North Star by Hammond Innes

have our temporary certificate of seaworthiness.’
    But it wasn’t the survey she was worried about. It was the crew. Apparently she had been warned by her local councillor that Johan and the three other Norwegians might be ordered to leave Shetland. ‘Somebody has been enquiring about their work permits. We never bother about work permits before. Not for fishing. But, now that we are going to work for an oil rig, it may be different.’
    ‘Then you’d better apply for them.’
    She nodded. ‘Of course. I have the papers already. But Mr Tulloch thinks it will be opposed and they will be ordered to leave.’
    ‘But if they didn’t need work permits before –’
    ‘He says it is politics. The fishermen here are a very strong community and they don’t like the oil companies. So, you see, it is not very difficult to stir up trouble.’
    ‘And you think Sandford is behind it?’
    She gave a little shrug. ‘Perhaps. I don’t know. But it is one way of ensuring that we lose this charter.’ She was so urgent about it that I agreed to sail as soon as we had taken on fuel and water.
    We moored at the quay, alongside a Lerwick trawler, shortly after 13.00. I think we were lucky in that it was lunchtime and the rain teeming down. All the offices were closed. Nobody bothered us and at 14.42 we slipped our warps and stood out into Bressay Sound. Visibility was bad in low cloud and rain squalls, but by 15.05 we were clear of Kirkabister Ness with Bard Head a grey lump bearing 85°.
    Sea conditions were fairly good as we steamed south under the lee of the long mountain spine running down to Sumburgh Head and I had time to take a look at the Admiralty Sailing Directions. I had never before had need of Part I of the North Sea Pilot, which covers the Faroes, Shetlands and Orkneys, and I was appalled at the force of the tidal streams. The main stream was south-east-going and between Orkney and Shetland it reached a speed of 8–10 knots at the margin headlands of North Ronaldsay and Sumburgh Head. The result, of course, was violent tide races. Known as roosts in Shetland, they were to be encountered off all the major headlands, with the Sumburgh Roost the most dangerous of all – ‘As in the confused, tumbling and bursting sea, vessels often become entirely unmanageable, and sometimes founder, while others have been tossed about for days in light weather, the roost should be given a wide berth.’
    I looked at the spine of the faded and dog-eared Pilot. It was dated 1921. Obviously the warning was for sailing vessels. I was checking the tide data on the chart when Johan appeared at my side. ‘You take Sumburgh very close, ja. It is the last hour of the south-going tide, so the wind is with the tide and we get a lift on the eddy by Fitful.’
    I left it to him and he took the wheel himself, turning the headland so close that we seemed in imminent danger ofhitting the islet of Little Tind. The wind was westerly, force 6, the sea lumpy and full of holes, but not breaking heavily. It took us a long time to round Hog of the Holm and claw our way up to Head of the Holm with wind and tide both against us. But with Johan piloting I had no worries, except perhaps when we turned due north up the long sheer slate-grey line of Fitful Head. We were on a lee shore then, no place for an engine failure, and so close in that we were back-winded by the towering cliffs, the burst of the waves sounding like gunfire.
    The tide turned and we were inside the Havras by 19.30 with the Stacks of Houssness just visible and Clift Sound opening up ahead. The light was fading, and, as we came into the shelter of East Burra, Johan sent Henrik for’ard to call the leading marks into the voe.
    That first view of Taing from the sea will always remain, the evening light dulled by rain, the clouds sweeping low and the narrow tongue of land suddenly revealed as being separate from the green slopes behind. And then, as we nosed slowly in, the house suddenly