Ishmael’s eyes settle on Tashtego, curious to see how he is taking to the news. He’s both respected enough and sensible enough that the others will listen to whatever he says. But Tashtego hooks his thumbs into his belt loops and remains silent.
“Any other questions?” Starbuck asks.
The roomful of sailors is quiet.
“All right,” says the first mate. “Be prepared to launch first thing in the morning.”
The chase-boat crews tread out. Ishmael’s is the last, and they’re passing Starbuck when Charity appears in the doorway. The pink is gone from her eyes, but she looks distressed as she addresses Starbuck: “How can you live with yourself when you know you’re sending these sailors to almost certain death?”
Starbuck frowns. “I know nothing of the sort. And no one’s making them do anything they don’t want to do.”
“No, you’re just offering them the one thing they can’t resist,” she spits back.
The first mate gives her a stony look, then strides away. “Don’t fall for this,” Charity warns Ishmael and his crew, now the only ones in the briefing room. “There’ll be other voyages.”
But other voyages mean more years away from loved ones, something Ishmael can’t imagine. On the other hand, he can imagine making an extra Ψ10,000 fast, paying back Gwen, and still having plenty of coin left over. Charity’s right. It’s the one thing none of them can resist.
“So what’s everyone going to do now?” Pip asks out in the passageway.
“Take a long, hot shower,” Queequeg replies. “That’s the only thing I missed on that island.”
“And I need to talk to Ishmael,” Gwen says. “In private.”
Pip makes a face, clearly not happy at being left out now that he’s one of the crew.
“We won’t be long,” Ishmael promises.
Abovedecks, a warm wispy fog wafts out of the dark, making the deck beneath their feet slippery. The great orb is barely visible. Gwen stops beside a crane mast. “What did Starbuck say about Pip?”
“He didn’t argue when I suggested that the Gilded were behind it. He seemed pretty upset that I even knew about them in the first place.”
“You really think they exist?”
“I’m starting to. Between the things Queequeg and Billy said and the way the first and second mates treat Pip, how else can you explain it?”
“But why would anyone go to such lengths to make sure Pip becomes part of our crew?” Gwen asks. “You think Pip learned ahead of time about the new bait Starbuck’s offering?”
Ishmael shrugs. “Don’t know. I get the feeling these Gilded folks like money, but not enough to risk dying for it.”
The thickening fog drifts across the Pequod’s dark deck. The ship creaks, and waves splash against its hull. Ishmael’s uniform is growing damp in the mist. “Guess I’ll head below.”
“Wait. There’s something else.” Gwen looks around, then lowers her voice. “A way we can all get rich without risking our lives.”
Ishmael stares at her uncertainly. “How?”
“Tell Ahab and Starbuck about the islanders raising terrafins.”
Ishmael feels a chill that has nothing to do with his damp uniform. “You . . . know about that?”
“Queek told me,” Gwen says. “Don’t be mad at him. I asked him why Diana didn’t want to let us leave the island. I guess he felt I had a right to know.”
Ishmael can’t really argue with that. “But why would telling Starbuck and Ahab about the islanders change their minds about hunting the Great Terrafin?”
“The night I stayed up with Charity, after she came back from being held by the pirates? She said some things about her and Starbuck. And about this green neurotoxin that terrafins have. I think it’s what was in those darts the islanders shot us with.”
Ishmael nods. It’s just as Gabriel said.
Gwen continues: “The way Charity talked about the neurotoxin, you’d think it has magical powers. She said that the amount the Great Terrafin has would be worth an unimaginable fortune.”
To have that much neurotoxin, it would have to be incredibly huge . . . Ishmael goes cold, recalling the enormous skiver leaning in the corner of Ahab’s quarters. It couldn’t be from an actual terrafin. But what if it was? They’ve seen enormous humps, and huge beasts on land. Why couldn’t there be an even larger creature? The sailor who’d been hopscotching across the sea to a working stasis lab had said terrafins weren’t worth the bother. But what if he didn’t know about the neurotoxin? Now it makes sense why Ahab and Starbuck want the Great Terrafin so badly.
All this raises another question: “Worth a fortune to who?”
“That’s what I was wondering, too,” Gwen says. “And I’m thinking maybe it’s these Gilded people. Charity never identified them. She just said there’re people who are desperate for the stuff. They’ll pay anything.”
Ishmael hasn’t forgotten how euphoric he felt while waking up after being shot with a dart, and how a mere drop of the most-diluted form of the nectar instantly healed his head after he’d been hurt while saving Thistle. Nectar, serum, neurotoxin — it was all the same.
But there’s something else he remembers as well: Gabriel saying, “Can change a man in unnatural ways.”
“All we have to do is tell Starbuck and Ahab about the islanders’ terrafins,” Gwen continues. “Then they’ll have all the neurotoxin they want without risking anyone’s life. . . . That means our lives, Ishmael, now that we’re stuck with an incompetent lineman.”
The logic of Gwen’s suggestion is undeniable. They’ve seen the battle that “normal” terrafins put up when harpooned. He can’t even begin to picture what trying to capture a truly giant terrafin would be like, but certainly many lives would be at risk. He gave his word to Gabriel, though — and even if he hadn’t, he’d never be able to live with himself if he betrayed the islanders’ trust. “We can’t. We’ d be destroying their lives.”
“You don’t know that for sure. Maybe the islanders would welcome trade with the Pequod.”
“If they wanted to trade their nectar, they would have done it by now,” Ishmael argues. “You didn’t see how crazed Diana got when she heard I knew about their terrafins. They want to keep them a secret. And I swore I wouldn’t tell anyone.”
“You swore, not me.”
Ishmael eyes her warily. “Don’t do it, Gwen. Even if you don’t care about the islanders — about Thistle and Billy — you’re better off keeping your mouth shut. Remember the money Ahab’s offering. You think you’ll get anything close to that if all you do is tell Starbuck and Ahab about the islanders’ terrafins?”
Gwen bites the corner of her lip and mulls it over. “You could be right. But how are we ever going to stick a terrafin that big with Pip as a —”
They’re interrupted by a thump and moan that come from the other side of the crane mast. When Ishmael and Gwen go around to see what it is, they find Pip getting to his feet like someone who’d just slipped on the wet deck.
“You okay?” Ishmael asks.
“Uh, yes.” Pip brushes himself off. “I . . . uh . . . came up here for some fresh air. Or, I guess, fresh fog. Finished your private conversation?”
Gwen’s eyes narrow. “It’s none of your business. Just because you’ve been made a lineman doesn’t mean —”
“Hold on.” Ishmael cuts her short and turns to Pip. “Gwen’s not the only one around here who has certain things she’d like to keep private. So unless you’d like to tell us why you’ve gotten special treatment since the day we got here, maybe you ought to respect that.”
Pip’s eyes tighten on Ishmael. “Point well taken,” he says, then heads belowdecks, leaving them alone again.
The ever-thickening fog drifts past. Gwen’s hair hangs dark and wet. “I don’t trust him.”
“We have to give him a chance.”
“If you say so, skipper,” Gwen replies sourly, then pulls her damp uniform away from her skin. “It’s too wet up
here. I’m going down.”
“Wait.” Ishmael gently takes her arm to stop her. “Not a word about the islanders and their terrafins, right?”
Gwen sighs. “For now.”
Lying in his sleeper that night, Ishmael once again tries to imagine a terrafin large enough to possess a skiver the size of the one in Ahab’s cabin. The chase boats would be mere toys in comparison with such a beast. Now he understands why that huge harpoon cannon sits on the bow of the Pequod: When it comes to the Great Terrafin, the Pequod itself will be the chase boat.
From out in the passageway comes the squeak of creaky wheels. Ishmael slips out of his bunk and leaves the men’s berth. In the dim light, he finds Tarnmoor sitting on the bottom step of a ladderway. The old swabbie takes a deep sniff, then yawns and pats the step next to him. “Ah, Ishmael. Can’t sleeps, lad? Troubled, are ya?”
Ishmael sits beside the old man. “Where did Ahab get that huge terrafin skiver in his quarters?”
“Aye, a souvenir that. And a reminder that the monster tooked his ship, the Essex. Tooked his men. Tooked his beautiful young wife and son. Tooked his leg.”
Ishmael digests the tragic end to the tale that the old swabbie had begun telling him that night two months ago while he sat in the steamy brig, his knuckles sore after breaking Daggoo’s nose. “Why didn’t it take Ahab?”
Maybe it’s his imagination, but Ishmael could swear that the old man’s blind eyes open just enough for him to get a glimpse of two shrunken pink orbs before they shut again. “Why? Because she knowed, lad. She knowed that for Ahab, there were a fates even worse than death. And that were to go on living with the memory a’ what he’d lost, what he’d still have if’n he hadn’t been so blinded by greed. Losin’ a fortune he never had to begins with don’t necessarily change a man. But lose a wife and child, and he’ll never be the same. Steals the humanity right out a’ a man. Leaves an empty, vengeful husk.”
Sitting on the step in the middle of the night, Ishmael can hear the faint hum of the Pequod’s heart — its reactor. But now he knows that its captain’s heart has been broken beyond repair.
“So it’s revenge he wants?”
“Aye, revenge — always revenge,” Tarnmoor says and stretches his arms. “He’ll say it’s coin he craves, but it ain’t. He lives only to destroy the thing what destroyed him.”
Ishmael sits back. “Tell me something, Tarnmoor. Why do you make it sound like you were there? Like you actually saw that beautiful wife and child?”
The old blind man is silent. The Pequod forges through the waves and from here and there come the creaks and groans of an aged, rusting ship plowing through the sea. Finally, Tarnmoor moves closer and lowers his voice, even though there’s no one around to hear. “Smarts you are, lad. Smart, smart. I’ll tells ya, but only so longs as ya swears never to tell another soul. Although if ya dids, I reckon it wouldn’t matter sinced they’d never believes ya, no never.”
Ishmael promises to keep the secret.
“I were Ahab’s first mate, lad, on the Essex. Had the rank Starbuck gots on this ship, and sailed under our captain when he were young.”
“You said you were blinded by the sun when you first got here.”
Tarnmoor chuckles. “Only a fool would look at the sun, lad. Ya takes me for a fool?”
“No, but —”
“Serves a good purpose, don’t it? Charity always makin’ sure new nippers runs into me on their firsts day. ‘Here’s the old fool swabbie whats looked at the sun and now he’s blinded, so don’ts go makin’ the same mistake, kiddies.’ Scares the Earth’s dry dirt out a’ them.”
Ishmael can’t help but feel amused. “You do it every time a new batch of nippers shows up?”
“Aye, lad, every time. Saved more’n a few a’ them their eyesight, I reckons.”
“So how did you lose your eyesight?”
Tarnmoor presses a bony finger across the bridge of his nose, covering his useless eyes. “The Great Terrafin, how else? Whipped acrost the eyes, I were. Left floatin’ on a piece a’ decking whiles all around me mens screamed and cried as the big-tooths moved in and mades a feast a’ them.”
“Big-tooths?” Ishmael repeats.
“Good-for-nothin’ scavengers that’ll eat anything what’s hurt or strugglin’. Terrafins is their favorites, but they’re too cowardly to attacks ones whats healthy. So they waits and follows a terrafin whats hurt or injured until its defenses is low and then attacks it. We been out a’ their waters these last few months. But nows we’re going back in, as it seems that’s wheres the Great Terrafin be headed.”
Ishmael sits quietly for a moment more. “You think we’ll find it, Tarnmoor?”
The old man is slow answering. With a yawn, he says, “Ahab knows this may be his last chance. The Trust won’t pay for another voyage if he don’t come back with a full pot. This time there’ll be no turning back. It’s the Great Terrafin or it’s him.”
The Trust again, Ishmael thinks, remembering what Old Ben said about it not wanting the people of Black Range to know certain things. And how Stubb claimed he was its official representative on the Pequod. And now Tarnmoor saying it pays for these voyages. He turns to ask the old swabbie what, exactly, the Trust is. But Tarnmoor’s head hangs forward, and he begins to snore.
“My third day as a lineman, and we’re on the trail of the Great Terrafin!” Pip exclaims excitedly. Under the blazing midday sun, Chase Boat Four floats peacefully on a vast glittery aquamarine bay. Overhead, drones buzz and zip like giant insects. An hour ago the beast was briefly spotted here, and now the chase boats drift silently, waiting to see if it will reappear.
“Just remember what you’re supposed to do,” Gwen grumbles. A warm breeze pushes the chase boat slowly along, and the crew sweat in their PFDs. This jungle-lined bay is so broad that the other chase boats are mere dots. Far away, waiting outside the mouth of the bay, the Pequod looks miniature. Schools of silvery scurry burst from the water now and then, fleeing some larger predator. Queequeg stands in the bow behind the harpoon gun, his visored cap pulled low.
“Look.” Pip points into the water, where the rusted hulk of a large ship lies on its side, caked with lumpy orange and red growths. Long green and brown blades of underwater plants gently wave in the current, and scurry of all sizes and colors dart in and out of the wreck’s many holes and crevices.
“What’s all that orange and red stuff ?” Gwen asks.
“Coral,” Queequeg answers, grinning triumphantly at Pip. “Those are its colors when it’s alive. That ship must have been down there for hundreds of years. It takes a long time for that much coral to grow.”
This time, Pip doesn’t challenge Queequeg as they all stare, fascinated, at the wreck below. Rusted and bent crane booms jut from its main deck, and in the stern, there appear to be a slipway and the remains of two large winches, though not nearly as large as the ones on the Pequod.
Suddenly, Queequeg points. Fifty yards away, something enormous and white glides slowly beneath the surface.
“Mother of Earth!” Pip blurts.
Ishmael catches his breath. Alarm barrels through him like an electric charge. The creature is gigantic! More the size of a submerged island than a living thing. Firing a harpoon at it will be like jabbing a splinter into the ankle of a giant.
Gwen and Queequeg glance anxiously at him, awaiting instructions. Right now the Great Terrafin is too far away for Queequeg to get off a shot with the harpoon gun. Ishmael suspects that if he were to start the RTG, the beast might spook and run.
“Get out the hand sail,” he whispers to Gwen, who quietly reaches beneath the seats and finds the light, clear sail. She holds one side and waits for Pip to take the other, but Pip looks at her with bulging, terrified eyes.
“Go on,” Ishmael urges.
Pip doesn’t move; he seems frozen.
“I knew it,” Gwen says bitterly.
“The sail, sailor!” Ishmael orders.
Quaking almost beyond co
ntrol, Pip reaches for his side of the hand sail. It catches the breeze, and the chase boat begins to drift more quickly while Ishmael uses the rudder to steer.
The Great Terrafin is straight ahead of them. Ishmael is trying not to imagine what will happen if they can actually put a stick into the enormous creature. Meanwhile, a few hundred yards off the bow, in the direction the terrafin is heading, a thin spit of land juts out from the beach. Soon the beast will be forced either to reverse course or turn to the right. Ishmael decides to gamble and steer the boat toward the spot where he thinks the Great Terrafin will be in a few minutes.
Just then comes the distant hum of a drone. Ishmael grabs the two-way and hisses, “Call it off ! We’re close.”
The drone veers off and hangs motionless in the sky, observing from a safe distance.
“You’ve got a visual?” Starbuck’s excitement is evident even over the scratchy two-way.
“Yes, sir.” Despite the polarized glasses he wears, the glittery surface makes it impossible to see where the creature is. Ishmael can only hope it’s still somewhere off the port side, soon to encounter the spit of land and turn right.
“Careful,” Starbuck cautions, as if Ishmael needs to be told.
The chase boat continues to glide silently, but Pip’s eyes dart like small, frightened creatures. “They can’t really expect us to fire a harpoon at it,” he whispers. “It’s madness!”
Ishmael presses a finger to his lips. Yes, it’s madness, but part of him can’t help feeling excited as well. Adrenaline rushes through his veins. They are pursuing what must be the largest, most dangerous creature on this planet.
The breeze continues to push the chase boat slowly toward the spot where Ishmael hopes to intersect with the beast. “Put down the sail,” he whispers to Gwen and Pip.
Without the aid of the breeze they drift more slowly. There is still no sign of the Great Terrafin. Ishmael wonders if it encountered the spit of land and doubled back. Or did he miscalculate where they would meet it?
Then he hears a gasp. Gwen points off the port side. Coming toward them beneath the water’s surface is not one but two creatures — the first is black and far smaller than the second.
The Beast of Cretacea Page 20
