The Pharaoh Key

13

HE WOKE SOME hours later—it was hard to tell exactly how many—as a murmur of voices rose around him, shot through with a tone of alarm. He sat up, temporarily puzzled. The engines sounded different than before—ragged, higher-pitched.

Beside him, Garza sprang awake. “What the hell?”

Everyone was awake now, and lights were coming on. Something out of the ordinary was obviously happening. The ferry began to make a labored turn toward the west, the water churning out from underneath the hull. Gideon could see the pilot on the bridge, in the red glow of the dim bridge lights. He was gesturing vigorously at a subordinate, while other crew appeared to be rushing about, silhouettes moving against the dim background.

“That doesn’t look good,” Gideon said. He could see Garza’s face in the faint light, beaded with sweat. “Hey, are you all right?”

“Don’t worry about me,” said Garza brusquely. “What I want to know is, why is the boat turning so sharply?”

People were now on their feet, and the murmur had become a clamor of talk. One of the engines was now uttering a high-pitched roar, and then the sound abruptly ceased with a muffled bang, while the other engine continued to chug at a higher pitch.

“Son of a bitch,” said Garza, “is it my imagination, or is the deck starting to slant?”

“I believe you’re right.”

“Do you think…we’re sinking?”

“We turned toward shore,” Gideon said slowly. “I suppose it could be because we’re taking on water. If so, maybe the captain is hoping to ground the boat.”

Garza was silent.

“All these people…” Gideon looked around. Their fellow passengers were thoroughly alarmed, but as of yet there was no panic. “I wonder how many can swim?”

The boat shuddered as the single working engine struggled to move them forward. The deck was now clearly slanting.

“Those cars and things aren’t secured,” Gideon said. “That shit’s going to slide. We need to get ourselves on the high side.”

Garza remained silent.

“Let’s go! Hold on to your money and leave the rest.”

The canting deck was still only a few degrees from horizontal, and Gideon felt there was a good chance the captain could ground the ferry or seal the bulkheads to halt the taking on of water. They wound their way among excited groups of people on deck until they had reached the starboard rail. Gideon looked over. The bilge pumps were running like mad, dumping powerful streams of water from the hull openings. He could see the boat was taking on water faster than the pumps could empty it. What had happened? They hadn’t hit anything. Maybe the rotten hull had just given way. From their vantage point at the rail, he now had a better view of the bridge. He was shocked: it was empty. Where were the captain and crew?

As if on cue, he saw the captain exiting the companionway at deck level, moving in haste, followed by his crew. He watched as they scurried to a hatch that led, most likely, to the lower mechanical deck. They undogged it and disappeared, leaving it open. Going to work on the engine, perhaps, Gideon thought grimly, or to seal the bulkheads. It must be worse than it seemed. If the scow actually sank, they needed to come up with a plan to deal with that—now, before mob panic set in.

“We must be a couple of miles offshore,” he said to Garza. “Not too bad a swim, considering the water is warm and there don’t seem to be any currents or tides.”

“Right,” said Garza, voice tight.

“Of course, there might be sharks.”

“Sharks.”

Gideon took a deep breath. “Look, Manuel. The obvious thing is to swim away from the boat before it goes down, get clear. Then we swim westward until we reach shore. Just keep the North Star on your right.”

“On your right,” Garza repeated mechanically.

Gideon suddenly had a suspicion. The captain and crew weren’t going below to fix the engine. The captain would leave the bridge for one reason only: to abandon ship. He and the crew were probably headed for a lifeboat—the damn cowards.

He grabbed Garza by the arm. “Follow me.”

They pushed through the crowd, which was now fully aroused, milling around and shouting up at the bridge in confused and angry voices. More people were instinctually pressing toward the high side of the sinking boat.

They arrived at the open hatch and descended into diesel-stinking dimness. A few caged bulbs illuminated the companionway to the lower deck. They continued following the passage until they heard voices echoing from ahead. In the lead, Gideon slowed and approached a partly open bulkhead door, which he stopped to peer through. The captain and crew were at a boarding platform in the lower part of the hull, open to the calm sea. They were arguing over a small Zodiac hung on davits next to the platform. Seawater was already slopping into the boarding hatch as the vessel settled in the water. The argument was escalating, and in moments it broke out into a fight. There was the flash of steel, a scream of agony, and the captain fell. The crew swung the davits out and lowered the Zodiac into the water, then surged into it, now fighting against the overcrowding; another man was stabbed and fell overboard, then two more were beaten off and left on the platform as the engine roared to life and the Zodiac shot out into the dark sea.

The water was now pouring in through the open boarding hatch. On the ferry deck above, Gideon could hear serious panic taking hold: muffled screaming, a thunder of running feet, the ululations of women.

“We can’t go back up,” Gideon said. “We’ve got to jump into the sea from here and swim for shore.”

He turned to Garza. The man’s face was pale. “No,” he said.

“No what?” Gideon yelled. “We’ve got no choice!”

“No.” The engineer backed away.

Gideon stared at him. “In a minute, maybe less, we’re going to be trapped down here!”

Garza continued to back down the passageway, a look of something like horror on his face. Gideon stared. He had never seen Garza so unmanned. Even in the most frightening moments they had spent together, the man had kept a cool head. Now he seemed to have lost it completely.

“You can’t swim,” said Gideon, simply.

Garza finally managed to nod.

Gideon’s mind raced. The man can’t swim? This messed up everything. “Okay. Okay. We go back on deck. Find something that floats. And launch ourselves on it.”

Garza managed to croak his agreement. The water was now swirling down the passageway at ankle level and rising quickly. With a great shuddering boom the second engine blew, and immediately afterward the lights went out.

“Just stay with me.” Gideon turned and they retreated down the passageway, feeling their way along the walls, up the companionway, and back out the deck hatch.

The scene that greeted them was one of heartbreaking pandemonium. The deck was now tilting at a steeper angle, and various carts, some with struggling donkeys still in harness, were rolling down the sloping surface, dragging the bellowing animals with them. One cart hit the railing and flipped over, throwing both donkey and cart into the sea. The poor animal screamed as it drowned. People had pressed themselves against the higher gunwales of the ferry, clutching at the railing, crying and wailing and reaching beseechingly toward the now empty bridge. Gideon could just see, headed westward, the running lights of the Zodiac vanishing into the murk.

The boat was dead in the water and sinking fast. Water rose over the port gunwales and began creeping up the deck. The tilt grew worse. And now a car began to move, and then another, sliding down the wooden deck and coming to rest against the rail. A large truck suddenly broke free, skidding sideways; it hit the railing with such force that it tore right through with a screech of steel. More trucks and lorries began rumbling down, bashing through the railing into the sea and sinking with a frenzy of bubbles. Screams rose as people caught in their paths were crushed or swept overboard. Flashlights and lanterns bobbed as panicky cries mounted upward from the darkened deck, the shrill screams of mothers punctuated by the wailing of babies—it was a scene out of hell itself. All these people, thought Gideon—they’re going to drown.

He shook his head, trying to clear his mind. The canting ferry felt like it might slide under at any moment; they had to quickly get well clear of the suction and imminent maelstrom of thrashing, drowning people, who would drag any nearby swimmer down with them. It felt heartless, but there was nothing left for them to do now but save themselves.

What could they use as a float? Lumber. He remembered a cart piled with boards that he’d seen loaded on board earlier. He cast about and spied it, jammed up against the port rail with other broken carts. The donkey pulling it, still harnessed, was lying, drowned, in the deepening water.

The lumber was stacked in tied bundles on the overloaded cart. The water was up to its hubs.

“Come on!” He pulled Garza down the deck toward the wagon.

“No—not into the water!”

“Get your ass moving!” He yanked at Garza, hauling him down the sloping deck. Everyone else had gone to the high side, leaving the flooding end free.

Gideon waded through the swelling water, grabbed the wagon wheel, and hauled himself into the cart. Garza followed gingerly, clearly struggling to master his anxiety. The hemp ropes holding the entire load had ruptured, but the individual bundles of wood were still tied and, he hoped, would be able to float like a sort of paddleboard. Gideon braced himself and grabbed a bundle, heaving it overboard, and then another and another. After a moment, Garza followed his lead. The bundles splashed into the sea, but since the boat had ceased moving they didn’t drift away.

“Let’s throw them all overboard!” yelled Gideon. He grabbed another and heaved it. “Manuel, get the women and children! They can float on these!”

Garza stared.

“We’re going to save some lives here! Get going!”

Comprehension dawned on the engineer’s face. He hustled off and a moment later returned leading a stream of women and their children, more following behind and soon generating a stampede. Gideon continued to flip bundles of wood overboard until the entire cartload was bobbing in the calm water next to the sinking boat.

Gideon leapt down from the remains of the cart. “Manuel, listen to me: get in the water and climb onto one of those. Do it now. Paddle away from the boat. Head west. We’ll meet up on shore.”

“And you?”

“I’m going to help these others. And then I’ll swim.”

“I’m going to help, too.”

“You can’t fucking swim!”

“I can do something!”

Mothers were screaming, clutching their babies and little ones. To Gideon’s amazement, the men did not press forward in panic—they were letting the women and children go first. It was a death sentence for all who couldn’t swim: a heartbreaking display of self-sacrifice.

Gideon seized a small child. “Go,” he said to the mother. “Into the water.” He jabbed his finger. “I hand you child.”

Someone who understood English yelled at her in Arabic and she slipped into the water, her arm wrapped around a floating bundle of boards. He passed the child to her. “Next!”

Garza and Gideon worked together, helping the mothers onto the bundles of lumber and then handing over the children. Soon all twenty or so bundles had women and children clinging to or riding atop them.

“Manuel, climb onto that last bundle!” Gideon yelled.

“No—women and children first.”

“Son of a bitch, the whole point of this was to get you on a raft!”

“You see any other men getting on?”

This sudden and unexpected display of heroism confounded Gideon. He wondered how the man—clearly terrified of the ocean—had managed to stay sane during the long and dangerous voyages of the Rolvaag and the Batavia…or, for that matter, how he’d kept his secret from Glinn.

Garza helped several girls onto the last bundle of wood and shoved it away from the railing with his foot. Every bundle was now full of people: perhaps fifty or sixty women and children were clinging to the lumber, drifting in a slow pack away from the boat.

The ferry suddenly lurched, a tremor passing over the deck. All at once it rolled sickeningly and people at the higher sections came tumbling down, screaming, hitting the water and thrashing about. Garza was abruptly thrown into the water and Gideon dove in after him, swimming around and calling his name. But the man didn’t surface. Gideon looked around and then realized he had to get some distance from the boat or he’d be sucked under.

With a great roar of air lurching up from below, the ferry slid sideways. Gideon swam as hard as he could away from the boat, away from the screams and heartrending cries—and then, with a great turmoil of water, the prow of the ferry swung straight up into the air, people flung from it into the water on all sides—and the vessel began sliding straight down with a gigantic, horrible slurp and a boiling eruption of bubbles…and was gone.

Gideon treaded water, clothes weighing him down, observing the scene from a distance. The cries did not last long. Almost nobody, it seemed, could swim. Garza was gone, and the flotilla of women and children on the bundles of lumber had drifted off into the darkness of night. There was nothing more he could do. He looked up, found the North Star, and began to swim through the warm water, slowly and steadily, keeping the star on his right, heading for the unknown shore.