Veracity (31 page)

It would be his last.

23

We woke to a perfect day. There wasn't a cloud in the sky, and the blue of it was vibrant, glaring. The rain of the previous days had washed the air of its dust and haze, so we could see far into the horizon, which seemed to sprawl out around us, becoming more distant, sharper.

When I'd first greeted the crew in the morning, I'd expected to see strange expressions on their faces, maybe even catch them exchanging a few secretive glances out of the corner of my eye, yet surprisingly, everything seemed to be normal. Despite having discussed some of the mysteries surrounding the expedition, and maybe even of the island, they were as willing as myself to pretend that everything was still the same - at least for the moment. The only thing different about them was that they were a little quiet; but so were Mikkel and I; and I think this was owing to everyone's hunger more than anything else. I saw a few people holding their stomachs, and I wouldn't be surprised if every one of us was thinking about food; splashing images of fruit-laden trees taking over our thoughts, or pictures of past community feasts, fish and vegetables sprawling out across wooden tables. In fact, Niels and Aimil were so preoccupied with the thought of food that they dragged the bin of grain up to the deck, hoping to salvage the tiniest bit of it by drying it in the sun before it was ruined. But as soon as they lifted the lid, and everyone caught the wafting smell of how rank it had become, we all knew it had to be dumped overboard.

So it was natural enough that the crew wanted to untie the bottom of the sail and try to catch some fish, and they had asked me first thing in the morning if they could do this, albeit with voices that were a little more polite than usual. And maybe it was because of this politeness that I felt I could postpone it for a while. I was bent on getting to land as fast as possible, and I saw every minute that wasn't spent moving in that direction, as increasing my risk of not making it there at all. So, initially, though with the understanding that we would have to fish at some point, I succeeded in putting it off for a few hours.

As the sun climbed higher, their polite requests decayed into a gentle demand. They were quick to point out, with clear voices, that we also hadn't washed ourselves for days, and they certainly had a point with this; every one of us reeked of sweat, vomit, and Aimil's blood. And when somebody sighted a few fish rising to starboard, there was nothing I could have said or done that would have impelled them to continue. Indeed, I didn't even get the chance to try. Mikkel suddenly jumped into command as if I were invisible, and called for the sail to be untied and reefed, and for people to start getting the fishing tackle ready. I was half frustrated at this, but also half glad - my stomach was stinging just as much as everyone else's.

I was standing at the helm when the decision was made, and noticed that, at once, there was a light, playful mood in the air, excited smiles spreading from face to face, people clapping once, then rubbing their hands together. And, admittedly, there was a lot to be excited about: soon we were going to be clean, but more importantly, full. The only thing we had to do was catch some easy food and cook it. We were happy. It was still a perfect day.

In truth, there was nothing strange or out of the ordinary about anything, and thinking back through all the specifics, I don't remember seeing any peculiar looks or worried sighs, no hesitation; none of us, as far as I know, had the slightest inkling that we were teetering on the edge of tragedy.

I watched a fish breach the surface to port, and slip back into its liquid world with a soundless splash. I thought to myself that it was a good sign that they were on either side of the ship, and that we would probably catch enough fish to feed us all within an hour or two, and then move on. I nodded to myself. I could afford an hour or two. Then I scratched the back of my right leg.

This is the insatiable detail of disaster. Everything that occurred in the minutes that followed were so scorched into my mind that I've retained even the most insignificant information, and, though I couldn't count how many times I've recalled these seconds, I believe that I've always done so without alternating or mutating their trueness.

The air was warm, yet still preserved the crispness of morning. As Mikkel had asked, Aimil and Niels were walking to the stern where they would set up our newly improvised fishing gear. Mikkel had descended to the lower deck to get the head of the fish that we'd kept, and would be in the galley for the next few minutes, cutting it up to use for bait. Onni, as usual, wasn't really doing anything; he was tapping his hips excitedly at the idea of jumping into the water, and was standing near the gunwale, staring down along the side of the ship, watching the water pass by. His right foot, with toenails still dirty with the sand of the island, began tapping in time with his hands.

Meanwhile, I watched from the helm as Solmund, Toivo, and Knut tried to figure out how to release the sail. When the group had attached it to the boom the day before, they were more concerned with its strength than they were with how easily it could be released, and the obvious drawbacks to this were just being discovered. The sun caught Solmund's back as he gripped one of the ugly knots. He shrivelled up his nose and put his face up close to the tangle of rope, probably analyzing how best to begin the process of taking it apart. But there was something in the way that he did this that seemed to bother Knut. He clicked his tongue. "What are you doing?"

Solmund took his face from the knot and squinted at him in his disdainful way. The tone he used matched his expression perfectly. "Gee. I guess I'm trying to figure out how you tied this stupid knot." Then he shook his head, "Wish a bowline wasn't too complicated for you," he muttered, bending over to continue his inspection. I remember that there was something in his posture that suggested he was satisfied with the wit of this remark. But I wasn't; and only rolled my eyes at him. He'd grabbed hold of the ball of rope and was beginning to work at it, apparently thinking that there wouldn't be any reaction or ramification to his snide remark.

But of course there would be, and I was expecting Knut to reach over and give him a quick punch in the arm, as he sometimes did with Solmund, but this wasn't the case. Instead, he looked over his shoulder at Toivo, who was also struggling with one of the knots, and he must have winked at him because he smiled impishly, dropped the rope in his hands, and began walking in a large circle around both of them, closing in on Solmund from behind. I was watching this, thinking that Toivo was going to hold him steady for the quick punch in the arm. I didn't say anything.

As Toivo neared, Knut leaned in toward Solmund, who was completely unaware of what was transpiring around him, and sniffed the air in front of his face, wincing. "Do you know what, Solmund? You stink like shit. Come to think of it, I don't think you've washed yourself
once
since we left." Toivo's posture perked up, suddenly understanding what the wink had signified. "Tell you what, because you need some extra time to soak, why don't you let
us
untie the knots while
you
wait for us..." his voice was taunting and condescending. Toivo suddenly grabbed him from under the shoulders and Knut bent over to seize him from his feet. Solmund was rigid, silent, bewildered. "...In the water!" finished Knut, laughing.

I opened up my mouth to tell them to put him down, but again, didn't. I really doubted they were going to throw him overboard; I thought they were just scaring him, giving him something that was deservedly a little worse than a quick punch in the arm. And even if I had said something, I think they still would've thrown him in. After all, none of us knew.

Onni turned his head to watch as Solmund's tiny body arced over the rail. He stopped tapping.

But there was something disturbing about Solmund's silence; he was gasping, inflexible, petrified. And when his body turned in the air to face the water as a natural course of the throw, he held his knees and palms out at the surface defensively, as if it were solid ground and he were dropping from a hopelessly high tree. No one who had ever jumped into water before in his life would have done that.

I saw the soft shadows of every contracted muscle on his neck as he descended out of sight.

We heard the expected splash, and Toivo and Knut leaned over the rail in hysterics. Onni was watching the circle of foam that Solmund had made pass by him as it ran alongside the ship, and with his look fixed on the tiny bubbles, I could gauge our speed for the first time; and saw that there could be a problem.

"We're moving pretty fast, Joshua," Onni said, still watching the water. Then he looked up at me to see if what he'd said had registered.

I dropped my shoulders in annoyance. Why couldn't they have waited until they were finished to throw him off? What were we supposed to do now? Stop the wind? The only way we had of slowing down the ship was to release the sail, which appeared to be a fairly complicated process. It looked like Solmund was going to be in the water for quite a while, and I thought that this, at most, would turn into a bit of a humiliating experience for him. He would have to swim a good deal to catch up, and the whole time the idiots would be watching him, pointing, laughing. But there was no alarm, no reason to fear for his life - until he surfaced.

Knut, who was still giggling and watching to see where he would come up, was the first to panic. When Solmund finally shot out of the water, we could see that he was well in our wake, and it became painfully obvious in the first second of his being above the surface, with his arms thrashing the air, his head shaking the water from his face, that he had no idea how to swim. Knut's smile disappeared. "Oh shit," he mumbled.

And then there was one slow instant where no one moved. We all just stood there, still as rocks.

Knut was also the first to act. He suddenly spun toward the boom with his hands in front of him and began attacking one of the main knots attaching the sail. And I think the urgency in which he did this is what sparked the rest of us into action as well.

Flustered and unthinking, I left the helm. "Onni! Throw the rope!" I yelled at the top of my lungs as I rounded the corner to grab the ring buoy. The ring buoy had always been perched on the wall, its silky rope that had never touched water, drooping from it in colourful sweeps. It was such a permanent part of the ship that I'd stopped noticing it - or its absence. It wasn't there. Like so many other things that had gone missing from the ship during the storm, the probing fingers of the sea must have found it and snatched it away, claiming it as another one of its ragged treasures.

I turned my back on the empty bracket, swearing, and saw Aimil and Niels standing wide-eyed and eager to help. "Find something that floats and throw it!!" I yelled at them, and turned to look for Onni who should have had the rope by then. "Onni - the rope!"

But he reeled around the corner and held out empty hands. "It's tying the sail." As soon as he said this, everyone muttered a curse and shot another look out at Solmund. He was becoming more desperate. He'd started coughing.

"Fuck!!" Knut screamed. He had been trying as hard as he could to untie the knot, but it hadn't budged. He also stopped for a second to look back at Solmund, who was only getting further away, his fists punching at the sky, the darkness of his mouth swallowing gulps of air whenever he managed to get his head above the water. Knut turned back to the knot and grabbed onto it for another second, "FUCK!!" he screamed at it. Then he let go, paused to think for a moment, ripped off his shirt and pants and broke into a run toward the stern of the ship, diving into the water with a clumsy splash. A few seconds later, after struggling to get his pants over his ankles, Toivo followed. Meanwhile, the rest of us scoured the deck for buoyant objects, Onni running below deck to look there, and the rest of us bumping into each other on the upper deck, searching in the same fruitless places.

Finally, after either hearing all of the commotion or being summoned by Onni, Mikkel ran up the stairs. He sized up the situation quicker than any of us, and ran to the helm to spin the wheel to starboard. We braced ourselves, and those who didn't, tumbled onto the floor as the ship leaned heavily to port. I gripped the rail, shaking my head at my lack of clear thinking. Why hadn't I done exactly what Mikkel was doing? I pounded a fist against the metal so hard it hummed.

The ship circled around, our bodies pivoting to watch as the two boys neared Solmund. His energy was draining; we could hear the distant sounds of his coughing beginning to fade, and his flailing arms, like a bird flying into the blurry distance, were appearing less energetic, random. By the time Knut was close enough to almost touch him, we saw a final arm flounder in the air, exhaustedly trying to grip at an invisible apparatus that might hoist him out of the water and into safety. But his fingers found nothing, and the white of his arm fell to the surface, limp.

Knut reached him right after this, grabbed hold of his clothing, turned, and started pulling him toward us. Toivo met him within a few seconds and both of them gripped Solmund at his armpits, his pale face bobbing out of the water with each heave toward safety.

Mikkel had turned the ship entirely around in a gigantic sweep, and had commanded Aimil and Onni to manipulate the boom so that the sail wouldn't catch any wind. Meanwhile, Niels and I prepared to get Solmund on board, tying some clothes together into a loop to hoist him from his underarms.

No one spoke while we watched them get closer. Because the truth was that Solmund's body already looked lifeless; his mouth was open, his eyes closed.

When they arrived at the ship, both Toivo and Knut were spent, and they clung to the rope ladder, which we used to get out of the water when we were swimming, and caught their breath. Meanwhile, Aimil and I jumped in and began trying to wrestle the loop of clothing over Solmund's arms. It was difficult. His limbs had become flaccid and heavy, and only after Knut and Toivo had recovered enough, and had joined us in the battle, did we manage to lift his arms enough to get the loop over his head and under his armpits.