The Whiteness of the Whale: A Novel

by David Poyer

  But he’d never said anything about being … a double amputee.

  As she wondered how he’d get around, Bodine stalked stiffly to the gap between pier and deck, bridged by a battered, paint-spattered aluminum gangway. He reached, and massive biceps tensed as he handed himself aboard, moving from handhold to handhold. Almost like … she turned away, admiring his adaptation to his handicap even as its resemblance to a great ape’s knuckle-walk made her shudder. Behind him the younger man handed across a heavy-looking duffel that clanked as Bodine eased it to the deck with one arm.

  “Dr. Pollard?” Turquoise-green eyes, a shade she’d never seen before, locked with hers. “Mick Bodine. We corresponded.”

  She forced a smile. “We certainly did. Did I say how much I admired your thesis?”

  “Did I say how much I liked your book?” He turned to greet Perrault, then Eddi. “This is my good friend Lars Madsen. We did a season together against the Arctic sealers.”

  They all shook hands. Sara took a deep breath and kept her eyes up, kept herself from backing away. If she did, she’d step off the stern. Lars Madsen’s grin was lit from within by a boyish eagerness that made her like him instantly. The hat, made to look like a goofy Saint Bernard, with dangling flaps that were the dog’s ears, looked warm, but also said, I don’t take any of this shit too seriously.

  Bodine was another matter. His dark hair was military short and his smile looked even more forced than her own felt. The prostheses, emerging from hiking shorts, looked absurd on a wind-whipped deck, in an open harbor foaming with short choppy whitecaps.

  Perrault kept shading his eyes at the clouds, then toward the gate. She, he’d said last night. “Right, take it all below,” he told the new arrivals. “You two are forward, on the port side. Opposite the girls.”

  “Got it,” Bodine said. He twisted on those incongruous legs and hauled himself down the companionway. The blond, Lars Madsen, began swinging the duffels down to him, to disappear into the dimness.

  Madsen crossed the plank several times, passing down more luggage. It must have contained delicate electronics, as he was very careful with it. Finally he paid the driver, who left. Meanwhile she and Eddi had been struggled with the inflatable dinghy. Its engine had snagged as they’d winched it upward. Lars grabbed one of the heavy braided handholds which cornered the rubber mass. “Take that other side—it is Sara?”

  “Correct.”

  “Take that side, and lift when I tell you.—Eddi, yes? Slack us just a tad, let her slide back.” His accent was Scandinavian. Madsen, yes, that might be Swedish. Or perhaps Norwegian. The winch clicked reluctantly. “Lift,” he grunted, and Sara tugged and something beneath the heavy gray bulk, so like a whale’s, popped free. They winched it in until the nose locked into the molded vee at the top of the ramp, and he bent to tie off the lines.

  “Thanks,” Sara told him.

  “Not a problem.” With his reddened cheeks, the silly hat, he looked like a boy out playing in the snow. His grin bent itself on her. She noted a complex fold to his eyelids, the beginnings of laugh lines. “Anything else I can help out with?”

  Just trying to fit in? Or coming on to her? He was attractive, in a tall Nordic way that’d always appealed. And those blue eyes … she had to drop her gaze.

  “What’s the plan?” Bodine’s head and shoulders were visible in the companionway.

  “It was to get under way yesterday.” Perrault snapped a rope’s end against the gunwale, frowning. “Season’s not that long. We’re going to hit a depression if we don’t get out there soon.”

  “Who we waiting on?”

  “The principals.” The captain turned away.

  “Who, or what, are ‘the principals’?” Sara asked Eddi. But got only a shrug in return.

  * * *

  Perhaps, like fruit flies, questions bred answers. Within the hour, as she was helping lay out lines, Perrault’s radio beeped. Eddi’s voice. “Anemone, gate: They’re here. An airport limo.”

  She wondered how many limos Ushuaia Airport had. But Perrault was instructing, “Tell the driver exactly how far to the pier. We don’t want him making any wrong turns, okay? If he doesn’t speak English, draw him a map.”

  A burst of static, then Eddi’s chipper lilt: “So on it, Skipper.”

  Perrault bent to a panel. A whine began and built. When it reached a shriek the captain pressed a button and an engine rumbled into life. He waited, blinking across the bay, then pressed a second button. Another motor started, telegraphing a buzzing tremor through lifelines and shrouds. They sounded extremely powerful.

  Perrault stepped up atop the steering dome, shading his eyes. He looked the boat over from masttop to deck, from stem to stern. Sara waited, rubbing her arms. She hadn’t worn a sweater this morning, and the Tierra del Fuegan summer was like November in Nantucket. Whitecaps chased each other across the harbor, rocking the boat. Gulls hovered, screaming, and a white fluid spattered down, just missing the boat. Across the pier a fishing trawler gunned its engine, sending a cloud of blue smoke drifting over them. Perrault coughed, looking annoyed. He pointed. “Forward spring. Take the slack out.”

  “Which one…?”

  He coughed again and frowned. “That one, by your foot. Now, when she comes aboard, stay out of her way.”

  Sara nodded, still unclear whom they were referring to. She was about to ask when a black Mercedes turned onto the pier, slowed, and came to a noiseless halt. Behind it were other cars, a motorcade. From these spilled men and women in parkas and sweatshirts. They readied notebooks and serious-looking video cameras, jockeying for vantages. The limo’s doors stayed closed. At last the driver came around to open them. He bowed and stepped back.

  “Oh my God,” Sara whispered.

  Leggy, rangy, incredibly slim, the woman posed on the pier, shaking shining long black hair out into the breeze. With her, and a broadly smiling yet uneasy-looking Perrault, an older man, lean, tanned, silver-haired, sunglassed, waved to the cameras. Sara backed slowly away from the gangway, unable to believe her eyes, as the actress placed one boot on it, as if claiming a newly discovered land.

  Yes; it was really her. She wore suede jeans that fit like a spray tan and a white parka with faux fox trim. Silk showed bright scarlet at her throat. The gulls darted madly overhead, screeching insults; she laughed, pointing them out to the older man. Past her Sara saw Lars Madsen unloading brass-trimmed butterscotch-leather suitcases from the limo’s boot. Then they were all headed for her: Perrault, Dorée, the older guy, in suit and tie and camel topcoat, and two more young women. The last woman onto the gangway turned and grasped both hand-chains, blocking it against the photographers, who promptly spread out along the pier. One focused a telephoto on Sara, who lifted a hand to shield her face. Just as she’d had to do outside the courtroom.

  “Our crew, Miss Dorée,” Perrault was saying, and Sara started and bent awkwardly before an extended hand. As Dorée patted her shoulder as if knighting her, Sara stared wordless at a face familiar from enormous screens.

  She’d often wondered, eyeing the tabloids in the checkout lines, what the celebrities on their covers really looked like. Without makeup and hair and lighting. Just like anyone else, she’d told herself scornfully. But no. This face and lips and chin spoke without speaking, invited without words, as if behind surface beauty lay another, transcendent, ageless, almost alien in its perfection. Tawny streaks gleamed within long black lashes, like the gems called tiger’s-eye. The curve of a full-lipped half smile was like the bestowal of a divine blessing.

  Before she’d grasped it the moment was past. The actress was turning to Bodine, who’d hoisted himself into the sunlight and was leaning, artificial limbs sheathed in khaki Dockers, against a digital display sited to be visible from the large wheel aft. An identical pat on the shoulder, an identical smile. Behind her Eddi came jogging down the pier. She took in the logjam at the gangway, and stepped on a huge black rubber fender between the boat and the pier and vaulted aboa
rd farther forward.

  A horn from the harbor spun them. Five more paparazzi roared past in outboards, cameras pointed. Where had they come from? Did they follow the actress literally to the ends of the earth? Sara felt her own gaze dragged inevitably back, as a lover’s to his most beloved, and her heart yearned in exactly the same way. She wanted to stroke that shining hair. Fold, or better yet be folded, within those arms. She shook her head, confused. Was it sexual? It felt deeper, more moving. More like … worship?

  “Is that really … Tehiyah Dorée?” Eddi murmured, flushed, panting, beside her. “Or am I dreaming this?”

  “I think it is, Eddi.”

  “Holy cow. I mean … holy cow.”

  Dorée was talking with Perrault. One of the women who’d accompanied her aboard stood an arm’s length away. The captain was saying, “Our space is limited, Tehiyah. I can take five pieces of luggage—absolutely no more. Scientific equipment, food, and fuel have to take precedence. And we don’t have any extra bunks.”

  The full lips pouted. “I really need Georgita. She can film, too. So we wouldn’t need anyone for that.”

  “Eddi’s already part of the team. She has a lot of experience with whales.”

  “We have enough whale scientists.” Dorée’s gaze flicked around, lighted on Sara. Who felt absurdly like genuflecting. She suddenly realized she was grinning in a silly way, and dropped her gaze to her boots. Only to feel it drawn up again, to rest once more on the flushed cheeks, the wind-whipped silken hair. “Are you trying to tell me she can’t come?” Dorée added.

  The captain cleared his throat. “I’m afraid—well, yes. Sorry.”

  “You wouldn’t have this boat, be taking this voyage, without me. Isn’t that right?”

  “Without Jules-Louis, that’s true.”

  “Well, I’m sure he doesn’t want me to sail all alone. That can’t be what you had in mind either. Can it?”

  “I wish you’d brought this up before. We have so little space, only so much food—”

  “Like I said. Leave someone else ashore.” Dorée looked around; noticed Sara. Waved a hand. “Her.”

  “She’s the doctor. The scientist.”

  “Then someone else. I don’t care. Georgita’s coming.”

  Through all this the mild-looking, wan, slightly hunched girl in question had stood unspeaking, not participating beyond a glance down the companionway, then out at the bay. She clutched a wrap close against her chest.

  The standing group broke, then re-formed as the silver-haired man in the topcoat bounded up the gangway. Suddenly the actress shrank two or three inches. She relaxed into him, twined an arm around his sleeve, and became a different woman. Sara blinked, not crediting what she’d just seen. Dorée looked up into the older man’s face with a yearning, dreamy fascination.

  He put an arm around her shoulders. “There is a problem? Dru?”

  “Monsieur,” Perrault said, and saluted. “Welcome back aboard.”

  “The owner,” Eddi whispered. “Dru’s boss. He used to race too, years ago. He’s loaning his boat to the Protectors.”

  Perrault began in rapid French, but the older man held up a hand and said pleasantly, “In English, please. For Tehiyah. The new engines? They are not working out?”

  “No, they’re fine. The problem … as you know, space is very limited. I didn’t plan on another crew member.”

  “Well, I understand that. Ty, darling, can you possibly get along without her? I’m sure Dru will do everything he can to make you comfortable.”

  “I need someone to talk to. We’ll be out a long time. It’s a girl thing, Jules.”

  “Well then. There’s a woman—bien sûr. There’s another.” The Frenchman smiled at Sara and Eddi. “I’m sure they’d be happy to help with your hair, or—whatever else you might need. Dru’s been sailing with me a good many years. He would not say it was inconvenient if this weren’t so. And he’s right about all that luggage. You really do tend to—”

  “‘Inconvenient.’ Why can’t you come? Honey?”

  “I would very much like to, but there is the commitment in Djibouti. Really, one has to make compromises now and then. This is an adventure, after all.”

  “I just can’t go without her,” Dorée said. The pale woman they were discussing never moved, never spoke. Sara wondered if she was mute.

  Beside her, Eddi seemed to flinch, then stepped forward. “Really, if it’s a question of bunks … she can have mine.”

  Perrault frowned. Before he could say anything Dorée said, “Oh, my, no. We couldn’t. Where would you go?”

  “I don’t need much. Any flat place. I can sleep somewhere up forward.”

  “Then it’s settled,” the older man said. Sara could see in his eyes what he was thinking: Let the little people deal with it.

  “One moment.” Perrault ran a hand through his hair; he seemed to be gritting his teeth. “We already have so much extra fuel I’m compromising stability. I can’t take any more mon tabarnak de luggage—”

  “Georgita won’t bring much. Will you, Georgie?”

  The girl shrugged. The wind changed, blowing exhaust their way from the stern. Perrault coughed into a fist, then sneezed. Jamie Quill came stepping lightly along the deck-edge from forward. Despite his bulk the first mate moved like a cat on a fence, one foot in front of the other despite Anemone’s pitching as wakes from the circling paparazzi lifted, then dropped her below the level of the pier. “Dru. We doin’ this?”

  “Spring lines first. Then the stern.”

  “Looks like you’re ready.” The older Frenchman looked aloft, then to where the sea opened. “I wish … well, you’ll see some sights. Take good care of her, Dru.”

  “I will, Jules.”

  They shook hands, and the owner turned to Dorée. They embraced, held it; Sara looked away. Strobes flashed. Then, at some unseen signal, both turned to the cameras, to the raised, extended boom mikes dangling above them. Madsen took off his silly hat and moved up to stand with Dorée and the Frenchman. Perrault, too, turned to face the reporters.

  “This is a great moment,” the older Frenchman said sonorously, removing his sunglasses. “For the first time, a mission of the Cetacean Protection League sets sail. We wish these courageous sailors the best. I now introduce Lars Madsen, of the CPL.”

  Madsen said a few words Sara couldn’t quite hear. He ended, “And now: Tehiyah Dorée.”

  The actress lifted her face; blinked up at the sky. Spread her arms; and her voice rang out over the listeners.

  “The earth is our responsibility. For too long, we’ve treated it as our hunting grounds and our trash heap. We sail today to protect the noblest creatures on this watery planet from greed and murder. I thank all our patrons for their great generosity, especially Jules-Louis Vergeigne.” Drawing him in by one arm, she turned a brilliant smile to the lenses, eyes glittering with incipient tears. “We sail! Thank you all for your prayers and good wishes. Until we are victorious, we will not return.”

  With a creak and a sway of the narrow gangway, Vergeigne loped up onto the pier and turned, palm lifted in farewell. Perrault and Madsen braced their shoulders to it, and the brow rolled up onto the pier. “Both springs aboard,” Quill yelled from forward.

  “Très bien.” Perrault bent to uncleat one of the mooring lines. He shook it in some abrupt complex way, and a wave traveled along it and on the pier a loop jumped straight up off its bollard. He hauled it in hand over hand and coiled it down into a locker in the stern. Then pushed past Sara to the wheel, shoving her aside. She stepped out of his way, muttering an apology. The engines dropped to a drone. He rotated a lever up, then circled his index in the air.

  Cries from the pier mingled with those of circling gulls. “Au revoir!” “Love you, chérie!” “You’re our favorite, Tehiyah!” “Good-bye! Be careful!”

  The engines climbed the scale again. White water shot out with a gushing roar. A gap rocking with dark green miniature maelstroms widened between Anem
one and the pier. Far down in them Sara glimpsed small fish fleeing frantically in among the pilings. A shiver raveled her spine the way the wave had traveled up the mooring line. Past one of the bollards she caught a squared-off silhouette; another. Dully gleaming, brass-bound butterscotch leather.

  Someone on the pier noticed at the same time. “Georgie—Tehiyah’s bags!”

  “You’ve forgotten two of Miss Dorée’s bags,” the pale-haired woman said, answering Sara’s doubt that she could speak. Dorée herself had climbed onto the forward deck and was standing at the very bow, posing like a Nike, scarlet scarf fluttering in the rising wind. “We have to go back!”

  “C’est bien assez, c’est trop,” Perrault muttered. He looked at Sara and the creases deepened around his eyes. “She’s got enough luggage. Don’t you think?”

  “Georgie! Tehiyah!” the voices grew fainter as distance expanded, as the boat became a separate world. The pier slowly moved aft, the mountains marching with Anemone. Perrault touched the wheel only now and then, avoiding the motorboats that fell in on either side. Stone breakwaters reached out, and Anemone rolled between them. Sara lost her balance and almost fell, but caught herself. Pain twisted through her wrist.

  Perrault shouted to Dorée to come aft. He bent to the panel, and a pane of heavy, glossy-shining cloth expanded. It stiffened in the wind as it unfurled, and the boat heeled.

  Past the breakwaters the motorboats circled them one last time, lurching and pitching in the heavier seas, then headed back. The silver inlet she’d seen from the air stretched out before them, the whitecapped mountains glinting across it. As the sail hardened, Anemone dipped and rose. Spray arched in shimmering rainbows. The wind was much colder out here than in Ushuaia. Cold and utterly fresh, as if no human lung had ever taken it in.