48 Hours a Day

Zhang Heng went back to the captain's room on the Cold Raven and wiped the rain from his head with a towel, while Annie also changed her clothes on the other side.

Zhang Heng poured a glass of rum to warm the red-haired girl up, and then he drank it himself. This wine is considered a sailor's standard, but it doesn't taste very good. Although it is made from sugar cane juice, it is somewhat bitter and far less pleasant than wine and brandy, but it is cheaper and has a longer shelf life compared to fresh water.

Normally, the barrel water on a boat gets ugly in a month, and it also breeds plankton, but the rum can be placed for a year or two, which is a must have on the boat.

With a glass of belly, Zhang Heng's stomach immediately raised a warmth, while a knock came from outside the door.

Billy walked in with a young man who was somewhat impatient.

“This is Mr. Vincent,” the helmsman gave a brief introduction, "I read the note you gave me to the crew on the boat. We were lucky, Mr. Vincent knew the text. ”

Zhang Heng also recognized the other party. He was the boat doctor who only got on the boat this time and was personally recruited by Billy. However, he himself seemed to prefer botany. He was hijacked by a group of pirates on the way to carrying out research on the boat. He was forced to become the other party's boat doctor. A year later, the pirates disbanded and joined another group of pirates. Vincent regained his freedom, but was left on the island for fear that his pirate experiences would be turned over.

He lived next door to Billy, usually making money booking places like the tavern buffet house, and after Billy's persuasion he finally decided to sail again with the Cold Raven.

“It's a cargo manifest, but it's written in Dutch, and it records the cargo that a ship carries on every voyage, which is quite common, like cotton, wool, or wood.” The young boat doctor was also speaking to the captain for the first time and seemed a little nervous, worried that Zhang Heng would not believe his words and explained, "My father was Scottish, but my mother was Dutch, and I lived in the Netherlands for a while when I was a kid, so I also spoke some Dutch.

“What about these?” Zhang Heng also gave Vincent the other two notes.

Annie was going to leave, but she stopped at the same time, curious about the strange missing crew on the boat, wondering what had happened to them.

The young boat doctor took the notes, opened one of them, looked at two pages and was somewhat uncertain, "This should be a collection of... poems. ”

“Poems? ”

“Yeah, and it's love poetry.” Vincent flipped a few more pages, "mostly to a woman named Betty, but not so well, and for the first time I've ever seen someone describe their loved one with a storm, and mostly not... very explicit. ”

The young boat doctor said he blushed first.

“Can you read us a piece? ”

“Oh, okay... okay, no problem.” Vincent sneaked a peek at Annie, and the red-haired girl didn't respond at all.

The young boat doctor flipped over and found a piece that looked good, cleared his voice, “Betty, my love, I praise you, I worship you. You are the storm that is the fruit of my presiding over your chest like a bent branch. Yours... Uh, your legs are like a valley of honey...” Reading here, Vincent's forehead also seeped sweat, he couldn't help loosening his collar, raised his head and asked Zhang Heng, “Should I continue reading? ”

“Now that you've read here...”

“Well," the young boat doctor touched some burning earlobes and continued, "you wrapped me in my ear with your own body whispering to let me fly and I loved you so much that you were willing to spend the rest of your life with me, no more than your own soul...” Vincent said, "If you like Dutch poetry, I can find much better. ”

When the young doctor finished, he found the three of them looking at themselves, so he picked up the third note and went halfway, "This book looks like a record of their supply at the ports, with port names, dates and supplies statistics. ”

“So there's no captain's log in here? ”

“I don't think I've seen anything like it.” Vincent shook his head.

“Did you forget to take it?” Annie asked.

“Not likely. I checked all the books in that room, including the books that fell on the floor, and none of them were handwritten, all printed. ”

Zhang Heng asked the young boat doctor, “Do these three notes have the same handwriting? ”

“There are two similar copies, the cargo list and the supply record, and the love poem is not quite the same.” Vincent went over it again, and then he definitely said, "Yes, these three notes should come from two people. ”

Billy Daw, "The first two are usually bookkeepers' jobs, and unfortunately, without the captain's log, it's hard to know what happened on that boat. ”

His voice just dropped and Vincent suddenly said, "Wait, it's a little strange here. ”

The young boat doctor still had the last supply record, and his face was puzzled, "I know these two ports, they're quite far away. It took me almost a month to get on the boat with my brother. How could it have been less than fifteen days since they made two supplies? This should be going more than nine knots. Is there such a fast freighter in that era? ”

“With that ship, sailing at full speed should be pretty much within reach.” Billy Road, "but the reality is that it's simply not possible to do that. Wind stays at the same level for 15 days without breaking the mast or providing the maximum speed needed to sail. The odds of this happening are about the same as a thousand gold coins falling in front of you. ”

“But it seems the captain of that ship didn't think so. ”

Vincent pointed to the above line and recorded that "they were only replenishing the freshwater and food needed for about sixteen days of sailing in the first port, and only a day and a half short of their final voyage. ”

“Ha, no wonder they ended up having an accident. ”

“But when we got aboard, they had plenty of supplies, and it was clear that the boat was not caused by the captain's arrogance.” Zhang Hengdao, then to Billy Road, "I remember there was a more complete chart of the voyage on board, find it, let Vincent see if he could mark the port where it docked all the way, calculate its average speed, so that we know if his previous voyage time was accidental. ”