other for a few seconds, neither one moving on their own but the ship moving them with its slow roll against the sea.
Olaf reached into a pocket of his trousers and retrieved something wrapped in a piece of old Norwegian newspaper.
“Give you this ,” Olaf grunted, and he held it out.
Michael put aside the paintbrush and took it. When he opened the piece of newsprint, he saw it contained an oatmeal-and-raisin cookie still warm from a platter in the mess hall. Like rust, the cooks never slept. “Thank you,” Michael said.
“No sailor,” Olaf told him. “ Yet . But maybe you fighter. Eh?”
Michael didn’t know how he should respond. He simply nodded.
“Olaf likes fighter,” said Olaf. Then he turned away. His thick bulk shambled away from the hard sunlight into the shadow beneath a blue awning roped against the superstructure. Michael heard a door open and close.
He returned to his painting, ate the cookie, and in a few minutes heard the sound of Marielle Wesshauser coming back. Her pace had slowed. It appeared the left shoe was heavier than before, and it dragged at her leg like an anchor. She made her way around a lifeboat, negotiated passage between two ventilation funnels, may or may not have glanced quickly at him as she clumped past, avoided the gaze of a couple more ordinary seamen doing the same work as Michael, and then she went through the exact door by which she’d left the interior of the ship. She was going back to her cabin, the one she shared with her twelve-year-old brother Emil. Her father and mother were in the cabin across the hallway. There were two more passenger cabins on the hall. Michael knew that a V. Vivian had paid for them, but V. Vivian had not shown up for the voyage and so those cabins remained empty. Michael knew that Paul and Annaleisa Wesshauser had made arrangements for their food to be delivered to their cabins. Their names on the Sofia ’s passenger list, a very short document, were Klaus and Lili Hendriks.
Michael finished his job. But there was always another one to do, and the advice he’d been given by the ex-master of the freighter John Willis Scott was to always find it and apply himself before he could be spotted dawdling and be assigned to something far worse. Therefore he went directly to another funnel and started the process of scraping away streamers of orange rust.
He knew his real job aboard this freighter. It was to carefully watch the crew, to listen to their conversations and gauge their movements, to fit in if at all possible, but to be very vigilant. To be as observant as a wolf on the hunt, so to speak. Much depended on it. Maybe many thousands of lives, as well.
Certainly four lives.
He thought he had things well under control so far. It would be a long voyage. They’d travelled about four hundred nautical miles already, but there were eight hundred and sixty-odd more yet to go. From Danzig to Dover, it was a journey of roughly ten to twelve days to two weeks, depending on the weather.
Michael suddenly had the desire to stand up from his kneeling position and gaze back across the sea they’d just crossed. It was untroubled but for the white foam of the freighter’s wake.
He recalled Colonel Vivian telling him that sometimes loose ends could come flying apart with remarkable and dangerous consequences. He recalled the colonel telling him to always be prepared for the unexpected.
Good advice, he thought.
“Hey, you! Get to work there!” It was the Spanish second mate, throwing his weight around. His voice was loud enough so that everyone could hear how a real man gave orders. Without comment or a change of expression, the lycanthrope from Russia knelt down and continued his labor.
Four
Vulcan At His Forge
Sofia entered the North Sea on the fifth night, having stopped at Copenhagen to take on another load of machine parts in crates and a couple of hundred hardwood logs.
Michael lay on his bunk in the semi-dark of the crew’s
Olaf reached into a pocket of his trousers and retrieved something wrapped in a piece of old Norwegian newspaper.
“Give you this ,” Olaf grunted, and he held it out.
Michael put aside the paintbrush and took it. When he opened the piece of newsprint, he saw it contained an oatmeal-and-raisin cookie still warm from a platter in the mess hall. Like rust, the cooks never slept. “Thank you,” Michael said.
“No sailor,” Olaf told him. “ Yet . But maybe you fighter. Eh?”
Michael didn’t know how he should respond. He simply nodded.
“Olaf likes fighter,” said Olaf. Then he turned away. His thick bulk shambled away from the hard sunlight into the shadow beneath a blue awning roped against the superstructure. Michael heard a door open and close.
He returned to his painting, ate the cookie, and in a few minutes heard the sound of Marielle Wesshauser coming back. Her pace had slowed. It appeared the left shoe was heavier than before, and it dragged at her leg like an anchor. She made her way around a lifeboat, negotiated passage between two ventilation funnels, may or may not have glanced quickly at him as she clumped past, avoided the gaze of a couple more ordinary seamen doing the same work as Michael, and then she went through the exact door by which she’d left the interior of the ship. She was going back to her cabin, the one she shared with her twelve-year-old brother Emil. Her father and mother were in the cabin across the hallway. There were two more passenger cabins on the hall. Michael knew that a V. Vivian had paid for them, but V. Vivian had not shown up for the voyage and so those cabins remained empty. Michael knew that Paul and Annaleisa Wesshauser had made arrangements for their food to be delivered to their cabins. Their names on the Sofia ’s passenger list, a very short document, were Klaus and Lili Hendriks.
Michael finished his job. But there was always another one to do, and the advice he’d been given by the ex-master of the freighter John Willis Scott was to always find it and apply himself before he could be spotted dawdling and be assigned to something far worse. Therefore he went directly to another funnel and started the process of scraping away streamers of orange rust.
He knew his real job aboard this freighter. It was to carefully watch the crew, to listen to their conversations and gauge their movements, to fit in if at all possible, but to be very vigilant. To be as observant as a wolf on the hunt, so to speak. Much depended on it. Maybe many thousands of lives, as well.
Certainly four lives.
He thought he had things well under control so far. It would be a long voyage. They’d travelled about four hundred nautical miles already, but there were eight hundred and sixty-odd more yet to go. From Danzig to Dover, it was a journey of roughly ten to twelve days to two weeks, depending on the weather.
Michael suddenly had the desire to stand up from his kneeling position and gaze back across the sea they’d just crossed. It was untroubled but for the white foam of the freighter’s wake.
He recalled Colonel Vivian telling him that sometimes loose ends could come flying apart with remarkable and dangerous consequences. He recalled the colonel telling him to always be prepared for the unexpected.
Good advice, he thought.
“Hey, you! Get to work there!” It was the Spanish second mate, throwing his weight around. His voice was loud enough so that everyone could hear how a real man gave orders. Without comment or a change of expression, the lycanthrope from Russia knelt down and continued his labor.
Four
Vulcan At His Forge
Sofia entered the North Sea on the fifth night, having stopped at Copenhagen to take on another load of machine parts in crates and a couple of hundred hardwood logs.
Michael lay on his bunk in the semi-dark of the crew’s
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