When Civil Servants Fail

by John Schou

first we shall keep steadily on course and not upset whoever is going to enter the trap.”

  “You mean we shall not proceed all the way to Dakar?”

  “Yes, certainly, but don’t tell the others yet. Can anybody tell about the captain’s attitude?”

  “No, he is an old stiff-neck,” Barbara began but stopped as some noise was heard and shortly afterwards, Old Stiff-Neck himself stood among us. All speech muted and he must have sensed that he was topic of an interrupted discussion. Good chiefs always turn up in the wrong moment.

  “Take care of your boss. The next one may be worse,” he said, and I smiled, hearing this joke for the first time.

  “Really?” asked Barbara. The captain looked sour, so she smiled at him. “You did not say it for the first time.”

  “We shall change our course soon, Mr. Krueger.”

  “If we change too soon, we shall be able to collect mussels at Jutland’s shores. I prefer water under the ship.” A reference to the previous event by Southampton. In an obviously bad temper, the captain turned around and left the bridge with the words, “Greetings to the Norwegians.”

  Igor and I also left the party, through the other corridor, for Igor in order to avoid meeting the captain. “Except Barbara, no one here could answer the captain that way without suffering some sort of punishment. He may have a good base but it must then be deep, because I never saw it.”

  I got curious. “May I invite you for a beer in the mass?”

  “Sorry, I don’t drink ... not anymore. I have duty on the bridge in four hours, and you better go to sleep with a not too full stomach before we reach the North Sea ... if we reach it, provided Johan can prevent the captain’s experiments.”

  We parted and I went to bed after the first day at sea.

  4 – A Small Addition

  Igor was right. A couple of hours later, I really had an empty stomach. Therefore, the pall which Luciano had recommended was in danger of running over, not because it was too small but because it was standing on the floor, and that was only passing the horizontal level every now and then, with ever bigger oscillations.

  Shortly after two in the night, Barbara knocked at the door. It was perhaps not suitable for a young woman to visit a stranger, but I was absolutely not dangerous. I tried to be so friendly as a dying man can be, but at first only single syllables passed my lips. She offered to empty the bucket, which I gratefully accepted, thinking I had given it all. When she returned somewhat later, I stuttered, “If the lifeboat swings as much, I prefer to die here.”

  She laughed. “Welcome to our baptizing ceremony. I just want to say that Luciano and I shall share your shift on the bridge tomorrow morning. Then we shall see ...”

  “I shall wake over the ship from above the skies”.

  “For a dying man, you can really mobilize much humour.”

  “It is just a facade. Now, many thanks ...”

  “I understand. I’m leaving now. Just tell me, which relatives we shall inform if you do not survive this small test.”

  “Small test?” What is then a big one?”

  “Wait till we come to the Biscayan,” she said, adding “There you shall see waves” just before the door closed.

  I managed to sleep some hours and was awoken only at nine a.m. Liu came in with what he considered breakfast, adapted to an ailing person.

  “Tea? It is years ago I tried that last time.”

  “Do you want coffee instead? I cannot recommend it as you look”

  “I don’t know how I look, but I feel miserable – and I don’t even dare to think of coffee”

  “Try the tea, Mr. Eric,” begged Liu. “There is something special in it, good for sea-sick people. Sip it cautiously and have some toast. The worst is soon over.”

  “You are right, it can’t get worse.” I don’t know what kind of narcotic it contained, but like an addict, I kept drinking this tea for the rest of my travel on ‘Frozen Gulf.’ I slept some more hours, just getting up in time for lunch. The two on the bridge, captain Caspersen and Konstantin, had just shovelled something down before noon and now, at ten past twelve, was the general assembly for the rest of the crew.

  “So you have decided to return to the World of the living,” started Luciano,

  “Yes, Liu mixed some doping in the tea,” I explained the miracle. “I shall of course return to the bridge this evening. Thanks, Luciano and Barbara, for the help.”

  Liu served the meal, some pork steak, the second meat-meal of our travel. From now on it was planned that the sea should deliver fresh supplies.

  “The captain is always on the bridge at noon,” Johan explained. “That permits the rest of the crew to celebrate the main meal together – except, of course, the unhappy person who is condemned to share the captain’s fate.”

  “Including the meal with him,” it seemed logical to me.

  “Not quite. You see the small table over there?” He pointed at a table standing up against the wall. “It’s the captain’s, and only the captain’s. He eats there fast, without looking or talking to the other person who is to join him later on the bridge.”

  “A man of firm principles,” I suggested. Eating just for survival. I was looking forward to tell Mr. Smith about that detail, he who rather lived for eating.

  Now Igor supplied: “You can say that again. Having made an opinion, he sticks to it, even when it proves to be wrong.”

  Barbara wanted to know more. “You did not tell me if you had relatives to inform about your premature demise last night.”

  “I have a father in Canada.”

  “You are not married?”

  “Working for Mr. Smith is impossible for a married man.”

  “Oh, that kind of man,” she said disappointed.

  “What do you mean?”

  “A man’s world, I mean.”

  “My girlfriend for many years disagrees; and Mr. Smith, a 350 pound mass of an unmovable invalid, is as sympathetic as your captain, although a lot more clever. He simply demands someone is available for him all the time. His house help or me, who is doing the practical things while he is doing the thinking – at least, that is how he believes his business is running, and he pays me well enough to believe the same. But tell me more about being the sole woman in a man’s world, now you opened the topic.”

  Barbara’s face blushed and I almost felt pity, but she started it. “It traditionally demands that all male members respect the position of a female as a full-worthy colleague and not as a sex-object.”

  “That demands, of course, that the woman behaves like a colleague and refrains from any advantages her sex-appeal may offer,” said Igor. Perhaps a fair argument, but the silence which followed it indicated that there had been some troubles before onboard this ship. Though interesting itself, I changed the subject through an innocent question:

  “You told me, Barbara, that the waves of the Biscayan may be worse than the North Sea. How about the English Channel?”

  She looked at me as was she grateful for the question: “It can be the same, but it is mostly slightly better.” That remark started a heated discussion about waves and weather, but at least we had left the former topic, also something with W.

  “The waves of the Biscayan may be so big that we may be forced to change the course, in order to avoid being turned over by them,” said Johan. “This coaster was not built for that kind of a rough sea. Even the captain shows respect.”

  “Although one can never be sure, what kind of experiments he carries out,” Igor remarked.

  “So old and still new experiments,” I said in an admiring tone.

  “You may soon enough learn to fear them,” Luciano commented.

  After the hot meal, I had occasion to have another phase of sleep. Probably there was something in Liu’s tea that made me sleepy, but I didn’t care after the terrible experience, from which I was now healed. I woke up shortly before my late shift at 6 p.m. and just asked Liu if he could bring me the magic potion to the bridge.
Unfortunately, the hypnotic effect lasted also there and counting the waves did no good to that. Igor, himself usually not very talkative, made a big effort to keep me awake.

  Around nine, Barbara came up to perform some of her real job. Only now did I notice that there was a logbook in which the presence of everybody on the bridge was noted, exact on minutes. It was the job of the captain and his officers, and they were very serious about it; perhaps because they had not much else to do?

  “There is a mail for you from someone called Fred,” said Barbara.

  “That is my replacement in Mr. Smith’s male world,” I said and read the content. He had found Tom, but the dog had died by himself before a veterinarian could take the honour for it. That I decided to leave to the captain to make public – or not. The next topic was difficult for me to evaluate, and for that I needed help. “That should interest you. The ship with its cargo for humanitarian aid is insured by Lloyds in London for 50 million £.”

  Igor was surprised. “The old ship is, in spite of earlier modernization, not very valuable. When it was repaired in Bremerhaven, there were indication of widespread corrosion, and it was considered a wonder that a new owner was found so quickly, in spite of a symbolic price of 1 million €. Coasters are hardly asked for any more.”

  “And the value of the cargo?”

  “With the toxic waste, it must be considered negative. You have to sail far away, to Africa, in order simply to get rid of it. Unless ...”

  “Unless what?” Barbara asked energetically.

  “Unless the ship sinks on deep water, in which case ‘Frozen Line’ earns both the fat insurance sum and probably an additional fee to get rid of the man-killing waste,” I concluded. “So try to use your criminal brain and tell me, where is the most probable occasion for our ship-wreck, North Sea, English Channel or later?” I asked.

  “Definitely later, somewhere in the Atlantic Ocean where you can’t even dream of recovering the ship,” Igor concluded.

  Barbara interrupted: “Probably there is a connection then to a strange order I must transfer to the captain from the shipping company – and of course not tell you anything about. We shall sail to Cherbourg and from there take up further cargo for Dakar. Not a big one, just a single pallet, which we shall then place in the aft cargo area. So it was specified. So the company will pay harbour dues for taking a single pallet on board. What do you think is on that pallet?”

  “It is rather obvious. Can you swim, Eric?” asked Igor.

  “A few hundred meters, perhaps. But I shall arrange an anonymous call to the police. I just have one question to you: is the captain victim or complicit?”

  “As you probably know, I don’t like the captain, but he will hardly be able to survive as the only one if the ship suddenly is filled with water. But let us not tell him about our suspicion and simply let Barbara hand out the order from the company.”

  “Before you go, let me just send a mail to Mr. Smith.”

  “At least, we know now that we are safe until Cherbourg. Then we shall see. By the way, let me inform my colleague Johan what is brewing together – and let us not inform the others. They will probably panic and desert,” Igor said.

  “I could consider that myself,” commented Barbara.

  “Don’t forget that we only have a suspicion, whereas you have signed a contract to complete the travel. Before you run away, it is necessary to prove the guilt of your employer. Perhaps that will be possible in Cherbourg, and perhaps we are just wrong in our assumptions. In that case, better keep your job. When shall we be in Cherbourg?”

  “Sometime in the night between tomorrow and the day after,” prophesized Igor.

  “That gives me two night’s sleep, before we perhaps becomes the bomb on board. Does it say something about what it should be? Perhaps a gorilla in retirement on the way back to its earlier surroundings?”

  Barbara laughed. “It should be a laboratory devise for