Peter James - A Twist of the Knife

Most importantly for Juliet, Tony and she were getting on better than ever. By the time they berthed in Perth, nearly three years into their voyage, she had never, ever, in all their years, felt so close to this man she loved so much. Enjoying the luxury of a hot shower in a deluxe hotel room, then making love to Tony afterwards and falling asleep in his arms in soft, clean hotel bedding, she decided she never wanted this voyage to end — although she did miss her children and grandchildren. He told her that he didn’t want it to end, either. And why should it? They were in the happy situation of being able to afford this life at sea — why not continue it for as long as they were both able-bodied?

They only had one real argument. That was when they were in Darwin, three years and six months on, and two more of their grandchildren had been born. Juliet realized that if they did not get back to the UK, at least for a short while, their grandchildren would be total strangers when they finally returned.

It didn’t seem to bother Tony, but it was an increasing concern to her. ‘Why don’t we take a straight route back home, spend a year there, bonding with the kids, then set off again?’ she asked.

‘I really want to go to Singapore first,’ he had replied. ‘We’ve never been and I’ve always wanted to sail there.’

‘But you’ve been there on business,’ she said. ‘Several times. And you always said it wasn’t that special. I asked you one time if I could join you on one of your trips and you said it was too hot and humid, and I wouldn’t like it.’

‘I did?’

‘Yes.’

He had shrugged. ‘It’s so totally different when you arrive by boat, darling,’ he said. ‘Can you imagine what it must have been like for Sir Stamford Raffles when he first arrived there? I’d love to experience that sensation with you.’

For the first time in the voyage, Juliet had bad vibes, which she couldn’t — or wouldn’t — explain. ‘I want to get back to England,’ she insisted. Then she pointed at the chart. ‘We could take that route, couldn’t we? Sri Lanka, then across to Oman, then up the Suez Canal?’

Momentarily he had a far-away look in his eyes. ‘Sri Lanka? I think you’d like it there.’

‘Didn’t you have a client there? You used to go there a lot.’

He nodded. ‘Yes. Yes indeed.’ And suddenly his whole countenance lit up. ‘Sri Lanka’s a good plan!’

‘So let’s do it!’

‘Sri Lanka it is!’

Then he pointed at the chart again. ‘If we’re going to sail that route, it’s about three thousand, seven hundred miles. At our average speed of six knots that’s about thirty days sailing across open ocean, and there’s a risk of Somali pirates all the way. We’d have several days out of radio contact with anyone — we would be totally on our own — at the mercy of whatever happened.’

‘I feel safe with you. And besides, what interest would pirates have with us? They’re after big commercial ships — like in that film Captain Phillips.’

‘Not always. They take Western hostages, too. We’d be sitting ducks.’

‘I want to get home, Tony, OK? I’m prepared to take that risk.’

‘Right, fine, we’ll have to establish a watch routine all the way — like we had to do during some other crossings on this trip.’

‘Yes, no problem.’

For some reason he seemed particularly keen to get this idea of the watches across to her. ‘It will mean long, lonely vigils on deck,’ he said.

‘I’m used to that.’

‘Of course you are.’

There were a couple of occasions over the next two days, while they provisioned the boat, when Juliet’s old suspicions about Tony returned. He seemed to need the toilet on the harbour rather a lot, and always took his satellite phone with him. And he had become particularly irritable with her.

Once, she ribbed him, only partially in jest, saying, ‘You’re going to have a crap, darling. Does your phone help you or something? Do you have a crap app on it?’

He just gave her a strange look as he jumped ashore and strode up the quay.

God, she loved him. But there was something, always something, thinking back throughout their time together, that she felt he kept from her. And she hated that. She had never kept anything from him, not from the very first moment they had met. Her biggest wish was that she could trust him just as much as she loved him.

She stared at the chart over his shoulder and could see it really did look a long way. An awfully long way. They would be leaving Borneo, and then Singapore, hundreds of miles to starboard. There was just a vast, blue, fathomless expanse of Indian Ocean. Of course, they could just berth the boat here and fly home. They’d be back in England in twenty-four hours, instead of three months, minimum. But she thought about the huge send-off they’d had, and all the donations, some per nautical mile covered, that were still clocking up, and she knew they had to arrive home, just as they had departed, by boat.

Three days later they set off. Tony, with his tanned face and beard flecked with white, was at the helm, motoring them out of the harbour while Juliet stowed the fenders into the hatches. It was a calm day, with a gentle force three breeze. Once they were clear of the moles, Juliet, still spritely, energetic and agile, unfurled the roller jib. When it was set, with the breeze on their port beam, she pressed the button to raise the mainsail.

Then Tony cut the engine and they sailed, with smiles on their faces, in the blissful, sudden silence. Just the crunch sound of their prow through the water, the clatter of the rigging, and the occasional caw from the handful of seagulls that accompanied them, hopeful of a snack of any scraps that they might jettison overboard.

After their long stay in port, Juliet moved around the deck, tidying away or coiling loose ropes, and checking for any loose tools Tony had left lying around. Then when her chores were finished, she went aft, leaned on the stern rail and watched the coastline of mainland Australia slowly, but steadily, fading into the heat haze.

Suddenly she felt a prick of apprehension. As if she had a presentiment, which she could not define, of the horror that lay ahead. They faced a long, long, voyage ahead of them. It would be one of the longest times they had spent at sea, unbroken by any landfall. In many ways she had been looking forward to it. On a long sea voyage, routine took over your lives, and she liked that routine. Taking turns on deck at the helm, on watch for other craft, especially at night in bad weather, when you were in the shipping lanes and there was the constant danger that a container ship or supertanker with a lazy crew on the bridge might not spot you, and could run you down without ever even noticing the impact.

Then preparing meals. Sleeping. And plenty of time for her passion: reading. They had a good supply of books, and she had her Kindle loaded with all the books she hadn’t yet got around to reading, including War and Peace and the complete works of Charles Dickens.

The first two weeks passed without incident, and they had a steady, benign wind on the beam, giving them slightly faster progress than they had expected. If this continued, they could be home several days ahead of schedule. She was looking forward to seeing her family more and more with every passing day — and becoming increasingly excited. About two weeks to landfall in Sri Lanka, then up towards Europe.

The first inkling of what was to come happened while she was asleep in the stateroom with two hours to go until her turn on watch, when suddenly the yacht pitched violently, almost throwing her out of bed. She could hear the rigging clattering more than usual, and the yacht pitched again. It felt like the sea was getting up.