On the tinted glass table in front of Yegor was a colour printout with the personal details of the passenger his third security officer had just provided a report on, including a photo, itinerary, cabin number and the status of his bill. To date the Argentinian hadn’t made much effort to replenish the coffers of the cruise company. He had an inner cabin, never drank wine with his meals, didn’t join any on-shore excursions, and hadn’t bought a single souvenir in the shops on board.

‘That’s the bastard. I’m sure of it,’ Veith Jesper said.

‘And he was the one hiding behind the bed?’

‘It’s like I said. I saw him and then found his picture in the passenger files. There’s no doubt about it.’

Yegor eyed the twenty-three-year-old man suspiciously. ‘What were you doing in the cabin, anyway?’ he asked Veith, even though he already knew the answer.

Yegor couldn’t stand his nephew. He hadn’t been able to abide the boy’s cheesehead father, who his sister had insisted on marrying just because she’d let the loser get her up the duff while she was studying in Amsterdam.

At twenty-one, getting involved with a street musician might have been an enticing prospect. But twenty-three years later Irina had also understood that no money, no job and no condom weren’t perhaps the best recipe for a promising future. It was only for his sister’s sake that he’d given the useless brute who called him uncle a job on the Sultan. As far as he was concerned Veith could have wasted the rest of life as a trainer for adolescent street thugs in that Dutch shithole that called itself a martial arts school. His one achievement in life was that he didn’t have a criminal record, but given his penchant for violence, drugs and easy girls, it could only be a matter of time before his accommodation was at the state’s expense.

‘I was dealing with the cleaner,’ Veith said, unfazed. He looked as if he was just about to do a photoshoot for a surfing magazine, which only made Yegor even more irate.

The ship owner pursed his lips and briefly enjoyed fantasising about Ikarus biting into his nephew’s I-have-them-all-on-the-first-date face. ‘Please jog my memory,’ he said. ‘I thought you were employed to help the head of security. Not to torture chambermaids.’

Not a week passed on a ship without substantial friction, both between the passengers and amongst employees. Yegor had thought it wouldn’t do any harm to have on board someone he could trust to deal with the rough stuff. But he’d also thought that Veith was as blond as he looked. A thug without a brain, easily manipulated.

How wrong you can be.