The Surfacing (23 page)

20th November

Dozing, he heard the door-handle. He did not need to open his eyes. He could smell
her, the moment she stepped in. Someone had hung a blanket across DeHaven's bunk,
to let him sleep. She lifted it back, looked in. She emptied her lungs noisily, let
the blanket fall back into place. A chair scraped. She was sitting down. He managed
to open his eyes a fraction of an inch. She was knitting, waiting for him to wake.
On the table, laid out in order, the contents of her box. A row of clothes for babies
of different age and size – as though there were several babies already aboard, or
several babies expected. It reminded him of the plate DeHaven had taken at
Aberdeen,
of the entire crew lined up in order of height, from Giorgio to Banes.

Eventually she glanced up and caught his stare, set her wool on her lap. Until now,
he had never quite believed her. More than once he'd heard the same news from his
wife, and it had always righted itself in the end. But looking at her now, that hope
was wrecked. Leaving for Beechey, the belly had merely seemed a little swollen, like
someone who's eaten too much during the festivities. Now, even under her coat, the
shape of the thing could no longer be disguised.

You came back, she said.

Afterwards as best she could she dribbled soup between the shredded lips. He could
feel it dribbling down his neck, inside and out. He did his best to swallow, but
felt sickened by fatigue. And forcing himself to eat, it seemed, was forcing himself
to recruit, as though the trial was still not done. At first he had protested, insisted
on trying to feed himself, but he could not even hold the spoon. The hands lying
on the blanket were no longer his own. They were the hands of a drowned man, a week
in the water. The skin smooth and swollen and shining, stretched tight. At the end
of each fat finger, a baby's fingernail was embedded deep in the flesh, ready to
pop.

21st November

Today the exhaustion had subsided a little, the better to let the pain push through.
Every inch of his flesh was teeming with it, savage loud and savage bright. On the
bunk opposite, too, DeHaven was breathing heavily, whimpering every time he had to
break wind. Morgan looked over at the battered face. They held each other's stare.
In the eyes there was only
recognition, no hate. They knew. They had pushed through,
survived.

Kitty came and sat with them again. She brought him a jar of preserved peaches, and
today he could just about hold the spoon. One spoon at a time, he could just about
keep it down. Afterwards she unwrapped his bandages, to rub salve into the broken
skin.

As she worked she chatted amiably, about what had happened in the weeks the sledge
party had been gone. She was explaining about Myer, how his health had declined.
It was now a fortnight since the old man had left his cabin, she said.

Afterwards, as if out of politeness, she asked about the journey to Beechey, the
efforts and obstacles, the empty-handed return. Before, he would have been wary of
submitting it to her inspection, would have preferred to hoard – as though the thing
were so fragile it might crumble on contact with the air, the light. Now, he began
to talk. For what felt like the first time ever, he talked freely, to distract himself
from what she was doing with his fingers and his toes.

From his bed, he let his mind swing back compass-like to the scene. Often it seemed
to him they were still out there, seen from afar – dim, tiny figures, featureless,
the merest touch of a paintbrush on a vast backdrop. He didn't know, he said, if
they could have done more. They certainly could have done less. It was a first, faltering
version of events, of their failure. He too wanted to understand what had happened,
explain it, even if culprits had to be found. They seemed to have failed utterly,
as though they had not tried at all. He felt it a mere sliver, that separated all
their efforts from some kind of success. As though a greater or smarter effort could
have brought another result. But what effort exactly, where, and when? And from that
sliver, how had the gap grown so impossibly wide?

In Trinidad he'd once seen a water-boa take a week to digest a bird. It had seemed
an extremely tedious ritual, but since returning to the ship that was how he felt
his mind
at work – trying to chew, swallow, and digest the ordeal. Deliberately,
almost stupidly, he reminded himself that they had not failed. They had done exactly
what they set out to do. They had travelled on foot from the north of Cornwallis
all the way to Beechey and back, man-hauling, in the November storms of 1850. It
had never been done before. It would never be done again. It was – he hoped – the
greatest physical feat they would any of them ever perform. There was no point trying
to water it down, or dreaming of some other exploit. This, here, in the Wellington
Channel, in the heart of winter, was what had been asked of him, and he had spent
every ounce in the task. He had given his all, was beyond reproach. They could say
what they liked below decks, he told himself. He had led them safely out and back,
pushed no one harder than he had pushed himself. Those were the hard, immutable facts,
that he kept rehearsing to himself. Why were they not loud enough to drown the other
murmurs out? Because there had been neither success nor failure, only effort and
relief. They had found nothing, met no one, exhausted themselves in the process,
that was all. They had not returned to safety, but to something else. What that was
he could not quite say. There seemed so much more uncertainty now in the ship, and
so much more menace. He had to be careful now where he looked. In certain places,
he knew, there was some brutal proof he was not yet ready to meet. Perhaps – except
the man opposite – that was why he'd thus far avoided those he'd travelled with.
He didn't even want to imagine what state they'd been in when the layers all came
off – what was hidden underneath. He had been equal to it out there, in utter necessity,
the torrent roaring in his ears. But here, with no useful distraction, he was not.
He still couldn't face it, whatever gross fact was scalded into their flesh. Even
now, in the officers' cabin, when she came to change his dressings, he still looked
away.

He'd still not been to see Myer, for something like the same reason. But he could
not put that off much longer, he knew.

23rd November

They were all somewhat diminished, Morgan said, but none so much that a little mothering
would not revive them. Dr DeHaven had returned of his own free will. His assistance
had been invaluable. As ordered, they had proceeded south along the coast to Beechey
Island, where they had expected to find the other expedition ships, but did not.
Difficult conditions and diminishing supplies there prevented them from searching
further. In the course of their travels, no evidence had been found of Franklin.

Myer lay in his bed barely moving. He looked much worse than Morgan had been led
to believe. Even so, Morgan felt his silence an accusation, and made the mistake
of trying to explain. Given their strait, he said, at Beechey he had simply sounded
the other men, as to whether they thought it better to search the neighbouring inlets
for Austin's ships, or to return.

You are not telling me it was your subordinates made the decision for you, or should
bear the responsibility for it? Myer said. He sounded almost amused. He seemed to
be imitating himself. His voice was weakened, but the bluntness and breeding was
still there.

No sir, Morgan said. But I respected their experience, and I expected any considerations
they might voice would be of value to me.

Did you want a second opinion, Mr Morgan, or did you simply want someone to second
the opinion you yourself had already formed? Myer's head was propped up, stared straight
ahead. He was addressing the wall just beyond his feet.

It was the very severe reduction in our provisions, Mr Myer, in a worsening climate,
on worsening roads, that discouraged me from searching further.

And no one objected?

Captain Myer, Morgan said, I would not for a moment have it understood that any man
would have been slow to go on, but we – I – saw little point, and no safety in doing
so, and the prospect of endangering others who might afterwards be
obliged to search
for us, should we be unable to complete our return, for want of supplies. If you
cared to go and inspect the men, and saw their condition, you would be obliged to
agree, I think, that even another day out would have been the end of us all.

On the 18th of November, Morgan wrote in the captain's journal, Mr Morgan regained
the ship with all of his charges, plus Dr DeHaven, having been out one full calendar
month, rather than the lunar month their orders had provided for. Several complain
themselves a little less in the flesh. I expect them all to resume their duties shortly.
There is no evidence whatsoever, he alleges, that Sir John Franklin ever visited
the Devon Island coast.

Myer thought he was being shrewd of course, forcing Morgan to take his dictation.
He thought he was merely tracing over old lines. But Morgan was quietly pleased with
this new task. From now on the ship's journal and log would be in his hand, and already
he was reworking some of the words. He would bide his time before adding the first
phrase of his own.

26th November

The day was exceptionally mild, and DeHaven and Morgan went up on deck to try to
walk a little life back into their legs. Morgan sent the watch below. He wanted to
talk without being heard.

What do you think it is? he said.

It's hard to say, DeHaven said. Out here, in this cold, with this food, the symptoms
aren't always easy to read.

Do the men know how bad he is?

They know he's confined to bed, but I've been deliberately vague.

They stopped at the Post Office, already out of breath. Morgan rattled the cage,
to see were they still alive. We can't have them thinking there's no one in command,
he said.

What's there to command? DeHaven said. The little there is to do, I could almost
manage it myself. We're like a ship in port, for godsake.

Not quite, Morgan said.

In any case, the man doesn't command, he interferes. The day you left, he was so
busy I swear to God I wanted to drug the bastard.

Under the red light of the train-lamp, Morgan sprinkled the seeds through the wire
cage. His mind was already hurrying ahead. His captain was dying. Of what he did
not know, did not care. The news was neither warning nor chastisement. The thing
was already too far gone, as though it had been going on quietly for years. He wanted
it over, was all. He wanted it part of the past, of that other world.

Around the ship the ice was stiff as glass. Overhead the moon was gaudy, in a sky
the colour of mud. To the south and west, the land was a cobalt slab. It had taken
him too long to admit it, that the day was definitely over, that the light had dimmed.

He caught himself thinking about the baby, wondered would Myer last that long. Something
in him, that he had not suspected, would be disappointed if Myer never saw it, was
never obliged to admire. At the very least, he would like the man to know it was
born. At least once to hear the raucous cry slice through the ship.

Afterwards, he thought of his own father. In that direction too, everything was
complicated. Deliberately, he asked himself several clear questions, trying to herd
himself past the easy answers. Lying had always been a great talent with him.

Would he have been eager to present it to his father, if his father were still alive?

Yes and no.

Why yes? Why no?

There were so many good answers, it was almost impossible not to lie. He tried to
tell himself it did not matter, that it was perhaps better this way. To his father
– Myer too, he told himself – it would have been no more than a mouth, a charge,
a noise. In any kind of company, Morgan suspected, the man would have been mean with
his joy. Even so, Morgan imagined handing over the child. He hoped it was not a question
of proving anything, of parading, of success. The old man would have to hold it,
of course, feel it struggle, tighten his grip. At any other distance, admiration
or indifference came too cheap. He would have to relive, perhaps, what he'd felt
when Morgan himself had been in his arms. Perhaps that was what Morgan really wanted
to see.

27th November

She found him lying on her bed, in his boots, eyes closed. She set the cat down on
the floor and instantly it leapt up onto the blankets, to sniff at his bandaged hands.
At the first lick, the eyes opened wide. He started to get up but she waved him down.
To answer the sickness and the fatigue – Morgan's as much as her own – she now had
nothing but care and patience, an endless fund. He was grateful. He still could not
stand for long. He could not yet lift his arms above the horizontal.

It was midday. She'd just had a bath. She stood towelling out her hair, in her nightclothes,
made no show of getting dressed. Her boots stood side by side against the wall, waiting
obediently. There was to be an inspection later, that was why.
Even now, talking
to Morgan, she was merely waiting for another admirer to call. That was why she'd
had her bath. It was DeHaven. She wanted to be impeccable for him, as though he would
be inspecting for flaws.

In his mind Morgan saw the scene. Her lying on the bed, nightdress hoisted, the folds
lying nicely about the bump. The rest of the body has been forgotten. She lies motionless,
more than docile, strangely eager for whatever is to come.

3rd December

They'd cleared a space in the hold, and brought in two stoves. Even as he stepped
inside, his head jerked back, struck. The whole place stank royally of peaches. The
jars had exploded months ago, frozen, and now been woken by the heat.