Glanville moved along the beach, picking his way between the veins of frosted quartz. As the wreck of the excursion module and the smaller capsule near by came between himself and the pavilion, he began to see the faint outlines of a low-hulled ship, a schooner or brigantine, with its sails reefed, as if waiting at anchor in some pirate lagoon. Ignoring it, Glanville crept into a shallow fault that crossed the lake, its floor some three feet below the surrounding surface. Catching his breath, he undid the parcel, then carried the object inside it under one arm as he set off towards the glimmering wreck of the module.
Twenty minutes later Glanville stepped out from his vantage point behind the excursion module. Around him rode the spectral hulks of two square-sailed ships, their bows dipping through the warm sand. Intent on the pavilion ahead of him, where the silver figure of Thornwald had stood up like an electrified ghost, Glanville stepped through the translucent image of an anchor-cable that curved down into the surface of the lake in front of him. Holding the object he had taken from the parcel above his head like a lantern, he walked steadily towards the pavilion.
The hulls of the ships rode silently at their anchors behind him as he reached the edge of the lake. Thirty yards away, the silver paint around the pavilion speckled the sand with a sheen of false moonlight, but the remainder of the beach and lake were in a profound darkness. As he walked the last yards to the pavilion with a slow rhythmic stride, Glanville could see clearly Thornwald’s tall figure pressed against the wall of the veranda, his appalled face, in the shape of his own hands, staring at the apparition in front of him. As Glanville reached the steps Thornwald made a passive gesture at him, one hand raised towards the pistol lying on the table.
Quickly, Glanville threw aside the object he had carried with him. He seized the pistol before Thornwald could move, then whispered, more to himself than to Thornwald: ‘Strange seas, Captain, I warned you…’ He crouched down and began to back away along the veranda, the pistol levelled at Thornwald’s chest.
Then the door on his left opened and before he could move the translucent figure of his wife stepped from the interior of the pavilion and knocked the weapon from his hand.
He turned to her angrily, then shouted at the headless spectre that stepped through him and strode off towards the dark ships moored in the centre of the lake.
Two hours after dawn the next morning Captain Thornwald finished his preparations for departure. In the last minutes he stood on the veranda, gazing out at the even sunlight over the empty lake as he wiped away the last traces of the aluminium paint with a solvent sponge. He looked down at the seated figure of Glanville tied to the chair by the table. Despite the events of the previous night, Glanville now seemed composed and relaxed, a trace even of humour playing about his soft mouth.
Something about this bizarre amiability made Thornwald shudder. He secured the pistol in his holster — another evening by this insane lake and he would be pointing it at his own head.
‘Captain…’ Glanville glanced at him with docile eyes, then shrugged his fat shoulders inside the ropes. ‘When are you going to untie these? We’ll be leaving soon.’
Thornwald threw the sponge on to the silver sand below the pavilion. ‘I’ll be going soon, Glanville. You’re staying here.’ When Glanville began to protest, he said: ‘I don’t think there’s much point in your leaving. As you said, you’ve built your own little world here.’
‘But…’ Glanville searched the captain’s face. ‘Frankly, Thornwald, I can’t understand you. Why did you come here in the first place, then? Where’s Judith, by the way? She’s around here somewhere.’
Thornwald paused, steeling himself against the name and the memory of the previous night. ‘Yes, she’s around here, all right.’ As if testing some unconscious element of Glanville’s memory, he said clearly: ‘She’s in the module, as a matter of fact.’
‘The module?’ Glanville pulled at his ropes, then squinted over his shoulder into the sunlight. ‘But I told her not to go there. When’s she coming back?’
‘She’ll be back, don’t worry. This evening, I imagine, when the timewinds blow, though I don’t want to be here when she comes. This sea of yours had bad dreams, Glanville.’
‘What do you mean?’
Thornwald walked across the veranda. ‘Glanville, have you any idea why I’m here, why I’ve hunted you all this way?’
‘God only knows — something to do with the emigration laws.’
‘Emigration laws?’ Thornwald shook his head. ‘Any charges there would be minor.’ After a pause, he said: ‘Murder, Glanville.’
Glanville looked up with real surprise. ‘Murder? You’re out of your mind! Of whom, for heaven’s sake?’
Thornwald patted the raw skin around his chin. The pale image of his hands still clung to his face. ‘Of your wife.’
‘Judith? But she’s here, you idiot! You saw her yourself when you arrived!’
