“That’s puzzling,” Dinesh said, walking about and peering into corners.
The door was shut and neither of us had been up in the night, as evidenced by the fact that we’d been tethered.I would have recalled a joint excursion in which we’d had to manoeuvre our bound hands as one.
Dinesh pulled on his trousers and went to the door.He stepped out.
“Good morning,” Squid said.
“Where’s Pearl?”
“Pardon?”
“The dog.She’s not in our room.”
“Oh…that’s strange,” Squid said, frowning.“Are you sure?”
“Well, come and have a look.See if you can find her.”
Squid came into the room, moving past the captain.
“Simon,” he nodded a greeting.
“Squid.I thought you might have let her out, if she was scratching at the door…”
“I didn’t hear a thing.”
“Neither did we.This is quite strange,” Dinesh said, looking over at me.“There must be a logical explanation.She got out somehow.Perhaps the door wasn’t shut properly.”
Of course, she was on the ship somewhere.We only needed to look for her.She was allowed the run of the ship at times, and she had her favourite spots.
I got dressed and went out on my mission.I checked her preferred areas.I asked everyone I met if they’d seen her.I called her name over and over.
Dinesh and Squid did the same.
I was beginning to lose hope, and imagining she’d jumped off the deck in the night.What if the creature that had pulled me to the rail the other night had lured Pearl in the same way?A mad thought, but where the fuck could she be?
I decided to check the galley one more time.Domingo and I had already opened all of the cupboards, but I checked again, even though it was ridiculous to think she might be in one of them.
“Pearl!Pearl, where are you, my darling?”I called out.
“The captain’s cock is a truncheon!”Esmaralda yelled from Domingo’s quarters.Luckily he and Guthrie had already risen to help us and had gone out to search for her elsewhere.
“I know, you bloody fucking strumpet!Shut it,” I said, losing my composure.
A strange soft snuffle and a muffled whine caught my attention.
“Pearl?Darling, is that you?”I said, trying to hear where it was coming from.
I heard it again, along with a frenzied scratching sound.
“My God, where are you?Where are you?”
The sound was coming from an area used for storage of pots and brooms and foodstuffs.
Why did her whining sound so strange?More frantic scratching and something that sounded like the attempt of a bark.Something was terribly wrong.
“Pearl!Where the fuck are you?”
There was a sizeable wooden crate wedged under some bags of flour.
