A Good Catch: The perfect Cornish escape full of secrets. Fern Britton
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June 1987
‘Mickey, you want to come fishing with me tonight? Celebrate the last of the exams?’
Jesse was pulling off his school tie as he walked out of the school gates for the last time. It was a momentous day; along with many others he had finished his final O level, and the occasion was marked by the usual flour and egg fight, ended only when the deputy head raged at the rabble-rousers for covering her car in cake ingredients and escorted them off the school grounds. The long hot summer lay, full of promise, ahead of Jesse.
Mickey shook his head disappointedly. ‘I’ve got to help my dad on the boat.’
Jesse put his arm round his friend. ‘Tell you what, I’ll help you and we’ll go out later.’
‘Would you?’ Mickey said gratefully, picking bits of batter off his shirt.
‘Yeah. Donna at the Spar shop fancies me. She might sell us some tins of cider with our pasties.’
Mickey smiled gratefully at his best and oldest friend. They’d navigated school life pretty well together. Football, detentions and girls. He was still hopelessly in love with Loveday, but she never seemed to take him seriously. He’d found comfort with females who were more than willing.
And now school was over and out. He didn’t have to worry himself with further education. He had no need. He’d been offered a job as deckhand on Our Mermaid, one of the newest boats on the Behenna fleet and skippered by his dad.
Meanwhile, Jesse was being groomed to take over the fleet when his own father eventually retired. He had to start at the bottom, though, and was to be deckhand on The Lobster Pot, the flagship of the fleet, skippered by Edward Behenna himself.
As the boys loped down the hill from school towards the harbour, they heard Loveday’s voice calling to them breathlessly.
‘Boys. Wait up!’ Loveday was galloping towards them, her school skirt covered in flour and rolled up at the waistband to reveal wobbly thighs, her white shirt pulling at the buttons as her bosoms jiggled invitingly with every pace. A little way ahead of her, Greer was jogging effortlessly in her spotless school uniform.
‘Where are you two off to?’ panted Loveday.
Mickey put his arms out to catch the girl he adored. His hands caught her waist and he felt the warmth from under her breasts. She turned her smiling freckled face up to the two boys. Mickey could smell the sweetness of her breath as she asked again, ‘Where are you two going?’
‘Mickey and I have got stuff to do,’ said Jesse, staring into the middle distance with feigned nonchalance.
‘What sort of stuff?’
‘The sort of stuff that don’t need girls,’ Jesse grunted.
Loveday looked crushed. ‘Greer and me thought we could do something together with you two. You know. Celebrate the end of school.’
Greer narrowed her eyes astutely. ‘You’re going fishing, aren’t you?’
Jesse ignored her and said to Mickey over the top of both girls’ heads, ‘You bring the bait and I’ll bring the food.’
‘We can come with you,’ Loveday told him, not prepared to brook any objections. ‘Greer and I’ll be good company for you.’
Jesse shook his head. ‘No. Blokes only.’
Loveday pulled a face. ‘Blokes only? You arrogant arse.’
Mickey laughed and turned to Jesse pleadingly. ‘They can come, can’t they?’
Jesse, who was trying to wean himself off his desirous want for Loveday, thought he might be in with a chance with Donna from the Spar shop later that night. Loveday was a no-go area while Mickey still had the hots for her. But maybe it would be nice to hang out with the girls – they hadn’t all been together for a while.
Damnit, Donna could wait.
‘OK. Seven o’clock at Our Mermaid,’ he agreed reluctantly.
Loveday took Greer’s arm and pulled her away excitedly. ‘What are you going to wear?’ she asked.
‘Jeans, I think,’ said Greer.
‘Me too,’ smiled Loveday.
*
Greer left Loveday at the cobbled corner where her mum had a tiny cottage. Then she walked on past the harbour and out onto the road that led towards the better end of Trevay.
When her father had sold the two trawlers his dad had left him, and bought the small fish market on the quay, he’d quickly turned the ailing business round. He’d taken a small selection of the best of his fresh catches up the M5 and the M4 to London’s swankier restaurants and hotels, persuading the chefs that he could undercut any of their other suppliers and provide better fish. He had worked hard. As soon as the fishing boats unloaded at his market, he paid the skippers the least he could get away with and then jumped in his refrigerated van and personally drove the lobster, plaice, turbot and crab to the back door of the poshest kitchens in the United Kingdom. Gradually he could afford to pay better prices to the fishermen, and that enticed boats from around the Cornish coast to land their catches with him. As business grew he expanded the old fish market, taking up at least three times more quayside and landing space. Now he had three vans every night ploughing the motorways and bringing home the money.
Naturally, the cramped house in the back lanes of Trevay had given way to a modern and airy executive bungalow, and this was where Greer was headed now.
Greer’s mother opened the front door as soon as she saw her turn into the drive.
‘How did it go?’ She took the proffered, and now redundant, blazer from Greer and hung it for the last time on a padded hanger in the coat cupboard, next to her husband’s golf clubs.
‘The English paper was fine and the history paper was everything I’d revised, so I think I’ll have done OK.’
‘You are a clever girl.’ Elizabeth kissed her. ‘I’ve got crab salad for tea.’
‘Actually, I was hoping to go out.’
‘Where?’
‘Fishing with Loveday and Mickey.’
‘Just Mickey and Loveday?’
‘Erm, I think Jesse will be there too.’
‘I see.’ Elizabeth knew all about Bryn’s plan for Greer and Jesse. There had never been any other children after Greer and no doctor could ever tell them why. Elizabeth was not really sorry. Childbirth was messy and dangerous, and once had been enough for her, but she knew how much it unsettled Bryn to think about what was going to happen to the company. Women were taking the reins in business more and more these days, but Greer had never shown the slightest interest – and quite right too, thought Elizabeth. Fishing was a man’s world and women had no place in it. Part of her wanted Greer to marry someone outside Trevay, someone with a bit of breeding; but she supposed that Jesse Behenna was as close as it came to old money in Trevay. Besides, look at Bryn, he’d been just like all the other coarse Trevay fishermen when he’d courted her, but she could sense his ambition and together they had come far. All men could be moulded by a strong woman who knew what she wanted.
‘Mum, there’s nothing to worry about,’ said Greer, interpreting her mother’s interest as concern for her morals. ‘He has tons of girlfriends and I’m not one of them.’
‘But you’d like to be.’
‘Muuum. Don’t. You sound like Dad.’
Elizabeth turned and walked towards the kitchen. Greer followed her.
‘Can I take the crab salad with me?’ She tried to appease her mother. ‘I don’t want to waste it.’
Her mother nodded. ‘Yes. I’ll make a