At first he wonders if, after his recently extended solitude, his mind is beginning to play tricks on him. He shakes his head again and rubs his eyes, and when the pounding of blood through his brain has reduced, he looks up and listens.
The voices are indistinct and muffled by the heavy blanket of fog. One moment he can hear people talking and the next, their conversation is swallowed up.
Ric strains to listen harder. There are two men, both Italian. One voice is low and guttural, harsh and unforgiving, like that of an officer chewing out a junior rank; the other distinctive, higher pitched, not that of a young man or boy necessarily, more that of a man pleading or apologising.
Their conversation grows ever more heated, the volume increases and some of the individual words become clearer. The pauses, too, grow longer and carry more weight, as though each argument is carefully considered before being contradicted. And every now and then, one softens and addresses the other in sentimental tones, as if they are friends or, perhaps, relations.
After a prolonged pause, the conversation develops an angry, threatening edge; the higher-pitched of the two voices pleads more desperately, whilst the other continues to accuse with greater authority.
Ric hears the words “bastardo” and “cagna”.
The two men are at loggerheads and their rhetoric is being ratcheted the way a wind-filled sail is tightened. The pleading grows more hysterical as the rebukes increase in certainty. Whatever wrong the one man has done, it becomes apparent the other is not inclined to forgive him.
The mist closes in and muffles the voices.
Ric walks up to the prow and stands, holding on to the forestay, waiting and listening.
The mist thins momentarily and he hears the words “traditore” and “vergogna” and the phrase, “Tesoro mio, sei una cagna. Vai con Dio,” and finally, silence.
One of the men begins to scream and plead, “No, per favore, no, Ci–” followed by a second muffled, choking sound and the scuffling of feet.
And silence. A silence both profound and chilling, and pressed beneath the enormous weight of the fog.
Ric listens hard, but… nothing. The seconds slow as somewhere out in the mist a life slips its mooring and fades away.
The deep, lasting quiet is suddenly punctured by the word “Puddaciaru!” not so much spoken as snarled by the man who has just murdered another.