In The Wreckage: A Tale of Two Brothers Read online

  The captain skewered him with a stare. “I see. So you’re along for the treasure, is that it? Fools. But thank you, for being honest, at last. Go.” He waved his hand in dismissal.

  Conall stopped, holding the door handle. “There’s no map? No treasure?”

  “Oh yes,” the captain said, laughter in his voice. “There’s treasure, but buried too deep for you to find. Or the first mate, either, for that matter. Leave me, I’ve work to do.”

  In the companionway he met Heather, Rufus cradled in her arms. She handed him the dog. “Been walking him round the deck,” she said. “He gets bored in the cabin all day.”

  The terrier licked Conall’s face, clawing at his chest and wriggling with delight. “Thanks for looking after him.”

  “How’s your brother?”

  “Don’t know, haven’t seen him. Not allowed.”

  On deck, Jonah yelled Conall’s name. He was late for his watch. He handed the dog back to Heather, ruffling his ears.

  “Don’t worry,” she said, “we’ll be at Svalbard soon. Everything will be better there, you’ll see.”

  ≈≈≈≈

  When The Arkady reached Hammerfest in northern Norway, the captain gave the order to anchor offshore. He’d take no chances with the ship being moored alongside the dock, where it could be stormed by a mob. He assembled the crew on deck and gave guns and knives to those going to the town. Conall was the only one not given any weapon.

  “Captain doesn’t trust you,” Jonah told him. “Not enough to leave you on board. Not enough to give you a gun.” Conall’s long knife had been confiscated the day Faro was arrested. He had nothing but his wits, and the protection of Jonah Argent.

  “It’s a wild town,” the captain told the men as they tied up the row-boats on the dockside. “Take care. Be back here, in two hours, no delays, stay out of trouble. If you’re not here, we sail without you. We’ll wait for no one. Understood? And no drinking, no whoring.”

  The crew had been talking about Hammerfest for days. It was a town of legend, the untamed capital of northern Norway. A small settlement in the old days, as people fled north it had turned into a staging post to the melting arctic, a lawless place, where slavers roamed the streets and alleyways, where crooks, thieves and gangsters preyed on anyone who let their guard down.

  One sailor remained at the dockside to watch over the boats. The captain set off towards the harbour-master’s offices with his men. Jonah told the others to follow him. Their task was to buy fresh food for the cook, then get news of Svalbard, find people who had been there, gauge the talk around the town. And finally, if they could, to take on a new member of crew, a guide who had sailed to Spitsbergen recently, who knew the waters and safe landings.

  Jonah held the list of supplies. He called at the first shops he found, rattling off his orders and haggling over payment. They lugged the boxes and bags down to the boats. Jonah ordered the sailors to make return trips out to The Arkady until everything was stowed on ship.

  “Conall, with me,” he said. “Rest of you, keep working. Once you’re done, you know where to find me.”

  Jonah strode off up the hill, setting a fierce pace even without the help of his cane. Up to his old tricks. Did he never learn? Conall ran after the first mate. “The captain told us to stick together.”

  “The captain didn’t give us enough time for all the tasks he wants finished,” Argent said. “He needs a guide and information, and there’s only one place we’ll find that.” He pointed to an inn perched on high land overlooking the harbour.

  “The captain said…”

  “Don’t keep telling me what the captain said, boy. Are you his parrot?” Jonah kept up his swift pace, never pausing to let Conall catch up or get his breath back.

  The inn, a sprawling wooden building two storeys high, had a balcony out front. Three women sat on chairs, looking over the harbour and catching the eye of everyone who approached. One of them stood and waved towards them. Jonah bowed low with a flourish, winked at Conall and strode through the front door.

  The bar was dark and gloomy after the bright afternoon sunshine outside and Conall’s eyes took time to adjust. He made out a handful of men huddled around tables.

  “Take care now, no loose talk,” Jonah said. He stalked to the bar, shouted for service. A tall, thin man with an eye missing slouched towards them. He said nothing as he fetched Jonah’s drinks, a beer and a glass of spirits, clear stuff in a shot glass that Argent knocked back with a single gulp. The barman put a mug of beer in front of Conall but he didn’t touch it.

  “Know any good sailors, men who’ve been north?” Jonah asked. “We’re taking on crew, if there’s someone with knowledge of the seas.”

  “And where would you be heading?” the thin man said in a thick, foreign accent. His hair was jet black, his skin pale, his mouth set in a permanent sneer.

  “North,” Jonah said.

  The barman shrugged and turned away from them, returning to a table where he’d been playing cards with two other men.

  “Not too friendly,” Conall said.

  “He’s not, but there’s some here who spend more time getting to know a man, if you take my meaning. Stay here, don’t go wandering, or finding any trouble. I’ll be upstairs, see if the ladies have the information we need.” Jonah slugged his beer, crossed to the card table, spoke to the barman briefly, then headed up a set of wooden steps.

  Conall turned to look around the room. Faces lurked in dark corners. No one seemed to be looking his way. All the same, he felt self-conscious, as if people watched him. As if they knew he had no business being here.

  He lingered for five minutes, maybe ten, then left his beer, unwilling to break the captain’s orders, and moved towards the door. As he crossed the bar-room, he felt the hair on his neck prickle as eyes followed him. The muscles in his shoulders tensed. The room was eery quiet, men whispering in corners, but from upstairs came the sound of female shrieks and laughter. Conall stepped through the doorway, saw The Arkady moored across the bay, her white hull catching the late afternoon sunlight. He looked down towards the harbour, hoping to see the crew making their way up the winding path towards the inn. Instead he saw one of the row-boats setting off for the ship.

  What was taking Jonah so long? Two hours the captain said. Would he really sail without them?

  Conall moved away from the doorway, stepping out of the shade into direct sunlight. The weather was cooler this far north. No longer the sweltering heat he was used to in Shetland. There was even a chill in the wind coming from the north east across the arctic sea.

  He heard a noise behind him. Two men emerged, not from the bar-room, but around the side of the inn, on the road twenty yards below him. Between him and the harbour. The look of them, the way they carried themselves, shoulders tensed, arms loose but ready, something warned him. He span around. Two more rushed from the inn and lunged at him. He twisted, turned, struggled to break free. One of them wrapped an arm around Conall’s neck, held him in a head lock. He wriggled, his ears and cheeks scraping on rough wool of the man’s coat. Conall broke free and ran but there was nowhere to go.

  “Come here,” one of the men shouted.

  Conall yelled Jonah’s name. Argent was armed. If these men had no guns, he could deal with them in a moment. He screamed again for Jonah as the men rushed him.

  He fought back, kicking and punching when he could, but there were too many and too strong. Heavy blows landed on his back, his sides, on his skull. He fell, his face splattered with mud, cheek pressed against hard stone. One of the men pinned him down. Another tied his hand behind him. He tried to yell once more but his voice was feeble, little more than a croak.

  “Good for the mines, this one,” a man said.

  “Fetch a fair price.”

  A roar like a charging bear erupted from the inn. He twisted his head around and saw Jonah charge from the doorway. In his right hand he held a pistol. The gun fired, the noise echoing across the bay, and on
e of the attackers grunted, staggered and fell across Conall’s legs, a hole in his chest, blood pouring into the mud.

  The men grappled with Jonah. He got off another shot, but he was soon overwhelmed, the gun snatched from his hands. The big man went on fighting, even as half a dozen of them punched and kicked, hanging onto his arms. Disarmed, his legs knocked from under him, Jonah went down, a gnarled, ancient tree toppling after centuries of grasping for sunlight.

  Kicks and blows rained onto Jonah’s body. Conall tried to call out for help, but it was hopeless. Where were the sailors from The Arkady? He tried to stand, struggling to his knees, hands roped behind his back. One of the men cursed, striding towards him. Conall felt a brush of air, a blow to his skull, and the world went black.

  Chapter Eight

  SLAVERS

  Conall woke in darkness. Pain throbbed in his head, his back and shoulders aching, bruised and tender. He lay on a cold, hard floor, face down, the left side of his face pressed against stone. He shifted his arms, groaned with the effort.

  “Lie still boy. There’s nothing to be done. Rest yourself,” Jonah said.

  Conall looked up, trying to see the first mate. The room was black. He sensed the man, sitting a few yards away. “Where are we?”

  “No telling. A brick building, small room. Door’s bolted. No way out.”

  “What happened? Who were those men?”

  “Slavers.” Jonah’s voice was weary, almost resigned, but bitter. A deep anger simmered underneath. “Always hated slavers.”

  “The captain will be looking, he won’t leave without us.”

  “He’s a good man. He’ll look. But he won’t find us, and he’ll sail soon enough. He’s got a crew to protect. Women and children. Can’t put them in danger for the sake of two missing men.”

  “The sailors. They’ll tell him we were at that bar.”

  “That won’t help us much. He’ll get no truth in that place.”

  “We should never have gone there.” Conall heard the accusing tone in his own voice, the self-pity, and regretted the words the moment they were spoken.

  Jonah grunted. “You should’ve stayed put, where I left you. Learn to do as you’re told, follow orders.”

  “The captain’s orders? Or yours?”

  “If it’s blaming someone you want, then carry on. Won’t do no good though. Won’t get us out of here.”

  “What will?”

  “Waiting. For the right moment.”

  But what if the moment never came? And even if he escaped, how would he find Faro again, and Rufus? Or Heather? He rolled onto his side, sat up. He needed a plan. What would Faro do? If his brother was here, he’d already be scheming, working out ways to get them free. But Faro brother was locked in the brig of The Arkady, sailing north.

  Conall lifted himself off his knees, the palms of his hands pressing into the floor. He stood up straight, legs shaking. Stretching his arms he felt wooden beams and above them corrugated metal, ancient and loose. A way out but noisy. If guards were close by, they’d surely hear.

  “Settle yourself down, there’s no escape, I’ve looked,” Jonah said.

  Conall ached from feet to head. He felt his neck and face, shoulders and arms, assessing damage. Nothing broken, but he couldn’t fight or run. Not like this. And what of Jonah? “Do you have your cane?”

  “Didn’t bring it, left it on the ship. Stupid, we could use a hidden weapon right about now. Didn’t think I’d need it, not carrying a gun.”

  “Would the townsfolk help us? The mayor, the council?”

  “Might, if they knew, hard to say,” Jonah said. “Can’t all be slavers. But are these a few bad men? Or are they in power? Got a lot of people behind them, I’d say, taking us like that in broad daylight, public place. Didn’t see anyone rushing from the inn to help us. And the women upstairs, they’d have seen. Must’ve known, all along.” He cursed under his breath and spat on the floor.

  Conall put his hands in front of his face and walked until he found the wall. He moved along it tracing the outline of the room. Ten foot square, with a metal door in one corner. He listened, his ear pressed against the cold iron. Jonah rustled, sat on the floor on the far side, shuffling his position, grumbling under his breath. Conall urged him to be quiet. “Voices, someone’s coming.”

  Gruff voices, mean and business-like, rumbled on the other side of the door. “They’re here. Do we try?”

  “Bide your time. They’re not fools.”

  A key turned in the lock. Conall stepped to one side, lurking in the darkness. The door swung open and a bright light blinded him. The door was kicked wide. Four men stood there, two holding guns.

  “No trouble or you die here, understand?”

  “Aye, right enough,” Jonah said.

  “Where’s the young one? Forward.”

  Conall hesitated, looked to Jonah for direction, but no word came. The light through the door showed Argent’s face, set hard, proud but defeated, a rage simmering deep down, helpless.

  “Hold your hands in front of you, wrists together, step forward. Now,” one of the slavers said. He spoke English, but with a strong accent.

  Conall looked again to Jonah, his heart racing, ready for action. The first mate refused to look at him, but gave a nod of the head. There would be no last-ditch fight for freedom. They’d walk tamely into slavery.

  Conall stepped into the light and two of the men grasped his arms, pulled him forward, knocked him to his knees. They put a metal collar round his neck, cold and hard against his skin. He struggled to break free. One of the men kicked him in the back, another held a gun against his forehead and told him to keep still. One twitch from death, a bullet would shatter his brains before he heard the sound. There’d be no time for pain or fear. Instant. Slavery would be a long, slow torment, a constant regret for a life lost. But there was hope, and Conall wasn’t ready to give up. He’d stay alive, bide his time, as Jonah said.

  A padlock clicked shut and the metal collar was fixed. The men passed a metal chain through a hoop on the collar, then called Jonah forward. The first mate didn’t try to fight or resist. He knelt beside Conall, face stern, showing little emotion. This was his act of defiance, to show no fear or suffering. To accept his fate, for now.

  The men chained Jonah’s collar so the two of them were joined, then yanked them to their feet.

  “No trouble, it won’t help you none,” one of the men said.

  They stood in a courtyard outside the brick shed that had been their prison. In front of them stood a gateway and a road beyond. “Keep walking. Meet us at the headland,” one of the slavers said.

  One of the men, as big as Jonah, six foot four and broad with it, took hold of the chain. He slung it over his shoulder. “You follow. Keep up.” Behind them, another man cracked a whip. “Or else,” the man snarled.

  The big man hauled on the chain and led them through the gateway to a rough track. Below them Conall saw the houses of Hammerfest. They were on the edge of the town, far from the bar where they’d been seized, out of sight of the port. No way to know if The Arkady was still there. Conall looked to the east, where the sun had risen above distant mountains. Mid-morning, he guessed. He’d been unconscious through the night. A whole day. How long would the captain wait?

  The men told them to walk, heading uphill towards a solitary building, a rough wooden barn beyond the last of the houses. When they reached it the slavers greeted another man slouched on a stone seat, a rifle across his legs.

  “No trouble? Get ‘em linked and moving.”

  Four more men were led out of the barn, metal collars around their necks. They looked in their late twenties, early thirties, fit and strong. Two were badly bruised. They carried a dejected, defeated look, as if there was no fight left in them.

  The men were joined to the back of the chain connecting Conall and Argent, and the procession set off again, now guarded by three men, still heading uphill.

  After an hour of walking they were
told to sit and rest. “Where are they taking us?” Conall whispered the words out of the side of his mouth while their guards stood a way off, smoking pipes.

  “Out of town,” Jonah said. “Put us on a ship without anyone seeing. Then take us somewhere to be sold, or put to work.”

  They marched again, heading higher, until they rounded a shoulder of the hill and saw the sea spread out below, littered with islands. And there, heading north, the distinctive white hull and sails of a three masted barque. The Arkady had sailed without them. “They’re leaving.”

  “They’ve no choice,” Jonah growled. “No way to find us. Best thing for it, get the ship safe.”

  A guard pulled on the chain. “March,” he yelled.

  Conall took a last look at the ship. Faro was on board. Did he even know Conall was missing? Or would he find out when they reached Svalbard, only then discover his younger brother was gone? Rufus was on the ship, too. Heather would care for him. All he had to do was to find Heather. But how?

  The slaver shoved him in the back and Conall walked, trudging uphill, knowing if he ever got free of these men it would take weeks, months to find a way to Svalbard. Months before he’d see any of them again.

  “I know what you’re thinking boy,” Jonah growled. “Forget it all. The past, future, friends, hopes. Survive, nothing else. Survive and wait.”

  The path across the mountain turned to the north-east, dropping towards the fjord. It was a weary walk, the captives weak from beatings and hunger. Conall’s throat was parched with thirst, but to ask for a drink would bring more beatings. He plodded on until the sun had passed noon. Still no food or drink. Only walking.

  They plunged into dark woods, following a track through pine trees that stretched from sea level half way up the hillside. They emerged above a sheltered bay where a thirty foot sailboat lay moored to a wooden jetty. The convoy of chained men headed for the boat, the slavers shouting at them. Two men appeared from the boat, talked to the slavers, then came to inspect their haul of workers. The new men walked up and down the line, pausing in front of Jonah, eyeing him as if they didn’t much like what they saw. They spoke rapidly in a strange language. Conall took it to be Norwegian, but as the men moved away, Jonah whispered, “Russians.”