The line pulled taut as the whale dived. A second, deeper thud signalled that the harpoon head had exploded inside its body. The line went slack and then the whale surfaced. The catcher went hard into reverse, dragging the creature backwards, pulling the line tight as the whale thrashed and the water began to run red. The gunner was loading another harpoon.
‘A bit low, I think,’ Lars said. ‘If the harpoon goes off in the lungs, it should kill the whale almost at once.’
The whale’s tail rose in the air and came down in a sickening blow, crashing on the water. A red spray spouted from its blowhole, forming an eerie mist. Mathilde gripped the railing, the only thing holding her upright. Until this moment she’d thought the hanging whale on Solglimt would be the most monstrous sight of the trip. But at least that creature had been already dead.
The gunner fired the second harpoon. The blow was more sickening this time now that Mathilde knew what was coming and she gasped aloud, feeling a sharp pain in her own entrails. The whale lunged against the two lines pinning it and made a terrible sound, a mixture of groan and shriek. It heaved back and forth, lay motionless for a moment, then shuddered violently, gave a final red spray from its blowhole and was still.
Thorshavn’s crew began yelling like madmen, jumping and shaking their fists. Lars smiled down at them.
Mathilde felt far removed from the scene before her. The bloody water, the catcher coming up to the carcass of the whale and beginning to pump its belly with air so the pleats expanded and distended in a grotesque balloon of flesh. She’d tried to warn the whales off, but failed, and now she was trapped in the middle of this crowd, mad with bloodlust. Norwegians had always been hunters, but she’d thought of it as an unpleasant necessity and presumed others did too. She’d been wrong. There was a fierce, violent joy in the kill that she could never share.
Once the dead whale was secure and inflated, the gunner waved in their direction.
‘Give him a wave!’ Lars said. ‘A job well done, and not easy with an audience.’
Ingrid’s grip tightened and she prised Mathilde’s hand free of the railing and raised both their arms. Mathilde was trapped in the forced gesture, but she refused to smile.
‘Will they go for the second one too?’ Nils asked.
‘They say a male won’t leave a female, even if she’s dead, but a female will leave a dead male, so it depends which one they got,’ Lars said.
Mathilde freed her hand from Ingrid’s grasp. Hjalmar was scanning the horizon and she saw his face relax.
‘I expect the other is far away now,’ Ingrid said.
‘I expect so,’ Hjalmar answered, and pulled his pipe from his mouth. It had gone out.
‘Well,’ Lars said, looking around at them. ‘That was a bit of excitement. Let’s have a drink with Thorshammer’s captain, shall we? He’s just preparing to come on board. Ladies, after you.’
Lillemor stood back to let Mathilde go past first. Below their feet was some scattered clapping.
‘They like your singing,’ Lillemor said to her.
To Mathilde’s horror she realised the applause was for her.
CHAPTER 28
Lillemor braced her hips against the ship’s railing and sighted along the rifle at a blue hole in an iceberg about twenty metres off. She squeezed the trigger and the gun fired with a satisfying crack and thud of the recoil against her shoulder. Chips of ice flew up from the hole.
‘Good shot,’ Nils said. ‘You’ve got a keen eye, Mrs Rachlew. But there’s a lot to remember. If the whale is close, you have to aim at the waterline as it starts to go down. If it’s further away, you have to aim higher than where you want to hit, as the weight of the harpoon makes it drop. It can all change depending on the direction the whale is travelling. It takes a lot of practice.’
‘Where are all those penguins when you want them?’ Lillemor said. She smiled at him and took aim again. Another shot, this one making the water spurt at the iceberg’s base.
‘Nice one.’ Lars was walking towards them from the cabin. ‘Ingrid’s getting her coat. Are you right to leave?’
Lillemor turned to him, lowering the gun. ‘Ready.’ She didn’t miss the quick, almost unconscious glance he gave her outfit. She’d dressed in slacks, topped by a white fur coat with a hood, under which she’d tucked her hair into a tight white fitted hat. Every man on deck was staring at her, openly or surreptitiously, fascinated.
‘We’ll be leaving the rifles, unfortunately,’ he said. ‘When the whalers are working, they don’t want to be distracted by us shooting seals. We’ll go out another time for them.’
Lillemor handed her rifle to Nils. ‘Fine with me. I’m not interested in a seal when there’s a chance for a whale. I’ll take the camera instead and get some snaps.’
She saw Ingrid emerge from her cabin and head down the catwalk towards them. She was also dressed in slacks, for the first time Lillemor could remember. She looked good in them, though Lillemor knew they suited her own taller, slimmer figure better.
‘Did you tell Mathilde we were going?’ Ingrid asked when she reached them.
Lillemor nodded. ‘She went straight to bed and covered her eyes.’
‘I don’t suppose she’d come, anyway,’ Ingrid said.
Lillemor found herself grinning. She and Ingrid had convinced Lars to take them out on the catcher to try for a whale. The prospect of a hunt seemed to override his fears about taking them on the smaller boat. With the three of them going for several hours, Mathilde had the perfect opportunity to be with Hjalmar. Lillemor winked at Ingrid. ‘She might appreciate a chance to be on her own. Do you need a practice shot?’
Ingrid shook her head. ‘Shall we go?’
‘Let’s,’ said Lars. ‘They’ve hooked up the basket to lower us into the catcher – it’s the quickest way. They’re keen to get moving.’
The catcher, Torlyn, was bobbing in the water alongside Thorshavn, the resupply ship’s newness making the smaller vessel look even grimier. Streaked with soot, old blood and blubber, it carried the same thick stink as the factory ship. The harpoon mounted on its prow left no doubt as to its purpose.
The captain, Andersen, and his crew had the engines running and as soon as the three of them had been lifted over in the basket, the engines dug into the water and the smaller boat sped away into the ice field. In minutes they were out of sight of the ship.
They were almost down at water level and for the first time Lillemor had a sense that she was truly in Antarctica. As they passed icebergs, towering high above them, and slid through the broken-up brash ice, it seemed real in a way it hadn’t from Thorshavn’s deck. Penguins plunged in and out of the water and Lillemor found herself laughing at their antics. They startled a seal resting on an iceberg, and as the creature roared and flapped to get away from them Lillemor managed to get her camera steady in time to take a shot.
‘Wish I had my rifle,’ Lars said.
‘You’ve bigger things to shoot today,’ Andersen said. ‘Come up the front and I’ll show you how to use the harpoon.’
Lillemor put the camera down and jumped to her feet, the first behind Andersen as he led them forward. They climbed the ladder up to the forecastle, where the harpoon stood on a swivelling mount on the catcher’s prow.
Lillemor forced herself to be patient as Lars went first, taking hold of the handle and squinting along the sharp-tipped head with its folded-back barbs. Buried out of sight in the metal was the explosive device that caused the barbs to spring out in the whale’s flesh, lodging themselves and ensuring the whale couldn’t pull free. The harpoon was attached to a coil of thick rope.
Sensing Ingrid’s hesitation, Lillemor went next, spinning the gun on its axis. Its weight and size were greater than any weapon she’d ever handled and she liked the smooth way it rotated on its stand. The motion was completely different from using a rifle, and she saw that it might not be an easy thing to shoot accurately at first.
Ingrid stepped up next and squinted dow
n the sights. ‘I’m not sure I’ll be any good at this.’
Lars smiled up at her. ‘Have a turn anyway. You never know.’
‘The main thing is to aim higher than you think,’ Andersen said.
The wind was icy at the front of the boat and they clambered back to the rear to wait in relative comfort. Lillemor scanned the horizon intently for the first sign of a whale’s breath. Or a glimpse of the continent, for that matter.
‘Do you think there’s land nearby?’ she asked Lars.
He glanced around at the gunner. ‘What do you think, Andersen? Are we near land here?’
The gunner shrugged. ‘Can’t be too far away. I’m thinking about whales, not land, so I don’t keep an eye out.’
‘Blaast!’ the lookout yelled above them. Lillemor was on her feet in a heartbeat. She could see the mist in the air, starting to disperse, and the dark curve of the whale’s back. The boat swung around for the pursuit.
Andersen was already out of the cockpit and on his way to the front of the ship. Lillemor was hard behind him and she could hear Lars and Ingrid following. At the bottom of the forecastle ladder, Andersen turned to them.
‘Who’s going first?’ he asked.
Lillemor held her breath. It wouldn’t be her, she was sure.
‘You go,’ Lars said to Ingrid.
Ingrid smiled at him, took hold of the railing and climbed up to the forecastle, dreadfully slowly it seemed to Lillemor.
‘Shall I help you?’ Lars called up to her as Ingrid took up position in front of the gun and turned it back and forth to feel the heft of it.
‘No, let me do it,’ she said.
The lookout yelled again and the boat accelerated and shifted course.
‘It’s a blue,’ Lars said excitedly.
Lillemor followed the line of his pointing arm. The whale had risen much closer this time, and was less than a hundred metres away. She had a sudden, vivid sensation of its size as it sank underwater.
The boat slowed and they waited. The water in front of them was still and glassy. The next explosive exhalation of breath was so close and loud that Lillemor jumped.
‘There!’ she cried. The creature had risen for breath right in front of them, huge and seemingly oblivious, the mist of its blow hanging heavy in the air, sending a briny scent over them. The curved back presented an easy target, Lillemor thought. She saw Ingrid swing the harpoon around as the whale began to sink.
‘Now!’ Lars called out.
It seemed to Lillemor that Ingrid hesitated. She heard the crack of the gun firing and the hiss of the rope spinning out of its coils. There was a splash and a muffled explosion. Whale and harpoon disappeared.
‘What happened?’ Lillemor asked.
‘Missed,’ Andersen said. ‘Bad luck, Mrs Christensen. A close thing.’
Ingrid stepped back from the harpoon. Lillemor wondered if she’d truly tried to hit it, or lost her nerve at the critical moment. Ingrid came down the ladder and Lars patted her on the back as Andersen clambered up and started reeling in the rope to retrieve the harpoon.
‘Will we get another try at that one?’ Lillemor asked him.
‘Doubt we’ll see him again,’ Andersen said. ‘We’ll find ourselves another. Are you next, Consul?’
Lillemor tried not to show her eagerness.
‘Do you want to try again?’ Lars asked Ingrid.
She smiled at him. ‘That’s sweet, but you should have the next shot.’
He nodded, then turned to Lillemor. ‘I know you’re keen, Mrs Rachlew. Want to go next?’
Lillemor felt a rush of excitement. She could see the look in his eyes, the gleam of a man on the hunt. It was generous of him to offer another the chance at a shot in the grip of this feeling. She gave him her best smile.
‘I’d love to.’
Ingrid and Lars decided to sit back in the cockpit out of the wind, but Lillemor stationed herself to wait by the harpoon as she knew the gunners did. She didn’t want to miss the chance at a shot if a whale rose unexpectedly close by. It turned out to be nearly an hour before they found another. By that time Lillemor’s face was scoured by the wind, and the sleet was hurting her eyes. Her fingers were numb inside her gloves, her nose had gone beyond dripping and had frozen, and she had a new respect for the fleet’s gunners. But when the lookout finally called ‘Blaast!’ she forgot the cold. She gripped the harpoon gun and marked where the whale had risen.
Again they closed in on the whale; again there was the tense, silent wait for it to surface near the ship. The wind was picking up, Lillemor noticed with part of her mind, and it was icy. But her being was focused on the harpoon, her body poised to react. This was why she adored hunting, this hyper-awareness of her own body, the animal and the weapon.
‘There!’
The whale surfaced and Lillemor spun the harpoon. The creature was in her sights, and close. She waited a heartbeat for it to come to the top of its rise.
Lars had come up from the cockpit and was standing below her on the deck. ‘Aim low,’ he said, his voice intense.
Lillemor dropped the gun a fraction, took a breath and fired. This time it happened in a flash. The harpoon flew out and hit the whale below the dorsal as it started to dive.
‘Fish fast!’ Andersen bellowed, leaping up beside her, tying off the rope and starting up the winch. Lillemor couldn’t help a cry of excitement as the boat went into hard reverse to pull the line taut. She had a powerful image of the great creature below them pulling hard to escape while the ship fought to drag it backwards.
It was all noise and yelling and engines. Lars was beside her. She understood, in the flurry, that Andersen was loading the harpoon for another shot. She wanted it to be hers so much that she ached with it, and when Lars stepped forward she had to force herself to give up the gun.
He leaned down to it and waited with the same intensity. They were joined in it, like sex, as she crouched next to him.
The whale flew out of the water, lunging, and Lars fired, sending the second harpoon deep into its underside.
‘Good shot, Consul,’ Andersen said. ‘That’s it.’
The whale stayed on the surface, thrashing. Lillemor hoped its death would be quick. Watching the animal suffering wasn’t part of her pleasure. She felt herself tensing up and then relaxed as the whale stiffened and went still.
A cheer went up from the crew and Lillemor turned to Lars. Their eyes met and she saw in them the hunger, the thrill, the satisfaction and the eroticism. He wasn’t a married businessman right then, and she wasn’t the younger wife of the naval attaché. They were humans who’d hunted, and the success of it was the fierce joy of survival.
He nodded his head. ‘Well done.’
‘And you,’ she said. She put out her hand and shook his firmly. Nothing for anyone to see that suggested impropriety. She’d had sex with less intimacy than the moment they’d just shared, but no one would know.
She looked over at their quarry again. It was far bigger than the humpback had been. As the boat manoeuvred alongside, she could see it was almost two-thirds the length of the catcher. One of the boys jumped nimbly across to the whale with a flensing knife, slashing footholds as he landed, as tiny as a tick bird on an elk’s back. Someone tossed him a hose and he made a slit and fed it into the whale. As they pumped the air, the pleats of the whale’s belly slowly ballooned, turning inside out.
Ingrid was waiting for them as they jumped back down into the cockpit.
Lillemor was still shaking with excitement. ‘I thought he’d get away. I was sure I’d gone too low.’
‘I knew you’d hit him, but I thought maybe he’d pull it out, and did you see how the line went hard – you wouldn’t want an arm or a leg caught in that!’ Lars said.
‘No! My God, it’d rip it straight off. You know, that was like the best part of hunting and the best part of fishing – you get to shoot the thing and reel it in.’
‘Did you get in a shot too?’ Ingrid asked Lars.
<
br /> ‘I fired the second harpoon,’ he said. ‘We killed it between us.’
Lillemor realised she had her hand on Lars’s arm; she’d gripped him in the excitement of the moment. He hadn’t noticed, but she felt Ingrid’s eyes on her. She let go of him, making sure the movement was casual.
‘Is there time to go for another?’ Lars asked Andersen.
He shook his head. ‘Factory’s been on the radio. Blizzard coming, I’m afraid. We’ll have to head back straight away. Don’t want the ladies to get cold.’
‘Sounds quite exciting,’ Lillemor said. She’d stopped feeling the cold, and in her exhilaration, the challenge of a blizzard sounded appealing.
The dead whale was inflated until it floated freely and the boys attached a chain to its tail, ready for towing back to the factory.
‘It’s a good eighty feet,’ Lars said. ‘Do you agree, Andersen?’
He glanced along the length of the whale. ‘Seventy-five, I’d say.’
Lillemor hoped there’d be some kind of trophy to take home, a piece of bone or tooth. A shout interrupted her thoughts. One of the catcher’s crewmen was pointing at the whale and gesticulating. Lillemor got to her feet and felt Lars stand beside her.
‘What?’ Ingrid asked.
Lars clambered over to the side where he could see and Lillemor followed. Five huge dorsal fins rose from the surface of the water and Lillemor saw a flash of black and white, moving so fast she couldn’t follow it.
‘Orcas,’ Lars said. ‘They try to eat the tongues, I’m told.’
They were lunging at the carcass of the whale, rising out of the water to attack, and Lillemor climbed higher for a better view. Down low, almost in the water, the whale’s shape was oddly distorted. It was a foetus hanging there, Lillemor realised, like the one they’d seen on the deck of the first factory ship. The dead whale was giving birth, in some kind of muscular spasm after its death. The orcas, with their instinct for an easy meal, were lunging and tearing at the foetus as it emerged.
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