The Silence of the Sea

Chapter 11

The young man on the other end of the line sounded subdued and distracted. He was the only Snævar Thórdarson in the telephone directory whose occupation was listed as ship’s engineer. Thóra had been running out of ideas about who to ask for background information on the yacht when she suddenly remembered the crew member who had dropped out, and Fannar had supplied her with his name. With any luck, she thought, his account of the accident that had caused him to be left behind might also come in useful for her report.

Snævar readily admitted that he was meant to have sailed with the Lady K to Iceland but his replies to Thóra’s questions, though so swift and to the point they almost seemed rehearsed, were not actually much help since his involvement in the preparations for the voyage had been minimal. At first she found it odd that his answers should be so fluent, but it turned out that he had already given the police three separate statements.

When Thóra persisted, Snævar became more uncomfortable, especially on the subject of how Ægir had come to take his place on board; but then, it can’t have been much fun to be the indirect cause of a whole family’s disappearance. He started off trying to give a sober, factual account, but as he progressed he became increasingly choked with emotion.

‘I’m still in shock, to be honest. I’m not usually easily upset, but when I saw the yacht sail straight into the docks with none of the crew doing a thing to prevent it, I knew something was seriously wrong. I was so nearly on board myself. It should have been me, not that couple and their poor little girls.’

‘Disasters are impossible to predict; you can hardly blame yourself for what happened. This time you were lucky, and others less so.’ Thóra was aware of the futility of her words; his conscience would continue to gnaw at him whatever she said. ‘Why were you on the docks when the yacht was due in? Surely that wasn’t by chance?’

‘I’d come to pick up Halli. We were mates; he’s the one who sorted out the job for me. We were both between tours on the trawler and he thought it would be a good idea to take me along. They were dead keen to hire him because of his previous experience, so he had no trouble fixing it for me. Personally, I wasn’t that bothered, but I didn’t mind going. You know – the pay was all right and I reckoned it might be a laugh if Halli was going too. We could have a bit of an adventure; the flight was free and we could hit the nightlife in Lisbon. But even that went wrong, though the first couple of days were awesome.’

‘Because of your accident?’

‘Yes. Breaking a leg is no joke. And it was a real bummer for Halli to have to go through it all with me.’

‘May I ask what happened?’ Silence greeted her question. ‘You don’t have to tell me unless you want to, but if you don’t I’ll simply have to find out by other means. It’s vital for me to know why Ægir ended up on the boat if I’m to sort out his and his wife’s affairs. May I remind you that they have another little girl, and for her sake it’s essential that the settlement of their estate goes through as smoothly as possible. Which means we need to clarify the sequence of events.’

‘All right, I can tell you what happened.’ He briefly turned his head away from the receiver to cough. ‘Though I don’t really like talking about it because the accident was so stupid.’

‘Most accidents are, so you needn’t worry about that.’

‘Maybe not.’ He took a deep breath, then the words came out in a rush as if to give them less time to leave a bad taste in his mouth. ‘I was drunk. Totally off my face, and I tripped and fell down one of those really steep streets in Lisbon. Actually, I was lucky it didn’t turn out worse because I rolled quite a long way and nearly ended up getting run over. If I had, it might have changed everything for the better. At least, that’s what I keep telling myself.’

Thóra could think of nothing to say. If Snævar had been killed, his friend Halldór would almost certainly have pulled out of the voyage, and then the captain wouldn’t have been able to get away with using Ægir as a replacement. The committee would have been forced to hire two new crew members instead. Still, it was no use crying over spilt milk.

‘And there’s another thing,’ Snævar continued. ‘I don’t know if it has any bearing on this case, but I was pushed. The Portuguese doctors didn’t want to hear it – no one was listening to me because I was totally out of it. But I was pushed. It all happened very fast, but I’m almost a hundred per cent positive.’

‘If you could give me some proof of the accident, I’d be very grateful. Regardless of whether you were pushed.’

‘What, you want my leg?’ It must have been meant as a joke, though Snævar did not sound particularly amused.

‘Actually, I was thinking more along the lines of hospital notes or maybe a signed statement from you.’

‘I can give you a statement but I might need your help to put it together. I don’t have any documents, though; the whole thing was handled by the Social Insurance office. If you like, I can ring them and ask if they have the papers. It’s not as if I have much else to do at the moment. If they can’t help, you’ll just have to contact the hospital in Lisbon.’

‘Okay. When would suit you? Is there any chance you could come to my office tomorrow or the day after, so I can type it up? And it would be helpful if you could have a word with the Social Insurance people first.’ Thóra was pleased with the way this phone call had panned out, though she hadn’t had high hopes beforehand. ‘On a tangent, since you knew Halli, I wanted to ask if you have any idea why he originally quit after working on the Lady K for such a short time. Could it have had anything to do with inadequate safety procedures? Or a problem with the yacht’s engine?’

‘Oh, it was nothing like that. According to him, everything was fine. All the equipment was present and correct, and the engine was as good as new; he had no complaints on that score.’

‘So what was it?’

‘I gather it was to do with the captain. Halli said he was a complete tosser and really tight-fisted. I haven’t crewed any yachts myself but according to Halli, the way it works is that at the end of every tour the captain is given a tip that he’s supposed to share with the crew. But there are two kinds of captain – those who divide the money equally between all the crew members, and those who take sixty per cent to share with the mate and chief engineer, then give what’s left to the rest of the crew. It might not sound so bad but when you’re working for the jet set there can be as many as twelve employees sailing the boat, cooking, cleaning and working as waiters. Then it really matters how the tip’s shared out. The Lady K usually had a staff of ten and the officers took twenty per cent of the tip each, leaving the rest of the poor sods to share the other forty per cent. Halli was employed as an engineer, so he was one of the unlucky ones. We’re not talking peanuts either. The tip was often higher than the wages – and tax-free, too.’ That sounded a bit dodgy to Thóra, but she refrained from commenting. ‘Under normal circumstances Halli would only have done two tours with a captain like that. But he stayed on a bit longer because he got the impression that the Icelandic woman who owned the yacht liked having him around so she could chat to him in Icelandic – you know, take the piss out of the guests without them understanding. But of course that wasn’t enough in the long run, so Halli left. Quit as soon as he found another position.’

‘Did he stay in touch with Karítas afterwards?’

‘Are you joking?’ Snævar laughed, genuinely this time. ‘It wasn’t that sort of relationship; you’ve got it all wrong if that’s what you think. The crew doesn’t really mix with the owners and guests on vessels like that. Halli may have enjoyed a laugh with Karítas, but not every day. As far as I can remember, he only saw her once after that, from a distance. He caught sight of her on the deck of the Lady K when she was moored off some island in the Med just after he left – he was working on another yacht by then. Not long afterwards he quit the luxury yacht business and went back to the trawlers.’

‘So he wasn’t in contact with her on Facebook?’

‘He wasn’t on Facebook.’ Of course not.

‘Tell me something.’ She hesitated for fear Snævar would lose patience and refuse to come to the office if she kept him on the phone too long. ‘What do you think happened? You’ve been on board, so you must have more insight than most into what might have become of them.’

Snævar hesitated before answering; perhaps he was trying to run through all the alternatives he’d considered. ‘Look, if one or two or even three of them had vanished, there would be all sorts of possible explanations. But all of them? There aren’t many answers to that. The only sensible theory I can come up with is that they believed the yacht was sinking and thought their only chance was to abandon ship. Maybe they were afraid she was about to blow up, though it’s unlikely the crew or captain would have thought that. They would have known better. In fact, they’re trained in risk assessment, so I’m guessing the crew weren’t around when it happened. I have no clue what became of them – I still can’t come up with a plausible explanation.’

‘Let’s just say they did believe she was sinking – why wouldn’t they have launched a lifeboat?’

‘How would I know? Maybe they didn’t think they had time. Maybe there was another boat nearby that picked them up.’

‘One final question. What could cause a crew or passengers to misread the situation so badly? Is there an alarm that would go off if the hull was holed, for example? I’m wondering if the system could have malfunctioned and given them the wrong message.’

‘Naturally, there’s an alarm system on board, but even if it went off by mistake, the crew wouldn’t just jump overboard. The passengers, maybe – but not the sailors. They’d check what was up and wouldn’t abandon ship unless she was literally in flames. Either somebody forced them to leave the yacht or they died by some other means. Nothing else makes any sense.’

Thóra thanked him and said goodbye, satisfied even though she was none the wiser.

Although the police were very understanding, Thóra had a tough time persuading them to answer any of her questions. She supposed they would need to double-check what information could be released to her. But at least the officers she spoke to seemed to appreciate the gravity of the situation and were keen to make things easy for her out of sympathy for Ægir’s parents and their little granddaughter. Admittedly, eyebrows were raised when she mentioned the life insurance policies, especially when it came to revealing the level of cover. She could have kept quiet about it, but that wouldn’t have been in her clients’ long-term interests. She persisted for a while in trying to find out whether the body recovered from the sea had any connection to the yacht, but gave up when she realised the police’s patience was wearing thin.

‘I appreciate that you can’t hand over the papers today, but would you be able to give me an idea of what there is? I’m particularly interested to know if the ship’s documents were on board and, if so, which ones?’ She decided to mention a few essential items but avoid listing them in detail in case she left something out. ‘I’m particularly interested in the official logbook, any other logbooks and any certificates of seaworthiness. As well as any compliance certificates connected to the yacht’s safety equipment.’

‘That I can tell you.’ The detective to whom she had finally been passed unwrapped a piece of chewing gum and put it in his mouth. ‘I’d offer you some if it wasn’t nicotine gum. I’ve just given up smoking. Apparently you just get addicted to this stuff instead but it’s not as bad for you as cigarettes, or so they claim.’ From his expression it would obviously be some time before he became reconciled to the flavour. ‘Most of the ship’s papers were on board and we should be able to release copies to you shortly. Just bear in mind that there are a few pages missing here and there, so the versions you receive will be incomplete.’

‘Pages missing?’ The ship’s documents were official papers that the vessel was required to carry by law. Removing material from them would be highly irregular. ‘Were they the ones relating to the Iceland trip?’

‘Yes, in all likelihood. Though there’s no way of telling when they were torn out; it may have happened before the captain took over, in which case they wouldn’t have included his notes. The problem is, we don’t know when the captain disappeared. There are a few entries from the beginning of the voyage, but it looks as if some of the older ones – if that’s what they were – have been ripped out. At any rate, the pages haven’t turned up. There’s no telling whether it’s significant, but it certainly looks odd.’

Thóra noted this down. ‘Next, have you had a chance to examine any cameras or phones? It would help my report if I could establish when the passengers were indisputably still alive.’

‘No.’ The detective kept chomping at the gum, his jaw muscles bunching.

‘Do you have any idea when you might have a chance to look into it?’

‘Never.’

‘Never?’ Thóra was taken aback.

‘That’s right.’ His facial muscles relaxed as he shifted the gum to lodge under his upper lip. ‘There were no mobile phones or cameras on board.’

‘Isn’t that a bit odd?’

‘I don’t know. They probably took all that stuff with them when they abandoned ship, or didn’t bring any along in the first place – though I admit that’s unlikely.’

‘Very.’ Thóra hastily scribbled ‘phone’ and ‘camera’ in her notebook, followed by three question marks. Ægir and Lára had included their mobile numbers on the list they gave his parents, so they must have intended to take them. And Lára had rung them from on deck, hadn’t she, as they were leaving port? So they could hardly have forgotten them in the hotel, or anywhere else in Lisbon. The crew must have had theirs with them too – there was hardly anyone under seventy who didn’t own a mobile phone these days. It was more than a little suspicious. ‘Another thing that would be helpful, if it’s available, would be the data from the yacht’s GPS system. Though I can’t work out what format I could access it in.’

‘We’ve already plotted their course using the GPS data. If we’re permitted to release this to you, it would probably make sense to give you a printout of the maps. That would save you the effort of duplicating our work.’

‘That would be great. Then there’s one further matter and after that I promise not to bother you any more for the time being. Do you have a summary of the yacht’s communications with shore or other vessels after she left port, including the dates and times? If I don’t submit exhaustive records, I’m afraid the insurance company will take advantage of the fact to delay proceedings.’

‘Hmm. Good question.’ He pushed his tongue under his lip to reassure himself that the gum was still there. ‘That’s a bit of a funny one too, actually.’

‘Oh?’ Thóra’s first thought was that the yacht’s communications system must be missing. Nothing about this case was quite as it ought to be.

‘Either the radiotelephones broke down or gremlins got into them during the voyage. Or so we gather from what the captain wrote in the logbook. The satellite phone wasn’t working either, though according to the captain’s notes that was because they hadn’t set up an account for the trip. We’re in the process of examining both radios but we do know they were working when the yacht left port. At least, the captain ticked the box stating that they had been tested and were in working order. What hasn’t yet emerged is whether they were sabotaged or it was simply coincidence that both broke down.’

‘Don’t they have two radios precisely to avoid that kind of communications breakdown?’

‘Possibly, but I gather they also have different ranges. The short-range radio or VHF can only communicate with nearby ships but there is also a long-range one, although I’m not really clued-up on the technology. At any rate, they managed to make contact at least once. The connection was poor so the message was a bit garbled, but about thirty hours out of port the captain spoke to a mate on a British freighter. The conversation took place in English, so there may have been a misunderstanding due to language difficulties, but we aren’t ruling out the possibility that the message was correct.’

‘What was it exactly?’ Thóra resisted the urge to cross her fingers.

The detective dislodged the gum from under his lip and began to chew with renewed vigour. ‘The captain asked the British ship to report the discovery of a body on board to the Icelandic authorities because their own long-range radio was broken and their satellite phone was out of action. From what the English mate could understand, the body was female. Their conversation touched on some other matters too, which I’m not presently able to divulge. Going by what was said, it seems unlikely the woman was Lára, though we can’t completely rule it out. And whoever it was, we have absolutely no idea how she died.’ The policeman stopped chewing and regarded Thóra levelly. ‘In other words, since we’ve found no trace of the dead woman, we may be dealing with not seven but eight missing people.’