Noose (5 page)

‘This was the beginning of the terrible events.'

‘Oh, definitely.'

‘Turning triumph into something else.'

‘The young woman – Emily Bass – is on the port side of the
King Arthur
, looking towards
Explorer
, really lapping up all the fun, especially because it looked certain we would succeed. That's the kind of person she obviously was, keen on fun, very natural to the young, and attractive in them.'

Ian said:
‘
She might not have seen the pier flag from there, but she'd hear the cheering and clapping and guess
King Arthur
had won, or was going to.'

‘She was
full of excitement and mischief and noise, Ian – calling across in a jolly, winner's way at the rival vessel. I was forward on the other side of the ship.'

‘Ready to fling the mooring line to the pier, so they could pull in the heavier hawser tied to it.'

‘I didn't see or hear her yelling at
Explorer
, but this came out in the Inquiry. And the rest of it.'

‘The things leading to disaster.'

‘The
King Arthur
didn't have solid bulwarks, Ian.'

‘Bulwarks being the sides of a ship above the main deck.'

‘What the
King Arthur
had instead was a broad metal rail at about four feet above the deck, and beneath it three spaced cables making a sort of safety fence. Now this woman, Emily Bass, was petite, and she must have thought they would hear her and see her better on
Explorer
if she could get extra height to shout her teasing. The thrill of it all seemed to take away her judgement. That can happen to people. I wouldn't say especially to women – that might not be fair – but it does seem to affect women the most. She climbed on to the first cable – about one foot above the deck. She must have decided this wouldn't do. She still wasn't high enough to be properly noticed from the other ship and heard. She stepped on to the second cable, another foot up. Her friends should have stopped her. But several of her party, including her parents, had gone starboard to watch the approach to the pier. Some pals did remain close by. They were as excited as she was, though, and one of them had climbed on to a cable as well, so as to be seen from the
Explorer
, but only the lowest.

‘This woman, the friend of Emily Bass, told the Inquiry there was what she called a kind of “holiday fever”. She said she'd tried the second cable, but didn't feel safe and came down to the one below. Anyway, nobody advised Emily Bass to be sensible. If a member of the crew had seen her, he would have made both of them get down on to the deck, but we were all on the starboard side, because that's where we'd be needed when we reached the pier.'

‘Ropes. The mooring hawser.'

‘Now, what became clear at the Inquiry was that Corbitty saw this woman, Emily Bass, from where he stood on the
Explorer
bridge and realized at once that she'd climbed into a very hazardous position if the
King Arthur
should rock or sway a little as she approached Penarth pier. He waved hard at her and also called out, telling her to get down.
Explorer
's
helmsman confirmed this at the Inquiry. But Emily Bass only laughed at Top Dog, seemed to think he was cross because the
King Arthur
would be first, and wanted to stop her enjoying this idea so much. Corbitty immediately put the
Explorer
engine room telegraph from Full Ahead to Dead Slow Ahead Both – obviously recognizing now that the
King Arthur
should go in first, and that
Explorer
must lie off and wait, for the sake of the woman's well-being.

‘As I mentioned, Ian, at the Inquiry nobody spoke of a race, except for one member of the Board, who asked if there had been anything of that nature, and received a very clipped and definite “No” – was told such behaviour would defy regulations, and therefore could not possibly occur. It would be irresponsible. He had to say that. He had to lie. Of course, there
had
been a race, but Corbitty must have seen the danger to that woman leaning out over the rail, and called off his challenge. He was a captain and competitor but also a professional and a gentleman. He accepted that the race must be abandoned so as to cut the risk to Emily Bass.'

‘The
King Arthur
had been making for the pier unusually fast, because of the threat from
Explorer.
'

‘Not
much
too fast, Ian. A little. Dominal knew he could rely on good stopping power from the two reversed paddles. That's how he was going to play it. I'd seen him carry out that kind of action several times before. He had the experience. But, Ian, you see, a sudden change from Full Ahead Both to Full Astern Both on a paddle steamer will always cause a kind of profound shock to go through the whole hull of a ship, and affect her steadiness for a moment, only a moment. There's a definite strain on the structure. Perhaps it's something like jamming the brakes on in a motor car. The driver can't be sure how the vehicle will behave then. With a ship, it's worse. She might suddenly and briefly develop a list – a tilt – to one side or the other when suddenly asked for that kind of abrupt change. This will be especially true if the port and starboard paddles are not absolutely matched in timing. Even a difference of half a minute between reaching maximum power will cause a ship to pitch slightly and briefly to one side. Paddle steamers gradually got phased out and the Bristol Channel pleasure craft became propeller driven. But that's how the paddlers were then – liable to lurch.'

‘It's known as yawing,' Ian said. ‘And this is what happened to the
King Arthur.
And this is what happened to Emily Bass.'

‘Dominal signals to our engine room Full Astern Both because his ship is almost at the pier. He knows he has won. The chief engineer gives him that big reverse surge at once – has been expecting the telegraphed order. Paddles as brakes. Dominal doesn't want to go backwards, but to halt. Once the
King Arthur
is stationary he'll telegraph Stop Engines. The Inquiry heard that tests showed the
King Arthur
's
paddles could, in fact, be very slightly out of unison – not enough to cause bother normally, but dangerous on the day owing to a pile-up of special circumstances. When he signalled for Full Astern Both, one paddle was fractionally behind the other in responding. This had an effect. It made a wobble more likely, and more marked.

‘That woman, Emily Bass, because of where she stood on the port side second cable, had the top of the rail at somewhere between knee and thigh level, Ian. It meant she had no proper balance if the ship skewed. Corbitty had spotted that, and cut his speed, evidently hoping Dominal would see he'd won, and could therefore take the
King Arthur
in gently to the pier, coming down gradually from Full Ahead Both to Half Ahead, then Slow, then, on the opposite side of the dial, to Slow Astern Both, Half Astern, and, finally, ease her into Full Astern, with no abruptness or stress on the hull.

‘But Dominal had let the
King Arthur
get a little too close to the pier for that sort of careful, stage-by-stage, standard run-in. The ship stopped at the landing point, with no damage to the pier or vessel, but she did do a momentary minor dip to port – yes, minor, only a few degrees, but, on account of the way Emily Bass had climbed, enough to fling her into the sea between the two ships. She was like a stone shot from a catapult. She had no hope of control.'

‘And then, Dad, as the
King Arthur
swings back to normal upright the ship sucks the water in under her port side, making a sort of whirlpool, and this is something else to pull Emily Bass down – and anyone trying to save her.'

‘I was still forward on the other side handling the ropes for mooring us to the pier, and didn't know about her at once. I did know the ship had “done a shudder” as we used to call it, but that was more or less normal when a paddler went suddenly into Full Astern from Full Ahead. We didn't worry. And we'd had so much yelling from both vessels that nobody could tell there'd been a change in what that meant. But some of it now was distress shouts from her friends.

‘On Slow Ahead the
Explorer
,
a little further out, had gone past us and I could see the whole length of her near side. Captain Corbitty was on the starboard bridge wing, staring down at the sea near the
King Arthur
. He wore dark blue uniform and a gold peaked cap, very smart, very Corbitty, but he pulled the cap off and let it fall at his feet and then started to undo his jacket. I realized two things then, Ian. First, someone must have gone overboard from the
King Arthur
, and second, I saw that Captain Corbitty meant to dive or jump from the bridge wing and attempt a rescue.'

‘Your mind raced.'

‘It did.'

‘You thought it wasn't right.'

‘In a certain way I thought it wasn't right.'

‘Because until now Captain Corbitty had been a sort of foe, and yet he was the only one ready to go in after one of
your
passengers.'

‘Well, not a foe, exactly. Say, a rival.'

‘A different ship.'

‘He was taking responsibility for the danger to one of our passengers, not one of his own. It made me feel ashamed, Ian. I was still forward on the starboard side, but I ran across the deck and along to the spot which Corbitty had seemed to be staring at. Several of the woman's friends stood at the rail looking down at the sea, calling her name, screaming that someone was overboard. Captain Dominal, on our bridge, must have heard this. He came out on to the port wing to see what had happened. He understood instantly and shouted to me to get the small, stern-mounted dinghy into the water. This was the sort of crisis that boat was meant for.'

‘But you thought it would take too long.'

‘Other crew members could do that. Dominal's reaction was the standard reaction. I don't say this amounted to an obvious mistake. No. In some situations he would have been absolutely right. But, as I think you know, Ian, I am one who will not always be satisfied by the obvious, the laid down method of tackling a situation. I am one who will form his own, personal response to a problem. I certainly don't want to overplay this. It's simply how I am. Others are made differently, and it would be vain and foolish to think less of them for that. But I decided, personally decided, that fellow crew members could launch the stern boat. The moment required something else from me, something quicker, in fact, something immediate. Demanded it.

‘I was at exactly the right place. This is something of a flair of mine. I tend in some mysterious, instinctive fashion to put myself into a position where, if there are difficulties, I can deal with them. Again, I don't wish to swank about this. It is a subconscious urge. I cannot explain it, or expect credit for it. Simply, it is me, Laurence Charteris.'

‘Although you were on the starboard side your flair and subconscious urge told you to get to the port side.'

‘I'm used to such promptings. I couldn't see Emily Bass, but I knew this must be the spot, because her friends had gathered there at the rail. And I knew also because Captain Corbitty must have seen her fall and, even while he undressed, had his gaze directed to one patch of water. I ignored Dominal's order. This is no small matter at sea – to disobey the captain.'

‘In
Mutiny on the Bounty
they used to keelhaul sailors for that.'

‘But I would have felt guilty if Captain Corbitty had gone in alone. I began to pull off my own clothes, then climbed on to the deck rail and dived.'

Ian became used to – very, very used to – the unvaried way his father always ended the account of things. He would tell the story as far as the couple of tense seconds while he stripped to his underclothes, climbed on to the
King Arthur
deck rail, stood poised for a moment, then dived. At any segment in this tale, if his father had suddenly lost his voice, Ian would have been able to continue with more or less exactly the right words and clever, well-tried pauses. But, always, when his father had reached the deck rail and the dive, he'd say hardly anything more.

Instead he'd hand Ian a scrap album already open at the spread of pages two and three. This book contained cuttings from newspapers dealing with the rescue, and the death. Mr Charteris had glued them in. Ian could never decide whether his father chose this way of finishing the tale because he did not want to be boastful, or because he
was
boastful, and thought that if several newspapers called him brave he must have been, so all he had to do was show the cuttings. On the whole, Ian, the child, considered his father had quite a stack of boastfulness in him, although he wasn't tall. Ian also considered that his father had been very brave. Nobody would have criticized him if he hadn't dived, but, instead, done what the captain instructed and gone for the stern dinghy. Yes, his dad could be brave, and his dad wanted people to know about it.

Ian had read the many cuttings so often he could have recited them also, without the print in front of him, but he always behaved as though this was the first time he had seen them, because of pity for his father and the way he needed to be praised and glorified for what he did. Ian would follow the newspaper paragraphs slowly, line by line with his finger, pretending to be scared of missing any of it, and he'd show quite a load of admiration and wonder. He thought his father expected this.

And when he had first spoken to Ian about events on that bad day, and first showed him the scrapbook, Ian really had felt admiration and wonder. And the second and third time, also. But then quite slowly there came an alteration. However, Ian knew it would be cruel to close the scrapbook too soon, or not to look at the shreds of newspaper at all, because this might show he had seen these cuttings enough to make him sick of them and to wonder whether his father was really proud of himself, too proud.