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teeth, strong and white with a single gold tooth at the side. ‘Will the ship sink if poor Katerina strolls on deck?’
    Olsen laughed, too. ‘I will make sure of that!’
    ‘I guard her well while she takes her walk.’
    ‘We see it. So do the crew. There is more than the bear to look at.’
    She grinned and stood up; she was at her most attractive, Mouritzen thought, when she looked like this – a coquette who might break a man’s arm almost without thinking.
    ‘I will go and tell Katerina what you say, Captain,’ she said. ‘Maybe she will come and eat you.’
    She was wearing a full, silky, red dress and she went out of the lounge with a flare of skirt.
    Jones said: ‘I was looking at the plaque upstairs, Captain. So this is the second
Kreya
.’
    Olsen shook his head. ‘No.’
    ‘But it spoke of the first
Kreya
being sunk during the war.’
    ‘That was the second
Kreya
. She was torpedoed by the Germans, twenty years ago, and sank with all hands. Eighteen years before that, the first
Kreya
was sunk in a storm, in the Irish Sea – she too went down with all hands.’
    Sheila said: ‘That sounds ominous, doesn’t it? What’s going to happen to the third
Kreya
?’
    ‘You wish to know?’ Olsen produced a pipe and began to fill it. ‘I will tell you. I personally will conduct her to the breaker’s yards in another twenty years.’
    Jones said: ‘That’s encouraging.’
    ‘That is a fact, Mr Jones. Leave me your address, and I will send you an invitation for this event.’
    Sheila looked at him. He said:
    ‘I’m afraid I can’t be certain what my address will be in twenty years’ time.’
    ‘In any case,’ Mouritzen said, ‘the company will probably sell her off, somewhere in South America, maybe.’
    ‘But she will not sink,’ Olsen said. ‘Not while I am in command. This you may rely on.’
    ‘We rely on it,’ Simanyi said. ‘A strong ship, a strong captain.’
    Olsen smiled. ‘And you, Mr Simanyi – how was the fishing in Ireland?’
    ‘Plenty of trout, some roach and carp – a conger once.’
    ‘Salmon?’
    Josef shook his head. ‘No salmon.’
    ‘You fish in Ireland, and catch no salmon? What kind of fishing is that?’
    ‘It was a bad year for salmon. Everywhere they told us that. I had one on the line once, but he got away.’
    ‘It takes skill to play salmon,’ Olsen said. ‘Next time I will go with you, and we will catch salmon together.’
    ‘Will you be going back to Ireland?’ Mouritzen asked.
    ‘Maybe. I think so. One must go where one can. In so much of Europe now there is no time for the circus. In Germany, the circus is dead. The circus is for children, and there are no children in Germany.’
    Mouritzen felt a slight draught and looked round. The door had opened noiselessly and Nadya had crept in. She had a bear skin thrown over her. She made her way without a sound to the table where Olsen was sitting and suddenly thrust the muzzle against his knee, at the same time emitting a throaty roar.
    Without looking down at her, Olsen said casually:
    ‘Mr Møller, I give you the responsibility to put this animal back in her cage. See to it.’
    Nadya rose to her feet and leaned over Olsen, embracing him and laughing. He bore with it with no loss of composure. She sat down at last, the bear skin across her knees. Josef came over and picked it up.
    ‘You have not seen this, I think,’ he said. ‘This was Alexander. We had him before Katerina.’
    ‘He died?’ Jones asked.
    Josef grinned. ‘Yes, he died. One day, when he was five years old, he became nasty – he turned on Stefan when Stefan was cleaning out his cage. Stefan called, and I was near with a small rifle.’ He brushed back the fur that covered the head. ‘You see there? Just above the eyes. With one shot.’
    ‘A good one,’ Jones agreed.
    ‘I tell you something else,’ Josef said. ‘So we had the body. It is something, burying a full grown bear – you must dig a big hole. Instead we skinned