Sun at Midnight

by Rosie Thomas

  Everyone else was reading, writing notes or listening to music on headphones. Alice went to bed. She lay in the dark security of her bunk, feeling loneliness stretched out beside her. The wind sometimes fell to a low growl, at other times it rose to a high-pitched scream that battered at the roof and the walls.

  She thought about the nine other people at the dinner table. Each of them had their stories behind them, all the people and places lined up in the recesses of their past, and she tried to imagine what they might be. Then she turned on to her back and lay with her eyes open, her fingers laced over her belly.

  Quite soon, sleep came and claimed her.

  The blizzard lasted for three days. It was impossible to leave the base – even crossing the few yards to the other hut was a serious excursion.

  On the first day Alice thought she would go and talk about their joint geology projects to Richard, who was working in the lab. She put on her parka and a pair of snow boots, and told Russell where she was headed.

  As soon as she stepped out of the door the wind slammed it shut behind her. She took an unthinking step forward as driving snow filled her eyes and mouth. She choked and lifted her arms to shield her face. The sudden movement and an extra-vicious gust of wind made her stagger, and she overbalanced and fell into thigh-deep snow. Coughing and gasping, she floundered on all fours trying to get her bearings. It was like huddling inside a tin of icy whitewash that was being violently shaken. Snow stung her eyes and half blinded her, and when she did shield them with a numb hand she couldn’t see beyond her own fingers.

  She had no idea which way to turn. The edge of the bluff was a couple of yards away in one direction, the main hut could only be the same distance away in the other. But she could see nothing. There was just the blizzard, a whirling wall of snow and sea fog, and the wind tearing as if it wanted to strip and flay her. She stood up again and glimpsed the blurred outline of her fall and the fumbling step that led to it, in a completely different direction from the one she would have guessed.

  She retraced the step and the red-painted wall of the hut loomed ahead. With a sharp gasp of relief she felt her way along it to the door. Against the gale, it took all her strength to heave it open. When it yielded she fell inside in a slanting column of snow. Papers blew off the table and saucepans rattled. She forced the door shut and bent over, panting for breath.

  It was like stepping from one universe into another. The noise of the wind was muted to a sonorous organ note. It was almost impossible to believe that the calm, domestic interior existed on the same planet as the wilderness outside, let alone that they were separated by only a few inches of insulated wall.

  She had been out for one or two minutes. Russ was still sitting in exactly the same position at the table, reading a two-week-old newspaper. Arturo was beyond him, tapping at his laptop. They both looked up.

  Alice’s eyes were watering. She didn’t know if they were tears of cold or shock.

  Russ got up, went to the coffee pot and poured some into a mug. He put the mug on the table and guided Alice to a chair in front of it.

  ‘Rough weather,’ he said kindly. ‘You’re not adjusted yet. Best to stay put until it quietens down.’

  ‘I had no idea,’ she whispered when she could speak.

  It was true. Every slow hour that passed seemed to underline the fact that she knew nothing about this place she had come to.

  Since her arrival there had been no chance to explore outside the hut even for half an hour. All she knew so far was this tiny space, enclosed by four walls against the fury of the weather. Although she had tried to prepare for it, a world of such absolute hostility was completely new to her.

  She kept reminding herself that compared with what the polar explorers of her childhood bedtime stories had endured they were living a life of ease at Kandahar. She was warm, dry, well-fed and quite safe. She didn’t have to man-haul a loaded sledge across massive unseen crevasses, or shiver for days and nights on end in a precarious tent with only a sleeping bag made of soaking animal furs for protection. She wouldn’t have to walk for days with no food, or eat the remains of the sledge dogs and consider it a luxury. But even so, the brief confrontation with the real Antarctica hit her hard. She was fearful, afraid that her first instinct, to stay away from this harsh place at the end of the world, had been the correct one.

  As the second and third blizzard days of idleness crept by, Alice found it hard to occupy herself. Everyone else seemed quite happy. Russell ran the base, overseeing everything from food preparation to the sorting of waste. Laure had her Adélie penguin samples to work on and spent most of her time sitting at her microscope in the lab. Arturo and Valentin worked on their data too, or collated their notes, or read scientific papers. Richard was always busy. An air of abstraction clung about him, except at mealtimes when he made an effort to preside sociably at the table. Jochen van Meer, the stolid Dutchman, was content to read paperback thrillers and watch DVDs. His own scientific study, to do with respiration, nutrition and body weight at extreme temperatures, involved nothing more at present than taking everyone’s blood pressure once in a while and enquiring about their appetite.

  Whatever the weather, Niki had to spend most of his hours in the radio room. He had a series of schedules to keep with the Chileans and other bases, and with the ships in the vicinity. Alice found it comforting to know that even though while the blizzard lasted they were actually as far out of reach than as if they were on the moon, there were other people alive and well in this white inferno.

  When she tried to think about home and her parents, or Pete, or Jo and Becky, they seemed too far away to conjure up. Each expedition member was allotted thirty minutes’ on-line time every day for personal e-mails, but when she sat down to write, Alice couldn’t describe her feelings of isolation and claustrophobia.

  It’s snowing, she wrote lamely. But I expect we’ll be able to get outside soon.

  In their replies their voices sounded unfamiliar.

  Margaret was tired. It does snow, she wrote, without the brisk advice to get used to it that Alice might have expected. Becky’s comment was how exciting, is it deep? She was plainly imagining somewhere not unlike Verbier.

  Philip Idwal Jones and the boatman, as Alice still thought of him, Rooker, were less in evidence than the rest of the team. The four male scientists occupied one of the bunk rooms and the support staff the other. Philip and Rooker seemed to spend most of their days behind the closed door of their room, with Niki whenever he was off duty. Sometimes Valentin joined them. Raised voices and laughter were occasionally audible. When the door did briefly open a breath of thick smoky air escaped.

  Everyone slept a good deal, Alice supposed. Certainly Laure did, whenever she wasn’t working. She slept very neatly and quietly, her spine curled against the room, threads of her dark hair spread on the pillow. Alice lay on her back, staring at the wooden base of the overhead bunk and listening to the wind.

  Margaret had once spent fifteen consecutive days in a tent, waiting for the weather to break so she could get back to the base. Her food supplies had run so low that by the end she was on quarter rations. ‘I just waited,’ was all she said about it. ‘It’s not very long, out of a lifetime, is it? To get what you want?’

  But Margaret had only worked on the coast or at the margins of the ice shelf, because that was where the animals she was studying were to be found. She never went inland, towards the white heart, where Alice would have to go to find her rocks. Sooner or later the blizzard would be over and the preparations would be complete, and she and Richard would head out into the field. They would spend a week alone together, collecting rocks, in contact with base only via a daily radio link. It was an intimidating prospect, but with the walls of the hut pressing closer and closer around her she was also longing to get outside, anywhere, to do anything at all that wasn’t hanging around waiting and trying not to be conspicuous.

  At mealtimes she covertly studied Richard Shoesmith’s prof
ile, wondering how they would work together out on the ice.

  On the third day of confinement Alice was rostered for hut duties. It was a relief to have something concrete to do. She cleaned the bathroom, scrubbed the floor of the living area and baked scones for tea, as well as serving up lunch and dinner. As soon as she banged the plate and spoon, everyone flocked to the table. With so few other diversions, they were all inquisitive about whether the new arrival could cook. After her day in the kitchen Alice was relieved and flattered when her Spanish omelette and spiced beef casserole were both wolfed down.

  ‘Bravo, Alice.’ Valentin beamed again. ‘You turn out to be a true gift.’

  Over dinner there was a noticeably more cheerful atmosphere. Richard rested his elbows on the table, and laughed when Jochen asked whether he was going to invite any more geologists to join them who were good cooks and betterlooking than Russ.

  ‘Isn’t Alice enough?’

  Laure had her dark head turned towards Rooker and appeared not to be listening. ‘And Laure, of course?’ Richard added.

  ‘I count only two girls. And there are eight of us,’ Jochen complained.

  ‘We’re scientists. We’re here to work, remember,’ Richard said calmly. It was a reprimand but he did it gently, so that his words floated over the rest of the talk. Jochen only grinned.

  Niki said that the weather forecast for the next forty-eight hours was looking much better. As a climatologist, Arturo usually regarded day-to-day meteorological predictions as beneath him but now he nodded in agreement. ‘It will be weather for sunbathing.’

  ‘Or for field training.’ Phil winked at Alice. Before she could set off inland with Richard, Alice would have to practise safety and survival techniques, and it was Philip’s job to instruct her. She leaned back in her seat and smiled at him. The cheerful little Welshman seemed even more jovial than usual tonight.

  ‘I’m looking forward to it,’ she said.

  The room and the faces around the table were becoming familiar. This evening, the hands of the wall clock were actually jumping instead of creeping. She began to think that she might after all fit in here and even make a useful contribution. Outside, the wind blew with less fury. Tomorrow, Alice thought, with just a bit of luck, she would be able to step all the way outside the door.

  After she had cleared away the dinner dishes and put the coffee pot on the table, Phil went to his room and reappeared with a guitar. He tipped back in his chair, strummed a couple of chords and then began to sing. He had a big, strong baritone voice, trained in a Welsh choir, that filled the hut and rode over the nagging wind. Within a minute everyone was singing with him.

  Rooker had a good voice too. Looking nowhere, with his black eyebrows drawn together, he sang ‘Brown-Eyed Girl’, then ‘Yesterday’ as a duet with Laure. Everyone clapped that one and Laure laughed, forgetting to be poised for once and turning pink with pleasure. She let her head fall, just for a second, against Rooker’s shoulder. Phil and Rooker went on singing, louder, absorbed in the music.

  ‘Laure, s’il vous plaît?’ Jochen said. He stood up, beckoning her to dance. She looked as if she would much rather stay put but she didn’t refuse. Valentin and Russ pushed aside some chairs to make room for them. Laure danced as if she were on MTV, Jochen waved his arms and hopped from foot to foot.

  Richard took Alice’s hand. ‘Would you like to?’ he asked.

  ‘Yes, please.’

  He was stiff at first, but then he loosened up. His hand shifted tentatively over her ribcage before settling in the small of her back. As they swung round, Alice saw him glance around the room, covertly gauging the mood. Understanding and a sudden affection sprang up in her.

  Richard was shy and he was also anxious because the success of Lewis Sullavan’s venture depended mainly on him. It was no wonder that he sometimes seemed ill at ease. But now his face had softened. He was pleased with the warmth that had sparked around the table tonight, and with the singing and dancing. They would settle down together, all of them, in this ice world.

  ‘It’s all right, isn’t it?’ Alice said, with her mouth to his ear as they moved closer.

  ‘I’m not much of a dancer,’ he protested, misunderstanding her.

  A whisky bottle materialised on the table behind him. Valentin was busy filling glasses. Alice had guessed that Rooker and Phil and the others were drinking in their bunk room to pass the time, and it was obvious that they were several drinks ahead tonight. A sudden burst of laughter and the sight of Niki draping a spindly arm round Valentin’s shoulders confirmed it.

  Richard had seen the bottle too. Now he would have to choose whether to make a heavy-handed objection, or to let tonight be an exception to his rule. It crossed her mind, with the music and the dancing, that she would quite like a drink herself. As if he read her mind, Valentin picked up a glass and waved it at her.

  Richard hesitated, missing a beat and looking down into her face as if for reassurance. Then his mouth lifted at one corner and he gave a small, self-mocking, acquiescent shrug. It was such a tiny movement that Alice, in his arms, felt it rather than seeing it. They found themselves laughing, the warm laughter of people who have begun to appreciate one another.

  Phil played a final loud chord and put his guitar aside to take a gulp of whisky. Richard bowed and led Alice back to her seat. Rooker was lounging at the other end of the table, his expression as unreadable as always.

  Richard leaned across and picked up an empty glass, nodded to the whisky bottle. ‘May I?’ he asked pleasantly.

  ‘Sure thing.’ Jochen poured him a measure. Alice accepted the glass that Valentin passed to her across the oilcloth and saw that Laure had one in front of her too.

  Richard lifted his drink. He considered for a moment and the table waited. ‘Here’s to the complete team, and to Kandahar, and to cooperation.’

  ‘And to less bullshit,’ Rook drawled.

  Laure bit her lip.

  The wind had dropped completely. After the days and nights of clamour, the silence was thick enough to touch.

  Richard flushed, but otherwise it was as if he hadn’t heard.

  Alice had begun to distinguish undercurrents of tension between several of the expedition members. Valentin often made a mocking little pout at the sight of Arturo’s earring or coordinated clothes, and Arturo retaliated by delicately pressing one finger to his ear when Valentin spoke, as if his voice was just too loud. Laure lifted a scornful eyebrow whenever Jochen leaned too close to her or dropped his big hand on her knee, although Jochen never seemed to notice this. But the discord between Richard and Rooker was like a big boulder just under the surface of a fast-flowing stream. For now the water cloaked it with a glassy skin but the smallest alteration would expose the jagged edge.

  Valentin spoke first: ‘The team.’ He stood up and drained his glass, everyone else raised theirs and drank. Richard sat back, two red patches still showing on his cheekbones. Russ turned away and slotted a CD into the player, and the moment passed.

  Somehow, against the odds, the evening was turning into a party. The music was a Latin-American compilation and Alice danced the tango with Valentin until she was breathless. He was an excellent dancer. Russell and Niki and Arturo snapped their fingers and stamped their feet in accompaniment. Alice noticed that Rook was watching. The nape of her neck prickled under his cool scrutiny.

  Valentin moved on to partner Laure, and they performed an exhibition samba while everyone whistled and clapped. There came a moment, later on, when everyone was dancing – even Rook. No one bothered with partners. Pent-up energy from the days of confinement burned off in swaying and singing and waving of whisky glasses. When she looked at the clock again, Alice was amazed to see that it was almost midnight.

  She had been aware of the door opening and closing, and stabs of cold air slicing through the warm fug in the room, and now Valentin took her by the elbow. ‘You will come to look?’

  She followed him, pulling on the parka he handed to her
as they stepped outside the hut.

  ‘See?’ Valentin said. He made a theatrical and totally unnecessary sweep of his arm.

  The air was magically still, although the lead-coloured overhead clouds were ragged from the storm. Over the bay the cloud had thinned away to long streamers of apricot and pale violet, tinged on the underside with jade. The snowfields and glaciers were washed with delicate shades of lavender and faded rose-pink, and the sea rippled with a long streak of molten gold. Alice drew in a breath. The sun just rested on the horizon. It was a perfect orb of brilliant flame-orange, except for the faintest flattening at its lowest margin. She glanced down at her watch. It was midnight exactly. From now, the beginning of November, until February there would be no darkness.

  ‘Not bad?’ Valentin chuckled. He was only wearing a T-shirt. The midnight sun turned the grizzled hairs on his arms to threads of gold.

  ‘Not…bad,’ Alice murmured. She wanted to have this moment to herself. The unearthly beauty of it struck a shaft straight into her heart.

  He nodded and heaved a sigh. After a moment he patted her on the shoulder and stumped away.

  Alice clambered down the rocks to the beach. The chunks of ice lapped by waves looked as if they were made of pure silver. Wet shingle crunched under her boots and the smell of salt and sea water stung within the chambers of her head. After the three days of the blizzard and all the small anxieties and human abrasions of the hut, it felt like walking out of a dark cellar and stepping into paradise.

  She was so entranced that she walked all along the shoreline until she reached the tongue of rocks that marked the boundary of Kandahar Bay. The convoluted layers of rough sandstone were lightly whiskered with snow and she paused for a moment, out of long-ingrained habit, to follow the sedimentary contours by eye. But the murmur of the dying surf and the clinking of ice distracted her. There were fleece gloves in the pocket of her parka and she gratefully put them on before climbing the rocky outcrop. She reached the flat top with its icing of snow and looked down. On the other side lay a perfect crescent of shingle beach, with a dozen penguins standing like sentries on the shelves of rock.