“The coasts of Turkey, sir,” says Muresh, when dawn shows us the horizon broken by a line of land.

I observe the entrance to the Bosphorus Strait with such attention that the Second Mate looks again for something new. But he finds only the felucca of Turkish customs maneuvering to reach our ship.

I order the First Mate to reduce speed.

I touch the bag hidden in my clothes, the coins arranged since the start of our voyage for the taxes we must pay for the greater glory of Sultan Abdul-Hamid II. And the obligatory bribe.

The old ceremony. Receive the officers. Hand over the documents they will review with suspicion, the brief review of the Demeter, the discovery of some detail that will make our old schooner a danger to other ships sailing to the Marmara Sea, the fact that they at last forgive us magnanimously this defect and allow us to continue, the farewell in which I give them additional coin. Never a bribe, only a recognition of their generosity.

A ceremony that will occupy us nearly the entire day.

The chief of the men who board us is Captain Melih and when he sees our flag, he mentions, quite matter-of-factly, that his father was killed by a Russian, during the war.

I mentally add a few more coins to the bribe.

He glances around as though he could glean our intentions from our mere appearance. I look at my crew; there is nary a suspicious thing about them.

Mayhap Abranoff’s tired appearance as he, like his Captain, has not slept well these last few nights. Or the familiarity with which Petrofsky and Acketz stand close together. Or the serious mien of Vlahutza.

He asks me to accompany him below to survey the cargo.

He has a couple of his men go down first, then he follows, a lamp in one hand and a pistol in the other. It is not a firm, self-confident gesture, like that of Varna’s Tziganes.

In the hold, there are only the boxes and a few dead gray rats on the floor. Naught else.

The Turk looks at me accusingly, as though I had put those small corpses there just to make him uncomfortable.

I must treat the rats as an unimportant curiosity; otherwise, the baksheesh will be unusually large. And we did not bring enough money to afford it.

I pick one up with indifference and examine it briefly.

“Old rats,” I say, tossing it into a corner, not letting disgust cloud my face, for the animal seems a bag devoid of weight, drained, internal organs gnawed. A shell.

Alongside Captain Melih, I examine the boxes we are transporting.

Wood: sturdy and well-assembled.

Too much so.

Only at that moment do I realize the strange construction of the crates. Valuable wood, with a triple row of nails ensuring it will not come apart for any reason.

No simple packaging, shipping containers; I should almost classify them as furniture, built with precision, with a particular purpose in mind.

There is no defect, except a small crack running the length of some lids.

While the Turks count the boxes, I run my fingers along the tiny imperfection.

It is akin to caressing skin: firm, soft, rounded ... I consider it again. Too precise; an idealized drawing of a crack.

Without knowing why, I close my eyes, draw the crack upon my palm, letting the feel of it travel the lines of my hand. It is difficult, soft ... I trace it and the motion makes it easier to form an image of it ….

I carry that image between my fingers, transport it to another crack, a different crate with another imperfection. I touch the new lid, resting my hand upon it, closing my eyes.

The cracks are identical, as if sketched upon the wood itself, without any variation.

Not a defect. Put there deliberately.

Someone hid the precise purpose of that drawing by disguising it. But to what end? It is too small to serve as ventilation. As tiny as the path of the worms inside an apple. I imagine them wriggling their way out of the box, joining together under my palm to form a rat, its fur a million white worms squirming, blinking a million blind eyes.

A rat like the one waiting under my sheets, every night.

Something infinitely small grazes my hand, digging into the whorls of my fingertips, humid and agile like some infinitesimal tongue ….

With a shout, I jerk my hand away from the box. Melih looks up from a document and walks toward me. He can confiscate the cargo, my ship, hold us in this place for as long as he deems necessary, lock us in the schooner with these boxes for months entire.

Not expecting the effort it requires, I shake my hand with a gesture of pain. Although I can still perceive something viscous on my fingertips, I bring it to my lips ….

A splinter.

As though unconscious of his stare, I dig with my teeth for a non-existent fragment stuck in my skin. After I feign its extraction, I sigh, bored, and look around.

Melih continues reading the permits, reviewing the stamps.

There is nothing unusual. Not there, at least.

At 4:00 pm, we receive the order to continue our course. I write in the log with a firm gesture: All correct.

I do not believe so.

Not when my palm retains the stink of some creature’s rancid saliva.

Not when I recall that Mikhail would kiss me like that, before biting my flesh hard, because after pleasure, all that remains is to experience pain.

Not when I recognize in my palm the dead stench of the rat that awaits me, erect in my dreams.

Vlahutza watches me lean overboard, vomiting a yellow fear that is lost in the waters of the Bosphorus.