Katie Fforde - Going Dutch

‘No, I think that covers it.' Jo sighed and then smiled. Although she felt a lot better since her talk with Marcus, she wasn't completely cured of her phobia.

He smiled back at her, as if reading her thoughts. 'It'll befine, Joanna, really it will. Now, I need to have a good poke around so I'm going to put on my boiler suit and get going.' Marcus got up from the table.

When he had gone up to the wheelhouse, where he had presumably left his boiler suit, Dora said, 'Now, you have a rest, Jo. Lie down and shut your eyes while we finish clearing up.' Dora had noticed that Jo liked to doze for twenty minutes or so and obviously felt she deserved to even more today.

‘I couldn't relax with Marcus here,' she said. 'He might want to ask me things.'

‘But you won't know the answer!' Dora's honesty was brutal. 'If you can't chill here, go and see Tilly. If Marcus really needs you, I'll shout across or come and get you.'

‘I'd come with you if I could get away,' said Tilly, handing Jo a tall glass full of ice cubes and fizzy water. 'But some of us have to work for a living.'

‘I have to work for a living!' Jo was already nervy from having this whole trip to Holland made horribly real. 'I'm restoring some bits and pieces for Miranda. Did you meet Miranda and Bill? On Hepplewhite?'

‘ Think so. They've got an antique shop, haven't they?'

‘Well, Miranda part owns it, but she said if I can learn to restore little collectables it would be really useful for them. And good for me, too.'

‘I know it's too late for you, Jo, but I would never give up my ability to earn my own living.’

Tilly, Jo remembered now, was a high-powered manage ment consultant who appeared to work smart not hard. Jo sighed. 'The trouble is, I didn't have much ability to earn money. I always had jobs, not a career. All I wanted were babies, really.'

‘And you've just got the one daughter?'

‘That's right. Karen. I'm terribly proud of her! I've just posted her fork-lift truck driving certificate to her; she needs it in Canada.'

‘Oh wow. She's got skills, then!’

Jo laughed. 'Oh yes, she's quite different from me.' Dora appeared on the pontoon.

‘Oh, come aboard,' said Tilly. 'Have a spritzer.’

Dora took a moment to wonder if people on boats really drank more than their shore-side equivalents, or if it just seemed that way. 'Better not. I'm in the middle of a job. Jo, Marcus wants to know when you last had the fuel barge round.'

‘The fuel barge?' Jo's brow wrinkled in thought.

‘Yes,' said Tilly. 'To fill you up with diesel. It hasn't been round for months, Dora.'

‘Why does Marcus want to know?' Jo sounded agitated and put on the spot.

‘He wants to know how much fuel is left in the tanks.'

‘I've been as economical as I can,' said Jo. 'I turned off the central heating as soon as possible. There should be plenty left because the tanks were nearly full when I arrived. Michael told me.'

‘Oh.'

‘Oh? Isn't that good news?'

‘I don't think so. Marcus wants to drain the tanks.’

Jo drained her glass and reluctantly got up. A 'rest' had been too much to ask for, obviously. 'I'd better come. I can't relax over here when God knows what is going on over there.’

Tom and Marcus were in the engine room. Marcus was wearing his boiler suit, and Tom a lot of grease. Jo and Dora peered down the hatch at them.

‘What's the problem?' asked Jo. 'There should be plenty of fuel. I've used as little as possible.'

‘That's the problem,' said Marcus. 'Whatever Michael says about them being clean, I want to check for myself. That means we have to drain the tanks.'

‘What, now?' Jo felt that reality was slipping away. 'It's six o'clock on a Sunday evening.'

‘If I can drain the tanks I can see if they need cleaning.

Tom's undertaken to do that for me if it's necessary.’

‘What, now?' Jo said again, obviously still aghast.

‘Well, no,' said Marcus. 'Over the next few days. When is the fuel barge due to come again?’

Jo opened the wheelhouse door and yelled across to Tilly, who, fortunately, was still relaxing on deck. 'When's the fuel barge due next?'

‘You'll have to book it. If several people need diesel, it'll come. Otherwise you have to go round to it. Or you could go on to the river. Lots of barges need filling up there. The fuel barge goes up and down all the time.’

Jo came back inside. 'Fine.' The time had come for Marcus's attempts to cure her of her terror to be tested.

‘OK!' Marcus called up. 'I've found the gauging stick.' There was a tense silence while Jo and Dora imagined having to take the barge out on to the rolling Thames, which, in their minds, was enduring a hurricane at the time.

‘There's not too much in there, but I want it all out.' This was directed at Tom. 'Is there a pump? Oh yes. Now, is there something we can empty it into?’

Marcus had stopped asking Jo questions and was concentrating on Tom.

‘Don't think so, not on the barge, but my mate's got oil drums. I could borrow a couple.'

‘Now?'

‘Pretty much. I'll go and ask.'

‘You'll need a hand to get them back.’

There was a silence. Jo and Dora were listening from the wheelhouse, both tense.

‘I'll get my mates to come back with me. I don't want to take Dora,' he added in a lower voice.

In the wheelhouse, Jo and Dora exchanged relieved glances. Jo was relieved that Dora wasn't going to leave her with Marcus, and Dora because she didn't want to walk miles with an oil drum clutched to her chest – and also because she was a bit nervous of Tom's mates. They were definitely scary to a nice middle-class girl from the Home Counties.

Tom emerged from the engine room. 'I'm going to-’

‘We know,' chorused Jo and Dora. 'We heard.'

‘Oh. I'll be off then.’

He was halfway down the pontoon when Dora suddenly called after him. 'Wait! I'll give you a hand.’

As she hurried to catch him up she wondered why and realised that being a nice girl from the Home Counties was quite a boring thing to be, and that she wanted to stretch her boundaries a bit.

Marcus joined Jo in the wheelhouse. 'He's a good lad, that Tom. He has initiative.'

‘He'd be thrilled to hear you say that. He's so keen to come with us to Holland.'

‘And how do you feel about it now?'

‘Better, but I won't know if I'm frightened until we actually set off. Do you want to sit down?'

‘Have you got a newspaper or something for me to sit on? I might be a bit oily.’

Jo instantly produced a newspaper from under one of the cushions, glad for once that she hadn't got round to recycling recently. 'So, what's the plan?'

‘I'll help Tom pump out the tanks, to see what they're like, and then he said he'll clean them out over the comingweek. I'll be back next weekend and we'll go to the fuel barge and refuel.'

‘But if you pump out all the fuel, how will you get to the fuel barge?'

‘We'll filter enough from what we pump out to get us there.' He hesitated. 'It's very messy, Joanna.'

‘Why do you insist on calling me Joanna?'

‘Because it's your name, and I like it.'

‘Oh.' Jo considered for a minute and decided she liked it too. On the other hand, she would never get people to stop calling her Jo, not now.

‘But what about the mess?' Marcus went on. 'Diesel gets everywhere and it's horrible stuff. We'll need to make sure we've got loads of rags, newspaper, kitchen towel, things like that.'

‘There's quite a large bundle of rags that. I purloined from the engine room so Dora and Tom could clean out the forepeak.'

‘Newspapers?’

Jo patted her seat. 'Several under here, and there's a recycling section for them with the other bins. We could raid that.' Jo looked at her watch. 'Won't all this make you late back?’