‘Fuck’s sake, Captain, this isn’t Silent Witness,’ I snap. Shit, shouldn’t have said that. But it’s been a long day and however many times I deal with a death, it always sets me on edge. Even more than it used to since what happened before I left for the ships.

Leo gives me a look. Even without the passengers on board, at sea, he is my superior and I shouldn’t speak to a captain that way. Especially not Leo, who I’ve learned in my short time on the ship, is a stickler for convention and hierarchy.

‘Sorry,’ I say. ‘I apologize. It’s late, we’re all tired, and this was obviously a bit of a shock,’ I continue. ‘There’ll need to be an autopsy when we can get him to land, but there’s no immediate sign of physical violence. And from memory, though I will need to check, he had no chronic conditions.’ I pause. I shouldn’t speculate, but I can’t help myself – I know what the most likely result of the autopsy will be and Leo is clearly looking for some kind of answer. ‘So my best guess, and I need to reiterate, it is simply a guess, is some kind of overdose.’

‘An overdose? What, as in, drugs?’ Leo splutters. ‘I have a very strict anti-drugs policy on board, all the crew know that.’ A beat passes before he continues. ‘Or do you mean he took a deliberate overdose?’

God. I’ve already said I don’t know – why is he keeping on like this? I try to keep my voice steady and even. ‘Captain, I’m sorry, I really can’t say. There’s no way of telling until the toxicology is done, and possibly not even then. And as I must emphasize, an overdose is nothing more than a guess on my part. I’m a GP, not a pathologist. Let’s move Rick to the mortuary and organize the paperwork. The sooner we can do that and get his body to land for an autopsy, the more likely we are to get answers.’

He nods. ‘OK. I’ll contact the port in the morning and see if we can bring forward our next scheduled resupply slot so we can offload him as quickly as possible to … wherever he needs to go.’

‘Thank you, I think that would be a good idea.’

Quite aside from wanting to get to the bottom of what’s happened here, I imagine the crew will be somewhat creeped out by knowing the dead body of one of their crewmates is still on board, cooling in the mortuary.

25

May 2013

Scottish Highlands

I pushed my book away, stretched and yawned.

‘Haven’t we done enough for today, Dad?’ I grumbled.

He twisted round to look at the clock. Almost four.