by John Molloy
“Thank you,” the captain replied.
The mate explained the situation to the other two and they went to the hospital. The body was laid out on a rubber sheet; the smell was overpowering and flesh was decomposing rapidly. Large cockroaches crawled out of the nose and mouth and the chief steward had to put a handkerchief to his face and walk to the door.
“My God, the deterioration since this morning is rapid. It would be impossible to keep the body here for another four days, it would be immoral. I believe the proper thing is burial at sea as soon as possible.”
The mate noted the chief engineer’s opinion. “You know I will have to keep a record of this for the inquest.”
“And you chief?” he asked the steward who had his head out of the door.
“I say the poor girl’s body should be committed to the sea as soon as possible.”
“Thank you sir, I’ll note that.”
The chief engineer touched a hook just under her nose with a pencil. There were more of them stuck around her ears and mouth. “Look at these hooks around her face.”
The flesh was swollen and decomposing and the hooks were imbedded in the rotting flesh.
The mate wrote some notes in his book.
”Christ,” the engineer remarked, “whoever did this is one sick man.”
They left and locked the door. When they returned to the captain Pippa was there and he was instructing her in what she should do for her safety. He told her to lock her door at all times and if she went on the bridge a little later than normal, to call him and he’d see her to her cabin. He said that under no circumstances was she to wander around after dark unless she was accompanied by an officer. He stood up to see her to her cabin and bade her goodnight as she locked her door. He then returned to speak with the officers.
“Now gentlemen, what conclusion have you come to?”
The mate acted as spokesman. “We have all decided having taken into consideration the deteriorating condition of the body that it would be impossible to keep her for another four days. It’s my opinion sir is that the boatswain should be ordered to stitch the body up first thing in the morning and a burial service conducted at noon.”
The two other officers confirmed to the captain that they agreed with the mate’s conclusion.
“That settles it. A noon burial it will be. I’ll have our decision radioed to the authorities. I’m sure they’ll understand.”
“Thank you for your help gentlemen.”
As soon as the boatswain got his orders for to prepare the corpse for burial at sea, word spread round the lower decks that the ship was continuing on to Melbourne. Henry was lying on his bunk when he heard the news shouted along the alleyway. Thank God for that much anyway, now to get a look at the body tonight.
Gary Conrad greeted the news with visible relief.
“Glad we’re not going back there. We’d have some idiot detectives doing some questioning on us. It would take very little for them to arrest someone. They’d have all those whores lined up pointing out the men they went with down the tween decks. Fuck that for a game of soldiers.”
“Yeah, I suppose you’re right, and the wrong man could be taken in on the word of one of the girls. But you think you know who was with the one murdered?”
“I’m saying nothing Henry, and don’t ask me that again. I don’t want to end up over the side with a knife between my ribs. The fellow I’m talking about, and this is all I’m going to say, is a dangerous bastard with a knife. I’m going up for a cup of tea, are you coming? I’ll make a couple of sandwiches too.”
“Right, as soon as I throw on a bit of gear, I’ll follow you on.”
When Conrad was gone, Henry went to his drawer and took out the small flashlight and tested it; the light was weak but it would do. He put it under his mattress, fished out the master key from its hiding place and put it in his pocket. All set, about two in the morning he thought, would have to stay awake until then; couldn’t chance going to sleep.
He joined Conrad in the crew’s pantry. He was pondering if the fear Conrad had of the man he suspected was real or only a cover. Conrad certainly didn’t want to go back for questioning, afraid one of the girls could finger him.
Henry wondered if Sean Sweeney had gone with one of the girls. Perhaps he could have taken one to his cabin, because he’d hardly go below decks like a common crewman, he mused. He’d have to be very discreet in this area of enquiry. He’d also like to know if Tukola was entertained below decks.
Later, Henry played darts with Conrad in the recreation room. Neither of them felt like sleeping. The crewmen came and went but none of them stayed around, nor did they talk to either of them. The air was thick with tension. Tukola and his watch mates sat for a while drinking tea, waiting to go on watch. Henry knew Tukola was first lookout which meant he’d be off duty between two and three. He couldn’t be totally sure, but when he saw Conrad looking at Tukola, he thought he detected a hint of fear in his fellow steward’s eyes.
“I think we should get a bit of sleep,” he said to Henry as he threw the last dart.
“I think so,” said Henry as he glanced at Tukola who stared back at him. They both left for the cabin. They spoke little as they got into their bunks. Henry took up a book, after a few minutes he saw Conrad’s bunk light go out. He looked at his watch; he’d have over two hours to wait so he began reading. It wasn’t long before his cabin mate was snoring. He switched off his own bunk light and listened to the sounds of the ship as he felt the soft breeze drifting through the porthole. His thoughts went racing back to the phone call from Katherine about Shirley not coming home that fateful morning. And now here he was, within no time at all, thrust onto a ship in the middle of the Indian Ocean. His life seemed so unreal; it was like he was acting out some crazy movie script. He thought of Vera and the wonderful time spent with her. He seethed when his thoughts turned to Lord Welland, who most likely would never be brought to justice for his role in the murder of Nilima. He also thought of the young girl in the hospital. His determination was stoked hot to find the maniac who killed her. He lay in a twilight zone of sleep or wakefulness where time was rendered meaningless.
Suddenly shaken from his thoughts, he looked at the luminous dial of his watch; it showed twenty minutes past two. I’ll go now, he thought. Dressing quietly, he slid the flashlight into the pocket and walked out into the alleyway. He heard someone making noise as he passed the pantry. Looking at his watch and calculating the watch keeper’s duties, it must be Tukola in the pantry. He felt a cold shiver run down his spine and hurried down the outside alleyway and across to the hospital door. It was as quiet as a graveyard. He took out the key and inserted it in the lock, but when he tried to turn it the bolt didn’t move. He tried again the same thing happened. He stood there frustrated; what the hell would he do now, he thought. Henry was sure all the locks were the same so why would this one be any different. He took out the key and returned it to his pocket. Then, more in hope than expectation, he tried the door handle. To his great surprise the door swung open. Holy cow, they must have forgotten to lock it, but who would want to go in there anyway, he thought. He closed the door behind him and as a precaution, slipped the lock on. The stench was overpowering as he switched on the flashlight and pulled the sheet down. In the weak beam he was shocked with what he saw. Although the body was partly decomposed, it was obvious that this was the work of the serial killer. He turned out the flashlight and kneeled down pulling his tee-shirt up to his face - the stench was choking him. Then he heard a noise outside and then he could hear the door handle being turned. Jesus, who could that be at this hour? Could they possibly be coming to get her ready for burial? He knew the body would be stitched into a canvas bag prior to burial, but why in the middle of the night? To his amazement, he heard what he took to be chanting coming from outside the door. He couldn’t make out the words of low droning chant, but he was sure it wasn’t English. Who could be so crazy to carry on such mumbo jumbo? Only the person
that killed her was his chilling thought. Then he heard something being scraped down the door. Bloody hell, maybe a knife. There was one porthole and he thought he might get a glimpse out through that, but if the person saw him it could be disastrous for his detection work and personal safety. The chanting stopped and he saw a shadowy figure pass the porthole. He put the sheet back over the body and walked stealthily to the door. He listened for a while; it was deathly quiet so he slipped the catch on the door lock and turned the handle. A slither of light came through and he walked out cautiously, closing the door from behind - he decided not to lock it.
Back in his cabin Gary was snoring soundly, he got quietly back into his bunk and slept the last few hours before the six thirty call.
The breakfast table was silent not a word spoken. The only one to break the silence was the mate when he announced that the girl would be committed to the sea at noon. There was still no sign of the junior radio officer this was the second meal he’d missed. Henry decided he wouldn’t remark on it to the other pantry crew. While having his own breakfast he had to listen to one of the old salts giving a graphic account of how the body should be got ready for burial. His wizened old wrinkled face and the absence of teeth gave him a look of an old crone. He spoke in a Liverpudlian accented monotone. “He’ll start stitching at the bottom after putting some heavy shackles at her feet, then when they get to the top he’ll put the last stitch through her nose.”
“Oh for Christ sake,” said Gary Conrad, half gagging on his tea, “would you shut up, that’s barbaric.”
“I’m telling you, that is the law of the sea and if there is any life left in the body, the last stitch will make it twitch.”
“Fuck this!”
Conrad got up from the breakfast table and stormed out on deck.
Henry turned to the old salt who the crew referred to as ‘Jack Tar’ and told him that he’d said enough.
“Yer modern day sailors couldn’t stomach it. What would you have done during the war eh?”
Henry also got up and left.
He went up to clean the junior radio officer’s cabin. He expected to find him unwell in his bunk. He opened the door and to his utter surprise, Sweeney was down on his knees praying, with a rosary beads in his hand.
“Do you want me to come back later?”
He stood up and blessed himself.
“There has been no service for that poor girl; I thought I’d say a few prayers for the repose of her soul. Are you a catholic?”
“No, I’m Church of England and I agree with you there should be some sort of prayer for her. I’ll mention it to the chief steward when I go below.”
“Thank you. I said it to my senior but he didn’t seem to care. You needn’t do anything with my cabin today thanks.”
“Right, do you mind if I ask are you feeling all right? You didn’t come down for dinner last night or breakfast this morning.”
“I was so upset I didn’t feel like eating. There’s some very bad person on this ship and I’d like to be transferred off when we get to Melbourne. With Marconi you can do that,” he added.
“There’ll be a big investigation when we do get to Australia,” Henry explained, “everyone will be questioned, especially the men who went with the girls while we were at anchor.”
“How will they know the person who killed her?”
“They have ways of questioning; trick questions that make criminals slip up and say things they wouldn’t normally say.”
“But if you tell the truth, that’s what matters isn’t it?”
“Well, I suppose so, but if you went with one of those girls you would be a suspect anyway, especially if someone saw you with one of them.”
“I suppose.”
He turned and put the rosary beads in his pocket.
“I must go on watch now,” he said as he left the cabin.
When he was gone, Henry opened the top drawer and there were some trinkets, small cheap bracelets and a bottle of the mineral water. The items were like the boat girls were selling. This could mean that Sweeney had a girl in his cabin or elsewhere on the ship. At the very least, it proved that he bought stuff from one of them.
Henry asked the chief steward about the burial. He said that at fifteen minutes to noon there would be a small prayer service on deck before her burial. He was about to take coffee for the crew on the bridge and he asked the second steward if he should take a cup for Pippa.
“No, she is having smoko with the junior deck officer’s, would want to mind herself with that randy bunch, but I’m sure the captain will be hovering around, he doesn’t let her out of his sight and rightly so too.”
He went to the bridge and he saw they had the national flag of Ceylon and the British Ensign. The wheelman was being relieved and the third mate told him to bring the two flags to the boatswain. While Henry was on the bridge, the whistle from the engine room rang.
“Yes third?” he heard the third mate saying, “Stop engines at fifteen minutes before noon and wait for the captain’s orders on the bridge here.”
There was a hatch board laid from the gunwale to a trestle on the afterdeck just outside the hospital. On this the body would be laid before being tipped into the sea. Henry was down on the deck fifteen minutes before noon and most of the crew had gathered. The officers stood in a separate bunch away from the crewmen. On the captain’s order, four deck hands went into the hospital and carried out the bagged corpse and laid it on the hatch cover. Two men stood at either side of the body. The ship’s engines stopped and an eerie silence hung over the ship and her assembled crew. She resembled the haunted ‘Flying Dutchman’. The third mate covered the remains with the two flags. The captain led the funeral with the Lord’s Prayer and followed this by reading a passage from the bible. He then said the prayer of the burial at sea and finished with, “I now commit your body to the sea.” It was such a sad and poignant address; the grief was palpable. It was as if everyone held themselves partly responsible in some way by just being part of a ship’s crew where such a thing could happen. Henry glanced at Tukola who seemed to be grieving. Then he looked over to Gary who appeared to be in shock. Sweeney, the junior radio officer was crying. The captain nodded to the two men standing by and they lifted the hatch board and the young girl’s corpse slid into the deep abyss.
Chapter Twenty-Four
Everyone stood and many made the sign of the cross; some said their own private prayer. The captain spoke to a deck apprentice and he walked up to the bridge to give the third mate on watch the order to resume speed and course. The ship’s engines came to life and she swung around leaving a snake like wake before she settled on her south easterly course. The crew dispersed silently, some to their lunch, others sat on hatches, smoking, looking out over the lonely sea. A pair of albatrosses appeared that afternoon and kept the ship company for some days to come; they never landed on the ship, just glided along on the warm updraft, their huge wings barely moving as they effortlessly escorted the ship. That evening at dinner, Jack Tar, the old fireman, was ranting on about how albatrosses were the souls of drowned seamen. “That young girl is haunting this ship now and when you see two of them it’s a bad omen.” One of the able seamen told him to keep his superstition to himself. Tukola was half way through his lunch when he put down his knife and fork he stood up looked at Jack Tar with what looked like fear in his eyes.
“Her soul is gone; she is at the bottom of the sea now, not a bird.”
“Ah,” said the old wizened sailor with spittle dripping over his lower lip onto his chin, “tonight when you’re on lookout, you’ll hear the small birds crying out, the little ‘Mother’s Carey Chickens’ lamenting the death of that young girl, you’ll hear them,” he repeated.
Tukola swore under his breath and promptly left.
“Funny type that,” remarked one deckhand, “very superstitious.”
“How so?” asked Henry.
“Ah well, he told me he believes the spirits of the dead can come
back to haunt you and some evil ones can cause you terrible pain and suffering, even death.”
“Did he tell you how they avoid these evil spirits?”
“They have some primitive rituals they have to perform to stop the evil spirits leaving the body.”
Gary Conrad paused with a spoon of plum duff halfway to his mouth. “Good God, it sounds to me like something out of the stone ages. What country is he from anyway?”
“Not sure, he’s mixed raced. His father could have been from any place around Borneo or New Guinea or some of those countries. Tukola was born in Singapore.”
Henry thought about the person outside the hospital door. Could it have been Tukola performing some of his mumbo jumbo?
The weather was getting less hot as they sailed south. Pippa was out on the boat deck most days. Protected from the sun by an awning the captain had specially rigged to keep her cool. She spent her time painting and sketching. She was trying to finish a watercolor of the ship with a cameo of the captain in the top right corner. When the third mate heard what she was doing, he volunteered a large print of the Rangoon for her to copy. He noticed a beautiful ring hanging from a chain around her neck. She saw him glancing at it. “I see you looking at my necklace. I only wear it when I feel lonely. I don’t know why I put it on today.”
She slipped it over her neck and handed it to him.
“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to pry, it’s just it looks so beautiful.”
He held it in his hand and gazed at the perfection of the beautiful large diamond set with three rich rubies.
“It’s my mother’s engagement ring. Father said the diamond was for fidelity and the three rubies represented me, him and mother. She gave it to me when I was leaving. Mother said she had nothing else of value so she could only give me the ring and her love.”
The third mate looked at her sad damp eyes.
“Pippa, why don’t you wear it on your finger?”
She slid it on her middle finger.