Page 30 of Summer at Harbour View House
‘Hi,’ Davey said, waving as they followed Matt along the walkway.
‘These here are the two maids I met in the pub yesterday,’ Matt said. ‘Helen and … what was it?’
‘Natasha,’ Natasha said.
‘And I’m Hannah,’ Hannah said. ‘Although Helen is my mother’s name.’
‘Thought ‘e looked like the spawn of a Helen,’ Matt said with a chuckle.
‘Well, it’s nice to meet you both,’ Davey said with none of his father’s thick accent as he reached down to take their hands to help them up into the boat. ‘Thank you for coming with us today. Hopefully we’ll get lucky.’
Natasha lifted an eyebrow, wondering what he meant, but when she glanced at Hannah, she frowned. Hannah was staring at Davey like a schoolgirl meeting a pop idol. Even though she had already climbed up onto the boat, she held out her hand again for Davey to help her down onto the deck, where she continued to stare at him.
‘I’m Hannah,’ she said again.
‘Very nice to make your acquaintance,’ Davey said, holding on to her hand far longer than was necessary. ‘Right, let’s get out to sea.’
The boat was about twenty feet long and had a little wheelhouse at one end, although it was only large enough for one person sitting down and another squeezed in behind them. The hull was a bright blue, with a string of luminous orange buoys tied along the sides. Set into the sides of the hulls were storage chambers, most containing ropes and fishing gear. Matt put the cool box into one, then waved at Natasha to sit down.
‘Welcome to Mary,’ Matt said. ‘Me old girl. Named after the boy’s dear mother, who departed this world fifteen long years past. Me life ain’t never been the same.’
Matt, who had gone into the wheelhouse to start the boat’s engine, closely followed by Hannah, turned and smiled. ‘And he’s been trying to hook up with old Lizzie from the Anchor ever since.’
‘Maid don’t know what she’s missing,’ Matt said, sitting down on a bench and leaning back against the gunwale. ‘Just playin’ ‘ard to get, I reckon.’
‘I’ve been telling him buy some new clothes and smarten himself up for years,’ Matt said, as the engine started to chug and they drifted away from the breakwater. ‘He’s convinced he knows how to charm her, though.’
‘She’s a woman of the sea,’ Matt said. ‘She ain’t interested in no shiny suits or posh shoes. She likes a man who reminds her of the ocean.’
Davey smiled. ‘Keep telling yourself that, Dad.’
‘Oh, so your mother died?’ Hannah said, putting a hand on Davey’s arm. ‘You poor thing. So, how does this all work?’
‘Let me shut the door, keep the wind off,’ Davey said. ‘Then I can talk you through how—’ The rest of his words were cut off as the door closed, shutting Davey and Hannah inside the tiny wheelhouse. Through the rear window, Hannah’s eyes were bright with interest. Natasha sighed.
‘So,’ Matt said. ‘You’s from Bathwater, is it? I remember going up there with Jago once. We bought a baler off a man called Johnny Johannes. Never met a man with almost the same first and last name before. He a family friend?’
Natasha suppressed a sigh. ‘No,’ she said.
Luckily, out on the open water, the engine was too noisy for her to catch most of Matt’s questions, as the old man sat facing her, one leg over the other, one arm holding on to the gunwale railing, but as she caught snippets of monologues about fencing issues, something about a missing sheep and another half story about an old motorbike they’d found buried in a hedge, she glanced at the wheelhouse, unable to shake off a feeling of envy as Hannah cosied up to Davey. By the time the engine cut out and the boat came to a slow, bobbing stop, the pair were practically married, emerging from the wheelhouse hand in hand, Hannah’s lipstick smeared and hastily finger-fixed, Davey with a contented grin on his face.
‘Now all we have to do is wait,’ he said. ‘According to the radio, the coordinates of the last sightings were a couple of miles southwest of here, so we should be right in their path.
Natasha looked over the water to the thin strip of coast a mile or so distant. The sea was flat and calm, the sky starting to clear, the air warm. Matt took off his duffel coat and opened one of the storage containers.
‘I brought some sandwiches, but there ain’t nothing like a fresh lunch,’ he said, pulling out some retractable fishing rods and handing them out. ‘Reckon we should have a shoal or two somewhere underneath us, especially if those boys are coming through. Fish ain’t got much in the way of brains. Don’t know what’s coming.’
‘What boys?’
Matt grinned. ‘You’ll see.’
Natasha had never fished before, and it was left to Matt to teach her while Davey gave Hannah a far more detailed and hands-on explanation.
‘Just hook one of these maggots on there and you’re good to go,’ Matt said, thrusting a box of multicoloured maggots in Natasha’s face as she recoiled in horror. ‘Don’t be shy about getting you’s fingers dirty. Nothin’ a bit o’sea water won’t wash off.’
To her surprise, Natasha found sea fishing to be a lot easier than she had expected, and she couldn’t help but feel a little smug as she reeled in a couple of cod and then a haddock nearly two feet long. Hannah, closely aided by Davey, managed to catch a couple of mackerel. Satisfied with their catch, Matt produced a small gas stove, then proceeded to gut and grill the fish while the girls watched. By the time the fish was cooked and added to a variety of salads and sandwiches Matt took from his cooler, the morning’s hangover was little more than a memory, and they ate a pleasant and fresh lunch with the sun now beaming overhead.
With lunch over, Davey climbed a ladder on to the top of the wheelhouse, where he held on to a rail with one hand while holding a pair of binoculars to his eyes with the other. After a minute or so of scanning the water, he lowered the binoculars and pointed off to the south.
