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‘And how did she look?'

‘Thirsty. Fierce.'

Crozier and Fitzmaurice were standing a little way back from the lifeboat. Invitations to the apparition to make itself known, along with tentative tappings on the hull, had yielded nothing.

‘Mmm, very interesting. And you say this kind of thing has happened to you before?'

‘A few times. When I was seven I talked to the ghost of Mr Gillespie-next-door's wife and she told me where she'd hidden the key to their summer house.'

‘And?'

‘There it was, where she'd said.'

‘Fascinating, and…'

There was a clatter at the opening of the companionway and Rafferty, his chest heaving, hauled Bunion onto the deck.

‘What kept you?'

‘Little brute,' Rafferty panted, ‘was doing Stiff Dog. Jaysus, he's heavy.'

The hound stared about him indignantly, his demeanour softening when he spotted Crozier.

‘Animals are sensitive to the supernatural,' Fitzmaurice explained. ‘It's a known fact. If there's something in there, this little fellow will tell us.' He pointed at the lifeboat. ‘Off you go, good dog.'

Bunion sniffed the breeze.

‘Go on boy, fetch.'

Bunion sat down.

‘Sic, Bunion. Sic!'

Bunion yawned.

‘Squirrel, Bunion! Rabbit! Squirrel!'

Bunion shifted onto one haunch, extended his other back leg at an upward angle and with a look of defiance plunged his snout into the shadows.

‘Great,' Rafferty said. ‘I've given myself a hernia for nothing.'

‘Don't worry,' Fitzmaurice started for the hatch, ‘I'll get my lizard. She'll flush it out.' He stopped dead. ‘What the hell was that?'

All three turned towards the source of the muffled but unmistakable sound of a female scream. The canvas cover pinged, and the head and shoulders of the screamer burst into view. An astonished silence fell. Crozier had been correct on all but one count: this was no phantom.

‘Do
not
,' she warned, pointing a vital finger at each of them in turn, ‘bring a f—ing lizard anywhere near me.'

6
Interrogation

The stowaway finished her second portion of suet and sultana pudding (it had been preceded by three helpings of salt-beef and cabbage) and laid down her spoon. ‘Compliments to the chef,' she pronounced, apparently without irony. Quivering with unaccustomed pride, Victoor moved forward, his belt clanking, and began gathering up the dishes. Ranged around the mess table, the Trinity men, Harris, and McGregor remained mute, the latter having added nothing further to the single hoarse profanity he had uttered on the bridge earlier.

‘So,' she said, when the cook had gone. ‘You probably have a few questions.'

She gazed at them levelly. Her pale face was oval-shaped, her expression defiant. A smear of fat shone on her chin. The others turned to McGregor, who made a noise in his throat like a bull mastiff approaching a burglar. He coughed, then spoke.

‘Well, how about ye start by telling us why ye picked the
Dolphin
? And how exactly ye managed tae get on board.'

There were some scattered breadcrumbs on the table in front of her and she began rounding them up with a fingertip.

‘Oh, it was easy. Your ship was the only one that wasn't guarded,' (McGregor glared at Crozier), ‘and I came aboard while these three were arguing about a ukulele.'

‘It's a
banjo
lele, actually,' Rafferty said. ‘There's a difference.'

‘Well, it sounds like a ukulele, and, by the way, your A-string is flat.'

‘No, it's not.'

‘It is, it sounds terrible.' (Rafferty blinked at her, taken aback.) ‘Then, when they went below, I hid in the lifeboat and made myself a little nest among the ropes, using my bag as a pillow. It was cosy at first but during the night the temperature dropped and I was freezing, so between watches I crept down to the hold, found some food and blankets and slept behind some packing cases with the chickens who, I have to tell you, are surprisingly good company, if a bit smelly. And then before dawn I'd sneak back to the boat and sleep some more. I did a lot of sleeping.'

‘I can't believe you managed to stay hidden for so long,' Crozier said.

She shrugged.

‘I only moved around when absolutely necessary and then only at night. I did nearly get caught a couple of times, once coming back from the… well, the you-know-what … by that man there.' She pointed at Harris. ‘And another time in the hold, not long after we set off when I was dreadfully sick and my pail fell over and I thought you…' she indicated Crozier, ‘had rumbled me for sure.'

‘What about food?'

‘That wasn't so easy. Sometimes I managed to steal scraps from the galley, but mostly it was just eggs.'

‘Raw eggs?'

‘I'm afraid so, and biscuits. I was very hungry, but then, there are many in the world who don't have any food at all.'

‘Weren't you bored?'

‘Sometimes, but when it wasn't raining I'd open the cover on one corner so there was enough light to read a book. And I also knitted a scarf. A lot of the time I'd just lie and listen to you lot complaining about how much work you have to do.' (McGregor snorted.) ‘You know, you really do go on.'

‘And had you planned to keep that up for the whole voyage?'

‘No, of course not. Just until we were clear of Scotland.'

‘And then what? You do know we're on our way to the Arctic?'

‘Yes, and it's not ideal, but I've decided you can drop me off at Reykjavik. I'll offer my services to the women of Iceland.'

‘Your services?'

‘In their struggle for equal rights with men.'

‘Oh Holy Jesus, a f—ing suffragette!' McGregor yodelled. ‘That's all we f—ing need.'

A breadcrumb ricocheted off his shoulder.

‘Let me get this straight,' Rafferty said. ‘I'm sorry, what did you say your name was?'

‘Phoebe. Phoebe Sturgeon.'

‘Let me get this straight, Phoebe.' He stopped. ‘Wait a minute,
Phoebe
Sturgeon…
' He frowned. ‘I know that name. Weren't you..? Aren't you the one that..., Yes, I thought you looked familiar – you were in the newspapers – wasn't it you that uh..?' He faltered, his face deepening in colour. ‘--That threw the, uh… “item of ladies clothing” at the prime minister?'

All eyes returned, wider and shinier, to the interviewee. She flushed a little also, lifted her chin a fraction higher.

‘It
was
you,' Rafferty continued. ‘Yes,
Phoebe Sturgeon
. You hid in a broom cupboard in the House of Commons for something like two days. And you got him right in the face with the, uh…'

‘Yes, it's coming back to
me
now.' Fitzmaurice snapped his fingers. ‘There was much speculation in the press as to what the “item” was. And you escaped – that's right – I don't remember how, but they were after you for a whole list of crimes and misdemeanours.'

Phoebe averted her gaze. The aforementioned ranged from routine mischief such as daubing graffiti on public buildings, cutting telegraph wires, pouring lampblack into post boxes, disrupting court sessions, and smashing windows (years playing cricket with her brother Philip in the garden of their childhood home had given her a powerful and accurate right arm, and she had scored multiple direct hits on the Home Office, the Treasury, the Privy Council, the Savoy Hotel, Harrods, Liberty's, the
Daily Mail
, Dublin Castle, the Custom House, and the General Post Office on Sackville Street, to name a few), to heftier outrages such as planting a bomb in the gallery of the Metropolitan Tabernacle, and burning down Yarmouth Pier.

Then, of course, there was the show-stopper, the
coup de théâtre
that had crowned, and ended, her career as a militant in England: the “item”. She remembered how the background tiers of gesticulating men slowed to a blur in the final moment; how the hullaballoo receded, leaving just her and the frock-coated figure before the parliamentary mace in a perfectly focused, silent space; how his pupils dilated as her arm drew back -- there in the inner sanctum, close enough to smell each other's breath – his shocked recognition of the “item” just before impact, reeling back in vain from its silken embrace, its scalding, intimate rebuke.

‘And you just
vanished
. Crikey, who'd have thought it! The most wanted woman in England, an enemy of the state, right here onboard the
Dolphin.
'

‘Bugger me sideways…'

‘Please, McGregor, there's a lady present.'

‘…with a haddock, that's just f—ing lovely.'

‘I went to a girls' boarding school, so believe me, I've heard much worse.'

McGregor looked at her uncertainly.

‘So you were in Ireland the whole time?' Crozier said.

‘Yes.'

‘But wasn't there an amnesty for the suffragettes when the war started?'

‘Yes.'

‘So, why didn't you go back to England?'

‘I had my reasons.'

She surveyed the men across the table from her, the hostile Scot, the grizzled Cockney, and the three younger ones, roughly her own age, who regarded her with such curiosity. The fop was a type she recognised from her own background (albeit from a rarer stratum), wafting around endless village fetes and interminable harvest fayres. But the other two were more difficult to place: the dark boy with the strange accent, quiet, a sense of something troubling him; the musician with the pale eyes huge behind the thick lenses. They had one thing in common though, they were all nonplussed by her presence.

‘Is Ireland all sorted out then?' Crozier asked. ‘I mean, for women?'

‘Far from it.'

‘So why leave?'

She paused, taking in the room's wood-panelling, the dimming sky through the brass-rimmed portholes, and pictured the view from her room at Ennisfree, the rain sweeping across the neglected lawns, pooling in the dormant fountains, the ancient trees dripping. Her Ladyship would be leaning on the service bell around now, and down in the kitchen the tight-faced housekeeper and her defeated husband would be slopping soup into chipped Wedgwood. Apart from occasional weekend forays to Dublin for protest meetings and window smashing, it had been a long and lonely two years as a ‘lady's companion'.

‘Well, it's all about Home Rule now, isn't it? Suffrage in Ireland is just a sideshow.'

There was a tinkling in the doorway and Victoor arrived with a tray. They waited while he arranged cups, biscuits and a teapot on the table.

‘I'm curious,' said Fitzmaurice presently. ‘Why didn't you travel like other people? Why stow away?'

Phoebe stirred sugar into her brackish tea.

‘Simple. I have no money. My family disowned me and my employment in Ireland was – oh, it's lovely to have a hot drink again — on the basis of bed and board only.'

‘I see. And what did you do?'

‘I was companion to a wealthy dowager in a big freezing-cold house in County Cork.'

‘Really? Name?'

‘Enola Vestey-Colquhoun.
Lady
Enola.'

‘Vestey-Colquhoun … never heard of them. I wonder if they're related to the Tryon-Vesteys? Mother would know.'

There was a lull while they sipped. Phoebe ate another biscuit.

‘So does that horrible lizard belong to you?' she said.

‘I beg your pardon?'

‘It's hideous. I nearly died when I first saw it.'

‘Her name is Bridie, if you don't mind, and she's a very fine example of a South American green iguana.'

Mention of the reptile caused McGregor's knee to hit the underside of the table. He slammed down his cup.

‘It's a dirty wee f—ing fly-muncher and it should never have come aboard,' he yelled. He jabbed a finger at Phoebe. ‘And neither should you. Women are bad f—ing luck.' He stood up. ‘Mr Harris, prepare tae turn the ship about, we're going back tae Stornoway.'

There was a jangling silence and then Fitzmaurice spoke.

‘Mr McGregor, may I have a word in private?'

The skipper held the younger man's gaze for a moment.

‘As you wish.'

He nodded at the first mate, who rose and headed for the bridge.

7
A Sighting

Crozier opened his eyes and stared into the darkness. He was on the top bunk, Rafferty below. He raised his head and flipped his hard, flat pillow over to the cool side. The wind had strengthened and he could hear rain on the deck above them. The rain at sea, he decided, was different. Lonelier. More intimate. It tapped on the soul. He thought about Phoebe next door in his recently-vacated bed, scrubbed and fortified, her first night of relative comfort in some time. Bidding them goodnight she had been quite a different prospect to the mad-haired starveling that had reared up from the lifeboat: the sun-deprived pallor had lifted, her hair shone and her eyes, earlier fractured and bloodshot, had cleared to a sceptical gooseberry-green. Only her borrowed garb, rough breeches and a roll-neck pullover rootled from the Savage Newell collection, maintained something of the vagabond.

He said, ‘What?'

Rafferty sniffed.

‘I say, I'm just after wondering – what do you think the “item” actually was?'

‘What item?'

‘
The
“item”. The “item” that Phoebe threw at the prime minister.'

‘Oh, that.'

‘Yes, that.'

‘I have no idea.'

‘Come on, you must have
some
idea.'

‘Well of course I have
some
idea, but it could have been a number of things.'

‘I know, but what do you think it
was
.'

‘How long have you been mulling this over?'

‘Not very long. Well?'

‘I really don't know... A shift?'

‘A shift? No, I don't … a
shift
? No, it must have been something more…'

‘Rafferty, enough of this salacious nonsense. Please won't you let me sleep?'

‘Oh
excuse me
,' Rafferty's voice rose half an octave. ‘Oh, I'm so sorry. I didn't realise you Protestants had such delicate sensibilities.'

Crozier rolled onto his side and wriggled around, trying to align himself with the motion of the ship. He knew Rafferty well enough but sharing such cramped conditions was not going to be easy. Nearly two thirds of the cabin was taken up by their steamer trunks and personal effects, leaving a margin of less than eighteen inches around the bunk beds to manoeuvre. He had already caught Rafferty using his hairbrush.

‘She is pretty though, isn't she?'

Crozier sighed.

‘Not exactly.'

‘Well, I mean to say, not pretty as
such
, not in the conventional way, but attractive, don't you think?'

‘I suppose.'

Crozier waited. His cabin-mate was evidently not ready to relinquish consciousness.

‘Walter?'

‘Yes.'

‘What do you think Fitzie said to the Scot?'

‘I'm not sure, but it doesn't feel as though we've turned about.'

‘I hope we don't. I hope Phoebe comes with us. At least as far as Iceland. It would be mighty unfair to make her go back.'

‘It would.'

‘He's quite a nasty man, isn't he?'

‘Fitzie?'

‘No, McGregor.'

‘He certainly has a temper.'

‘He does. And the language out of him. Jaysus.'

‘I know. Desperate.'

‘I'm baffled as to how Fitzie puts up with him. He's a fully-fledged case of what we medics call
proctalgia fugax.'

‘Which is?'

‘A horrible pain in the ar—'

‘Thank you, Frank. Any possibility of sleep now?'

 

In fact, Crozier did not sleep immediately. The arrival of Phoebe had disturbed thoughts of another woman. And of home. He drowsed. He was back in his father's house, on its little hill overlooking the park, the church at its side, the hallway full of morning light through the door's sugared glass, the dust planes sliding endlessly into each other. He could hear the murmur of voices far off, his mother most likely, instructing a maid. He imagined drifting along the corridor towards the kitchen, entering its warmth: smells of porridge and narcoleptic fumes from the range, the table laid for breakfast. In the scullery, the air would be rich with the damp exhalations of just-washed linen, draped over racks and hoisted to the ceiling by squeaking pulleys. He listened. There it was, the sound he missed, that assailed him in his loneliest moments, that was lodged in the core of his memory. On the windowsill a line of doves, soft grey blurs through the pane, nestled together in the heat and light and – what
was
the sound? – it was a kind of purring. Contented, yet somehow wistful. They were always there. His father put out grain for them from a sack he kept in his potting shed among the tools, the bags of compost, the herbs propagated in long trays and labelled: Thyme, Mint, Lemon Balm, Hyssop.

Purge me with hyssop and I shall be
clean
. He remembered the dreams: the first time, waking in the early hours, convinced, absolutely certain that all his family had been taken
(Then shall two be in the field
; the one shall be taken, and the other left. Watch
therefore: for ye know not what hour your Lord doth
come),
running through the blood-red dark along the never-ending corridor to his parents' bedroom. And later the fear, still jolting awake in a sweat, the hymn in his head:
God's house is filling fast / Yet there
is room
(What if there
wasn't
room?)
Some soul
will be the last.
(What if you were in the queue
behind
the last one? What then?)
Are you
washed in the blood of the lamb?
Yes, he had been washed. Squeaky clean. Redeemed. Saved on his sixteenth birthday. In his father's church. Buoyed by the love from the carbolic-scented congregation. Salvation. Cleansed in the precious blood. And yet…

‘What happened?'

He opened his eyes. He had said the words aloud, half conscious, and had half woken Rafferty, who mumbled something that might have been ‘girdle', twisted in his creaky cot and was silent. Crozier closed his eyes again…
And now these three remain: faith, hope and
love. But the greatest of these is love.
He thought of Jenny and the summer before he went up to Trinity
(will you wait for me?)
: picnics on the slopes of Cavehill and the view over the city, its red-brick terraces and pale green domes, the shipyard and the sweep of Belfast Lough to the horizon; her yellow dress, the heat of the earth and the hiss of the breeze through the dry heather. Climbing to the summit, gazing east beyond Belfast Castle towards the far coast of Scotland; the edge of the hill forming the basalt profile of a dreaming giant. And all the while, the war at their backs: the
Lusitania
torpedoed off Queenstown with twelve hundred souls lost; the Triple Offensive under way; Warsaw already wrested from the Russians; much,
much
death.

Why had he not gone? Selfishness? Fear?
Love?
What had his father said? ‘People like us will be needed
after
the war.' An objector, yes, but conscientious? The men of the Ulster Division were already at the Front, some of them parishioners, or sons, husbands or brothers of parishioners. People he knew. And now he really had no excuse. And where was he?
(It happened so quickly… Please forgive me, Walter.)

*

When the crew emerged from their bunks at daybreak, the
Dolphin
was on an unaltered course. During their conferral the previous evening Fitzmaurice had put a number of arguments regarding the stowaway to McGregor, all of which he had rejected, settling finally, and with ill grace, for the promise of a hefty cash bonus at the end of the voyage. After breakfast a meeting was held to allocate duties to the new arrival.

‘Can ye sew, lassie?'

‘Of course I can. Can't you?'

‘There are sails tae be repaired and I daresay some of the men's clothing.'

‘Why don't you sew them then?'

‘Ah, Jesus Christ.' McGregor raised his eyes to the heavens. ‘
Your Lordship?
'

‘Uh, do I take it you would prefer tasks of a more robust nature?' Fitzmaurice said.

‘I don't see why I should have to do the sewing just because I'm a woman, that's all.'

‘A perfectly reasonable position.'

Fitzmaurice thought for a moment, then his eyes brightened.

‘Well, if you're not afraid of hard work, I have just the job for you.'

‘Yes?'

‘Do you know where the bilge is?'

To her credit, Phoebe tackled all the duties assigned to her ably and without a murmur, even, when it was her turn, the sluicing of the heads, a chore the very mention of which drained the blood from the faces of her shipmates. The crew, disconcerted, despite her manly attire, by a feminine presence, went out of their way to treat her with courtesy (though their behaviour, generally speaking, was governed less by inclination and more by fear of McGregor). The exception was the cabin boy, who goggled with furtive intent at every opportunity, increasing the volcanic pressure beneath his adolescent skin to new and troubling levels.

Rafferty and Harris kept a running book on the boy's dermal turmoil, betting on the longevity of the more spectacular pustules and papules (including a side wager one evening on the likelihood of a live eruption during dinner) and attempting to predict – with lucrative accuracy in Rafferty's case — the site of the next disfigurement.

Apart from a night of gales and a morning of heavy swell, the
Dolphin
made good headway following Phoebe's appearance. The first sighting of
terra firma
was reported by Harris on the fifth day: a momentary glimpse of snow-capped mountains far off, quickly obscured by mist. It was a still afternoon and they were running on steam power. All had settled into their tasks with the dreamy acquiescence required for passages of tedium at sea, taking their leisure where they could. Fitzmaurice had found a favourite spot on the port side of the stern where, due to the position of a supporting beam in the wheelhouse, he could not be seen by the officer in charge, and here he smoked his pipe and coughed quietly into a handkerchief. In the evenings, after dinner, Phoebe set about teaching the Trinity men how to play Bridge, their progress slowed by Fitzmaurice's insistence on withdrawing early to update his ‘expedition journal'.

Crozier found this document lying open on the mess-room table one afternoon at the following entry, written in a curiously jerky, childlike hand:

… be a charming, if misgided young filly who
seems to have caught the eye of both my colleegues.
I have assured the Scott, who has been beastly about
the entire matter, that she shall remain in Rakeyervick after
our business their is concluded.

 

With idle fascination Crozier flicked back to the beginning:

 

Expedition Log (Being An Acount
of My Artic Adventure)

By Hugh Peregrine Balthazar Fitzmaurice

Thursday
, 30th of March, 1916

Wayed anchor at first light
and left Queenstown with strong wind. In all there are
eleven soles aboard (thirteen including the expedition leaders igwana and
the ships' dog, twentyone including the chicken's – note: do
chicken's have soles? Ask Crozier). The ships' captain is
a rough type but seems respectfull enough and very experiensed.
His advise, and I have excepted it, is to avoid
the Atlantic squawls as much as posible by sailing round
the east coast of Ireland and via the Hebradees. This
is estamated to take around five days.

10:00 hours. We
have incountered a heavy swell which is having, has casued
(the following lines were scored out and only partly legible)
the novice sailors among us feeling the affects of
(three words unreadable)…
a garstly mistake
.
Beleive now death real
posibillity, therefore
(seven words unreadable)…
and hereby bequeeth my
worldly goods to Nanny Brannigan, excluding the collexion of rare
books and steriograrfs in my bedside locker in chambers, and
excepting my igwana which I intrust to Mr Frank Rafferty
, and my pipe which I leave to Mr Walter Croz
…

Friday, 31st of March.

Order has been restored and
most of the company has eaten a harty brekfast. One
disterbing note concerns allercation of ships' duties…

At this point the log's author was heard whistling in the corridor and Crozier hurried up the spiral steps into daylight.

A short while later he was leaning on the gunwale on the port side when the cabin boy, who was perched in the crow's nest, gave a cry. Crozier thought little of it, the cabin boy being given to frequent involuntary ejaculations due to his volatile skin, but there came another shout, more urgent, and footsteps sounded behind him. It was McGregor, hoisting a pair of field glasses.

‘What is it?'

The question was ignored. Crozier scoured the horizon but could see only the usual rippling mass of ever-changing seams and shadows.

‘Is it a whale?'

Harris appeared and stood, also silent, watching the waves. The skipper exhaled heavily through his moustache and turned to glare up at the lookout who was still squinting out to sea. Harris raised his arm.

‘There! One o'clock.'

McGregor pressed the binoculars to his face.

‘Holy s—e.'

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