siren song

Irish Jesuit Province

Siren SongAuthor(s): John GannonSource: The Irish Monthly, Vol. 75, No. 883 (Jan., 1947), pp. 17-23Published by: Irish Jesuit ProvinceStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/20515595 .

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17

Short Story

Siren Song By John Gannon, S.J.

FOR a moment, framed in the cordage from the main

sail, I saw Gardiner's face. Then the cutter bucked in the swell and left me only the fearful image. Sleepless nights

had trampled on every feature. In the half-light his skin shone

palely white against an unkempt stubble of beard, and his eyes were dark wells. Fatigue and stark despair had marked him.

Overwhelmingly the question surged in me : Am I, too, pocked and marked? I shuddered in physical pain at the thought and

pushed an unsteady hand across my face. The worst was over

now. The storm was sinking back into the sea, and the inky clouds were breaking just a little at the horizon.

Three days and two nights we were in the grip of storm, the

light cutter tossed by the waves from one mighty shoulder of water to another. The wave crests slapped over our decks and

sloggered by the cabin's head and in the corners. In a bedlam of crashing water and thunder, we clung to tiller and sheets, ever

acutely conscious of the strained creaking of timber and the

shrieking of ttr ^ale among the rigging. South before wind and sea we ran alon^ the Mayo coast, helpless to turn from the course

marked out for us by the storm, hopeless to determine our exact

position. Anxiety and fatigue had turned to apathy the vain efforts we had made to control our ship. Headlong we fled,

bucking and twisting, our safety dependent on no effort of ours,

and now with the sea sinking gradually since morning we had run the channel of Fineman's Bay. On either side slanting



18 THE IRISH MONTHLY

hills marked the coast-line and long ledges of sharp rock jutted out into the surf and dived under the waves like great sinister claws reaching out to clutch us. But through the rain and the

gk>Om the hills were only darker shapes against the dark clouds and the rock-lines were invisible save for the water that boiled

and frothed around them. The wind was howling down the bay between the hills and driving us all too swiftly along the narrow

channel. We lowered the main-sail and left the jib to the wind. The tide was coming in and the passage was taking a heavy swell.

Once I was knocked flat on my face, tripped by a loose rope's end,

awkward in my oilskins. The sea on the deck rolled me over

and over, and I caught hold of a capstan and got to my feet very much out of breath and out of temper.

Gardiner was hunched up by the tiller, just hanging on. We were in the bay to shelter, and as we nosed further inland I

thought it high time we took soundings and prepared to ride at anchor. Clutching a cable with both hands, I splashed down the

deck towards the tiller. It was then I saw the light. I supposed it was just an ordinary cottage window suddenly visible from

behind some rocky promontory. A small ball of orange light, it glowed unwinkingly, and in the watery air cast a nimbus of

spikey light. It was steady, constant, cheery, everything that

we were not ; it was to us the sign and symbol of our humanity and civilisation. I was buoyed up by its steady glow, and laughed fiercely in the face of the roaring sea. Men lived here. It was

a harbourage. I had seen a light. v Gardiner was steering all the time with an uncanny feel for

the channel. I caught hold of the turn-up of his oilskins, and

yelled in his ear as I pointed towards the light. We came up out

of a trough and ploughing the crest of a huge wave, saw below us

the friendly glow. Then Gardiner had his frenzy. Cool when the danger was at its worst and far from land great waves broke



SIREN SONG 19

over us, here in the comparative safety of the bay he lost all control. Though my hand was oh his oilskin only, I felt, running through him from head to foot, a sudden wave, a surge of nausea ;

or was it an unhinging fear? Unhesitatingly he jammed the tiller hard down and ran straight for the light. The cutter

swung across in the surge of a wave and then a second wave struck

her broadside and staggered her ; and then another and another.

I shouted and screamed in terror at Gardiner. His eyes were

fixed on the light and his teeth hard clenched as he leaned his

weight on the tiller. I tried to grapple with him, and was almost

Hung overboard by a wave that curled broadside over the beam

and caught me unprepared. We were close up to the shore

now, the light maybe a hundred yards away on our port side. I

steadied myself for another effort. Then the bow lifted sud

denly ; we slipped sideways, and the bow dived low ; the keel

ground and bit, and the cutter shivered and shook. She strained to break forward against the reef, but the bow was jammed tight in a corner of rock. The beam came up with the rise of a

breaker, and Gardiner and I pitched forward down the deck. The bow was almost under water and waves broke steadily over it. I

dragged down the jib, splashing to my knees in the sea-romp. Gardiner was on his knees clutching the cabin head with outspread arms. He was going to be no help now. Big breakers were

rolling up on our beam with deadly shock. Unless the wind

turned, or unless she could hold out till the turn of the tide, the cutter was certain to break up against the rocks under the blows

of the waves. The suck and smash of big waves was loud in here

by the reef, and the wind howled dismally up the coast. We mustn't stay on the cutter. Between us and land lay a hundred

yards of broken water, spuming and boiling. The orange light caught my eye again, and my feelings towards it were altogether

changed. I felt now as Jason felt when first he heard the sirens'




song. I was blinded with a sudden burst of bitter passion. I

shook my fist and cried out at the light. I was certain that while

we foundered here at their door, the owners of the light were

chatting and laughing to one another above the lashing of the

rain. How long I was shaken by this passion that blinded all

reason, I cannot tell, but I know that soon I was calm as one

may hope to be when life seems washing away on a tide. We

had one hope of safety left us ; one slim chance of escaping the

death that awaited us when the cutter finally broke up and sank. Below decks we kept a round rubber, flat-bottomed rescue craft.

If we should succeed in floating this wide of the crash of water

against the rocks, we stood a fair chance of being brought inshore

by the tide, I got the hatch open and went below. In the

darkness and the enclosed space the storm roared appallingly,

and the strain on the keel and the plates made a harsh rasping

noise. I felt that it was imperative that we should get away at once. On deck again, I dragged the boat out of the swirl of water and up to the stern, rising dry out of the sea. My plan was that we should launch ourselves on a great wave just before

it began to retreat, and be carried out clear of the rocks and the

cutter, and then by luck or perhaps by some manoeuvring with

a paddle, we might gain the flood that was boring up between two reefs to the shore a hundred yards away. If we could keep

ourselves afloat in the suck of the first wave we had an even

chance of getting clear. If we failed?well, it was a matter of

life and death anyway.

As I swung the boat down the deck, the orange light caught my attention. It seemed less steady now, as though someone

within a room were moving a lamp to and fro. Even if we had

sent up a rocket nothing oould have been done for us on a prac

tically deserted bit of coast, and seeing this, I no longer was bitter against those who were safe on the shore. The light



SIREN SONG 21

bobbed and moved again and I thought now it must ibe a lantern or perhaps a light-buoy that had slipped moorings and was washed

ashore.

I yelled my plan in Gardiner's ear, and then we put it into

act. It isn't easy to describe a terrifying experience that takes

place within a few seconds. At one second, it seemed, we had

launched ourselves on the back of a wave, and immediately we

were whipped away out to sea. Clutching the side-struts of our

rubber boat, I felt that I was being flung upwards and outwards, as in a chairaplane. Breathless, deafened by the roar of the

night, terrified by the walls of water that reared over us on every

side, we were swept into the landward flood. It was impossible to think clearly or to have any account of time ; we simply held on and prayed for safety, and the tide swung us nearer shore with

every wave that raced under us. After a period, long or short I

do not know, I heard a new note in the night's medley, a boom

followed by a long hiss ; waves breaking over sand. I had

scarcely realised this when we were flung flat upon a beach. Before

we could save ourselves a wave rode in breast high and covered

us. I floundered up in the water and found a footing. Gardiner was struggling beside me. Sea water blinded me, rushed up my

nostrils, made me sick. I fought madly to get ashore, tearing

at the water with my hands and thrusting forward with my shoulders. Water was dragging at me. Then it fell away

round me, down to my knees, and I was splashing through

hissing shallows to the higher levels of the beach. I stopped when I reached a bank of grass and heather, and was very sick.

Lying on my back, I laughed helplessly without the least humour to make my laughter bearable, and controlled myself only when I remembered Gardiner and staggered to my feet to find him.

I did not find Gardiner. I struggled up and down the beach, and called his name into the teeth of wind and wave, and there




was nothing to answer my cries. I commended his soul to God with an earnestness that my prayers had never had before.

" One

shall be taken and one left ". Sick and weary I staggered away from the beach towards the light that had led us to our wreck.

It would be fifty to a hundred yards to the left. When I had

gone two hundred yards or so there was still no sign of light or

cottage. I tried to persuade myself that I had not come far

enough, or that I ought to have turned right, but it was no use.

I had calculated fairly accurately before leaving the cutter the

position of the light in relation to the beach, and it seemed now

that I had overstepped the mark. Yet behind me there had been no sign of cottage or paths or boats, nothing at all to suggest that men had lived here. Surely there would have been a path

way down to the sea? There was none. I made a cast inland

and found still no sign. A bog edged down the hills to sea

level, and covered all the flats back towards the mainland. I turned around and began to make my way southwards across the

breadth of the promontory where the going was free of bog and

quag. Rain dashed against my oil-skins, and frequently,

despite the damp, I lay down in the dark morning hours, when I felt that I could go no further.

The new morning was born on the inland hills, grey and cold.

In faint light I came down from the heights of the promontory to the shore on the southern flank, and saw before me the few

scattered cottages of a fishing community. I must have made a

dreadful figure swaying in the doorway against the grey sky, but the fisherman's wife showed only concern. The house was in a

kind commotion. I was just about asleep on my feet. I

remembered telling some muddled story of the wreck, drinking something very hot, and being hustled into a low soft bed by the fire.



SIREN SONG 2S

I awoke in the dusk, when the open fire was throwing long fantastic shadows on the walls. The night and its horrors came

back to me in a flash, and I was afraid again. A gentle voice

asked me if I were awake, and feeling better. I raised my head

and saw them all sitting round the fire in a ring, close to the bed.

They gave me something to eat and drink, and I asked them if

Gardiner's body had been found. They were bewildered, so I

told them the whole story, as I set it down here. When I

mentioned the cottage window they shook their heads, and the man of the house said that no one lived or could long live in the

bog, where we had seen the light. I explained then that we

had seen possibly a lantern or a drifting buoy, but still they shook their heads, and the woman of the house said :

*; God be good

to him ".

When I finished there was an electric silence in the little room.

Then the fisherman said: "

This has happened before. On

nights when there are no stars, though the sea be calm enough, boats and men are swallowed up in Fineman's Bay. There

never were signs of wreck. It's said that the helmsman sees a

light on shore, and while he sees it no power can save him from

being drawn towards it, and in upon the rocks on the shore, and

what the water-sprites do is no business of the living." The surf was booming along the beach while the fisherman spoke. It

was like a chorus of assent. I laughed shakily. Men who go to sea are superstitious, and I thanked God that I was really a

landlubber. When the storm passed we stood above the fatal beach, but

there was no trace of Gardiner, no trace of the cutter ; not a

plank, not a rope remained from the wreck. Chilly shivers

chased each other down my spine. I could not speak. I could

scarcely stand. Fineman's Bay smiled in the sun.



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