by Peter Tonkin
‘Don’s up, you say.’
‘For a couple of days now.’
‘Thank God he’s not as bad as me. Where is he ...?’ Lethbridge paused, listening to the renewed vibration as Atropos got under way, powered laboriously by her manoeuvring propellers. ‘No, don’t tell me. I bet I know where he is. Wait a minute.’
Carried away by his sudden enthusiasm, the chief surged out of bed and began to search for some clothes. ‘Give me a hand, will you, Captain?’ he demanded unselfconsciously as soon as he found a promising pile of neatly folded clothing. ‘Hold those trousers there so I can climb into them.’
In five minutes, with his pyjamas as underwear, the chief engineer was dressed in trousers and pullover. His white overalls covered the ensemble. As long as he had no intention of going outside, it was quite adequate. Had LeFever taken the opportunity of spying through the door at any stage, he would have been treated to the unusual sight of a captain dressing her chief engineer; had he done so now, he would have seen her tying his shoelaces. And he would have heard them talking. Talking nineteen to the dozen, like old friends who had been separated for years.
*
Lethbridge was right. Don Taylor was in the engine room with Lloyd Swan. The two young engineering officers were deep in conversation, speculating as to what their captain had in mind. As soon as she arrived, she explained to them what she had described to Lethbridge and then she left the three of them in close enclave, talking over the practicalities and working out how two senior officers with no hands might best direct the efforts of someone with less experience but more functioning fingers. The first thing they sent him to do was to find Henri LeFever and Ann Cable; it was time, the engineers reckoned, to see just how many more of these bandages could be dispensed with.
Buoyed up with that burgeoning feeling of hope, Robin ran up to the bridge and joined Timmins in the wheelhouse. No sooner had she done so, than Hogg stuck his head out of the radio room. ‘I have Clotho for you, Captain,’ he said.
Her heart leaped but she did not rush over. One glance around the bridge was enough to tell her that everything was going adequately. A slit-eyed look out into the opalescent glare of the afternoon assured her that they were just entering the fog bank which clothed the iceberg. She crossed to the radio room and caught up the microphone. ‘Richard?’
‘No, Captain Mariner, it’s Nico. Lieutenant Hogg says you have moved Atropos.’
‘Yes.’ The elation was gone, punctured by Nico’s statement as easily as a child’s balloon. ‘The radio officer was injured and we could not warn you.’
‘So the captain and Bill Christian did not reach you.’
It was exactly as she had feared. ‘They came across the ice.’ She made it a statement, not a question.
‘That is correct.’
‘How long have they been out of contact?’
‘Only an hour.’
An hour! Anything could have happened. She looked round the bridge but there was no help there. There was no help anywhere, she realised. Not for her. Not for Richard. ‘He’ll be back in contact soon,’ she said, more for her own benefit than Nico’s.
‘I’ll let you know,’ he said. ‘Can I have your current position? He’ll want to know at once I should think.’
‘I’ll hand you back to Mr Hogg. He’ll give you the details.’
She had no time to indulge herself in worry over Richard. Her first task was to stand at Sam Larkman’s shoulder and will him safely through the fog. As soon as the fog began to clear and the glistening slopes of the iceberg shone through the thinning billows, she began to give more precise directions. In the lifeboat it had seemed to take them a considerable time to round the cliff face and discover the slipway with its surrounding stepped galleries. Even under the power of just her manoeuvring propellers, Atropos seemed to close with the glittering monster more quickly. It seemed little more than moments before Robin was directing the helmsman to steer hard over so that the ship could swing round in a slow half-circle, reverse her course and approach the slipway stern first.
It was going to be a long manoeuvre. As soon as it was under way, Robin handed over to Timmins once again, went into her day room behind the chart room and began to prepare for the next part of her plan. Overall, the scheme was relatively simple. When they were in position close to the iceberg she was going to put lines ashore from the stern on the port and starboard quarters. They would be long lines secured to the lower slopes of ice, designed to hold Atropos safe and still in the correct position vis-à-vis the slipway. As soon as the hull was secure, she would dismiss the crew to dinner and hold a council of war with her officers. She had no desire to do anything complex tonight. In the morning, at first light, she proposed to run two more lines ashore. They would run backwards from the port and starboard bows this time and be anchored on the upper slopes. Then, carefully, in agreed sequence and perfect harmony, all lines would be tightened. The stern lines would wind round the capstans and the bow lines would be gathered by the split windlass. So, inch by inch, Atropos would be guided backwards up the frozen slipway until as much of the hull as seemed necessary and safe was pulled out of the water, and the propeller could be inspected.
Precisely what would happen then could only be guessed at, but as far as Robin could see, it would follow one of two courses. Either they would fix the propeller where it stood, or they would simply take it off and replace it.
Simply. It was only twenty feet high, almost the size of a house front. It only weighed God knew how many tons. It was only welded onto a main drive shaft the size of a giant redwood’s tree trunk which in turn contained a complex of variable pitch mechanisms which would need to be disconnected and then reconnected before the job was complete.
Hogg stuck his head round the door and caught her unusually grim gaze. ‘Niccolo again,’ he informed her. ‘Your husband’s just been in contact. He’s fine.’
‘Excellent. Get on to Heritage Mariner, would you? Tell them I want them to fax something out. In sections, if need be.’
‘Yes, Captain.’
She followed him out through the chart room, then walked over to the clearview and looked out at the fog for a moment. It danced and wavered hypnotically, hiding the ice barrier just as effectively as it had hidden the iceberg. She let her thoughts drift for a moment as she brought her relief under control. Oddly, knowing that Richard was safe brought her much closer to tears than the news that he might be in trouble.
In a surprisingly short time, Hogg called through, ‘Captain, I have Sir William on the line. He says what do you want?’
‘I’ll take it,’ she said at once, crossing to the radio. ‘Daddy, why are you still in the office?’
‘Why do you think, darling?’
‘Okay. Silly question. How are the twins?’
‘Fine. Safe and sound up at Cold Fell. They’ll stay there until you get back. Now, what is it you want?’
‘I want the engineering drawings and architect’s plans of the ship. Everything, in as much detail as possible. Especially the propeller.’
‘I have them here. They’ll be on their way in a moment. You think you’ll have to go ahead then?’
‘I’ll know for certain tomorrow, but it seems more sensible to plan for the worst that can happen.’
‘Replacing the propeller will be bad,’ he said sharply. ‘But I wouldn’t call it the worst that could happen.’
‘You’re right, Dad.’
‘Now, Richard has described your situation to me as he understands it, but I find it hard to visualise. Is there actually an iceberg in your vicinity?’
She began to explain that not only was the iceberg —which Richard must have seen only from a great distance — utterly real, but she was actually planning to use it.
After a while he broke in and said, ‘You realise that it must have been moving south all along?’
The question stopped the flow of information and speculation. ‘Well, yes,’ she said. ‘Of course it h
as. How else could it have come down upon us while we were waiting against the ice barrier?’
‘Have you any idea of its speed?’
‘No. I’ve been thinking, but even with the faxes you’ve sent out to us it’s impossible to be at all accurate. And in any case ...’
‘Yes?’
‘The barrier will slow it. Maybe even stop it.’
‘I’d say that would depend on the relative masses and the power of the currents involved.’
She tried not to let her sigh of irritation carry to the microphone and away across the airwaves. Of course it would. She knew that.
‘It’s impossible to see all of the iceberg because of the mist,’ she said, ‘but I think part of it has already come into contact with the barrier. I’m sure I felt it shake some time ago. The berg is the only thing I can think of that would make something as massive as the barrier shake. We’ll find out more soon, I’m sure.’
‘The point is, you see, that if you’re caught between them, and it sounds as though you certainly are —’
‘Of course. It’s an acceptable risk. We’ll just have to keep a weather eye out.’
‘My elementary physics suggests, you see,’ he insisted gently, ‘that if the berg keeps moving but the barrier stops its progress to the south, then it might very well start swinging round to the side. To the eastern side, for instance, where you are positioned; then Atropos could end up like a nut in a pair of nutcrackers. It would simply crush the life out of you.’
‘Even our manoeuvring propellers can still move us faster than an iceberg, Daddy. There really is nothing at all for you to worry about.’
‘Still ...’
‘Still what, Daddy? Stop beating about the bush. What do you have in mind?’
‘All right. I know you’ve a lot on your plate and all of it is more important than putting an old man’s mind at rest, but what I have been thinking ever since Richard told me about the iceberg was this. If we haven’t been able to pick it up on the satellites because of the fog surrounding it, then how can we track it accurately? I suspect that even Atropos’s visual trace will be invisible once you’re tied up alongside that much high ice. If it’s as massive as Richard said, it will be bound to have quite a cloaking effect, especially when added to the mist. And that amount of ice could even break up your radio transmissions again. We simply cannot see you here. Are you anywhere near an overhang? It’s so frustrating, darling, not to be able to track Atropos at all.
‘What we could track, however, is one of the rescue beacons from a lifeboat. I’ve been thinking, you see, that if you could send someone up onto the berg itself, preferably onto a high point on the ice, then we could pick up the signal and track the iceberg’s movement very precisely indeed. Inch by inch, near as dammit.’
‘Well, as you say, I have my work cut out for me ...’
‘But, don’t you see, it’ll let us give you a completely accurate description of the iceberg’s movements and that could be absolutely critical if it is turning towards you for any reason.’
‘Well, if the barrier stops it going southwards, then the odds must be fifty-fifty it might turn our way ...’
‘And if it does so, then we’ll be able to warn you long before there’s anything to worry about. Certainly long before you would actually be able to see anything clearly on the ground.’
‘Okay. You’ve convinced me. I’ll add it to the list.’ She might have said more, but Timmins stuck his head round the door to inform her that Sam Larkman had swung Atropos onto the required bearing and now wanted permission to go to reverse. ‘I’ll come through, Mr Timmins,’ she said decisively. ‘That’s it, Dad. Love to the twins. Over and out.’
*
The plans had arrived through the fax while Robin was talking to her father. She spread them on the chart table and then divided the next half-hour between them and the bridge wing where she guided Sam as he reversed Atropos painstakingly up towards the slipway. As soon as she was satisfied with the line of the great ship’s reverse approach, she sent Timmins and Hogg down to gather teams of men in readiness for getting the long lines ashore and secured onto the ice. No sooner had she done so than LeFever and Ann brought a much recovered Harry Stone back up. While the radio officer went through to check over his beloved equipment and make sure that Hogg had looked after it properly, Robin looked speculatively at the other two.
‘You know your way around on ice, don’t you, Henri?’ she asked. ‘You were sure-footed enough helping me on the ice barrier when we went after Mr Timmins and I heard you say you had been far north in Canada when we thought we heard a shot this morning.’
‘Yeah, I guess.’
‘Do you think you could find your way to the upper slopes of the iceberg and put a transmitting beacon there? We really need to keep track of how the iceberg is moving and a beacon would be the most reliable way of doing so.’
‘It’s pretty steep this side. I’m no mountaineer, Captain.’
‘I know. What I have in mind is this. You go ashore with the boats taking the lines and the anchor points, then you explore a bit back behind the slipway. If you can find a path up onto the upper slopes, all well and good; if you can’t, come back down. If it looks dangerous, I don’t want you to go. Remember what you said to me on the way down into that ice cave. This isn’t worth the hair on your head.’
‘What did you say, you smooth-talking devil?’ asked Ann archly. But before the big man could answer, Timmins bustled back into the wheelhouse, heavily wrapped in cold-weather clothing and full of new-found importance. Henri met Ann’s eye and gave a minuscule shake of his head.
‘We’re ready to go, Captain,’ Timmins said, noticing none of this. ‘My team and Walter Hogg’s. I’m taking Don Taylor and a team led by your man Errol Jones. Walt’s taking the chief and Joe Edwards is leading his team.’ He rubbed his gloved hands together, clearly eager to be off, and Robin felt an unaccustomed pulse of affection for the little man. He really seemed to be trying as hard as he could. He was beginning to grow into the role Robin had mapped out for him in her command structure. She couldn’t begin to imagine how he or Hogg — was his given name really Walter? — had earned their papers, but the pair of them might make adequate officers one day if they kept this improvement up.
Henri went off to change into his cold-weather gear and Ann went off with him. Timmins and Robin went down to the stern and, while the teams stood ready by the lifeboats, the senior deck officers were joined by the engineering officers to discuss the finer points of what was due to happen next. They stood between the capstans, each one a pair of independently operated steel mushroom shapes designed to wind cable in or out in a controlled manner. They were integral to the first part of Robin’s plan. The officers gathered at the after rail, the better to see what lay before and around them.
Inevitably, as they discussed the plans Robin had drawn up, she felt her eyes straying over the breathtaking view again and again. The bulk of the berg rose on their right, its crystal crest hanging above them like a great wave breaking over their heads, etched against the darkening afternoon sky. Beyond and above that deceptively absolute edge lay the upper slopes that LeFever would try and gain in order to place the signalling device, but the slopes and the peaks above them were hidden by the angle caused by Atropos’s nearness to the berg. This proximity and the waning afternoon brought a chill to the air beyond anything that even Robin had been expecting. The edge of high ice swung round in front of them and, as it did so, the slopes beyond it were at last revealed. The levels below it stepped down to the slipway itself before swinging further to form what looked like a mountainous isthmus on their left.
When the boats went ashore — and they would need to do so very soon indeed — they would take with them the spare anchor and a heavy anchorage spike. They would pull behind them the heaviest rope they were capable of carrying. When the anchor points were secure, the rope would be fed through a tackle secured to each and brought back aboard by the retu
rning lifeboats. One small safety crew would remain ashore to stand by each anchorage point. Then Robin would use the capstans one at a time to pull heavy cable out from the ship’s stern, through the tackle and back aboard as though she were threading a needle. It would be enough for tonight to have the cable doubled through each, the ends secured to the pairs of capstans. In the morning, they would wind the cables tighter until Atropos was nudging up the slipway and then they would send the other lines ashore from the split windlass forward. When the forward lines could take the strain, the cables from the stern would be singled and resecured so that one of each pair of capstans could be released. They would need to use the freed capstans later for other, more important work.
No sooner had the plan been reviewed than LeFever pounded up, well wrapped and ready to go. Robin took him to one side. ‘You’ll go ashore in one of the lifeboats,’ she said. ‘Take the emergency beacon from the boat you go in. And, now I think of it, take another one as well, just in case. I know the light’s beginning to go, but the evenings are long in these latitudes and you should have plenty of time to decide if you can get it placed, place it if you can, and get back before I’ve finished. Then you can come back with the safety teams from the anchorage points. Okay?’
‘Sure.’
‘The beacons are simple. It’s perfectly obvious how to turn them on and off. Put one of them where it can broadcast effectively and try to shield it from the worst of the cold if you can — low temperatures play havoc with batteries. Keep your spare one switched on all the time so we can find you in an emergency.’
‘Sure thing,’ he said.
She paused, wondering if she should discuss his mission in any more detail, then she decided she had wasted enough time. The first order of business was to get the anchorage points ashore and secure.