by Antonio Napoli

A young cabin boy found a hen’s egg on the road to the port and slipped it into his pocket. Shortly after, he boarded a merchant ship bound for Africa, unaware of the adventures that awaited him.

Out in the open sea, the vessel was attacked by pirates: the crew was slaughtered or thrown overboard; only the boy was taken prisoner. The pirate captain took a liking to him because of his resemblance to his dead son. But fate had more in store for him. A furious storm struck the ocean, destroying the pirate galleon. The cabin boy alone survived, floating on a barrel, until he was rescued by a group of fishermen. However, mistaken for a pirate, he was brought to the city and sentenced to the gallows. When all seemed lost, an unexpected popular uprising saved his life.

After these ordeals, the young man found his way home and was able to embrace his parents again, who had believed him lost. And through all these vicissitudes, the egg he had found by chance that distant day, and which he had long forgotten, had remained intact in his pocket.

It wasn’t long before that cabin boy, hardened by fate and still kissed by fortune, quickly rose through the ranks and became Captain Brooke. Midway through his life, he accepted the task of a long journey into the African continent, sailing up the Congo River. But he bitterly regretted it: he witnessed, powerless, how colonial oppression had ravaged that land, bringing cruelty and greed. He returned to the open sea, with a small crack in the shell of his heart. After that experience, people said he carried in his pocket either a golden egg or an iron one. Perhaps it was true, or perhaps it was just a tale meant to magnify him even more—a man always strong, always kind.

His final voyage found Captain Brooke’s old ship caught in a battle between the fierce southwesterly wind and stormy waves. Its wooden carcass, worn down by the elements and time, was preparing to surrender under the weight of the inevitable. As the galleon slowly sank, the crew remained at their posts, following strict and precise orders—orders as respected as they were feared. The captain had never before allowed his ship to fall into disgrace or his fate to be sealed prematurely. But this time, he surrendered: there was no use in fighting.

Thus, the shipwreck unfolded in slow motion, unhurried, as if the ship’s death were a lingering farewell, a dignified retreat from the world of the living.
“No one abandon the ship—it is our fate, and we are its fate,” the captain shouted before retreating to his quarters. There, the first officer found him, and the two spoke for the last time.

“This is the perfect place to take on water, wouldn’t you say?” the captain remarked, his voice unsettlingly calm.

“Perfect,” the first officer replied with a wry smile. “And after all, the cargo has been delivered, the commitments honored… except…” he ventured, as if something more remained unsaid.

“Except what?” the captain asked, raising an eyebrow, irritation barely concealed in his controlled tone.

“Except that no one will return our bodies to our loved ones,” the officer answered, as though stating an irrefutable truth.

The captain looked at him with a shadow of disdain. “Since we first set sail, our bodies have been nothing more than wooden planks of this ship,” he said, his voice heavy but resolute. “They will follow the ship’s fate,” he repeated with vehemence.

The first officer nodded, but his face betrayed deep disappointment. “Words worthy of a great captain,” he said, his voice laced with false respect.

Meanwhile, some sailors had taken bottles of rum from the hold and were passing them around. The vapor of the liquor, tickling their nostrils and promising one last comfort, mingled with the thick air of salt and sea.

“I don’t blame them,” the first officer murmured, watching the scene through the paned window.

“The last pleasure is taking on liquid, just like the ship,” the first officer remarked.

The captain gave a bitter smile and lit his pipe. “One last pleasure… even that tastes like death,” he murmured. Then, recalling a small detail, he set the pipe down and prepared to wind his watch.

“It was a gift from a merchant I met in the Congo,” the captain said. “It has never missed a beat since then. Have you ever been to the Congo?”

“Not yet. They say it holds fabulous riches—a hen that lays golden eggs at the heart of Africa,” the officer replied, his eyes gleaming with greed.

“The golden eggs,” the captain repeated wistfully. “During my time in the Congo, the locals often told me that a man must strive to be like an egg, and I, throughout my life…”

But before he could finish the sentence, the first officer made a swift movement, seizing something in an instant. With a sharp blow, he shattered the captain’s head—as if it were an egg.

The silence that followed was like a chilling breeze. The captain fell without a groan, without a breath of anger. The first officer climbed onto the deck, his face expressionless.

“The captain is dead,” he announced firmly, and the crew looked at him, perplexed, awaiting a sign. “Every man for himself.”

The sailors lifted their eyes for a moment, but the order remained unchanged: they answered with the cowardice of those who accept fate without a fight.

Even the officer himself was surprised to remain motionless, as if nailed down by a force greater than his own, as the sea advanced inexorably, soaking his shoes, his trousers, his shirt. As the water rose, his body grew heavier, his expression anguished, caught in the grip of remorse. The last thing he saw was the ghost of the captain wrapping itself in the ship’s sails, torn by the storm.

And so the ship vanished into the abyss, taking with it the captain’s honesty, the first officer’s ambition, and all the human passions it had carried within its hull.

Drifting on that stretch of sea, before the solemn and imposing figure of Africa, remained only the eggs from the ship’s pantry.