Storm Surge Read online

  Puffin Books

  Editor: Kaye Webb

  STORM SURGE

  The wind, which had been blowing at gale force all morning, was beginning to fling water over the sea wall, but no one on Flatsea Island was seriously alarmed. They were used to January gales and, besides, everyone said those walls were impregnable. So even when the creek stayed full at what should have been low tide, the little community went about its business as though it were any other Sunday.

  And so no one was prepared when the water came surging through the walls that night, covering the bridge that joined Flatsea to the mainland and swamping the coastline too. Young Peter Brown was helplessly trapped in his family’s pub, where the flood had burst open the doors and was rising steadily up the stairs, and was worrying desperately about what had happened to his brother Aaron, due back on the last train home after a night out in Oozedam, or to Martin, who lived on the mainland and had left with his girlfriend only a short time ago, or to his parents, who had driven into town to see their first grandchild, or to his grandparents alone in their cottage a little way inland.

  David Rees tells his story of the flood and its aftermath with great power and clarity. You’ll find yourself getting involved with every member of the close-knit Brown family as they face this crisis, whose shocking effect is, for more than one of them, a turning-point in their lives.

  For older Puffin readers.

  David Rees

  Storm Surge

  Illustrated by Trevor Stubley

  Puffin Books

  Puffin Books, Penguin Books Ltd,

  Harmondsworth, Middlesex, England

  Penguin Books, 625 Madison Avenue,

  New York, New York 10022, U.S.A.

  Penguin Books Australia Ltd, Ringwood,

  Victoria, Australia

  Penguin Books Canada Ltd, 2801 John Street,

  Markham, Ontario, Canada L3R 1B4

  Penguin Books (N.Z.) Ltd, 182-190 Wairau Road,

  Auckland 10, New Zealand

  First published by Lutterworth Press 1975

  Published in Puffin Books 1978

  Copyright © David Rees, 1975

  All rights reserved

  Made and printed in Great Britain by

  Richard Clay (The Chaucer Press) Ltd

  Bungay, Suffolk

  Set in Linotype Pilgrim

  Except in the United States of America, this book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, re-sold, hired out, or otherwise circulated without the publisher’s prior consent in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition including this condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.

  For

  Terry and Harriet

  Contents

  Part One

  Flood 10

  Part Two

  Rescue 60

  Part Three

  Afterwards 104

  A map of Oozedam and

  Flatsea appears on page 18

  The natural forces which bred the “great tides” came to be investigated, and investigation pointed to a phenomenon described as a storm surge . . .

  ‘It appeared that the “surge” was born of the drag on the wind on the surface of the sea, and had a fleeting dynamic life of its own, independent of the normal tide. The stronger the wind, the longer it blew and the farther it “fetched”, the greater the increase of water it could pile up and set in motion . . .

  ‘If the peak of a surge occurred near low water, it was harmless; but should it occur near high water, at a period of spring tides, the combination might be deadly.’

  Hilda Grieve

  The Great Tide

  Acknowledgements

  I am indebted to The Great Tide by Hilda Grieve for some of the background information in this book. The definition of a ‘storm surge’ which appears on the preceding page is taken from her book and is reproduced by kind permission of the Essex County Council.

  The quotation from The Israeli Boat Song by Lionel Morton which appears on page 80 is reproduced by kind permission of Essex Music International Limited.

  D.B.R.

  ‘They’ll surely cancel the game? I don’t know why you have to play on a Sunday anyway.’ Charley Brown stopped cleaning the pipes and looked at Aaron, who was sitting on a stool on the other side of the counter, practising on his guitar.

  ‘It’s only because so many Saturday games have been postponed this January. I’ll have to get there if I can. Look at that!’ The wind which had been blowing at gale force all morning was beginning to fling patches of water over the sea wall. ‘When’s high tide?’

  Charley looked at the pub clock. ‘About now.’

  ‘I’ll go and see if the bridge is flooded.’

  'Put your raincoat on.’

  ‘Of course, Dad.’ Why did people always point out the obvious, as if he had no common sense at all!

  The gale took his breath away. He had to bend double to avoid being knocked over, and the force of it slewed him sideways across the road. The bridge was only a hundred yards off, but it took him nearly five minutes to reach it. The road was covered by a grey angry sea, the wind whipping a continuous curtain of spray off the surface and blowing it over the walls and far inland. Only the parapet was visible. He was alarmed; they were cut off from the mainland, for the moment at least. For how long? Perhaps he would not be able to get to his football match after all. He could not let the team down. Then a car emerged through the mist of spray and came slowly over the bridge. The water was not even a foot deep.

  He waved, and followed the car back to the pub. His mother and his younger brother, Peter, opened the doors and ran inside. They had been into Oozedam to buy the Sunday papers and were full of excitement about the gale.

  ‘There are trees down everywhere,’ said his mother, ‘and telephone wires, and people are pulling their boats right back to the edge of the road. With this wind and a spring tide tonight they’re afraid of floods. Charley, I don’t think we ought to go out this evening.’ She folded her arms, always a sign that she was about to assert herself in an argument. She was a large imposing woman, formidable with customers who wanted another drink after closing time.

  ‘Why ever not?’ Charley, who was on his hands and knees behind the bar, sorting through packets of potato crisps, now stood up and faced his wife.

  ‘I’m not leaving these kids on their own to drown in a flood!’

  ‘Kids!’ chorused Aaron and Peter.

  They’re both strong swimmers, and Ron’s hardly a kid. He’ll be eighteen in a few weeks’ time.’

  ‘Neither am I,’ said Peter, who was fifteen, and head and shoulders taller than his mother.

  ‘Swimmers!’ said their mother, scornfully. ‘What do you think you’re talking about, Charley Brown? I hope they won’t have to do any swimming tonight!’

  ‘In that case, Doris, what’s the harm in us going out?’

  ‘Because it’s not safe, that’s why not! If we're going to be flooded out we should be here ready to take the stock upstairs, instead of gallivanting half-way over the countryside!’

  Charley planted his elbows firmly on the counter. Aaron and Peter grinned at each other; Dad was going to make a stand. He did not often do so, but when he did, Mum had to surrender. Nothing would shift him. They thought it did their mother no harm to lose an argument occasionally.

  ‘Now, look here, Doris.’ He wagged his finger at her. ‘You’re just being hysterical. For one thing, there’s been no flood warnings on the radio; Strong gales, they said, some rain and sleet. Cold. Nothing about floods.’

  ‘If you go by what the weather people tell you, Charley Brown, you’re a bigger fool than I thought.’

  Aa
ron twanged out a tune to accompany the argument. He was the lead guitarist in a group he had started at school, and named after himself ― ‘Aaron's Rod’. They played at parties and dances in Oozedam, and had an occasional engagement at a disco.

  ‘Secondly,’ said Dad, counting off on his fingers, ‘we’re not gallivanting half-way over the Countryside, we’re only going into town, and we’re going to see our first grandson. Gallivanting indeed! If we didn’t go David would never forgive us.’

  That’s not the point . . .’

  ‘Thirdly, Martin and Ann are coming in to look after the bar. They’ve done it before, and what’s more, there won’t hardly be any customers on a Sunday night with the weather like this.’

  ‘I hope he puts a decent suit on instead of them jeans and beads he’s always wearing.’

  ‘Of course he will. And he knows this bar as well as you do.’

  ‘As soon as it’s closing time he’ll be rushing off with her, and not bothering to wash up or lock the money away or anything.’

  Martin was their second son, two years older than Aaron, in digs during the week, attending art school in Ipswich. He had fallen out with his mother some months back, for instead of coming home at weekends he stayed in his girlfriend’s flat in Oozedam. Charley told his wife it was none of their business, but Doris had never got used to the idea. Nevertheless, she was fond of Ann; Ann was an islander like the Browns and they had known her since she was a baby. She and Martin had been in the same class at school, and they had been going out together for years. Then last year her parents had been killed in a car crash; she had moved into a flat to be near her job, and Martin’s visits home were confined to a few hours on Saturdays and Sundays, and Ann was always with him.

  Charley pulled a pint of beer and held it up to the light. He invariably threw this first pint of the day down the sink ― ‘terrible waste,’ Aaron always said, and his father would answer ‘If you drank that one, my lad, you’d have the squitters by nightfall’ ― and then a second one was pulled, inspected, sniffed, and pronounced fit after he had drunk it.

  ‘Well, Doris,’ he said, as he tasted the second pint, ‘you can do what you like. But I’m going to see my grandson. I’ve been looking forward to it ever since we heard. Kevin David Charles Brown. Grand names! Here’s to him!’

  ‘Can’t we all drink to him?' Peter asked.

  ‘No you cannot!’ said Doris, ‘The idea! You’ve done that already several times over. Ron, stop playing that blasted thing! It goes right through my head. And why don’t you get your hair cut? How you can see on a games field in this wind and hair below your shoulders I don’t know.’

  ‘I wear a band.’

  ‘I don’t know what the world’s coming to, I really don’t. Martin decorating himself with beads and you with a hair ribbon. I thought I'd brought four men into this world, not ― not ― I don’t know what.’

  She marched out, dignified but defeated, and slammed the kitchen door behind her. Charley and Peter laughed; Aaron played ‘Land of Hope and Glory’.

  ‘Do you think there will be a flood, Dad?’ Peter asked. ‘Do I heck! If there is my name’s not Charley Brown. Last time the sea burst in was 1897; you ask your grandpa! And they didn’t have sea walls like these. The bridge might be awash, nothing more. And that reminds me, what are you two doing tonight? Going out?'

  ‘Youth club,’ said Peter.

  ‘I’m going to the flicks with John,’ said Aaron, ‘in Oozedam. “A Teenage Werewolf’s Chick.” Should be a laugh.’

  ‘A teenage how much? Whatever next! Be back by half past ten, both of you. High water’s eleven o’clock. The bridge may be impassable before then, and I don’t want you stranded on the mainland.’

  ‘Will do,’ said Peter. ‘We never wait till the last train. Susan has to be home by eleven.’ But Aaron said nothing. He was planning to have a drink after the film, and that would mean catching the last train.

  ‘Listen to it,’ said Charley, as the wind lifted the dustbin lid off and sent it clanging across the yard. All the doors in the house were rattling, the windows squeaking discordantly. The mat by the front door lifted and dropped.

  Tide’s turned,’ said Peter. They all looked out. There was no more sea coming over, but large sheets of water lay on the land side, ready to work into the earth at the base of the walls and soften them. These defences were concrete on the sea side, but only at what were considered to be the weakest places. The wind outside screamed in the telephone wires, and roared in the leafless ash tree on the other side of the road. Out across the island the marshes and fields were alive, moving ceaslessly as the wind rushed through the grass and flattened the reeds. A herd of cows huddled for shelter beside the wall of a barn. Angry clouds hurtled through the sky and a few flakes of snow dashed against the windows.

  ‘You boys come and help me wash up,’ said Doris reappearing. ‘Haven’t cleared away breakfast yet. Do you want a coffee, Charley?’

  ‘May as well. It’s an hour till opening time.’

  * * *

  During the afternoon Peter went out for a walk. He thought he would go and look at the sea, then return via his grandparents’ cottage, which was a little way inland from the pub. Mum was still in a bad mood, and taking it out on him, as Aaron had gone to his soccer. A breathing space at Grandma’s would be helpful.

  The wind was less than it had been, but still strong enough to make walking difficult. The inn-sign, with its picture of Charles I’s head, flapped backwards and forwards, creaking in protest. A huge branch of the ash tree had been torn off; it lay on the grass, a twisted, writhing shape, as if in pain. Peter turned off the road along a track through the marshes. He was glad he had put on his boots, for he had to splash through a large expanse of sea water before he could climb up the wall.

  Flatsea Island was separated from the mainland by a narrow creek, crossed by the one bridge near The King’s Head. Where Peter was standing it opened out into a large estuary that joined the open sea. On the other side was the port of Oozedam, a dark silhouette of houses, factory chimneys, cranes, and ships, against the grey sky. Lights of buildings and street-lamps made chains and necklaces in the dusk. When he and Aaron went to school, they crossed the bridge, and caught the train at Flatsea Station, just on the other side of the creek. It was the last stop the London trains made before Oozedam, and the line followed the edge of the land, inside the sea wall, for much of the way. The only movement now in the landscape, apart from the rushing clouds and the violent sea, was the lighted length of a train slowly leaving the town.

  He turned and looked inland. Flatsea was well named. It appeared to be totally level, except for the little knoll in the centre where the parish church stood. Hedges and dykes criss-crossed the land, but there were few trees to break up the monotony, and they were all stunted or bent to strange angles by the winds that whipped in from the North Sea. The soil was poor, frequently waterlogged, and much of its grass salty from ancient drownings; until the walls were strengthened the sea had often swept in. Few crops were grown, but twelve families ― thirty-seven people in all ― lived on the island; a boat-builder, themselves, and a few small-holding farmers. Mum often complained that the milk tasted sour, and this was caused, she said, by the cows eating grass that grew on soil which had never lost its salt from the last submerging in 1897. But Doris was not a native islander. She had come from Oozedam, and had never quite convinced herself that she was going to spend the rest of her life on Flatsea. Peter and his father were proud of being islanders; the Browns had lived there for hundreds of years. He had once seen the names of his ancestors in the parish registers in the church; there was even a Peter Brown, ‘son of Charles, fisherman, and Marianne, baptized ye fourth day of February, 1660’. He was pleased too that he took after the Browns in his looks; he, Aaron, David and their father were solidly built Anglo-Saxons, blue-eyed and blond in hair; Aaron’s in particular was pale, almost white, the envy of all the girls. Only Martin was different, with frien
dly brown eyes and dark hair.

  He was just about to climb down from the wall when he realized that something was very wrong. He had known it all the time he had been standing there, but only as a vague sense of unease; it was so obvious now that he could not understand why he had not noticed it at once, it was supposed to be low tide, but instead of the usual sight of glistening mud-banks, sloping down to a narrow shallow stream of water in the bottom, boats lying askew at ridiculous angles on the mud, the creek was more than half full. He looked at his watch. A quarter past four; yes, low water. It must be the force of the wind stopping the ebb, and he remembered, from the talk of old men once in the pub, that such a thing could happen. But never in his lifetime had it occurred. He wondered how this would affect the next high tide. It couldn’t be much higher than it had been that morning; there wasn’t that much water in the sea. Besides, everyone said the sea walls were impregnable. They had never been breached. Water only came over the top when a gale like this morning’s blew, especially at this time of the, year, January, and that was nothing to worry about. Still, he thought he should tell his father.

  At the door of his grandparents’ cottage he paused for a last look at the view. Though it was almost too late to see anything he could just make out the straight lines of things, the sea, the creek, the opposite shore. Everything in this landscape was horizontal, grey or black, except for the odd vertical post sticking up out of the marshes, or the spiders’ web of Oozedam’s cranes. But most of his vision was filled with a vast sky as clouds tore from the distant sea and billowed out above him. He loved it.