The Gilgamesh Conspiracy

by Jeffrey Fleming

  He played his flashlight over, looking for any signs of movement.

  ‘Anyone in the raft there?’

  Perhaps he should climb aboard and examine it more closely? A wave heaved the raft up towards the yacht. It then sank rapidly down and by some combination of their relative motion a jet of water erupted from between the two craft and soaked him thoroughly. He cursed his stupidity in not putting his waterproofs back on. He decided it was too dangerous to climb down into the raft in the dark with the sea in its current state; he pictured it breaking free while he was on board it and watching his yacht drifting away. He would do nothing more until morning by which time the sea should have moderated. He looked up at the mast. There was no point in setting the sails. With the raft acting as a sea anchor, the yacht’s handling and steering would be problematic at best. He decided to ride out the night.

  He walked into the saloon cabin, sat down in front of his computer and switched it on. As he waited for the satellite link to connect he gazed up at the bulkhead where the photograph of his late wife used to be fixed. Six weeks ago he had realised that he was spending too much time clutching a glass of whisky and gazing at her picture and tormenting himself with memories and he had taken it down and hidden it in a drawer.

  He thought again about the strange design of the raft. That rectangular shape would make it awkward to manoeuvre or to tow and that curious raised flat end would make it less seaworthy. A series of low pitched bleeps told him that the internet connection was available.

  After a few minutes searching the web sites of manufacturers of life rafts and their associated equipment he discovered what he had moored to the stern of his yacht must be a slide raft from an airliner. Usually it was packed into the lower half of a passenger door but if the door was opened in an emergency then the raft would erupt from its container and inflate into a rectangular shape that passengers could slide down if they had to escape from the aircraft when it was on land, or if the aircraft ditched into the sea then it could be detached from the side of the aircraft and became a life raft that could hold fifty people.

  Steven read through the description of the raft and its features. Apparently all the newest ones were fitted with an Emergency Locator Transmitter that would broadcast a signal on the international distress frequencies for at least forty-eight hours before the internal battery was exhausted. He slowly folded down the screen of the computer. His own life raft was packed into a readily accessible box on the cabin roof and he knew it was fitted with an ELT. He wondered if the raft floating outside had been equipped with one and if it was working. Maybe he should find out. He reached over to the radio set and switched it on. He selected the receiver to 406 MHz; there was nothing but a quiet hiss from the internal loudspeaker. He switched it off again and went outside to look at the raft. The moon had risen above the horizon and the raft was bathed in its silvery light. He listened as the waves slapped at the sides of the raft and gurgled under the flat end. He had read that it had been attached to the side of the aircraft on the door sill and when the door was opened it …that was strange; it seemed that the heap of fabric at the far end of the raft had shifted. He shone the flashlight beam over it. Perhaps the action of the waves on the raft had tumbled it into a new position. He heard a sudden movement behind him and began to turn round but as he did a savage blow to his head knocked him unconscious.

  He woke up with a throbbing, aching head. As soon as he tried to shift his position he found his hands were tied together behind his back. His knees were bound and so were his ankles. He tried to straighten his legs but his hands were held to his feet by another length of rope. He had been attacked, knocked out and expertly tied up by an unknown assailant. He swore quietly under his breath. By his nature he was not a man much given to fear, and as an ex-Major in the Royal Marines he was mentally well equipped to supress panic. His most important conclusion was that if his unknown assailant wanted to kill him then he would already be dead, not trussed up.

  He looked up and around and realised he was lying on the deck in the forward cabin of the yacht. Normally a sleeping cabin for two, he had turned it into a storage compartment. But hell! What had happened to him?

  ‘Fuck!’

  The oath was called out in an irritated female voice. The woman must have been concealed on the raft under the plastic sheets. She had climbed on board when he was down below and then knocked him out. He was about to call out, but stopped. Who was she? An ordinary person would have called out to him as soon as he had found the raft. She would have cried out in the blessed relief of being miraculously rescued from near certain death, and hugged him in gratitude. She would not have assaulted him and tied him up.

  He looked around as best he could in the dark space. There were no rough metallic edges against which he could try to sever the binding ropes. He could call out and asked to be released. He could pretend to be deeply unconscious and hope that his captor might release him. He could cry out that he was in agony and ask that at least his hands be released so that he could straighten his legs. Maybe then he could find a way of freeing himself. He realised that he needed to relieve himself. In the old days in the Marines, even in training it was expected that you would just wet your pants. But he was not a young officer in the Marines any more, he was forty-seven years old, in his own yacht and he did not want this woman, even if she was a homicidal maniac, to find him with wet trousers.

  ‘Hey!’ he shouted’ and winced as the ache in his head suddenly intensified. He was about to call again but then he heard a stumbling of feet from the saloon and then a few moments later he heard the bolts being worked free and the door opened. He jerked his head sideways so that the door did not hit him. The light from the main cabin made him screw up his eyes. He retained an impression of a face surrounded by long straggly dark hair peering round the door at him. He opened his eyes again and gazed up at the woman standing in the doorway. She stared down at him with brown bloodshot eyes; a yellowing bruise surrounded one of them; a thin scar led from beside her ear down her neck to her collarbone and her lips were cracked and swollen. Then her eyes darted down to inspect the ropes around his legs, and then looked around the cabin for a moment before staring at him. ‘So you’ve come round; I was afraid I’d hit you too hard; I didn’t mean to knock you out so much.’ Her voice was educated southern counties English, incongruous against her villainous appearance further enhanced by a missing front tooth.

  ‘I’m in pain! Can you release my legs? I’ve got awful cramp.’

  ‘What’s the password?’

  This seemed a somewhat surreal question. He stared at the woman for a moment wondering if she had been driven insane by her exposure on the raft. He slowly became aware that she stank; a mixture of waterlogged clothing, vomit and possibly excrement. Suddenly she gave a short, irritated sigh. ‘For your computer!’

  ‘Oh! Its…I’ll tell you what it is after you’ve untied me.’

  ‘Bollocks!’ she replied emphatically. She stared at him for a moment before continuing in a more reasonable voice ‘Actually if I can use your internet connection to make a few inquiries then I can probably release you altogether. I just need to check a few things out.’

  ‘About me?’

  ‘You’re on the list.’

  ‘Will you be quick? I really need to go to the head.’

  She frowned at him. ‘To the what?’

  ‘The loo, I need to go to the loo.’

  ‘Why did you say ‘to the head’?’

  ‘Because we are on a boat. That’s what they’re called on board a boat.’

  Despite the bloodshot eyes and the bruising he thought he could see a hint of amusement on her face.

  ‘Give me the password then you jerk, and maybe you won’t have to wet your knickers.’

  Bitch! Bloody pirate! She had assaulted him on his own yacht, now she was insulting him, demeaning him…and he was getting angry to no purpose. He must stay calm; see if he could get an opportunity to turn the situatio
n around.

  ‘Ok, it’s “surprise”’

  ‘A surprise?’ She shook her head in amazement or disdain. ‘Go on then; surprise me.’

  ‘No! That’s it. The word ‘surprise’; it’s the name of my yacht.’

  She looked at him with an expression of understanding and maybe even apology. ‘Oh I see! - thanks.’

  She shut the cabin door and bolted it, leaving a strong odour behind her. Steven heard her shuffling back into the saloon. He wriggled about trying to relieve the pain in his right shoulder and right hip which had been carrying his weight since he had been tied up. Time passed slowly. He thought about his assailant, wondering how long she had been on the raft; had she been alone all the time? Had there been fellow survivors, now dead? Damn, his shoulder hurt. What kind of aircraft had she been on? Was she a passenger or one of the crew? What had happened to the rest of the passengers? That raft had been large enough to carry forty or fifty people. He thought back to the description of the raft in the web site. Why had the ELT not summoned a rescue mission to pick up survivors? Perhaps it had, and perhaps someone would soon come out to his yacht to take this mad woman off his hands and leave him to continue his solitary journey. His head ached; his shoulder ached; his hip ached and his bladder cried out for relief. He was about to call out when he heard the woman shuffling across the deck and moments later the door opened.

  ‘So you’re Steven Morris, ex Royal Marine officer and owner of this yacht and a property company based near Chichester.’

  ‘That’s near enough. And who are you?’

  ‘I’m Emily.’

  She stared down at him. He suddenly realised that she held a gun in her hand, and he did not feel inclined to question her further.

  ‘Hello,’ he said.

  ‘Look I only tied you up as a sort of precaution. I’ll cut the ropes now. I know I owe you an explanation but just in case you are a vengeful person I’m going to hold this gun on you until you have heard my explanation.’ She paused and then showed him his own small automatic pistol which she must have found in its locker in the saloon. ‘In case you think I don’t know how to use your gun, I can tell you that this is a Smith and Wesson double action .45 semi-automatic compact. Barrel length is three point five inches and weight not including six rounds in the chambers is twenty three ounces.’

  ‘I see,’ he said. ‘I won’t try anything.’

  ‘Good. You may be an ex-commando, or something, but I’m sure you know when you’re not in control. Now I‘m going to cut the rope holding your hands and then you can untie the rest. Ok?’

  ‘Understood,’ he replied.

  ‘Roll onto your stomach.’

  He did so. She put her foot on his back high up between his shoulders. He felt the vibration through his wrists as the knife sawed through the rope, and then he heard her walking back to the saloon and he set about untying the other ropes that bound him.

  A few minutes later Steven was seated in the saloon of his yacht with the woman who called herself Emily opposite him. He had borne the indignity of relieving himself while she watched him and now they both sat down with a bottle of water each and stared at one another under the cabin lights. Steven decided that she must be between thirty and forty, but her face was bruised and swollen and it was difficult to judge her age. She was tall for a woman, probably about the same as his own height of five feet ten inches. She wore a yellow weatherproof jacket from his deck storage, dark trousers and a pair of his best Timberland shoes. Her hair was matted on one side of her head and Steven wondered if she had been lying in a pool of her own vomit. She still held the small gun in her hand, but in a rather more negligent manner with the barrel pointing towards the deck. Steven had the impression that she seemed unaware that she was holding it,

  ‘I stink, don’t I.’ she said.

  ‘Yes, you do!’ he replied.

  ‘I didn’t dare swim off that raft to clean up. It’s quite difficult to climb back on again when you’re knackered.’

  ‘So how did you come to be in it?’ He saw that Emily was staring intently at him, but her gaze did not appear to be focussed on him. Her eyes were wide with an expression of barely suppressed anger. Her mouth twitched; her grip tightened around the gun

  ‘It’s a slide raft from a freighter aircraft. We came down onto the Atlantic…four…no, five days ago, I think. Since then I’ve just been living off a very little water and my own fat, hoping some miracle would turn up. You did, and I’m very grateful.’

  Steven stared at her, wondering what she would be doing on a freighter aircraft unless she was a pilot, and if this was the only explanation she would give him. ‘Why did you hit me and tie me up,’ he asked. ‘Why didn’t you just call out when you saw my yacht?’

  She did not answer, seeming to be lost in some inner contemplation. Then she blinked several times and gazed at him with a more natural expression.

  ‘Do you want to tell me what happened?’ he asked.

  She began to run her fingers through her hopelessly tangled hair, looked at her fingers and wrinkled her nose.

  ‘Perhaps you’d like to have a shower. Clean up.’

  ‘You have a shower on this boat? With fresh water?’

  ‘Well no, it’s sea water actually. I don’t have the fuel to spare for running the desalinater except for drinking and cooking.’

  ‘Is there any chance you could lend me some soap and shampoo?’

  Somewhat incredulous, Steven stared at the woman; she had attacked him, tied him up, threatened him with his own gun and was now calmly requesting the loan of bathing sundries.

  ‘By all means. Let me show you the way.’

  ‘Thanks. Here you are.’

  She held the Smith & Wesson out in the palm of her hand. He took it from her in silence, and then placed it in a locker under the seat.

  She nodded her understanding while he explained the operation of the bathroom facilities to her and then he left her in private. He looked around the cabin. Nothing had been moved, but there was a nearly empty plastic two litre water bottle which he did not recognise as his own and a box of cereal bars newly opened and three of them had been eaten. He wondered how long she had gone without food and if she had enough sense not to eat and drink too much too quickly after a period of extreme deprivation.

  He climbed back out to the cockpit and gazed around the yacht. It was pitching gently on the swell, its drift still restricted by the raft attached to the stern. He found his flashlight in a corner where he must have dropped it when she hit him, its bulb now giving out nothing more than a dim glow. He changed the batteries and then stuffed it in his pocket. He pulled the raft close in to the stern and clambered aboard it. As it heaved over a wave he lost his footing and rolled over in the bilge water. He crawled towards the far end where the bundle of cloth lay in a disordered heap and began to inspect it with his flashlight. Underneath he found a waterproof bag that contained some leak stoppers, a hand pump and a pair of woman’s leather shoes sodden with water.

  He stuffed everything back into the bag except the shoes and gazed thoughtfully at his yacht. He could see her, a vague shape moving about in the light of the saloon windows. Perhaps she would cut him adrift when he was in the life raft. In a moment of panic he began to crawl back to the yacht before he remembered that already she could have killed him and shoved him overboard.

  He took a deep breath and crawled more carefully back to the yacht, threw her shoes on board and then climbed over the stern and peered in through the window. She was sitting on the saloon wrapped in a couple of towels gazing down at the cabin floor. She had washed her hair out and combed it into a damp curtain that hung across her shoulders. He wondered what she looked like when she was not bruised and suffering from exposure. She had a straight nose, a hint of cheek bones a wide brow with the lines of early middle age etched across it. Her shoulders and arms reminded him of the Russian pole vaulter from the Olympic Games. He opened the door and she turned round and gave him a faint
smile that was spoilt by the missing front tooth and abruptly turned into a wince; she fingered her cracked and swollen lips.

  ‘Do you feel better now?’ he asked by way of starting off a conversation.

  ‘Yes, thank you. I look awful, though, but it’s mostly superficial. This is your yacht then?’

  He realised that this statement of the obvious was her way of inviting him to continue the conversation.

  ‘Yes it is. I’m sailing it across the Atlantic to Florida, and then I’m thinking about going on all the way round. A circumnavigation.’

  ‘You obviously don’t mind being alone then.’

  ‘No I don’t.’ He paused a moment. ‘Not now, anyway.’

  She nodded as if she understood what he meant. And then with an embarrassed reluctance to meet his gaze she added, ‘I looked you up on the internet I found out your wife died five months ago…but don’t you miss your daughter?’ She stared at him curiously as if the answer was important.

  ‘I will miss her, but not her ghastly boyfriend.’

  ‘Oh! What’s wrong with him?’ she asked, eyebrows raised.

  ‘I don’t like the way he makes his money.’

  She considered him for a moment. ‘Does he approve of the way you made some of yours? Or perhaps he doesn’t know.’

  Steven stared at her in silence, wondering if she had discovered his past as a mercenary after he left the marines.

  ‘So why is your boat called Surprise?’

  ‘Patrick O’Brian is my favourite author,’ he replied, glancing toward the shelf of books where the familiar twenty-one book spines were lined up.

  ‘Never heard of him,’ she said with a dismissive shake of her head.

  ‘Well we won’t make Fort Lauderdale for a few weeks, so you’ll have plenty of time to read him…On second thoughts we could go to Bermuda first. I could leave you there.’

  ‘Ok. Thank you. That would be fine. British territory,’ she added after a moment.

  Steven stared at her. She seemed strangely uninterested in their possible destination, and how long it would take for them to reach it. But he had much more to be curious about. ‘So how come you were floating in a life raft in the Atlantic?’