Geoffrey Jenkins - Southtrap

There was no time to think of what was happening. The ship sheered, the jib-boom dug into the cliff, and broke off short abaft of where we were.

Linn and I were pitched into the surging water. The cold was paralysing. I felt the backwash start to draw me away from the cliff. I seemed to be caught in a spider's web of ropes, guys, chains, wires and blocks all washing and entangling themselves.

I knew that in seconds the undertow would sweep us away from Ship Rock and the icy sea would do the rest.

I held Linn under the arms and snatched at the nearest thing. It wasn't a rope, — it was thick and slippery, the thickness of a man's calf. It was a frond of kelp anchored to Ship Rock.

I hauled us in, hand over hand.

'Linn — ride in on the next wave — that ledge — there!'

The kelp seemed to originate from a ragged shelf about five metres above us.

'Use your feet!' I called, spitting out mouthfuls of water. 'Don't let the water smash you against the rock!'

There was no time for more. The next roller — a huge sea — picked us and Botany Bay up together and threw us against the rock. At the same instant I heaved all my weight on to the kelp, scrambling, slipping, grasping, keeping hold of Linn.

I felt the horizontal shelf — no more than a metre wide — under my clawing fingers. The water started to fall back. If I didn't hang on, there would be no second chance.

I whipped the rope linking us over a spur-like projection on the shelf and at the same time gripped the kelp frond with my knees and ankles the way I had used Botany Bay's backstay to slide down. The roller took another side-swipe at the dying ship on its return. We were left hanging like two flies against the streaming black cliff.

'John!' called Linn faintly. 'Let me go! Let me go! I can't make it any more!'

She was about a metre lower than I was, trying to find a finger-hold in the smooth rock.

'Linn! Listen! The rope's fast round a rock. I'm going to ease myself down on this piece of kelp. My weight will counter-balance you and pull you up. When you reach the shelf double-loop the rope round the projection. That'll hold it for me. Then haul yourself on to the ledge.'

'John, it's hopeless…'

'Do as I say! Quick — there's another breaker coming!', I eased my grip en the kelp. The seesaw effect of my weight was immediate. Linn went on up past me. I went down.

'John!' It was Linn above. 'I've got it!'

I knew she had, the way the rope felt. I scrabbled and clawed my way up the smooth cliff on the lifeline. It could not have been more than a couple of metres, — it felt like a thousand.

Then I was up and over on to the ledge.

I threw myself to shelter on the narrow projection just as the next roller poured over us. Half an hour of that kind of drenching and we'd simply fall off the ledge into the sea from cold.

I risked a glance over the edge. Botany Bay had turned broadside directly under me. The next breaker would give her the coup de grace. Then I spotted Wegger in the motor-launch, poised over the tiller. He was alone. He was seaman enough, and cool enough, to wait for it: he was going to float the launch off its deck skids at the next wave — if he wasn't dashed to pieces by it. Two or three men were on deck, shouting and gesticulating at him. They made a rush at the boat and I heard the sound of more shots.

Then the mainmast crashed against the cliff level with our ledge. The topsail yard scraped along our rock.

I knew in a flash what to do.

I stood up, half-carried, half-led Linn, and swung myself on to the yard by some trailing buntlines and sheets.

That mainmast must go at any moment; it also must fall clear the only way Wegger could escape in the motor-launch, namely on the weather side.

The mast sheared, the ship shattered, and we toppled sideways all in one movement. The mast broke, in two places, one at deck level and the other at the topmast cap-stay, just above our heads. The main section struck the rock first with a bone-shattering jar and then rebounded seawards in a slow arc from the drag of its retaining tackle.

We hit the water. I heard the crackle of an engine.

The mast had fallen almost on top of Wegger.

He wrenched the tiller over but before the rudder could bite he was amongst the ropes and fallen rigging. And us.

I shot to my feet, balancing myself on the plunging yard like a circus act, while I hauled Linn up beside me.

Within half a dozen metres the motor-launch had tangled with some shrouds and backstays. Linn and I raced along the intervening space like trapeze artists. We toppled headlong into the boat.

My first thought was to remember how Wegger had gunned down the survivors on deck as they made for the launch.

I pulled myself off the bottom-boards. 'Wegger…!'

He was trying to back clear of the wreckage.

'She's fast for'ard!' he rapped out. 'Quick, man! Free her! The screw mustn't foul!'

I knew as well as he what would happen if it did. I unhitched myself from Linn and darted forward. The bow was enmeshed in some of the main deck life-nets and part of the maintop shrouds. I grabbed some floating wreckage and prised it free.

'Hard astern!' I yelled at Wegger.

Wegger gunned the engine, went astern for a few moments, and then skilfully manoeuvred the launch to clear the wreck.

Suddenly Linn called, 'Stop!' There's a man swimming — right here! A little to your right…'

There was only one person that huge frame could have been — Ullmann. He was swimming strongly towards us.

One moment he was there, the next his face shot out of the water as he screamed in agony.

I saw the great black fin dart between the launch and the swimmer like a running torpedo.

Killer whale.

Then Ullmann was gone.

Four other black fins raced past us to the pounding wreck.

'Wegger,' I shouted, clawing my way aft, 'make for the shore! They'll come for the boat once they've finished off the men in the water!'

He didn't seem to follow me.

'You're heading out to sea, man! Take her in — port, port, port!'

He jammed the tiller over so hard I thought we were lost as the fragile craft rose high on the next roller and plunged. From the wave's crest I had a glimpse of iron-bound black cliffs.

Ship Rock is about 100 metres from the shore but it seemed only seconds before we were amongst the boiling water of the reefs which run out from the mainland cliffs, dissected and serrated by a million storms.

The launch struck, slewed, stuck.

There was only one thing for it. I jumped over the bow into the perishingly cold sea.

I went up to my armpits. I felt my boots on the ragged out-crops. I put a shoulder under the bow, trying to heave the boat to safety. But she slewed further, canted, then went almost clean over with a grinding, rending noise as her bottom was ripped out. My grip on the bow was torn loose but I hung on to a painter which I had looped round my wrist. I stumbled, fell, stumbled landward — to safety.

The next wave carried the launch on and deposited it on the reef. High, if not dry.

'Linn!'

She half-fell over the side to me. Together, with my arm supporting her, we lurched higher on to the rocks, out of reach of the waves.

In a moment or two Wegger threw himself down alongside us.

For five, maybe ten, minutes, we all lay there gasping, panting, gagging seawater. Fine spray spurted over us at every roller.

The numbness of my feet and fingers matched the numbness of my mind. It was the realization that I might allow myself to slip into unconsciousness that made me pull myself into a sitting position. First, I dragged off my waterlogged boots. Then I started massaging my fingers and slapping my arms.

The initial thing I became conscious of was the absence of wind. For days the gale had tormented me,now its force was broken by the cliff at the foot of which we lay. There was hardly any light beyond a curious grey undertone to everything. We had finished up in a kind of rocky gully, not big enough to be styled a cove. There was a sheltering arm between us and the sea. The motor-launch lay on the seaward side.