by Cormac James
Later, the barefooted girl came and danced beside him. Morgan gave no ground, and soon afterwards she took his hand and led him outside. On his way out, he made sure to catch DeHaven’s eye. Morgan gave him a stiff salute over the heads of the mob, glad he’d been seen, because it would give them something else to jeer him about.
She turned her long white back to him. A little later, she turned to face him again with a wise grin. He told her it was hopeless, she was wasting her time. He told her how much he’d had to drink, but the girl believed in her own special talents, and got down to work. Either she thought she knew better, or she simply didn’t understand a word he said.
Afterwards, he lay alone in the sly midsummer twilight, listening. What he heard, all around him, was panic and surrender. Out on the ship, Myer had hoisted a red lamp to guide them home. Across the harbour, every window in Rink’s house was liquid gold. Morgan was wrung-out, stupid, brittle, and ready to make the most of it. He would be calling on her for sympathy – a role he didn’t think she could resist. Sympathy and forgiveness, of course, could easily be confused. Letting her see him in that state, with his guard down – she’d take it as an act of trust, and feel obliged, or allowed, to pay him back.
From a distance, later, DeHaven watched his friend trying to walk from the dancehall across the beach, towards the governor’s house. He watched the man falter and dither, stagger on only to stall again, as if unsure of his bearings. Now he gathered resolve and lunged forward, swaying outrageously, like a ship in a heavy swell. Beside him, the sea glittered like silver foil in the moonlight, and slopped beery foam onto the sand.
At six o’clock in the morning, still singing, the men took hold of the capstan, and began to haul up. Some of the girls stood crying silently on the shore. About the ship, the gulls swooned and mimed in the wind. Morgan had been found and carried to the jolly-boat and laid along the bottom, and that was how he quit Disko – snoring, unconscious, almost forgotten, in a leaky boat trailed behind the ship.
Even as the last whaleboat was pushing off from the beach, Rink tried to convince them to wait. Myer was out at the ship, of course, and there was no one to appeal to but the drunken crew. They left him letters for the next homebound ship, whenever that would be.
25th July
All sails set, they ran along smartly under the cliffs. For two days now, a strong wind from the south had been driving them on. It felt like proper progress at last. On deck, Morgan listened to the jibes batted back and forth overheard. They were no more anxious, it seemed to him, than men making a jaunt from Kingstown to Holyhead. They seemed utterly indifferent to their own fragility, and that of their ship.
Up the coast the whalers were all gathered just off Upernavik, where the ice now pushed right in to the shore. Like them, Myer made fast to the floe to wait for an opening. Immediately, a boat came working its way towards them through the mess. It was Captain Parker, of the True Love. He had mailbags for them from Scotland, but no news of Franklin.
Myer insisted the man stay to dinner, and all through dinner interrogated him. True, the ice was fairly rotten, Parker said. But what did that matter without the wind to scatter it? No, he said, this year he did not think they would find a way. Neither their nor his nor any other ship. Of course, Parker told the table, I’m not a prophet.
Myer insisted on telling the man their own story, blow by blow, as though inviting him to approve or find fault. The long weeks trapped in the floe, the daily crush, the ice that simply would not be bullied aside. He’d left himself open to accusation, he was sure. Now, listening to him interrogate Parker, Morgan wondered was Myer looking for a way in or a way out. Coaxed by the lamplight, he felt something very like pity for the man. The weeks refitting and recruiting at Disko had done little for him. Since taking to sea he’d been tired and sick. He looked older, starting out a second time.
Afterwards, as usual, MacDonald retired to his cabin early. Now Myer too stood up, saying he was not altogether well. That left Morgan and DeHaven and Brooks, and Cabot clearing away, and Hepburn already in his bunk. They had all understood the conversation with Parker. As soon as the ice loosened any, they would begin to bore again. They would have to bore as far as they possibly could, for the sake of the log. Myer had even convinced Parker to sell them a sail and yards, that would let them add a main topsail to their spread.
Pure folly, DeHaven said, almost to himself. The ship and everything in it, he meant, or what was waiting for them in The Pack.
How do you mean? Brooks said. It was a challenge of sorts, a show of loyalty to the captain.
He means we’re too late, Morgan said. He could not contemplate an argument. Like Myer, he’d been not a little tetchy since shipping from Disko, and in every half-heard word now felt some little barb. He would not be easy, he knew, until they entered the ice again.
It’s still the middle of the summer, Brooks told him.
The solstice was six weeks ago, Morgan said. In a month it’ll be September. He was tracking the calendar, counting the days. September, he said, as though that would settle the argument once and for all. It did not. It was only a word. It was still bright, close to midnight. Men were sleeping up on deck. All the evidence was against him, and it was pointless trying to explain. Nonetheless, they were too late. That was the simple fact. Even if the passage went fairly well, it had been a lost race from the start, having to return to Disko, leaving again late in July. This far north, the doors did not stay open long.
26th July
He did a round of the ship after breakfast, to distribute the letters from Parker’s postbag. He handed each one over and quickly moved along. It was a poor life had sent most of them out, he knew, and precious little promise in it anywhere, no matter how hard a man looked, to tempt himself back.
He found Banes on deck, trying to tempt the cat with a frayed bit of rope. But Banes refused to take the thing. He needed Morgan to read it out.
Would you not prefer to go below? Morgan said.
I don’t care who hears, Banes said. It’s not me had the writing of it.
It was a single sheet. Morgan tore it open and folded it out. He began to read it aloud. First the formalities. Then: Well I bet you will be surprised to hear that Anna Lennon is married. She married James Dempsey the schoolmaster last month in Cork. They had a good day out. Everyone here was surprised at the news. I expect you will be surprised yourself.
Who was she? Morgan asked, wondering was the news proof or reprieve.
A girl I knew, Banes said. I know the fellow too, fairly well.
Another of his conquests, many and varied, DeHaven jibed. Leaving other men to clean up his mess after him. Isn’t that it, Dan?
That’s it exactly, sir.
They had been ready for days. They were only waiting now for the word from above. Above, the canvas was slapping joylessly against the masts. The wind from the south was failing, that till now had held The Pack in place. Already the ice seemed a little looser. Tomorrow morning very likely they would begin to bore.
Myer was studying the whalers through the glass. One by one, he noted their names in his book. What it was proof of, Morgan did not know. After a time Morgan himself stood out at the bow and studied the land. At the far end of the glass, he saw another life and anot
her age. The houses were all sod, walls and roof. He felt he was looking all the way back to Ireland, his father’s estate, the life he’d left behind.
He watched until his eyes began to water and the world began to dance. He shook out his head and saw the vision was not merely private. Between ship and shore the air was dancing as over a stove. It was the warm air. It was like staring drunk through old glass. The men did not like it. They stood frozen at their tasks to watch the bergs being hoisted into the sky. Morgan stood on deck as rapt as any of them.
As evening came on, they heard a new song set adrift from Parker’s ship. The voices were brazen against the rough silence of the sea. Cabot stood alone, listening, tears in his eyes.
That’s not French, Morgan told him, as though to set him straight.
Basque, Cabot said. They used to rule the seas up here. All this. The first of the whalers. The bravest and the best. And all is left of that now is a few old songs. He shoved the butt of his hand against his eye. It will be a time before I will hear them again, he said.
You could teach them to us, Morgan said. Beef up the repertoire. God knows I’d be glad to hear a new tune.
It is not the same, Cabot said.
No, Morgan said. I suppose not.
There had been a letter for Giorgio, the cabin-boy, from his father. Morgan read it to the whole deck, with a sick taste in his throat. We had a letter from your brother Jim, he read. He told us he does not think you care so much for the life of a sailor. However much it may seem a hard life and a strange one to a young boy, you must put up with it now. Maybe you will like it more with time.
4th August
At midnight Morgan hauled his mattress up on deck and rolled it out. Still he could not sleep. Below it had been too warm. Here it was too bright. The moon overhead, and the stubborn sun, and both giggling below, in the long crazy lead they’d been ploughing through the floe. He got out his mother’s letter again, that had been waiting for him in Parker’s bag.
Dear Richard, it said. It is with deep regret I am writing you these few lines, in the hope that they may somehow find you, wheresoever in the world you may be. Your father was buried yesterday 28th. I am only after coming back from the funeral at Bandon, where all our people are buried as you know. He had a very happy death. You can rest easy on that count. It was a grand funeral. The bishop insisted on saying it himself, on your account I believe. 79 yrs he was according to the Bible. I am congratulating you on your birthday 19th July whether yet to come or already gone. I hope you will enjoy many more years. I hope too you have seen sense and are now living a better life than previously. The weather here is still very hard and cold. It is terrible hard on all the Old People, and there is plenty about the place I think will not see another winter through. I myself will be 71 years in September. I am going through life here alone now the best I can, but I am lonesome as I have not a single one of the family with me. That is not what I expected of you. I did not think ye would forsake me every one. I am very anxious to hear from you at least one last time before I die. I am lonesome here now after your father of course. To the end like myself he could see neither sense nor virtue in your pursuit of hardships and labours to which you were never bred. We could never neither of us ever comprehend why you went and quit the Land Service. I expect a long letter soon and don’t forget it. God bless you and watch over you day and night wherever you may be.
He remembered his last visit home, calling to his father’s room. He’d opened the door just enough to stick his head in, to ask was it a good time? The doctor was bent over the bed. The old man was getting his daily dose, the doctor said. Morgan chastely closed the door. Going down the stairs, his mother was coming up. He stepped back against the wall, so they would not touch as they passed. Afterwards he waited almost an hour down in the kitchen, warming himself at the fire, before he could muster the courage to go up again. For this, his last visit, he wanted the old man in a proper state – beyond the first flush of stupidity, the first grin of relief. He wanted him well enough to pretend he wasn’t in too much pain. By extension, that he wasn’t in pain all the time, that he hadn’t always been in pain, more or less constantly, more or less unbearably, all his life. That it didn’t matter his son couldn’t do anything about it, was helpless, like a parent with a suffering child, because nothing more needed to be done, it had been dealt with, he felt considerably better now. So Morgan waited a long time at the fireside before going back up.
He had mentioned the letter to no one, and most likely never would. It was something he wanted to keep for himself, apparently. Why, he could hardly say. In so many things, he was a mystery to himself. Perhaps those aboard were not fit to share it, in his slighted mind. Yes, that felt right. That felt like a reasonable counterweight.
Now in the silence he could hear scraps of ice nibbling at the hull. Still he could not sleep, and in the end he climbed down and walked out in the queer twilight, under its spell. He could see clearly that the thing had relaxed. He watched the cracks breathe, felt he was standing on the back of a lazy Leviathan. All day there’d been a fair breeze blowing that worked with the tide to open everything up. They’d been boring a week now, were making much better progress this time round. He wondered would it last. He hardly cared, now, if it all closed up again. The prospect no longer vexed. Now he was simply glad to be back in the ice. Now he felt and enjoyed its preserve. On the open water he’d still felt too close to Kitty, to Disko, to home. Now he breathed deeply and freely, great lungfuls of cool, clean air. More than anything he felt relief.
10th August
In the officers’ cabin, they all felt the breeze, and all lifted their heads. It was MacDonald, in the open doorway. Most likely there would be some extra duty for one of them, or something very like a reproach.
Mr Morgan, I wonder if I might talk to you privately, he said.
Of course, Morgan said. He turned his book face down on the table. It was something he would take up again exactly where he’d left off. But Hepburn and Brooks were already on their feet, and already stood between him and the door.
We’re going to take a little turn, Brooks said. Stay where you are.
Too quickly, they were gone. Morgan was still sitting at the table, looking up.
There is someone wishes to see you, MacDonald said.
Here I am, Morgan said.
It would be better if you came with me.
Morgan studied the man’s face, searching for the eloquent clue.
Trust me, MacDonald said. It was not an order but an appeal, and an offering.
Morgan got to his feet slowly, burdened. Do I need my coat? he said.
No.
MacDonald led the way, the few steps down the corridor to his own cabin. He opened the door and stepped aside, for Morgan to go ahead. Morgan stepped inside, and MacDonald stepped straight in behind him, closing the door. She was sitting on the bed, her legs folded beneath her tailor-fashion, her back to the partition wall.
Morgan stood there in silence. He needed a moment to let the information soak right the way through. To open himself up to it, physically.
Who else knows? he said, and heard himself saying it. That was what he finally managed to say.
Just the three of us here in this room, MacDonald said. No
one else.
Three weeks you’re stowing her in here, without one other soul in the know? I don’t believe you. It’s not possible.
Believe what you like, MacDonald told him. But there she is.
The man was right, of course. What he said was true. The proof of it was only three feet away, sitting on the bed.
She says she is carrying your child, MacDonald said.
Even as he heard the words, Morgan felt the planks under his bootsoles wavering, preparing to cede. A sickening lurch, as the entire solid world fell away. Suddenly there was no bottom, no solid surface to crash – crush – into, to give this moment an end. He reached for the post to steady himself.
She says, he said.
A woman tends to know these things, MacDonald said. Especially when it concerns herself. You’re not going to contradict her, I hope. Or are you going to try to tell me that, how shall I put it, that the means were not put at her disposal, for such a thing to come to pass?
Morgan had been listening with his head bowed, penitent. He now reached out and opened the door, as if to go. In turn, MacDonald reached to take hold of Morgan’s arm, to keep him, and oblige him to face full square his responsibilities. At the first touch Morgan’s hands shot out and lifted the man bodily off the ground. He carried him out into the corridor, like a docker hefting a hundredweight sack of grain.
The officers’ door was kicked open.
MacDonald was thrown into the room.
At the table, Cabot was looking up expectantly, ready to be amused. He’d come to collect the dirty ware.
Out, Morgan said, but Cabot stood where he was, faltering, unsure. MacDonald lay sprawled on the floor, panting, a hounded look on his face.
