When the contraction and release of their muscles make the men fall silent at the gunwale, or when a birdcall 37abruptly knocks a hole through the noiseless air, that’s the worst. Then Fritz hears the solitude hiss. Every time the wind plucks at the ropes, it sounds like someone laughing.

Half a cup of water, for Christ’s sake.

Around the sloop the world is nothing but grey sea, white haze and tall rocks, which appear to be hovering above the water. Everywhere lurk the brown shadows of Misery Mountain. Misery, thinks Fritz, wanting to go home. Silently he curses each of the mountain’s three peaks in turn, then himself and finally the skipper, who saw fit to march him out in front of the entire crew and bellow till the spittle flew and froze in his beard. As though half a cup of fresh water was worth all that fuss.

Fritz has a sore throat.

His toes are swimming in cold sweat, and an ugly smell seeps into his nose every time he exhales. Now, despondently, he pokes his tongue around the furry bottom of his mouth. Surely a sick man is allowed to brush his teeth?

The fish leaves thin blood under his nails, in his woollen jumper. Streaks of glittering slime and something darker. Tiny pieces of scale, which flake beneath the knife, sifting down and sticking to wet skin. Sometimes there are worms.

The mood on deck is stooped. Awkward. Soon someone will crack and blurt a joke. Others will laugh too loudly and too long. Fritz will have to make sure he’s the one who guffaws the loudest.

Fancy Fritz. Fritz the Dandy. Fritz the Bath Duck. 38

How he loathes the view over the island, the brutal bulk of the mountain. Inside, hidden beyond the barren wall of the south coast, live diamond miners and meteorologists, men who also smoke and slurp their coffee, men who sleep in low huts and piss with the wind. It doesn’t comfort him. Everything is so desolate and open. Grey and brown. Ice-spotted. When Fritz sends his thoughts overland, the emptiness echoes back. Something inside him flinches. In there, on the island, is where solitude runs its control centre. Fritz has known this ever since he saw the bear—big and white on a cold stretch of beach. Its head shook slowly, then a tremor ran through its pelt, its heavy musculature. The bear rose. Fritz could see it roar. The hatred. A raging dark.