by Stef Penney
‘No, indeed. Your father is quite the tycoon, Vera. A regular meat baron; a peddler of flesh.’
‘I know he is,’ says Vera proudly.
Hendrik glares at Jakob, and kisses his daughter on the head.
‘Don’t believe everything your silly uncle tells you, honey pie. And, for heaven’s sake, don’t repeat it in front of . . . anyone.’
He was going to say ‘in front of your friends’, but stopped himself in time.
.
Hendrik worries about his brother and his daughter; they share a quality he distrusts: he thinks of them both as having their eyes fixed on something beyond the horizon, longing for something that cannot be seen and might not be there at all. It is a bad card in the deck, an unlucky hand. He and Bettina have nothing of the sort, and their son, Willem, has escaped too, but he sees it in Vera. It has taken Jakob to far-flung and no doubt interesting places, but, last fall, when he came back from Europe, Hendrik had never seen him so withdrawn and unhappy. He claimed to have had a productive time, but Hendrik and Bettina agreed that he seemed to have lost something: a part of his bright spirit, that mercurial quickness that had always been his most attractive quality. Perhaps it is only the inevitable consequence of growing older, and yet . . . As for Vera, who is not only a girl, but a cripple – what sweets can life hold for her? If she does not marry (and she is not even pretty, so who will have her?), what can she do with that lively mind? Jakob doesn’t help matters; he inflames her imagination with his pictures and stories, fills her head with wild, unlikely ideas.
.
Only a week ago, Hendrik took her aside and said, ‘You know when Uncle Jake tells you about the places he’s been to? I know he sometimes says he’ll take you there, but, really, he won’t be able to do that.’ He forced a laugh. ‘Girls don’t go to such places.’
‘Uncle Jake’s friend does – Mrs Athlone. She’s been to Greenland. She had her own expedition.’
Hendrik sighed. He has wondered about this Mrs Athlone, privately deciding she sounds no end of trouble.
‘What you mean is, I can’t go because I’m lame. I know that.’ And she looked at him with her clear, level gaze.
Hendrik felt his heart turn over, painfully. ‘Little treasure . . . I just don’t want you to dream of things that are impossible, and then be disappointed.’
‘I know. It’s all right.’ She smiled and patted his hand. He thought how it was supposed to be the other way around.
.
Jakob and Vera walk up to the museum in ninety-degree heat, fanning themselves with playbills. Jakob wonders how the Eskimos are coping. Inside the museum, he makes enquiries of an attendant, who says they are not on display at the current time. When he persists, he is passed on to an official, who says that the Eskimos are ‘away’.
‘They’re not going on tour until September,’ says Jakob, as pleasantly as he can manage.
The official frowns. ‘No, but there are other engagements. They are important visitors.’
‘Of course. When will they be here again? I brought my niece especially to see them.’
Vera tugs his hand in embarrassment, hisses, ‘Come on, it doesn’t matter!’
The official’s eyes dart all over the place. ‘I can’t say for sure.’
‘Never mind, Uncle Jake.’ Vera is used to disappointment. ‘We can come another time.’
‘Let’s visit the basement while we’re here. That’s where they’re supposed to be.’ He hustles her towards some stairs. ‘I’m not sure that man was telling the truth.’
‘Why wouldn’t he?’
‘Because I think something’s wrong. Shall we find out what it is?’
.
He smells them before he sees them. There is a mephitic dankness in the air this summer, but in the basement corridor he smells something he has not smelled since Greenland – rancid seal fat, sweat and urine. Vera gasps but keeps silent, and, as they approach a closed door at the end of the corridor, it bursts open and a man walks out.
‘This corridor is out of bounds. Get her away from here!’ he shouts, slamming the door.
Through the open door, he briefly sees bodies lying on the floor. Jakob takes Vera back upstairs and puts her in a cab.
‘I’m sorry, Vera. You’ll have to go home. I have to see them. They’re my friends and they’re in trouble. Do you understand?’
Vera nods solemnly.
Things are worse than he thought. Jakob pushes open the door and stems the doctor’s objections with the explanation that he is a friend of the Eskimos. The doctor, who has never encountered people like this before, welcomes him.
‘Thank God. I thought you were never coming! When I saw the girl, I didn’t realise . . . I can’t understand them, even when they claim to speak English! It’s impossible to keep them clean.’
‘You’re expecting someone?’
‘Of course . . . For days I’ve been expecting you!’ He registers Jakob’s puzzled expression. ‘You are Mr Armitage?’
‘No. I’m Jakob de Beyn. I was the geologist on Mr Armitage’s first expedition – that’s how I know these people. But I am here in a private capacity.’
Jakob turns to Aniguin, standing patiently beside them. He wears Western clothes, and his hair has been cut short – the effect is very odd – but he smiles his gap-toothed smile, seemingly delighted to see him.
‘Te Peyn, you have come! Are you well? Is Armitage here?’
‘No, Aniguin. I haven’t seen Armitage in a long time. I’m not here on his behalf.’
‘He told us to come to New York, that we would see wonderful things. He told us it would be good for the Inuit. But Ivalu is ill – look. And he has not come to see us.’
‘I’m sorry to hear it, but I’m happy to see you all. Qooviannikumut.’
He greets each of them. Ivalu and Ayakou are lying on makeshift beds of dirty furs, breathing with difficulty. Ayakou grips his hand and smiles, but seems unable to speak. His brow is beaded with sweat. Padloq, the wife Jakob remembers, sits beside him, mending a boot. He turns to the doctor.
‘What’s wrong with them?’
‘What’s his name? Ayakou? He has pneumonia in both lungs. And his leg pains him. It was badly broken. This woman’ – he indicates Ivalu – ‘has pneumonia too. The other women have head colds, but I fear a turn for the worse. I’ve tried to throw away those furs, but they made such an unholy fuss – they seem to prefer them to clean beds.’
‘I expect they’re all they have with them from home. Who is responsible for them?’
‘I was asked to come by Mr White, the assistant curator.’
Jakob looks around at the close, airless room. The only daylight – and air – comes from a grating near the ceiling.
‘They should be in a hospital. Where do I find Mr White?’
‘His office is on the second floor.’
Jakob turns to Aniguin. ‘We’ll find somewhere better than this place. Somewhere they will make you well.’
‘Can you do that, Te Peyn?’ Aniguin looks at him. ‘Will you speak to Armitage?’
‘I’ll do better than that. If necessary, I will speak to the press.’
‘Who is the press? I do not think I have met him.’
.
In the end, he has no need to go to the press; at the threat of a genuine Arctic explorer telling the papers of the sad state of the Eskimos, Mr White – a youngish, heavy-set man with a pink face and plump, hairless jowls – panics and, within days, the Greenlanders are moved to Mount Olivet Hospital.
Jakob writes to Armitage, saying that he is sure he has no knowledge of their conditions and that he will personally see to their well-being. He asks about plans for taking the Eskimos home. His indignation is unfeigned; he is filled with an energy he has not felt for a long time.
A few days later, he visit
s Mount Olivet to find them in a worse state than before. Ayakou is asleep, but his breath struggles in his throat. The young girl, Aviaq, has become ill with pneumonia-like symptoms.
‘You hear from Armitage?’ Aniguin asks.
‘No. He may be away.’
It could be that Lester is away, or that he is busy. Or it could be that he has seized on Jakob’s intervention as an opportunity to wash his hands of the whole embarrassing affair.
.
‘Did you want to come to America?’
They walk up a slope to a stand of trees, and pause in the shade. Flies and gnats buzz around them. Jakob takes out a handkerchief and blots his forehead. Aniguin lets the sweat run down his face, unheeded.
‘Yes. Armitage says I can talk to important people – perhaps then there will be more trade. We need tools. You need furs and ivory. Few whalers come now. I don’t know why. There are whales still.’
‘Ayakou? Did he want to come?’
‘No.’ Aniguin’s voice holds a tinge of contempt. ‘He was afraid to come, but he is a poor man at home, since he cannot hunt. Padloq said she would return to his house if he came to America. He will be rich if he comes, and brings back many things, you see.’
Jakob nods.
‘Te Peyn, why did you not come back with Armitage?’
‘There are things we did not agree on, Aniguin. I’m a scientist, and he is an explorer above all else. He wants the Pole.’
‘Ah, yes. He wants to go to the Big Nail.’ Aniguin shrugs at the pointlessness of such an idea. ‘Where is Fellora? Why has she not come back?’
Jakob hesitates. The sound of that name causes an unpleasant pressure in his chest.
‘I don’t know. She lives far across the sea, in Britain.’
‘I would like to send her a letter. Can you write it? Perhaps she will take us back.’
‘No one can take you north before next spring. If Armitage does not promise to take you back, then I will take you.’
It is a bold claim, but as he says it, he feels the resolution crystallise.
‘It will be winter soon. There will be snow here. In spring, I’ll take you back.’
Aniguin shrugs.
‘Spring is far way. What if we die? I want to send a letter to Fellora. Now I am in America, I act like the kallunat. You see, Te Peyn, I cannot be inuk here. There are no spirits in America. I cannot make my people well, not even my wife.’
Chapter 37
London, 51˚31’N, 0˚7’W
September 1896
‘I worry about him. He suffers with his knees – he was very lame when I was there, although he tries to hide it.’
Flora has just returned from visiting her father in Dundee.
Iris sharpens the ash of her cigarette to a point. Helen has gone to see her mother in Stepney, and they are alone – something that is rare these days.
‘He’s not young. These things happen.’
‘That’s what he says. I wish he weren’t alone.’
‘So his sailing days are over?’
‘I don’t know. I hate to think, if he can’t, what he will do. He’s not yet sixty.’
‘Would you have him to live with you?’
‘Oh, I don’t think there is any danger of that!’
The thought makes Flora laugh. Her father’s opinion of London has not improved since she moved here, and, although he doesn’t say so, he finds her intention to return north, leaving her husband (in short, behaving like him), unnatural and unbecoming.
‘He keeps reminding me of my wifely duties! Of course, he doesn’t know . . .’
Iris smiles. ‘I’ve been meaning to ask . . . Is there anyone . . . ?’
‘Is there anyone . . . ? No! No . . . heavens.’ She shakes her head. ‘I can’t imagine . . . You know, I still think about him.’
‘The American? I thought that was water under the bridge.’
‘It is. Still, I can’t seem to . . . Stupid, isn’t it?’
Stupid thoughts; pointless. When she gives in to them, she pores over his letters, the face in the photograph, just to remind herself that it was real. Some of her memories are vividly intense: the softness of his skin, the way he felt inside her. (But would not – this is the kind of thought her mind proposes – would not any man have left those impressions?) Other things – both less and more intimate – are slipping out of her grasp. Although she has his likeness, she finds it hard to remember the way he looked at her, his peculiarly sweet morning smile. Every time she looks at the picture, it threatens to make them again into the strangers they were on the beach at Neqi.
‘When Freddie fell ill . . . I was so afraid for him, I told myself I was doing good by being there. I thought if I gave up what I most wanted, it might help. Isn’t that ridiculous? He would have recovered anyway.’
‘I think he would have suffered greatly if you’d left him.’
‘I wasn’t going to . . .’
Iris looks at her, as if assessing the truth of this.
‘The last year has been a trial. But things are looking up, aren’t they? Freddie’s doing well.’
‘Yes, considering.’
‘Have you heard from him again?’
‘No. He wrote, after I broke it off, asking me to reconsider; he said he would come to London on his way home and . . . It just seemed too awful to make an assignation when Freddie was so ill – different, somehow, from before. And . . . you know. I didn’t know how to reply. I’m sure he’s forgotten all about me. Perhaps it never meant much to him in the first place.’
‘You thought he was quite attached. As you were to him?’
Flora looks to the window. ‘I felt so. But I have little experience. How would I know?’
‘Oh, stuff – you’re not an idiot. It seems to me that you have two choices: either forget about him – and, believe me or not, eventually you will – or write to him again. Either he won’t write back, and then you will know, or he will – and then you would have a problem. Either way, you will have eliminated uncertainty. I recommend the first course.’
‘You make it sound simple!’
‘Well, it is simple . . . and quite mundane, to be honest.’
Flora laughs. ‘I’m sorry to bore you!’
‘Oh, you don’t bore me. Other people’s loves – Lionel Fortescue, for example, falls in love every third Tuesday, and each time it’s the greatest romance since what’s-their-names’ – but not you.’
‘Shall I tell you something that may not bore you?’ Flora gives a strained laugh. It is something that has been on her mind, a nagging devil of a question that won’t go away.
‘Do you want another drink?’
‘No, thank you.’
Iris helps herself to brandy and soda water, her back to Flora. Even so, Flora can speak only by focusing on the floor and the patterns of leaf shadows.
‘You see, I don’t know . . . I think, if I could think of him . . . without desire, then I would know if what I felt was love, rather than just . . . But I can’t separate them, so I don’t know.’
Iris comes back and sits beside her. Flora wonders if she is laughing at her, but, when she dares to look up, Iris appears to be considering the matter seriously.
Flora continues, ‘Sometimes I wonder if what we call love is just . . . a kind of selfishness. If you take pleasure from another person, and their presence makes you happy, then . . . well, that is you taking pleasure, and wanting to be with them is you wanting to be happy . . . Is that not self-interest? Isn’t “love” just the word we use to dress up our desires? I wonder if I’m just . . . selfish.’
Iris is looking at her with the beginnings of amusement.
‘Goodness, Flora, what a creature you are! Of course love is selfish! But so what? Marriage is just the social sanction for arrangements of financial and physica
l benefits . . . You are no more selfish than anyone else. Less, in some ways: you have stayed with Freddie.’
‘There is nothing unselfish in that. He’s done far more for me—’
‘But, forgive the vulgar question: are you happy?’
Flora laughs. ‘As happy as anyone is, I imagine. As my father likes to say, “Life is not a pleasure garden.”’
‘Mm. Well . . . But if I understand you correctly, you aren’t sure whether it’s the man himself that you’re missing, or, shall we say, the intimacy, in which case, your course seems obvious.’
Flora sits back in her chair, regretting her outburst. ‘That’s not what I said!’
‘Isn’t it? As you are forever telling me, you’re a scientist. Well, as a scientist, undertake an experiment.’
‘What experiment?’
‘The man . . . or the act? You cannot have the man, at the moment, but . . .’ She raises her eyebrows.
Flora bursts out laughing.
‘It’s logical, is it not?’
‘No! It’s not logical! It’s . . . appalling. You’re an appalling woman.’
‘I merely observe that, firstly, his feelings are even more of a mystery than your own. More pertinently, you are here, and he is in New York. A great mass of water separates the two – or so it appears to my limited understanding.’
Flora studies her empty glass. ‘Perhaps I would like another . . . No, I’ll get it.’
‘Nonsense, give . . .’ Iris sweeps to the end of the room. ‘Have you seen Mr Levinson again?’
‘He’s working on the conservation of the mummies, so I see him at the museum, of course. What is this apropos of?’
‘Apropos of nothing, my dear.’
Iris hands Flora the fresh glass. As she does, the lace cuff on her sleeve falls back, revealing a bony, white wrist marred with dark marks.
‘A minute ago, you were complaining that you lack experience. Experience is there to be had. I can make suggestions, if you really have no ideas of your own. Lionel, for instance, has always shown a marked predilection for you.’
‘Oh, God!’ Flora nearly chokes. ‘How old is he?’