‘Much better, thank you, six. My lungs hardly hurt at all.’
‘Is he fit to work, Strachan?’
‘Light duties only.’
‘That’s all I want from him this morning. Latimer, I want you to take an inventory of everything we have left: food, clothing, equipment, everything.’ The Venturer might be destroyed, but everything that had been in the depot on the ice – victuals, spare spars and sails, and various other pieces of equipment – was intact, along with anything else they had managed to salvage from the ship before it had exploded. ‘Molineaux, you can help him.’
‘Aye, aye, sir.’ If the boatswain’s mate was tired, he was not letting it show. He followed Latimer outside.
‘Ågård, I want you to form a work party and dig two graves: one for Ibbott and one for Smith.’
‘What about Sørensen, sir?’ asked the ice quartermaster.
There was nothing left of the harpooner to bury: his burned body had been blown to smithereens. Under more propitious circumstances, Killigrew would have ordered an empty grave dug for him. Seamen were superstitious enough to prefer spending an hour digging an empty grave to leaving a dead shipmate unburied. But he knew that in the weeks ahead they were going to need every last ounce of strength if they were going to live to see England again, and could not afford to waste it digging empty graves. ‘Belay that, Ågård. Sørensen’s memorial will have to wait for another time.’
‘Aye, aye, sir. Right, lads, I want four volunteers. You, you, you and you!’ He picked out Qualtrough, Endicott, Hughes and Butterwick. ‘Fetch picks and shovels and come with me.’
‘I could make them headboards, sir,’ offered Riggs.
‘There’ll be no headboards, Chips. We lost our remaining sledges in the fire last night, so you and Kracht are going to be busy today making new ones. We’ll need three large sledges – eleven feet long, three broad and a foot high – and a smaller sledge for the dogs to draw. Take a look around and see what material you can find, then let me know what you want to break up for wood before you do anything: I might have other plans for it.’
‘Aye, aye, sir.’ Riggs and Kracht went out.
‘Are there any portable stoves left, Orsini?’
‘Si, signore. Two.’
‘Good. You can make breakfast for everyone. Something hot. And cocoa all around. Fischbein, you can help him. Strachan, how’s Gargrave?’
‘Not good.’ The assistant surgeon’s tone made it clear he wanted to say more, but was not prepared to discuss it in front of the others.
‘All right. Frau Weiss, you stay with Gargrave, try to make him as comfortable as possible.’ Killigrew looked about to see who was left: if he kept the men busy, it would help take their minds off the hopelessness of their predicament. ‘Armitage?’
‘Sir?’
‘Stand guard over Captain Pettifer. If he so much as looks as though he’s thinking about giving us any trouble, you have my permission to shoot him.’
‘Aye, aye, sir.’
‘Yelverton, Strachan, Varrow and Terregannoeuck: you four come with me.’
The five of them stepped out into the dark of the Arctic morning. A pall of smoke hung over the scene, unable to rise in the frozen air, and the stench of death filled Killigrew’s nostrils. He thought of the men who had died, and the men who were still alive but who would surely die long before they reached safety. The dogs howled mournfully, as if sensing the atmosphere of despair.
Killigrew led the way into the wash-house and the five of them stood and faced one another awkwardly. Everyone knew what they had to discuss, but no one wanted to be the first to broach the subject. It was difficult to know where to begin. Killigrew lit one of his cheroots – he only had three left, the rest had gone up in smoke with the Venturer – before starting. After this, he would save one for New Year’s Eve, and the other to celebrate with once they had reached safety. Between now and then he might be able to sleep occasionally, but he knew he would not be able to rest properly.
He took a deep breath. ‘The way I see it, we have three choices.’ He tried to keep the tremor out of his voice. ‘The first is to wait here and hope that someone comes to rescue us. In its favour, we’ve got plenty of food here: we won’t know the exact figures until Latimer’s completed his inventory, but I’d guess we’ve got more than enough food to keep the twenty of us alive for a year, perhaps even two.
‘Against this, we have to bear in mind that the chances of anyone coming to look for us are so small as to be non-existent. No one knows where we are, and thanks to Pettifer no one even knows in which direction we were headed. Given that the rest of the squadron may not even have made it through the Middle Pack, it may be that no one even knows we’re missing – and we may not be listed as missing for another two or three years. Even if the rest of the squadron did make it as far as Beechey Island and are looking for us even now, they have hundreds of thousands of miles of coastline to search. There are thousands of miles of ice between them and us. For all we know they’re trapped in the ice. For all we know they’re worse off than we are. For all we know they’ve already turned back and gone home. It’s no good our waiting here for rescue, because it isn’t coming. The only people we can rely on to get us out of here is ourselves.’
‘Reckon there’s another good reason for not biding here, sir,’ said Varrow. ‘Bruin. He attacked again last night, despite Mr Strachan’s assurances to the contrary.’ The engineer glanced at the assistant surgeon, who flushed and hung his head. ‘I think we can be sure he’ll be back. Again and again and again, until there’s nay reason left for him to come here.’
‘And if we move off and try to get back to civilisation?’ Strachan asked Varrow. ‘Do you think he won’t follow us?’
‘Pipe down, the pair of you!’ said Killigrew. ‘What’s done is done. Whether we stay here or set out for safety, I’m sure the one thing we can all agree on is that Bruin is still a factor to be taken into account. But first I want us all to agree that we can’t stay here.’
The others nodded. ‘What are our other choices?’ asked Yelverton.
‘Secondly, we can head north, across Boothia and North Somerset, to Beechey Island. That’s only about four hundred miles from here, and the chances are that when we get to Barrow Strait the sea will still be sufficiently frozen for us to cross on foot.’
‘And if it isn’t?’ asked Yelverton. ‘If we reach the north coast of North Somerset and meet with open water? Worse, what if we make it as far as Beechey Island and find that the rest of the squadron never got that far? We’ll be even worse off than we are now, another four hundred miles from civilisation.’
Killigrew nodded. ‘Which brings us to our third – and to my mind our only – option. We head south-west, to Fort Hope on the Great Slave Lake.’
‘Fort Hope!’ exploded Yelverton, and was at once seized by another fit of coughing. ‘That’s nearly a thousand miles away!’ he wheezed.
‘Eight hundred, according to my calculations,’ Killigrew said mildly.
‘What’s at Fort Hope?’ asked Strachan.
‘It’s a Hudson’s Bay Company outpost,’ explained Killigrew. ‘Ever since Franklin disappeared, the company has been keeping its outermost trading posts well stocked with stores of food in case Franklin and his men pitched up there. There may even be traders at Fort Hope – voyageurs, fur trappers – who can help us on our way, show us the easiest routes back to civilisation.’
‘And you think the twenty of us can walk eight hundred miles across the most inhospitable terrain on earth, in the dead of the Arctic winter, to Fort Hope?’ asked Yelverton.
‘You have any better suggestions?’
‘It would be hard to think of a worse one. We’ll run out of food before we get halfway there! Even dragging our victuals behind us on sledges, we can only carry enough food to keep us going for forty days at the most. Even if we average twelve miles a day – which I very much doubt – that’ll still only take us four hundred and eighty mil
es. What do we do when our food runs out?’
‘If we go on six-upon-four, we can spin out our rations for seven hundred and twenty miles.’
‘The men can’t drag the sledges seven hundred and twenty miles on six-upon-four.’
‘The further we go, the lighter the sledges will become.’
‘And the shortfall of eighty miles?’
‘We’ve got two factors on our side: we’re heading south, and we’re heading into spring. There’ll be more game: reindeer, musk ox, ptarmigan. We’ll be able to live off the land.’
‘What do you think, Mr Terregannoeuck?’ asked Strachan. It was some indication of how desperate their straits were that the scientificer was prepared to admit they had to rely on the ‘primitive savage’ for advice on how to survive in the wilderness.
‘It only way,’ the Inuk said grimly. ‘Small chance – but small chance better than no chance at all.’
‘Then it’s settled,’ said Killigrew. ‘I’ll tell the men at once. The sooner they know we’ve got a plan – that there is hope – the sooner their morale will start to lift. We can’t do this unless we believe we can do it.’
‘Then I’m doomed from the outset,’ said the master.
‘Don’t give up on me now, Yelverton. We need you. I can’t navigate from here to Fort Hope without you.’
‘What makes you think I can do it? The closest thing I could find to a chart was a map in a book from the ship’s library.’
‘We have chronometers, don’t we? Compasses? Navigational instruments? All we have to do is reach the Great Fish River and follow it upstream to Lake Aylmer. From there it can’t be more than ninety miles due south to the eastern arm of the Great Slave Lake.’
The master sighed. ‘I’ll do what I can.’
Killigrew clapped him on the shoulder. ‘Good. Plot us a course for Fort Hope, Yelverton.’
The master went out, followed by Strachan and Varrow. Only the Inuk lingered in the wash-house with Killigrew. ‘What are our chances, Mr Terregannoeuck? Can we really make it?’
‘Twenty too many to live off land. If strongest of you leave rest – ten at most – there is chance you make it back by living off land as you go.’
‘And abandon the others, you mean?’
‘Otherwise you all die.’
Killigrew shook his head. ‘I can’t abandon them; not any of them. When I assumed command of the Venturer and her crew I became responsible for every man on board.’
‘Then stay behind. Send others. At least give some of your men chance of life.’
‘No. We’re all going.’ He hesitated. ‘Mr Terregannoeuck, you’re not a member of the ship’s crew. If you want to take your own chances – and I know they’ll be better than if you stay with us – I shan’t think any the less of you.’
The Inuk grinned, the first smile Killigrew had seen all morning. ‘You never make it back to your own people without Terregannoeuck.’
‘We’re not your responsibility.’
‘You become responsibility of Terregannoeuck when he agree to come with you. Terregannoeuck cannot live with guilt if he abandon you now when you have greatest need of him.’
Killigrew wondered if the Inuk spoke from experience. Perhaps he felt guilty that he had abandoned Franklin and the others to their deaths; perhaps that was why he had agreed to join the crew of the Venturer. Perhaps, for him, this was an act of atonement.
‘Then you understand why I cannot leave any of these men to perish. No matter how hopeless it may seem, I must try.’
Terregannoeuck nodded and went out.
As soon as Killigrew was alone, his expression crumpled. He splashed cold water on his face, but now that talking his desperate plan through with the others had put everything in perspective, the reality of their situation finally hit home.
They were all going to die.
He stumbled across to the latrines and vomited.
He had faced death before plenty of times, but not like this. Before there was always hope, a chance that he could outwit his enemies or, if the worst came to the worst, overcome them by sheer grit and determination. But there was no escaping their situation now. No amount of cunning and ingenuity was going to take them all the way to Fort Hope.
‘Are you all right?’ Ursula’s voice asked behind him.
He took out his handkerchief and wiped his face before straightening and turning to her. ‘Still feel a bit all-overish from all that smoke I inhaled last night.’
‘We are in trouble, are we not?’
There was no point in lying to her: she would see through it in an instant. ‘It doesn’t look good.’ He chuckled softly, without much humour. ‘It’s rum, when you think about it. You know the real reason I volunteered for this expedition? It wasn’t to find Franklin and the others – I know as well as you that they’re all dead by now – and it wasn’t to find the North-West Passage, either. It was to find out if I was up to it. To find out if I could follow in Franklin’s footsteps and survive where he died. To prove myself a man.’ He smiled wanly. ‘Queer, ain’t it? I’m intelligent enough to know how stupid that sort of behaviour is, yet still I fall a prey to it.’
‘You can’t help it. You’re a man.’
‘Well, I suppose now I have my answer. I was the one who got Yelverton, Cavan, Strachan, Ågård, Molineaux, Dawton, Endicott and O’Houlihan berths on this expedition. Now Cavan, Dawton and O’Houlihan are dead, thanks to me, and the rest of us are doomed. Because I wanted to prove myself man enough to face down the Arctic, and win.’
‘I could tell you that they were all grown men capable of making their own decisions – that it was their own choice to come on this expedition – but I do not suppose that would cut much ice with you.’
He shook his head. ‘I’m their commanding officer now. They’re my responsibility.’
‘Then take responsibility for them! Instead of feeling sorry for yourself, get out there and reassure them. Give them the one thing you’ve got left to give: hope. Remember what you said to me when we were trapped on that ledge in the ice crevasse? Nil desperandum: things are never quite as hopeless as they seem. You want to believe you’re the one who got these men into this situation? Very well. Then be the one who gets them out of it.’
Chapter 21
A Single Step
‘All right, lads, gather round.’ Killigrew felt sick to look on those smoke-blackened, frost-bitten, defeated faces. He had to put hope in these men, give them the strength to follow him out of this wilderness. Even Moses would have balked at such a task. But Moses, he reminded himself ruefully, had not held Her Britannic Majesty’s commission.
‘Now, I’m not going to lie to you and pretend that everything’s all right. So first the bad news, to get it out of the way. We’re eight hundred miles from the closest outpost of civilisation: Fort Hope, on the shores of the Great Slave Lake. It’s the dead of winter, and the weather’s going to get colder before it turns. I’d say it’s going to take us about three months to make the journey through the most inhospitable climate on the face of God’s creation. And I’ll tell you now that some of us won’t make it. But I believe some of us will. And I can tell you which ones will make it: those of you who have the will to live. Those of you who aren’t prepared to give in, not now, and not later, when the going starts to get tough. Because get tough it will, I can assure you.
‘That’s the worst of it. Now the good news. The summer thaw is still several months away, so if there are any stretches of water between here and the mainland we can just walk right over them. The further south we travel, the easier the going will get. The sun will return, the weather will improve, there’ll be more wildlife for us to hunt, more food for us to eat. And we’ve got plenty of food to keep us going until then.’ He took a deep breath. ‘Now this is the way it’s going to be. Once we set out we’ll be back on six-upon-four—’
The men groaned.
‘Yes, that’s right, six-upon-four. We’ve got a lot of ground to cover
and for the first few hundred miles the only food we’re likely to find is what we take with us. Six-upon-four will weaken us, but it’ll last half as long again. Same goes for the officers. We eat the same rations and we share the work of pully-hauly, Mr Yelverton excepted…’
‘If it’s all the same with you, Killigrew, I’d rather do my fair share,’ protested the master.
‘It’s not all the same with me, Mr Yelverton. You’re in no condition for pully-hauly. When you agreed that I assume command of this company, you put yourself under my orders. Well, I’m giving you an order now. Have the sledges loaded, Mr Yelverton. We’ll need victuals, stoves, spirits of wine, tents, chrysalis bags, changes of clothes and spare boots.’ Killigrew had a feeling they would be needing the spare boots. ‘The sooner we get going the better.’ He turned away and headed for the observatory.
‘Mr Killigrew?’ called Butterwick. ‘Sir?’
The lieutenant turned back. ‘Yes, stoker?’
‘Merry Christmas, sir.’
Killigrew stared at him, wondering if he was being sarcastic. Butterwick flushed. ‘Well, it’s Christmas Day, isn’t it, sir?’
‘That it is, Butterwick,’ Killigrew said wryly. ‘That it is.’ He continued on his way to the observatory and motioned for Strachan to accompany him. ‘How’s Gargrave?’ he asked the assistant surgeon in a low voice.
‘Not good. You realise, of course, that he can’t walk, let alone haul a sledge? His leg’s broken in a dozen places. He’ll probably never walk again.’
‘I know.’
‘We can’t drag him on one of the sledges. Not if we’re going to take enough food to get us even halfway to Fort Hope. Besides, no matter what we do, no matter how warmly we wrap him up, those injuries will become frost-bitten. Then they’ll turn gangrenous. Then the only chance of saving his life will be to amputate, and even that’s no guarantee.’
‘You mean to tell me that with all the advances that medicine has made in the past few years—?’
Killigrew and the North-West Passage Page 43