‘No. There’s a party. We saw it.’ The man had reached the girl’s side and was leaning on her. They seemed steadier like that than separately.
‘Then you must be seeing things. There are no buildings here, just boats. And no parties.’
The man smiled idiotically. ‘Yes, there is. We could see it.’ He turned and pointed into the air. ‘On that posh boat over there.’
Brynjar realised at once which vessel he meant; the couple would hardly describe the fishing boats or trawlers as ‘posh’. He must be referring to the yacht that was berthed in the Coast Guard area. ‘There’s no party there. You’ll have to leave. Come back tomorrow when you’re in a better state.’
‘There is a party. I saw it. One of the guests was on deck.’ The girl sounded like a spoilt child who had got hold of an idea and wouldn’t let go. ‘You can’t ban us from going to a party.’
‘You’re mistaken. There’s no one on board and no party. That ship is damaged; no one would throw a party on board.’ Brynjar felt his heart begin to pound, pumping the blood round his body in readiness for danger. ‘I repeat, you’ll have to leave.’
‘There is someone there.’ The girl swung her head clumsily to her companion, stumbling as she did so. Brynjar put out a hand to prevent her from falling flat on her back, but the man didn’t notice. He seemed in an even worse state than when Brynjar had first spotted them. Initially he had contented himself with watching them from his hut, hoping they’d turn back and spare him the bother of dealing with them. He didn’t recall noticing any movement on the yacht, though come to think of it the couple had stopped and stared at it when they first entered the harbour area. The girl had nudged the man and pointed, but Brynjar had assumed she recognised it from the news. It went without saying that he would have shot out of the hut the instant he spotted an unauthorised visitor on board. It must have been an illusion.
‘I think I’d better go home.’ The man’s face had turned grey. ‘I don’t feel well. I reckon I’m seasick. Is the dock moving?’ Brynjar couldn’t be bothered to point out that they were standing on solid concrete. The man was leaning most of his weight on the skinny girl, who was not amused. ‘Thanks, mate, it was cool – be seeing you.’ He had forgotten who Brynjar was. They tottered away, in spite of the girl’s protests that they were missing out on a ‘wicked boat party’.
When he was sure they had really gone, Brynjar finally braced himself to look over at the yacht. She was listing a little towards the dockside, presumably as a result of the damage she’d sustained when she hit the jetty. Was it possible that a drunk had climbed aboard without his noticing and was now wandering about on deck? He couldn’t see any movement, or hear any sound but the quiet lapping of the waves, but there was a chance someone might be standing out of sight. They couldn’t be below decks unless they had broken in, since all the doors were securely locked. Perhaps the drunk had left or passed out, if he or she was ever there in the first place. Still, Brynjar was duty bound to investigate, however little he relished the task. He started walking.
Recently the yacht had dominated conversation in the coffee breaks between shifts, so Brynjar had heard all the tales about her supposed curse. While he didn’t necessarily believe such nonsense, he couldn’t ignore the fact that there was an odd atmosphere about her, one which couldn’t be put entirely down to the lurid stories or the unknown fate of her passengers. He had witnessed with his own eyes the way the birds shunned her, never perching on her, not even flying over her if they could help it. Of course it could be – must be – coincidence. And yet. The night after she had been moved to her current mooring he had noticed several fish floating dead in the water by her hull. This was abnormal; he couldn’t remember ever having seen more than one dead fish at a time before. As his job demanded, he had made a note of the incident and learnt the following evening that a team from the Matís food research institute had collected the dead fish for testing. Brynjar’s informant had added that although some of the white coats put it down to pollution or poisoning, people in the know believed it was linked to the yacht.
There was no sign of any figure on deck. Switching on his torch, he shone it along the ship but could see nothing but fleeting shadows. ‘Hello!’ His shout pierced the stillness but faded instantly. The ensuing silence felt heavier, more tangible, as if it resented the disturbance. ‘Hello!’ Brynjar called again, wondering how often he would have to repeat this before he could be said to have done his duty. There was no answer. He took a step backwards to get a better view and began to shine his torch back and forth along the white aluminium hull, at which the shadows resumed their jerky dance. He tried to illuminate the waterline to check that the uninvited guest hadn’t fallen overboard but could see nothing unusual. A red Coke can was floating lazily beside the ship; otherwise the sea looked as if it had been vacuum-cleaned. When he directed the beam further away he noticed a narrow white ribbon of mist curling in over the surface of the water from the harbour mouth, only about a metre above sea level. While it was not particularly common, he had often experienced misty conditions in the harbour before without being alarmed. But this time it was different. He didn’t want to be standing beside this notorious ship if the mist thickened into a fog and closed in on him, reducing visibility to zero. Enough was enough.
He hurried back towards his hut, not looking round even when he thought he heard a whisper from the deserted yacht. He couldn’t make out the words but was fairly sure that, despite their similarity, there were two voices. Female, but not those of grown women; more like children. Two children. Twins. His mouth felt suddenly dry and the torch weighed heavy in his hand. He stopped and strained his ears, though his brain was screaming at him to keep moving. He could hear nothing now, yet that did little to lessen his terror. He hadn’t a clue what he was afraid of; until now children had roused little emotion in him, and certainly never fear. Perhaps it was the mental image of the dead sisters roaming the yacht in a vain search for their parents or a way out, forever trapped aboard the vessel that had robbed them of their future. Brynjar started walking again. One thing was certain: he wasn’t putting a word about this in his report, or people would think he had finally cracked.
He quickened his pace and once safely inside the hut locked the door behind him for the first time since he’d started the job. Then he rang the police and reported a possible break-in on the yacht, not mentioning the voices. If something untoward was happening, let the police sort it out.
He really needed a new job.
Chapter 11
The young man on the other end of the line sounded subdued and distracted. He was the only Snævar Thórdarson in the telephone directory whose occupation was listed as ship’s engineer. Thóra had been running out of ideas about who to ask for background information on the yacht when she suddenly remembered the crew member who had dropped out, and Fannar had supplied her with his name. With any luck, she thought, his account of the accident that had caused him to be left behind might also come in useful for her report.
Snævar readily admitted that he was meant to have sailed with the Lady K to Iceland but his replies to Thóra’s questions, though so swift and to the point they almost seemed rehearsed, were not actually much help since his involvement in the preparations for the voyage had been minimal. At first she found it odd that his answers should be so fluent, but it turned out that he had already given the police three separate statements.
When Thóra persisted, Snævar became more uncomfortable, especially on the subject of how Ægir had come to take his place on board; but then, it can’t have been much fun to be the indirect cause of a whole family’s disappearance. He started off trying to give a sober, factual account, but as he progressed he became increasingly choked with emotion.