Chapter 1
ST VINCENT Halfhyde came awake, slowly and painfully. His mouth was like the bottom of a parrot’s cage, filled with the gritty feel of sawdust, and his head rang like a ship’s bell. On the floor above, a cat sounded as though it was stamping its feet. The smallest sound went through Halfhyde like the jab of a marline spike. He retched violently and broke out into a cold sweat as the sleazy room swayed around him. His recollections of the night before were so hazy as to be virtually non-existent. He remembered falling in with a seasoned shipmaster, a short man in a tall hat who had been having his final fling ashore before taking his windjammer out of the Mersey and south for Cape Horn. Sobriety had lain ahead and Captain McRafferty was making hay while he could, and had drawn Halfhyde with him in his almighty haywain…
Liverpool was a roistering hell of a place. As the nineteenth century moved towards its end and the old Queen grew even older and more revered and the Prince of Wales waited impatiently for his inheritance and his freedom, Liverpool was reaching a peak of prosperity, its docks and wharves crowded with masts and spars, with bales of cargo to and from all the world’s ports, with swearing, blaspheming, hard-living and hard-drinking stevedores and ships’ officers and crews, the latter having largely come through purgatory to the Mersey and soon to be off again for another dose.
It was no wonder the public-houses did a roaring trade in whisky, gin and beer. One of the best and busiest was the Bear’s Paw, handy for the docks on the Birkenhead side of the river. It had been in the Bear’s Paw that Halfhyde had made the casual acquaintance of Captain McRafferty. “I am being driven to the drink,” Captain McRafferty had said as he emptied his seventh glass of Dunville’s whisky, “against my will.”
“Indeed?”
“’Tis the truth I’m telling you, my friend. ’Tis the filth and smoke that’s doing it.” McRafferty waved an arm towards the vicinity of the river. “All those dirty steamers that send their stink to heaven to offend the good Lord’s nostrils. There’s more and more of them today, driving sail from all the seas.” He laid down half a sovereign on the bar and signalled up his eighth Irish whisky. He gathered up nine shillings and eight pence change in silver and copper. This he thrust into a leather purse; Halfhyde regarded the purse sardonically: a purse was the symbol of a mean man, and McRafferty hadn’t bought him so much as one drink, a compliment that he had not hesitated to return. Each paid for his own. “There’s a new breed come in with the steamers,” McRafferty went on, not in the least discommoded by the amount of drink he had taken. “Engineers, they call themselves, and think they should be classed as officers, so I’m told. They’re black with filth, with oil and grease and coal-dust. It would not be possible to have them in any decent ship’s saloon. Now I’ll tell you something.”
“Yes, Captain?”
“Never would I take a steamer to sea. I’d sink first. I’m a sailing-ship man and always will be. And you?”
Halfhyde smiled. “Steam has been my own experience, but—”
“I might have known it,” McRafferty said in disgust. “You look like a seaman, and yet you don’t—that’s steam for you! When I was young ships were made of wood, the men who sailed them were made of iron. Now it’s the other way round, so help me God. Iron ships and wooden men. Drink up, and maybe I’ll stand you the next.”
Halfhyde gave a hiccup. “You don’t really mean that, Captain.”
“Well now, maybe I don’t. You have money?”
“Enough for my humble needs.”
“Then I don’t mean it. Drink up just the same. What’s your ship?”
“At this moment, I have no ship. That’s to say—”
“On the beach. I see. Your line, man?”
Halfhyde said, “Grey Funnel.”
“Grey Funnel?”
“Her Majesty’s Navy, Captain. But I have a sabbatical. I have recently been placed, not for the first time, upon the half-pay list.”
“You mean,” McRafferty said with much deliberation, “You have been booted out. I like an honest man, not one who uses euphemisms.”
“I am no liar, Captain McRafferty,” Halfhyde said. He set his glass down hard enough to break it. Whisky and blood stained the bar. “I told you I am on half pay and that’s the truth. If—”
“Very well, I accept your word. It is not important to me after all,” McRafferty said off-handedly. “And now? Have you come to Liverpool to look for more active employment aboard a ship, or what? Are you in need of further pay, and have found that no one ashore stands in need of those trained to the sea?”
Halfhyde said, “I wish to return to sea, certainly. But I’m not in need of a permanent berth. I intend sailing ultimately as an independent shipmaster.”
McRafferty gave a loud laugh followed by a belch. “Your pardon. Damme, you’re mad! You sound like an owner, as I also—”
“That’s what I intend to be after acquiring some experience aboard a merchant ship,” Halfhyde said. “Then I shall be in the market for a small but well-found ship, and it must be steam.”
COMING DIZZILY that next morning through the fumes of Dunville’s, Halfhyde knew that he was not in his customary lodging but had no idea where he might be. No matter; he was alive and uninjured by the gangs of evil-minded men who roamed the night streets and alleys of Liverpool. He racked his brains in an attempt to remember exactly what he had told Captain McRafferty. One thing he was able to recall: McRafferty had asked him to go aboard his ship, the fully rigged Aysgarth Falls of which he was owner as well as master. A time had been set for noon. Halfhyde, whose family farmed a large area of Wensleydale in Yorkshire not far
