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Rereading 12: Monica Edwards part five
Jun. 6th, 2023 10:54 amIs anyone still with me on this read? I don’t mind because it’s a useful record for me.
This is another book about night time haunting. The first scene is the church’s annual ‘harvest of the seas’ service, which all the local fishermen attend because it would be bad luck not to. This year is different because catches are so low that the fishing folk can barely make a living. Tamzin finds out that it’s because ‘they Frenchies’ are not only poaching in Westling’s waters but using illegal small-mesh nets. Her first thought is to talk to Jim about it. Remembering their adventures in The White Riders, they plot a haunting by a ghost ship, a sort of Flying Dutchman, to frighten the French away. Jim’s old boat The Thunderer will be made seaworthy again and dressed with white sails to look ghostly. This time, they tell their parents first and all seems set until Rissa’s parents say it would be all right if the vicar went, too. Tamzin finds that her ever-surprising father has not only known all along about the poaching (‘Vicars hear things,’ as he says in an earlier book), but is willing to join in, as it’s for the good of his parishioners.
They need tar, ropes and sails and all cost money In no time there’s a regular working party, including Mr Grey, painting and hammering away. Even Diccon is allowed to sit on a cradle suspended from the side, happily painting with tar (he’s only seven!) Roger makes a war drum and practises producing eerie sounds on his mouth organ. Rissa will swing the banshee wailer they used when they were White Riders. Meryon gets hold of some headlights to light up the sails and Tamzin provides some broken stained glass for spooky colour changes and a bee smoker. They’re a cheerful team on the whole (Hookey Galley is never cheerful). The first rehearsal goes well and as it’s only a practice, Mrs Grey and Diccon join in, along with Billingham, who quickly reverts to being a ship’s cat. Everything seems set for more haunting but then Jim ‘changed me mind’. Why? And why does he disappear for a few days to ‘Aunt Ada’s’? Tamzin observes that Snowey Peplow hasn’t been around, either and remembers Mrs Merrow saying that Snowey looked like a saint but would stop at nothing and she wonders … (One of the nice things about these books is that almost all the inhabitants of Westling have known each other since they were children.)
Of all people, it’s Smiling Morn who suggests that they get ‘that Hookey Galley’ to take them out while Jim is away. He agrees; he may be disagreeable but he’s a fine sailor. There will be red sails this time but otherwise, everything as before. They close with a French boat, a coastguard launch appears and there’s a general melee before everyone is back on the Sarah, including Jim, who was on the French boat (up to his old tricks) but: no vicar! He’s been taken hostage. The adventurous side of the scholarly Mr Grey is the great revelation of this book. He can steer a boat, is a strong swimmer and ‘once played rugger for Oxford’. You’d never believe he’d of took to a rough life so natural, wouldja? observed Snowey …and him so righteous.’ ‘Thass because he’s righteous that he done it,’ said Jim …’But I count he enjoy it, all the same.’ said Snowey.
No sleep for poor Mrs Grey that night, with a missing husband. Jim assures her he knows just where the vicar is and will get him back. Next day, the rescue party sets out, ready to do battle if necessary, like the Sussex men of old, to get back what is theirs i.e. ‘parson’. They arrive at a secret French port and a deserted village. Making their way to the church, they find it packed and Mr Grey, speaking French, just winding up a service. He joins the others cheerfully and says he supposes there will now be a night sailing. You have to remember it’s only ten years since the end of the war and who knows what Mr Grey got up to? The news is good and bad: he has persuaded the French villagers to give up poaching but also, to the disgust of Jim and Snowey, smuggling. This is a really exciting story.
( Operation Seabird (1957) )
This is another book about night time haunting. The first scene is the church’s annual ‘harvest of the seas’ service, which all the local fishermen attend because it would be bad luck not to. This year is different because catches are so low that the fishing folk can barely make a living. Tamzin finds out that it’s because ‘they Frenchies’ are not only poaching in Westling’s waters but using illegal small-mesh nets. Her first thought is to talk to Jim about it. Remembering their adventures in The White Riders, they plot a haunting by a ghost ship, a sort of Flying Dutchman, to frighten the French away. Jim’s old boat The Thunderer will be made seaworthy again and dressed with white sails to look ghostly. This time, they tell their parents first and all seems set until Rissa’s parents say it would be all right if the vicar went, too. Tamzin finds that her ever-surprising father has not only known all along about the poaching (‘Vicars hear things,’ as he says in an earlier book), but is willing to join in, as it’s for the good of his parishioners.
They need tar, ropes and sails and all cost money In no time there’s a regular working party, including Mr Grey, painting and hammering away. Even Diccon is allowed to sit on a cradle suspended from the side, happily painting with tar (he’s only seven!) Roger makes a war drum and practises producing eerie sounds on his mouth organ. Rissa will swing the banshee wailer they used when they were White Riders. Meryon gets hold of some headlights to light up the sails and Tamzin provides some broken stained glass for spooky colour changes and a bee smoker. They’re a cheerful team on the whole (Hookey Galley is never cheerful). The first rehearsal goes well and as it’s only a practice, Mrs Grey and Diccon join in, along with Billingham, who quickly reverts to being a ship’s cat. Everything seems set for more haunting but then Jim ‘changed me mind’. Why? And why does he disappear for a few days to ‘Aunt Ada’s’? Tamzin observes that Snowey Peplow hasn’t been around, either and remembers Mrs Merrow saying that Snowey looked like a saint but would stop at nothing and she wonders … (One of the nice things about these books is that almost all the inhabitants of Westling have known each other since they were children.)
Of all people, it’s Smiling Morn who suggests that they get ‘that Hookey Galley’ to take them out while Jim is away. He agrees; he may be disagreeable but he’s a fine sailor. There will be red sails this time but otherwise, everything as before. They close with a French boat, a coastguard launch appears and there’s a general melee before everyone is back on the Sarah, including Jim, who was on the French boat (up to his old tricks) but: no vicar! He’s been taken hostage. The adventurous side of the scholarly Mr Grey is the great revelation of this book. He can steer a boat, is a strong swimmer and ‘once played rugger for Oxford’. You’d never believe he’d of took to a rough life so natural, wouldja? observed Snowey …and him so righteous.’ ‘Thass because he’s righteous that he done it,’ said Jim …’But I count he enjoy it, all the same.’ said Snowey.
No sleep for poor Mrs Grey that night, with a missing husband. Jim assures her he knows just where the vicar is and will get him back. Next day, the rescue party sets out, ready to do battle if necessary, like the Sussex men of old, to get back what is theirs i.e. ‘parson’. They arrive at a secret French port and a deserted village. Making their way to the church, they find it packed and Mr Grey, speaking French, just winding up a service. He joins the others cheerfully and says he supposes there will now be a night sailing. You have to remember it’s only ten years since the end of the war and who knows what Mr Grey got up to? The news is good and bad: he has persuaded the French villagers to give up poaching but also, to the disgust of Jim and Snowey, smuggling. This is a really exciting story.
( Operation Seabird (1957) )
