Canal Dreams

'Then, in the sky; streamers of high cloud like ragged rays of dark sunlight, seeming to imanate from one place over the horizon. They spread over the head, while in the distance, beneath them, clouds form, and the sun looks milky, and a halo the colour of ashes surrounds it, so that it begins to look like an eye.

'In time, the sun is put out by the clouds, and it begins to go gloomy; quick dark clouds fill the middle air while on the horizon a wall of cloud starts to engulf the sky. It is the colour of copper at first. As it comes closer and grows higher, it darkens, through brown to black, and half the sky is covered by it. It is like an impossibly tall wave of darkness, tall like the night; the winds around you are still slight and uncertain, but the surf is hammering the beach like thunder, slow and heavy, like the beat of a cruel god's mighty heart.

'The dark wave falls, the winds land like hammer blows; rain like an ocean falling from the sky; waves like walls.

'When you think — if you are still alive to think — it can grow no worse, the sea retreats, sucked back into the darkness, leaving the coast far below the lowest low tidemark draining away into a violent night. Then the ocean returns, in a wave that dwarfs all previous waves; a cliff; a black mountain spilling over the land like the end of the world.

'Perhaps you have seen satellite photographs of a hurricane; from space, the eye looks tiny and black in the centre of the white featheriness of the storm. It looks too small and too perfectly round and black to be natural; you think it is something lying on the film. The hurricanes look very like galaxies, which I hear also have black holes in their centres. The eye is maybe thirty kilometres across. The air pressure can be so low sailors have said blood comes to the mouth and the eardrums ache. The water at the bottom of the eye is sucked up three metres above the rest of the ocean. Seen from a ship which has survived the winds, it is like being in a cauldron; the walls of blackness swirl round about, but in the eye the air is calm, humid, and appallingly hot. The circling storm moans from all around. The waves on the water froth and jostle and leap up, coming crashing in from every direction, colliding and bursting their spray into the boiling calm air. More often than not, raggedy, exhausted birds fly aimlessly inside the eye, those not killed by it; confused and beaten, they fill up the moaning air with their cries. A circle of clear sky overhead looks like Earth seen from space; blue and far away and unreal; sun and stars shine as though through gauze, removed and unreal. Then the screaming winds and the blackness and the drowning rain starts again.

'You ever been in a hurricane, Mandamus? Broekman asked.

'Merciful heavens, no, Mandamus shook his big head heavily. 'But I have read about it.

Hisako listened to the sound of the aguacero howling outside, and thought Mr Mandamus was very likely the sort of person who talked about air crashes during a bumpy flight, attempting to reassure nervous passengers with the thought that they wouldn't feel a thing, possibly. She decided not to correct him on 'imanate'.

The storm passed quickly, as aguaceros always did. Behind the drawn curtains of the stuffy lounge, it looked like a pleasant day.

Gordon Ja

Then the venceristas took one of the cooks away; some time later he returned with a trolley of burgers, potatoes and salad. The gunmen watched them eat and passed out bottles of water and Coke.

Mrs Bleveans persuaded Sucre she should be allowed to collect some toothpaste, a few toothbrushes and a bottle of antiseptic. Before she went she checked with Marie and Hisako, to find out if either of them needed any sanitary protection; neither did.

'Christ, I suppose that could be it, Broekman said, rubbing his lips with one hand. Philippe, Endo and Hisako had told him of the theory that the venceristas had come to shoot down the plane. The noise of Mr Mandamus snoring as he slept off his meal covered any sounds short of a shout they were likely to make.

'Is just a thought, Philippe said.

'Flight today, Endo confirmed.

'Crazy bastards; what're they trying to do?

'Maybe we're being paranoid, Hisako said. 'We'll know soon anyway.

'If the flight is today, Broekman said. 'On the news yesterday there was talk of some last-minute hitch; might be a delay.

'There was? Hisako looked at Philippe and Endo. Nobody else had heard this.

'On the World Service, just before our friends arrived.

Philippe looked worried. 'Captain Bleveans; he said the venceristas became… upset? Upset, when they hear something on the radio. Last evening.

'Shit, Broekman said. 'Sounds uncomfortably neat, doesn't it? He rubbed one bristly cheek. 'I didn't think the venceristas were that crazy.

'I think we must get to the radio, Philippe said.

'How do we do that? Broekman said, patting his overalls pockets for cigars that weren't there. 'Rushing the guy at the bar would be suicide, and all we get's a gun or two and a couple of grenades, plus we alert the others. If we had the time and a screwdriver maybe we could unscrew the windows, he nodded slightly towards the curtains, 'if they aren't rusted up. But we'd have to distract them for ten minutes or more. There's no outside access from the toilets; no access anywhere. The alternative is, one of us can try to get out on some sort of excuse and aim to overpower whoever they send with us. That's probably our best bet. And they probably know that.

Philippe shrugged. 'What excuse, you think?

'Try pretending we have to do something to one of the ships; tell them we have to turn on the bilge pumps or we'll sink, or transfer fuel to the generator or we'll lose power; something like that.

'You think they believe us?

'No. Broekman shook his head.

'So is not much hope?

Broekman shook his head. 'Doesn't mean it isn't worth a try. Perhaps we'll be lucky. They've been very casual so far; maybe they're not as confident and professional as they look; maybe they're just sloppy. Broekman ran one hand through his hair, looked round at where the Nadia's captain lay, one arm raised over his head to keep the light out of his eyes. 'We'd better get Bleveans in on this; it's his ship we might break if it goes wrong. Do we wake him now or leave him to get up in his own time?

Hisako confirmed Endo had understood. 'Leave him, Endo said.

Philippe pursed his lips. 'I don't know… if this plane-

The lounge door opened. Sucre stood there, pointing the gun at Hisako with one hand. Señora Onoda, he called. Bleveans stirred a little at the noise. Mandamus snored loudly and muttered something under his breath in Arabic. Hisako stood up into a layer of smoke, smelling Gitanes.

'Yes? She was aware that everybody was looking at her.

Sucre waved the gun. 'You come with me. He stood away from the door. There was another armed man in the corridor behind him.

Philippe started to get up too; she put a hand on his shoulder. 'Philippe-chan; it's all right.

He squeezed her hand. 'Hisako, don't- he began, but she was moving quickly away.

'Is just a phone call, Señora Onoda, Sucre told her on the way up to the radio room. He was about the same height as she, though much more muscled. His skin was coppery-olive and his face held no trace of the blacking; it looked freshly shaved. He smelled of cologne. She suspected his black curly hair was trimmed and perhaps even curled to make him look Guevara-ish.