Krishna
We have reviewed several of Bernard Cornwell’s books. We have reviewed several of his series as well as standalone books like this one. For a sample see Wildtrack and Redcoat.
The narrator John Rossandale goes home to see his sick mother. He never was close to the family and had been away but feels compelled to go, when he got word from the bankers that his mother has fallen sick and wants to see her.
He meets her in the hospital and she dies in front of him. He lies to the doctor that he was only a distant relative and goes back to his boat. He meets the family at the funeral. His sister seems to be mentally unwell and looked after in an institution.
His sister Georgina has the mind of a two year old (and is a fully grown woman) and is being looked after in a convent equipped to look after the mentally deficient.
Family fight ensues with cutting remarks bouncing off John, irritating his (other) sister further. John decides to leave the scene, go back to the sea.
He remembers a Van Gogh which, oddly, belonged to the family in better days that disappeared and everyone, especially his sister, accuses him of stealing. When he is rowing back to his ship after having a troubling tooth extracted, he spots a man in his ship. Startled, he stealthily circles around hoping to surprise him and discovers (when he is still on his boat approaching the ship) that there are at least two people there, a man and a woman.
A thin man confronts John and John wounds him. He escapes in a boat with an accomplice waiting nearby but not before he throws a look of intense hatred at John.
John goes to confront the girl who is Jennifer Pallavincini. Attractive and young, but she was sent by the collector Sir Leon who was trying to buy the stolen Van Gogh. She offers him nineteen million dollars or more for the painting but refuses to believe John when he says that he did not nick the painting and does not know where it is.
He then limps across to his old friend George Cullen’s garage and asks him to give these facilities over for a few days while he gets the ship in shape. When he described the two mean folks George immediately identifies them as Trevor Garrard and Ronny Peel. Garrard is cunning and dangerous, and Peel is just the muscle. When George left and John is sleeping, the two arrive at the repair shop and cleverly trap John. They promise that there will be no marks on him and he seems to relax a bit but realizes that they are planning a drawing accident for ‘the Earl’ and panic rises in him. But he is truly helpless against the wiles of Garrard and the strength of Peel.
He learns from Garrard’s words that they know he does not have the painting but his living is inconvenient as the painting’s ownership could be disputed at all times as long as he is alive.
He is saved on time by Charlie, who funds all the rebuilding of his twice ruined ship Sunflower. Charlie is now a very rich businessman but shows the same affection to John as he did in olden days. He promises also to get to the bottom of the puzzle of Garrard. Who sent him? Why?
But soon the urge to move takes him and he sails with his boat to Azores where he meets an annoying old friend called Ulf.
Next thing he knows, Jennifer Pallavincini knocks on the cabin door, astonishing him! She asks him to help her employer recover the painting. He refuses and says he is sailing. She relays the news that his sister Georgina is about to be successfully petitioned to be moved to the care of his uncaring Elizabeth so that she can get at the tightly locked trust money. Georgina will not know or care. Even though his blood boils, he sends Jennifer away and goes, meets Ulf, and knowing that he is the one who betrayed the location to Jennifer, beats him and knocks some of his teeth off, in front of her.
But secretly he goes back to England to meet the lawyer of Elizabeth called Sir Oliver who tells him that he, John, has no case. He does not own any facility to care for Georgina and he has proven himself to be irresponsible, with a criminal record to boot! So the lawyer snidely tells him that he is trapped and cannot do anything to stop Georgina from being entrusted to the care of ‘her loving sister Elizabeth’. His motive of course is the fat fee waiting for him in that deal.
When he goes to see his sister, she is out but he finds that the ‘generosity’ of his sister is simply so that she could make money by creating a retreat with all comforts and slowly easing out Georgina, after all the attention is dead, to a creepy and cheap place while making money as a tourist resort! He now knows he needs to fight to rescue Georgina and with his weaknesses, he stands no chance.
He decides to approach Jennifer and a lawyer, Harry Abbot, comes to see him and says that he, Johnny has been invited to the house of Leon Buzzacottwho is the art collector. He also learns that Jennifer is a Countess and the daughter of Leon. She is engaged to a business magnate called Hans, who the spirited mother of Jennifer labels ‘boring’ and talks only of cheese (his business) till you want to scream. Or talks to Leon about the stupid game, Golf. John finds that he likes Lady Buzzacott.
Jennifer is shocked when he gives away the painting to Leon for just the surety of Georgina’s future. It is Harry’s theory that Elizabeth is behind the whole plan of hiding the painting and sending ransom notes, and John is reluctant to believe that his money crazy angry sister will stoop so low but what other explanation is there?
They hatch a plan to get the person who has the painting into the open (Gazzard’s boss, who is Elizabeth) by making John the bait. He comes back ostentatiously to England in the full glare of media publicity and all papers, and TV channels show this in prime time and he causes an uproar when he announces that he has ‘donated the painting’ if it is recovered to the Buzzacott gallery!
Charlie comes to meet him the next day and gets an update on the plans and the protection and affectionately calls him an idiot. He says the best thing for him is to sail away and not become a pawn for Buzzacotts. John promises to think about it.
Meanwhile Jennifer and John grow close and she even accompanies him on a boat trip on The Sunflower. But due to sabotage, there is a huge accident where the cut gas lines ignite when Jennifer strikes a match (to prepare food) and the boat burns. John leaps through the flames to carry her and jump off into the sea and almost drowns with her in his arms when he is rescued.
When he is in the hospital, he is visited by Lady Buzzacott. He learns that Jennifer is badly burnt but the plastic surgeon is hopeful of making her ‘all new again’.
Charlie visits him at the hospital and learned what happened from John. Charlie is devastated at the latest misfortune and insists that he will buy John a brand new boat. John has lost everything he owned in the world with the boat. John refuses the offer.
When he gets well, he decides to go stay with Charlie, as he feels safest in the company of his childhood friend.
Sir Leon calls him to come visit him to inspect the arrangements he has made for Georgina and he agrees to go.
He goes and sees Jennifer and professes his love. She reciprocates but claims it is ‘too late’.
Sir Leon, however, offers money on condition that he stays far away from Jennifer. The money is to build a new boat.
Meanwhile Harry Abbot, who is a detective who tried and failed to solve the mystery of the painting, tells John that the kidnappers who are in contact with Sir Leon for ransom want John and only John to bring the ransom. Sir Leon had agreed to pay up. With the money John is asked to go alone and board a ship. He does. He then realizes that the men behind the plot have an amazing plan! They have the ship fitted with a one way navigation system and a walkie talkie which is rigged so that he can hear what they say but they cannot.
On top of it the instructions are just numbers and are recorded from the radio broadcasts and replayed to him. He manages to guess that the coordinates are those for the navigation system and follows instructions. When they are sure that he is alone and unarmed (He has been asked to come just in shorts, carrying the bag) they give him their final destination.
John agrees to go, even though he knows that he is walking into his almost certain death, in the middle of a thick mist, because he is obsessed with avenging Jennifer’s burning. Even Harry asks him to turn back but John carries on.
A word on the side : Even though Bernard writes a lot about the sea in all his stories, the stories are not about the minutiae of seafaring. In this book, there is a bit more of that. It, however, does not take away, for those of us laymen, from the enjoyment from the story.
What follows is a sequence that is very tense and completely action packed. The whole last fifty or so pages take you to the edge of your seat and it is impossible to put down.
I will not spoil the ending but I thought I knew what the twist was going to be; I was half right. It is more complicated than what I thought but then highly satisfying.
It is a simpler story, and told in the inimitable style of Bernard Cornwell. A thriller that fully deserves its name!
9/10
–Krishna