Chapter 1

He launched the little dinghy at Waldringfield a little before dusk; he had his reasons. The weather forecast was perfect for his purposes, though perhaps not for a sensible sailor. Dressed correctly, he began to don a buoyancy aid before smiling a little and tossing it under the foredeck. He neither needed nor wanted it today.

As he approached ‘The Rocks’ he let the sails flap in the light breeze, and the current carried the boat slowly down river; James Robinson opened the plastic jar containing his wife’s ashes, and began to systematically empty them into the river. He was passing the little, coarse-sand beach as he finished; he’d judged it perfectly, and for several minutes he looked at the beach with its low sandy cliff behind and the fir trees above. His vision blurred as he remembered another dinghy pulled up on the beach there and a picnic one summer’s evening ... making love as dusk fell, making love with Esther for the first time. For a while, he was back there and her body was warm and alive, vibrant in his arms.

Reality forced itself in on him as the sails flapped – the wind was picking up. He shook himself, scraped the back of his hand across his eyes to clear his vision and began to sail again, around Pretyman’s Point, through the moorings at Ramsholt; rounding Green Point, down to Bawdsey and Felixstowe Ferry – through the moorings – remembering launching at the Ferry, returning long after dark, their picnic over, to recover the boat and go home, deeply, irrevocably in love. Irritably, he brushed tears away again, and continued through the narrows and down Sea Reach, past the Martello Tower.

The wind was veering slightly and increasing as he began to cross the bar; the water was broken and choppy, the boat making slow progress and tossing about but he was too preoccupied to be nauseous. Once clear of the bar, things steadied down, and he headed out to sea in the steadily increasing wind. She was there with him in the boat, a real, solid presence, and she was yelling at him.

“What are you doing, you fool?”

“I’m ... following you!”

“No, you are not! What you are doing is suicide. If you carry on, you’ll never see me again!”

Then she was gone, and he began to think as a sailor again.

He furled the foresail and pulled down a reef with the rapid reefing system, then delved under the foredeck for his buoyancy aid and shrugged into it, the dinghy tossing in the rising wind. Taking control once more, he executed a wheelbarrow tack and headed for the entrance to Harwich Haven ... wondering if he’d left things too late.

She was there again. “Don’t give up! Don’t let go! You’ve got a lot of living to do yet! James ... I love you!”

“Esther...” but she was gone.

He didn’t see the old Thames Barge, sailing towards Harwich Haven, and it wouldn’t have made any difference if he had. Her skipper called to her Mate...

“Marty! There’s some idiot out in a little Wanderer in this!”

The young man, Martin Peters, looked where his skipper was pointing.

“I see it, Jenni!” He went to the hatch, and bellowed down it. “Beth! We may be needing you on deck!”

Not long later, another, older woman emerged onto the deck, shrugging into a bright yellow jacket over similar overtrousers, buckling on a self-inflating life-jacket.

He might have made it into the shelter of Harwich Haven without help, but man proposes, God disposes ... or perhaps it was just Murphy at work. He was about to perform another wheelbarrow tack to get the mainsail across when a gust hit. You don’t need to know why, but a gust is always associated with a sudden veer – change clockwise – in the wind direction. The wind got behind the leach of the sail, the boom slammed across uncontrolled ... the change in the forces, previously carefully balanced, capsized him and he was in the water. Without the buoyancy aid, he’d have been dead for sure, dragged down by waterlogged clothing. Even with it, he went under and was chilled by the water, his body heat leached away immediately.

Jenni Peters, Master under God and Skipper of Sailing Barge Asphodel, snapped orders to her Mate, and laid the barge across the wind to give a lee to the little dinghy, but didn’t expect her Third Hand to take a flying leap over the side. She watched long enough to make sure Beth was, for the moment, okay, then she and her Mate were reducing sail.

Beth Hanson hadn’t expected the shock she received when she hit the water. The North Sea is rarely anything but very cold and this was not one of the rare occasions, but she struck out to swim the few yards to the dinghy, on its side.

James’ arm was hooked over the toe-strap webbing, but appeared to be unconscious. At least his head was out of the water. Beth swam round, dragged herself up onto the centre-board, impeded by her waterlogged clothing and inflated life-jacket, but heaved the dinghy upright just as Asphodel began to pass them. She used what felt like the last of her strength to get James fully into the boat then sailed her up behind Asphodel.

James had coiled the painter neatly ... old habits die hard, even when you’re contemplating suicide ... she was able to toss it to Marty at the stern of the old barge. It fell short and she quailed at the thought of trying again, but steeled herself. This time, she unfurled some of the foresail and gained a little speed. Closer, in fact only feet from the barge’s quarter she tossed again and this time Marty caught the line and made fast. She furled the jib again, lowered the mainsail and bundled as much of it and the boom as she could under the fore-deck. She raised the centre-board, then turned her attention to the man she’d pulled out of the sea. He was breathing, at least. She found his pulse ... rapid, but reasonably strong. The barge was gathering way again, and she opened the self-bailers ... the water-level dropped rapidly.

Marty hailed her. “How’re you doing?”

“Cold. Tired. I’ll live. He’s breathing, good pulse. What does Jenni think?”

“Easiest to leave you both in the boat until we’re anchored off Shotley. You okay that long? Half an hour?”

“Not sure, but probably! We’ll need warming up when we get aboard!”

Jenni reduced the delay considerably by rounding-to to anchor on the ‘Shelf’ off Harwich; a little exposed in the easterly winds that were coming, but nothing the barge couldn’t cope with. She and Marty hoisted the man they’d rescued on board using the davit, which meant launching their tender, but made getting his ‘dead’ weight on board much easier. Beth was hardly a dead weight, but chilled and exhausted as she was, she needed help too.

Marty had the stove going in the saloon, and a mattress next to it with several duvets. Beth was dismissed to a cabin to strip, dry herself and put on dry clothes, while Jenni and Marty stripped, towelled dry and wrapped their patient in duvets. They were a little surprised when Beth emerged in pyjamas rather than day clothes.

“He needs warming up, too,” she pointed out. “Wrap me up with him and I think we’ll warm each other ... especially if you feed me cocoa or soup or something hot like that.”

It was no sooner said than done.

When the gust hit, James had time for a moment’s realisation that he was in trouble ... at least at that point he hadn’t consciously been seeking death. The dinghy tipped, he was in the water, which closed over his head until the buoyancy aid brought him back to the surface. He began to swim around the boat to start the capsize procedure, but realised if he did he was in danger of losing consciousness and drifting away. He could feel his body losing heat, weakness spreading through his body, his mind drifting into sleep. He hooked his arm over the toe-straps as he lost consciousness.

He didn’t know what was real. Esther was holding him, murmuring to him; he felt warm and happy, until the pain began. He couldn’t move, his arms and legs restricted by cloth and by someone next to him, holding him close...

“Esther?”

“Hush...” It was a woman’s voice, but it wasn’t Esther’s soprano.

His feet and hands hurt, and he was shivering violently, but the body next to him was like a furnace.

After an eternity, he opened his eyes and looked into a pair of startling green eyes, which had the sort of wrinkles at the corners that suggested laughter; at that moment, though, holding concern, not humour.

“Esther?”

He jerked round, and saw a young couple looking down at him. He didn’t recognise where he was. And he was laying in the arms of a redheaded woman with green eyes; Esther had dark hair and brown eyes.

The redhead spoke, her voice a soft, warm contralto. “Who is Esther?”

He looked at her, memory returning. “She’s dead ... my wife is dead, and I wanted to die, too, but she wouldn’t let me...”

Beth looked up at Jenni and Marty. Jenni shook her head slightly.

“What’s your name?” She asked, quietly.

“My name?” He paused, as if searching his memory for the answer. “I’m ... James. James Robinson.”

“Well, James, I’m Jenni, skipper of SB Asphodel, and this,” indicating the young man next to her, “is Marty who is both my Mate and my husband. You are lying in the arms of Beth, who is our Third Hand, and who went for a swim to pull you out of the drink. Right now, we need to get something hot into you; we’ve got some soup that’s both warm enough to be helpful and cool enough for you and Beth to drink without burning your mouths. Marty, I think we’re going to need some clothes for our guest.”

Her companion nodded and left the room, returning shortly after with an armload of clothes. James was somewhat embarrassed by his nakedness, but pulled on the layers of soft, dry, warm clothing provided as Beth added a couple of layers to her pyjamas. Once dressed, Marty insisted he wrap himself in a duvet again and sit on an old sofa at the side of the saloon, not far from the stove. Beth did the same, wrapping herself in a duvet and flopping next to him on the sofa.

Looking at Beth, James said, “I ... owe you my life, I think; thank you. Thank you very much.”

Jenni handed them both mugs of soup.

“I won’t say ‘it was a pleasure’,” Beth smiled, “but I’m glad I did it”. And sipped her soup.

They emptied the mugs quite quickly, and Marty replenished them with some soup that was hot enough to slow them down. By the time they’d finished that, they felt as though they were glowing.

“Do you want to talk about it?” Beth looked at him, radiating sympathy.

“I certainly owe you that much...” he sighed and, looking into infinity, he began.

“We met at school. Hit it off right away. Her parents didn’t approve ... But we managed to stay friends and do things together. We had to be devious, though. I left school at sixteen, trained as a plumber. It meant I had a little money, and when I turned eighteen I bought an old sailing dinghy; I learned to sail in the Sea Scouts, you see. She wasn’t sure, but ... well ... we were friends, so she gave it a try, and she loved it.” He stopped and swallowed hard. “Do you know, we hardly thought about sex? Quite enjoyed kissing, though. One day, we arranged to sail up the Deben for a picnic. It was late in the day. There we were, on the little beach at ‘The Rocks’, no-one around, it was gathering dark. We kissed, one thing led to another ... we were pretty clumsy. We made love there ... didn’t think about the consequences.” He was silent for ages, but the three listening left him to his thoughts.