Invasion

Cribben hesitated for a moment. 'Wait,' he ordered, and snatched an oilskin from behind the door, then plunged off down the beach frontage. Kydd followed.

'Ye're breaking ship y'self, then,' Stirk said, with relish, as he caught up.

The lively seas were rolling in, with white-capped breakers here and there, the wind flat and hard from the east. If they left now they would make it out to Teazer, a wet and uncomfortable trip, but if they delayed . . .

Kydd chuckled. 'Well, we bein' held up ashore, th' ship's boat won't take seas like this, will it now? S' what we do while we waits for th' weather t' ease is no one's business . . .' They laughed together, like youngsters out on a prank.

Cribben disappeared inside a hut further along and came out with a weathered individual. 'Dick Redsull,' he threw over his shoulder. 'We needs another.' The man was clearly of some years and cackled a greeting at them, but Kydd recognised the wiry build of a seaman.

Cribben hurried along to another boat-hut, but without success. 'Long Jabber Neame?' Redsull suggested reedily.

'If 'n he ain't betwaddled wi' ale,' muttered Cribben, but entered a small cottage and emerged with a large, bewildered man carrying sea-boots and trying to pull on foul-weather gear.

'Jack Neame, lads,' he said apologetically. His red-rimmed eyes probably owed more to grog than salt-spray but he steered a straight enough course.

'Get some foulies f'r ye,' Cribben said, and briefly ducked into his house, finding Kydd and Stirk sea-boots, jerseys and oilskins. They were well used, with the smell of tar, linseed oil and humanity.

Leaving the grateful pair to haul them on, Cribben went away to get further word on the ship. He returned with a satisfied grin. 'A three-master t' seaward o' the Knoll,' he said, to understanding nods from the hovellers. 'We'll go 'im I think. Oh—what does we call ye, then?'

'Ah, Tom's m' tally an' this here is Toby.'

Cribben nodded, then explained that the ship was probably a foreigner without a pilot, too much in dread of a notorious reputation to attempt the narrow channels through the treacherous sandbanks to the shelter of the Downs on the other side. And, with the easterly wind strengthening, so would be their anxieties over the anchor and cable that were holding them.

Daisy May was lying stem seaward with deck-covers whipping and hammering in the gusts, but already a large beach party was milling about in expectation of employment. Cribben waved cheerily at several men as he tramped over to the field past the King's Naval Yard.

Dozens of anchors of all shapes, weights and vintages recovered from the sands were laid out there; Cribben took his time and picked a stout piece nearly twice his height. 'This 'un,' he declared. It needed twenty men and a sledge to bring the awkward monster to the water's edge, the seas breaking heavily about it in a seething hiss.

The crowd held back respectfully while Cribben heaved himself up into the lugger and carefully checked the gear. 'Jack?' he called, and Neame joined him. The long fore and mizzen yards with sails already bent on were handed into the boat, clapped on to their masts and quickly rigged.

A steady stream of men laid square timbers down the shingle.

'Come on, let's be havin ye!' Cribben urged. Kydd heaved himself up over the high bulwarks and stumbled over a dismaying tangle of ropes and spars lying about in the capacious hull.

Fortunately a dipping-lug rig was the simplest of all, and by the time impatient shouts were going up from those outside, he had taken it in: two masts, a yard for each, tacks and sheets. Under the wet snarl of rigging, all around the bottom-boards, there were regular coils of substantial rope, with the left-hand lay of anchor cable.

'You, Tom, go take th' fore wi' Jack. Toby, aft wi' me.' Kydd did as he was told and glanced to seaward. It was a scene he had seen many times before—but from the deck of a well-found man-o'-war, not an open boat hardly bigger than a frigate's launch.

Under the hammering easterly the white-caps were increasing and now marched in on the backs of grey-green waves, setting the many ships in the Downs jibbing energetically to their anchors. But what drew Kydd's attention was an indistinct white line developing on the grey horizon: wild seas piling up on the hovellers' destination, the Goodwin Sands.

The tide was low, making it nearly a hundred feet down steep shingle to pull the craft to its native element. The beach party crowded round, every inch of the boat manned, and a double rope led out forward with willing hands tailing on.

Kydd looked down on scores of backs bent ready.

'Alaaaawww!' At the hoarse cry every man buckled to.

They were launching into the teeth of a dead muzzler, and Kydd knew they had to win their way against wind and the surging combers.

'Alaaaawww!' the cry went up again. It was answered immediately by a regular chant, and the heaving began. 'Alaw boat, haul, alaw boat, haul, haul, haul, haaauuul!' At first the straining saw no result, but then the boat shuddered and inched forward over the timbers.

'Alaaaawww!' The ton deadweight of the Daisy May picked up speed and slithered down the ways until she met the seas in thumps of spray—and they were afloat, the wet black iron of the big anchor left forlorn on the beach.

'Jack, damn ye!' But Neame had already leaned over the bluff bow and taken the dripping rope handed up to him, straightening and passing it rapidly to the waiting Redsull. Then Kydd understood: this was a haul-off warp, and he bent to help get it over the stout windlass so that they could heave their boat bodily out to sea past the line of breakers.

Daisy May reared and shied at the considerable seas now rampaging in, but with three men at the windlass they hauled out steadily in the teeth of the wind to the warping buoy and quickly tied off.