But I couldn’t speak. I could only gulp, staring down at his outstretched hand, in the pale latex catering glove, while the blood hissed in my ears.
I looked up, into his friendly blue eyes, and then back down at the latex glove, with dark hairs showing through, pressed against the rubber, and thought, I must not scream. I must not scream.
Please God, don’t let me scream.
Jansson looked down at his hand, as if to see what I was gaping at, and then laughed, and pulled the glove off with his other hand.
“So sorry, I forget I am wearing these. They are for catering, you know?”
He threw the pale flaccid glove into the bin and then shook my limp, unresisting hand; his grip was firm, his fingers warm and slightly dusty from the latex coating.
“I’m looking for a girl,” I said, knowing I was being abrupt, but too shaken to be more polite. “Dark-haired, about my age or a bit younger. Pretty, with pale skin. She didn’t have an accent—she was either English or completely bilingual.”
“I’m sorry,” Jansson said regretfully, and he did look sorry. “I don’t think any of my staff fit that description, though you are welcome to take a walk around and see if any of them are the girl you are looking for. I have only two female staff members and neither speak very good English. Jameela is over by the serving hatch, and Ingrid is on salads, behind the grill station there. But neither of them fit your description. Perhaps one of the stewards or waiting staff?”
I craned my head to see the two women he indicated, and saw that he was right. Neither was remotely like the girl I’d seen. Although she had her head bowed and her body hunched away from me, I was certain that Jameela was the Asian woman I’d seen in the cabin as we came down. She was Pakistani or Bangladeshi, I thought—and absolutely tiny, probably not even five feet tall. Ingrid, on the other hand, was Scandinavian and at least two hundred pounds, plus she had a good six inches on me. As I looked at her she put her hands on her hips, squaring up to me almost aggressively, although I knew it was unfair to think that—it was her height that made the gesture seem threatening.
“Never mind,” I said. “Sorry for disturbing you.”
“Tack, Otto,” Nilsson said, and then made a joke in Swedish that set Otto laughing. He patted Nilsson on the back and said something that made Nilsson guffaw in return, a great belly laugh that set his stomach shaking. He raised his hand to the rest of the crew. “Hejdå!” he called, and then ushered me out into the corridor.
“I’m sorry about that,” he said over his shoulder, as he led the way towards the stairs. “The official language of the boat is English and it’s policy that we don’t speak other languages in front of our English guests, but I thought under the circumstances . . .” He trailed off and I nodded.
“It’s fine. Better that everyone was comfortable and understood what they were being asked properly.”
We were passing the crew’s cabins again, and as we passed the few open doors I glanced in, shocked afresh at the dinginess of the cramped quarters. I couldn’t imagine spending week after week, month after month, in the windowless confines. Perhaps Nilsson felt my silence at his back, for he spoke again.
“They’re a little small, aren’t they? But there’s only a dozen or so staff on the boat, excluding the sailing crew, so we don’t need much space. And I can tell you, they are better than much of the accommodation on rival ships.”
I didn’t say what I was thinking, which was not that it was the space itself that shocked but the contrast with the light, airy rooms above. In truth the rooms were no worse than plenty of cross-channel ferries I’d traveled on; in fact they were more spacious than some. But it was the graphic illustration of the gap between the haves and have-nots that was upsetting, a modern upstairs-downstairs in action.
“Does everyone share?” I asked, as we passed a darkened cabin where someone was getting dressed with the door ajar, while their bunkmate snored. Nilsson shook his head.
“The junior staff share cabins, the cleaners and the younger stewards and so on, but all the senior staff have their own.”
We had reached the staircase that led to the upper deck and I made my way slowly up, following Nilsson’s wide back, and holding on to the grab rails as the ship heaved and tipped. Nilsson opened the dividing door that separated the guest part of the ship from the workers and then turned to me, as he shut the door behind us both.
“I’m sorry that did not work out so well,” he said. “I had hoped that one of the girls would be the woman you saw, and put your mind at rest.”
“Look . . .” I rubbed my face, feeling the roughness of the healing scar on my cheek, and the pressure headache that was beginning to build. “Look, I’m not sure—”
“Let’s press on and speak to Eva,” Nilsson said firmly. And he turned and led the way along the corridor towards yet another set of stairs.
The ship heaved itself up another crest, and down in the trough, and I swallowed against the gush of spit in my mouth and felt the cold clamminess of sweat on my spine, beneath my shirt. For a moment I almost considered ducking back to my cabin. It wasn’t only my head—I had work to do—I still had to finish reading the press pack, and I needed to make a start on the piece Rowan would be expecting when I got back. I was horribly conscious that Ben, Tina, Alexander, and all the others were probably already making notes, filing pieces, googling Bullmer, and sorting out press shots.
But then I steeled myself. If I wanted Nilsson to take me seriously I had to go through with this. And as much as I wanted to climb the ladder at Velocity, some things were more important.
We found Eva in the spa reception, which was a beautiful, tranquil room on the upper deck, almost all glass, with long curtains that floated in the cool breeze from the open door. The glass walls looked out onto the deck, the light almost searingly bright after the beige warren of dimly lit rooms below decks.
A striking dark-haired woman in her forties with wide gold hoops in her ears looked up as Nilsson and I entered.
“Johann!” she said pleasantly. “What can I do for you? And this must be . . . ?”
“Lo Blacklock,” I said, holding out my hand. I felt instantly better out of the claustrophobic confines of the staff quarters, the clammy nausea retreating in the sea breeze.
“Good morning, Ms. Blacklock,” she said, smiling. I shook her hand, her grip firm, her fingers bony but strong. Her English was astonishingly good—almost as good as the girl in the cabin’s had been, but it wasn’t her. She was much too old, her carefully moisturized skin still betraying that slight weathering of a complexion that had seen a little too much sun. “What can I do for you?”
“I’m sorry,” I said. “I was looking for someone, and the girls below decks suggested it might be you, but it’s not.”
“Miss Blacklock saw a woman last night,” Nilsson put in. “In the cabin next to hers. She was in her twenties, with long dark hair and pale skin. Miss Blacklock heard some noises that made her concerned, and we were trying to ascertain if it was a member of staff.”
“I’m afraid it wasn’t me,” Eva said, but quite kindly. There was no trace of the slightly tribal defensiveness the girls downstairs had betrayed. She gave a little laugh. “If I’m being honest, it’s a long time since I was in my twenties. Have you spoken to the stewardesses? Hanni and Birgitta both have dark hair and are around that age. And so does Ulla.”
“Yes, we’ve spoken to them,” Nilsson said. “And we’re on our way to see Ulla now.”
“She’s not in any trouble,” I said. “The woman, I mean. I’m worried for her. If you can think of anyone it might be . . .”
“I’m sorry not to be able to help,” Eva said. She spoke directly to me, and she did look sorry, the most genuinely concerned of any of the people I had spoken to so far. There was a little frown between her beautifully plucked brows. “I really am. If I hear anything . . .”
“Thank you,” I said.
“Thanks, Eva,” Nilsson repeated, and turned to go.