Borealis(13)
“Briefly. Talk about queer, she was just sittin’ on the cot buck-ass naked.”
“You get a name from her yet?”
“No. And talkin’ to her’s kinda funny. Leaves me feeling…strange, I guess. Like talking into a tornado—words get all jumbled and lost.”
He didn’t have to ask what Mike meant. “How’s the power situation coming?”
“No soap. Still futzing with it.”
“We got ice on the pipes down by the generators.”
“Fuck me blue.”
“Just thought you should know.”
“Yeah, right.” Mike Fenty looked shaken. “Goddamn f*ckarow this is turning out to be.”
Just then, Charlie happened to glimpse arms waving down on the foredeck from the corner of his eye. He turned to see Bryan Falmouth semaphoring to them from the bow, McEwan crouched on one knee before the hatch that led down into the crab tanks. The hatch was open and McEwan was peering in while dragging a hand across his scalp. Joe was bounding up the stairs of the control room, his eyes blazing like high beams in his head.
“Oh, shit,” Charlie uttered. That sinking sensation in his gut suddenly amplified ten times over. He and Mike burst through the control room door and nearly collided with Joe, who was spouting gibberish, talking too fast.
“Jesus Christ, fellas— I mean, it’s— Jesus—”
Charlie brushed past him and took the iron steps two at a time, Mike right behind him on his heels. Looking far from the Dynamo Joe who’d stepped on board the Borealis just over a week ago, Joe Darling did not follow Charlie and Mike down the steps, he merely propped himself up against the iron railing and clung to it with both hands, all the color drained from his face.
McEwan held up a single hand, palm out, as Charlie and Mike approached the open hatch. “It’s bad,” McEwarn warned, his voice hollow.
Charlie stopped at the edge of the hatch and peered down into the tank.
Yesterday’s catch of crabs populated the water—enough of them to compound the confusion of the scene, which required Charlie to do a double take. Then he realized what he was seeing, recognizing the whitish skin and the specifications of the protrusion of a human leg…finally, the undeniable fan of dark hair, undulating in the icy tank water like some undersea vegetation. The reddish, spidery crustaceans heaped on top of what remained of the body, moving with a mechanical, calculated slowness.
He felt his stomach lurch and he turned quickly to the side of the trawler to address the sea below. The vomit came up in a messy, pasty string that burned his esophagus and stank like the bait locker. Eyes squeezed closed, he waited for the nausea to pass before turning back around. Moisture from his eyes froze to his face. He saw Mike Fenty, poised precipitously at the lip of the hatch, not so much staring down as he was staring into a blind abyss. Like talking into a tornado, Charlie thought. The captain’s mind, it seemed, had temporarily shut down.
McEwan stood, albeit shakily. His small eyes appeared even smaller, almost disappearing altogether in the creases and folds of his weathered face. A sick tone to his voice, he mumbled, “How the hell could this have happened?”
“Shut it,” Mike ordered him. He took a step backward and tore his eyes from the opening in the deck. “Shut the f*cking thing already.”
Together, Bryan and McEwan eased the hatch down and bolted it into the planking. They looked mutually disgusted and equally drained.
“It takes two men to open that hatch,” Mike said. He could have been addressing them all or just talking to himself.
“Doesn’t make sense.” It was Bryan, hugging himself through his bright orange slicker. Bits of frost had collected about his eyelashes. “It’s impossible…”
Charlie looked down at his hands. The tips of his fingers were blue. They were shaking something fierce.
7
Bryan put on a pot of coffee while Mike retreated to the control room once again. In his mounting agitation, McEwan grabbed a pack of Camels form his footlocker and tucked himself away at the rear of the boat where the diesel sauna fought to keep the cold at bay. With the sun full in the sky and the waters stretching around the world, looking alluringly calm, they would soon have to reclaim the pots and, in the wake of a unanimous decision, head back to Saint Paul Island.
Charlie crept down the corridor and, without knocking, pushed open Mike’s cabin door.
Fully dressed in the clothes Charlie had given her the night before, the girl stood staring directly at him as if in anticipation of his arrival. A cold finger touched the base of Charlie’s spine. He cleared his throat and was about to speak when she beat him to it—
“Did you find your friend?”
“Sammy’s dead.” He cleared his throat a second time, fearful he might choke on his own words. “I want to ask you something.”
She eased herself down on the cot, folding her small hands in her lap. “Okay.” Again: that helpless, childish voice…
With a grief so powerful it nearly shook him to his knees, her voice caused him to think of Gabriel, his son. Before he knew what was happening, his eyes began welling with tears, blurring his vision.
Like a puppy plagued with unending curiosity, the girl cocked her head to one side and examined him with coal-black eyes.
The feeling passed and Charlie regained his composure, quickly swiping his thumb over both eyelids. “Have you left this room since last night?”