Scott Mariani - Star of Africa

‘What the hell for?’ he asked when Jude told him of his own ambitions to join the Royal Navy. ‘Do yourself a favour, partner. You don’t wanna get in with that bunch of tight-assed dipshits. You wanna sail the world, Jude, then this is the way to do it. There is,’ he added grandly, ‘no better life for a free man than this one right here.’

‘A free man?’

‘You ain’t got no wife back home, do you? Not at your age, right?’

Jude shook his head. ‘Girlfriend. Nothing that serious.’ The truth was, he was pretty certain his thing with Helen, who’d been a year below him at university, was dead and buried now that he’d dropped out of his studies. Her parents disapproved of his ‘dissolute ways’ and were a little too much of an influence on their daughter. He still wore the little bracelet she’d given him, a string of beads that spelled her name. He hadn’t had the heart to throw it away.

‘I’m not one to go givin’ advice,’ Mitch said, happy to go on dispensing it freely. ‘But don’t go gettin’ yourself saddled. I finally had the good sense to walk away after number four. Lord knows there ain’t no ocean as cold nor no mountain on this earth as hard as a woman’s heart. These days I keep the bitches strictly on a payin’ basis, if you get my drift.’

‘I’ll take your word for it,’ Jude said, with a smile.

For all that he was making friends and feeling more comfortable by the hour in his new environment, Jude wasn’t so sure about all his fellow crewmen. In particular, a chisel-faced, greasy-haired ex-biker called Scagnetti, who wore a grimy wife-beater T-shirt to show off his muscles and tattoos, and whose moods fluctuated between being silent and sullen, then argumentative and prone to lash out at the slightest provocation. He had been a Harley mechanic somewhere down in New Mexico before he’d gravitated to stealing choppers, nearly got caught and fled to sea. Everyone had a story, it seemed.

Mitch had already warned Jude not to get too close to Scagnetti. ‘Dude’s a decent enough mariner but there’s something ain’t quite right up here’ – tapping a finger to his head. ‘Watch’m, is all I’m sayin’.’

Another crew member Jude quickly warmed to was Hercules, the ship’s cook, a larger-than-life black man with a laugh that could vibrate the hull from stem to stern, and who always wore the same frayed old army jacket that was spattered with a thousand grease stains. Hercules’s constant companion in the galley, the mess, and everywhere else, perched on his shoulder, was an evil harpy of an African grey parrot that went by the name of Murphy and possessed an even more scatological vocabulary than most of the sailors. Not everyone appreciated the bird, especially after being screeched at repeatedly and at maximum volume to get the fuck out of here! – its favourite expression.

‘If that vulture of yours shits in my plate, I’m going to chew its goddamned head off and spit out the beak,’ complained Gerber, absolutely serious. Which, Hercules later confessed to Jude with a grin, earned Gerber a dollop of green parrot excreta mixed in with his gravy. Gerber either didn’t notice, or thought it was an improvement on the usual slop the galley served up. Jude had to secretly agree that, whatever else Hercules might be, he certainly was no chef.

Strangely, Murphy never swore at Jude. On the third day of the voyage, the bird even flapped off its master’s shoulder to swoop across the mess and perch on Jude’s. ‘First time he’s ever done that,’ Hercules said, mightily impressed, while Jude sat very still and hoped the thing wasn’t about to rip his earlobe off with its nutcracker beak.

‘Murph has real good taste in people,’ Hercules chuckled while pouring Jude a mug of stewed coffee later that day. ‘If he don’t take kindly to a guy, that’s how I know they’s an asshole. He’s like my early warnin’ system.’

‘Everyone seems okay to me,’ Jude said, playing the diplomatic newbie. ‘Mostly, anyway.’

‘Ain’t such a bad bunch crew on this run,’ Hercules said. ‘Just that lousy prick Scagnetti and the three a-holes up on D Deck.’

D Deck was where the engineers and mates had their slightly more comfortable quarters than the common crewmen, and for a moment Jude thought Hercules must be referring to some of them.

‘Nah, man. Talking about our esteemed fuckin’ passengers. Bird don’t think too much of them neither, believe me.’

This was the first Jude had heard of passengers on board. No mention of it had been made by anyone until now, which struck him as being odd. ‘I didn’t realise merchant ships carried anybody but the working crew.’

Hercules sniffed. ‘That’s ’cause we don’t, not as a rule leastways. I been at sea twelve years and I ain’t never seen it. This ain’t no damn cruise liner. Ain’t no Sunday picnic neither. Like I don’t already got enough to be doin’ down here without I’ve got to carry up their meals twice a fuckin’ day. What, are their asses too high an’ mighty to chow down here with the rest of us? Ain’t no room for freeloaders in this here merchant marine. Everybody pulls their weight or they ain’t got no right bein’ here in the first place.’

‘What are they, friends of the captain?’

‘You bet I already asked the bosun the same question ’fore we shipped out.’

‘And what did he say?’ Jude asked, wondering whether maybe Jack Skinner wasn’t quite as unapproachable as Mitch had suggested.

Hercules grunted. ‘Didn’t say shit. Just gave me the look that says, don’t even fuckin’ ask.’

As he went about his duties that day, Jude kept an eye open in case he might spot one of the mystery passengers. He saw no sign of them, and presumed they must be confining themselves to their quarters and choosing not to mix with the others on board. But what he did start to pick up more signs of were the grumbles of resentment among the crew against the unknown, nameless, faceless freeloaders up on D Deck. None of his business, he decided, reminding himself that he, too, was just passing through and only here thanks to some favour called in, some string or other pulled by one of Jeff Dekker’s connections in the maritime world. He wasn’t one of these guys. He was only here to gain knowledge and experience.

Which he was doing, every waking moment. Jude had always been a fast learner, effortlessly remaining top of his class at uni before he’d decided that Marine Biology was not what he wanted to spend his life doing. He was constantly full of questions for Mitch and the others, though careful not to overdo it. He soon filled in the gaps in his knowledge concerning the roles of the senior crewmen. The impressively named Henry Hainsworth O’Keefe was, as he’d supposed, the supreme authority aboard ship, directing things from his throne room up on the bridge. Frank Wilson, the chief mate, was responsible for overseeing the loading and unloading cargo, as well as handling security and the general day-to-day running of the ship. The chief engineer, Diesel, was a rare sight above decks, he and his assistants seldom emerging from their domain in the engine room down below. When not filling his already capacious belly, Guzman, second mate, was the so-called ‘paper mate’ in charge of navigation, charts and all the electronics up on the bridge. The third mate, Marshall, acted as an assistant. And as Jude had already inferred, the fearsome Skinner’s job as bosun was to mediate between the mates and the rest of the crew, as well as ensure discipline on board.

In addition to learning about the men he was sailing with, Jude was also getting to know the ship pretty well. His first impression of a floating city had been perfectly right: you could lose yourself for days in the bewildering, endless maze of passageways and storerooms both above and below decks. Maybe it was because he was the youngest and most fleet of foot out of the crew, or maybe it was just because he was the new meat; either way, Jude found himself running back and forth all day on gopher duty. Clattering up and down rusty iron steps. Fetching this, fetching that, passing messages here and there.