An Ocean Like Me
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“The wind has dropped a little, but she is still blowing from the northwest. I have seen that before and if it lasts long enough for me to get my sails set there will be some fun.”
I was in a cheerful mood as I walked down into my cabin after breakfast; the wind had been steady since dawn but not particularly strong, so even though it was blowing at least five knots it was still too much effort to raise any speed with canvas alone.
The weather forecast had come out just before we left the harbor: “A fresh north-easterly breeze of seven or eight knots, increasing to ten or twelve tomorrow”. As usual, the forecast was correct and I knew that within a day or two it would change again and we’d be back on our way.
The weather in this part of the world was never what you could call predictable, but at least it didn’t change all that often.
I spent most of the morning checking over the ship’s papers and making sure everything was ready. It was one of those rare days when we sailed without paying passengers—the only reason they were aboard was that they couldn’t afford passage anywhere else—so I wouldn’t need to see them unless anything happened during the voyage.
The crew was happy to be away for more than a day or two at a time. They liked being paid well enough, but they also appreciated the opportunity to take a few days off and get drunk. It made their life easier and more pleasant, which gave me less cause to yell at them.
Most of them would probably have preferred to go to sea on an empty ship anyway. That always seemed like a better bet to me; you weren’t responsible for anyone else’s drunkenness and you could drink yourself senseless as often as you like.
At least if you got caught drinking on board a ship while you were sailing under someone else’s authority, you could claim that you hadn’t noticed they were watching you and you weren’t actually aware that they owned your vessel—you might be able to get away with murder that way!
At about eleven o’clock I went below and had lunch at my desk while I waited for the captain to make an appearance. When he did finally arrive, he looked very grim; it was unusual to see him so downcast.
“What’s happened?” I asked. “Have we run afoul of the coastguard again? We’re going to prison for sure now. They must have tracked us to our lair by now.”
Captain Gant shook his head slowly. “No, nothing like that,” he said quietly. “This is worse.”
I frowned, not understanding. He looked at me steadily.
“We’ve lost another man.”
His voice sounded hollow even to my ears. I knew that this wasn’t good news; no matter how bad things were on a ship, the loss of one of its crew always caused trouble. Even if the death was quick and painless, there was still a sense that the ship was somehow incomplete afterward. You felt like the ship itself was damaged by the absence of the person who had been killed.
I sat up straighter in my chair. This was important: whatever the Captain had discovered, he needed the ship’s first mate to support him. “How did it happen?”
He hesitated. “I don’t know yet. I’m waiting for the coroner to come aboard and conduct a post-mortem.”
That sounded reasonable enough: there were times when it was necessary to send a body ashore for further investigation. But I could tell from his tone of voice that he knew something was wrong, and that it hadn’t been the work of some natural phenomenon like an accident or a storm.
I nodded, trying to sound confident. “So he’s dead?”
Captain Gant nodded. “Yes, sir.”
My mouth was dry now, but I swallowed hard and forced myself to speak in a level, steady voice. “And you think foul play was involved?”
He paused. “It looks that way, yes.”
That didn’t give me much information. If we were going to investigate this further, then I should probably find out where the body was lying at the moment. I tried not to seem eager, but I hoped that my question would prompt him to explain. “Where is he?”
“In my quarters. We haven’t found the body yet.”
“Is that all right?”
Captain Gant shrugged. “There’s nothing wrong with it. Why?”
I was pleased that he’d understood. “Just wondering if we should take care of it ourselves or wait until the coroner arrives.”
I knew that it was unlikely that there would be anything suspicious about the death, given our recent history with the coastguard. But you never knew until you checked it out. And it might be useful to have someone onboard who could answer questions about what had happened and whether any of it related to the coastguard or not.
As if reading my thoughts, Captain Gant nodded slowly. “I’m afraid that we will have to leave it for the coroner. I don’t want to do anything that might jeopardize this investigation.”
“Of course.” I wanted to ask more questions—about the identity of the victim and what his duties had been on board the ship—but I didn’t want to push too far at this point in case I seemed overly inquisitive. Better to wait until the inquest before I started asking embarrassing questions.
“You can help me with this investigation if you like.” He smiled slightly, his eyes twinkling behind his spectacles. “I need to write up a report for the authorities. I’ll need you to help me collect all the facts and sort through the evidence. The problem is that I know so little about this particular incident, so your experience with these things may be helpful.”
I was surprised. I hadn’t thought that the Captain had considered it possible to have a ship stolen, let alone that he would suspect foul play in such a matter. But it made sense that the captain would be concerned about the theft of any of his property, especially if the vessel was worth something. It wasn’t as though we could just walk off with the ship and pretend it had sunk.
I was impressed by the Captain’s initiative, and I couldn’t suppress my enthusiasm. “I’d love to help! What kind of information do you need?”
Captain Gant leaned forward, resting both forearms on the edge of his desk. His fingers drummed against the wood in a rapid, staccato rhythm, and I could see him counting off items mentally on his fingers.
“We only recovered the body yesterday. So there isn’t much information we can use.”
“That’s okay,” I reassured him quickly. “Once the coroner arrives I can talk to them and find out a bit more. That won’t interfere with the investigation.”
He nodded and leaned back, folding his arms across his chest. I watched him as he stared down at his hands, watching his fingers move over each other with purposeful intent. For a moment I imagined that I heard their tapping, but it was probably just my imagination.
He looked up again. “Do you mind if I ask how long you’ve known the deceased?”
I hesitated, feeling awkward. I didn’t know exactly how long I’d known him—not since before we’d met. But I decided that it couldn’t hurt to tell the truth. “Not very long. A few months, perhaps.”
He nodded. “Did you know him well?”
“Only casually. We didn’t really get along. But I knew him a little better than most because he worked closely with Captain Kite.”
“Ah.” He frowned as if the mention of his name bothered him. “Was that a bad relationship?”
I shook my head slowly. “No, I wouldn’t say that. Not really. Sometimes we would argue, but not too often. And he was always polite to me.”
“Hmm.” He tapped the armrests of his chair with the fingertips of both hands, thinking. “What do you know about the man?”
“His name was James,” I spoke quietly. My mouth felt dryer still, and I wished I could have some water. I was surprised when a glass appeared in front of me on the desk without anyone speaking.
It was filled with a dark brown liquid that smelled faintly of rum. I sipped carefully, savoring the taste as it washed over my tongue and warmed my throat. It felt good after all the sea air and salt from being on deck, but I knew that it couldn’t be real rum because it had an odd flavor that wasn’t quite like what I was used to.
The Captain watched me intently, his eyes focused on mine. I wondered why he wanted to know so much about the crewman, but I figured it must just be part of the job. Maybe I had said too much already.
“What else can you tell me about him?” He asked finally.
“He was a sailor.” I tried to keep my tone even, and my voice from shaking. It wasn’t easy with a stranger asking me personal questions. “A deckhand. On our ship.”
Captain Gant nodded. He pulled a small notebook from inside his jacket and scribbled something in it, then set it aside again. “That’s enough.”
He paused for a moment, staring down at me with his penetrating green gaze. The light from the lantern above illuminated his face, making him look almost stern or severe. It made me nervous; I had never met anyone who seemed to notice every detail about everyone they met like this man did.
But then he smiled, and the intensity of his gaze faded away. “Thank you,” he said. “This will help a lot.”
I stood awkwardly, not sure what else to do. “Is there anything else you need? Or is there anything I can do?”
He reached into a drawer and withdrew another glass, which he handed to me. This one held whiskey instead of rum. I took it gratefully and drank half of it in one gulp. It burned a little going down, but I liked the way it tasted—smooth and strong.
“I don’t think so, thanks.” He picked up his glass again and downed it in a single swallow. Then he placed the empty glass back on the desk beside me.
“Thanks again,” I told him and then we walked out of the cabin.
I left the Captain’s cabin feeling strange. I had no idea what to make of his behavior. It had been a long day, and I hadn’t slept at all during the night—even though I’d barely woken up. But now that I’d seen the Captain again, I started to feel a little bit better.
As soon as I was out on the deck, I realized that my mood had improved even further. The cold winter wind whipped across the deck, making me shiver slightly. It also helped clear my head, leaving me feeling more awake.
The sky was cloudy, but the sun still managed to peek through from time to time. Most of the ship’s company was standing on deck, chatting amongst themselves. Many of them were in groups of three or four, discussing something.
Some of the younger sailors—the ones I had seen earlier playing cards—were walking around, carrying boxes of supplies and tools from somewhere below. Several other crewmen were cleaning the deck, moving buckets of black tar-like gunk that had collected in several places near the bow of the ship.
They worked in pairs, scrubbing and scraping at the sticky mess with their mops until it became hard and crumbly, then tossing the clumps overboard to break apart in the waves.
I found myself wondering how long I would have to be a prisoner on this ship before I could leave it for good. If Captain Gant really was planning to take me on board his own vessel, maybe I could convince him that I could be useful, and he might let me go then.
Maybe he’d even give me back the money that I had paid for passage to America. That thought made me smile slightly, and a small sense of hope crept into my mind as well.
There were only a few dozen men and women working on deck, but they kept busy nonetheless. I saw several other ships docked nearby—some of them even larger than ours. At first, I assumed that they must belong to other captains in the harbor, but I soon realized that these were cargo ships.
The people on deck waved to each other as we passed by, exchanging greetings and sometimes even brief conversations with their neighbors.
The whole scene reminded me of how I had spent so many years on the ship with my mother. We rarely spoke to any of the other passengers, but it didn’t matter. There was always something to do. And the fact that so many others around us helped us feel safe because if anything happened, there were plenty of people to watch out for each other.
It brought back a flood of memories, of when I had been young, sailing with my family across the vast oceans. My mother loved being out on the sea so much that she often took me along. She said it made her feel free. Like everything was possible, and nothing could ever get in her way.
That’s what I felt right now too.
As the morning wore on and the sky slowly brightened, it grew easier for me to focus on the task at hand. I went about my daily routine without distraction, and after a while, I almost forgot where I was—and what I was doing.
I began to believe that I might actually escape from here, somehow.
The End