‘Wow!’ he exclaimed. The drawing Anouk must have done during the emergency drill was unbelievably detailed and accurate. A masterpiece which left no doubt that she was a highly talented child, at least in art.

Because he didn’t want to take the computer away from the girl, Martin fished his mobile from his pocket and photographed the screen. Then he left Anouk, who’d closed her eyes again and waited outside the cabin for Elena.

*

‘Anouk drew that?’ the doctor asked after she’d dressed the girl in a clean nightshirt and left the cabin too. ‘All by herself?’ She stared in disbelief at the picture on Martin’s mobile, showing a hole yawning murkily in the ground – a well perhaps – at the bottom of which you could see water shimmering darkly. The drawing also showed a rope that extended down the shaft to the water.

‘Is there anywhere here on the ship that looks roughly like this? A hole, a cavity or a bulkhead through which you can see the ocean?’ he asked Elena.

The doctor knitted her brow and bent her head sideways to look at the picture from a different angle. ‘Hmm,’ she said indecisively. ‘I’ve never seen anything like that. And, in general, cruise ships rarely have holes in their hulls when out at sea.’

Out at sea, Martin repeated in his head, and that gave him an idea.

Of course. When they’re out at sea. But what about when they’re not?

‘Which deck is the anchor room on?’ he asked excitedly.

‘Anchor? You mean…’

A hole, beneath it water, a rope, which could also be a chain.

‘Which deck?’ he urged her. ‘Please!’

Elena thought about it. ‘There are several,’ she said eventually. ‘As far as I know there’s one on deck 3. And another higher up, on deck 11, I think.’

11 + 3

The blood was pumping noticeably faster in Martin’s veins. He glanced again at the image of the toy computer and said, ‘Maybe it’s just my imagination running wild. But it can’t do any harm if we take a look around the anchor room.’

31

‘Tiago Álvarez?’

Although it was no longer morning Yegor Kalinin was sitting on the sofa in his suite in dressing gown and leather slippers, tickling the neck of his Jack Russell terrier, Ikarus. Normally dogs and other pets were not permitted in the private rooms aboard the cruise liner, but the owner of the Sultan took no more heed of that than he did the smoking ban in the cabins. To the chagrin of his non-smoking wife, he’d had the smoke alarm deactivated in the bedroom.

‘This chap here?’