`Well, you know how fast water runs at the ebb-time. They were yards away in a few seconds. At first Evans thought they were done for then he saw Matthew strike out towards Polly He didn’t see any more because he started running off to. the Yacht Club to give the alarm.
`It was Colonel Summers who went after them, but eve with that fast motor-boat of his they were well over a mi 1e downstream before he could find them. Matthew was still supporting Polly.
`The Colonel was tremendously impressed. He says that if he ever saw anything that deserved a medal, that did; and he’s going to make sure Matthew gets one. (*)
`We were i here when it happened. My two never thought to tell us until they ha d seen the Colonel’s boat chase off after them. Not that we could have done anything. But lord-oh-lord, waiting for him to come back … I hope I never have to spend an hour like that again …’
`Anyway, it came out all right, thank God – and thanks to young Matthew. There’s no doubt at all your Polly’d have been done for, but for him. Damn good show, and if the Colonel needs any backing for that medal idea, he’ll certainly get mine. Matthew deserves it.’
Alan finished off his drink at a gulp, and reached for the bottle again.
I finished nine, too. I felt I needed it.
Everybody ought to be able to swim. It had worried me at times for the last year or two that Matthew could never succeed in swimming more than three consecutive strokes …
I was shushed away from the room Polly was sharing with young Emma.
`She’s fast asleep,’ Mary told me. `She’s got a nasty bruise on her right shoulder. We think she must have hit the boot os she fell. Otherwise she seems only tired out. Oh, David…’
`It’s all right, darling. It’s over now.’
`Yes, thank God. Phyl told me all about it. But, David, how did Matthew do it …?’
I looked in on Matthew. The light was still on. He was lying on his back storing at the lamp. I had time to catch his worried look before he turned his head and saw me.
`Hullo, Daddy,’ he said.
Momentarily he looked pleased, and relieved, but the anxious expression soon came back.
`Hullo, Matthew. How are you feeling?’ I asked.
`All right,’ he told me. `We got jolly cold, but Auntie Phyl made us have a hot bath.’
I nodded. He certainly looked all right now.
`I’ve been hearing great things about you, Matthew,’ I told him.
He looked more worried now. His eyes dropped, and his fingers began twisting at the sheet.
`It’s not true, Daddy,’ he said, with great earnestness.
`It did rather make me wonder,’ I admitted. `A few days ago you couldn’t swim.’
`I know, Daddy, but …’ Again he twisted at the sheet. … but Chocky can …’ he finished, looking up at me uncertainly.
I tried to show nothing but sympathetic interest.
`Tell me about it,’ I suggested.
Matthew looked a little relieved.
`Well, it all happened terribly quickly. I saw the boat just going to hit, and then I was in the water. tried to swim, but I was awfully frightened because I knew it would be no good, and I thought I was going to be drowned. Then Chocky told me not to be a fool, and not to panic. She was sort of fierce. She sounded rather like Mr Caffer when he gets angry in class, only more. I’ve never known her get like that before, and I was so surprised that I stopped panicking. Then she said: “Now think of nothing, like you do witk painting.” So I tried. And tlen I was swimmming …’ He frowned. `I don’t know how, but somehow she showed my arms and legs the way to swim, just like she makes my hands go the right way to draw. So, you see, it was really her, not me, that did it, Daddy.
‘I see,’ I said. It was a memorable overstatement. (*) Matthew went on.
`You, and lots of other people, have shown me how to swim, Daddy, and I tried, but it kept on not happening until Chocky did it.’
‘I see,’ I lied again. I reflected for some moments while Matthew watched my face attentively.
‘I see,’ I said once more, and nodded. `So, of course once you found you could swim, you struck out for the shore?’
Matthew’s attentive look turned to an incredulous stare. (*)
‘But I couldn’t do that. There was Polly. She’d fallen in, too.’
I nodded again.
‘Yes,’ I said. `There was Polly, too – that does rather seem to me to be the point…’
Matthew considered. I think he went back to those first frightened moments in the water, for he shuddered slightly. Then his face took a look of determination.
‘But it was Chocky who did it,’ he asserted, obstinately.
The next morning Alan and I sat in the sun, waiting for the call to breakfast.
‘What surprises me,’ Alan said presently, `is how did he do it?” According to the Colonel he was still supporting her when the boat came up with them. Nearly a mile and a half, he reckons, in that fast ebb. Matthew was tired, he says, but not exhausted. And only a couple of days ago he was telling me, as if he were ashamed of it, too, that he couldn’t swim … I tried to teach him, but he didn’t have the knack. ‘
‘It’s quite true. He couldn’t,’ I told him, and then, since he knew already about the Chocky problem and been responsible for bringing Landis into it, I gave him Matthew’s version of the affair. He looked at me incredulously.
‘But – well, and no disrespect to Matthew – but do you believe that?’
‘I believe that Matthew believes it – and how else can one explain it? Besides …’ I told him about the pictures. He’d not heard of them before. `They, somehow, make it not quite as difficult to accept, or half-accept,’ I said.
Alan, became thoughtful. He lit a cigarette, and sat silently smoking it, gazing out across the estuary. At last he said:
‘If this is what it seems to be-and I can see that it’s difficult to explain it any other way. it opens up a whole new phase of this Chocky business.’
‘That’s what we thought,’ I acknowledged. `And poor Mary’s not at all happy about it. She’s afraid for him.’
Alan shook his head.
‘I can’t see that she needs to be. After all, whether Chocky exists or not, it is because Matthew believes she does that your two are alive today. Does Mary realize that? It ought to help her a bit.’
‘It ought,’ I agreed. `But – oh, I don’t know – why do people always find it easier to believe in evil spirits than in good ones?’
Matthew was late for lunch. I went in search of him, and found him sitting on the remains of the wrecked jetty, talking to a good-looking, fair.haired young man I did not remember seeing before. Matthew looked up as I approached.
‘Hullo, Daddy – oh, is it late?’
‘It is,’ I told him.
The young man got up, politely.
‘I’m sorry, sir. I’m afraid it’s my fault f@r keeping him. I should have thought. I was just asking him about his feat: he’s quite a local hero, you know, after yesterday.’
‘Maybe,’ I said, ‘but he still has to eat. Come along now, Matthew.
‘
‘Goodbye,’ Matthew said to the young man, and we turned back to the cottage.
`Who was that?’ I asked.
‘Just a man,’ said Matthew. ‘He wanted to know how Polly is after yesterday. He said he’s got a little girl just like her, so he was interested.’
It did just cross my mind that the stranger looked a little young to be a family man with ten or eleven year old child, but then you never know nowadays, and by the time lunch was finished I had forgotten about the incident.
During the next few days Matthew developed such a passion for swimming that he could scarcely be kept away from the water.
Then the holiday was over. Colonel Summers dropped in on the last evening for a drink, and to assure me that he had already written to The Royal Swimming Society commending Matthew.
‘Plucky youngster of yours. Good reason to be proud of him. Could just as easily have looked after himself only: many would. Funny thing his pretending he couldn’t swim; unaccountable things, boys. Never mind. Damned good show! And good luck to him.’
The following Monday evening I got home late and tired after a busy day catching up with the accumulation of work at the office. I was vaguely aware that Mary was a little distrait, but she had the tact to keep the cause to herself until I had eaten my supper. Then she produced a newspaper, much folded for post, and handed it to me.