should be over here. That’s where we are,’ slurred Andrew.
Clyde ignored him and spoke slowly, making sure that Andrew understood his every word. ‘She’s waiting over there because I’m going into the river to shake hands with the Iceman, and you’re coming with me.’
There was a moment of shocked silence. ‘You’re going to do “the Swim”?’
‘Yes. So are you.’
‘I can’t go. I’m too pissed. Maybe when I sober up.’
Silence followed and Angelo could see from the way that Andrew sat with his head down that he would never agree to undertake such a risky venture.
Angelo sneered at the cowardly Andrew and stood up. ‘I’ll go with you.’
Clyde shook his head. ‘No. This has nothing to do with you, Biagi. If you like you can collect our clothes and bring them around to us.’
Angelo looked at Clyde with a look of utter loathing, knowing that once again he had been summarily dismissed as totally irrelevant. ‘Fuck you!’ he said, kicking an empty beer bottle out of his way and storming off, leaving Clyde standing over the cower-ing Andrew.
‘You’re coming with me,’ Clyde announced bluntly. ‘The Old Codgers have decided. Your dad did it when he was your age and so did your uncle. Now it’s your turn.’
‘They’re both dead.’
‘They both died fighting for their country. They were heroes and now you’re the man of the family. Act like one!’
Andrew’s mind was reeling and his legs felt like jelly. He could almost imagine what his father would have said if he was here. All his life he had been told about the exploits of his dead father and uncle, but they had been men he could barely remember. The Old Codgers were always going on about them as if by telling the stories they could make Andrew into a man in their mould when in actual fact the reverse was true. Andrew was completely lack-ing in self-esteem because of those tales and because of his own contrary emotional leanings.
Clyde stepped closer to Andrew. ‘The Old Codgers want you to do this. My uncle says they’ll be willing to overlook certain matters if you make it to the other side.’
Andrew looked up at Clyde and could see the steely resolve in his eyes. He also understood the veiled threat in his words and knew that the Old Codgers would be unrelenting in their reprisals if their wishes were ignored while success would ensure his future, whatever he chose to make of it.
Head hung low, he stumbled to his feet and nodded reluctantly.
‘Seeing that Angelo has gone off in a huff I’ll get Dave Conway to gather up our clothes and meet us over at the fire.’
As the moon came out to offer its meagre light to guide them, they walked down to the water’s edge where Clyde stripped off and watched as Andrew slowly did the same.
‘Remember, you have to keep going, no matter what,’ he said before plunging in and striking out for the far shore.
A second splash told him that Andrew was close behind.
A very disappointed Dave Conway was bending to pick up the boys’ discarded clothing when he saw Angelo approaching from the direction of the clubhouse.
‘They went?’ he asked and Dave nodded.
‘I’m going too,’ declared Angelo as he unbuttoned his shirt.
‘You can’t!’
‘Don’t say I can’t! I’m as good as any of you!’
‘The Old Codgers won’t like it!’
‘Sod them! They’ll have to get used to the idea!’
Dave Conway watched as Angelo slipped out of his clothes. He was of a mind to join him but knew the consequences of going against the wishes of the Old Codgers. Life, for him, in Henswytch would be intolerable if he defied them. Rules were rules and the Old Codgers made the rules around here.
Angelo dived in and despite Conway’s protests he swam out to try and catch up with his fellow rowers.
Out on the river Clyde was by far the stronger of the two swimmers and he quickly drew away, leaving Andrew to lumber through the water as best he could.
The instructions from his uncle and the Old Codgers had been most explicit in this. They knew full well that Clyde was capable of overcoming the Iceman and taking his place among the village’s elite, but Andrew was another matter entirely. His father had indeed been a ‘worthy’, but the boy did not seem to be made of the same sturdy stock. That was why it had been decided that Andrew must do the Swim, and do it alone. Sink or swim was the Old Codgers’ method of sorting out the enigma that Andrew Lang had become.
Clyde glanced and calculated that he was about to pass the river’s halfway point and had still not encountered the Iceman. He was feeling confident now and his arms swung past his head in steady strokes while his body felt warm with the blood pumping forcefully through his veins.
Suddenly the Iceman struck and Clyde felt the wind being smashed out of his lungs. The water had instantly turned frigid and the skin of his scalp felt as though it was trying to crush the skull beneath. ‘Shit!’ he screamed as he struggled to regain his composure. Don’t panic! his mind screamed. Keep going! You have to keep going!
Every muscle in his body knotted in reaction to the cold and his body temperature began to plummet which caused him to shake uncontrollably. The pace of his stroke dropped dramat-ically and it took all his willpower to keep going, even as his strength sought to fail him. Maybe I should go back? No! That’s what the Iceman wants me to do. I have to keep going forward. How much longer? How much longer?
Stroke by agonising stroke Clyde crawled toward the far bank. He was shaking like someone in the throes of malaria and could hardly feel his hands and feet when, with a final effort to freeze his intended victim, the Iceman let go his deathly grip.
Around Clyde the water’s temperature went up by a few degrees and that was enough for his body to begin to feel the warmth return. The youth’s body still felt as though it were made of ice, but he struggled on. More confident now he looked up to see that the welcoming flames of Tilley’s fire were drawing closer.
At last he found himself among the reeds at the river’s edge and was relieved to find that he could place his feet on the river’s muddy bottom. Still shaking uncontrollably he clambered up the bank and stumbled through the dark toward the fire.
Tilley heard him coming and rushed to his side. She ignored the freezing water running down his sides and wrapped her warm arms around him while drawing him toward the fire.
‘You’re freezing!’ she said.
‘The Iceman,’ he stuttered as he willed the flames to ease the pain in his tortured muscles.
‘Who
