‘Is the ship sinking, Daddy?’ Bylgja put her head on one side as was her habit when she wasn’t wearing her glasses. She was carrying them in her hand in case she wanted to read.
‘No.’ It came out more sharply than Ægir had intended, but the anger in his voice was directed at himself, not her. ‘Good heavens, no. There’s nothing wrong, everything’s going to be fine.’ He was saying the words Lára had wanted to hear.
‘Will we drown if the yacht sinks?’ Evidently he had failed to convince his daughter.
‘She’s not going to sink and even if she did, no one would drown. Do you remember the lifeboats?’ They both nodded doubtfully. ‘Ships carry lifeboats so that no one will drown even if they do go down. But this yacht is unsinkable, so there’s no need to worry.’
‘Then why does it carry lifeboats?’ Arna interjected, without sarcasm. It was an entirely logical question that demanded an answer.
‘Because it’s obligatory, sweetheart. All boats and ships have to carry lifeboats. It’s the law.’
‘How silly.’ Arna ran her finger over the radar screen. Ægir was glad he hadn’t told them what it showed; it was such a stark reminder of their isolation. If they needed help, it appeared there was none to be found nearby.
‘You know what they say, darling: better safe than sorry.’ He noticed that Thráinn was signalling to him. Lára stood a little way off, avoiding his eye. There was a conspicuous bulge at her slender waist. ‘Better safe than sorry.’
‘I swear I didn’t lay a finger on Loftur. Why would I have asked you where he was if I’d just killed him?’ No doubt the question had sounded sensible when Halli formed it in his head but spoken aloud, it was meaningless. Now that it looked as if they were going to come up empty-handed, the young man seemed on the brink of despair. The three of them were down in the engine room, having scoured the other two levels without finding any trace of a stowaway. They had given Halli’s cabin, which adjoined the engine room, a thorough going-over, as well as the small workshop next door. ‘Perhaps the murderer has moved while we’ve been searching.’ Halli was breathing rapidly. ‘I didn’t go anywhere near Loftur. I swear it.’
‘Methinks the laddie doth protest too much.’ The marks of strain were showing on Thráinn’s face and the weariness in his voice was audible. He lowered himself onto a wooden crate by the wall and leant backwards until his head encountered the steel bulkhead with a low thud. ‘I’m going to let you two search in here. Call me if you find anyone. I’ll sit tight.’
Halli turned to Ægir, having clearly given up all hope of persuading the captain of his innocence. ‘You believe me, don’t you?’
‘I don’t know who to believe. I’m working on the assumption that you’re both equally dangerous. It’s the safest option.’ Ægir ran his eyes over the engines that stood in the middle of the room. He was fairly sure that in addition to the ship’s engine there were two generators, one probably for backup, and some pumps. ‘Where shall we begin?’ He took a couple of steps away from Halli, who had come unnervingly close. ‘This is your domain so you must know it inside out. It’s not as if there are many hiding places here.’ He glimpsed a door at the back of the room, behind one of the generators. ‘What’s that?’
‘The door to the storeroom. Might as well start there.’ Halli now sounded subdued, as if he had given up trying to win Ægir round and would simply accept whatever happened. The effect of this was unexpected; for the first time Ægir was inclined to believe that Halli might actually be innocent. Which meant what? That Thráinn was the one to watch? They walked towards the storeroom, staying ludicrously far apart, as if each expected any minute to be stabbed by the other. Abruptly, Halli halted, and Ægir almost cannoned into him. ‘I can smell perfume.’
Ægir sniffed and became aware of the familiar heavy, sweet odour that had filled the air outside their cabin on the first evening. Perhaps the fragrance emanated from the yacht’s air conditioning system, though it was highly unlikely that they would use air freshener in the engine room. Perhaps the bottle Lára had been hunting for had found its way down here and smashed. It wouldn’t be the first time on this trip that something peculiar like that had happened. ‘Where’s it coming from?’ He sniffed hard, noticing as he did so that his sense of smell was becoming numbed to the scent. It was still present but there was no way of guessing its origin.
Halli turned in a circle, trying to work out the source. ‘For fuck’s sake. I definitely smelt it.’
‘Perhaps the mystery passenger is a woman,’ called Thráinn, who had been eavesdropping on their conversation from where he was sitting. It was hard to tell if he was joking or serious. Neither of them replied.
The storeroom was larger than Ægir had expected. Inside were stacks of toilet paper, cleaning products and linen folded on shelves. Against one wall stood a wine cooler and a chest freezer, and he shivered at the thought of lifting the lid. Halli, on the other hand, went straight to work, reaching behind the shelves to bang on the walls in case there was a hidden compartment behind them. Ægir aimlessly pushed aside some cardboard boxes; they were far too small to hide a person, but he felt he should be doing something. ‘No one here.’ Then he braced himself and opened the freezer. He was met not by a blast of cold air but by a disgusting stench that mingled nauseatingly with the perfume that seemed to be growing stronger again. Holding his nose, Ægir peered inside. It was crammed with vacuum-packed meat and vegetables that would never be eaten now. ‘Shut the lid on that bloody thing.’ Halli held his elbow over his nose. ‘We turned off the electricity supply to that bugger to save energy. Close it before I throw up.’
Ægir dropped the lid, then stepped out of the storeroom and walked over to Thráinn. ‘What now? We’ve been over every inch of the yacht. There’s no one here.’
‘We haven’t been down to the bottom deck where the tanks are yet.’ Thráinn was so red-eyed with exhaustion that he looked like a vampire. ‘We should probably take a look down there. Otherwise there’s little to show for our efforts.’
‘Let’s get on with it then.’ Ægir may not have been awake as long as Thráinn but he was shattered too. It ground one down having to be constantly on the alert. ‘I want to get back to Lára and the girls.’
‘They’re fine. The person they’ve got to fear is almost certainly down here with us. One of us, more to the point.’ Thráinn closed his eyes briefly, then slapped his thighs and stood up. ‘Best get this bullshit over with.’
Ægir turned to call Halli but was stopped in his tracks by an extraordinarily loud, penetrating crack that reverberated around the room. ‘What the hell was that?’ When he turned, he saw that Thráinn had set off at a run towards the exit. Without looking back, the captain shouted: ‘A shot. Presumably from the bridge.’
The sickly sweet smell of perfume intensified until Ægir thought it would suffocate him. He raced after Thráinn as if the devil were at his heels.
Chapter 24
Photocopies of the ship’s log lay strewn over Thóra’s desk. They had arrived in a muddle from the police, which meant she had to try and work out the chronology from the context. Although the entries were dated, it complicated matters when a day extended over more than one page. Nor did the missing leaves help, since they were probably the very ones that had contained the most significant information. It seemed odd that whoever was responsible for tearing them out hadn’t simply tossed the whole book overboard.