The Mariner

A new adventure series by C. Hamlin Otchy

Part III

The night ended with the light of a searing sun breaking over the eastern horizon. It woke the mariner, who had passed out lying on the quarterdeck. Too unsteady to walk, he crawled on his hands and knees to a skin hanging near the ship wheel and drank from it. Then he lay back down, the pain in his shoulder driving chills through his whole body, though it was a warm morning. For a moment, he just lay there, looking at the fair weather clouds floating high above him. He listened to the creak of the sloop’s timbers. The earth revolved under the weight of hundreds of kilometers of rock and molten lava, on top of which were dozens of kilometers of ocean, on top of which was a small, wooden ship, on top of which lay a weak, 24-year-old man, living the last few hours of his life before he joined with the eternal. God forgive me.

He struggled to the starboard edge of the boat and pulled himself up to a sitting position. There was no land, as far as the eye could see in any direction. With the use of a compass and a sextant, he could deduce his latitude, and make a decision on where to head—but what did that matter now? How much longer did he have left?

The mariner crawled below, sweating from the effort. He unlocked the drawer where he kept his captain’s journal and a quill.

February 13, 1688

Morning. Seventh hour. Coral Sea. 12th day from San Cristobal. Drifting. Sea high and wind quiet. Color of the sea dull green and bottomless. Running before the wind on a South-South-East track.

Yesterday ran into a band of islanders in a praus. They came on quick and I wounded one with musket shot. May have killed him. Sustained injury from arrow, probably poisoned. Feeling very weak and tired.

No land in sight. Will continue on present track in hopes of making New Caledonia before nightfall. Remote chance they have antidote.

The mariner stuck the quill in the waistband of his trousers, took the journal under his right arm, and dragged himself back on deck. He was so exhausted when he got back there, he passed out again.

When he awoke, his shoulder ached more sharply. It felt like something was growing in there—something evil and unpleasant. He thought he smelled something strange and then it went away. He dragged himself to the skin and wet his parched lips, then managed to get to the rim of the boat and prop himself there.

Looking out at the expanse of water stretching out in every direction, a desperation began to well up in him. This is it. This is how it all ends for me. Here. With no one to blame but myself. A loneliness appeared in him so raw that it felt like it was gnawing his insides out. He felt this kind of desperation before in the cities of the world, but never here… never out on the ocean on his own. This was always his space, where he was commander of his own destiny.

“Out here, you got the time and space to think and be alone with your thoughts,” his friend Jerome said to him long ago. They were sailing the Arafura Seas in those days, going from one isle to the next, fishing and trading and just having fun. Those were easier times. Special times. Why did I ever leave that?

“Must be running away from something” said the old woman sitting on the port side of the sloop. “That’s what I would say. A boy your age don’t find himself out on these open oceans, much less alone, unless he’s running from something.”

“Who are you?” the mariner said, frightened by her haggard appearance and drooping face. She didn’t look up from her knitting.

“Don’t look so surprised. What, you don’t recognize me? Just like your father. Left home at a young age and never looked back. Never looked back at what you did, who you left behind. Dirty rotten…”

The mariner shook his head. “You never wanted me there. I was just getting in your way. Another mouth to feed.”

“How do you know? You ever stop or think to ask? Oh no. You just up and run. That’s the only solution you have—run. Keep running, keep running… well look where it got you now. Nowhere left to run. Death caught up with you. It’s right there, over your shoulder. Ha! Made you look!” The hag started cackling, her tooth hanging like a lone bat guarding the entrance to a cave.

The mariner bit his lower lip and closed his eyes. When he opened them, the hag was gone but he could still hear her sickening laughter. He drank from the skin, tasting how foul and brackish the water was. He poured some out on the deck and it made a small yellow pool.

The sounds of a flute drifted over the boat. The mariner turned his head and saw a tall islander floating nearby on a large lily pad. He was sitting cross-legged, wearing a only a white loin cloth. Red dots were painted on his forehead, chin, between his breasts, and above his navel. On a long purple flute, he played an enchanting and disarming melody. The mariner looked around but no one else was there. No one but the two of them. The islander floated nearer, and as the music got louder, the mariner could hear a conversation between two people inside that melody.

“What do you mean?” said the boy.

“Oh come now, Jacob, you must know what I’m talking about. This is our only chance. There’s only one way out of this,” said the girl.

“I can’t. I can’t do that… I’ll be an outcast. We’ll never be able to live here. They’ll never accept me.”

“Yes they will. They are an open-minded people. You don’t give them due credit.”

“I’m not the last one to come to this island, though—you know that, right? And those who come after me… they aren’t going to be interested in just trading… you have no idea. Those people… I’m afraid what they will do. I’m afraid—”

“YES, that’s it, isn’t it? You’re scared!”

“I’m not scared.”

“Jacob, listen to yourself. You don’t want to try because you’re afraid of what some unseen men might do? It doesn’t even make sense!”

“This isn’t going to work,” the boy shouted. “It can never work!”

“I’m tired,” the mariner said, visions swirling in his head. “I’m so tired. Go away. Leave me to die in peace.”

The islander floated away into a thick, oncoming mist.

When he woke, it was noon. He looked over the side and the islander was gone. The sloop had drifted into new waters. The mariner marveled at the bright aqua shade of the water, transparent strait to the bottom, about ten meters below. A long coral reef ran there, alive with every manner of colorful fish one could imagine. The reef stretched out as far as he could see, though no land was visible. The water seemed to have a luster all its own, glowing with its own energy.

“Where are we headed?” he asked his grandfather, who stood at the ship wheel.

“Along the Tropic of Capricorn, where you will meet your guide. If we don’t drift into the horse latitudes, that is.” He kept his eye firmly set on the horizon. “Do you know why they call them the horse latitudes? I found out when I was just a boy, working aboard da Gama’s flagship. We left Sagres with a warship escort, but once we reached Cape Verde, it left us and we did something I thought crazy at the time. Instead of hugging the African coast as I heard so many men predict we would, the Captain swung the Sao Gabriel west, out into open ocean. Without land in sight, I was scared witless. For three weeks we sailed ahead on white flecked seas, with strong winds abeam, making the voyage pleasant. Then, without warning, we changed course towards Africa and our luck ran out. Calms beset our four caravels and we sat becalmed for weeks, sharks feeding on garbage, swarming in a long line behind the ships… In two months time, the food went rotten and the water stank, and there was too little of both to go around. The first thing jettisoned was the horses… and the sharks loved every last one.”

“How did you make it out?” the mariner said.

“Blind providence. After three months, when half the crew had started boiling the calfskin that wrapped the mainmast, we spied Africa rising out of the water in the distance. I never thought I would see such a beautiful sight. But little did I know that was only the beginning of our troubles… Before that journey was over, only 76 of the original 350 were still alive, and I was marooned with my uncle and two other men for suspicion of mutiny in the Banda Sea, not far from the island where you were born.”

The boy ran across the clearing of trees with a coconut in his arms.

“Daddy, can I open it?”

“I don’t think so. Not unless, you can handle that machete on your own.”

“I can. Watch.”

The boy picked up the machete, unsteady with its weight in his small hands.

“Whoa, whoa, I think you had better take it easy yet, son. This is a man’s instrument.”

“No, please Daddy, let me try. I can do it.”

“No, lad, you’re too young.”

“Daddy…”

“No!”

The man took the coconut and hurled it across the clearing where it disappeared under the brush.

“You never let me do anything, you bloody bastard,” the mariner said, looking at the coral at the bottom of the sea. “You were afraid of me.” He turned over and saw his father hanging from the main mast by his neck.

“You did it anyway, without me. You ran and you ran and now you will die just like I did—pathetic and alone.”

“At least I wasn’t a bloody pirate,” the mariner said.

“You’re a pirate the same as I was,” the hanged man said. “Where did you get that gold from? Where did that money come from, boy? You think those islanders wanted to give those spices? You’re a pirate, same as all the other half-breeds in this ocean. A pirate through and through, same as I was.”

“I didn’t cheat anyone. I gave them their fair share.”

“OK. Keep telling yourself that. May help your conscience eating you up from the inside, like the maggots in your fruit, heh?”

The mariner looked at the bag of fruit hanging from near the wheel. It was dripping with worms.

“Ha ha… You see it too, now, eh?”

“Leave me, infernal ghost! You’re not real. You’re dead, dead 5 years now! What more do you want from me?”

The mariner leaned over the edge of the boat and scooped cool water in his hands. He splashed it on his face and neck, then ran his hands through his hair.

Am I really going crazy? Is death too big for me to comprehend? What have I been running from all my life, on this sloop, sailing from one island to the next, the only driving force being “repeat pleasure, avoid pain.” Where do I belong in this world? Have I even given myself the chance to find out?

He looked out at the undulating waters stretched out in front of him like a field of grass the ship cut through like a scalpel. He blinked and the light refracted. He blinked again and it refracted more. A stone dropped into the dead still lake inside him, and as the ripples expanded outwards, he felt hot, wet tracks streaming down his cheeks.

What a waste. What a waste of a life. Look at all I have been given. So many things, so many beautiful things… and what have I done? I’ve chased money and women and rum and reaped nothing but deceit. And soon it will end. And then I really will have nothing.

The mariner fell on his knees.

“Is this what I was brought on this planet to do? To live a short life and die alone in the middle of this wasteland? You don’t have to do this. You don’t have to leave me to die here. Give me another chance. Please, let me try this again. That’s all I ask.”

He raided his eyes and an albatross flew overhead. He looked starboard, and saw a small island in the distance.