Harvest

hungry,' saidYakov.

'You're always hungry. Go, cut yourself a slice of bread. The loaf is stale, but you can toast it.'

The two boys rummaged in drawers for the bread knife. The Cook was right; the loaf was dry and stale. Holding down the loaf with the stump of his left arm Yakov sawed off two slices and carried them across to the toaster.

'Look what you're doing to my floor!' said the cook. 'Dropping crumbs all over. Pick them up.'

'You pick them up,'Yakov told Aleksei. 'You dropped them. I didn't.' 'I'm making the toast.'

'But I didn't drop the crumbs.'

'All right then. I'll just throw away your slice.'

'Someone pick them up!' roared the cook.

Aleksei instantly dropped to his knees and picked up the crumbs. Yakov slid the first piece of bread into the toaster. A furry ball of grey suddenly popped out of one of the slots and leaped to the floor.

'A mouse!' shrieked Aleksei. 'There's a mouse!'

The grey ball was scampering around Aleksei's dancing feet now, chased in one direction by Yakov, then in the other direction by the Cook, who threw a pot lid at it for good measure. The mouse skittered halfway up Aleksei's leg, eliciting such a scream of terror it immediately changed course. It dropped back to the floor and shot off, vanishing under a cabinet.

Something was burning on the stove. Cursing, the Cook ran to turn off the flame. He cursed some more as he scraped blackened onions from the pot, the onions he'd been so tenderly nursing along in butter. 'A mouse in my kitchen! And look at this! Ruined. I'll have to start over again. Bloody fucking mouse.'

'He was in the toaster,' saidYakov. Suddenly he felt a little sick.

He thought about that mouse crawling, scratching around inside. 'Probably left it full of his shit,' said the cook. 'Bloody mouse.'

Yakov cautiously peered into the toaster. No more mice, but lots of mysterious brown specks.

He slid the toaster towards the sink, intending to dump out the crumbs.

The Cook gave a shout. 'Hey! Are you stupid? What are you doing?'

'I'm cleaning out the toaster.'

'There's water in that sink! And look, the thing is still plugged in. If you put that in there, and you touch the water, you're dead. Didn't anyone ever teach you that?'

'Uncle Misha never had a toaster.'

'It's not just toasters. It's anything that plugs in, anything with an electric cord. You're as stupid as all the others.' He waved his arms, shoving them towards the door. 'Go on, get out of here, both of you. You're a nuisance.'

'But I'm hungry,' saidYakov.

'You wait for supper like everyone else.' He threw a fresh slab of butter into a saucepan. Glancing atYakov, he barked: 'Go!'

The boys left.

They played on deck for a while, until they grew chilled. They tried the bridge again, but were shooed from there as well. Sheer boredom took them, at last, to the one place in the boat where Yakov knew they would bother no one, and no one would bother them. It was his secret place, and he'd meant to show it to Aleksei only as a reward, and only if Aleksei could manage, for once, not to be a crybaby. He had found it on his third day of exploring, when he had spotted the closed door in the engine-room corridor. He

HARVEST

had opened that door and found it led to a stairwell shaft. Wonderland.

The shaft soared three levels. A circular staircase spiralled up and up, and leading off the second level was a flimsy steel walkway that clattered and shook if you jumped up and down on it. The blue door leading aft from the walkway was always kept locked. Yakov had stopped even bothering to try it.

They climbed up to the top level. There, with the floor a dizzying drop below them, it was easy to scare Aleksei with a few noisy jumps.

'Stop it!' Aleksei cried. 'You're making it move!'

'That's the ride. The Wonderland ride. Don't you like it?'

'I don't want to take a ride!'

'You never want to do anything.'Yakov would have kept jumping up and down, shaking the walkway, but Aleksei was on the verge of hysteria. He had one hand clenched around the railing, the other hugging Shu- Shu.

'I want to go back down,' Aleksei whimpered.

'Oh, all right.'

They went down the staircase, setting off lovely clatters. At the bottom they played for a while under the bottom steps. Aleksei found some old rope and tied one end to the lowest walkway railing. He used it to swing back and forth like the ape man. It was only a foot off the ground; not very exciting.

Then Yakov showed him the empty crate, the one he'd found shoved into a nook under the stairs. They crawled inside. There they lay in darkness among the wood shavings and listened to the engines rumble in Hell. The sea felt very close here, a great, dark cradle that rocked the hull of the ship.

'This is my secret place,' saidYakov. 'You can't tell anyone about it. Swear to me you won't tell.'

'Why should I? It's a disgusting place. It's cold and wet. And I bet there are mice in here somewhere. We're probably lying right now in mouse shit.'

'There's no mouse shit in here.'

'How do you know?You can't see anything.'

'If you don't like it, you can get out. Go on.'Yakov gave him a kick through the wood shavings. Stupid Aleksei. He should have known better than to bring him here. Anyone who carried a filthy stuffed dog everywhere could not be expected to enjoy adventures. 'Go on!You're no fun anyway.'

'I don't know the way back.'

'You think I'm going to show you?'

'You brought me here. You have to bring me back.'

'Well I'm not going to.'

'You bring me back or I tell everyone about your stupid secret place. Disgusting place, full of mouse shit.' Aleksei was climbing out of the crate now, kicking up shavings in Yakov's face. 'Bring me back now or-'

'Shut up,' saidYakov. He grabbed Aleksei by the shirt and yanked him backwards. Both boys tumbled together into the shavings. 'You asshole,' said Aleksei. 'Listen. Listen.t' 'What?'

Somewhere above, a door squealed and clanged shut. The walkway was rattling now, the sound of every footstep shattering to a thousand echoes in the stairway shaft.

Yakov crawled to the opening and peered out of the crate, at the walkway above. Someone was knocking at the blue door. A moment later the door opened, and he caught a glimpse of blonde hair as the woman vanished inside. The door closed behind her. Yakov retreated back into the crate. 'It's just Nadiya.'

'Is she still out there?'

'No, she went in the blue door.'

'What's in there?'

'I don't know.'

'I thought you were the great explorer.'

'And you're the great asshole.'Yakov gave another kick, but only succeeded in tossing up a puff of shavings. 'It's always locked.

Someone's living in there.'

'How do you know?'

'Because Nadiya knocked, and they let her in.'

Aleksei retreated deeper into the crate, having changed his mind about venturing out quite yet. He whispered: 'It's the quail people.'

Yakov thought of the tray with the wine bottle and the two glasses, the onions sizzling in butter, the six tiny birds blanketed in gravy. His stomach suddenly gave a rumble.

'Listen to this,' saidYakov. 'I can make really sick noises with my stomach.' He sucked in and thrust out his