A Thimbleful of Hope Read online

  Pulling her fur hat down over her ears, she slipped her arm through her husband’s and they made their way by gaslight along Admiralty Pier and across the walkway on to the Samphire. When the inspector checked their tickets, Arvin glanced towards her with a look of mild surprise as if he had been lost in a trance and forgotten she was there.

  ‘You seem distracted this evening,’ she observed, as the water slapped against the quay.

  He patted her hand. ‘My mind is much occupied with business that you need not be concerned with. Don’t fret, my dear! Once we are safely through Calais, we’ll take the train to Lille where we change for Paris. I’ll feel much more at ease when we arrive at our destination.’

  She couldn’t help wondering if he was anxious about the crossing – he would never admit to it, of course. Smiling to herself, she walked with him along the deck, listening to the sound of manly voices: the captain’s orders to the sailors and their calls back; the laughter and swearing from some passengers who had clearly emerged from one of the nearby inns; the shouting from where the mail master was stowing the bags which had been unloaded from the train alongside, its engine hissing and belching steam and smuts.

  The porter stopped outside one of the doors towards the bow of the ship, unlocked it and showed them inside. He tipped his trolley, depositing their belongings in a neat stack on the floor.

  ‘Can I help you stow this away, sir?’ he asked.

  ‘No, that will be all,’ Arvin said.

  There was an awkward moment when Violet found herself compelled to give her husband a hard stare to remind him to tip the poor man. Arvin dug around in the pockets of his greatcoat and found a shilling.

  ‘Thank you, sir. I wish you a pleasant crossing.’ The porter’s expression was one of indifference as he left with his tip, and Violet supposed that her husband’s generosity had not been enough to make up for his initial faux pas.

  Removing her gloves, she looked around the cabin where the sconces flickered, making reflections in the brass fittings and woodwork. The upholstered seats were clean and well padded, giving an impression of luxury, but the air reeked of tar and bilge water.

  Feeling sick, she sat down.

  The boat juddered as the engine cranked into life. Soon, the pistons began to pound, powering the steam packet away from the quay and into the Channel. The unrelenting noise made her ears hurt and the quaking of the ship brought a fresh wave of nausea welling up in her gullet.

  ‘Please, fetch me my smelling salts. Arvin!’ She raised her voice to attract his attention from where he was testing various keys on a ring from his pocket in the padlocks attached to the chains on the trunk. ‘I’m not well. I think a breath of hartshorn will revive me.’

  ‘Where is it?’ he said grudgingly, over the sound of the engines.

  ‘In my reticule over there,’ she said, not trusting her legs to hold her up. ‘I would fetch it myself, but … Oh dear, I feel such a fool.’

  ‘I hope this isn’t a sign of things to come.’ Arvin fetched her beaded purse from which she extracted the silver vinaigrette. He opened it for her and held it under her nose, the sting of the sal ammonia in her nostrils making her feel worse than ever. ‘We’ve barely left Dover and you are pining for home. I think that we should ask the master to turn about.’

  ‘Oh no, I am not going to miss out on our grand tour,’ she said, upset that he would contemplate leaving her behind. There was no way she was going home now. She was determined to meet Claudette, stay in the chateau and walk through the vineyards he had talked about so much. ‘I’m not homesick like I was before – that would be ridiculous.’

  ‘You’ll be unhappy without your mother and sisters’ company. Sometimes I wonder if we can really be married when you spend more time with them than you do with me.’

  She found it hard to explain how deeply that comment hurt her feelings. Her husband was her priority, but he was away more than she had expected, and she had found herself depending on her family to combat the loneliness. There were only so many letters one could write, and Arvin didn’t often respond because he was busy. She didn’t feel that it was polite to pick people up and put them down whenever it suited her, which was why she maintained her visits to the Rayfields even when he was at home, but she wished that he didn’t take them as a kind of rejection when she was fond of them all: him and her family.

  ‘It’s late,’ she said, not wishing to argue. ‘Usually we are abed by now, my love.’ In the excitement and anticipation of their journey, she had tired herself out. ‘I wish we could have taken the earlier crossing.’

  ‘You are being petulant,’ he said. ‘You know I had to wait for the mail train from London.’

  ‘Perhaps you could have had the chest sent on after us,’ she suggested.

  ‘Your father has entrusted me with its contents.’

  ‘Pray, tell me what they are.’

  ‘Just papers. No more questions. I’ve had a long day. The steward will soon be here with refreshments and I wish to sit quietly for a while.’

  He was keeping secrets from her, she realised, and lowered her gaze. For now, it seemed wise to let the subject of the chest drop.

  She looked towards the door again – Arvin had locked it behind the porter – and then at the porthole through which she could see only blackness. The engines continued to rumble. Everything around her was vibrating, churning her insides. She stood up quickly, gathering her skirts.

  ‘I need some fresh air,’ she muttered. ‘Will you come with me?’

  ‘Passengers aren’t allowed on deck at this hour. It’s too dark out there.’

  ‘I wish to go outside. I cannot breathe in here,’ she said, her heart racing with panic as the low ceiling seemed to press down on them.

  ‘Violet, do as I tell you!’

  ‘Oh, Arvin, I can’t stand another minute in this godforsaken cabin.’

  ‘Go then.’ His eyes flashed from the shadows where he knelt by the trunk. ‘On your head be it, if you fall overboard! Nobody will see you’re gone.’

  ‘If you’re trying to frighten me, it isn’t working.’ Her need to escape was more pressing than obeying her husband.

  ‘You would make a fool of me?’ he said coldly. ‘I forbid you to step outside.’

  Her hand was on the key. With trembling fingers, she turned it. What was wrong with him?

  ‘I’m grateful for your concern for my safety, but I won’t go far, only up the steps to the deck to take a few breaths of air.’

  ‘If you walk out through that door, I swear I will not follow you. I’ve been charged with looking after this, and I will not let it out of my sight.’

  She let herself out and made her way up to the main deck where the cold night air caught her by the throat. She took a deep breath as her eyes began to make out shapes emerging from the darkness: the mast for when the Samphire went under sail; a rope coiled around a capstan; the railing defining the perimeter of the deck. She walked across and grabbed on to the top rail with both hands, glad that she’d left her gloves on. Gradually, she began to feel better as the steam packet thrashed through the mild swell with her running lights – brass lanterns – shining brightly: red on the port bow and green on the starboard. One of the sailors topped up the oil in a third lantern, adjusted the wick and lit it. He closed the hinged door and tightened the wingnuts to secure it, then carried it up to the masthead where it gave out a reassuring arc of white light.

  She glanced back towards Dover where the moonlight caught the breaking crests of the waves before disappearing behind a skein of fog which obscured the South Foreland Lighthouse where she and Arvin had walked together, light-hearted as they’d tried to escape their companions. She had grown fond of him, but his devotion to her now appeared to be fading, like the colour in a plucked rose. What had she done wrong? Could it be that he was unhappy that she wasn’t yet with child?

  She turned to face France. All would be well once they reached the chateau and Arvin had had time to pu
t business aside for a while and return to his normal self. The lighthouse on Cap Gris-Nez twinkled then disappeared, and the Samphire carried on through the bank of sea haze.

  ‘Look harder!’ came the sound of shouting. ‘There are herrin’ boats about. Who’s the forrard lookout?’

  ‘Here—’ The rest of the response was drowned out by the engines, but Violet was no longer listening. Sick at heart over her marriage and disturbed by the renewed rocking of the boat, she retched miserably and clung to the railings, wishing she was back on dry land.

  ‘Hey, miss!’

  She tried to ignore the voice at her shoulder, but the man was most insistent.

  ‘Miss, go back to your cabin immediately. You shouldn’t be out here!’

  She turned to face the speaker, a young man in a dark coat and hat.

  ‘Mr Noble!’ she exclaimed.

  ‘Mrs Brooke. I’m sorry for speaking roughly to you, but there are rules,’ he said. ‘Oh dear, it seems that one hasn’t found their sea legs yet. Never mind, we’ll be in Calais before you know it.’

  ‘I truly hope so.’

  ‘I’ll escort you to your cabin.’

  ‘Thank you, but I don’t wish to trouble you while you’re at work. I can find my own way back.’

  ‘May I be so bold as to take your arm to help you down the steps at least?’ he asked as the mist swallowed the Samphire and the lights from her lanterns for a second time.

  Before she could give her assent, another shout rang out.

  ‘There’s a sail off the port bow!’

  ‘Lord have mercy on us,’ her companion muttered, and she followed his gaze towards the bow where a steamer under sail was looming out of the darkness, heading straight for the Samphire. It came so close she thought she could reach out and touch it, but she didn’t feel any fear until she heard a second voice.

  ‘Hard to port!’ the captain bellowed from the bridge. ‘Hard to port!’

  She glanced behind her and caught sight of the reflections of his night glasses from the bridge. As she turned back, she saw the name of the ship in front of her and heard her sailors shouting a warning, as the Samphire swung to one side, throwing her off balance and into William’s arms.

  ‘Hold tight, missus,’ he shouted, and she clung to him with her hands locked around his neck as the Fanny Buck bore down on the Samphire, striking her with a deafening crash on the port bow.

  ‘Steamer ahoy! Back engines!’ The crew shouted and screamed at each other.

  ‘It’s too late.’ William clasped her to him, so close that she could feel his heartbeat pounding in time with the pulse in her ears.

  Two of the Fanny Buck’s sailors came falling barefoot from above them when the ship’s bow rode up and scraped across the Samphire’s, coming to rest on her deck. Someone blew a whistle and people began shouting for help.

  ‘There is water coming in. She’s holed!’

  ‘Not us. They mean the Fanny Buck,’ William reassured her as the steamer rose with the swell of the sea and slipped from the Samphire’s deck. There was a grating and groaning sound as it fell back on to the water while the Fanny Buck’s crew began to take down her sails.

  Violet stared at where the Samphire’s fore-cabin and compartment should have been. They were under water, crumpled by the contact with the other vessel, the occupants surely having perished, crushed or drowned. The cabins to the aft of it were above the surface of the waves, but she couldn’t tell in the confusion and chaos who had escaped and who was trapped.

  ‘I have to find my husband.’

  ‘Where is he?’

  ‘In our cabin. Down there …’ She tore herself away from William and pointed towards the steps, but they were broken, made unusable by the impact.

  ‘Arvin!’ she called. ‘Are you there?’

  ‘Stay with me, Mrs Brooke,’ William said, reaching for her arm to restrain her.

  ‘I have to do something. I can’t just stand here,’ she cried, as the Samphire’s pistons ceased pumping and the engine fell silent.

  ‘The chances are that he’s already made his way out. It isn’t safe. You’ll break your neck trying to go down those steps.’

  ‘Please, let me decide for myself. You go and attend to your duties. There are so many people …’ Other passengers pushed past her, shouting for their friends and dear ones, milling back and forth looking for the lifeboats, their eyes white with fear.

  ‘There’s no danger!’ William shouted. ‘We are not taking on water! The Samphire is not about to sink.’

  ‘We’re drifting without power,’ the captain shouted back. ‘Man the lifeboats and cutters. Some of the crew will row to Dover for assistance while the rest remain here.’

  ‘There are four boats – plenty of room for all,’ William said as one of the crew yelled, ‘Ship ahoy!’

  ‘It’s the Belgique,’ somebody else shouted with relief. ‘She’ll give us assistance.’

  ‘No, she isn’t stopping. She’s steaming past us,’ William said.

  ‘She can’t see us. Fire the rockets!’ the captain ordered. ‘Lower the boats without delay.’

  ‘We can’t get to the rockets. They’re underwater,’ one of the sailors said. ‘Where is the Fanny Buck? Why hasn’t she come back for us?’

  ‘She’s holed,’ William explained. ‘All hands will be repairing the breach in her hull with canvas cut from her sails, but as soon as she’s watertight, they’ll make their way back. I’m sure of it.’

  ‘William, I’m grateful for your attention, but you have to go back to your work.’ In desperation, Violet caught the sleeve of a passenger’s coat and added, ‘This is the ship’s junior engineer – he’ll help you.’ She pushed her way out of the crowd of people who surrounded him, begging for help with their luggage and shouting to be let on to the boats, but William had been right – she couldn’t get near the cabin, only see from a distance that the door had been broken off its hinges and cast aside. Arvin had escaped – she just had to find him.

  ‘I’m looking for my husband, Mr Brooke,’ she kept saying as she made her way aft, but it seemed that no one cared. The rules of polite society were ignored as everyone – man and woman, old and young – cried and fought for a space in one of the boats. Violet counted three people – none of them Arvin – sitting in the first cutter before the crew had a chance to lower it on to the water.

  ‘Captain Bennett, these people won’t move even though I’ve asked ’em to,’ one of the sailors shouted.

  The captain stepped in. ‘Ladies and gentlemen, please get out and leave your possessions on the deck, so we can take more passengers.’

  ‘We aren’t getting out,’ one of them said. ‘And we will not leave our luggage behind. We’ve paid for our tickets just like everyone else has – I don’t see why we should have to forfeit our valuables.’

  Violet wanted to urge the master to be more forceful but he conceded quickly.

  ‘Lower the cutter,’ he barked at the crew, and they let it down into the sea with the passengers inside it. ‘There’s no time to waste. I want five of you to row to Dover to find help …’

  Offering silent prayers for everyone on board, Violet continued to search the deck for her husband, and then she saw him with his back to her.

  ‘Arvin,’ she called. Relieved, she hurried on, bumping into an elderly gentleman who was supporting his wife.

  ‘Have a care, my dear,’ he said.

  ‘I’m sorry.’ She rushed forwards to let her dear Arvin know she was safe. ‘My darling,’ she exclaimed, but as he turned to face her, a quizzical expression in his eyes, her heart plummeted. ‘I thought you were my husband,’ she stammered, realising from the stench of whisky on the stranger’s breath that he was soused to the eyeballs.

  ‘Madam, I wish that I was, and we would go down together.’ He raised a silver hip flask to his lips, took a swig and tried to hand it to her. ‘This will make you feel better.’

  ‘No, thank you.’ She recoiled.


  ‘I would that I had a whole bottle – I believe oblivion is a better prospect than to be drownded conscious.’

  ‘The crew are rowing to Dover to fetch help,’ she said, trying to remain optimistic.

  ‘Ah, I swear the boat is taking on water and I’ve heard there are over seventy passengers on board tonight and there isn’t enough room for all on the lifeboats.’

  ‘Sir, please keep your opinions to yourself,’ she said sharply. ‘The Samphire isn’t sinking, just drifting. We must stay calm and not arouse further panic. Now, I have to find my husband.’ She looked along the railings and there he was, staring at the captain. She hastened towards him and flung her arms around his neck.

  ‘Violet!’ He extracted himself from her embrace and glared down at her, grim-faced. ‘Have some restraint. There are people watching.’

  ‘I was afraid you’d been killed.’ She bit her lip, drawing blood.

  ‘We must make our way into one of the boats,’ he said. ‘Why didn’t you board the first one? I saw you nearby.’

  ‘Because I was waiting for you, my dear. I wouldn’t abandon you, just as you wouldn’t leave the ship without me.’ She looked down towards his feet, spotting a bag and the locked chest. ‘You have our luggage?’

  ‘I have the papers and personal items at least. Hurry, or there will be no space for us. Bring the bag! I’ll carry the chest.’ He leaned down and dragged it along the deck towards the remaining boats, beads of sweat glistening on his forehead, while she followed with the bag.

  The second cutter was full, and a passenger was sawing at one of the lines with a knife.

  ‘Put that away, sir,’ Captain Bennett shouted. ‘Sit down and the crew will lower the cutter.’ The sailors released the lines to let the boat on to the water with a soft splash, and the crew who were already on board picked up their oars to row. ‘Go after the Fanny Buck. Tell them to heave to and help us as soon as they can. The ladies who are left on board should get into the next boat.’

  Violet glanced towards Arvin, who was barging his way to the lifeboat, shouting, ‘Let me through. My wife will not go without me.’ When he reached it, he stowed the trunk in the bow.