The Byssus Killer by Charles Tucker (read a book .TXT) 📗

“We need them in good shape to return their ship to the Black Sea. We need to find the toughest and most intelligent man, preferably with a seagoing qualification. Promote him to skipper to control the crew and take a Falmouth pilot on board to navigate the ship. Dropping into Sant Antioco en route would be a bonus for the island and Senora Vigo.”

Jones was answering the call of the islands. Islands have a strong nostalgic pull on all who leave their entrancing shores. The hardships of surviving battering gales and the loneliness of being cut off by storms are forgotten. The warmth of beautiful days, crystal clear nights and a comradeship against the odds is to experience all of nature’s soul. Setting foot back on one’s island is an uplifting gift known only to islanders. Yet Jones had been caught up in Sant Antioco’s enchantment from the day he set foot on the Sardinian island. The call of that island was overwhelming. He had to go back. And he would take every golden Pinna nobilis shell and every piece of golden shell back to Senora Vigo. He knew she would lay the golden shells in a pattern, a cathedral under the sea, a cattedrale mare, dedicated to all those who had fallen under the golden byssus spell, from Jason and his Argonauts, to Stone Man, to Senora Vigo, to the Sant Antioco islanders and to Jones.

By his dominating warrior appearance Stone Man had imprinted his leadership on the Bulgar crew. They were fit to sail the factory ship to Bourgas. Jones’ administrators worked with the UK Marine Agencies and the Coastguard to remove the seizure notice on the ship. The navigation equipment, instruments and safety gear were tested and approved. The ship, and crew, were ready for sea. Customs threw a spanner in the works refusing to give an export licence for the golden shells. Despite protestations that they were not gold, or gold plated, Customs insisted on an assay test in the Birmingham office. It took three months to remove egg off Birmingham faces.

Stone Man was becoming gently frustrated, even agitated. Jones did not wish to take him to Sant Antioco. Mason and James had no wish to take him on their pilgrimage to the Seven Stones reef. He wanted to return to his home but could not communicate where. He sketched a rough map of the Nordic and Baltic areas overlaid with apparent star patterns. He pointed to himself and the star patterns. He gruffly spoke one word, “Ask.” The scientists raised eyebrows. He could not possibly be a spaceman! But he did have super-fluid blood, unknown in any Earth creature. And, to their amazement, his brain had regenerated. Could he have survived a spacecraft crash? Or a spaceman survived it, intermingled with a Nordic beauty and produced the magnificent Stone Man.

Were they looking at a descendant of a Nordic god? But in Norse mythology the World was created from the flesh of the primordial being, Ymir. After the World was created the first two humans came upon the Earth, Ask and Embla. They were charged with repopulating the Earth after it was destroyed in a catastrophic battle.

Norse mythology is an unknown to marine scientists. Stone Man had asked to be returned to the Nordic area. Circulation of his photograph and bio-data through the Foreign Office to all countries in that vast area drew a blank. Mason, James and Jones were lumbered. Stone Man was making the pilgrimage to the Seven Stones reef. He was of good humour, as if they had opened the door to his homecoming.

There was a high-pressure weather system stationary over the Azores when the four men arrived in Sennen Cove. The Cornish September weather would be fine and clear for some days. Time enough to hire a sea-going boat for the twenty-mile trip to the Seven Stones reef. The boat owners insisted on taking a Lloyds registered pilot to dangerous reefs. Sennen had several retired master mariners qualified to take ships around the treacherous waters of Land’s End. “We will have the best one for you,” they said.

The sturdy pilchard fishing boat was ready for sea, awaiting the pilot when he turned up, a brightly beaming old codger. Many times he had rounded the Horn, he kept reminding them as the seas gained a decent rolling height and the safety of land grew fainter. Mason and James were losing interest in this pilgrimage and their stomachs. Jones was sanguine. He had sea legs. Stone Man was getting more excited the farther west they rolled and pitched, dashing from side to side, bow to stern, fearful of missing some new event.

The whole idea was to arrive in the lee of the reef at sunset at the highest tide of the year. Both Mason and James had exchanged blood gashes with Stone Man when they tried to restrain him in the morgue. They had been infected by his byssus-chitin platelets entering their bloodstreams. They were collectively and unconsciously part of Stone Man’s thought processes, his wishes and dreams. It was his desire to return to the Seven Stones that was driving them. The reality of being on a rolling boat in the wild Atlantic was crushing any dreams except survival. How they wished they could return to Sennen, but they arrived in the lee of the reef to hear the old codger declare high tide would be at ten past midnight.

Stone Man strode to the bow of the boat. He stared at the distinct cream coloured waves crashing over the Seven Stones spraying high into the sunset. Despite the rolling motion of the boat, he stayed majestically upright. Head back, silhouetted against the rich red sky lined with streaks of black cloud, he cried loudly, “Nyodr.” Many times, this word roared forth into the darkness of the icy north. About an hour before midnight, the