Devil's Rock - Chris Speyer [32]
‘This is Anusha, Grandad. I was teaching her to row.’
‘Hello, Mr Luxton,’ said Anusha.
‘You’ll be all over dust and shavin’s if you crawl around there, my love.’
‘I don’t mind,’ smiled Anusha, hopping up and dusting herself off.
‘Learnin’ to row, eh?’
‘Yes,’ said Anusha, ‘but it was getting late, so we had to give up. Wow! This is so beautiful! I didn’t know boats were built like this.’ She walked around the part-built boat, examining it inside and out.
‘Not many are any more,’ grunted Grandad.
Zaki could see that half the planks of the rowing boat’s hull were now in place. It was a slow process, particularly if you worked on your own. Each plank had to be offered up to the one before, marked, then shaped by hand and finally fixed in place. For the hull to be watertight, the fit had to be perfect.
‘We left the dinghy by the slip. Hope that’s OK,’ said Zaki. ‘I’ll take her back out to Morveren on the weekend.’
‘Shouldn’t be too much in the way. Your parents know where you are?’
‘Dad won’t be home yet,’ said Zaki.
‘I probably ought to phone my mum,’ said Anusha.
‘Probably you ought to,’ said Grandad. ‘You can call her from the house.’
They filed out of the shed and waited with Jenna while Grandad locked up. Jenna sniffed hopefully at the carrier bag containing the logbook that Zaki had ‘borrowed’ from Curlew but, having ascertained that it contained nothing edible, she lost interest.
‘What you got in the bag?’ enquired Grandad.
‘School project,’ said Anusha quickly, to cover Zaki’s hesitation.
‘Has that cat been back?’ asked Zaki.
‘Not since your last visit.’
Grandad led the way across the narrow lane and up the steep flight of steps to the cottage overlooking Batsford Creek where four generations of Luxtons, including Zaki’s father, had been born and raised. Little ever changed in Grandad’s house. The green oilcloth that covered the kitchen table was the same green oilcloth that Zaki could remember covering the table when he was little more than a toddler. The same chipped mugs and jugs hung from hooks, the same pictures of ships under sail hung on the walls. But, although the range was still always alight, some of the cosy warmth seemed to have left the kitchen since Zaki’s grandma had died two years earlier, and the smells of cooking and baking had slowly faded, to be replaced by the workshop smells carried in by Grandad.
Jenna pushed between their legs, crossed the kitchen and threw herself down in her favourite spot with her back against the stove.
Zaki remembered the day his grandmother died. He had raced up the steps to the cottage ahead of his mother and father, eager as ever to see his grandparents. His grandmother had been ill for some time and they were visiting regularly. His grandad was sitting at the kitchen table, an unusual place for him during the day. ‘How’s Grandma?’ Zaki had asked. His grandfather looked up and there was an emptiness in his eyes that Zaki had never seen, like a grey empty sea under a winter sky. ‘We’re just waitin’ for the tide to go out. She’s a fisherman’s daughter, she’ll go with the tide’ his grandad said quietly. His grandmother died at low tide that evening.
‘Telephone’s by here. Help yourself,’ Grandad said to Anusha. ‘’Spect you children’ll be hungry if you’ve been rowin’ all afternoon. Have a rummage in the larder, Zaki. See if you can find some eggs. I’ll get a bit of tea and toast goin’.’
It was agreed that after tea Grandad would run them back into Kingsbridge. Soon the three of them were sitting around the kitchen table eating fried eggs on thick slices of buttered toast. With the first mouthful Zaki realised he was starving and, judging by the quiet concentration with which Anusha was attacking her food, he guessed she was just as hungry.
‘Grandad,’ began Zaki, through egg and toast, ‘do you have a chart of the Orme?’
‘Should do. Why d’you ask?’
‘Is there deep water anywhere in the Orme, apart from Dragon Pool?’
‘Not in the river, but in