Swimming Lessons(67)
“But you got the bird?” Gil asked again, staring at Martin over the top of his sunglasses. “There’s no point in having the boat without the bird.”
Martin stood back to reveal a small skiff, a knocked-about blue with two benches inside and a rill of dirty water slopping about in the bottom. It would have been big enough for three if it weren’t for a small wire cage jammed in the bow. Inside, a cockerel jerked its head, staring at them with one beady eye and then the other, its wattle swaying.
“Daddy,” Flora said, “what is this? I thought we were bringing you to look at the sea.”
“I’m going out on the water,” Gil said. “I’m not sure Martin’s up for the rowing, so it’ll have to be one of you two.”
“But the chicken?” Richard said.
“Cockerel,” Martin said.
“It’s a little trick Flora’s mother told me about,” Gil said. “A long time ago . . . well, not so long ago.” He stepped forwards into the water beside the boat, his trouser bottoms turning a darker grey. “Hold it steady, Martin.” Gil lifted one shaky leg and the cockerel croaked in the back of its throat.
“Wait, Daddy, wait,” Flora said. She dropped the folding chair, flung the blanket and cushion into the skiff, and moved to her father. “Richard,” she said, “come and help.”
“I don’t think this is a good idea,” he said, but he stood beside the old man, put an arm around his chest, and lowered a shoulder for Gil to lean on. Flora and Richard manoeuvred his limbs like those of a stiff-jointed doll until they got him sitting on the bench in the stern, opposite the cockerel. Gil clung on to the side with his good arm and caught his breath, his sun hat knocked off and hanging down his back. The others stood on the beach, undecided, while the bird watched.
“What is going on, Martin?” Flora said in a low voice.
“Don’t ask me. You know what Gil’s like. He wanted me to meet him here this afternoon with a boat and a cockerel. It took some getting, I can tell you. I had to pay twenty pounds just to borrow the bird for the afternoon from a farmer over near Sydenham. He’d better not come home with a single feather ruffled or I’ll be done for.”
“So one of us has to row him? But where to?” Flora looked at the sea. A couple of yachts were moored far out, and the silhouette of a container ship sat low and motionless on the horizon.
“He always liked a bit of an adventure,” Martin said. “God, we used to get up to some stuff around the village, you wouldn’t believe.” He seemed about to go on to give an example and then changed his mind. “Look, the man is dying.” His voice was quiet, and the three of them glanced at Gil, who sat with his head pushed forwards on his scrawny neck, staring at the cockerel, which was eyeing him back. “Take him out on a little row around the bay and home again. That’s all he wants. So what if he’s taking a cockerel with him. People have asked for stranger things.” He didn’t give an example of these, either.
“You go,” Richard said to Flora. “It would be good for you to spend some more time alone with him.”
“There’s enough room for us both.” Although she wasn’t sure there was, with the cockerel’s cage.
“I’ll wait with Martin.”
They turned the boat and pushed it out, and when it began to float, Flora jumped in, settling in the middle and holding the oars. She rowed with her back to the cockerel, facing her father. Flora liked the action of rowing: there was something satisfying about pressing her feet against the sides of the boat and feeling her shoulder muscles work—the closest she could come to swimming without being in the water. The skiff gave a blip as it rose and dipped in the swell; Gil took off his sunglasses and closed his eyes, wedging himself into the corner formed by the stern and one side. His arm was stretched out and his hand gripped the side of the boat.
When they were about a hundred metres out, Flora turned the skiff and rowed hard against the current, which flowed towards Old Smoker. She got into a rhythm, pulling the oars through the water, lifting and rotating the blades. Behind her, the cockerel’s croak had changed to a puk, puk, puk.
“I read about this trick that you can do with cockerels,” Gil said, opening his eyes.
“I thought you said Mum told you,” Flora said, when the blades were out of the water.
“Well, yes. Whichever,” Gil said. “They have a sort of sixth sense.”
“I have to rest for a bit.” Flora pulled in the oars and bent over, panting. They had gone past Dead End Point and were opposite the beach huts, where a few owners sat out on wooden decks. Without the forwards motion the boat wallowed in the waves, which were bigger now they were out from the lee of the cliff, and Flora felt the wind chilling the sweat that had formed down her back. “Are you cold, Daddy?” Gil was hunched, his free hand tucked between his legs. Flora picked up the cushion and the blanket from the bottom of the boat, but they were both sodden and she dropped them back. A bigger wave caught them broadside and spat at all three of them. The cockerel’s noise changed to an open-beaked bray, starting high and plummeting to a throaty cough. It wasn’t a crow but a sound more melancholic, a lament. As soon as it finished, the bird began the sound again. Flora twisted around to look behind her and the boat rocked. “I think it’s seasick,” she said.