We, the Drowned

by Carsten Jensen

  He swung around to look at me.

  "Everyone comes here for money. What other reason is there?"

  "I'm looking for someone."

  He sized me up with his close-set monkey eyes. "Madsen," he said. "You're Laurids Madsen's son."

  "Is it that obvious?"

  "It's easy to work out. Only a son would look for a man like Madsen."

  "What's that supposed to mean?"

  I stepped up to him. I could feel my anger surge. But it was mixed with a fear of what I might discover. And when anger and fear get mixed up, anything can happen.

  Jack Lewis didn't move. He kept staring me in the face. His eyes were inscrutable. I could tell this was a man who'd taught himself to control others with just a look.

  "Listen to me," he said. "You're young. You're looking for your father. I've no idea why and it's not my business. Nor is morality. I'm not interested in good and evil and I judge no one. I'm only interested in whether a man is suited for work on board."

  "And my father wasn't?"

  There was still anger in my voice: a ridiculous feeling of hurt pride on my father's behalf had swept through me. After all, the man passing judgment on him was no more than a criminal.

  "The first time I met your father he seemed like a man who'd lost everything. As a rule, men like that are useful in my line of business. They have no illusions. They're survivors and life has taught them what really matters: money. I ask this out of curiosity, and you don't have to answer—what had he lost?"

  I shook my head. "I don't know."

  "His family? His fortune? Or some quaint notion of honor?"

  "He had my mother. He had three sons and a daughter. He could get all the work he wanted. He was a respected sailor."

  Jack Lewis made a gesture of invitation. "We're standing on a beach. Let's go into town and have a drink."

  When we parted a few hours later I discovered, to my astonishment, that I'd grown to like Jack Lewis. He reminded me of Anthony Fox. In Marstal I would probably have avoided him like the plague, but when you're far from home you learn to appreciate the strangest people. He was a man who considered things. He was direct and he never pretended to be anything he wasn't. He invited me on board the Flying Scud the following day, and I accepted his invitation.

  Neither of us mentioned my father.

  Sunshine filtered through a skylight onto the table in Jack Lewis's low-ceilinged cabin. At the center sat the empty shell of a sea turtle, laden with a strange fruit—the Kanaks called it a pineapple—that I'd never seen before coming to Hawaii. A whale-oil lamp was burning, but it seemed that the real light came from the fruit. It was gold and it glowed like a slice of sun.

  On the bulkhead a spear and shield shared space with two miniature portraits, which I studied closely. One was of a portly gent with sideburns and bushy eyebrows; the other showed a pale, weak-looking woman with a sharp nose, whom I took to be his wife.

  "You're wasting your time," Jack Lewis said. "I've no idea who they are. I found them in a wrecked ship. I thought my cabin could do with a few ornaments. A couple of portraits like that give a man some respectability. Make him look as if he has ancestors and a family history. But I haven't and I don't want any, either. That would be stupid for a man in my position. Take a look at him," he continued. "A big man with a big appetite for life. And then take a good look at her: a sad sack. I bet that pointy nose of hers was always red from crying and whining. He can't have had much fun out of her. I look at them every now and again to remind myself why I'm here. Take the Pacific as your bride, and she'll bring you money and all the fun you could wish for."

  I pointed at the weapons.

  "And those?"

  "A gift from the Pacific. A healthy brawl with cannibals on a remote island that no one ever visits. A fight like that makes you feel alive. Especially afterward, when you're wandering the beach, looking at the enemies you've slain. Those weapons are trophies. They remind me why I'm here."

  He opened a wall cabinet and took out a bottle. It was an unusual shape and held a white liquid that seemed to whirl around like mist or boiling milk. I thought I saw something dark stir inside it. Jack Lewis shook his head and put the bottle back, then selected another one.

  "Scotch?"

  I nodded. We sat down, facing each other.

  "And my father?"

  "He looked at things differently. He didn't share my view of a good time. He didn't want the same as me. But I didn't know what he was after, so we went our separate ways." He raised his glass to me and we drank. "Pity," Jack Lewis said. "He had it in him. He could have done well out here. I liked him."

  He got up and drew the curtain of the bottom berth. He was looking for something and a moment later he straightened up. In his hand he held a small parcel wrapped in a cloth that had once been white but had yellowed with age. He grinned at me.

  "Now that we've got to know each other, there's something I want to show you. Initiate you into the inner sanctum, so to speak."

  He placed the parcel on the table and started to untie the string around the yellow cloth with slow, careful movements, almost as if this were a ceremony he'd invited me to witness. Then he whipped off the cloth with a quick tug.

  Before me lay the most disgusting sight I've ever seen.

  At first I couldn't even have found a name for it, but my eyes were faster than my brain. Even before I'd understood what was on the table in front of me, my stomach started to spasm and my heart felt as if it had stopped. The thing wasn't much bigger than a clenched fist. The filthy, smoky hair, which must once have been white, was gathered in a pigtail at the back.

  I clasped my mouth with my hand and staggered to my feet. Jack Lewis sent me a look of approval, as if my reaction had lived up to his expectations.

  "You've gone pale," he said.

  I grabbed the table for support, then withdrew my hand as if a scorpion had stung me: the revolting thing was still on it. A terrible thought struck me. I had only vague recollections of my father's face. We'd no pictures of him at home, and whenever I tried to recall his features, my imagination seemed to be conjuring something as shifting and unreliable as a cloud in the sky.

  "My father?" I whispered.

  I'd never have expected to see Jack Lewis erupt in laughter. But at this, his hard mask cracked and he guffawed—not a warm or hearty sound, but one as dry and harsh as his appearance. Still, he was laughing.

  "For God's sake," he hiccupped between fits. "Of course it's not your father. What kind of a man d'you take me for?" Then he burst out laughing again. It was only when he'd finally stopped that it dawned on him that I was standing with my fists clenched. My fear had turned into rage.

  "Don't be angry," he said, holding up his palms to calm me. "I'm only trying to contribute to your education."

  He picked up the head from the table.

  "Do you know how to make a shrunken head like this? Clearly you have to start by scalping it. Now the redskins in America take only the scalp and the hair. For this, you have to slice off the whole face, because you can't shrink the skull. Then you dry it over the fire. Not much left by way of a resemblance. A shrunken head's hardly a fine example of portraiture." He held up the head before my face and scrutinized it, turning it about so that I too could fully appreciate the sight.

  "But still, something remains. His old mother would recognize him, don't you think?"

  "It's a white man," I said.

  "Yes, of course it's a white man. Do you think I'd keep the head of a cannibal? No, a white man's head is a great rarity. I had to pay five rifles for it on Malaita. They're all headhunters there. It was a bargain. I handed over the guns and taught the cannibals how to shoot. Then they aimed them at me, so I shot all five of them before they had time to count to three. Which incidentally they wouldn't have been capable of. I was a more experienced shot, of course. But I'd failed to mention they needed to release the safety catch before pulling the trigger. Sadly, I can't put the shrunken head of a white
man on public display. But when I'm alone or in company I trust, I'll take it out and contemplate it." He placed the thing back on the table. I stared at its horribly distorted features. They were still recognizably human, and that was the worst of it. "If I have a religion, then it's him. He can't say a word, but he tells me everything I need to know about life. Look! What are we? A trophy for others? An enemy? Yes, that too—but above all, a commodity. There's nothing that can't be bought or sold. I paid with rifles. If those miserable cannibals had known about money, I'd have paid the right price and we could have avoided all that unfortunate shooting. Which, by the way, I don't regret. That too was a trade. In my favor. Another drink?"

  I wanted to say no, but I needed another one. So we sat there drinking in Captain Jack Lewis's cabin with a shrunken head on the table between us. I glanced at it out of the corner of my eye until slowly I grew used to its presence.

  "Who was he?" I asked.

  "Even if I knew, I wouldn't tell you. Let's just say that I call him Jim and leave it at that. Do you ever look at yourself in the mirror?" Jack Lewis fixed his eye on me.

  We had a small mirror at home, but it was hidden away in one of my mother's drawers and it rarely came out. I'd seen myself reflected in a windowpane more often than I'd stood before a mirror; none of the ships I had sailed kept one in the fo'c'sle.

  "Not often," I replied.

  The question didn't interest me, nor could I grasp where Jack Lewis was going with it.

  "A wise decision. You should never study yourself in a mirror. It tells you nothing but lies. When a man looks at his reflection, he starts getting all sorts of wrong notions about himself. I'm not talking about what a mirror does to a woman. A man doesn't look to find out how handsome he is. A man's vanity isn't in his face; it's found elsewhere. Still, the mirror gives him the idea that he's unique, totally different from everyone else. But it only looks that way. Do you know how we come across to others, in this mirror, here?"

  He pointed to his eyes.

  "Let me show you."

  He grabbed hold of Jim's pigtail with his clawlike hand and dangled him in front of my face. Startled, I jumped up.

  Jack Lewis laughed triumphantly.

  "That's you," he said. "That's how you look to me. And it's me. That's how I look to you. That's how we seem to each other. The first question we ask ourselves when we meet someone is this: what use is he to me? We're all shrunken heads to one another." He sat down again and poured himself another drink. He gave me an encouraging look. "Another one?"

  I shook my head. All I wanted was to get away from this man as quickly as possible. But it wasn't an option. I'd traveled too far to meet him, and without him I'd never find my papa tru. I had yet to ask him where he was, but Jack Lewis beat me to it.

  "I know where your father is," he said. "And I'm offering you a deal. I'll take you to him. But there's a price, of course." He looked at Jim and laughed again. "This is the deal. You don't get something for nothing. I'm bored with having only Kanaks for company, but it's difficult for me to hire crewmen of my own race. You'll be my first mate—which is a promotion, I'd imagine, for a man as young as you. You won't get paid, but you'll get free passage. Now here comes the most important bit." He raised his index finger and stared at me with what seemed like an artificial gravity, though I didn't know him well enough to interpret his expression. "I'm your captain and you'll obey my orders."

  "I obey only my conscience."

  "And what does your conscience bid you do?" he asked mockingly.

  "My conscience doesn't care about the course we take, or wages, or time off. I'm not afraid of hard work. But there are some things it forbids me."

  "We'll see," Jack Lewis said. "It's your choice. Your father or your conscience."

  "Where is he?"

  "I'm not going to tell you. The Pacific's a big place, and he's far away. The trade winds blow as they will, but I promise not to travel there the long way round. So, what shall it be? Yes or no?"

  And I replied, "Yes."

  WE SAILED a fortnight later. The hold was full—but what with, I didn't know. Captain Jack Lewis had deliberately kept me away from the loading.

  "The usual," he replied, in answer to my question.

  I knew it was pointless to ask again: I could see his urge to mock me resurfacing.

  "Remember your conscience. What you don't know won't hurt you."

  Our course was southwesterly, but that told me nothing. Hawaii was in the eastern Pacific, and the course merely confirmed what I already suspected: that my papa tru was somewhere across that vast expanse of water, on one of the thousands of islands.

  I was at the helm and we were being carried along by a light breeze. Jack Lewis was standing next to me. He was a man of his word and he must have been serious when he told me how lonely it was with nothing but Kanaks for company, because now he rarely left my side.

  "You may not be aware of this," he said, "but you're crossing the Pacific for the wrong reason."

  "How do you mean?"

  He could always arouse my curiosity, though I rarely enjoyed his philosophy.

  "If I ask someone like you where he's headed, do you know what you're meant to say if you're a young man with a zest for life? I'm headed for the whole world, you should say. For the oceans and all their islands. A young man goes to sea to escape from his father. But you're looking for him. That's the wrong way around. Is it because of your mother?"

  "It would be better for her if he were dead, and she had a grave to visit. It would do her no good to know that he's still alive."

  "So you're not doing her a favor. Are you sure you're doing yourself one?"

  "I need to know the truth."

  "What do you want from your father?"

  "A man needs a yardstick."

  "A yardstick? Find another one. A ship, your own actions. Let the Pacific be your yardstick. Look at the swell. You'll not find a bigger swell anywhere. It has half the globe for its run-up. You're young. You have the whole world. Don't bother yourself with the past."

  I made no reply. What I wanted from my father was none of Jack Lewis's business, so why was he interfering? Besides, we'd struck a deal, and I wasn't questioning him about our course.

  I thought about my papa tru. Once upon a time I missed him so much that my heart ached every day. Then I grew up and a feeling of bitterness crept in. I never doubted that he was alive—and I assumed he'd gone missing because he wanted to. I had to know why. That was all. What kind of life was he living? What would I say when I met him? I didn't know. I hadn't prepared a speech. I just had to see him. And then what?

  I couldn't answer that either. I only knew that while I was searching for him, he'd changed into a different man. And that was the truth about him. He'd become a stranger. Perhaps that was what I wanted confirmed. I needed to find him so I could say goodbye.

  It was a year since I'd left Hobart Town. I had been back and forth across the Pacific, but I hadn't seen it, because Jack Lewis was right: I'd been traveling with my back to it. But now I saw it for the first time. I saw its long swells, which were the remnants of storms past; I saw the dolphins leap and the sharks' fins cut through the water; I saw huge shoals of tuna churn the water to foam. Only rarely did I see a seagull; land was always far, far away—though I saw the albatross glide past on its massive wings. It didn't need to be near land.

  They said the Pacific was just like any other ocean, only bigger. But I learned that was nonsense. It could be gray and rough like the North Sea, or calm like the South Funen Archipelago, but I never saw the sky as blue or as vast over any other sea, and though the earth isn't flat and has no edge, I discovered that the Pacific was its center.

  On clear nights when I was at the helm on my own and even the constantly philosophizing Jack Lewis had surrendered to the demands of sleep, the stars were the only geography, and I felt like one of them, adrift in the center of the universe.

  The Kanaks sat on the deck, silently watching the co
nstellations, and I knew that as a seafaring tribe who'd once navigated by the most remote suns of the universe, they too felt at home here. Suddenly I understood my papa tru. There comes a time in the life of a sailor when he no longer belongs ashore. It's then that he surrenders to the Pacific, where no land blocks the eye, where sky and ocean mirror each other until above and below have lost their meaning, and the Milky Way looks like the spume of a breaking wave and the globe itself rolls like a boat in the midst of the sinking and heaving surf of that starry sky, and the sun is nothing but a tiny glowing dot of phosphorescence on the night sea.

  I was filled with an impatient longing for the unknown, and there was a ruthlessness to it; perhaps this was what Jack Lewis had meant when he spoke about that need for adventure that makes young people yearn to see the whole world, the oceans and all their islands. Mystery emanated from the Pacific's vast surface. My papa tru must have felt it once. And when a man has felt it, he doesn't return.

  I was reminded of a summer's evening on the beach back home. The wind had died down and the water was completely calm. In the dusk light, sea and sky had taken on a violet tinge and the horizon had melted clean away, leaving the beach as the only fixed point, its white sand marking the farthest edge of the world, beyond which lay endless violet space. When I took my first stroke, I felt as though I was swimming straight into the immensity of the universe above me.

  That night on the Pacific I had the same feeling.

  The Flying Scud smelled of copra from stern to bow. There was nothing strange about that in itself. Dried coconut was the most important commodity in these parts. But given Jack Lewis's reputation, it occurred to me that the copra smell might be masking something else. It wasn't through dealing in copra that Jack Lewis had become notorious—though I couldn't work out what else he might be trading.

  Anthony Fox had used the word slavery, and when I repeated it to Jack Lewis, for once he failed to reply in his usual direct way.