A Good Catch: The perfect Cornish escape full of secrets

2
Spring 1987

‘You’d do a lot worse than to marry that girl,’ Edward Behenna told his son.

‘Shuttup, Dad.’ Jesse Behenna ducked out of reach of his father’s hand as he tried to ruffle his son’s hair.

‘It would be a dream come true for your granddad,’ continued Edward as he pulled out an ancient wooden chair, scraping its legs across the worn red tiles before seating himself at the kitchen table opposite his younger son.

‘If he were still alive,’ murmured Jesse.

Jesse’s mother, Jan, slid the tray of pasties she’d been making into the top oven of the Aga; she banged the door shut and swung round. ‘Edward, don’t start all this again,’ she warned him, irritated.

But Edward hardly seemed to hear her. ‘I promised my dad, as he promised ’is father afore ’im, that I’d do all I could to build the business and make Behenna’s Boats the biggest fleet in Trevay.’

‘And you have, Dad,’ Jesse assured him. ‘Behenna’s is the biggest fishing fleet on the north coast of Cornwall.’

Edward nodded, but a frown marred his lined face. The pressures of running the business were very different from those of his father’s day. This year, the European Union had really become involved and laws were being passed governing fishing quotas for member states. Cornwall and Devon MPs had tabled questions in the Commons about their impact on their fishing industry. How could they all hope to keep going in this climate, when the government was impounding vessels and fining their owners? This interference, along with upstarts like Bryn Clovelly screwing them for every penny down at the fish market, were driving some fishermen to the wall.

The old ways were dying. Small fleets were struggling to remain at sea and Edward knew that it was the likes of Clovelly who represented the future. Edward’s father had fished these waters for fifty years, man and boy. Sometimes his fish would be bought by a fishmonger from somewhere as exotic as Plymouth, but Clovelly saw the swollen wallets of the flash London City boys as rich pickings; he was buying monkfish for restaurants in Chelsea and exporting scallops to New York.

‘Aye, it is. I’ve been working the boats since I was fourteen and left school. I didn’t have your education.’

Edward knew he was a good fisherman, one of the best, but being an entrepreneur, like Bryn Clovelly, was beyond him. Behenna’s Boats had provided a good living for many families up to now, but carrying on as a lone operation was looking like an increasingly risky option. Clovelly would love nothing more than to add a big share in the Behenna fleet to his portfolio and Edward was finding his offer harder and harder to resist. He knew there were men with fewer scruples than he who would bite Clovelly’s hand off for a deal such as the one he was offering.

‘I’m only staying on to do O levels,’ Jesse reminded Edward. ‘Then I’m full time working at sea on the fleet. But when I’m a bit older and I’ve saved up a bit, I’m off travelling.’

His father looked at him as if he’d just said he was off to buy a Ferrari. ‘Go travelling? Travelling? There’s more to find in your own home town than you’d ever find travelling.’

‘Oh, that’s right. I’d forgotten. There’re the Hanging Gardens of Bodmin, The Pyramids of Porthleven, The Colossus of St Columb … Cleopatra’s Needle up Wadebridge. Silly me.’

Edward scowled at his son. ‘That’s enough of yorn lip, boy. You’re the next generation. Greer Clovelly is a lovely girl and the only child Bryn and his lah-di-dah wife ever managed. Poor sod, never ’ad a son. Poor me, I got two and neither of them any bleddy good.’

‘Leave off mithering the poor lad. He’s only sixteen. He’s got ideas of his own,’ Jan said.

‘I knew by his age that you were the one for me,’ Edward told her, and Jan groaned inwardly as Edward played his familiar riff. ‘As soon as I saw you, twelve and lookin’ like an angel, I said to my mate, “There’s the girl I’m gonna marry”.’

‘Yeah and, more fool me, I did marry you.’

Edward caught Jan’s hand as she walked from the Aga to the sink. ‘No regrets though, maid? No regrets?’

Jan felt the warmth of her husband’s rough and calloused hand on hers and wondered. She’d had plans to travel to the Greek Islands and sleep on the beach under the stars, like the character she’d read about in a book once. The last book she’d read. Must be more than twenty years ago. But Edward had wooed her into submission and she never did send off the passport application form that had sat on her mother’s dresser for two years after she’d married. For their honeymoon, Edward had taken her to Exeter and they’d seen a rep production of The Mousetrap. Edward had promised her that the next show they’d see would be in Paris. Almost twenty years on and they still hadn’t made that trip.

She stooped and dropped a kiss on her husband’s weatherbeaten forehead, feeling the spikes of his overgrown eyebrows tickling her chin. Edward Behenna would now be more likely to see the surface of the moon than the insides of the Folies Bergère. She smiled. ‘No regrets my ’andsome.’ She straightened up. ‘But that don’t mean to say you can dictate what Jesse’s future is going to be.’

Edward let go of her hand and turned his attention back to Jesse. ‘Greer is a lovely girl. Clever, beautiful, and comes from a good family.’

Jesse gave his father a glare. ‘I’m not marrying someone so that you can do a business deal.’

‘What are you talking about? Business deal? Who said anything about business? I’m just saying she’s a lovely girl.’ Edward looked at his son with a patient, innocent smile. Bryn Clovelly was a sharp operator. For all of his talk about a merger, Edward knew that selling a share of the business to him was a risk. However, Bryn had no boys of his own. Like Edward himself, and most vain men, Bryn was desperate for his business not to die with him. If Jesse and Greer were married, it would ensure that Behenna’s Boats was safe and Bryn would have himself a son-in-law from one of Trevay’s oldest fishing families. They were building a dynasty. But Jesse seemed to have other ideas. Edward got a hot itch on the back of his thinning scalp when he thought about selling his son’s future off to the highest bidder.

‘She may be, but I’m not marrying her. If you want to do business with old man Clovelly, do it yourself, but leave me out of it.’

‘An’ what’s the matter with lookin’ to the future?’ Edward spread his hands, fingers splayed, on the old table, his extraordinary eyebrows raised in innocence.

‘Plenty.’ Jesse dropped his head and stared at his lap.

‘Oh, now,’ cajoled his father. ‘You’re not bleating about that other girl, whatshername …’

Jesse’s mother took her hands out of the sink and wiped the suds on her apron.

‘Edward, leave him alone. Loveday Carter is a really nice girl. Jesse would be happy with her. Let the boy fall in love with whoever he wants.’

‘Her mother hasn’t got a pot to piss in, and anyway, what’s love got to do with it? He doesn’t know what love is.’ Edward was exasperated.

‘But you did, or so you say,’ Jan threw back. ‘And stopped me from having a bit of life in the bargain.’

‘Oh, you and your life.’ Jesse recognised the brewing of a row and his father didn’t disappoint him. ‘You didn’t have a life till I took you on. You’ve wanted for nothing since we married. I’m a good man. I’m not a drinker or a womaniser.’

‘And I’m supposed to be grateful for the fact that life now starts and ends at Trevay harbour sheds, am I?’

Edward stood up. ‘There’s no talking to you when you get in one of your moods like this. You sound like your mother, and she was a miserable old cow. I’m going back to work.’

‘But the pasties’ll be ready in a minute.’

‘I’m not hungry.’

In the simmering silence that remained after Edward had stomped out of the door and into the spring sunshine of Fish Lane, Jan stood for a moment in powerless frustration. Edward had set his mind on securing the future of the fishing fleet, and if that meant arranging a marriage between Jesse and Greer Clovelly, heiress to the Clovelly Fisheries Company, then that would be it, no matter what Jesse wanted.

She ran her thin hands through her short hair and bent to get the pasties out of the oven.

‘They’re hot,’ she said needlessly, serving one to Jesse.

‘Thanks, Mum.’

She put one onto a plate for herself and, wiping her hands on the tea towel that was perpetually tucked into her apron, sat opposite her son.

‘Eat,’ she told him. Jesse did so. After a couple of mouthfuls, she asked. ‘So … is it Loveday?’

Jesse shuffled a bit in his seat. With a full mouth he said, ‘I dunno.’

‘But it’s not Greer?’

‘How do I know? I’m sixteen. I want to see the world before I decide on anything. I’ve got my own mind and my own life.’

Jan nodded in understanding. It was one thing encouraging Jesse in a particular direction, but quite another thing to put all this pressure on the poor lad.

‘I’ll ask your dad to back off.’

*

‘Bloody ungrateful kids.’ Edward was on his boat, The Lobster Pot, checking the trawl nets with his old friend and ship’s mechanic, Spencer. ‘He doesn’t know his arse from his elbow. Does he think I wanted to take on the fleet from my dad? No I bloody didn’t. But it was the best thing that ever happened to me.’ He looked up from his work and surveyed the harbour around him. ‘Look at this place.’ He swept an arm dramatically across the view. ‘Trevay is the most beautiful place on earth. What’s he think he’s going to find anywhere else? Answer me that.’

Spencer moved his stained and smouldering hand-rolled cigarette from one corner of his gnarled mouth to another and made a noise that sounded as if he was in agreement. Edward continued: ‘Fifteen boats we’ve got in the fleet now. Fifteen! If my dad hadn’t been so canny after the war and bought them first few cheap from those poor fishing widows whose husbands had never come home from the Navy, we’d still have the arses hanging out of our trousers.’

Spencer gave another grunt.

‘You and me, Spencer, you and me, we know how the world works. Hard work brings good things. Not nancying around doing yer O levels and packing yer spotted handkerchief to go travelling. What’s that about?’

As inscrutable as ever, Spencer peeled the damp cigarette from his lips and revealed a handful of tobacco-stained teeth. ‘Want a brew, Skip?’

Edward stopped what he was doing and looked at his old friend as if for the first time.

‘See. You’ve seen it all, haven’t you, Spence? I’ll have a cup of tea with you and then, when we’ve finished here, I’ll take you for a pint. How does that sound?’

Spencer went below decks to the galley and Edward could hear the comforting sounds of the pop as the gas was lit and the rattle of the old kettle as Spencer banged it on the hob. Edward took another look at the fishing village that had been his home from birth. The gulls were cackling above him and the May sunshine made mirrors of the water on the mudflats. ‘Bloody kids,’ he muttered to himself. ‘Bloody women.’ He rubbed the thick gold wedding band on his finger. ‘Bloody Jan.’

He took a deep breath of the salty Cornish air and thought about his boys. Grant a bloody liability, and Jesse a dreamer. What had he done to deserve them? He loved them. Of course he did, but why didn’t they do what he told them? When his dad had told him to jump, he’d asked how high. When his dad got ill and Edward had had to take on the fleet aged only eighteen, he’d had no choice. Sink or swim. He’d chosen to swim. He’d shut the door on the dreams he’d had to go to America. He’d taken on his responsibilities. He’d swallowed his resentment and done the right thing. Why the hell wouldn’t Jesse?

*

Jesse knew he should be in his room revising for the imminent O levels, but he couldn’t see the point. He’d be leaving school in June and joining his dad at sea. He knew how lucky he was to have a job, and he loved the sea but … oh, there were so many buts. He took his Levi denim jacket off one of the pegs by the back door and kissed his mum, who was now setting up the ironing board.

‘You going out, son?’

‘Yeah.’

‘Where are you going?’

‘Up the sheds.’

‘Shouldn’t you be doing some school work?’

‘What’s the point, Mum?’ He bent and kissed her cheek to stop her from asking any more. ‘See ya.’

He was out of the back door leaving his mother to watch him, shrugging on his beloved denim jacket, slipping his Sony Walkman headphones on his ears and retreating down the short front garden path. She heard the little gate click shut for the nth time in her life; on her own, again. She worried about her boys and their future. Grant was in the Royal Marines now, stationed in Plymouth. Last time he called he said he was going for Commando Training at Lympstone. Ever since he was 16, fuelled by the nightly bulletins reporting the Falklands War, he’d wanted to wear the Green Beret of a commando. Now, at 21, this was his chance to earn it. Grant had been a handful from the off. His unpredictable mood swings had always marked him out. It could be like treading on eggshells living under the same roof as him, and school had been one long round of visits to successive heads. He’d left school with only one exam pass to his name, in metalwork. He was lucky that the army recruiting officer had seen something in him beyond the defensive, edgy character that he conveyed.

‘We’ll smooth the rough edges off him, Mrs Behenna,’ he told her.

She was proud of him, of course, but fearful about the dangers he would face in any war, and of those dark moods which had got him into trouble with the police already. He was such a contrast to Jesse, who was calm and steady, but still waters ran deep with Jesse – Jan knew that there was much more to him than his father gave him credit for. At least Jesse would be safe at home, working with his dad and groomed to take over the business. But what if Edward’s plans to marry him off to Greer Clovelly came about? Jesse would be stuck in a loveless marriage, burdened with the responsibility of a very big business and no chance to see the world and enjoy his freedom. Just like she’d been.

‘Stop it, Jan,’ she said into the silence. ‘Just stop it.’ She plugged in the old iron, turning on the radio for her daily infusion of The Archers as she waited for it to warm up.

Jesse was still just a boy. Let him have his dreams; there was time enough to be a man.

*

Jesse left the cool of the narrow lane of terraced fisherman’s cottages, and was walking up the hill away from Trevay and towards St Peter’s, the fishermen’s church. The graveyard slumbered in the warm sun and delicate white cow parsley heads shuddered in the light breeze, making shadow patterns over the cushions of forget-me-nots growing beneath them. He always glanced at his grandfather’s grave as he passed. Today its granite headstone glittered like a smile. Jesse touched his brow and saluted his grandfather before carrying on up the hill towards the sheds.

The sheds were a series of around thirty to forty home-built wooden structures, owned by the people of the town who had no garages attached to their houses, which, since most of the houses were built long before the motor car was invented, was the majority. The sheds had started as makeshift stables and boat-houses but now contained all the detritus of modern living. It was a kind of shanty town sited on a two-acre plot of flattened mud and sand. Opposite the sheds, some of which were now two storeys, stood a long line of boats of all kinds. Dinghies, clinker boats, fishing boats, rotting hulks, along with trailers of varying sizes on which the boats could be towed down the hill, through the town and down the harbour slipway into the water. At the entrance to the sheds was the second of only two public phone boxes in Trevay. The other box was down on the quay. Every resident knew the number of these boxes and regular calls were made between the two to give a shout to the lifeboat crew or call a man home for his tea.

Jesse walked past the phone box, kicking up a little sandy dust as he did so. He looked over to his father’s shed, which had expanded over the years and was now a run of four sheds linked together. On the upper floor were the words Behenna Boat Yard est. 1936, painted in fading blue and white letters.

He saw Mickey before Mickey saw him. His best friend since nursery school, Mickey Chandler was the person Jesse shared everything with. Mickey was standing outside his own family’s smaller shed, unlocked now with its doors wide open to the sun, and was polishing the chrome of his pride and joy: a two-year-old Honda moped, a present from his family and friends for his recent sixteenth birthday.

Jesse lengthened his stride, taking the headphones from his ears and calling, ‘Hey.’ Mickey stood up and shielded his eyes with the hand holding the stockinet duster; Jesse could smell the metal cleaner on it.

‘Hey,’ he replied.

Jesse was now close enough to give his best mate a punch on the arm, which was returned with equal force and affection.

‘I thought you were revising,’ Mickey said, returning to his polishing.

‘I thought you were too.’

‘Waste of fuckin’ time, isn’t it?’

‘Yeah. Want a snout?’

‘Please.’

Jesse pulled a crumpled packet of Player’s No. 6 out of his pocket and offered one to Mickey.

‘Ta.’

‘You got a light?’

‘No. Have you?’

‘No.’

‘Shit.’

Both boys pondered on the dilemma of having cigarettes but no means of smoking them. Mickey laughed first. ‘You’re bloody useless, Behenna.’

Jesse grabbed his friend in a headlock and they scuffled contentedly for several minutes.

Eventually they stopped

‘Bike’s looking good,’ Jesse told him.

‘Got my test next week.’

‘Gonna pass?’

‘Of course.’

‘Can I come out with you?’

‘Sure. I’m gonna ask Loveday out when I’ve got me licence.’

Jesse’s heart flipped at the sound of Loveday’s name. Mickey was in love with Loveday and had never made any secret of it. Jesse had never admitted to Mickey that the mention of her name, let alone the sight of her, was enough to shoot a flame of desire and longing coursing through his body.

‘Her arse is too big for the seat,’ he observed.

Mickey smiled. ‘Yeah. And what an arse. Imagine having her arms around you, holding tight, pressing those big boobs against your shoulder blades.’

Jesse could imagine all too clearly, but said only, ‘Fill your boots, boy.’

3

‘How do I look in these?’ Loveday had struggled into a pair of lime-green leggings, her face flushed and perspiring.

Greer, sitting neatly on the edge of Loveday’s unmade bed, wondered what to say. Should she tell her friend that she looked embarrassing? That the hideous leggings were pulling at the seams and clearly revealing the revolting cellulite clinging to her thighs. Could she tell her that she needed to lose a lot of weight and learn how to dress properly? Though on the plus side – and Greer did feel slightly guilty about this – Loveday did make Greer look great by comparison.

‘You look like Loveday Carter,’ she managed.

Loveday turned back to her reflection in the mirror that hung off the back of her bedroom door. ‘I like the colour. They didn’t ’ave ’em in the next size, but I’m gonna lose a bit of weight before the summer comes.’ She turned sideways and looked at herself from right and left. ‘If I put on my orange T-shirt, that’ll cover me bum.’

Greer looked down at her own slim legs in their perfectly fitting Pepe jeans. The orange T-shirt might cover Loveday’s bottom, but it wasn’t going to disguise the two rolls of fat wobbling between the bottom edge of her bra and the elastic waist of the leggings.

‘There. What d’ya think?’ Loveday asked a few moments later. Greer looked up.

She wanted to say, ‘Loveday. You look ghastly. You couldn’t be wearing a less flattering outfit. Your breasts are too big, your stomach is enormous and your derrière huge.’

Instead, she said, ‘It’s very you.’ She stood up and smoothed her hands over her own trim derrière, brushing off imaginary flecks. Loveday was now at her dressing-table mirror. The dressing table itself was strewn with several used cotton wool balls and a large amount of ancient make-up; a cold, half-drunk cup of tea and an empty Diet Coke tin. Hanging from a glass hand with curved upright fingers were strings of gaudy beads and a worn pair of knickers.

Greer pulled the collar of her crisp white shirt up at the nape of her neck and checked that the cuffs of her sleeves were turned back as the models in her mother’s monthly Vogue magazine did. She wanted to get out and see Jesse. ‘Come on. The boys will be waiting for us.’

Loveday took one last look in the mirror and smacked her matte red lips together. Recently she’d been copying Madonna’s make-up, even adding the beauty spot above her lip with an eye pencil. ‘I can’t find my black pencil so I’ve used the green one. I rather like it. What do you think?’ she said, turning to Greer. ‘It shows off me green eyes, don’t it?’

Greer blew her cheeks out and thought for a moment. ‘I think you look … unique.’

Loveday hugged her uptight friend. ‘You are so sweet. Unique? Really?’

‘Really.’ Greer extricated herself from the miasma of Giorgio Armani’s Beverly Hills rip-off scent, bought in Truro’s pannier market.

‘And what does that mean? Sounds posh,’ bounced back Loveday, reaching for her heavily fringed and studded, stone-washed denim jacket.

‘It means you are a one-off.’

*

Jesse was first to spot the girls walking up towards the sheds. Loveday’s marmalade hair with its wash-and-wear perm gleamed in the sunshine; her beautiful body was gently undulating towards him in skin-tight green leggings, her large breasts swinging to the rhythm of the fringes on her jacket. He thought often about those breasts. Sometimes, when she wore her white T-shirt, he could see the outline of her nipples. He turned his back on the girls, feigning disinterest, and called over to Mickey, who was checking his quiff in the wing mirror of the Honda moped. ‘The girls are coming.’

Mickey smiled in the mirror at his own cheeky face. ‘I’m going to give Loveday a night to remember.’

‘Oh, yeah? When’s that then?’

‘Tonight.’

‘Never. She won’t touch you with a barge pole.’

‘She won’t need to. I’ve got me own barge pole to touch her with.’ Mickey ducked swiftly out of reach of Jesse’s punch and together they locked the precious motorbike in its shed.

‘All right?’ Mickey raced to get ahead of Jesse and be first to walk by Loveday’s side.

‘Yeah.’ She smiled at him and, for him, the sun seemed suddenly to be shining extra bright. Then he frowned.

‘You’ve got something on your lip.’ He lifted a finger to wipe at the mark on her face. She grabbed his wrist before it got to her.

‘It’s me beauty spot. Like Madonna’s. It’s unique.’

‘Oh. Looks like you’ve drawn on yourself.’

Loveday stopped and waited for Greer, who was a couple of steps behind with Jesse.

‘How does my beauty spot look?’

Greer and Jesse both looked at the green blob on Loveday’s sweating lip.

‘Well, it’s smeared a bit,’ said Greer.

‘Oh shit. Badly?’

‘A bit.’

Jesse looked through his pockets and found an old, dried-up tissue. ‘Shall I wipe it off for you?’ he offered.

‘Yes, please. Get it all off.’

He lifted the tissue to Loveday’s mouth. ‘Spit.’

She did so and, tenderly, he wiped all trace of the green pencil away. Standing so close to her, Jesse could sense the rise and fall of her chest, and smell the heady scent that emanated from her. Her dewy golden skin glistened in the sunlight and her emerald eyes were like those of an exotic cat. The combination was suddenly overwhelming.

‘There. All done.’

‘Thanks.’ Loveday gave her rescuer a hug, leaving him breathless on many counts.

She turned to Greer. ‘Has it all gone?’

‘Yes.’

‘Maybe I’ll try an indelible ink next time.’

‘Best not,’ murmured Greer.

Mickey muscled in and grabbed Loveday’s arm. ‘Have you eaten your tea?’

‘Only a bit. Mum did shepherd’s pie earlier. But I could do with some chips.’

‘Come on then.’ And, taking her hand he ran down the hill, forcing Jesse and then Greer to run after them.

*

Edward Behenna had been in the Golden Hind since he and Spencer had finished on the boat. Edward was full of beer and the memory of the row with Jan was disappearing as fast as a sea mist on a warm morning. The beer had warmed his heart and his humour. ‘Spence, you’ll ’ave another before ’e go.’

Spencer removed a battered tin of tobacco from the front of his canvas smock and nodded. ‘Aye.’

‘Good man, Spence. Good man.’ Edward lumbered heavily to his feet and clapped his friend on the back, dislodging the scanty twigs of tobacco from the near transparent cigarette paper that Spencer was balancing between thumb and grimy index finger. He hailed the landlord. ‘Same again, Pete.’

Pete, a very tall man with a stomach straining against the buttons and belt of his shirt and trousers, bent down so that he could see through the forest of pint tankards hanging from hooks on a shelf above the bar. ‘Skinner’s?’ he asked, reaching for the empties Edward had placed on the damp counter.

‘Aye.’

Without anyone taking much notice, the door of the pub opened and a slim man in his early forties entered. His quick, bright blue eyes skimmed the familiar faces and he nodded at those who acknowledged his arrival. His prey was at the bar, delving into a handful of change to pay for the two waiting pints. He walked lightly and quickly towards him. ‘I’ll get those, Pete, and a Scotch for me, please.’

Edward turned to see who was buying his pint. ‘Bryn Clovelly, you’re a gentleman.’ He turned his eyes to where Spencer was sitting. ‘Spence, Mr Clovelly bought you a pint.’

Spencer had rolled his cigarette; its smoking fragrance drifted towards the bar. ‘Thank ’ee, Mr Clovelly.’

Bryn ignored him and spoke to Edward. ‘So, Edward, when are we going to do business?’

Edward looked down at his feet, uncomfortably aware that Clovelly was completely sober.

‘Bryn, I’ve ’ad a drink. Me ’ead’s not straight for talking business.’

Bryn pulled up an empty bar stool and indicated for Edward to do the same. ‘It’s not business as such, is it?’ He unhooked the casual blue jumper he had knotted round his shoulders and draped it on the back of the stool. ‘We’ve known each other a long time, haven’t we, Edward?’

Edward rubbed a hand over his mouth and chin. ‘You’ve gone up in the world since we were nippers though, ain’t you, Bryn?’ Edward looked at Bryn’s clean hands. ‘Look at you. Smart clothes, smart way of talkin’, smart car outside. You’re different now, Bryn.’

Bryn placed his right hand on his chest. ‘Not ’ere. Not in my ’eart. I can still talk as Cornish as you, boy, and don’t ’e forget it. There’s nothin’ wrong in doing well and earning a little cash, is there?’

‘No,’ Edward agreed reluctantly. He had given more thought to Bryn’s continued insistence that their businesses were stronger together than he wanted to let on, but it didn’t do to show your hand too early where Bryn was concerned. Besides, what Jan and Jesse had said also nagged at his thoughts. Now that Bryn was sitting here in front of him, in his flash clothes and with a conceited look on his face, Edward’s doubts had once more risen to the surface.

‘I don’t know whether I want more. I’m happy with the boats and passing them on to Jesse.’

‘Not Grant then?’

‘No. ’E’s happy in the Marines. Best place for him.’

‘Is he settling well?’

‘Think so. Better to get all that anger out of ’im in hard training than ’ere in Trevay.’

Bryn placed his hand on Edward’s shoulder. He knew that Grant was a worry. A drinker with a short fuse and handy fists. ‘Maybe the discipline is just what he needs,’ he said.

‘Aye.’

Bryn remained silent, watching as Edward took a long mouthful of beer. Then he asked, ‘What does Jan think?’

‘With women you’ve got to pick your moment.’

‘So you haven’t told her about the offer that I’ve put on the table?’ Bryn leant closer to Edward. ‘’Tis a good offer, Edward. You know that these EU quotas could be the death of the Cornish fishing industry. We need to diversify and open up our markets if we’re to survive. We’re better together – you’ll never get an offer like this one again. The future of Behenna and Clovelly will be settled.’

‘But you getting fifty-one per cent: you’d have the controlling interest then. You might leave me high and dry.’

‘Look, Edward,’ Bryn leant in closer. Edward could smell the scent of cigars on his beautifully laundered Pierre Cardin shirt. ‘I’m prepared to sell you a share in the fish market, if that would sweeten the deal. We’d both sit on the board of Behenna and Clovelly and each have a fair shout on how the business is managed.’

Edward frowned and rubbed his chin. Bryn looked appraisingly at him.

‘When did you and Jan last have a holiday?’

‘What do we need an ’oliday for?’

‘You’ll need a holiday from all the hard work we’ll be putting in running the new business together. Imagine. You could go up country and see the sights of London. Catch a plane to Italy or Greece. Or maybe have a week in New York.’

‘Who’ll look after the boats while I’m away?’

‘Me. And you’ll look after the fish market and the refrigeration factory for me when I’m away with my missus.’

Edward shook his head. He’d been thinking about Bryn’s ‘business’ plan since the idea had first been floated. It was all very well for Bryn to talk about them joining forces but, as the months had gone by and Bryn had kept on about Jesse and Greer getting married, it felt more and more like Bryn was leading them all down a road that led in one direction, where there was no turning back. As a reality, he knew where his moral compass was pointing.