Nailed by the Heart (8 page)

Of
course he would.

The
inevitable electric trickle of fear prickled across his skin.

"David.
Stay there." He kept his voice calm, but he was climbing the
steps quickly. "Don't wander off."

"Okay."

There
was nothing particularly alarming about the upper floor after all.
Anyway, the seafort was strongly built of good Yorkshire stone.

No
harm would come to them here.

As
he had done every evening for the last ten years, the big American,
Mark Faust, locked the door of the shop and walked down to
Out-Butterwick's seafront.

There
were a dozen or more people there. One or two nodded a greeting, but
most looked out to sea.

By
this time the tide was sliding in over the beach, lifting the few
small coats off the sand alongside the jetty.

The
Major was there with his dog, a smartly clipped Westie terrier. The
man looked every inch the retired officer, dressed in gray slacks and
a blazer that bore a regimental patch on the breast pocket. The
clothes, like the man, had faded over the years.

Mrs
Jarvis had pulled her wheelchair to the edge of the pavement and sat
resting one foot on the low wall that separated sand from road. It
was common knowledge that she suffered from spinal cancer. She
wouldn't make Christmas.

A
car passed slowly down the road behind them. That would be the
Reverend Reed. He would never stand here with the other
Out-Butterwick residents, but Mark knew he would drive his old Austin
Maxi up and down the seafront road at least three more times before
the sun sank behind the salt marshes. No other vehicles would pass
this way tonight.

More
people arrived, most middle-aged to elderly. Apart from little Rosie
Tamworth. She must have been about thirteen now, but she had the mind
of a three-year-old and her hands shook in a palsied way.

He
watched. We're all creatures of habit. We come down here at the same
time, stand in the same place, and we probably all harbor the same
feelings in our guts-that same tense anticipation that draws every
muscle in your body taut like a bow string.

Brinley
Fox wasn't quite like the rest. With his head down, he paced the
beach, ferociously smoking a cigarette. The image of the
old-fashioned expectant father with his wife in the delivery room.

Tony
Gateman, the little Londoner, arrived panting from the exertion of
his hurried walk.

Tony
gave the American a brisk nod.

They
waited. The sense of anticipation grew.

No
one talked at these gatherings. Not yet anyway; not until the waiting
was over.

But
tonight Mark had something to tell the Londoner; it would have to
wait.

The
Major's dog gave a little yelp and began to pace backwards and
forward as far as the tartan leather lead would allow. The Major
appeared not to notice. He gazed out to sea. As did Mark and his
neighbors.

Fox
paced faster, kicking up a spurt of sand every time he switched back
in the other direction, never raising his eyes from the beach. The
sea did not exist for him. It held one object too many.

Chewing
his lip, Mark looked out across the sea which caught the last rays of
the sun. It looked real, real peaceful.

But
the seagulls, he noticed, were deserting the sky to flee inland.
There was a bad storm coming.

The
dog gave a yelping bark and twisted on its lead.

Mark
chewed his lip-harder. Was this it? Was it coming?

All
around him there were intakes of breath. They felt it too.

Mark
sensed it oozing through the place. A kind of electricity that ran
through everything. Right down to the sand crunching beneath his
feet. So strong he could almost taste it.

Then
it was gone. As quickly as it had come.

It
was only an advance wave of the thing they all waited for. Even
little Rosie Tamworth, moving wisps of blond hair from her
little-girl face with a shaking hand.

The
sense of anticipation waned. It would not happen tonight. Probably
not even tomorrow or next week, but some time-soon.

The
Major produced a tennis ball from his pocket and threw it down the
beach. The dog, unleashed, leapt after it as if it had been fired
from a mortar, the tension in its muscles exploding in a rush of
energy.

"Evening,
Tony," said Mark in his deep rumbling voice. "I've been
wanting to catch you."

"Talk
away."

"Have
you heard about the old seafort out at Manshead?"

The
Londoner shot Mark a startled look. "No. What about it?"

"Someone's
moving in." Mark watched Tony Gateman's reaction. It was what he
expected.

Pure
shock. "Who on earth would do that?"

"A
family. Met them a couple of days ago in the shop. They've got a
little lad about six years old."

"They're
moving in? Into the s-"

"Sshh
..." Mark's big tanned paw gripped Tony's forearm. Brinley Fox
was heading toward them.

Tony
used the pause to light a cigar.

When
the Fox brother was safely out of earshot, Tony asked, "When?"

"Today."

"You
are joking? The place is derelict."

Mark
shook his head. "Took a walk up there this morning. They've put
a static caravan in the courtyard. They'll be living there while they
convert the place into a hotel."

"A
hotel? Jesus wept ... Know anything else about them?"

"Just
that they seemed like ordinary folks." Mark shot Tony Gateman a
troubled look. "Do you think they know?"

"Hello
... Anyone there?"

Henry
Blackwood chuckled. "Come out, come out wherever you are."

No
reply.

Then
he never expected one. Using the single oar at the stern, he sculled
the boat across the ocean toward the bobbing plastic bottle that
marked the position of the next lobster pot.

"You
tell me, girl, if you hear it again."

He
listened himself. The sound, three knocks on the bottom of the hull,
like someone trying to attract Henry Blackwood's attention, did not
repeat itself.

Singing
softly to himself, he hoisted the pot up by its line. As he did so he
talked.

"Beautiful
morning, Suzy. It's going to be a champion summer ... Now .. What
have we got here? Come out, my beauty, and into the box."

Taking
care not to get crimped by the lobster's massive claws, he placed the
creature into his catch-box.

"Seven
already, Suzy ... It looks as if we're going to have a good day ... A
bloody good day ... There you go-"

There
was nothing he liked better. A glass-calm sea, the sun edging up over
the horizon, a milky mist softening the line of the coast. And to
talk to his beloved Suzy. He'd built her with his own hands fifteen
years ago: twenty feet long, she was painted a brilliant white and
resembled an overgrown rowing boat. He imagined even God Almighty
himself couldn't have been more pleased when He stood back to admire
His cosmic handiwork on the Sixth Day.

Suzy
never answered back. Always faithful, always reliable. Suzy carried
him efficiently away from the noise of his household full of teenage
sons who never stopped arguing morning, noon and night, all the way
ten miles down the coast, to where he fished the lobster and crab
grounds.

"Tea
break, Suzy." He sat on the bench seat and pulled out a thermos.
"Mind if I smoke, old girl? Okay... I promise it'll only be the
one."

Smiling,
he poured the tea and lit the cigarette. He relaxed with the gentle
bob of the boat and looked around, enjoying everything in God's
creation. The seagulls scooting low over the water. A formation of
geese flying high overhead.

He
was all alone. No other boats. Not even a glimpse of a distant cargo
ship.

Gradually
the mist began to thin and he could make out the houses down the
coast at Out-Butterwick.

Half
a mile in front of him the lines of the old seafort were taking
shape in the morning sunlight.

It
wasn't always like this, though. The North Sea could be a rough old
bastard. When he left school he worked the trawlers. One winter's day
the boat had simply filled up with water and gone from under his
feet. For twenty hours he hung onto the buoy that marked the
deep-water channels.

When
at last the lifeboat got him back to dry land a news reporter had
gone on and on about Blackwood's superhuman strength; how he'd hung
onto the buoy through a force eight gale that smashed boats into
matchsticks.

Blackwood
had grunted: "Of course you bloody well get strong, pulling in
nets so full of fish that they weigh the same as a family car."

After
that girls he'd never met before would come up to him in pubs and
squeeze his muscular arms and giggle.

"You're
not a silly giggler are you, old girl?" He patted Suzy's
gunwale. "You're worth your weight in gold."

It
happened again.

"Knock
bloody knock-who's there?"

This
time four slow knocks beneath his feet-he even felt the vibration
through his sea-boots.

"Who
do you think it is, Suzy? Mr Neptune? Davy Jones-up from his locker?
Captain Bones looking for his booty?"

He
chuckled and peered down over the side into the water.

Nothing
but smooth green ocean with hardly a ripple to break the surface.
Perhaps something had caught underneath the fishing boat. If it was a
line or piece of discarded net it could foul the propeller when
Blackwood came to start the engine.

"Right,
we can't see anything-let's see if we can feel anything on you, old
girl." Rolling up his sleeve, the fisherman knelt down at the
side of the boat, leaned forward over the side and ran his hand along
the hull below the waterline.

Carefully
he worked his way to where the sound had seemed to come through the
planking. Leaning so far over he was within an ace of rolling forward
into the water, he felt the underside of the boat, fingers tingling
with the cold now.

"Nothing
... You're as clean as a whistle, old girl."

It
was as he began to pull his hand from the water that something
touched him.

"Now,
what was that?" He reached down under the boat again, his hand
clutching at sea water.

Nothing.

Probably
just a stalk of sea kelp floating by.

He
stood up, flicking the water from his hand, then drying it with a
rag.

"Reckon
it's Davy Jones up to his old tricks again."

He
reached the next lobster pot, caught the plastic bottle marker
floating on the dead-calm surface, and began pulling in the line.

Blackwood
returned to his singing again. Then he stopped. The line had snagged.
He pulled harder. It still held firm.

He
was just about to yank it when the line cracked tight, jerking his
hands down toward the water.

"Ach
... Damn, damn-damn!"

He
let go of the line and watched as the slack he'd already pulled on
board shot over the gunwale and disappeared, taking the bottle marker
with it.

He
looked over the side. The bottle had disappeared.

The
sod had actually sunk like it was made out of stone.

Incredulous,
Blackwood shook his head. "Well, I've never seen that before.
Something pulled that bugger straight down ... Hmm, we've got
something bloody peculiar going on here ... Ach, that's sore."

He
looked at his fingers. A friction burn ran across them in a
raw-looking groove. It began to burn like hellfire.