Yrsa Sigurðardóttir - The Silence of the Sea

‘Probably best if I take the outside watch to start with.’

‘Anything in particular I should keep an eye out for?’

Thráinn surveyed the bridge. ‘Well, there’s no need for you to touch the console since we’re idling, so I won’t waste time teaching you how to use the equipment. If anything happens, just come and get me.’

Ægir was left alone in the pilot house. His book seemed to have lost all its power to entertain and he could barely make out the print in the semi-darkness anyway. Despite Thráinn’s absence, Ægir couldn’t bring himself to occupy his seat like a fully grown man playing at being captain. Instead, he huddled in the corner with his feet propped on a side table. He put his book down, not even bothering to check whether it was open at the right page. It didn’t matter, as he was unlikely to return to it during the voyage; if he didn’t feel like reading it when alone on night watch, when would he?

It was going to be a long night. He sat with his hands in his lap. Outside there was nothing but impenetrable darkness; there were no stars and the moon was hidden by cloud. Night in the city was nothing compared to this dense, unrelieved blackness. It seemed almost palpable; if he thrust his arm far enough over the rail he imagined he would be able to feel its texture, yielding and slippery, like cold slime. Rising, he moved into the circle of light in the middle of the room. Mercifully, the VHF remained dormant but that malevolent voice still rang in his ears.

He regretted not having asked if it would be all right to step outside now and then for a breath of fresh air or a drink. Surely it would only take him a couple of minutes to dash down to the galley and grab a can? He longed for a cold beer but decided against it, not because he was indirectly in command of the ship but because he was afraid it would make him drowsy. For some reason he felt a strong aversion to sleeping alone in here. No doubt it was the fear of being caught by Thráinn.

The galley lights came on after an instant’s delay. He hadn’t noticed the humming of the fridge before; perhaps it was because everything was quieter now. He was assailed by a sudden feeling of loneliness and wondered if he should wake Lára to keep him company, but dismissed the idea at once. If he did, the girls would be alone while their parents slept off their fatigue in the morning, and it would be unforgivable to leave them unsupervised on deck. Though they were growing up faster than he liked, they were still young and foolish enough to do something silly.

The fridge, a big double-door model, was half empty. The stores they had lugged on board could not fill the deep shelves and it was almost alarming to see how little they had to eat. Supposing they ran out of food before the voyage was over? Then again, they had the world’s biggest larder right underneath them, so they were unlikely to starve. He pushed aside a bottle of ketchup in the hope of finding a can lurking behind it. No such luck. The same went for all the other possible hiding places in the roomy interior. For a moment he was glad Lára wasn’t there to tick him off for failing to replace the can he had taken out earlier. It was an endless bone of contention between them; they both took drinks out of the fridge, but he took it for granted that she would replace them. And the last thing he wanted right now was a tepid Coke. How stupid to have a big fridge like that with no ice-maker. That would have saved the day.

Feeling grumpy, Ægir fetched a Coke from the larder, but his spirits revived when he caught sight of the huge chest freezer whose existence he had forgotten. They had chucked a couple of loaves in it to ensure they would keep for the entire voyage, along with some packets of chicken breasts and mince. He had been in a hurry at the time, so couldn’t recall if he had seen any ice cubes, though he did remember that the former owners had left the freezer stuffed to the brim – they had barely been able to squeeze their own food in on top – so it was quite possible there was ice in there somewhere.

The large lid creaked as he opened it. He was met by a puff of arctic vapour and recoiled for an instant before bending over to root around among the frozen contents.

At first he was able to shift the packets without much effort, but couldn’t find any ice cubes. Determined not to give up straight away, he carried on digging, deeper and deeper, hampered by increasingly numb fingers. While he rummaged, he reflected on the inadequacies of freezer design; it was impossible to reach the contents at the bottom of the cavernous chest except by removing the upper layers. He was only halfway down when he encountered a black bin-bag, which seemed to fill the rest of the interior. He prodded it in the faint hope that the owner of the yacht had been planning a mega party and had bought in several kilos of ice for the occasion. Unsurprisingly, this turned out to be over-optimistic. Whatever the bag contained, it was much larger; the entire carcase of a suckling pig, perhaps, or a side of beef. Snatching back his hand, he blew on his fingers. He would have to make do with lukewarm Coke.

Food packets of various sizes were now heaped at either end of the chest and Ægir set about replacing them. It wasn’t easy as the freezer had been crammed to bursting. As he tried to stuff some fish fillets down beside the bin-bag, his hand was forced up against the cold plastic, making him uncomfortably aware of its contents. Withdrawing his arm slowly, he peered into the chest, from which a cold mist rose as if it were exhaling. What the hell had he touched? It wasn’t a side of beef, that much was certain. Nor a suckling pig either. It had felt almost like rigid fingers. Waving the vapour away, he tried in vain to make out the shape of whatever the black plastic was covering. He felt an urgent desire to slam the lid, take his Coke and return to the bridge without exploring any further, but he couldn’t.

In the lull before he acted he was acutely aware of his solitude. He yearned for the warmth of Lára’s body under the thick duvet and the sound of her gentle breathing. The last place on earth he wanted to be was here, with whatever was in that bag. Suddenly, losing patience with himself, he tore open the plastic where he had touched it.

The light picked out a white finger, sparkling slightly with frost, tipped with red nail varnish.

They jostled for space in the small larder, nobody wanting to stand too close to the freezer. ‘What are we going to do?’ Lára’s voice was husky from sleep, her hair tousled, her cheek still creased by the pillow. Loftur and Halli were in much the same state, also newly woken, though they succeeded better in keeping their cool. ‘What are we going to do?’ she repeated in a trembling voice. ‘We can’t sail home with a dead woman in the freezer as if nothing had happened.’

‘Who do you think it is?’ Thráinn bent over and peered into the chest. The contents were just as Ægir had left them; no one apart from the captain had liked to touch the bin-bag after Ægir had opened the lid to convince them it wasn’t a delusion.

‘I’m not sure I want to know,’ said Halli. ‘And personally I have no desire to see the woman’s face. What difference would it make, anyway? It wouldn’t be anyone I know.’ He shuddered. ‘At least I hope not.’

Lára chewed her lip. ‘Answer me, somebody – what are we going to do?’

Ægir opened his mouth to speak, then changed his mind. He hadn’t the faintest idea; besides, Thráinn was in charge, so it was his problem. He didn’t envy the man; he was finding it hard enough to get a grip on himself let alone take responsibility for other people. Ever since he had realised what was in the bag, he had been obeying a stream of orders issued by his brain without any apparent intervention from his conscious mind: close the lid, fetch the captain, wake Loftur and Halli, and take them up to the bridge without disturbing his wife and daughters. Lára had, in fact, woken up, but the girls were still sleeping peacefully.