Of the hundreds, nay, thousands of people who patronise the little steamers plying between Falmouth and Truro—or Malpas, according to the state of the tide few are likely to notice a small creek on the starboard hand of the picturesque river Fal. Fewer still know it by name.
Its entrance is narrow, between steeply rising, heavily wooded ground. Although barely twenty-five yards in width across its mouth, it carries nearly thirty feet of water at Springs. Two hundred yards up, the creek widens out. One bank retains its precipitous, tree-clad nature. The other dips, forming a wide bay, with a flat belt of ground between the shore and the high ground beyond.
On this site, hidden from the Fal by a bend in the channel, stood a derelict shipyard. A century ago, when Falmouth was at the height of its prosperity as a packet-station, the shipyard teemed with activity. It enjoyed a brief and illusory spell of life during the Great War, when it again sank into obscurity and neglect. The two slipways were left to rot, two tidal docks were allowed to silt up. The buildings were ruinous and leaky. The whole concern was in the hands of the Official Receiver.
To the delectable spot came Trevorrick and Pengelly. They looked at it. Trevorrick lost no time in declaring that it was "the" place; Pengelly asserted that it was not. The big man had his way, and thus the Polkyll Creek Shipbreaking Company came into being.
They started modestly upon their enterprise. The heaviest item for plant was the purchase of an oxygen-acetylene apparatus. At first, ten hands were engaged. Pengelly wanted to obtain them locally. Trevorrick, as usual, overruled him, and as a result inserted in a Plymouth paper an advertisement for ex-Naval and Mercantile Marine men. They received shoals of replies and could pick and choose, without having to pay Trade Union rates.
"We'll have unmarried men," declared the senior partner. "They won't be wanting to run away home every five minutes."
"Married men are more likely to stick to their jobs," objected Pengelly.
"No one but a born fool would chuck up a job nowadays," retorted Trevorrick. "They are none too plentiful."
In due course, the shipbreaking yard began to function. A destroyer and a submarine were purchased at Devonport and towed round to Falmouth and up the Fal to Polkyll. The scrap metal was sent up to Truro in barges and thence transferred to goods train for the Welsh smelting works. So profitable was the venture that three more vessels were bought for demolition, twenty additional hands taken on, and the firm of Trevorrick and Pengelly became a limited liability company.
So far, things were going smoothly. The two principals got on amicably, which was rather to be wondered at, since Trevorrick was apt to boast that he had had heaps of friends and had never been able to keep one of them. No doubt, the totally dissimilar physical and mental characteristics of each kept them in a state of mutual docility; but already Pengelly was tiring of the monotonous work, and Trevorrick was scheming to get away to a livelier spot than the dead-and-alive Polkyll Creek.