Depths

by Henning Mankell

  He returned to his sheltered spot. A freezing cold sailor emptied a bucket of waste food over the stern. Seagulls were following in the wake of the ship like a watchful rearguard. The deck was deserted again. He continued to contemplate the rocks. It was getting lighter.

  These reefs and rocks are not only animals, he thought. They are also stones that are breaking free from the sea. There is no such thing as freedom without effort. But these stones are also time. Stones rising slowly out of the sea, which never lets go of them.

  He tried to work out where they were. It was eleven hours since they had left Stockholm. He estimated the speed again and adjusted his previous conclusion to nine knots. They must be somewhere in the northern Östergötland archipelago, south of Landsort, north of the Häradskär lighthouse, to the south or east of Fällbådarna.

  He went back to his cabin. Apart from the rating on deck he had not set eyes on a single member of the ship's large crew. Nobody could very well have seen him either, nor his hiding place.

  He closed his cabin door and sat down on his bunk. In half an hour he would take breakfast in the officers' mess. At half past nine he was due to meet the ship's captain in his quarters. Captain Hans Rake would hand over the secret instructions presently locked in the ship's safe.

  CHAPTER 12

  He wondered why he so seldom laughed.

  What was he missing? Why did he so often think he must be fashioned out of faulty clay?

  CHAPTER 13

  He sat on the edge of his bunk and let his eyes wander slowly around the cabin.

  It was three metres square, like a prison cell with a round, brass-framed porthole. On the deck immediately below it was a corridor linking the various sections of the vessel. According to the plans, which he had memorised in minute detail, there were also two watertight, vertical bulkheads to the left of his cabin but two metres lower down in the ship. Above his head was the companionway leading to the starboard midships gun.

  He thought: The cabin is a point. I am in the middle of that point at this very moment. One of these days there will be measuring instruments so precise that it will be possible to establish the exact location of this cabin in terms of latitude and longitude at any given moment. Its position will be capable of being fixed on a map of the world down to a fraction of a second. When that happens there will no longer be a place for gods. Who needs a god when the precise location of every human being can be established, when a person's inner location will coincide exactly with his external location? People making a living out of speculating about superstition and religion will have to find something else to live off. Charlatans and hydrographic engineers stand irrevocably on different sides of the crucial dividing line. Not the date line or the prime meridian line, but the line that separates the measurable from what cannot be measured and hence doesn't exist.

  He gave a start. Something in that thought confused him. But he could not put his finger on what it was.

  He took his shaving mirror from the sponge bag Kristina Tacker had embroidered with his initials and a childishly formed rose.

  Each time he looked at his reflection he took a deep breath. As if he were preparing himself for descending into a chasm. He imagined being confronted by a face he did not recognise in the mirror.

  CHAPTER 14

  He always felt a strong sense of relief to encounter those eyes, his furrowed brow and the scar over his left eye.

  He examined his face and thought about who he was. A man who had made his career in the Swedish Navy, whose ambition was one day to become chiefly responsible for mapping the secret naval channels that were a key part of the Swedish defences.

  Was he anything more?

  A person who constantly measured distances and depths, both in external reality and in the oceans inside him that were as yet uncharted.

  CHAPTER 15

  He stroked his cheeks and replaced the mirror in his sponge bag. He was also a man who had changed his surname. His father had died at the beginning of March 1912. A few weeks before the Olympic Games were due to be opened in the newly built stadium in Stockholm, he applied to the Royal Patents and Registrations Office with a request to change his name. To distance himself from his dead father, he had decided to insert his mother's maiden name between his Christian name and his surname, Svartman. His mother had always tried to protect him from his moody and perpetually irascible father. His father was dead now, but dead people can also be a threat. The protective wall his mother had thrown up would be extended into his name.

  He put away his sponge bag and opened the lid of a wooden box he had placed on the low table with raised edges to stop items falling off in stormy seas. It contained four watches. Three of them showed exactly the same time. They were a check on one another. The hands on the fourth, which he had inherited from his father, were still. In that one, time had stopped.

  He closed the lid again. Three of the watches told him the time, the fourth represented death.

  CHAPTER 16

  Three officers got to their feet and eyed him with interest as he entered the mess. He recognised one of them, the short-sighted first mate who had welcomed him by the gangplank the previous evening. Höckert introduced his two colleagues.

  'May I introduce you to Lieutenant Sundfeldt and Artillery Captain von Sidenbahn?'

  The latter was tall and slim, and smelled strongly of either aftershave or gin.

  'No doubt you are wondering what an artillery captain is doing on board a ship,' he said. 'We are usually more at home and more effective on dry land, but sometimes an artillery captain can be of use on board a warship. Especially when guns have to be broken in and adjusted and there is a shortage of officers.'

  They sat down. A waiter served coffee. Nobody asked any questions. Captain Rake had naturally informed his officers that they would be accompanied on their voyage to the outer edge of the Östergötland archipelago by an officer on a secret mission.

  Sundfeldt and von Sidenbahn left the mess.

  'Have you met the ship's captain yet?' said Höckert.

  He spoke with a pronounced accent, possibly a Småland dialect, or perhaps he came from Halland or Bohuslän.

  'No,' said Tobiasson-Svartman. 'I know Captain Rake only by reputation so far.'

  'Reputations are generally misleading or exaggerated. But there is always a grain of truth in what is said. The truth about Rake is that he's very competent. Possibly a bit on the lazy side, but aren't we all?'

  Höckert stood up, clicked his heels and gave an apology of a salute. Tobiasson-Svartman finished his breakfast alone. He could hear Lieutenant Sundfeldt's angry tones from the deck, but could not make out what had upset him.

  It was broad daylight by now. Captain Rake would be waiting for him, preparing to produce the secret orders from the ship's safe.

  The Svea was heading south. The wind was still squalling and appeared to be veering in different directions. Towards the shore it had started raining again.

  CHAPTER 17

  The meeting between Captain Rake and Lars Tobiasson-Svartman was interrupted by an unexpected incident. They had just shaken hands and sat down in the leather chairs fixed to the floor of Rake's suite when Lieutenant Sundfeldt marched in and announced that one of the crew had fallen ill. He could not judge if the man's state was life-threatening, but he was in a lot of pain.

  'Nobody can simulate such fearful pain,' said Lieutenant Sundfeldt.

  Rake said nothing for a moment, staring at his hands. He was known to be a man who backed his crew to the hilt, and so Tobiasson-Svartman was not surprised when Rake rose to his feet.

  'The unfortunate fact is that our ship's doctor, Hallman, has been given leave to attend his daughter's wedding. I'm afraid we shall have to postpone our meeting.'

  'Of course.'

  Rake was about to leave when he paused and turned.

  'Why not come along as well?' he said. 'Taking a look at a sick crewman is an excellent way of having a look round the ship. Who is he?'r />
  The question was directed at Lieutenant Sundfeldt.

  'Johan Jakob Rudin. Bosun. Permanent crew member.'

  Rake racked his brain.

  'The Rudin who signed on in August, in Kalmar?'

  "That's the one.'

  'What is he suffering from?'

  'Stomach pains.'

  Rake nodded.

  'My bosuns don't complain without good cause.'

  They walked down a narrow corridor then up a companionway and on to the deck. The cold, squally wind made them crouch down. Lieutenant Sundfeldt took the lead, followed by Captain Rake, with Tobiasson-Svartman bringing up the rear.

  Once more he had the feeling he was taking part in a procession.

  'I have been in command of naval ships for nineteen years,' said Rake. He was shouting, to make himself heard above the wind. 'So far I've only lost four crew members,' he went on. 'Two died of a raging fever before we could get them to land, an engineer fell backwards off a companionway and broke his neck. I still believe the man was drunk, although it couldn't be proved. Then I once had a mentally ill petty officer who threw himself overboard just off the Grundkallen lighthouse. There was something shameful behind the catastrophe, debts and forged bonds. I suppose I ought to have seen it coming, but it's generally hard to stop a sailor who has really made up his mind to jump. Of course, we always carry a ship's doctor – but this trip is an exception. It also has to be said that naval doctors are seldom the most competent ones around.'

  Rake paused and was clearly annoyed as he pointed at a bucket standing next to a companionway. Lieutenant Sundfeldt ordered a rating to remove it immediately.

  'I learned a bit about medical diagnosis quite early in my career,' Rake continued. 'And I can pull teeth, of course. There are a few very simple ways of keeping folk alive for a bit longer. I console myself, and possibly also flatter myself, that I have significantly fewer deaths on my ships than any of my colleagues.'

  They went on down various companionways until they came to the very bottom of the ship. Tobiasson-Svartman could feel that they were down by the waterline. The air was oppressive and the smell of oil stifling.

  They continued their way downwards.

  CHAPTER 18

  The bosun was in his hammock. It smelled stuffy, with a stench of sweat and fear.

  It was dark, and Tobiasson-Svartman had difficulty making out details. It was a considerable time before his eyes got used to the transition from light space to darkness.

  Rake took off his gloves and leaned over the hammock. Rudin's face was glistening, his eyes flickering restlessly. He looked like a terrified, cornered animal.

  'Where does it hurt?' Rake said.

  Rudin folded back the blanket to reveal his nightshirt. He pulled it up over his chest. All three men leaned over the hammock. Rudin pointed to a spot to the right of his navel. Moving his hand made him grimace in pain.

  'Has it been hurting for long?' Rake said.

  'Since yesterday evening. We'd just left Stockholm when it started.'

  'Constant or on and off?'

  'On and off at first, but now all the time.'

  'Have you had anything like this before?'

  'I don't know.'

  'Think. Think hard.'

  Rudin lay still, thinking.

  'No,' he said eventually. 'This is something new. I've never felt anything like it before.'

  Rake lay his slender hand on the area Rudin had indicated. He pressed down, gently at first, then harder. Rudin pulled a face and groaned. Rake took his hand away.

  'I think it's appendicitis.'

  He straightened his back.

  'You need an operation. It'll be OK.'

  Rudin eyed his captain gratefully as he pulled the blanket up to his chin again. Despite lying down and being in pain, he saluted.

  They returned to the upper deck. On the way Rake instructed Sundfeldt to tell the wireless operator to contact the Thule, one of the class 1 gunboats the Svea was due to meet east of the Sandsänkan lighthouse.

  "They ought to be heading north, somewhere between Västervik and Häradskär,' Rake said. 'The gunboat must come and meet us as quickly as possible, take Rudin on board and transport him to Bråviken. There's a good hospital in Norrköping. I've no intention of losing one of my best bosuns unnecessarily.'

  Lieutenant Sundfeldt saluted and made off. They returned to the captain's quarters without speaking. Rake offered him a cigarette. Tobiasson-Svartman declined. He had tried to start smoking when he embarked on his naval officer training. He was one of only three on the course who did not smoke. But he never managed it. Inhaling the smoke from a cigarette or cigar made him feel as if he were choking, and he was in danger of panicking.

  Rake lit his cigar with great attention to detail. All the time he was listening to the vibrations in the ship's hull. Tobiasson-Svartman had noticed how older, more experienced sea dogs used to do this. They were always on the bridge in spirit, even when they were in their own quarters smoking a cigar. The vibrations were evidently transformed into images so that your experienced sailor always knew exactly what was what.

  Then they talked about the war.

  CHAPTER 19

  Rake told how the British Fleet had left Scapa Flow as early as 27 July, in great haste and a certain degree of disarray, even though war had not yet been declared. The Admiralty had made it clear they had no intention of allowing the German blue-water fleet the least opportunity to attack British warships trapped in their bases. The periscopes of German submarines had been spotted by the crews of British fishing boats at dawn on 27 July. Trawlers on the way through the Pentland Firth to Dogger Bank further out in the North Sea had sighted at least three submarines.

  Tobiasson-Svartman could see the charts in his mind's eye. He had an almost photographic memory where sea charts were concerned. Scapa Flow, Pentland Firth, the British naval bases in the Orkney Islands: he could even recall the crucial details of depth soundings in the entry channels to the natural harbours.

  'It's possible that the British Fleet is in for a surprise,' Rake said thoughtfully.

  Tobiasson-Svartman waited for more, but nothing more came.

  'What kind of a surprise?' he asked after measuring out an appropriate silence.

  'That the German Navy is much better equipped than the arrogant English imagine.'

  Rake's words carried a clear implication. Sweden was not yet involved in the war. The Swedish Navy was preparing itself for circumstances in which that would no longer be the case. If that did happen, there should be no doubt as to where the sympathy of the Swedish military lay. Even if the government and parliament had declared their country's neutrality.

  The conversation died out.

  Rake put down his cigar on a heavy green porphyry ashtray, stood up, produced a key attached to his watch chain, then knelt down in front of the large black safe screwed to the floor.

  The secret instructions were in a plain, cloth-bound folder, tied with a thick blue-and-yellow silk ribbon. Rake handed over the folder, then returned to his cigar.

  Tobiasson-Svartman opened the folder. Although he knew the general objective of his mission, he was not aware of the more detailed plans that had been drawn up by Naval Headquarters. He sat back comfortably in his chair, balanced the folder on his knee and started reading.