by Meg Mundell
On the morning of the killing, the deaf boy, Cleary Sullivan, had missed rollcall. He’d shown up with his mother at the tail end of class, pale and glassy-eyed, and plonked down beside his friend. His mum beckoned me into the passageway to break the news.
Horrific thing for any child to see. Especially a sensitive kid with a vivid imagination.
I promised to look out for her son, keep him engaged in lessons, occupy his mind. There was a former priest on board, I began, but his mother interrupted: ‘That fella’s Catholic.’
No surprise that Cate was protective. Cleary had been deaf three years, a legacy of some super-flu that almost killed him. She’d had him on the deaf school wait list (despite, she noted, that also being Catholic), but it was a hopelessly long list. Dublin had ground to a near-halt under the curfews, stream access was patchy, and virtual ed was straining at the seams.
Cate had encouraged his writing and drawing, helped maintain his friendships, spent countless hours practising lip-reading together. They began learning sign language too, she explained, but stopped when they got BIM approval: doesn’t translate overseas, apparently. Instead, they’d coined their own language: a mix of gestures and facial expressions, official and invented signs. With home far behind them, the future a wild guess, and no Deaf community waiting to embrace them, mother and son were obviously close. No certainties ahead, just the hope that Cate’s new salary might buy her child his hearing back.
The boy struck me as a keen observer, so I lent him my binoculars: a bid to distract him, direct his attention outward, beyond the confines of the ship. They’re meant to be waterproof, I wrote in his notebook, but try not to drop them overboard. This raised a smile and a neatly penned: Thanks, Teach!
After relaying the official verdict on the ‘accident’, to lift the mood I set the kids a creative exercise: imagine a perfect world. Design it any way you like. Write about a day in this world, making yourself the main character. Fifteen minutes: go.
Three stories stood out. Lucy, a shy tween, read hers aloud: humankind lived up in the clouds, weightless and free, far above the earth. Gravity had no place in her Utopia: the sky people floated, without effort, wherever they pleased. Homes were mounds of cumulus, beds soft puffs of vapour, and everyone had birds for pets. No rulers, no crime, no wars. People spent their days creating elaborate cloud sculptures, to be illuminated by brilliant sunsets. The room listened intently. No-one asked what happened on cloudless days, or why humanity had abandoned solid ground.
Declan – nine or ten, a monkey-faced Irish kid, cheeky in a harmless way – dreamt up a very different paradise. If Lucy’s genre was magic realism, Declan’s was sci-fi action thriller. In his world Declan had the godlike power to make anyone obey his commands. Happily he was a benign dictator: he acquired a ferocious dinosaur to do his bidding, and they spent their days exploring volcanoes, feasting on cakes and stealing gold from pirates.
Bloodshed featured in just one tale: Troy, bolshy English kid, not yet twelve but built like a solid sixteen. His world was a machine-gun splatterfest, the plot lifted from some mindless digi-game. Written to shock, I supposed, or get attention. Or perhaps simply a bid to mirror the recent violence, respond to a perceived threat – a way to process the gruesome rumours?
~
Overnight the sky cleared to a glorious washed blue, the wind died down to nothing. Passengers surfaced from below to sun themselves, sprawled out on the deck like lizards, all bare flesh and hairy shins, getting under the crew’s feet. One group attempted tai chi, a bid to ward off device withdrawal, their graceful slow-mo ballet lent a drunken air by the occasional big swell.
Sunshine is such an underestimated pick-me-up. But as the rays shot down through the rigging, an angry blush crept across the paler specimens. The smart passengers reapplied sunscreen, sought shade or retreated below. But others seemed content to let their flesh cook. Cancer: king of the bad side-effects. So easy to forget that gorgeous light and warmth has a deadly side.
We soon found ourselves becalmed, the Steadfast languishing on glassy seas. When a breath of wind at last appeared, our progress was slowed again, this time by a massing of strange organisms. For days we laboured through the milky soup of a jellyfish bloom – millions of alien blobs crowding the water like malignant cells, their tentacles strung with debris, dragging at the hull.
It was eerie enough, being slowed by these boneless creatures. But while we languished in their clutches, the sea offered up a far more grisly apparition.
A woman’s scream rang out – loud, urgent. People flocked to the rail, pointing, and like a sheep I followed. Saw it floating there, just below us, close to the hull of the ship: a human body, bloated and monstrous, tangled in with the jellyfish and rubbish, its rotted eyeholes open to the sky. Chunks missing from its torso, the skin mottled greenish black, coming away in sheets. Too late I turned away, the image already imprinted.
Crewmen ordered us back, and Captain Lewis hurried to the rail, straightening his cap, as if he’d been caught napping. He stared down, then faced his officers, his even features sagging slightly, disgust not quite concealed.
‘No,’ I heard him say. ‘Absolutely not. Just photograph it. We need to be making way.’
The crew ordered us below decks until nightfall. Conversation at dinner was stilted, the obvious topics deemed unfit to broach, with people eating and children within earshot. I swallowed several precious doses before sleep came that night.
By morning the wind had picked up and we broke free of the jellied sludge, making up lost time, crossing the warm belt of the equator and heading south towards Cape Horn. Progress, delays, speed, direction – all was out of our hands. Being a passenger, I was learning, is an act of trust.
Big screens in the saloons tracked our progress. Rendered in pixels the ship resembled a bath toy, the Atlantic a harmless puddle – a neat digital taming act, designed to reassure. A wise move: a map that depicted our true predicament, an insignificant twig at the mercy of that vast indifferent ocean, would have had the whole ship gobbling Calmex by the box.
My own med supply waning, I’d exchanged a few strategic words with Kellahan, the ship’s senior doctor. He struck me as a dry sort – polite enough, but not giving much away. My private-school accent did me no favours in that setting: I was just another migrant contractor, indentured labour like the rest, whereas Kellahan, working-class to his Afro-Caribbean boots, enjoyed a far senior rank. Status flipped by circumstance, the old rules reversed. And why not?
That evening, during dinner, a platoon of crewmen searched the men’s dorms unannounced, combing through everything – lockers, clothes, bedding. Ransacking our personal effects.
Hours passed before I realised what was missing. Before I went digging in the lining of my luggage, seeking out those magical packets. A panicked scrabble of disbelief, the truth slowly dawning: my entire supply, gone.
4
CLEARY
The first time they’d tried to question him about the dead sailor, he’d gotten so flustered that his ma had cut the meeting short. But he knew that wouldn’t be the end of it.
Sure enough, a few days later, they sent for him again. From the moment he entered the captain’s rooms he willed himself not to look directly at the man guarding the door, not even a glance. That looming presence: at once he recognised the height, the slight stoop, that blur of hair half-covering his face. Blackbeard.
Captain Lewis had a kind face, but you could see the fright in him. With his ma acting as go-between, Cleary answered question after question, signing to her and scribbling words in his notebook. The captain sitting very straight and proper, the serious men in smart uniforms. And that bearded crewman guarding the door, watching and listening to everything. Writing out his answers, Cleary kept the man on the edge of his vision.
Did you see anyone near the kiosk that night?
No, he wrote.
> He pictured the bearded man standing before the washroom mirror, examining that tell-tale streak of blood across his white cheek. Recalling the boy he’d just passed in the hallway. A boy he would forever recognise.
Breathe in, he told himself. Breathe out. Look at the captain.
Cleary knew the sailor in the kiosk was dead but wasn’t sure how he’d been killed: what kind of wound could make a person’s blood pour out like that. Not until this morning, when he’d seen Declan miming the attack with a group of kids: someone had crept up behind the man and slit his throat.
This news had filled Cleary with fresh horror. This was his secret fear, the one that had haunted him ever since his world had fallen silent: someone sneaking up behind him. An unseen, unheard attacker.
Stumbling down the corridor that night, Blackbeard had had a darkness coming off him, like someone who’d woken from a nightmare to find it was all true. Now Cleary felt that darkness taking on an almost physical force, the man’s stare transmitting an unspoken threat. From the corner of his eye, he sensed the man’s gaze shift from Cleary to his mother. His ma: the killer was staring at his ma. Cleary tried to focus on the captain, his jacket’s shiny brass buttons, the gold embroidery on his cap.
Did you see anything else that night? asked the captain. Anything you want to tell us about?
No, wrote Cleary. He made the letters big, the word impossible to miss.
At last his ma called a halt and took him up top for some fresh air. He stole glances back, checking the man wasn’t following them.
They walked in step, her hand resting on the back of his neck. Ever since that night she’d kept him close, touching his hair or shooting him quick smiles, passing a fork or clean socks before he could think to reach for them. She still let him run off to play with Declan after school, but made him promise to meet her in the saloon before dinner. And she’d set new rules: stick with the other kids, don’t wander off alone, stay clear of the crew’s areas, and no more roaming the ship after dark. Not ever. If he needed to pee – if he needed anything at night – he was to wake her. Understand? Promise me, Cleary. Cross your heart.
Blackbeard: he’d gotten the name from something Declan said. Pirates, his pal had mimed, slashing the air with an imaginary sword. It was pirates killed your man. Pirates in disguise, dressed up like normal sailors.
At night, after the dorm lights went off, Cleary was all in bits. He couldn’t banish the sight: water sloshing in the tanks, light fizzing off the kiosk walls. The man’s body lying in that slick pool of blackish red. The picture kept returning, leaving him weak and queasy, like that sickening swoop in your guts when a big wave snatched the floor from under you.
For comfort, he’d been creeping into his mother’s bed, curling up against her like a puppy until sleep finally washed over him. But from now on, he decided, he’d stay in his own bunk. He was too big to get caught sleeping with his ma.
~
After school the next day Cleary joined a game of hide-and-seek. He’d found the perfect hiding spot, inside one of the orange lifeboats suspended over the gunwale. Too perfect, perhaps – he’d been hunched up in there for ages. The air was cooling, the wind turning sharp, a light rain misting the deck.
He had a knack for tucking himself into small gaps, keeping still for long stretches. His hiding places always offered a clear view of his pursuers. Best to see them coming: less of a shock, that way, when they pounced.
Cleary checked the spyhole. Huddled together, their hair and faces damp with drizzle, the children were tiring now, would soon give up the search.
The lifeboat scooted above the waves, a bird shadowing the mothership. Canvas flapped, revealing an overcast sky, an ashen ceiling pressing down upon the sea. Under a seat he’d found a first-aid kit packed with tourniquets and tape, aspirin and seasickness tablets, coloured sticking plasters and a waterproof first-aid card. Cleary knew the bleeding section off by heart: Elevate the legs. Apply firm pressure to the wound. Use your hands if nothing else is available.
He pocketed a handful of sticking plasters. Stuck discreetly to walls, at eye level for an almost-ten-year-old boy, they might help him navigate the ship’s tangled warren of corridors: green for safe routes, red for risky areas.
Out on deck Cleary could see the children were trailing away, heading below to continue their hunt, or perhaps abandon it. Declan brought up the rear, swinging a length of hose, a weapon for beheading any pirates they encountered. Cleary watched his friend go, half willing him to backtrack and discover him. But the kids vanished through a hatch into the belly of the ship.
A cramp twinged in his leg. The light was fading, the deck almost empty, just the odd sailor going about his work. His ma would be wondering where he was.
From here he couldn’t see the kiosk, the crewman now guarding the door. Declan had pushed him to revisit the scene, inspect the deck for clues or bloody footprints. Not wanting to seem cowardly, Cleary had gone along with it, but was relieved when they’d been shooed away.
Bright red, the blood had been, pooling on the floor so slick and rich and wrong. It had been an omen, that first day back on the dock – that scarlet streak trailing down into the water, like the dying gush of some huge sea creature. Monsters could be lurking below him right now, squirming through the sea-floor muck, hunting for flesh.
He shivered. Was he safe here, dangling like bait above the waves? Maybe not. He abandoned his hiding spot and dropped to the deck, wincing as pins and needles sparked through one leg. Staggering on his bocky limb, he almost collided with a couple rounding the corner, their cigarettes trailing sparks into the wind. He hobbled away, making for the warmth and shelter below decks.
Near the hatch loomed a tall figure, facing the sea, head concealed beneath the hood of a raincoat. The man turned as he approached, and Cleary’s heart jerked like a hooked fish. Eyes fixed on his quarry, Blackbeard tipped his head back and slashed an invisible knife across the white skin of his own throat.
Cleary stumbled for the hatchway, aware of that shadow in his peripheral vision, like a shark seen from the corner of a diver’s mask. He yanked the door open and felt its weight bang home behind him, shutting out the man and the rain and the coming dark.
BILLIE
She was becoming a regular at Limpet’s now, her bar tab paid in song, Robbie playing along on fiddle. Tonight’s set had gone down well, but two drinks away from closing time a ruckus broke out at a nearby table. Billie turned to see a passenger swaying on his feet, hands cupped to his face, blood leaking between his fingers.
‘What the fuck?’ Pure disbelief. An Irish voice, brown eyes full of injury.
A crew member glared back, primed for trouble. The room was hushed.
‘Never say those words at sea,’ said the crewman. ‘If you parasites don’t know that, you don’t belong in here.’
Tabling his drink, Marshall stepped forward: ‘And don’t go whining to brass,’ he warned the bleeding man. ‘Not unless you want more of that.’
The crew swayed as one, all focused on the offender. The injured passenger threw a bewildered glance around the room, then let his friend lead him away.
Robbie exchanged a look with Billie. They were drinking with Juliette and Len, a sailor pal of hers, a wiry man adorned from neck to knuckles with blurred tattoos. Crew outnumbered passengers in here by five to one.
‘What was that about?’ Billie asked.
‘Shush,’ warned Juliette.
Their drinking partner spoke in a low voice. ‘Certain words, it’s bad luck to say them at sea. Only way to put things right is to spill blood. Punch on the nose does the trick.’
Billie kept her voice down too. ‘Certain words?’
Len nodded. ‘Example: a common expression for wishing a person good fortune.’
‘Don’t say it!’ Robbie hissed in her ear.
She waved him away. ‘I�
��m not daft.’ Addressed the sailor: ‘Why not? In case it has the opposite effect?’
‘Correct. And you never refer to someone, let’s say … perishing in a particular way. A wet way, if you catch my drift.’
‘Got you. What else?’
The tattooed sailor took a swallow of beer. ‘There’s a notorious number – everyone knows it. That’s out too. We say “twelve plus one” instead.’ And yes, he confirmed: however lovely the voice, singing the forbidden words was just as bad.
Billie scanned her memory for lyrics: just the other night, in this very room, she’d sung ‘The Daemon Lover’, that old song where the ship sank in the last line. Mentally she scratched it from her repertoire.
Their drinking companion had been at sea all his life, and had the wind-battered squint to prove it. These rituals were second nature for seamen, he said. But on this journey the crew were especially jumpy, alert to omens of all kinds. Good ones were in scant supply.
‘Some say this whole trip’s cursed,’ said Juliette.
An easy rowdiness had reclaimed the room, the tension dissolved, as if the blow had never happened. A burst of laughter, drinks poured down gullets.
‘What about the sickness?’ Robbie asked. ‘Can that be spoken about?’
A rumour was doing the rounds that despite all the elaborate precautions, the vigorous superscreen they’d all endured, disease had somehow followed them aboard. Several passengers were said to be confined below with an unspecified malady. Some people had resumed wearing masks, but there’d been no official announcement, so Billie had dismissed this as the usual germophobe nonsense, a paranoid overreaction to what was likely just an upset stomach.
But now the tattooed seaman told another story: two of those sick passengers were dead. Buried covertly at sea, their loved ones confined below decks for monitoring. Three more ill passengers were locked up in sick bay. No-one but the doctor and his deputy was allowed in that room, and they donned masks and gloves before coming within spitting distance of the door.