EPILOGUE

 

 

THE YOUNG GIRL lay on her back in the wooden boat and looked up at the sky. It was pale blue, almost grey. Wispy white clouds hung motionless, strung across the faded expanse like fine cobwebs in an attic.

Enormous faces seemed to form above that cosmic ceiling, peering down at her with vague interest. A group of birds wheeled overhead – seagulls foraging for carrion – but they remained at a height, afraid to fly any lower. Their cries were muted by the distance, the tiny screams of lost souls.

The sun was weak and insubstantial; a light slowly going out in that huge attic, perhaps forever.

The faces receded, disinterested for now in her lowly existence.

The girl could not remember her name.

She had no memory of how she had got here, in the little rowboat.

Her arms and legs were aching and there were cuts on her knees and shins. The skin of her hands was lacerated. Fresh blood stained her clothing.

She sat up and stared at the distant shoreline, blinking as she examined the lines of the dead who stood calmly looking out to sea, as if waiting for something. They stood in neat rows, stiff and unmoving; their white faces were a series of smudges atop their ragged shoulders. One or two of them raised their arms and pointed out to sea, towards her; others followed suit, setting off a chain reaction. Before she turned away, most of them were pointing at her, singling her out. For an instant the girl thought that she recognised one of them, but could not be certain.

The girl’s boat was moving away from the dead, drifting gradually out to sea, buoyed on the strong current. She was glad: they looked scary and threatening.

They seemed ravenous.

The girl hoped that she would be lucky enough to run into a ship and be rescued. Otherwise she might simply drift until she starved to death. And then she would return, weighed down with a hungry heart that could never be satisfied.