The Beast of Cretacea (44 page)

Suddenly the huge creature flaps its white wings so hard that the ocean erupts.

Queequeg’s jaw drops. “The stern’s going down!”

As the huge winches turn, the
Pequod
’s stern gradually dips lower and lower. Ishmael can imagine an impossibly huge anchor causing that to happen, but not a living creature.

“Stern’s going down, ya says? Down!” Tarnmoor grips the sides of the chase boat and presses his face forward.

It seems unimaginable, but the
Pequod
’s aft continues to dip, seawater inching up the slipway, while the ocean behind the ship is a swirling cauldron.

Aboard the ship, sailors press against the bulwarks, alarm creasing their faces while they witness the tug-of-war between beast and vessel.

“This can’t be happening,” marvels Queequeg.

“You’d think the lines would snap,” says Gwen.

“Not them lines,” Tarnmoor tells her. “Not when there’s six a’ them all reinforced with steel an’ the strength a’ hawsers.”

Suddenly, the huge winches halt, and the sea behind the ship stops roiling. The sailors lining the deck seem to give a collective sigh of relief.

But the reprieve is short-lived. A furious-looking Ahab yanks open the control booth door and hauls the winch operator out by the collar, throwing him off the tower. The captain enters the booth, and the winches resume their toil.

The stern of the
Pequod
dips deeper.

Sailors have begun fleeing forward, clutching rails as they struggle upward toward the bow. The two remaining chase-boat crews watch in stunned silence. Ishmael thinks back to how weak the terrafin appeared just a short time ago, how even the skittish big-tooths sensed the moment had come to pounce.

Was it only putting on an act? Pretending to be weak in order to be towed close to the
Pequod
’s stern, where it knew it could do the most damage?

No. It can’t know what it means to pretend. It’s a wild beast, an animal. . . .

And yet . . .

Ishmael turns to Tarnmoor. “How did the Great Terrafin destroy the
Essex
?”

A cloud passes over the old man’s features. “We followed hers into a vast, broad bay, but it were a lot shallower than it looked. The next thing we knowed, the tide goed out and the
Essex
were aground, keel stuck on the bottom, unable to budge. And that’s when she went to works.”

Ishmael shivers. “What do you mean, ‘went to work’?”

“Attacked, lad. Battered the
Essex
with her wings and tails till there were nothin’ left but some broken masts and a crumpled hull.”

“When it could have just as easily escaped?” Queequeg asks.

“Aye.”

“You said that happened in a vast, shallow bay?” Gwen looks rattled. “Like the one we were in when we first saw the terrafin.”

“Ahab kept the
Pequod
outside,” Queequeg adds. “By the bay’s entrance.”

“The wreck we saw!” Gwen gasps. “The one that was covered with orange and red coral? Was that the
Essex
?”

Ishmael starts to shake his head. “It couldn’t be. Queek, you said that wreck must’ve been down there for hundreds of years to have so much coral on . . .” But as he says this, he realizes that this is
exactly
what happened. Gabriel said the undiluted neurotoxin could change men in “unnatural” ways. It’s kept Tarnmoor, Ahab, and Starbuck alive far beyond their “natural” life spans.

He looks again to Tarnmoor. “Do you think . . . is it possible the Great Terrafin
led
the
Essex
into that bay, knowing the ship would run aground and become an easy target?”

For a few moments the old man is quiet. “Never thinked a’ it that way. Just figured she suddenly found herself cornered, and likes any trapped wild animal, she turned on her pursuer. Buts it
were
an awful big bay,” he adds, almost to himself. “Ya gots to wonder, how trapped were she really?”

“Look!” Queequeg points into the sky over the
Pequod
’s stern, where white-and-gray flyers have begun to wheel and dart. Above them, larger black fork-tail flyers circle. . . . And even higher overhead glide half a dozen huge winged beasts like the one that snatched Thistle.

Hundreds of red-tipped dorsal fins cut through the water around the ship. By now the
Pequod
’s tilting aft section is nearly deserted. Almost all the sailors have fled to the bow and many have begun to don PFDs.

The huge winches keep turning, and it seems impossible that the Great Terrafin can put up such a tremendous fight for much longer. They may have underestimated the beast’s reserves of strength, but it
is
just an animal. It has to grow tired eventually.

As the level of the sea slowly continues to rise up the slipway, a single figure works his way aft, hand over hand, along the ship’s railing, heading for the tower where Ahab controls the winches.

Ishmael focuses the binoculars.

It’s Starbuck.

“What’s happening? What? What?” Tarnmoor pleads.

Chase Boat Four is quiet while the crew watch Starbuck brace himself with one hand and bang on the control booth door with the other.

“Starbuck’s trying to get into the control tower,” Queequeg says.

“What? To stops our supreme lord and dictator?” Tarnmoor laughs maniacally. “Ahab’ll never give in. Never!”

Through the binoculars, Ishmael can see Starbuck’s jaw working while he hammers at the door with his fist and shouts.

The turbulence at the stern of the ship continues to excite the flocks of flyers. The small gray-and-white ones skim along the surface, snatching scurry that’ve been tossed up in the mayhem. The medium-size black ones plunge into the waves, scooping up larger scurry thrust to the surface by the beating of the Great Terrafin’s wings. Only the huge green flyers continue to glide high above the rest, ominously waiting for still larger prey.

In the stern of the
Pequod,
Starbuck backs away from the control booth door and looks around. Ishmael narrates for Tarnmoor as the first mate makes his way aft, searching, then starts back.

“What’s he gots with him?” Tarnmoor asks.

“Nothing. He —” Ishmael catches himself. Through the binoculars he sees that Starbuck
does
have something with him. “Looks like the handle of a hand winch. . . .”

“For tryin’ to breaks down the door,” Tarnmoor says.

By now the
Pequod
’s stern is nearly submerged, the bow of the ship poking into the air like the high end of a seesaw. On the steeply slanting deck, a group of sailors struggle to lower a tender. Others grasp the ship’s rail, staring in horror at the red-tipped fins of the big-tooths slicing through the sea close to the
Pequod
’s hull.

Just as Tarnmoor predicted, Starbuck swings the winch handle at the window in the door of the control tower, the crack of breaking glass inaudible against the screeching of flyers and the churning of the ocean. The first mate starts to reach through the opening — then suddenly staggers backward like someone struck by a blow, losing his balance and slamming into a large, mushroom-shaped metal chock.

“Ouch!” Queequeg winces sympathetically. “That must’ve hurt.”

“Starbuck or Ahab?” Tarnmoor asks.

“Starbuck,” answers Ishmael.

“Aye, there’ll be no stoppin’ the madman now.”

The winches still turn, the
Pequod
’s aft section dipping even farther into the ocean while its bow climbs higher in the air. The tender has been lowered not quite to the sea, but already sailors have begun scampering over the rail and down the cargo rope.

Within minutes the tender is filled with sailors, yet more keep climbing down. Those already in the boat swing oars and kick at those still attempting to board. A sailor loses his balance and falls into the water, having barely enough time to scream before the big-tooths are on him.

And still Ahab will not stop the winches.

More screams and shouts fill the air. Up in the bow, a sailor loses his grip and tumbles toward the stern before smashing into the base of a crane. And now, under the weight of so many fleeing sailors, the cargo rope has started to tear away from the
Pequod
’s railing. Half a dozen sailors lose their grip and plummet into the overcrowded tender below, while others fall straight into the sea and are immediately set upon by big-tooths.

The tender is now a writhing mass of arms, legs, and bodies, riding so low in the water that every wave crests over the gunwales.

“They’re going to capsize!” Gwen shouts.

Feeling like he’s suddenly been shaken from a dream, Ishmael tries to start the chase boat’s RTG, but it stalls. He curses and tries again.

But the engine still won’t start. Picking up the two-way, he calls over to Tashtego. “I’m dead in the water. Can you help them?”

“Someone must be watchin’ out for you, son,” comes the harpooner’s pensive reply. “They’ll take us down with ’em if we go anywhere near.”

In frustration Ishmael tosses the two-way aside. Moments later, when the tender swamps and tips over, he and the others are forced to watch in helpless horror as all aboard fall into the hungry jaws of the frenzied big-tooths.

The sea around the capsized tender has turned red. Tarnmoor has once again gone quiet; the desperate cries of dying men tell him all he needs to know.

The winches continue to turn. The ocean now laps at the
Pequod
’s stern bulwark. If the ship dips only a few feet more, the sea will flood over the aft deck, which is riddled with rust and soft spots.

A handful of sailors are still clustered in the ship’s bow, literally holding on for dear life.

“Look!” Gwen gasps. In the
Pequod
’s stern, Starbuck’s head comes into view as he grips the gunwale and pulls himself up. Ishmael doesn’t need the binoculars to see the blood running from the bright-red gash on the first mate’s forehead. Once again, Starbuck struggles toward the tower, the walkway now so steep that he must climb along the railing, clutching each baluster like a rung on a ladder.

But the water has breached the stern bulwark and starts to flood the aft deck. The
Pequod
’s bow rises even higher, the ship now angled more than forty-five degrees.

Starbuck, on his belly now, crawls to the open booth door and reaches in. An instant later, Ahab comes tumbling out, caught unawares by the hand that grasped his false leg. Both men fall down the walkway, but Starbuck grabs a baluster and stops his descent, while Ahab crashes gruesomely off the bulwark and disappears from sight.

Blood pouring down his face, the first mate once again begins to drag himself along the walkway, desperately trying to reach the winch booth before it’s too late.

“What’s happenin’, lad? What? What?” Tarnmoor pleads.

His eyes pressed to the binoculars, Ishmael tells the old man everything he sees. “There’s still a chance. If Starbuck can stop the winches before too much water goes over the
Pequod
’s stern . . .”

“He’ll do it or die tryin’,” Tarnmoor says. “He always dids have heart, that one. Damaged heart, true, buts heart just the same.”

The
Pequod
juts up unnaturally from the seething sea, portholes along the hull blowing open as trapped air forces its way out. Flyers shriek, but the screams of the sailors have ceased. The tender floats upside down, the only sign of life in the bloody sea around it the red-tipped dorsal fins still slicing hungrily to and fro.

Through the binoculars Ishmael can see the agonized grimace on Starbuck’s bloody face as he hauls himself hand over hand toward the control booth.

He’s . . . almost . . . there . . .

“He made it!” Ishmael exhales with relief as the first mate heaves himself into the control booth. A moment later, the huge winches stop, then begin to spin freely in reverse as the Great Terrafin escapes, stripping the green lines off the massive drums in a blur.

An instant later, the lines pull free of the winches and disappear into the deep.

Stillness again descends. Flyers circle but have ceased to cry. The big-tooths glide smoothly through the water, calmer now that their feast is over.