took out Amelie, it carried on swinging and the cruiser trying to push in jammed in reverse, convinced that the swinging boom was going to smash his windows. It stopped and then shot backwards straight across into the private mooring opposite, causing a war of words on the other side of the river. The boom was pulled in and into the crutches. Then the gaff was lowered and the crisis started to lessen. A single sail tie bunched up the sail. The jib came down and they were able to tie alongside. “Well, that was fun. Heh! What’s wrong? Did it hit you?” Amelie was crying.

“No, but we nearly sank, and that boat, and the sails and the noise.”

“That’s sailing for you – an hour of total peace followed by five minutes of sheer panic. You did really well.”

“Did I?”

“Of course.” His arm round her comforted her, she put her hands on his hand that looped around her shoulder. It looked totally innocent that she clutched it to her bosom so hard. Mary knew better. ‘Wow, she’s good.’ she thought.

“Young MAN!” said a voice behind them “We were first here, you had no need to take the whole space!” A man of about forty, the kind who thinks they deserve everything.

“Can you read?” Rupert said and pointed to the sign saying sailing boats had the right to moor to take down their masts.

“Oh, don’t give me that. You have no intention. You’re off into the town now.”

Mary stepped in “We ARE going for coffee. The tide isn’t right yet. We will lower the mast when we are ready. If you don’t know how to sail THEN DON’T TELL US! We’ve been sailing here for years, and know exactly what we are doing. We need the space unless you want a half ton of wooden mast landing on your boat? No of course not. What the hell? You just don’t want to walk a few more yards to Lathams. Just go back to your gin palace and relax. Goodbye.”

She walked off, followed by the others. When they’d moved away Rupert asked “Where did all that come from? Lathams? Gin Palace? And sailing for years?”

“Oh, Potter Heigham is famous for Lathams shop, I read that somewhere, and I saw it when we got off the bus. Gin Palace? My Uncle used to call the big yachts that in London. You know, the ones that never go anywhere, that are just for show. And I wasn’t going to say this was our first time and please be nice was I?”

“Well, he didn’t know what hit him. Thanks. I would have run out of words and hit the stupid git. That would not have done at all.”

“No.”

Mary was still shaking with anger when they got to the cafe. It took her an hour to wind down. “You should know something about my sister, she can get pretty angry when she wants.” Amelie explained when Mary was looking at something in the shop.

“Yes, I noticed.”

“So don’t wind her up. She needs her sleep.” Amelie, at least, was assuming the rotation was still happening. Rupe wasn’t sure anymore, after last night, he quite fancied staying with Abigail.

“Don’t be – a fucking wanker, as my cousin would put it, she is pretty basic.” Abigail said. “We stick to what we agreed. When it’s my turn again, we’ll see ... no, no we won’t. If you can repeat that, I’ll be very happy.”

Maybe it was just as well, they would leave their clothes in the drawers and just get what they needed. They bought some food, nothing healthy except onions. They were young and their bodies would cope quite happily.

They lowered the mast with some difficulty. It was fine at first and then more and more of the weight was taken by the forestay lowering it. “Balanced mast? Fuck that! This thing weighs a ton!” But they got it down and then tied up the shrouds, looked at the hole through bridge again – it looked very small. “Oh well, what’s the worst that can happen?”

“Get stuck?”

“Sink?”

“Sink another boat, jam the bridge and drown?”

“Okay, okay. But we’ll be fine.”

The tide was rushing out now, but they set off. In the river, the flow was slow, but when they got to the bridge, from ten yards out they were committed. The engine couldn’t have stopped them if they had wanted to. The flow through the small arch of the bridge was scary, there was actually a visible drop from one side to the other. Only an inch, but that indicated just how fast it was flowing. They all ducked and slid through.

“Man! That was scary. It felt like such a tight fit, such a big object for a small hole!”

“Now you know how a virgin feels.” said Amelie.

“AMIE!” Mary said, Amelie was laughing. She hadn’t meant to say that out loud. They stopped and raised the mast, then pootled over and filled up with water. To fill up in Herbert Woods they would have had to lower the mast again to get in due to the bridge over the entrance. It was a good choice to use the hose at the pilot station, he told them not to worry about payment, considering how small their tank was. and then opted to continue for a while on the engine. People were friendly in Norfolk.

They continued down to Thurne on the engine, it’s thumper thumper noise was gently soporific for those not steering, and thought they’d stop there for the night. No hurry. They moored on the river, away from other boats. If anybody was thinking of a reason for doing that, nobody said. “Shall we try the pub again?”

“Well, we have food, but we could ... why not.” So they trooped down, to the pub. This pub served them with no questions. It wasn’t clear why, but they were busy, perhaps nobody noticed. It wasn’t like they went mad; they were responsible, safe drinkers. When they got back, they were reminded why they should have put the cover on first. Now they just wanted to relax; but there was rain in the air, no food made.

Abigail suggested “The pub did take outs, Shall I get some while you put the cover on?” She was pleased to avoid that little job, the boat cover was heavy and unwieldy. When she came back, half an hour later, she had four boxes “Sausage and chips, pie and chips, different pie and chips, battered sausage and chips; you can all choose. I don’t mind what I have.”

Amelie smothered her chips with tomato sauce. “Damn girl! We’re going to have to buy another bottle.” Rupe laughed.

“What? I like tomato sauce.” she had dropped a big dob of sauce onto her shirt. Rupert picked up one of her chips, slid it up her shirt, collecting most of the sauce, conscious that it slid over a soft protuberance beneath, and then popped it into her mouth. It had been unconsidered when he did it, but the three girls – especially Amelie – considered it seriously erotic. Amelie considered trying to swap with her sister sharing the cabin with Rupert; she spoke later to Mary “No, absolutely not! You want to flaunt your body. He won’t do anything. If anybody it would be Abi, you know that.”

“Yeah, yeah. I know. Okay.”

Mary had been quite convincing, but she hadn’t completely convinced herself.

She and Abigail went for a walk along the bank while Rupe and Amie washed up. Amie took the opportunity. She dabbed the sauce stain with a cloth once all the dishes had been done. “Would you mind if I took off my shirt and washed it in the washing up water? Just that stain.”

“Ummm no, I’ll go up on deck.”

“No need.” she had the shirt off and carefully rinsed the stained part in the soapy water. He was still drying up the crockery, he couldn’t help but see her young breasts pushing out, covered by a sensible bra. He couldn’t help thinking about what was under the bra, exactly the intention she had.

On the bank. Abi and Mary had tiptoed around a subject. “So ... you and Rupe.”

“Yeah? We’re still friends.”

“But has it moved on from that? I mean, I...”

Abigail was wondering, had Mary heard anything? “No, not really. No ... I don’t think so. I don’t see him as a boyfriend. I ... Oh! You want him?”

“Well, I don’t want to ruin our friendship, and I don’t really want to be more than friends with him but ... Oh I don’t know.”

Abigail put her arm through her friends. “I see! No, I really do. Look. Go with the flow – as my Dad says like he is an ageing hippy. Don’t worry about it. Umm ... I think he’d be nice.” She said no more, she wanted to say that he would be a caring, delightful first lover; but Abi wasn’t even sure it would be Mary’s first; and suggesting that could be taken wrongly. Mary on the other hand was precisely concerned about that and didn’t want to say. “We should get back. Your sister...”

“-has her own thoughts. She’s too young. We’ll have to warn him off if we rotate again tomorrow.”

“I think we have to – rotate I mean. Amie will throw a fit. I’m sure it will be fine. Rupe knows her age.”

On the boat. Amelie had carefully positioned herself to maximum advantage, pushing her body out to maximise the view. She just wanted to know he fancied her, she wasn’t thinking beyond that; her hormones were saying ‘attractive man, show yourself off.’ Five more minutes and he would have had his hand round her naked back and pulled her in to a kiss; they both knew that; but the boat rocked as the girls came back on board and she pulled her shirt back on. Then she said “It’s getting chilly, I’ll get a jumper.” So even the big wet patch wasn’t visible when the two girls dropped down to the cabin.

“Brr! it’s getting chilly again.” Mary said, and went to get a jumper.

“That’s what I said. Maybe we should have brought hot water bottles, like Mummy said.”

“Nah, we aren’t seventy yet. Cocoa? Or coffee?” Rupe said. The concensus was for cocoa. “Yup, so we are seventy. We’ll be drinking Horlicks soon.” He got a saucepan and some milk and went up to make four cocoas. When he came down, all three were in their night wear, with jumpers on over the top, and thick socks. They sat in the cabin hunched over their mugs of cocoa. “I suppose one advantage of the cooker being here would be it warming the cabin.”

“Yes, balanced against the carbon monoxide and fire risk...” Abi replied. She was right, of course; they all knew that, but still called her an old fuddy-duddy. Mary hooked her legs up under herself, having a nightdress was not as practical as pyjamas. Her legs were getting cold. “Right, Rupert. Go and get ready while we all use the bathroom. No need for you to hear.” She needed a shit, she knew she would. She had wanted to go in the pub, but it just hadn’t been ready. Now it was. She didn’t want anybody hearing, but especially not Rupert. There were still taboos.