The Ship

by Stefan Mani

  ‘Yeah, but we had also decided not to,’ Big John says, lighting his half-smoked cigar.

  ‘After the old man disarmed us!’ says Rúnar with a soft laugh.

  ‘You guys should never have smuggled those guns on board,’ Ási says, shaking his head. ‘I could have told you no good would come of it.’

  ‘Yeah,’ mutters Big John and he exhales sour cigar smoke. ‘We should have asked your advice, Ási, lad, instead of listening to Methúsalem’s nonsense!’

  ‘Methúsalem,’ Rúnar says and sips his coffee. ‘There’s something not quite right with Methúsalem.’

  ‘Do you think he …?’ Ási looks questioningly at his comrade.

  ‘I don’t know,’ says John. ‘But I can’t understand how we —’

  Boom!

  The ship slams sideways into a rising wave. The blow is unexpected and heavy and the three men are thrown about in the galley and fall onto each other, as hot coffee, baked goods, milk, cigar ash, embers and sugar are strewn all over the floor.

  16:30

  Guðmundur Berndsen grabs the table in the chart room when the ship slams into the wave and holds on tight while the bridge shakes like a skyscraper in an earthquake. The weather deck fills with seawater and the windows on the starboard side are about to kiss the dark-grey sea, but then the ship’s hull rights itself, about halfway.

  ‘Sæli!’ calls the captain when the worst is over. ‘Are you okay?’

  ‘I’m fine,’ Sæli replies, sitting up on the floor and blinking his eyes. He had been spun around in the captain’s chair, thrown out of it, flipped over on the floor and left with his head in the doorway to the starboard bridge wing.

  ‘I think we’d better forget about sitting in chairs while the weather stays this bad,’ says Guðmundur, releasing his grip on the chart table. ‘It’s actually insane to be up here at all, but we have no choice. Here we can keep track of other ships and send a signal light or shoot up a flare.’

  ‘I know,’ says Sæli. He positions himself on the port side of the bridge. He stands by the window with his legs spread wide, holding with both hands onto the copper rail that runs the length of the windowsill.

  On the floor of the chart room lie the mattress from the captain’s bunk, his doona and a pillow. Guðmundur had piled all this up and lugged it up to the bridge, where he tied the mattress to the cupboards in the chart room.

  This is where he’s going to sleep for the remainder of this voyage.

  ‘If it’s all the same to you, I’m going below to get a few more things,’ says the captain. He still has to get his charts, sextant and calculator.

  And the shotgun.

  ‘Fine by me,’ says Sæli without looking back over his shoulder.

  20:39

  Ási is in the galley, almost finished clearing away after supper. Conditions on board don’t encourage much in the way of fancy cooking, so he just threw some pork chops in a pot, browned them in the oven and served them with thick mashed potatoes. No gravy, no caramelised potatoes, no peas, no red cabbage and no fuss.

  Nobody complained, though – the men have other things to think about, and it’s hard enough to eat simple meat at a forty-degree tilt without having to wrestle with caramelised potatoes, peas and thick, creamy gravy as well.

  Even Jónas contented himself with flat-tasting tomato soup, despite the fact he’d hardly had anything to eat for two days. But while he’s running a high fever and on morphine, liquids and a minimum of nourishment is all the second mate’s getting. That’s by order of the captain, who’s responsible for the health and safety of each and every man on board as long as the ship is afloat.

  ‘My good old lads!’ says Ási with a sigh, chewing a toothpick as he turns on the dishwasher. While the main engine is out of commission and thus the dynamo also, the generator is working on full power to ensure there’s no shortage of electricity for cooking, freezing and washing.

  Ási wipes the work surface in the galley with a damp cloth, turns off the coffee machine and locks the fridge before he turns off the light and closes the door to the galley behind him.

  ‘How are things with you, friend?’ asks Ási as he enters the sick bay.

  ‘Just … the same,’ mumbles Jónas and he tries to lick his dry lips. He is both sweaty and pale, and he lies absolutely still under a thin doona, a collar around his neck, his left foot in a pressure bandage raised on two pillows and his left arm in a sling across his stomach.

  ‘Do you need anything for the night?’ Ási moves the toothpick from the left side of his mouth to the right.

  ‘I need to piss.’

  ‘Of course,’ says Ási and hands him the urine bottle. ‘Can I help you with it?’

  ‘No, no … I can manage,’ Jónas says, but he struggles a bit with the flask under the doona.

  ‘Storm’s dying down.’

  ‘Yeah …’ says Jónas, grimacing.

  ‘Shouldn’t I pour you some water?’ says Ási, pouring water from a pitcher into a glass on the bedside table.

  ‘Yeah … thanks.’ Jónas sighs with relief when his urine starts to trickle into the flask.

  ‘Good man,’ says Ási. He stands on tiptoe. ‘Should I give you a shot for the night?’

  ‘No, I don’t think so,’ says Jónas, rolling his eyes. ‘It gives me such a lot of nightmares. Just leave the pain pills by me.’

  ‘Of course.’ Ási fetches two sheets of paracetamol-codeine and puts them on the bedside table. ‘Have you finished down below, pal?’

  ‘Yeah … I think so.’ Jónas pushes slightly, then he moves something under the doona before he hands Ási the half-full flask. ‘Here you go.’

  ‘Thanks, pal,’ says Ási. He examines the dark-yellow liquid before he pours it into the sink and rinses the flask.

  ‘Thanks,’ mumbles Jónas and closes his eyes.

  ‘No sweat,’ says Ási, turning off the light as he opens the door to the corridor. ‘Goodnight, pal.’

  ‘Ási!’ says Jónas, opening his eyes and rising up on his right elbow.

  ‘Yeah?’ asks Ási, turning the light on again.

  ‘Leave it on – it’s better,’ Jónas says and drops back down on the pillow.

  ‘Okay,’ says Ási with a shrug. ‘Goodnight.’

  ‘Goodnight.’

  Ási saunters up to C-deck, where he, Sæli and Rúnar have their cabins. Ási’s cabin is on the port side, Sæli’s in the middle and Rúnar’s to starboard. C-deck is the only deck in the ship that is completely manned, as the middle cabins on the other decks are empty.

  ‘Rúnar, you there?’ asks the cook as he knocks on the bosun’s door.

  After a few seconds the bosun opens the door.

  ‘Something the matter?

  ‘No, no, I was just wondering if you would ask the captain something for me.’ Ási takes the chewed toothpick out of his mouth. ‘Don’t you have night watch later?’

  ‘Yes, I’m due up about midnight,’ says Rúnar and yawns. ‘What do you want to know?’

  ‘I was just wondering how much I should take out of the freezer. If we’re about to abandon ship I’m not going to defrost loads of food.’

  ‘You might just as well shut off the freezer, Ási, lad. This ship is heading for hell.’

  ‘Which means we abandon ship sooner or later, right?’ Ási sticks the worn toothpick back in his mouth.

  ‘Yeah,’ says Rúnar and grins. ‘Unless you want to stay on board?’

  ‘And sail to hell?’ says Ási, making a face. ‘No-oo. Hardly. But I won’t turn off the freezer for all that.’

  ‘Up to you. Was there anything else, Ási?’

  ‘Nope!’ says Ási, and he clicks the heels of his wooden clogs together.

  ‘Goodnight,’ says Rúnar, nodding to the cook.

  ‘And sleep well!’ Ási bows to the bosun, who smiles and closes the door to his cabin.

  23:47

  Sæli is standing by the window to port in the bridge, staring out into the darkness. The
storm is dying down little by little, the ship isn’t tilting as much as before, and the weather deck has neither water nor briny mist on it. In the bow the forecastle is tilted and inside is a chained man who has no idea what’s going on, although he must realise that the ship is drifting before the wind and waves, instead of cutting through the waves and heading in a definite direction.

  Would his light be on?

  ‘When can we fetch the man?’ asks Sæli, who jumps hearing his own voice break the hour-long silence.

  ‘First thing in the morning,’ mutters the captain, who is standing at the table in the chart room and writing a list on the lined paper of a notebook, lit by a low lamp.

  It is a list of the things to take with them in the lifeboat. The boat holds eighteen people, so there’s plenty of extra room for fuel, clothes and supplies.

  ‘At dawn, that is,’ says Guðmundur a little while later, as he adds ‘reading material’ to the list. If they are in the boat for a long time it is better if they have something to do besides stare at their hands in their laps.

  ‘I see,’ says Sæli softly. He continues to look out through the salt-encrusted windows; there is nothing to see except the ocean and eternal darkness around the lit-up weather deck, and sometimes the odd star in the far distance.

  Stars that someone at some time had told him were maybe long dead, although the light they once gave out still travels through the universe.

  But that’s either a lie or some kind of astrophysics that Sæli doesn’t understand.

  His legs ache but, after having stood for almost eight hours, the pain has become a buzzing numbness that is almost closer to comfortable than uncomfortable. A fatigue that’s unpleasant but which you get used to. What you don’t get used to is the way the ship drifts off to the side this way, making you feel like a passenger in a car that skids sideways and is always just about to run off the road.

  Is he getting seasick?

  ‘I think I’m getting seasick,’ says Sæli as he lets go of the copper pole and moves slowly across the slanting floor and over to starboard.

  ‘Wait till Rúnar comes up,’ says the captain. He closes the notebook and looks at his watch. ‘It’s only a couple of minutes.’

  ‘Yeah, okay.’ Sæli grasps a knob on the control panel. ‘Should I take the dishes down?’

  ‘No, no,’ says Guðmundur, glancing down to the floor where a food tray containing the dirty dishes, cutlery, a coffee mug and a glass is jammed between the mattress and the filing cabinet. ‘Rúnar can take it down in the morning.’

  ‘All right,’ mumbles Sæli. He takes a deep breath to counteract the nausea that washes over him.

  ‘Are you going to be sick?’ asks the captain, turning off the table lamp. As the light goes out they seem to see something blinking on the sea only about fifty metres off the starboard side of the ship.

  ‘Yeah, I –’

  ‘Hush!’ says Guðmundur, putting a hand behind his ear as he stares out the window to starboard. ‘Did you see that? Something’s blinking out there!’

  ‘Wasn’t it just the lamp?’ says Sæli, who sees nothing but darkness wherever he looks. ‘The light was reflected in the glass and when you turned it off it was as if something blinked.’

  ‘No! It was something else.’

  The captain rushes to the control panel. He presses his finger on the switch that turns on the foghorn but there’s no sound.

  Of course not – all of the wires on the mast have been cut.

  ‘Bloody hell!’ says Guðmundur, running across the floor to open the door out onto the starboard bridge wing. ‘There’s a ship out there! I’m certain there is a ship out there!’

  ‘Why …’ Sæli says, then inches across to the door to the wing, which tilts towards the black sea. ‘Watch it!’

  The captain reaches out and grasps the end of a searchlight that’s shining at an angle down to the sea on the starboard side; he jerks at it until the cone of light moves up and over the sea, where the waves rise and fall.

  ‘Come on!’ says Guðmundur as he holds on to the light frame with one hand and stares out over the endless sea.

  ‘There’s no ship there!’ shouts Sæli out the open door. ‘What kind of ship do you think would sail without a light …’

  Sæli goes silent as the cone of light reveals sharp outlines on the sea north of the ship.

  There is a ship there. A ship without lights.

  ‘Did you see that?’ shouts the captain, clenching his left fist. ‘There is a ship there!’

  ‘Gummi, come back in!’ Sæli calls him back. ‘I don’t like the look of this!’

  ‘Sæli! Go get the emergency flare! We’ll shoot up a flare! Quick! The flare gun is in the drawer on the right of …’

  The captain stops speaking when the approaching ship turns on lights in front and behind and on both sides. These are no ordinary lights. They’re green and, rather than lighting up their own ship, they’re all directed away from their ship, which disappears in a sea of poisonous green light.

  ‘Green lights?’ asks Sæli. He stares open-mouthed at this oval sea of light that glows like a weird flying object in a cheap movie. ‘Who uses green lights?’

  ‘They can’t be seen from a distance. They can’t be seen from a distance,’ mutters Guðmundur as he lets go of the searchlight frame and sneaks backwards through the door without taking his eyes off the green light that’s following his ship, coming closer and closer. ‘Christ almighty! And I thought things couldn’t get any worse.’

  ‘What is it?’ asks Sæli, his heart in his mouth as he watches, bewildered, while the captain hits one switch after another, turning off all the lights on the outside of the Per se, which gradually becomes lost in the darkness.

  Too little, too late. ‘We don’t have much time,’ says Guðmundur as he looks at the dial of his watch, where the second hand is beginning to eat up the last minute before midnight. ‘Go up on the roof and shoot off an emergency flare. If we’re lucky there’ll be other ships in the area.’

  ‘Captain?’ says Sæli, his voice trembling, and he grips Guðmundur Berndsen’s left arm hard.

  ‘Up on the roof, now!’ screams the captain and he slaps Sæli across the face with the palm of his right hand. ‘If nobody comes to help us we’ll all be dead before tomorrow dawns.’

  23:59

  Big John is standing in front of the generator with an adjustable spanner in his right hand, a dirty rag in his left, grimy ear protectors on his head, and a dead cigar clamped in the right corner of his mouth.

  The chief engineer listens carefully to the rhythmic rattling of these big diesel engines as he reduces the fuel injection in one of them. At night the use of electricity is at a low, so he’s decided to run the generators one at a time at half speed, both to reduce fuel consumption and limit wear and tear and, thus, reduce the danger of a breakdown.

  ‘There!’ says Big John to himself as he gives the rattling engines a friendly pat. He puts the wrench back where it belongs, wipes the oil off his fingers with the rag and saunters over the iron floor and into the storeroom.

  The evening watch is over and the chief engineer is on his way to bed. He takes off his ear protectors, steps out of his overalls and hangs them up, kicks off his work shoes and slips on his clogs.

  Whatever happened to that picture of a girl he’d hung up inside the door of the control room?

  John lights a match and sucks life into his cigar stub before he turns out the light in the cubbyhole and saunters up to A-deck.

  In front of the food locker a light blinks, as if the bulb is about to give out. But it’s been acting that way for the whole voyage.

  ‘I’ll change you tomorrow,’ says the chief engineer as he grasps the stair rail leading up to B-deck, but he stops when a black shadow appears at the top of the stairwell.

  ‘Who …’ Big John Pétursson half closes his eyes under his hairy eyebrows and wrinkled forehead.

  A light blinks in front of the shadow.
A light like a candle that flames and dies at incredible speed.

  And with this light comes a terrific noise. Rhythmic, thundering blows with a metallic undertone. Like a heavy iron chain running noisily over a sharp iron edge.

  Ratatatata!

  Then silence as empty as the night, which smells of bitter smoke and blood.

  Warning bells start to sound throughout the ship and at the same time the chief engineer falls slowly but surely backwards, like the last tree in the forest.

  The light blinks, the light dims, the light goes out.

  His heart stops.

  Stop.

  And everything goes black.

  XXVIII

  00:00

  Guðmundur is standing forwards on the starboard bridge wing, watching five black-clad men sail a hard-bottomed inflatable up to the ship’s side, where they kill the outboard motor and throw a line with a three-pronged hook on the end onto the weather deck.

  What should he do?

  The captain runs into the bridge to get his shotgun. He flips off the safety catch, clutches it to his chest and, bent over, sneaks back out onto the bridge wing. When he looks out from the wing he sees that the men in black have tied the dinghy to the railing on the overhanging side of the ship; three of them are already up on the weather deck and the other two are about to leave the boat. They are dressed like terrorists, in black military boots with black berets on their heads and machine guns on short shoulder straps.

  Skuggi coils up under the table in the chart room, whining like a puppy.

  The captain shudders as he bends his knees, leans on the metal wall and aims the gun at the men, who are running single file along the weather deck. He aims at the leader of the group, his cold index finger trembles on the trigger, his eyes fill with salty liquid, his heart hammers, his blood rushes through his veins, and he breathes quickly through his open mouth.

  He can’t do it! But he must. He has to!

  Guðmundur Berndsen pulls the trigger. The gun goes off and slams him hard in the shoulder. For one second he sees only black and it’s as if time stands still, but then his eyes open, his lungs draw breath and the ship moves up and down. He lifts the gun and peers over the wall. Below on the weather deck run four black-clad men, stepping over their comrade, who lies curled up on the cold metal.