My recollection of the journey down to the plane is confused and vague. My mood had changed from panic to intense excitement. It had changed the moment I’d returned to the room where Maxwell lay and Hilda had told them I’d agreed to fly them out. They had looked at me then with a new respect. From being an outcast I had become the leader. It was I who ordered them to fix up a stretcher for Maxwell, to hitch George to the cart again, to bring Tucek and Lemlin down. The sense of power gave me confidence. But with that sense of power came the realisation of the responsibility I had undertaken.
I had time to think about this as we crunched down the ash-strewn track to the vineyard. And the more I thought about it, the more appalled I became. The sudden mood of confidence seeped away, leaving me trembling and scared. It wasn’t death I was scared of. I’m certain of that. It was myself. I was afraid because I didn’t think I’d be capable of doing what I’d said I’d do. I was afraid that at the last moment I’d funk it. I was in a sweat lest when I sat in the pilot’s seat with the controls under my hands I’d lose my nerve.
I think Hilda knew how I felt for she held my hand all the way, her fingers gripping mine with a tightness that seemed to be trying to give me strength.
We were a queer cartload. The mule moved very slowly, Hacket holding the reins. Maxwell was coming round and moaning with pain under — his blankets. Lemlin was unconscious, but Tucek, propped against the side of the cart, had his eyes open. They stared vacantly in front of him, the pupils unnaturally large. The little Italian boy was playing with Zina’s hair while she lolled like a courtesan against Reece, her skirt rucked up to show her naked thigh, a dreamy smile on her lips. It was insufferably hot and the sweat trickled down between my shoulder blades.
I remember as we left the villa a little mound of ash by the front door with a swarm of flies buzzing over it. I didn’t have to ask what it was, for there was a hand sticking out of the ash. Roberto’s grave started in my mind a picture of the twisted wreckage of a plane and the flies buzzing in clouds about our swollen bodies. It was all mixed up in my mind with the flies that had crawled in swarms over my smashed leg up there in the Futa Pass so long ago.
I felt my mind drifting over the edge of reality into fantasy. Hacket was swearing at the mule and I found myself identifying myself with the animal’s reluctance to reach its destination. I wanted to go jolting on into infinity, just moving steadily on and never reaching the plane. And then I saw Sansevino watching me curiously. I could see him following the antics of my mind with a cold, professional interest. And then for a moment anger and hate blended in the sweat of the heat and I wanted to be transported in a flash to the cockpit of the plane and go roaring out over the lava with a wild shout of laughter as I proved to them I could do it.
We were down by the rows and rows of planted bush vines now and Hilda’s fingers clutched more tightly at my hand. ‘Where shall we live, Dick?’ Her voice sounded a long way away as though I was hearing her talking to me in a dream. ‘Can we have a house by the sea somewhere? I have always wanted to live by the sea. I think perhaps it is because my mother was a Venetian. The sea is in my blood. But the frontiers of Czechoslovakia are all land frontiers. It will be nice to live in a country that is surrounded by water. It is so safe. Dick. What sort of house shall we have? Can we have a little thatched house? I have seen pictures—’
So she went on, talking about her dream home, trying to fill my mind with thoughts that lay beyond the nightmare of the present. I remember I said, ‘First I shall have to get a job — a job in England.’
‘That will not be difficult,’ she answered. ‘My father plans to build a factory. He has patents, and the money for the factory—’ She stopped then. ‘What happened to the things that were in your leg?’
I remembered then and my mind seized with relief on something immediate and practical. I leaned forward and grabbed Sansevino by the arm. ‘You took something from my leg — up there on that roof. Give it to me.’ I saw cunning and hesitation in his eyes. ‘Give it to me.’ My voice was almost a scream.
He put his hand in his pocket and for one awful moment I thought he’d got a gun and I half rose to fling myself at him. But his hand came out with the little leather bag and I remembered he hadn’t got a gun. He handed it across to me. It was quite light and as I shook it the contents rattled like a bag of dried peas. I undid the neck of it and poured the contents into Hilda’s lap. Zina’s eyes opened wide and she leaned forward with a hiss of excitement. It was like a stream of glittering fire as I poured it on to Hilda’s dust-caked skirt. Diamonds and rubies, emeralds, sapphires. They lay there winking and glittering, all the wealth of the Tucek steelworks condensed into that little pile of precious stones.
I was angry then, angry because Tucek had committed me unwittingly to smuggle his wealth out of the country. He’d come to my room that night with the intention of asking me to help him, and when he’d found me drunk he’d seen my leg and slipped the little leather bag into the hollow shaft. He’d realised that if I didn’t know what I carried I’d be more likely to get through. But he’d no right to do it without my permission. He’d committed me to a danger that I hadn’t known about.
I stared at him angrily. But he met my stare with vacant eyes, his head rolling mindlessly with the jolting of the cart. Then I remembered the other package. I demanded it from Sansevino. And when he’d handed it to me I knew why Tucek had done it without asking me. The little oilskin roll contained a dozen small metal cylinders, light as feathers. I knew what they were at once. They were rolls of films — microfilms of blueprints. There in my hand were the details of new equipment, arms and machinery, in production at the Tucek works. He’d done exactly as he’d done in 1939. I understood then. I closed the package and passed it across to Hilda.
She stared at the tiny cylinders for a moment and I saw that she was crying. Then slowly she poured the pile of precious stones back into the leather bag, tied it up and handed me the bag and the oilskin package. ‘Keep them, please, Dick. Later you can give them to my father.’ It was a gesture of trust and I suddenly felt like crying too.
Sansevino was talking to Hacket now and the cart lurched off the track, dragging slowly through the vineyards towards a big corrugated iron barn half-buried in an orange grove. When we reached it Sansevino jumped down and he and Hacket and Reece slid back the doors. Inside was an old Dakota, its camouflage paint worn to bright metal in places by the constant impact of air. My heart sank at the sight of it. It had been dragged in tail-first by the tractor that was parked under the starboard wing.
I sat there staring at it, quite unable to move. I was conscious of them carrying Maxwell’s stretcher off the cart, of Zina clapping her hands with joy at the sight of the plane, of the child sucking its thumb and staring in awe. Even when Tucek and Lemlin had been got off the cart I still sat there. My limbs seemed incapable of movement.
‘Dick.’ Hilda was tugging at my arm. ‘Dick. Please.’
My gaze shifted from the plane to the mountain behind. It seemed to lean right over the improvised hangar, the great, black column of gas surging up from its crater, billowing, swirling, rising till it spread like a hellish canopy across the sky. And between us and the mountain was a thick, sulphurous haze. ‘Dick!’ Hilda’s voice was suddenly urgent and my body shook as though I were possessed of some horrible devil. Memory stood at my side, the memory of the last plane I’d flown, a crumpled heap of burnt-out wreckage. ‘I can’t,’ I whispered. Panic had seized me again and my voice came like a sigh from deep down inside me.
Her hands gripped my shoulders. ‘You see that haze? You know what it means?’ I nodded. She twisted my shoulders round so that I was facing her. ‘Look at me.’ Then she took my hands and put them about her throat. ‘I can’t face that lava, Dick. Either you fly that plane or you kill me — now.’
I remember I stared at her in horror. Her throat was soft beneath my fingers. And then the softness of her flesh gave me strength. Or perhaps it was her grey eyes, staring straight into mine. I got to my feet. ‘All right,’ I said. I jumped to the ground. I stood there, trembling. But she followed, caught hold of my hand and led me towards the machine. ‘When you feel the controls — you will be all right then.’ She looked up at me and smiled. ‘Are you very tired, Dick?’
I bit on my lip and didn’t say anything. We walked to the plane then. I remember my feet seemed a long way away, almost beyond my control. They had the door of the fuselage open and were getting Maxwell’s stretcher in. It was Reece who pulled me up into the plane. He patted my shoulder and grinned. I stood there, staring at the familiar details in the half dark. It was just as it had been when it had carried parachutists to half the countries of Europe — the canvas seats, the oxygen notices, the Mae Wests and collapsible dinghies.
A hand gripped mine. I stared at it and then at Reece. He was stammering, awkward. ‘I want to apologise, Dick. I didn’t realise — what guts you’d got.’
I think it was that more than anything else that helped me to get a grip on myself. I felt that here, in this plane, I was in some measure squaring my account with him and Shirer. Hilda was beside me and together we went forward to the crew’s cabin. It was as though I’d stepped back into the war. Everything was familiar, ordinary. I climbed to the cockpit and sat down in the pilot’s seat. A helmet hung over the control column, trailing its intercom plug-in wire. I felt as though if I put it on I could talk to my navigator and the wireless operator.
Hilda had climbed into the second pilot’s seat. Reece, who had followed us, said, ‘I’ll let you know when we’re all set.’
I ran my hand over the controls, thrust at the rudder with my feet.testing the weight of it against my dummy leg. Then I got my handkerchief out and wiped the sweat from my face and hands. It was so damnably hot and I felt sleepy. God, I felt sleepy. I stared at the dials and they seemed to be trembling in the heat of the cabin. I felt sick then.
Hilda’s hand came out and gripped mine. ‘Are you all right?’
I wasn’t all right. I felt faint. But I said, ‘Yes, I’m all right.’ I said it violently as though to convince myself. She kept a tight hold of my hand. And then Reece was at my elbow, peering up at me, telling me they were all on board. ‘Do you want the motors turned over? There’s starting equipment here.’
‘No. They’ll be all right. They shouldn’t need warming up in this heat.’
‘Shall I close the door then?’
‘Yes. Close the door.’
The moment had come now. I looked up from the controls, looking out through the windshield to the ash-covered vineyard that was to be our runway. And then I saw George. They’d moved him to one side and he stood there, a desolate little figure standing dejectedly between the shafts of the broken cart. A violent, uncontrollable wave of anger swept over me. ‘You swines,’ I shouted. ‘You bloody swines.’ I was out of my seat and down the fuselage in an instant. ‘Get him on board. Get him on to the plane.’
They stared at me, Reece and Hacket standing by the door, the others sitting in the canvas seats.
‘Who?’ Hacket asked.
‘The mule, you bastard!’ I screamed at him. ‘Do you think I’m going without my mule?’
Reece came towards me. ‘Steady, Farrell,’ he said. ‘We can’t take the mule.’
‘You’ll bloody well take him or we don’t go at all. You leave him there, trailing that cart—’
‘All right. We’ll cut him loose from the cart. But we can’t—’
‘You’ll get him on board or I don’t fly this plane out.’
‘Have some sense, man,’ Racket said. ‘I’m very sympathetic about animals, but, damn it, there’s a limit.’
If I hadn’t been so tensed-up maybe I’d have seen his point. But George was something more to me than just a mule. He’d got me out of Santo Francisco. Just as I wouldn’t leave him in that building, so I wouldn’t leave him now to be slowly burned up by the lava. I went down to the door and wrenched it open. And then Sansevino caught me by the arm. My flesh cringed at his touch. ‘You must not become upset over the mule. After all, what is a mule? He wouldn’t be happy in the plane and anyway we could not get him into the fuselage.’ He was talking to me like a child — like a doctor talking to a mental patient — and all my hate of the man flared up.
‘How would you like to run from the lava trailing a broken cart and then at last be overrun by it and die, smelling your flesh burning?’
‘You have too much imagination. That was always your trouble, my friend. You forget it is an animal, not a human being.’
I had a sudden wild idea of leaving the damnable little doctor harnessed to the shafts of the cart. The mere thought of it brought a bubble of laughter to my lips. I heard him say, ‘Pull yourself together, Farrell.’ He was speaking to me as though I were mad. I saw his eyes dilating in sudden fear of me, saw the way his nose had been twisted by Roberto’s fist, and then I saw nothing as I drove my own fist with all the force I possessed into his face, lusting in the feel of pulping blood and tissue, the satisfying thud and crunch of impact and the beautiful pain of my knuckles. Then I was looking down at him, sprawled on the sheet-metal floor of the fuselage, his face broken and bloody. I was trembling. The details of the plane began to swim round in my eyeballs, nausea crept up my throat and into my brain. Very far away I heard my voice say, ‘Get the mule into the plane.’ Hacket and Reece were staring at me. Then without a word they climbed out.
Seeing them go like that without question gave me a sense of command, and with it confidence. I jumped down and found some planks to form a ramp. Hacket came into the barn leading the mule, its cut traces trailing behind it. I went up to the animal and rubbed its velvet muzzle, talking to it, calming it with the sound of my voice. It baulked at the ramp, but pushing and pulling we got it up and into the plane. I backed it so that its rump was against the toilet at the rear and we roped it. I stood talking to him for a bit and then I turned to go fo’ard to the cockpit and found myself face to face with Sansevino. He was holding a bloodstained rag of a handkerchief to his broken face and his eyes looked from me to the mule with a malevolence that halted me. ‘You touch that animal,’ I said, ‘and I’ll kill you.’
He smiled and said nothing. I turned to Reece. ‘Keep him away from that mule,’ I said.
‘The mule will be all right,’ Hacket assured me.
I hesitated, staring at Sansevino. You can’t kill a human being in cold blood whatever sort of a devil he is, but by God I wanted to. Then Hilda was at my side, leading me back to the aircrew’s cabin. I heard the door of the fuselage clang to and then I was in the pilot’s seat, my hands resting on the controls. ‘Anything I can do?’ It was Reece.
‘Nothing,’ I said. ‘Go and keep an eye on that damned doctor.’ I didn’t want Reece near me. I didn’t want him to see that I was trembling and sweating. He went and I said, ‘Tell them to fix their safety belts and then shut the door, Hilda.’
I heard her passing on the order and then the door to the crew’s cabin slid to and she was back in the seat beside me. I pressed the starter button. The port engine sprang into life. Then the starboard motor was turning, too. A cloud of dust swirled through the barn. The noise was shattering. I taxied out then, bumping through the ash towards the vineyard. Automatically I ran through the final routine check-up — flaps, rudder, oil, petrol, brakes, everything. All the time I kept the tail swinging back and forth as I tested out the strength of my dummy leg on the rudder.
At length I swung into position at the road end of the vineyard, facing the villa. I put the brakes on then, revving the engines, watching the dials, trimming the airscrews. From behind in the fuselage I thought I heard the frightened whinny of the mule and the clash of hooves on metal. Then I throttled back till the screws were just ticking over and wiped the sweat from the palms of my hands. There was nothing now between me and take-off except the trembling ache at the back of my knees.
Hilda’s hand touched mine. I looked across at her. She smiled. It was a slow smile of friendliness and confidence. Then she raised her thumbs and nodded.
I turned to face the runway. It stretched ahead of me, a grey plain of ash marked out with bush vines drawn up in straight, orderly lines, each a drab, pitiful object under its mantle of ash. And at the end was the lava outcrop and the villa. I thought perhaps I ought to take off from the villa end. But then suddenly my hand was on the throttle, revving the motors. If I taxied the length of the vineyard, feeling each bump, I knew my nerve would be gone. It was now or never.
I took the brakes off, felt the plane begin to move, checked the trim of the motors and braced my feet on the rudder bar, my left hand gripping the control column. The thing that worried me more than anything was the ash. How would the plane react when it gathered speed? What bumps did that damned carpet of ash hide? But there was no going back now. I opened out to full throttle. The ash was streaming past us now. Little grey bushes fled beneath us faster and faster, the villa on its lava outcrop raced to meet us. I braced myself, waiting for the tail to lift, my hands on the control column. We began to swing. I checked the swing with my left foot, checked too much and felt the tail swinging across in the opposite direction. For a second all my mind was concentrated on adjusting the rudder. And then at last I had it and at the same moment I felt the tail rise. The villa grew large till it seemed to fill the whole windshield and then I was pulling back on the stick, sensing the sudden lift of the wings, hearing the motor noise soften to a drone, and the red-tiled roof of the villa slid away beneath us.
I relaxed with a sense of relief. Hilda’s hand pressed mine. I looked out through the perspex and beyond the port wing tip I saw there was nothing left of Santo Francisco now, just a black welt of lava.
And then some Jinx got hold of the wings of the plane, shook them, slammed us down and then rocketed us up towards the black pall of the sky. I knew what it was even as we were flung upwards. We were caught in the uprush of hot air from the lava stream that had outflanked Santo Francisco. I fought to keep myself from panicking, to keep control of the plane. As the uprush lessened we began to bump about, tossed here and there like a shuttlecock in the turbulence of the air-streams and all the time I was fighting with stick and rudder to hold us on our course. The lacerated stump of my leg was agony each time I had to put on left rudder.
And then quite suddenly I was at home there in the pilot’s seat — at home and at ease. I knew we’d get through all right. I knew I could still fly. And as though in conquering myself the elements recognised defeat, the turbulence suddenly ceased and we were flying straight and steady without a bump as though we were floating in space.
It was then that Hacket burst into the cockpit. ‘Farrell. There’s been an accident. That damned mule. Can you land as soon as possible?’
‘What’s happened?’ I asked. I was banking now, turning away to the sea, clear of the lava.
‘It’s that doctor fellow. He’s badly hurt. The mule kicked him.’
‘Kicked Sansevino?’ I suddenly wanted to laugh. ‘That mule’s got sense.’
‘Don’t be a fool, man. He’s pretty bad.’
I straightened the plane up, flying along the coast, headed towards Naples. ‘What happened?’ I asked. ‘The mule couldn’t have kicked him unless he was behind it.’
‘It was when you hit that updraught of air. Sansevino had got to his feet to see that Maxwell was all right. Then he lost his balance, the plane tilted and he went slithering down between the mule’s legs to the back of the fuselage. The mule was lashing about and whinnying. If he’d lain still he’d probably have been okay. But he tried to get to his feet. The mule caught him as he got up. He’s lying there now close against the rubber dinghies. He’s unconscious and it looks as though his head’s badly battered. We can’t get to him because of the mule.’
‘Well, for God’s sake don’t try and shift the mule,’ I said. ‘Wait till we’ve landed.’
‘Okay. But hurry. He looks bad.’
I was swinging in towards the Vomero now and all Naples lay below me, grey with ash, the roads out of the city blocked with traffic. ‘Go and sit down,’ I said. ‘And see that everybody’s got their safety belts fixed. We’ll be landing at Pomigliano in a few minutes now.’
He left then and I heard the connecting door to the fuselage slide to. I sat there, my hands on the controls, staring out ahead, searching for the airfield, and there was a feeling of complete calm within me. I think I knew Sansevino was dead. I felt as though a chapter of my life was closed now, as though the hand of God had been stretched out and had closed it for me. The past was dead. A new life stretched ahead. I had only to land the plane safely….
I saw Pomigliano then, a grey, flat circle like a huge arena. I thrust forward the undercarriage level. Through my side window I saw the port wheel come down into position. ‘Check that your wheel is down,’ I called to Hilda. She glanced back through her window and nodded. I circled the airport, losing height. I felt no sense of nervousness. The calmness that had come over me with the news of what had happened to Sansevino was still with me. But through that calmness I was conscious of an aching tenseness in all my muscles.
There was no aircraft on the runway or lined up for take-off. I swung away towards Vesuvius, banking for a westward run-in. Then I had the flaps down and we were coming in to land. There was little wind and the plane was quite steady. I misjudged slightly and had to come in rather steep. The grey edge of the landing ground came rushing towards me. For a moment I felt a sense of panic. Then I pulled back on the control column. The wheels slammed on the concrete. The plane lifted. Then the wheels were firm on the deck and I was braking. We stopped well short of the runway end and I taxied in towards the airport buildings. A truck came out to meet us. I stopped the engines and sat there for a moment in a sort of daze, a cold nausea sweeping over me. I think I was sick. I know I fainted for when I came to I was lying stretched out on the canvas seats in the fuselage and Hilda’s voice, very far away, was saying in Italian, ‘Nervous exhaustion, that’s all.’
After that I had only moments of half-consciousness in which I was being bumped about in a smell of disinfectant. I could feel that somebody had hold of my hand. The fingers were cool and safe and I kept trying to tell them not to hurt the mule. After that I remember nothing till I woke up in a room full of soft furnishings and the cool of blinds drawn against the daylight.
Somebody moved in the shadows and then I saw Zina bending over me.
‘Where am I?’ I asked her.
‘At the Villa Carlotta. It is all right, Dick. Everything is all right.’
‘Hilda?’ I asked.
‘I tell her to get some sleep. Now you must also go to sleep.’ Her hands were stroking my forehead. My eyes closed. From far away I thought I heard someone say, ‘Goodbye, Dick.’ Then I slept again.
I woke to sunshine and the friendly bulk of Hacket sitting beside me. I rubbed my eyes and sat up. I felt damnably weak, but my head was clear. ‘How long have I been out?’ I asked him.
He said, ‘Well, between drugs and sleep you’ve had about fifty hours.’
‘Good God!’ I said. And then I remembered Sansevino.
But when I asked about him, Hacket shook his head. ‘You can forget him now,’ he said. ‘He’s dead. They buried him as Walter Shirer. Maxwell’s orders. He thought it was easier that way.’
‘And the others?’ I asked.
‘Maxwell’s doing fine. He’s in the next room. He insisted on staying here. The Countess has gone to Rome to join her husband. Some nuns are looking after the little Italian kid and all the others are fine.’
‘What about George?’ I asked. ‘They didn’t — do anything to the mule, did they?’
He had risen to his feet. ‘You don’t have to worry about George,’ he said with a grin. ‘I guess George saved every one a lot of trouble. Right now he’s stabled in the summerhouse here. You’re at the Countess’s villa, by the way. And the eruption is over.’ He turned towards the door. ‘Now I must get the nurse.’
I heard the door close and I lay there for a moment blinking at the sunlight that showed through the slits of the Venetian blinds. Then I pulled back the bedclothes and put my foot to the floor. The tiles were wonderfully smooth and cold to the touch. There was no grit in the room. It was clean and clear of ash. The left leg of my pyjamas had been cut off short and I saw that the stump of my leg had been bandaged. I got hold of the back of a chair and manoeuvred myself to the window. I hung there for a moment, panting with the effort and feeling very weak. Then I pulled up the blind and sunshine flooded into the room.
For a moment I was blinded. Then as I got accustomed to the glare I saw the sea glittering below me and away to the left the ash-heap of Vesuvius. It was no longer a pyramid. It seemed to have been distorted into the shape of a camel with two enormous rounded humps of ash. It looked remote and unreal without even a wisp of gas coming from the crater. It was hard to believe that those twin hills had been spouting fire and ash only a few hours ago. The scene was placid, tranquil. The whole thing was like a nightmare dimly remembered.
And then in the garden below I saw the mule. His neck was stretched out and he was eating the wisteria that still cascaded over the summerhouse as it had done that day I met Zina to go out to Casamicciola. So little time had passed and so much had happened.
The door opened behind me and I turned to see Hilda and her father. ‘What are you doing out of bed, Dick?’
I started to move towards the bed, not wishing her to see me standing there with only one leg. And then I stopped for I saw she had on a white overall and carried an enamel tray with bottles on it.’ Have you been nursing me?’ My voice sounded angry.
‘You and Max — yes.’
My hand touched the stump of my leg. It was she who had put the bandages there. A sort of thankfulness swept over me. I didn’t even have to worry about that any more. I reached for the bed and sank into it, feeling as though I wanted to cry. Jan Tucek came forward and his hand gripped mine. He didn’t say anything and I was glad. I couldn’t have borne it if he’d said anything. He was very pale and the bones of his skull seemed to stare through the fleshless skin. But his eyes were quite different. They were no longer haunted, but full of confidence. And Hilda, who had put down her tray and was holding on to his arm, was different, too. The harassed look was gone. Instead, it was the smiling face of the photograph on her father’s desk that looked down at me.’ You were right,’ I said to Tucek. ‘She’s got freckles.’
Hilda made a face at me, and then she and Tucek were laughing. I don’t think I’ve ever been so happy as I was then, seeing those two laughing together.
She came round the bed and handed me my jacket.’ I think, Dick, you have something for my father.’ It was still torn and dirty, just as it had been — and the pockets bulged. I put my hand into one of the pockets and the first thing I touched was Zina’s automatic. I put it down softly on the table beside me and then I got out the two packages that had been hidden so long in the shaft of my leg. I handed them to Tucek.
He took them and stood staring at them for a long time.
Then he put the oilskin package in his pocket and tossed the chamois leather bag on to the bed. ‘That one I think we will split fifty-fifty, Dick.’
I stared at him and saw he meant it. ‘No,’ I said. ‘I can’t—’ And then I stopped and glanced at Hilda. ‘All right,’ I said. ‘I’ll accept your offer — provided you let me trade back my half in exchange for your daughter.’
‘For that,’ Hilda said, two spots of colour showing on her cheeks, ‘you get another injection, my boy.’
And for the second time within a few minutes I saw Jan Tucek laugh. ‘I think it is a bad bargain you make,’ he said. ‘But all right.’
Hilda took hold of my arm and jabbed the needle into it. And then she bent and kissed me. ‘I’ll see he gives me some of it for a dowry,’ she whispered. ‘I still want that thatched cottage near to the sea.’