The Undertow Read Online Free PDF Page B

through the water. William’s teeth throb. His head throbs. His eyes throb. He drags then lifts and pushes on his oar. He doesn’t think. He doesn’t consider Amelia. Or the baby. Or anyone else, or what will happen afterwards. He is just his body and it’s determined to live.
    He sees Dwyer jerk back, slump onto Silcock’s oar and Silcock shove at him to get him off. The bullets whine, hiss. They crump into wood, sear flesh. There’s a yell from right behind him—Sully’s hit—but he can’t turn round to look. Loosed oars skip over the water, clatter against the live ones. William, swinging through his stroke, sees the scrub on top of the gully in the pink-gold glow of dawn: sniper, up there, in the bushes. Sully’s cursing behind him, low, short of breath:
Fucking bastard Annie, fucking evil bastard Turks
. Someone else is screaming.
    But the gunfire’s stopped. William doesn’t know for how long. But no more insect whine, no more searing bullets. The screaming, though, continues.
    They slacken off the pace, but still row on, making distance, uncertain of their safety. The blood pounds through his head. No more bullets. Still there are no more bullets. William scans round for the trawler, they should head back, get help, get orders; then he coughs, and is taken over by coughing, wracked with it. Sweat drips off him. But he is sound, still; unbroken. He spits over the side. He wipes his face with a hand, looks round, taking stock.
    Dwyer is slumped forward over his oar. The blade’s forced dripping up high into the air like a signal. His cap has fallen into the boat and his right arm is dangling as if he’s reaching down for it. There’s a dark red hole in the side of his head, and there’s dark blood dripping onto the boards.
Skin like cream
, he’d said,
skin like the finest Welsh cream
. Spooner’s pale, with a bloody right hand pressed to his left arm. It’s a lad called Clelland that’s screaming. Writhing on the boards at the stern. Two men crouching at his side, holding his arms; morphine ampoule, syringe. William turns round, feels sick. Checks on Sully.
    Sully’s face is a twist of fury, his hand clamped to the side of his head. There’s blood running between his fingers, blood down the side of his face and neck, soaking into his rig.
    “You all right?”
    Sully just narrows his eyes.
    “Let’s have a look.”
    Sully hesitates a moment, then he lifts his hand away. There’s just a raw weeping stump, blood.
    “Blimey.”
    “Bastard fucking bastard Annie.”
    Clelland stops screaming. The morphine taking effect. They’re shifting Dwyer now, taking him by the armpits, making the boat rock. Someone is leaning over Spooner, examining his wounded arm. William turns back, nods towards Sully’s ruined ear.
    “Dress that for you?”
    Sully shakes his head—then winces, stops. “No. Fuck off.”
    Sully reaches his unbloodied hand into a pocket. He takes out his cigarette case, clicks it open one-handed, but then can’t pick a fag out, not without getting the papers bloody.
    William reaches out for the case. “Give it here.”
    Sully hands it over with a grimace. William picks out one of the smokes and holds it up. Sully dips his head down, takes it between his lips. He juts his chin towards the case, offering William one. There’s gunfire from inland, and the sound of waves chopping against the hull.
    William takes a cigarette, and lights both, shielding the match with a hand. The cigarettes flare quickly and crumble away: Sully always rolls them too loose. William drags the smoke deep into his lungs. They feel raw as butcher’s meat.
    “Could have been worse,” William says.
    “Fuck off.”
    “An inch to the right and it would have killed you straight.”
    Sully lets out a thread of smoke. “Six inches to the right and it would have hit
you
smack between the eyes.”
    William turns away. He watches the ratings struggle with Dwyer’s body. He feels sick. They’re just boys, the two