The Q Series

by Trevor Hoyle

Genres: Fantasy; Science Fiction

Synopsis

The Q Series includes Seeking the Mythical Future, Through the Eye of Time and The Gods Look Down. An acclaimed scientist is chosen to travel through alternate futures to find safe haven - and instead, finds a totalitarian world of dictators and concentration camps . . . Christian Queghan is a Myth Technologist, a highly respected scientist on Earth IVN. Like so many other worlds colonised generations ago, the planet was created to be as much like Old Earth as possible - even though Old Earth itself is now pretty much a myth, the stuff of legend. But Earth IVN has its problems too. Now a machine has been developed to project a researcher into one of the infinite number of possible futures of Earth IVN, and Christian Queghan is the ideal subject. He can't resist the idea of going where no man has gone before, but there are an infinite number of possible futures, and no guarantee of a safe return. On a parallel world, a strange, translucent figure is found floating in the blood-red ocean on a craft of scorched metal. Could the alien's claim to come from the future be true? Or is this totalitarian world of dictators and concentration camps a dream projection from another dimension? The Q Series is an epic science fiction adventure through parallel worlds.

Release date: June 14, 2018

Publisher: Jo Fletcher Books

Print pages: 562

Sample

1The Red Ocean

The vessel cleaved through the red ocean, the purple foam churning and frothing in its wake. It was a three-masted barque, square-rigged on the fore- and main-mast, schooner-rigged on the mizzen, with yellow, vinyl sails, its prow a whorled piece of timber painted white in the shape of a unicorn’s horn: the Slave Trader, seventeen days out of London Toun bound for New Amerika in this, the ninth year of the reign of Our Most Gracious King Jimmy K.

For three days the Easterlies had tautened the sails and swept the vessel along at a fine pace, but now, approaching the doldrums, the wind was slackening and within hours would have died to a whisper, barely moving the heavy ship at a rate of two or three knots. A thin haze obscured the yellow orb of the sun, encapsulating the heat so that the breeze along the decks was as warm and fetid as human breath.

Captain Kristiensen stood impassively on the bridge, a tall barrel-chested man with a full black beard who had sailed the oceans since boyhood and knew the tempers and tantrums of the sea, its sly temperament and cunning, and knew also the deeply superstitious nature of the men who sailed it. They were not educated, could neither read nor write, and sought omens and presentiments in the natural phenomena of clouds and waves, birds and sea creatures. Only the day before, a black albatross had circled the main-mast – as the embodiment of an evil spirit might hover round a crucifix – and the crew had watched fearfully in case the bird should decide to land. They could have fired the cannon to scare it away, but that would have prevented the ‘spirit’ from making a free choice; in effect it would have been cheating on destiny. Instead they had watched silently, and waited with upturned eyes, as the long sweeping arcs of the bird’s flight brought it first nearer to the ship and then away from it, approaching and departing, testing their nerves with the perfect symmetry of its swooping glides. Then at last it had flown off: an ominous black hieroglyph heading directly towards a point on the horizon which would eventually be dissected by the descending parabola of the huge yellow sun.

One member of the crew, a Summarian – small, slant-eyed, olive-skinned – said that the black albatross had returned to its master to report their position, course and speed; it was a warning, he said, which they ignored at their peril.

Kristiensen knew of the rumours circulating on board ship but chose to do nothing about them. They were an outlet for the latent fears of the crew, the outward show of collective paranoia which was harmless, providing it didn’t erupt into open mutiny. As he said to the First Mate, Mr Standish: ‘It almost seems as if the voyage is timed to a nicety, as if the length of it was predetermined in some way. On every trip the sickness reaches the point where it can no longer be contained, when the crew are lethargic and unwilling to work, yet in a very dangerous mood; and then, as always, we sight land.’

The First Mate stepped back from the binnacle, having checked the compass in its brass mounting. He was a young man, this was only his second voyage, and he had great respect and admiration for the Captain. ‘There have been mutinies in the past,’ he pointed out. ‘I read of them in the Nautical Record.’

‘That is so,’ the Captain agreed, ‘but they were usually the fault of the captain, not the crew. An inexperienced man can easily be misled into believing that harsh, repressive measures need to be taken – when in fact quite the reverse applies. These are simple men. They understand clear and direct decisions, but at the same time they are likely to interpret them wrongly, to suppose that a captain dealing harshly with them is doing so through fear and because he has something to hide; therefore a lack of action, indifference almost, can be the correct and sensible approach.’

The young Mr Standish nodded slowly. He could see the wisdom of this, though he also wondered why the Captain thought it necessary – not believing in omens, spirits and demons – to pray each night in his cabin. To whom or what was he praying? And from what horrors of the unknown was he seeking deliverance? Could it be that the black albatross really was a sign of imminent disaster, one they would do well to heed? He felt a vague unease, and despite the enveloping prickly heat the back of his neck was cold and clammy.

*

On the third day of entering the doldrums they sighted the sea monster. It rose from the red ocean at a distance of approximately three hundred metres: a green scaly neck and massive head with large yellow eyes fixed in a glassy reptilian stare. The crew cowered behind the gunwales, shocked into fearful silence, fingering their holy beads and miming with numbed lips. There was little the Captain could do, for the vessel was practically becalmed on the ponderous swell, the sails hanging wrinkled and flaccid from the sweating booms. Over the entire ocean, from horizon to horizon, there was hardly sufficient movement of air to cause a ripple. He could have ordered the crew to fire on the creature, but the distance was too great, and, instead of frightening it away, might have had the effect of provoking it to attack. If it came any nearer they would have no alternative but to release a broadside yet, knowing the poor accuracy of the fire-weapons (antiquated pieces with primitive sighting devices) and the appalling marksmanship of the gunners, Captain Kristiensen knew very well that the chances of a direct hit were abysmally low.

The First Mate had trained the deck-mounted telescope on the monster and was watching it with a dreadful thrilling fear. It was his first; he had seen sketches and lithographs, heard innumerable eye-witness accounts, but this was his first personal sighting and he was caught between the conflicting emotions of nervous exhilaration and cold abject terror. His throat worked in order to produce saliva for his dry lips.

The creature rode easily on the swell, its yellow saucer-eyes observing the barque with a flat unmoving stare, but making no attempt to approach it. The snake-like neck extended several metres into the air, enlarging to the head and grooved snout below which three concentric rows of backward-facing teeth glinted in the hazy sunlight. The bony diamond-shaped protuberances on its back – hence the name ‘Diamond Back’ used by the sailors – were plainly visible, appearing as a long line of blunt spikes resting on the surface of the water.

‘What do you estimate its length to be?’ Mr Standish asked; his excitement and fear were evident in his voice but even so he couldn’t bring himself to look away from the eyepiece of the telescope.

‘It’s a fully-grown plesiosaur,’ the Captain answered. ‘They can be anything up to eighteen metres and have been known to reach twenty in the southern hemisphere. It’s the first you’ve seen?’

‘Yes,’ Mr Standish said, mesmerized. He hardly dared breathe. ‘Will it attack?’

‘If it does we shall part company, you and I.’ The Captain tightened his hands into fists and added: ‘For a little while.’ The young man was sufficiently intrigued to glance up. He frowned and said, ‘For a little while? How is that?’

‘We shall part company when the monster attacks and meet up again – very soon, I assure you – in its stomach sac. You see the mouth—’ He raised his solid arm and pointed a finger which betrayed no emotion. ‘The mouth is hinged so that the lower jaw drops down and acts as a scoop over the surface of the water. It can take three men at a time and can mover faster than a sloop under full sail. There have never been any survivors of an attack by a sea monster. Ships have vanished, wreckage has been found, but never any seamen, living or dead. Not even their remains.’

‘So if it attacks our chances are—’

‘We have no chances,’ Kristiensen replied bluntly. ‘What I have told you is not opinion or hearsay, but fact.’

‘We can telegraph for help,’ Mr Standish said quickly. There was a mist of cold perspiration on his forehead. He was becoming feverish.

‘We can do that easily enough,’ the Captain conceded. ‘We can send a message to any vessel within a radius of sixty leagues. How long do you suppose it would take a ship – if there is one to receive our message – to reach us? And when it arrives, if it arrives, what could it do? Do you think that if we received a call for help from a vessel being attacked by a sea monster we would rush to its aid? The sensible thing would be to set course in the opposite direction.’

‘But our cannon,’ Mr Standish said. ‘Surely we have the firepower to kill it, or at least deter it?’ There were flecks of foam on his lips now. His eyes were wide but the pupils had contracted to black dots.

‘If the creature comes obligingly near and stays in one place long enough then we might just possibly, given God’s own luck, score a hit. But Diamond-Backed plesiosaurs are as agile as eels: it could dive, swim under the ship, come up the other side and attack to port while we’re still attempting to sight our cannon to starboard.’ The Captain smiled grimly. ‘Still not convinced?’

The young man turned nervously to gaze out to sea and as he did so the monster dipped its head, the long sinewy neck curving downwards with supple dexterity; the lower jaw came unhinged and the horizontal, almost rectangular mouth slot began scooping the sea in long gliding strokes. It was fascinating in its patient deliberation.

‘My God, it’s horrible!’ Mr Standish said. He was ashen. ‘Does it know we’re at its mercy? Does it have a brain capable of any real intelligence?’

Captain Kristiensen crossed his arms, gripping his biceps with strong fingers. He gave the appearance of placidity, almost of unconcern, but a diligent observer would have noticed the faint white marks around his mouth and nostrils: lines of inner strain and fierce self-control. He said: ‘Nothing is known of the creature’s physiology, we’ve never even discovered a skeleton washed ashore. The seamen believe that the creature has two brains, one in its skull and the other in the base of its tail. But it’s unlikely that we shall ever get close enough to learn the truth – close enough for that alone, anyway.’

The Second Mate came up the steps to the bridge and saluted. ‘I’ve primed the cannon, sir, and picked five men who can be trusted not to lose their heads if the monster attacks. The rest are a pack of gibbering idiots. They’re cowardly scum and I’ve told ’em that to their faces.’ He jerked a calloused thumb over his shoulder to indicate the men crouching below on the main deck. Mr Swann had risen over fifteen years from ordinary seaman to Second Mate. He had seen monsters before and lived to tell the tale, and though he knew the ship to be virtually helpless should the creature decide to attack he had absolute faith in Captain Kristiensen’s qualities of leadership – besides which he believed in his own sense of destiny; he wasn’t ready to die yet: the surge of life in his veins was too quick and strong. He glanced from the Captain to the First Mate, and it confirmed what his nostrils could detect: the rancid smell of fear.

‘Very good, Mr Swann. We can do no more. Have you checked the line for drift?’

‘Not a movement, sir, the cork’s dead. We could be on a millpond. The barometer is steady, no change.’ He stepped to the rail and spat into the sea; the spittle plopped into the murky red water and remained motionless. The vessel was fixed to the ocean as a fly stuck in treacle.

‘What do you reckon, Mr Swann, to sending a telegraph message?’ asked the Captain.

The Second Mate forced a cynical grin. ‘And scare off any ship within fifty leagues? Aye, damn true, I know where I’d be if a message came through that somebody had sighted a Diamond Back. I’d be gone.’ And he pointed away towards the empty horizon, an almost imperceptible demarcation between sea and sky which was lost in the sluggish haze.

Mr Standish said, ‘Is it eating or drinking, or what? Why doesn’t it do something? It’s almost as if there’s something … mekanikal about its movements – so slow and deliberate.’ He looked at the others, taking a handkerchief from his sleeve and wiping his face and neck. He couldn’t believe that this was actually happening; it had about it the eerie strangeness of a nightmare. Was he really on this deck, here and now, and not dreaming in his deep and comfortable bed in London Toun, wrapped in the arms of a girl? He would wake up in a minute. He pinched himself to wake himself up but nothing happened, nothing had changed, he was still here. The plesiosaur basked seemingly unperturbed some distance from the ship. The sky, the sun, the mist still had their yellow tinge, the ocean its reddish hue. Captain Kristiensen stood with his feet firmly braced on the deck, the Second Mate leaning on the rail, the crew on their knees murmuring prayers and imprecations. Mysterious forces were at work, hidden powers of the unknown, and the First Mate felt intimidated by his ignorance of the natural elements.

Mr Swann turned from the rail and said tersely, ‘It’s moving.’

It was true. The plesiosaur had slid down into the water so that only its long snaking neck was visible, and had begun to move astern of them, a gentle vee of ripples marking its progress. The neck glided through the water with perfect smoothness, the creature moving away on a dead straight course, without deviation, and within minutes was a speck in the haze almost too faint to be seen.

‘Have we seen the last of it?’ Mr Standish asked in a voice he didn’t recognize as his own. He felt slightly braver. He had seen his first sea monster and was alive to tell of it. What a story it would make!

Kristiensen unfolded his bulky arms, and the places where his hands had been were damp. ‘Unless one or both of its brains decides otherwise,’ he said shortly. ‘Mr Swann.’

‘Captain?’

‘Break open a cask of black biddy for the crew. They’ll need something to wash the fear out of their throats.’ He said to the First Mate: ‘I expect you could take a strong drink yourself, Mr Standish. We’ll retire to my quarters. Mr Swann, when you’ve issued the ration, post a double-look-out and join us there. It isn’t every day a Diamond Back comes a-calling and is polite enough not to eat its hosts.’

Later in the day the faint stirrings of a breeze began to palpate the sagging vinyl canvas. The timbers began once again to creak their welcome song as the barque eased itself slowly into motion: it was barely a movement at first, a few paltry knots, but to everyone on board it seemed as though they were racing into the sun itself.

*

The cry from the crow’s nest and the outstretched arm of the look-out brought everyone up on deck. The crew took up vantage points in the rigging and scanned the flat sea, shading their eyes from the fierce yellow orb of the sun. ‘What is it, Mr Standish?’ asked the Captain, emerging from the companionway on to the quarter-deck, still struggling into his black pigskin jerkin with the golden eagle embossed above the left breast: his captain’s insignia.

‘Can’t make it out, sir.’ The First Mate adjusted the brass ferrule on the telescope. ‘Appears to be a craft of some sort, quite small, I should judge. It’s signalling to us, I think.’

‘Let me see.’ Kristiensen came forward and squinted into the eyepieces. He was silent for a moment, his lips compressed tightly together. Then he said in a breath, ‘Oracles and omens.’ It was an exclamation used by the crew, one signifying fear and perplexity, but not what the First Mate would have expected to hear on the Captain’s lips.

The barque drew nearer. Through the heat mist it became evident to Mr Standish that what he had taken to be a signal could now be seen as the sun’s rays glinting on the hard and polished surface of a small, low craft of shallow displacement floating not so much in the water as on top of it. And as they approached they could see the figure of a man sprawled against the smooth concave incline, his head resting on the rounded lip, one hand trailing in the water. His clothing was stained and tattered, apparently bleached white by the sun.

Kristiensen issued instructions and a boat was lowered. At this distance – less than ten metres – they could see that the craft was made of a material resembling gun-metal. It had the appearance of having been scorched by fire: parts of it were pitted and blistered, with darker areas obscuring the hard bright finish.

‘What on this earth do you make of it, sir?’ Mr Standish asked the Captain. ‘Has he been cast adrift do you suppose?’ He was nearly his old self once more, curious but not frightened; castaways were not as fearsome, and much more easily accommodated, than sea monsters.

‘If we, as educated men, believed in omens,’ Kristiensen replied with faint irony, ‘we might be forgiven for taking this to be the fulfilment of a prophecy. But no doubt we’re too rational for that.’ He was smiling in a detached fashion.

‘What omens do you mean?’ the First Mate said.

‘Have you forgotten the black albatross we sighted three days ago?’

‘No, I hadn’t forgotten, but I thought—’

‘You thought that to regard it as an omen was straining credulity – that it was a foolish superstition confined to the ignorant and the simple-minded.’ He nodded slowly and said softly, as if to himself, ‘Perhaps you’re right. After many years at sea the sickness seems to spread everywhere like a cancer; sooner or later it affects everyone.’

The First Mate regarded him curiously. He was about to ask which sickness the Captain was referring to when his attention was distracted by the voice of Mr Swann calling from the boat. ‘He’s alive, Captain. But only just. Heartbeat faint and unsteady.’

‘Bring him on board,’ Kristiensen ordered. ‘Is there anything worth salvaging, supplies, telegraph equipment?’

‘It’s a shell, that’s all,’ the Second Mate answered. ‘No lockers, sails, no rudder even.’ He gestured to one of the seamen, and together they raised and supported the unconscious man and with some difficulty brought him into the longboat. Where he had lain on the shallow concave interior the craft was streaked dark-grey as if seared by flames; and as Kristiensen looked he suddenly stiffened and a tremor passed through him. Partly obliterated by the discoloration, yet still legible, a row of letters in a strange configuration was visible. Kristiensen read them silently, his lips forming the sounds:

RAL

X→

JEC

            LE

A foreign language perhaps? Certainly the craft was of a type and construction unfamiliar to him. Yet it was just as likely, Kristiensen reasoned, that the letters formed part of words which had been burnt off or otherwise obliterated. He repeated the sequence to commit it to memory, then watched as the longboat returned to the ship and the man was taken on board. Beckoning to the First Mate he went down to the main deck and approached the circle of men that had formed round the supine figure. They fell back and stood silently, curious and yet ill at ease, their eyes shifting restlessly from the Captain to the man lying on the bleached timbers.

He was a tall man, Kristiensen judged, with a strong neck and a robust physique: his features were sharply defined, the nose angular and jutting out from beneath a wide forehead, his hair discoloured from the effects of sun and seawater. There was something odd, too, about his appearance that Kristiensen couldn’t quite place until Mr Standish remarked on it – to do with the man’s face. It was deathly pale, when by rights it should have been sunburnt. The flesh seemed almost transparent, as if all colour and substance had been washed out of it.

His clothing was also strange. He was dressed in a single piece of material, without seams or fastenings, which fitted him snugly like a second skin from neck to ankles; here and there it was torn and ragged, stained by seawater, and through the vents in the material his skin appeared to glow with an intense paleness and transparency.

Kristiensen knelt down and placed his ear against the man’s chest. Barely perceptible, but, yes, there it was: the slow irregular beat of the heart.

He said to Mr Swann: ‘Have a bunk made ready. We can save him if we hurry.’ He stood up and jerked his head impatiently at the crew: ‘Lend a hand here,’ but the men clustered in a self-protective group looking fearfully at the pale, scarcely-breathing figure. The voyage had held more than its share of terrors: they were unprepared for sea monsters and even less for the sudden arrival of a man adrift in a strange craft in the dead lost centre of the ocean. It would have been wiser, their attitude implied, to have left him to die: it was tempting the fates to bring on board a man of such unnatural appearance.

Kristiensen tried hard to control his temper. He took a step forward, this time gesturing more emphatically, and the men retreated before him, intimidated by his anger but unwilling to obey.

‘I’ll shift ’em,’ Mr Swann growled. His hand went to his belt where the ivory handle of a knife protruded, but the Captain stopped him with a cautioning hand.

He said softly: ‘We needn’t resort to force.’ Then, addressing the crew in a level and reasonable tone of voice, ‘There is no cause to be afraid of this man. I know where he comes from.’ There was a stirring of disbelief. ‘You’ve all heard of the airships which New Amerika has constructed to carry passengers and cargo across the sea. This man is a crew member of such an airship, I know this by his uniform. His airship must have been on a voyage over uncharted seas and been blown off course – perhaps it foundered and fell into the sea and this man is the only survivor. There is no reason to be afraid. Surely you don’t fear an unconscious man in this state of exhaustion? Look at him, is it conceivable that he could do you any harm?’

The men glanced uncertainly at each other. They rubbed their bare feet on the deck in the manner of schoolboys caught in some childish prank. He would shame them into obeying him. Then the Summarian, his dark eyes slitted and evasive, his small tarbrush of a beard close to his chest, shuffled forward a pace or two.

‘We didn’t bargain for this. There is something bad about this man. I feel it here’ – touching his heart with a horny thumb-nail. ‘Already we have seen the evil omen, then there was the sea serpent, and now this man floating on the ocean.’ His eyes flickered across the Captain’s face. ‘If he’s from an airship of New Amerika, as you say, where are the others who were with him? Why should one man survive and all the others perish?’

Kristiensen held up the broad palms. of his hands. ‘Who can say? How do we know there aren’t other survivors out there somewhere? Take my word, I have no reason to lie to you.’ Without waiting for a reaction or giving the Summarian a chance to respond, he turned, saying over his shoulder, ‘Take him below, Mr Swann. He must be given immediate attention.’

‘One moment, Captain.’ The Summarian was not giving in so easily. ‘Why is he so pale? He has been exposed to the sun and yet his skin is like a child’s.’

‘The men who fly the airships are all pale-skinned,’ Kristiensen answered. ‘It is because they are so high above the clouds. His colour will return in a day or so.’ He continued, almost as if it was an afterthought, ‘There’s likely to be a reward for his safe return; he’ll be able to give an eye-witness account of what happened to the airship. Any sum awarded the Slave Trader will be divided equally amongst all hands – providing I get your full cooperation.’

He returned to the quarter-deck, Mr Standish hurrying to keep pace with him. The young man was in a state of rare excitement. He knew of the airships though had never seen one, and it was thrilling to have rescued one of their crew – a man who would have marvellous stories to tell of steering with all sails unfurled through pinnacles and canyons of cloud.

He said anxiously, trotting along, ‘Is it possible, do you think, that the airship is still afloat?’

Kristiensen halted at the entrance to the companion-way. He looked slowly over his shoulder and shook his head.

Mr Standish followed him down the steps to the narrow passage. ‘The craft he was in stayed afloat, so perhaps the airship did too.’

‘Not possible,’ Kristiensen said. He opened the door to his cabin and went swiftly round the chart-table to a cupboard in the corner, unlocking it with a small silver key he took from his pocket.

‘You sound very certain.’

‘Shut the door.’ Kristiensen began to take medical supplies from the cupboard: phials of coloured liquids, tubes containing emollients, bandages, salt tablets, and various other preparations. He glanced up and said in a flat expressionless voice: ‘I’m certain the airship isn’t still afloat because there is no airship.’

The First Mate smiled apologetically. ‘You mean the airship has been lost? I’m sorry, I don’t—’

‘I mean that there is no airship,’ Kristiensen said distinctly. ‘There never was.’

‘He isn’t from an airship?’

‘No.’

The First Mate regarded him blankly.

‘I had to spin the crew a tale to calm them down. It wouldn’t take much just now to panic them. But he’s no more from an airship than you or I. I’ve seen the uniforms they wear, and this man belongs to no service that I’m familiar with.’

‘But we found him in the middle of the ocean. He’s not from a sailing vessel, that much is clear, so what other explanation is there?’

‘I don’t know,’ the Captain said thoughtfully. He placed the supplies in a small canvas bag and handed it to the First Mate. ‘But I suggest we find out as quickly as possible.’

They found Mr Swann and several of the men clustered round the bunk in which the man lay, still attired in the one-piece garment and showing no signs of recovery. The Second Mate moved aside to allow Kristiensen access, saying, ‘His breathing is shallow but I don’t think he’s injured in any way. There are no wounds or bruising that I can see.’

‘His skin,’ Mr Standish said. ‘It’s so white.’ He couldn’t yet fully take in what the Captain had told him: that here was someone who had appeared as if by magic from nowhere. But of course there had to be a sensible, rational explanation. No educated person, especially in this advanced age, believed for a moment in the inexplicable, the extra-ordinary. There was always a reason to explain everything, from the behaviour of people to those events which at first seemed to defy common sense. For those who didn’t conform to this belief there was the inescapable reality of Psy-Con, which no one in his right mind would deny.

Kristiensen told the crew members to clear out of the way, and it seemed for a moment as if the Summarian might object, but then Mr Swann made a gesture which was unambiguous in its intention. He closed the cabin door firmly behind them and stood with his back to it.

Kristiensen leaned over the unconscious man and carefully cut the material away with his knife until he was naked to the waist. His flesh seemed to glow, as if illuminated from within; and Mr Standish, his eyes straining in the dim light, started involuntarily and said, ‘You can see his bones.’

‘And also his blood vessels,’ the Captain added.

Indeed it was true: the man was translucent. His flesh was solid enough to the touch and yet it was possible to see below the surface, to see actually inside him – the vague milky outline of the skeleton and musculature, the tenuous network of arteries and veins, the shadowy bulk of the inner organs, like pebbles seen darkly at the bottom of a murky pool. And there was something else. Kristiensen touched the man’s left shoulder and traced the shape that was imprinted there, as though branded into the flesh. It was a circle with a bar set diagonally through the lower right-hand arc. It was the letter Q.

The First Mate said wonderingly, ‘Is he a man? Is he human?’

‘He’s a man all right,’ Kristiensen replied. ‘Though where he comes from and to what race he belongs I haven’t a notion. Mr Swann, what do you make of this?’

The Second Mate stepped forward, his dark square face sober and perplexed. He gazed his fill at the figure on the bunk, and then his brows grew close together; his arms hung by his sides, impotent, urging some kind of action. He looked towards the Captain as if seeking some friendly reassurance, a sensible and rational explanation.

Kristiensen held a tube to each of the man’s nostrils and squirted something inside which dispersed like mist in the nasal cavity. They waited for a moment but there was no response.

‘What does the mark on his shoulder signify?’ Mr Standish asked.

‘It’s not a birthmark, at least I don’t think so,’ Mr Swann said. ‘It’s too exact and well-formed.’

‘A badge of rank perhaps.’ Kristiensen said, which was less a query than an inward musing.

‘But where is he from?’ Mr Standish said. ‘A man adrift on the ocean must come from somewhere.’ He looked at the others; for some reason he felt light-headed and was aware of a trembling in his fingertips. There was no threat of danger, so why should h