The Whispering Muse Part 1

The Whispering Muse.

A Novel.

Sjon.

ON THE CELESTIAL CHARTS of the scientific treatise Almagest, written in the mid second century by the cosmologist Claudius Ptolemy, there was a vast constellation called Argo Navis (the s.h.i.+p Argo), named for Jason son of Aeson's galley of many nails. This a.s.sembly of stars could not be seen until one reached Alexandria by night, but from there the Argo was clearly visible traversing the southern skies with all oars out and bellying sail, voyaging into the unknown in search of the Golden Fleece while around her floated the lesser constellations, Centaurus (the centaur) and Hydra (the sea monster).

Sixteen centuries later, the Earth was no longer at the centre of the universe and men set about drawing themselves a new heaven. It was then that the French astronomer Nicolas Louis de Lacaille decided that the Argo Navis was far too large and unwieldy, so he dismantled the s.h.i.+p, retaining some parts and jettisoning others, and created, in the process, three new constellations: Carina (the keel), Puppis (the p.o.o.p) and Vela (the sail).

But we old-timers say: She sails there still!

- from 'Seven s.h.i.+ps'

by Capt. Hans Caron Alfredson.

background to the voyage.

I.

I, VALDIMAR HARALDSSON, was in my twenty-seventh year when I embarked on the publication of a small journal devoted to my chief preoccupation, the link between fish consumption and the superiority of the Nordic race. It was written in Danish, under the t.i.tle Fisk og Kultur, and came out in seventeen volumes over the s.p.a.ce of twenty years. During the First World War, publication was suspended for two years and the sixth and seventh volumes were only half complete, i.e. only two issues each, as fate decreed that following the death of my first wife I was confined to my bed for eight months, from late August 1910 until spring 1911. Then the extent of the readers' loyalty to the periodical was revealed, as I see from my records that the only parties who cancelled their subscription were the University of Krakow and the Kjos Parish Reading Society. I won't go further into the reasons here but will refer anyone who may be interested to my book Memoirs of a Herring Inspector (pub. Fisk og Kultur, Copenhagen, 1933).

The content of the journal was written primarily in foreign tongues, as I knew that the majority of my ideas would be far too newfangled for my countrymen, indeed would pa.s.s way over their heads. For they hadn't even heard of the recent scientific advances on which I based my theory, which was reiterated on the t.i.tle page of every issue: It is our belief that the Nordic race, which has fished off the maritime coast for countless generations and thus enjoyed a staple diet of seafood, owes its physical and intellectual prowess above all to this type of nutrition, and that the Nordic race is for this reason superior in vigour and attainments to other races that have not enjoyed such ease of access to the riches of the ocean.

The final issue of each volume included a summary of the year's best articles and essays, translated into Hungarian by my brother-in-law, the psychiatrist Dr Gyorgy Pazmany. Every issue also included bits and bobs to fill up the pages, chiefly droll stories and occasional verses from my childhood home in the county of Kjos, all in Icelandic which I left untranslated.

As one might expect, I was for a long time the sole author of the scientific articles in Fisk og Kultur, but as the journal gained a wider circulation I received ever greater numbers of letters and contributions from foreign enthusiasts on these topics. While most were interested in fish consumption, there were also quite a few devotees of Nordic racial history. However, it was a rare man who perceived as I, the editor, did how inextricably these two factors were linked. Primus inter pares among the latter group was the Danish s.h.i.+p-broker Hermann Jung-Olsen, then hardly out of his teenage years yet already showing an unusual brilliance of mind. He was one of those individuals who inspire benevolence and sympathy from the very first encounter, deepening on more intimate acquaintance into respect and trust. For Hermann Jung-Olsen was a fine figure of a man, a firebrand with an insatiable appet.i.te for work. He was born with a silver spoon in his mouth, yet although his childhood home was one of the most elegant in Copenhagen, there was fish on the table at least four times a week, not only on weekdays but on high days and holidays too. This was mainly because his father Magnus Jung-Olsen was of the old school when it came to money a strict man who never rushed into anything or did a precipitate deed in his life, a great man indeed.

The reason for my bringing up the publis.h.i.+ng history of Fisk og Kultur here is that a whole eight years after the appearance of the final issue I received a letter from the great s.h.i.+p operator, the aforementioned Magnus Jung-Olsen, father of my late young friend Hermann, in which he invited me on a cruise with the MS Elizabet Jung-Olsen, a merchant vessel of the Kronos line, the Jung-Olsen family firm. Recently launched, she was due to embark on her maiden voyage, conveying raw paper from Norway to zmit in Turkey and continuing from there to Poti in Soviet Georgia to pick up a cargo of tea that the locals cultivate on the Kolkheti coastal plain and prepare for export in the exemplary tea factories provided for them by Stalin.

Mr Jung-Olsen says in his letter that his son long dreamt of doing me some sort of favour as he had mentioned more than once and that the old s.h.i.+pping magnate had been reminded of this fact when he received my telegram of condolence on the anniversary of Hermann's death, nearly four years after his untimely end (he was murdered on the day peace was declared, in a Bierkeller brawl in Vienna).

The letter reached me at the end of March, at a time when I had long been in low spirits (my second wife having pa.s.sed away that very month the previous year), but now my heart was filled with unfeigned joy: joy at being invited on such an adventure; joy that one could still meet with such charity from one man to another; joy that the buds looked promising on the boughs of the apple trees in the tiny patch of garden that belonged to my foolish neighbour Widow Lauritzen, although the poor neglected creatures had suffered cruelly in the February storms. Yes, such was my joy when I read Mr Magnus Jung-Olsen's letter.

And I read it often.

In 1908 I published a witty anecdote in the spring issue of Fisk og Kultur. For some reason it popped into my mind as I stood there at the kitchen window in Copenhagen, the letter still clutched in my hand: Once there were two gentlemen who met in a park while out walking their dogs. The younger instantly doffed his hat to the elder, who nodded in acknowledgement. Then, as chance would have it, the younger man's dog tore itself loose and raced off after a squirrel. The young man was embarra.s.sed and started apologising to the elder, saying that his dog had never done this sort of thing before; he had no business frightening squirrels; this was a one-off; it wouldn't happen again, he could promise that.

The elder gentleman listened patiently to his apologies, then putting his head on one side, said with a twinkle in his eye: 'Young man, is it possible that you are confusing me with little Mr Esquirol?'

Dr Pazmany and I were so tickled by this story that we added it to the Hungarian summary that year.

But I doubt my countrymen would have made head or tail of it.

life on the ocean wave.

II.

AT ELEVEN O'CLOCK on the morning of 10 April 1949 the merchant s.h.i.+p MS Elizabet Jung-Olsen departed the free port of Copenhagen en route to Norway, bound for Mold Bay in the county of Vest-Agder. My quarters on board consisted of two s.p.a.cious cabins amids.h.i.+ps on the port side below the bridge, the outer room entered from the saloon. This cabin contained every conceivable comfort: a berth and chairs, desk, cupboards and book-shelves, all as neatly made as one could wish for. The inner cabin consisted of a bathroom with a china wash-basin, a mirror as long as the s.p.a.ce permitted and a deep bathtub on bronze feet shaped like the claws of a dragon or lion (one can't always tell them apart). Opening off the bathroom was a roomy closet containing a modern WC. I couldn't help thinking that it would be interesting to see the captain's quarters, given the comfort of the accommodation afforded to the 'supernumeraries', as they call those who are over and above the crew.

Well, I was now extremely glad that I had dropped by at my benefactor's headquarters on my way to the s.h.i.+p that morning to deliver a letter of thanks. I had worked on its composition far into the night, making three drafts before the final clean copy, for in addition to conveying my grat.i.tude, I wished heartily to congratulate Mr Magnus Jung-Olsen on the success of his remarkable company.

I sat down by the porthole and looked out over the sound. The sky was overcast, a stiff northerly breeze sending a considerable swell head on to the s.h.i.+p. The whistle blew from time to time, at lengthy intervals. Ahead nothing could be seen but the crests of the waves, slapping their white foam hither and thither as they swelled and subsided in turn. Sleet began to pelt from the sky and the view faded. I watched until I could no longer distinguish sky from sea, then lay down, worn out from my letter-writing the night before.

I set my alarm clock for 5 pm. The food on board the vessels of the Kronos line is famed throughout the s.h.i.+pping world and it is claimed that the Danish king borrows their chefs when His Majesty's own s.h.i.+p's cook is indisposed.

I was shown to a seat at the captain's table, where Captain Alfredson introduced me to the first and second mates, the first engineer and the purser. There was a woman there too, the purser's wife, I a.s.sumed, but later gathered that their marital status was somewhat irregular and it would be more correct to call her his lady friend. Apparently I was not to be the only supernumerary on this trip.

The woman, who had thick fair hair, was of below average height and stoutly built. She seemed half afraid of me, or at least inordinately shy. I thought she was goggling at me but later observed that this expression was habitual, for on closer acquaintance I noticed that in addition to large eyes set rather low in her face, she had a drooping lower lip that caused her to gape inadvertently between sentences. She was German or, by her own account, Polish by family and birth, or even Lithuanian, but apparently spoke German to her gentleman friend. She understood a little Danish but didn't speak it as the couple had only been together three seasons. At this stage it didn't occur to me to delve any further into her situation or life story as I a.s.sumed that there would be plenty of time for such things on the voyage. I asked the captain whether the purser normally brought along his 'lady friend'. He said no. In reply to my question of how long the woman intended to remain with us he said that there were only two options, either she could disembark at Mold Bay or else go all the way to zmit, because those would seemingly be our first two ports of call. But we would see how it went. I should mention that the purser was in his forties; a likeable chap, despite an inability to p.r.o.nounce his 'r's, who could be described as good-looking were it not for the milky-white cataract in his right eye. His foreign mistress was about twenty years younger than him.

There were seven of us in the saloon and plenty of room at the captain's table. Everyone was friendly and did their best to make this first meal as congenial as possible. I myself was not feeling quite the thing after my afternoon nap; there seemed to be something wrong with the heating in my cabin because however far I turned on the radiator it remained obstinately cold, whether I turned the tap at the top or the bottom. After the cheery fat cook had announced the evening's well-thought-out menu, I informed the captain of my problem. And also that when, having started up from my sleep around three, I went into the saloon and complained to the s.h.i.+p's steward who was there polis.h.i.+ng the dinner service, he had said that there were often small teething troubles with new s.h.i.+ps, though of course this shouldn't happen, and that this little hitch would be sorted out in no time. However, this had not been done and now, you see, I was rather dreading the onset of night. Captain Alfredson nodded during my speech but did not reply, keeping his own council, but then signalled to the engineer to see to the matter. The engineer asked the company to excuse him and rose from the table.

Now the meal commenced with one splendid dish succeeding another. They had not lied about the quality of the Kronos line cooking. What did attract my attention, however, was the fact that none of the dishes were fish. I thought to myself that this was probably coincidence and that we would have fish for the next four days as was customary in the Jung-Olsen family home. Anyway, it was all delightful and time pa.s.sed far too quickly. The first engineer reappeared as we were finis.h.i.+ng the most ambrosial ris a la mande that has ever pa.s.sed my lips. He said he thought there was some grit in the radiator pipes, they must have come like that from the manufacturer, and he had ordered the third engineer to flush them out or sc.r.a.pe them. I didn't entirely follow the details of this repair story to tell the truth I considered it rather inappropriate for the dinner table. At this point Spanish brandy was served, accompanied by Danish cigars in a hardwood box, and without another word on the subject, the first engineer applied himself to these refreshments. Different rules pertain at sea from on sh.o.r.e here men must constantly tend to their lodging even while enjoying its protection.

Sailors who have been at sea for many years have a bottomless supply of tales about events they have either experienced first-hand or heard of from others of their ilk. In particular, it turned out that Caeneus, second mate of the MS Elizabet Jung-Olsen, was not shy about sharing with us various incidents that had befallen him in his day. He did so for the entertainment of his messmates, though they regarded it as an education too, since he had travelled further and seen more than any of them. From the antic.i.p.ation that gripped my travelling companions I gathered that the second mate must be an outstanding storyteller, and I realised that they had been waiting for this moment throughout the meal.

I haven't touched tobacco since my wife died, as I explained to the captain so he wouldn't take it amiss when I declined his expensive cigars. However, I did accept another gla.s.s of brandy, then leant back in my chair and prepared to enjoy Caeneus's seafaring yarn.

Before embarking on his tales the mate had the habit of drawing a rotten chip of wood from his pocket and holding it to his right ear like a telephone receiver. He would listen to the chip for a minute or two, closing his eyes as if asleep, while under his eyelids his pupils quivered to and fro. As this was the first time I had heard Caeneus talk, I smiled foolishly at his absurd performance. I could only a.s.sume that it was the prelude to some vulgar piece of clowning and mimicry, and I looked around, expecting to see the same reaction from my table companions even to see the woman t.i.ttering. But they were sitting quite still in their seats, waiting for the story to begin. Even the purser's lady friend watched enthralled as the man listened to the splinter of wood. My smile swiftly faded and in my confusion I darted a glance at Captain Alfredson who did me the courtesy of overlooking my faux pas. Abruptly leaning forward on his elbows, he said in a quiet, firm voice: 'It's where he gets the story from ...'

At these words the second mate put down the piece of driftwood. And began his tale: 'Many things can befall a sailor in his life; the perils await him not only at sea but also in far-off ports. I wish to tell you about a train of events that led me into a piece of foolishness, which resulted in such misfortune that I came within an inch of losing my life.

'I was a deckhand on a s.h.i.+p called the 'Argo'. We were crossing the Aegean, having set sail from the city of Iolcus in Magnesia with a long voyage ahead. The s.h.i.+p was newly built and fitted out with the finest rigging, but contrary winds and an unusually heavy swell had caused us to drift somewhat off our course at the very outset of our adventure. When we made land-fall on the island of Lemnos it was with the intention of taking on water and provisions there was certainly no other plan and it should by rights have detained us no more than a couple of days. But in the event we were to spend nearly ten months on the island.

'Admittedly we thought it strange that there were no s.h.i.+ps lying in the harbour and that we hadn't encountered any craft in the approaches to the port, but as we were eager to reach land it was not enough to rouse our suspicions and make us cautious. Nor were we troubled by the fact that the docks were empty of people. The men exchanged glances and said that the citizens must be in the city celebrating some festival and wasn't it a happy coincidence that we should turn up at such a time? We put out a boat and two of the crew piloted the s.h.i.+p to the harbour side. There we reefed the mainsail, moored the s.h.i.+p and stepped ash.o.r.e.

'The first reaction of a man who has come ash.o.r.e from the sea is to wonder that the earth should be so firm beneath his feet. This lasts for an instant before being succeeded by another sensation that feels as if it will never end: thirst. In an instant all the salt that one has inhaled from the sea air is released from one's lungs to crystallise on the tongue, coating it like a glittering iron glove. And only one thing can quench that fire: wine.

'We looked as one man at the captain, who was standing by the gangway with the helmsman, and our eyes flashed with the eagerness of athletes at the starting line. A whole lifetime pa.s.sed in this way, ending when the captain folded his arms across his chest and slowly shook his head. We emitted a pained sigh, the happy hopefulness fell from our faces, our shoulders drooped. The helmsman looked from this wretched rabble to his captain, who gave a sly smile. The helmsman laughed aloud. And the captain shouted at us, his white teeth flas.h.i.+ng in the burning midday sun: '"By holy Dionysus, men, go forth and be merry!"

'And we answered in chorus: '"Long live the son of Aeson, long live Captain Jason!"

'It should be mentioned here that this crew consisted of no weaklings, but of the greatest heroes known to man. Each and every one of us could have steered an entire fleet to victory, each and every one of us had the courage to meet whatever foes may be, whether of human or monstrous kind, but before thirst, even the greatest champions must concede defeat. We raced off up the wharf, for all the world like a swarm that has found the rotting carca.s.s of an a.s.s in a cabbage bed, making a beeline for the first tavern that met our eyes, and charged over the threshold with a great yell of jubilation. But our joy was short-lived, the yell died on our lips: it was a ghost town, there was nothing here but a layer of dust covering the benches and tables. We broke into the next tavern, and the next and the next; everywhere the same sight met our eyes.

'The wine barrels had burst and the long-desired drink mouldered black as blood among the broken staves.

'Oh, the disappointment!

'We turned on our heel and trudged back to the s.h.i.+p with aggrieved complaint. When Jason son of Aeson saw his sailors returning to the quay so woebegone he grew thoughtful. And on hearing that the dock area had succ.u.mbed to moths and rust, he ordered us to prepare without delay for battle with the monster that had evidently destroyed all human life on the island. He sent Phalerus, skilled in feats of arms, into the city to spy it out and with him the huntress Atalanta, the only woman among our number. They were well armed, as always, when there was the prospect of a hunt.

'These two had not gone far before they returned to the s.h.i.+p leading between them a golden-haired maid child that a group of terrified women had sent out to meet them. In her lily-white hand the girl held a papyrus scroll. The troop of armour-clad heroes stood aside, opening a path for the small maiden to the gangway where Jason greeted her. She handed him the scroll that the son of Aeson unrolled and read with interest.

'The rest of us waited; soon we would know whether plague or a monster was responsible for the sinister state of the land. Meanwhile the stout mids.h.i.+pman Heracles set the child on his knee and performed tricks for her amus.e.m.e.nt.'

I couldn't sleep that night. I had nodded during the second mate's story and finally fallen asleep and in my dozing state the tale seemed to become ever more far-fetched. When the steward nudged me awake I was sitting alone at the captain's table in the saloon. All signs of the excellent repast had vanished.

I entered my cabin to find it baking hot. The first engineer's so-called repairs had involved no more than running scalding water into the radiators, then tightening the taps. To make matters worse the wind picked up from the northwest, accompanied by rough seas, so the s.h.i.+p, which was empty, began to roll and pitch. Chairs and other loose fittings took to the air, the drawers shot out of the chest, cupboard doors banged ceaselessly and I was frantically engaged in trying to keep them under control until the early hours. When I finally managed to lie down, pouring with sweat under the empty quilt cover like an inhabitant of the tropics, a bustle began in the saloon: the whistling steward was preparing breakfast. I didn't have the strength to get up and give him a piece of my mind.

So, clattering crockery and clinking cutlery formed my lullaby on my first 'night' as a guest on board the flags.h.i.+p of my benefactor, Mr Magnus Jung-Olsen.

III.

THAT MORNING the MS Elizabet Jung-Olsen had cruised into Fedafjord, one of those endless Norwegian fjords, and now lay moored in a small bay at the foot of a lofty mountain. The settlement was a disgrace; shabby workers' huts had been thrown up higgledy-piggledy on the rock, with the sawmill and a large warehouse below. The only building worthy of the name of human habitation in this G.o.dforsaken hole was a yellow two-storey house that stood at the end of the jetty. Meanwhile the gold colossal tree trunks in their hundreds floated in the bay.

After lunch I took a turn about the deck. I had a headache from the vicissitudes of the night before and was feeling lethargic following a midday meal of horse sausage with mashed potatoes and white sauce, but I found relief in watching the production of the paper pulp that was to be our cargo on this trip. Two steel cables ran from the mill and warehouse up to the summit of the mountain that towered a thousand feet above the seedy little settlement. I was informed that from there the cables ran overhead straight to the doors of a timber-working factory located ten miles away up the long tapering valley. I watched the workmen dragging the tree trunks up the beach, loading them on sleds and sliding them into the mill. There the monster logs were chopped into chips and the chips were put into wagons, which then rolled along the cable that carried them up the valley to the factory. After the wood chips had been shredded, pulped, blended with this and that chemical and pressed into sheets, they returned as iron-bound blocks of raw paper, running back down the cable that ended up in the warehouse by the wharf. There the raw paper was stacked and finally loaded on board the s.h.i.+ps that came from every direction to transport it around the globe.

I antic.i.p.ated spending many happy hours watching the fresh wood chips ascending the mountain and vanis.h.i.+ng over the top, while the snow-white paper pulp materialised over the edge and swooped majestically down the slopes.

The freight rate was fifty kroner per ton, according to Captain Alfredson, and our intention was to take on 2,500 tons of raw paper and transport it to the Black Sea coast of Turkey. I found a good spot to sit and wrapped myself in blankets. It pleased me to be able to witness with my own eyes the fortunes of my friends the Jung-Olsen family swelling with every pallet that the crane swung on board that happy s.h.i.+p the MS Elizabet Jung-Olsen. In fact, the day before I embarked, a report on their prosperity had made headline news in the Stock Exchange Times: The board of the Kronos s.h.i.+pping company has reported a profit from its operations last year, 1948, of 4,794,388.00 kroner. To this should be added the interest of 1,162,168.00 kroner which, after the addition of last year's arrears of 738,806.00 kroner, makes a total income of 6,693,357.00 kroner. After the overheads of 1,258,022.00 kroner, including dockyard fees in Denmark and elsewhere for maintenance and repairs to the fleet, are paid off, there will be a surplus of 5,450,000.00 kroner, which the annual general meeting of the company has agreed to allocate as follows: profit to shareholders 20 per cent, payment to the new buildings fund 3,000,000.00 and, to be carried over to next year's account, 985,355.00 kroner, while a sum has already been set aside in a special fund to cover payment of taxes and foreign currency fluctuations. The company currently has at its disposal 16 steam or diesel vessels and 4 s.h.i.+ps under construction. Profit to shareholders in 1947 was 12.5 per cent.

At coffee time the purser's lady friend brought me some refreshments on deck, a selection of rations in a wicker basket with a dishcloth folded over the contents. I had a better impression of her now than I had the previous night, having grown more accustomed to those goggling eyes and finding it evident from her general deportment that she had been well brought up, no matter where she crossed paths with the purser at the end of the war. She asked me warily whether it was right that I had been in Germany during the hostilities. I admitted as much and told her the truth; that I had worked for the German national broadcasting service, reading the news in Icelandic. She told me in turn that she had been a governess, a gouvernante, on a country estate in Poland when war broke out and had remained there to the bitter end.

We conducted our conversation in German, for it had been a misunderstanding on my part that she knew any Danish (or that the purser spoke any German, for that matter), and she told me how badly the Germans had behaved after their arrival in Poland.

'First they broke all the windows in the house by throwing stones, then after that, they started on the family furnis.h.i.+ngs, the furniture and dinner service, not stopping until everything had been smashed to smithereens.

'The filth and squalor were so appalling that it was too much to bear, even for a person trained in home economics like myself. Many of the soldiers had been wounded and the dressings on their wounds hadn't been touched for weeks. Their clothes were in a disgusting state, but instead of was.h.i.+ng them, they just threw them on the fire when use and dirt had worn them away. Then the soldier who was immediately subordinate in rank would have the clothes torn off his back, if they fitted his superior and were not complete Scheie please excuse the phrase and so on down the line until some poor Pole was shot for his rags.

'And their eating habits were no better. The Germans fed themselves with their bare hands, and if large chunks of meat were on offer they would throw themselves on them, ripping and tearing until the whole place was awash with brawling and a large part of the meal went to waste. Afterwards it took them hours to lick the remnants of food from their hands since they had rings on every finger (all looted from the living and the dead) and it required some skill to suck the sc.r.a.ps of meat, grease and blood from under the rings, where it would rot if it wasn't eaten those same hands that they laid on the womenfolk.'

She omitted to mention how the Russians had behaved when they entered Poland some years later and the fact that she didn't touch on that side of the matter roused my suspicions that she was not entirely impartial. But I didn't comment on it at the time because she pointed a plump finger at the basket and said: 'Please, don't let it get cold ...'

Once she was out of sight I whipped the dishcloth off the basket to discover a thermos flask of milky tea, which was indeed going cold, and a diagonally cut ham sandwich on a gla.s.s plate.

So as yet there was no let-up in the carnivorous eating habits on board the MS Elizabet Jung-Olsen.

Entree.

Thinly sliced roast beef with pickled gherkins and cold potato salad Main Course.

Pork shanks in red wine with red cabbage, Brussels sprouts and wild mushroom sauce Dessert.

Raspberry and rhubarb compote with whipped cream.

After the dinner guests had sung the cook's praises for this tasty but indigestible meal it was time for the evening's entertainment. This was a continuation of yesterday's story, which was apparently not yet finished. The second mate took out the piece of wood, performed the same spectacle as the night before, and in the dead silence that settled on the saloon resumed his tale: 'The message the young maiden brought Jason, our captain, was from Queen Hypsipyle, the doe-eyed beauty who ruled over Lemnos. According to this letter, the men of the island had moved away to Thrace, judging the women of that land both fairer and more submissive than their own wives. They had sailed from the island under cover of night, taking with them all their sons and killing any male slaves. The only male creature they left behind alive was Hypsipyle's aged father, King Thoas. And he had not been alone with the daughters of Lemnos for long before he too fled on the only vessel he could push from land unaided; a chest containing the undergarments of Hypsipyle's handmaidens. Yes, things had come to such a pa.s.s that when we landed on Lemnos it was inhabited solely by women.

'It is a widespread belief that sailors have a girlfriend in every port but that's an exaggeration. Far from having a girlfriend in every port we usually only have them in one or two well, maybe three or four. Naturally, there are disadvantages to this arrangement, though the will is ever present; it depends on the countries and the native customs as to how willing their womenfolk are to accommodate strangers. For although it is pretty much the rule that sailors go ash.o.r.e to find themselves a woman, this aim can miscarry in some ports. And worst of all are the times when part of the crew must set sail again without having experienced an hour of bliss in the arms of some compliant beauty, since this can lead to bad feeling between those who got lucky and those who did not. Such discord among the crew is something that no captain would wish for.

'A manly smile played over the lips of Jason son of Aeson. Looking boldly to sh.o.r.e he raised the papyrus scroll to the skies and shouted in triumph: '"My friends, we find ourselves on an island of women!"

'The news left us speechless.

'Before being overwhelmed by the contrary winds that brought us to Lemnos, our s.h.i.+p, the Argo, had cleft the seas like a gull that skims the surface, the crests of the waves wetting the tips of its wings while the bird itself glides between sky and sea like wing-footed Hermes, the messenger of the G.o.ds. And all the while that miraculous musician Orpheus strummed the rhythm on his lyre, chanting a lay that caused the monsters of the deep to flinch away from the eager prow of our many-nailed craft in the very act of attacking. For the Argo appeared to these monsters like some divine being, a unique life force, the song and the singer, a new verb that combined the verbs "to come" and "to go", at once both mother and womb for the embryo always believes that the mother is nothing more than her womb. And we oarsmen were truly the Argo's children. We braced against the blocks and rowed in contest with the hostile wind that filled the mainsail, twenty-four to a side, two to a bench, applying ourselves to the oars, dragging them back and swinging them forwards back and forth, as if grappling with an energetic bedmate. The s.h.i.+p flew over the water, rocking her crew, and the way she rose and fell on her way across the choppy highways of the barren sea strongly recalled the rolling hips of Aphrodite as she took to the waves in her scallop sh.e.l.l.

'Such was the lover-like tempo that had taken up residence in the virile bodies of the Argonauts during their voyage; such was the rhythm that governed our movements when we found dry land under our feet at last.

'And the women of Lemnos had been alone a long time ...'

Here the second mate paused in his narrative and reached for the water jug. His audience sighed gustily and sipped their drinks, pleased with the story so far. Meanwhile, I seized this opportunity to put a question to the evening's guest of honour, Raguel Bastesen, the director of the paper mills (he claimed Icelandic descent through a grandmother from Hnifsdalur), saying by way of a preamble: 'Today I have been looking down the fjord, or perhaps up it, I simply can't work out which is which. I can't for the life of me understand where the entrance is to this bowl we're sitting in. When I asked Captain Alfredson this morning which direction we had entered the fjord from by your leave, Captain he answered by pointing due north, to where the rock wall is at its highest. But I couldn't see any gap by which we could have entered, nor can the MS Elizabet Jung-Olsen excellent s.h.i.+p as she is sail straight through the Norwegian fjeld.'

My dinner companions gave a murmur of laughter at this last sally. I tilted my head, looking waggishly at Captain Alfredson to ensure that everyone knew the joke was on me, not him. And added: 'You see, I a.s.sumed we had come from the south where the mountains are lowest.'

Then I came to my question: 'So I appeal to you, Herr Director, as a local; what species of fish are most common in this fjord?'

To my astonishment Raguel Bastesen seemed at a loss: 'Er, that's a good question ...' the director muttered, plucking at his right earlobe and rubbing it between finger and thumb while he considered his answer. I filled the gap: 'You see, it occurred to me that we might be able to purchase some fresh fish for the pot.'

At this he seemed to wake up: 'Oh, no, I doubt that, Mr Haraldsson, fish don't find their way up here in any great number. It's mainly in April that you get a shoal or two of cod straying into the fjord by mistake. Then you can catch the odd fish with a rod, some of them quite large, but we don't see any other species.'

I had difficulty hiding my disappointment at Director Bastesen's 'neither nor' reply. My dinner companions were not especially concerned, having shown nothing but satisfaction with the catering on board, so I thanked him politely and the captain gave the mate Caeneus a sign to resume his tale, which he did: 'Our s.h.i.+p was the Argo of the many nails, the greatest vessel of her age. The timbers of her hull came from the forests of Mount Pelion, where Jason son of Aeson had been fostered until the age of twenty by Master Cheiron, Cheiron's mother, his wife and his daughters and this Cheiron was half man, half horse, or what the poets call a "centaur". The trees of the forest containing the future strakes of the yet-to-be-built s.h.i.+p were felled under the guidance of this same Cheiron who chose only those trees that had achieved their full maturity during the time the future captain of our s.h.i.+p had shared the mountain with them. Indeed, while their branches had been stretching their leafy crowns to the skies and their roots sucked nourishment from the fertile soil of the Pelion heights, the young Jason's muscles had been tempered by the practice of sports on the mountainsides by day, while by night his intellectual gifts were honed in debate and song in the deep cavern of his tutor.

'Yet although Jason's mind and hand had such a deep rapport with the vessel that he was to steer, it was evident that it would require more than mere mortal strength to achieve the superhuman task that had been laid upon us. So the day the s.h.i.+p was deemed ready to launch, bright-eyed Athena descended to earth among the s.h.i.+pwrights and fitted in her prow a beam from the whispering oak of her father Zeus. With this gift the Argo became the eighth wonder of the world, and the speaking bow timber was to be our guide throughout the perilous quest that lay ahead.

'Now the bow timber had some motherly advice for Jason son of Aeson, captain of the Argo, telling him to order his crew back on board and continue on his way. Gently but firmly she reminded him that by our hazardous voyage into the blue grasp of Poseidon the earth-shaker, who could easily twiddle the greatest galley in the world like a sixpence between his blue fingers by this voyage, we Argonauts were intending to be the first men ever to negotiate the Clas.h.i.+ng Rocks. For thus we would enter the Black Sea to reach the land of Colchis and find the golden fleece that Jason's people had lost and wished to recover. They had promised to make him king if he fulfilled this quest.

'But as Jason son of Aeson stood foursquare on the gangway with the message from doe-eyed Hypsipyle in his upraised hand, he was deaf to the s.h.i.+p's voice of reason. The Queen of Lemnos had concluded her letter with the words that he was welcome to a banquet at her palace together with those of his crew who were not standing watch that evening. So now Jason ordered us Argonauts to ready ourselves for a visit to the nation of women.

'Jason buckled on his purple mantle of double fold, a gift he had received from the hand of Athena the day the keel was laid in our s.h.i.+p the Argo, and this mantle was a creation of such blazing splendour that it rivalled the dawn; red as fire in the middle, deepening to indigo at the richly ill.u.s.trated hem. This hem was embroidered with gold and told the story of the siblings Phrixus and h.e.l.le, children of King Athamas and the cloud G.o.ddess Nephele. When their stepmother Ino convinced their father that he should sacrifice his children to prevent the harvest from failing in the land of Iolcus, they escaped on the back of a certain golden-fleeced talking ram.

'Having flown a longish way, the children began to tire and it so chanced that midway the girl h.e.l.le fell to earth over the sea of Marmara which has been known ever since as the h.e.l.lespont. But at the ram's urging the boy Phrixus clung on for dear life to his dazzling woolly coat and so at last they reached land at Colchis. There the boy married the princess, sacrificed the ram and dedicated the sacrifice to the war G.o.d Ares. He hung the blazing gold fleece in a grove of trees, casting a web of spells so that it would be guarded by a sleepless dragon and no man would ever be able to lay hands on it. Meanwhile, back in Iolcus, the children's homeland, the people thought it a national disgrace to have lost the fabled ram into the clutches of the men of Colchis.

'All these events could be seen woven into our captain Jason's purple cloak. And where the story of Phrixus and h.e.l.le ended, his own story began.

'Jason son of Aeson now set out to meet doe-eyed Hypsipyle, the powerful queen of the Lemnian women, together with the poet Orpheus, the beekeeper Butes and the brothers Zetes and Calais, the winged sons of Boreas. The mantle swirled about the captain's body how well he wore it! while the dazzling storied web billowed about his feet as if he were floating like an immortal on a sun-flushed cloud. Towards evening the rest of us were to march through the town and meet them in the palace gardens.

'So, with the help of the finery that we had brought along in our kitbags, we deckhands hurriedly set about making ourselves presentable for the womenfolk of Lemnos.'

IV.

TODAY THERE WAS AN ACCIDENT at the sawmill. I was sitting in my spot on deck with one eye on the cable cars that were crawling up and down the mountain as they had the day before, the other on the fis.h.i.+ng rod that I had cadged from the purser. I had baited the hook with bully beef, cast the line over the port side and fixed the rod firmly to the gunwale. The line glittered as it arced gently in the spring breeze. My gaze was fixed on the float when the factory siren suddenly set up a deep strident wailing in the bay and a moment later there was a clank from the mountainside: the cableway had ground to a halt, timber wagons swaying on one side, iron-bound blocks of paper on the other.

A workman in blue overalls came racing out of the mill and ran over to the yellow, two-storey house where the director Raguel had his headquarters. Two clerks came out to meet him. The workman waved his arms in the air, pointing to the sawmill and the yellow house in turn. Then he clenched his fist and held it to his ear as if talking on the phone, at which one of the clerks ran back into the house, while the worker and the other clerk raced back to the mill. As they reached it the big doors at the eastern end were flung open and four factory hands hurried out carrying a fifth on a stretcher between them. He seemed delirious and kept trying to throw himself off the stretcher while his workmates pushed him down again. He beat them off with what seemed like unusually short arms that I understood later had been truncated in the accident torn off at the elbows. More workmen came out of the mill doors on their heels and looked on apprehensively. One turned, shouted something to the others and pointed to the cable cars.

Now the door of one of the workers' huts burst open and a wailing woman tried to run to the injured man but before she could go far the man in blue overalls intercepted her and clasped her tight. Three young children appeared in the doorway and stood there watching their mother cry, not daring to venture out.

I heard a truck start up on the quay and a moment later it drove over to the group by the mill. The driver shouted something out of the window to the stretcher-bearers but they didn't stir. At that, the office clerk from the yellow house did some fast talking, gesticulating with his arms and stamping his feet, trying to drag the others over to the back of the truck. The man holding the woman now relinquished his task to someone else, shouted an order at the stretcher-bearers and ran to the beetle-black limousine parked beside the yellow house; it was the director's own car, a Chrysler Windsor, 1947 vintage.

I nudged the first engineer who was standing beside me on deck watching the events unfold like the rest of the crew of the MS Elizabet Jung-Olsen.

'This should be interesting ...'