The Killing Ship

by Simon Beaufort

  Although still an Antarctic novice in many ways, she was fit, cool-headed and resourceful. She decided that the chances of everyone’s survival would be greatly improved if two attempts were made to reach the camp, not just one. She woke Mortimer.

  ‘Please wait,’ he begged. ‘Two forays might result in all of you being caught, and then where would I be? Stuck here with a couple of frightened kids.’

  ‘We need supplies, Geoff. I’ll take Joshi – you stay here with Lisa.’

  ‘The fact that Andrew and Graham haven’t come back suggests that the gunmen are still at large. Taking Joshi out there isn’t clever.’

  ‘I have to. The temperature’s dropping, and we need to do something now – before it’s too late to do anything at all.’

  ‘I’m not happy about this,’ grumbled Mortimer, although he suspected that his happiness, or lack of it, would not induce her to change her mind. He scowled. ‘Go on, then. I assume I don’t have to tell you to be careful.’

  ‘No, you don’t.’

  If the situation had not been so terrible, Yablokov would have laughed. The crew were wholly unequal to the task of butchering the whale, and Garik was a useless supervisor, despite his claims to have done it before. Chaos ruled. Several men had fallen in the blood-stained water, and were lucky to have been fished out alive. The rest skidded around on the whale’s slippery back, chopping ineffectually with unsuitable knives. The lumps they hacked were irregularly sized and impossible to stack neatly.

  Hasim watched in growing dismay, their inefficiency obvious even to him, and turned accusingly to the captain. ‘I thought you said they could do this.’

  ‘They can,’ replied Garik airily. ‘Just give them time.’

  ‘We don’t have time,’ snapped Hasim. ‘We’re on a schedule, remember? If they don’t get their act together, we’ll have to go home empty-handed.’

  ‘It’s because we don’t have the right equipment,’ grumbled Garik defensively. ‘You wouldn’t let us bring it.’

  ‘And I told you why,’ retorted Hasim. ‘How would we explain having whale-flensing gear if we were boarded by a patrol ship? It is illegal down here, you know.’

  He made an exasperated sound when one of the crew lost his grip on a slippery cube of flesh. It splashed into the sea and sank.

  Yablokov also watched, thinking Hasim was a fool to believe that a bunch of cod fishermen and hired hands could butcher a whale, no matter what Garik had claimed on their behalf. They might have managed a smaller one – they could have winched it aboard to deal with. But Garik and Hasim had been greedy, and had harpooned the biggest blue without thinking about how they would handle such an enormous carcass.

  ‘Any news of the scientists?’ asked Garik, lighting a cigarette. The whites of his eyes were yellow, and he had a sallow, unhealthy mien. Yablokov had overheard the cabin steward say that Garik was now getting through two bottles of vodka a day.

  ‘Only that they’re still at large,’ replied Hasim. Pointedly, he flapped away the smoke that wafted towards him. ‘But they won’t get far – there’s nowhere for them to go.’

  ‘They don’t need to go anywhere,’ said Yablokov, lighting a cigarette of his own, with the sole intention of making Hasim uncomfortable. ‘They just have to wait for their supply ship to appear. It’ll be here in nine days – I looked it up online. All they have to do is wait us out.’

  Hasim waved a dismissive hand. ‘They’ll die of exposure before then.’

  ‘Not necessarily,’ said Yablokov, ‘accidentally’ blowing smoke at him. ‘They might have cached supplies on the glacier for emergencies, and while a crevasse isn’t cosy, you can survive there, because it’s out of the wind. I read that online as well.’

  Hasim stared at him. ‘You do realise what will happen if we fail to silence these people? They’ll tell everyone what they saw and we’ll be arrested. Strings will be pulled to get me released, but you … Well, I doubt you’ll see your wife and kids again.’

  He did not wait for a response, but leaned forward to whisper in Garik’s ear. Yablokov watched with disapproval, wondering what impractical plan was being hatched now. Sure enough, when Hasim had finished, Garik cleared his throat and made an announcement.

  ‘I’ve decided to optimise our resources. The crew will help Hasim’s team hunt for the scientists.’

  ‘But they’re flensing the whale,’ Yablokov pointed out. ‘Not to mention dealing with the cargo.’

  ‘Then they’ll have to pull double shifts,’ said Hasim. ‘Zurin and Nikos can go, for a start – there’s no need for a helmsman or an engineer while the ship’s anchored. You have to deal with the cargo yourself, Mr Yablokov. It is, after all, why we’re here.’

  Sarah scanned the horizon carefully before striking out in the opposite direction to the one taken by Berrister and Graham. Her plan was to walk north across the glacier, then double back to the camp. She could hide in another crevasse if she was spotted, although she was confident that she would not be – the whalers would not expect anyone to come from that direction. With Joshi in tow, she made good time across the ice, and then trudged west, towards the sea.

  It worked perfectly. Within an hour, she and Joshi lay on their stomachs, looking down on the camp from the north. Nothing moved and there was no sign of a boat. There was no sign of Berrister and Graham either, but she tried not to let her concern show.

  Carefully, they descended the cliff and crept towards the camp. It was a mess. The tents were sticky masses of burned synthetic, and their supplies and belongings had been scattered all over the place. Some were salvageable, but most were not.

  ‘Look for sleeping bags and food only,’ she instructed Joshi. ‘Ignore everything else.’

  They fared better than she had feared. Three sleeping bags were only singed, and the box containing Mortimer’s stash of treats had survived. She shoved them in two servicable rucksacks, along with a small saucepan, three packets of stock cubes and some tins of food with the labels burned off.

  They were on the verge of abandoning the remains of the place that had been their home for the last three months when they heard the roar of an engine.

  Berrister lost track of the time that the two men laughed and smoked above him. Once or twice, the pressure of the ice on his chest was so great that he was tempted to give himself up, but he gritted his teeth and endured it stoically, concentrating on breathing in and out, in and out. He wondered how Graham was faring.

  He began to lose all sensation in his body. If he could have moved, he might have kept the circulation going, but afraid that the slightest twitch would give them away, he lay as still as a corpse, increasingly aware that he might soon become one.

  Just when he thought the men could surely skive no longer, there was another waft of cheap tobacco and slightly raised voices, suggesting a debate was in progress. His mind began to wander, and at one point, he thought he was at home. He opened his eyes expecting to see his bedroom ceiling, but there was nothing but whiteness.

  He almost leapt out of his skin when someone tapped him on the shoulder, but it was only Graham, kneeling next to him and glancing around anxiously.

  ‘That was close,’ the Scot muttered. ‘I really thought we’d had it. God only knows how you managed to sleep through it – I was on tenterhooks the whole time.’

  Berrister did not explain that it had been more a case of his brain shutting down to survive than a comfortable nap. He began the agonising process of squirming out of his hiding place, so cold that he could barely feel his legs, while his chest ached abominably. He staggered to where Graham was watching the two men walk towards their boat. Its driver was waiting for them, while another man was slumped on the ground. When the other two arrived, they had to lift him into the little craft.

  ‘He must be one of the ones we knocked down the hill or shot at,’ whispered Graham. ‘He was lucky – the other two must be under that sheet of canvas.’

  He pointed, and Berrister saw a green tarpaulin
draped over an irregularly shaped pile. Something white poked from under it: a human hand. Berrister felt sick. He saw no reason to suppose the enemy’s dead had been dumped so unceremoniously there, and felt it was more likely to be Wells and Freddy.

  Graham misunderstood his despair. ‘It was them or us, so don’t feel bad about killing one with the flare. Besides, their friends don’t seem bothered – they’re not even taking them back to the ship.’

  He was right – whoever lay under the tarpaulin was being left behind. It convinced Berrister more than ever that it was his friends, and that the whalers’ own dead had been treated with more respect. Meanwhile, the two smokers went through an elaborate pantomime with their hands, trying to convey that the scientists had fallen down a crevasse.

  ‘They don’t all speak the same language,’ Berrister surmised.

  ‘So?’ asked Graham.

  ‘So it tells us a bit more about them. The two who sat on us were quite happy to skive, which means that vengeance for the ones we killed isn’t a priority – which suggests in turn that they don’t know each other very well. I suspect they’re mercenaries, hired for the season.’

  ‘If I were their leader, I’d put a bounty on our heads,’ said Graham. ‘If these men are driven by cash, then what better way to ensure success?’

  ‘Then let’s hope he isn’t a Scot,’ muttered Berrister fervently.

  They watched the boat skim towards the ship, after which they hiked back across the ice until they could look down on their camp. Two tiny figures were there, moving through the wreckage. Berrister trained his binoculars on them, but they were too far away to let him see anything other than that they were searching.

  ‘Now what?’ asked Graham dejectedly. ‘We can’t go down there, obviously. Or do you think we should launch a surprise attack?’

  ‘Not really,’ said Berrister, regarding him askance. ‘They have guns, remember?’

  ‘True.’ Graham slumped in despair. ‘It makes no sense. Why steal our food and bugger up our radios? Why not just kill us while we slept? I don’t understand any of it. But I do think we’re going to die.’

  ‘We’re not,’ said Berrister firmly. ‘We’ve evaded them so far. We can do it again.’

  ‘For nine days?’ asked Graham, unconvinced. ‘Or longer, if Worsley’s late?’

  ‘Yes, if necessary, but it won’t be that long. Noddy Taylor will raise the alarm when he can’t reach us, and the Chileans will send a plane. They’ll see the whaler and all hell will break loose. We’re going to make it.’

  ‘I don’t see how you can be so sure,’ whispered Graham.

  ‘Because I’ve done it before,’ said Berrister, although it was not something he was eager to discuss. ‘Survived inside a glacier, I mean. For days. It’s a question of attitude. You’ll live if you want to.’

  Graham regarded him intently. ‘When this happened, did everyone get out alive?’

  ‘I was alone.’

  ‘Alone? But that’s not—’

  ‘We can’t go to the camp as long as the whalers are there,’ interrupted Berrister, not about to confide anything else about an experience he would rather forget. ‘And it doesn’t look as though there will be much to salvage anyway.’

  ‘No,’ conceded Graham. ‘So what do we do? Go back to the others empty-handed? Or do you have another idea?’

  ‘I do,’ said Berrister. ‘Just not a very nice one.’

  Sarah and Joshi froze at the distant roar of the engine, but no boats bounced towards them, and the sound grew softer rather than louder. Hearts pounding, they watched the end of the point, waiting for the splash of colour that would herald the next contingent of killers.

  ‘It must’ve been on the other side of the ridge,’ Sarah said eventually, forcing herself to relax. ‘Perhaps they’ve decided to call off the search. It’ll be dark in an hour, and it’s already getting colder.’

  Joshi shuddered. ‘We’ve been here too long. Let’s go.’

  They began to slog up the slope. Halfway, Sarah was seized by a wave of giddiness. She had eaten virtually nothing all day, and the cold and constant tension were finally taking their toll.

  ‘We have to eat,’ she said tersely.

  Joshi was pale and there was a sheen of sweat on his face. ‘What about the others?’

  ‘We’ll be doing them no favours if we collapse.’

  They sheltered behind a rock and opened a packet of water biscuits, which they smeared with honey. It tasted like nectar, and Sarah felt her strength return.

  ‘Come on,’ she said eventually. ‘If you feel faint, tell me and we’ll stop again. We’re going to be relying on each other heavily until we’re rescued, and we need to respect what our bodies are telling us. So if you feel weak, we rest. OK?’

  Joshi nodded. Some of his pallor had faded, but perspiration had soaked his underclothes, and he was now shivering. They clearly needed to move more slowly – fast enough to stay warm, but not so fast as to work up a sweat. To take her mind off the ache in her arms and shoulders, she pondered a paper she planned to write when she got back, wondering if the memory stick in her pocket had enough data. When had she last backed up her data from the laptop? Two days ago? Three? She couldn’t remember.

  By the time they reached the ice, the roaring ache in her upper body was almost unbearable. They rested again, after which there followed an agitated hour in fading daylight trying to find their crevasse. Why didn’t Mortimer or Lisa see them coming and give them a signal? Or had they been caught and killed in the interim?

  They found the opening eventually, thanks to Joshi, who recognised a distinctive ice ridge. Sarah was unimpressed to slide down inside the crevasse, only to find Mortimer and Lisa asleep.

  ‘One of you should have been on watch,’ she snapped angrily.

  Mortimer blinked blankly and with shock, Sarah recognised the first signs of hypothermia. Lisa was little better, although at least able to pull herself to her feet and help sort through their finds. She and Joshi prepared some food while Sarah wrapped Mortimer in the sleeping bags.

  ‘Where are the others?’ she asked. ‘It’s past nine o’clock.’

  ‘Perhaps they’re not coming back,’ said Lisa in a low, strained voice.

  ‘Of course they are,’ said Sarah brusquely, although she suspected Lisa was right. Berrister and Graham should have returned ages before, and the fear that something dreadful had happened to them had been with her since she had gone out herself.

  Joshi opened a tin. It contained peaches, which they ate with more crackers and a ‘soup’ of cold water and stock cubes – despite the chill in the crevasse, water still dripped down the sides, and Mortimer had been canny enough to scrape out a hollow to catch some.

  ‘You did well to get all this stuff,’ said Mortimer when they had finished. He looked better, the dullness gone from his eyes. ‘We might make it out of this mess yet.’

  ‘We will,’ averred Sarah with conviction. ‘But not by being careless. I’ll take the first watch, and you can have the second. Andrew and Graham will never find us in the dark – they’ll need us to guide them.’

  ‘Yes,’ said Mortimer, although it was clear that she and Lisa were not the only ones who thought their friends were dead.

  ‘Wait a minute,’ exclaimed Graham, shocked. ‘You want to loot the gunmen’s bodies?’

  ‘Not loot,’ said Berrister, still sure it was Wells and Freddy they would find, and eager to know, one way or the other. ‘But we could take their coats and backpacks. There might be food in them.’

  ‘That’s disgusting!’ Graham began to move away, glancing irritably over his shoulder as he did so. ‘Well, come on then. Let’s get it over with.’

  The beach was deserted, and nothing moved except three terns that dipped and dived along the surf. Somewhere an elephant seal roared, producing short, staccato bursts of sound that went on for several minutes. As they descended, Berrister could not help but notice the stark difference between the clean splen
dour of the icy mountains and the ship with its ugly tail of blood and half-butchered body. He felt a sudden wave of fury towards the whalers, and wondered how many more magnificent beasts lay in clumsily cut chunks in its stinking holds.

  Graham chose a convoluted route to shield them from sight, so it took some time to reach the beach. Berrister glanced at his watch and saw it was approaching nine o’clock – they had been playing hide-and-seek for hours. He was tired and hungry, and his head ached from the constant tension. It was also nearly dark.

  They approached the tarpaulin, where the dead white hand still curled from beneath it. Heart thudding, Berrister lifted a corner of the canvas and peered underneath. With relief, he saw the body belonged to a stranger – a circular burn on his jacket suggested he was the one hit with the flare. His head was twisted at an impossible angle – he had broken his neck in the fall.

  Berrister forced himself to pull more of the cover away. There was one more corpse, and it, too, was unfamiliar. It lay face down with a red stain on the back of its hood. There was no sign of Wells or Freddy.

  ‘Take what you want, while I keep watch,’ said Graham softly. ‘But hurry. I don’t like it here.’

  Nor did Berrister, and stripping bodies was a distasteful task, which he wished he had never suggested. He began with the coats, which weren’t of nearly such good quality as his own – the mercenaries’ employers had provided them with sub-standard gear. Underneath were woollen sweaters, so he hauled those off, too. Then there seemed no point in squeamishness, so he removed their plastic trousers, woollen socks, and a collection of shirts and sweatshirts. Each had a daypack, so he stuffed some of the clothes into them, rolled the rest in the tarpaulin, and called Graham to say he had finished.

  The Scot looked at the near-naked corpses in revulsion. ‘You were thorough.’

  ‘Waste not, want not. Now let’s get back before it gets too dark to see.’