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Who hath seen the Phantom Ship,
Her lordly rise and lowly dip,
Careering o'er the lonesome main,
No port shall know her keel again…
-Albert Pinkham Ryder
Out on the treacherous waters of the Cape of Storms, during devil weather, a glow bursts into life, a yellow-green glow the colour of swamp gas and witch's brews. From this green glow, a red phantom emerges, cresting the savage waves, attempting to complete a voyage that began hundreds of years before. Doomed to never round the headland and find safe harbour at the docks of Cape Town, the Flying Dutchman traverses the terrible seas at the far south of the Dark Continent, spelling doom to any sailor who catches a glimpse of its ghostly shape. Never hail it, for the damned seek to deliver messages to loved ones long dead. Long dead, and in hell or heaven, suffering or at rest while the inmates of the cursed vessel ply their endless way till the trumpets of Judgement Day sound.
Colin Moriarty, on a visit to family in South Africa, and a man with much diabolism about him, sees the arrival of a terrible storm as a reason to go prospecting. He'd heard all about the legend at a pub at the Waterfront, and instead of taking it as the cautionary tale that it is, he sees an investment opportunity. A bunch of men trapped on a ship for the last four hundred years? They'll be in want of everything he can provide - booze, games, girls. Oh, and drugs, let him not forget about the drugs. How exactly would he make the necessary contact with the ship for the selling of these things? That's a problem for later. First, he needs to ascertain the route, then he'll hire a boat and move from there.
And maybe, just maybe he wants to see the most infamous ghost ship of them all.
“It's a trick of the light, hun.” says Nova, from the passenger seat of Colin’s brother's jeep, the perfect vehicle for travelling down to Cape Point, where the haunted ship can best be viewed. The day was as beautiful as they usually are in South Africa, with wall to wall sapphire blue skies like the waters of a paradisaical island, and they have spent it exploring the Cape of Good Hope Nature Reserve where they're staying, but by late afternoon the weather is closing in. Black clouds are approaching off the ocean, black clouds coming to molest the land with their violence.
“That's what yokels would have you believe, lass, but I've seen enough ghosts to know that this one ain't no trick. Too many people have seen it. Far too many people.” Not to be dissuaded from his mission, Colin turns the steering wheel with the gusto of a businessman having the time of his life out in nature, the car crunching over sand and rock, passing by strange succulent daisies, magnificent proteas, and other fynbos. The smell of warm soil and fabulous sea air is too great to resist, and Colin switches off the air conditioner and lowers his window, breathing in air like it's liquid money. Gulls shout at him, hoping he’ll toss some food out the window. Baboons watch from the scrub.
All those ghosts are in the mirror, is what Nova thinks, but not what she says.
There's a restaurant right on the beach of the headland, which is where the couple stop off to wait for the encroaching storm to do its worst. And also where they stop to eat and drink. Nova, who's still riding high on her promotion from hooker to wife entitled to half of her man's vast empire, needs nothing but his presence and the sight of a beautiful world in order to feel content, but she orders fancy wine and a platter of every sort of expensive seafood, just in case. Meanwhile, Colin keeps a pair of binoculars trained on the increasingly angry ocean.
“This angelfish is going to kill me, it's so good.”
“To die for, is the phrase you're looking for, dear.”
"Mmm, you're right, babe."
Rain begins to lash the walls of the restaurant as a premature night bears down. Most people pay no attention to it, although, now and then, someone looks up and out the window, and swallows, blinks, or shivers. There’s a few things in the area that are named after the Dutchman, but to admit to being hopeful of seeing it is a bit embarrassing. The view of the southern ocean is unimpeded, nothing, nothing for miles, thousands of miles till the ice choked shores of the frozen continent beyond.
Real night arrives, along with many more guests, and lightning, which strikes the sea in great white bursts of jagged light, illuminating the heavy ceiling of black cloud. Colin and Nova keep drinking and eating and talking, right up until the moment when Colin, his binoculars pressed to his face, leaps to his feet with the quickness he only employs when he's beating ass or snatching up a coin someone dropped.
“Colin?”
“Green.” he rasps, rushing for the sliding glass doors, which he opens but doesn't close, leaving Nova to do so with much apologetic grimacing at nothing and nobody. Outside on the deck, the wind plucks her left and right, like rival gods attempting to carry her away for themselves. Rain smashes into her skin like liquid bullets, but she follows her husband to the point closest to the sea, valiantly fighting the forces of nature.
“Lightning can be green!” she shouts, but Colin doesn't respond, and neither does he seem particularly bothered by the storm, standing in his white shirt and black leather jacket, both soaked, his high powered binoculars trained on the horizon.
From his point of view, a great tumult of black waves fight to be the first to reach the shore, destroying themselves and each other in the process. Bolts of electricity blind him temporarily, but he keeps his gaze trained on the nebulous spot where he saw a flash of green, hoping, knowing it's going to appear again, thoughts of monetary gain on the outskirts of his mind, for once.
“I suppose it's pointless trying to convince an Irishman not to see ghosts.” sighs Nova fondly, her arm draping itself around her man's waist. No point trying to make him hear, and the rain is warm. Still, she's going to demand a hot bath with bubbles and champagne after this, if they're not struck by lightning, that is.
For a couple more minutes, while the storm increases in intensity, nothing is sighted. By Colin.
“There! Look!” Nova's arm shoots past her husband, her finger pointed at the lowering sky.
Swinging his binoculars by reflex, Moriarty has a twist of glowing green enter his vision, a twist of green suspended above the waves. Something sails there indeed, something upside down and distorted. Immense disappointment fills his soul. Fata Morgana, that's what all the naysayers and Redditor midwits said the Dutchman was. Nothing but an optical illusion. The sight is so crushing that he looks away, deciding to lie and say he saw nothing.
Except he looks straight down, the lenses of his binoculars landing on the very real ship responsible for creating the illusion…and it is no ship of the 21st century.
For a long time Moriarty is transfixed by the tremendous sight, and after a sharp gasp, even Nova remains still and silent, for out of a whirl of ghostly green sails a phantom ship crewed by the damned.