by Killigrew
If they had still had the Halkett boat, they might have crossed it; but as if anticipating they would need it, the bear had destroyed the boat along with Charity over three months ago.
They walked along the bank for a couple of miles, but there was no way across. The river barred their path.
‘Fifty-four miles,’ said Molineaux, as they slumped to the ground. ‘Fifty-four bloody miles.’
‘We tried,’ sighed Yelverton. ‘Dear God, how we tried.’
They had come so far, got so close, and yet they were all so far gone with hunger Killigrew could see they were ready to give up. But there had to be a way across, there had to be! He looked around, but there were no trees they could cut down to create a bridge or make a raft, just stunted bushes. Not that any of them had the strength to cut down any trees.
‘Mr Latimer, would you be so good as to hold these for me for a minute?’ said Strachan.
Latimer accepted the spectacles the assistant surgeon handed him. Strachan picked up a rope and tied one end to a rock.
‘What are you going to do?’ Killigrew asked him.
Strachan ignored him and tied the other end of the rope around his waist.
The assistant surgeon’s intentions finally dawned on Killigrew’s hunger-dulled brain. ‘No!’ he tried to run across to grab Strachan, but his legs collapsed beneath him and he fell to his knees. ‘You’ll never make it! You’ll freeze to death, man! Stop him, someone!’
Yelverton tried to grab him, but Strachan just ran out into the water. He gasped at its icy touch, then waded out until he was waist-deep. He plunged into it and began swimming.
‘Haul him in, for God’s sake!’ said Killigrew. ‘The fool’s going to kill himself!’ He crawled over to where Strachan had tied the rope to a boulder, but Molineaux stopped him.
‘It’s a done thing now, sir. Either he makes it, or he doesn’t. If he doesn’t, we’re all going to die anyhow.’
They watched from the bank as Strachan paddled pathetically across the mill-race. He had never been the strongest of them, and their arduous trek from the polar seas had taken its toll on him as much as anyone. If Killigrew had had to pick someone to swim the river, Strachan would not have been high on his fist.
The current in mid-stream caught the assistant surgeon and threatened to sweep him away. He fought it, his desperation giving him new strength. Then he was through the worst of it and it looked as though he was going to make it.
The next moment he had disappeared.
The men watching groaned. Killigrew waited for him to resurface. He had come so close: if he had only gone under momentarily, then to drag him back now would mean all his efforts had been in vain, and he would never have the strength to make a second attempt; if he had not…
Seconds passed. Killigrew scanned the foaming white water. Strachan did not resurface. ‘All right, that’s enough. Pull him in.’
‘Hold on, sir,’ said Molineaux. ‘Just give him a few more moments…’
‘Pull him in now, damn it! He’s drowning!’
‘No he isn’t, by God! Look!’ Yelverton pointed downstream, to the left of where Killigrew had been watching. Strachan had resurfaced and still struggled to reach the shallows on the far side.
‘Come on, sir!’ Molineaux yelled hoarsely. ‘Just a few more feet!’
‘You can do it, sir!’ shouted Endicott.
Killigrew had seen men in the final stages of exhaustion and he could see that Strachan was well beyond those stages, drawing on reserves of endurance that no man could have any right to. At last the assistant surgeon was wading up out of the shallows, staggering like a dying man; which, Killigrew thought grimly, was probably what he was. Strachan splashed out of the water, clambered up the rocks on the far bank, took two more steps and then collapsed in the snow.
He had earned a rest, of course, but he could not afford to pause, not now, not until he had tied that rope to one of the rocks on the far side. Until he had done that, there was nothing anyone on the north bank could do for him. If he fell asleep where he lay – and what man could not, after what he had just been through? – then he would never wake up.
Killigrew was about to call out to him when he saw Strachan slowly push himself to his feet, untie the rope from around his waist, and loop it around a rock. He tied it off and then collapsed once more.
On the north bank, Molineaux and Endicott drew in the slack and made the rope fast. Killigrew took the rope in both hands and was about to wade into the water when Molineaux laid a hand on his arm. ‘You think the pill-roller’s rope-work is any better than his needlework?’ he asked, with a nod to where Strachan had tied off the other end of the rope.
‘Only one way to find out.’ Killigrew stepped into the river.
The water looked icy, but appearances were deceptive: it was so cold, it burned. Killigrew realised at once that Strachan had had the right idea: get across as quickly as possible, before the cold seeped into his bones to paralyse his muscles with agonising cramp. With the rope to help him, it was a lot easier than it had been for Strachan. He was through the mill-race in midstream when the rope gave a little and he glanced across to see the knot where Strachan had tied it coming adrift. With a lunge of desperation, he pushed on. The rope shifted again and he lost his footing and went under. Only the rope saved him, but as he pulled himself up it shifted even more. There were only a couple of inches left beyond the knot, sliding through inexorably, and just when it seemed that the knot must come adrift Strachan appeared on his feet once more and hauled it tight again. He kept on hauling on it until Killigrew was able to let go of the rope and wade out of the shallows.
Strachan’s teeth were chattering too fiercely for him to be able to speak. Killigrew retied the rope with a proper seaman’s knot and then went to gather some firewood while Qualtrough entered the water behind him. They had to untie Pettifer’s hands so he could haul himself across, while Qualtrough kept him covered with a musket. There were no muskets with dry powder on the south bank, but by the time Pettifer hauled himself out of the water, he was too exhausted to resist as Molineaux bound his hands once more.
Most of them were across by the time he had got a fire going by the time-honoured method of rubbing two sticks together.
‘What the hell were you playing at?’ Killigrew asked Strachan, not unkindly.
The assistant surgeon managed to grin through chattering teeth. ‘You always get to be the hero. Thought it was my turn.’
Killigrew returned his grin, and then caught sight of the crimson stain spreading through the snow around Strachan’s right foot and the smiled faded from his face. ‘What happened to your foot?’
‘Must’ve stepped on something under the water,’ said Strachan. ‘Thought it was cramp. So cold… hardly felt a thing… Is it bad?’ Killigrew unwrapped the rags the assistant surgeon wore in place of a boot. They were soaked with blood, and underneath the flesh was lacerated to the bone. ‘It’s not good,’ he admitted. It might only be fifty-four miles to Fort Hope, but Strachan was not going to get far with his foot in that condition. Worse, without proper medical attention, that wound was going to fester and become gangrenous.
‘Jesus!’ hissed Molineaux. At first Killigrew thought he too had seen the state of Strachan’s foot, but then the seaman raised his voice in a hoarse yell of panic. ‘Mr Yelverton! Look out behind you, sir!’
Killigrew looked up. Kracht was the last man but one to cross the river, hauling himself strongly through the torrent. Behind him, Yelverton was on the verge of following him into the water. At Molineaux’s yell, he turned in time to see the bear charging towards him.
The men on the south bank reached for their guns, guns rendered useless by the water that soaked the cartridges. Yelverton froze, reached for his knife, and then thought better of it and splashed into the water. The bear followed him unhesitatingly, diving from the bank with remarkable agility. It swam confidently after Yelverton, seemed to rise up on top of him, and then they both went u
nder. The water foamed red, and then the bear was swimming back to the north bank, dragging Yelverton with his leg in its jaws.
The ultimate horror was that the master was still alive. He screamed horribly while Killigrew and the others watched helplessly from the far side of the river. At that moment the lieutenant would have given anything for dry powder so he could put his old friend out of his misery.
The bear dragged Yelverton out of the water and then, growing weary of his struggles and screams, smashed his skull with a casual swipe of one paw. Glowering across the river at the others, the bear backed out of sight, dragging Yelverton’s corpse behind it.
‘Dear God!’ sobbed Latimer. ‘You don’t think it was the same one…?’
‘How many polar bears that big do you think there are in the world?’ Varrow retorted sharply.
‘Yes, but to follow us for nearly eight hundred miles…’
It was inconceivable that anything in God’s creation, man or beast, could show such single-minded determination, but Killigrew was sure the engineer was right. There had been two dark specks on the bear’s side, and Killigrew did not doubt they were the scars where Terregannoeuck had shot it. He felt grief: grief for an old friend he had sailed with for many years, grief for the family back in Yarmouth whom he would have to tell in person that their husband and father was dead – and tell the old, old lie that he had not suffered. But more punishing than that was the fear. The fear that the same fate awaited him somewhere along the last fifty miles of their trek. Bullets had not killed the bear, nor dissuaded it from following them 746 miles.
‘You remember what Terry told us,’ said Molineaux. ‘They go where the food is, trailing herds of reindeer for hundreds of miles.’
‘Not inland,’ said Latimer, and rounded on Strachan. ‘You said it wouldn’t follow us inland!’
The assistant surgeon grinned weakly, without humour. ‘I think we must have made it really, really angry.’
Killigrew sighed. He could not accept that the bear had followed them hundreds of miles inland just to settle a grudge, and yet there it had been. ‘Come on, let’s get organised,’ he said. ‘Our guns will be useless until the powder dries, so we’ll have to make alternative weapons. There are more than enough saplings around here for every man to make a spear, so let’s look lively.’
No one had much strength for cutting down trees and sharpening them to wicked points, but they had less taste for being killed by the bear, so they went to work. Killigrew hoped that its latest kill would sate its hunger until they could reach Fort Hope – how long would that take, a fortnight? – where, with any luck, help would be at hand. Nonetheless, there was no need to appoint anyone to stand guard that night: no one felt much like sleeping. Molineaux spent the night sewing stitches in Strachan’s foot, at the doctor’s insistence. Strachan never once cried out, although Killigrew feared this was less a reflection of his fortitude – already proven beyond question – than of the fact that his foot was numbed with frostbite.
Dawn came – what a luxury it was to see the sun rise in the mornings again! – and they set off once more. Strachan hobbled along on a makeshift crutch that Riggs had fashioned for him from a stout sapling. The weather favoured them, but that was about all. The next day Killigrew saw a couple of stray reindeer some distance off and he and Molineaux went after them with muskets, but the reindeer eluded them easily and they rejoined the others empty-handed. That night they dined as usual on the vile, indigestion-inducing tripe de roche.
A week later they had to cross a rocky defile. It was hard-going, and when Qualtrough was about halfway down he lost his footing, fell a few feet, and rolled the rest of the way to the bottom. Killigrew wanted to hasten down after him to make sure he was all right, but he knew that that way he would only risk breaking his own neck.
‘Qualtrough? Are you all right?’ Killigrew’s raised voice, hoarse as it was, sounded strange as it echoed off the rocks.
‘I’m fine,’ the ice quartermaster called back.
It took Killigrew another five minutes to climb to the bottom and find Qualtrough sitting up in the lee of a boulder. The ice quartermaster had been lying: he was not fine at all. He was conscious and in no immediate pain, to all intents and purposes in good spirits, but Killigrew did not need to wait for Molineaux and Butterwick to finish helping Strachan down the steep slope to find out that Qualtrough had a compound fracture of the left leg. As Strachan did what he could to make the quartermaster comfortable, Killigrew announced that they would make camp there for the night. Afterwards Strachan took him aside.
‘He’s never going to get to Fort Hope on that leg.’
‘Then we’ll have to carry him,’ Killigrew said simply. ‘I’m not leaving anyone behind. Damn it, there were thirty-seven of us on board the Venturer when we left Beechey Island, and how many are left now? Fifteen!’
Strachan shook his head. ‘See sense, Killigrew. Look at us. The fittest of us will be lucky to make it to Fort Hope. If anyone tries to carry him, they’ll die along with Qualtrough himself.’
‘Then what do you suggest?’ Killigrew hissed angrily. ‘That we leave him here to make another meal for Bruin?’
Strachan shook his head wearily. ‘I don’t know. God help me, Killigrew, I just don’t know.’
Killigrew cursed. He reckoned they had covered nearly thirty miles in the ten days since they had crossed the river. Only twenty-two miles left to go, but as they staggered along they were covering an average of three miles a day. They would be lucky to reach Fort Hope in a week.
‘All right,’ he said. ‘Perhaps if we sent a couple of the stronger ones ahead to Fort Hope to send help back here. Say, six days for someone to get there, a day or two for a party of fit and healthy men to make it back here; the rest would only have to wait eight days at the most, if this weather holds up.’
Strachan shook his head. ‘You know it makes more sense for the majority to go on, Killigrew. Less food for a rescue party to bring back to the survivors. I’ll wait here with Qualtrough. I don’t think I can go much further with this damned foot of mine.’
‘No can do,’ said Killigrew. ‘What if Bruin comes back?’
‘Leave us a couple of muskets. We’ll have to take our own chances. There’s no point in us holding back the rest of you.’
Killigrew shook his head. He could not leave his friend and Qualtrough at the mercy of the bear. ‘Then I’ll stay with you.’
Strachan grasped him by the arm. ‘No! The others need you, Killigrew. I know it’s only a few miles to Fort Hope, but they’ll never make it without you. They’re ready to give up, they’d all have given up a long time ago if it wasn’t for you.’
‘And what will you eat while you’re waiting for us to send food back to you? You’re in no condition to go foraging for tripe de roche.’
‘I’ll stay with them, sir,’ said Molineaux, who was sitting nearby. ‘I can get them food, keep a fire going; and if Bruin comes sniffing around, I’ll soon settle his hash,’ he added with a grin, patting the barrel of the musket he was cleaning.
Killigrew shook his head. He knew that if he left anyone behind he would be leaving him to die. It was bad enough even to contemplate leaving his friend Strachan behind, but to leave Molineaux as well, who was also… yes, damn it, his friend… It was curious to think of a rating as a friend, but Killigrew knew of few men of his own class he could rely on the way he could depend on Molineaux. Both the assistant surgeon and the petty officer had helped him so much in the past; he owed his life and his career to them both.
Molineaux stood up and came across to join them. ‘I’ll look after ’em, sir. That’s a promise.’
Killigrew stared hard at him and realised that if any man could fulfil that promise, he stood before him now. He hated to do it, as much as he had hated to put Gargrave out of his misery; but once again it was the only sensible solution.
He took a deep breath. ‘Thank you, Molineaux. But I’ll be obliged if you’ll keep that promise.
’
‘Have I ever let you down in the past, sir?’
‘Never.’
‘Well, then.’
The next day it was eleven men and one woman who set out from the camp site, leaving three behind them. Killigrew was too choked up to find anything to say to his friends as he left them, so he just shook their hands.
‘Don’t you worry, sir,’ said Molineaux. ‘We’ll see you at Fort Hope in a couple of weeks.’
‘Thank you, Molineaux. God be with you.’
‘And with you, sir.’
The rest trudged on. At the mouth of the defile Killigrew stopped and glanced back. Molineaux was already too busy building a fresh fire to notice but, despite the petty officer’s apparent self-confidence, Killigrew could not shrug off the feeling that he was looking at his friends for the last time.
Chapter 24
A Taste of Pork
Towards evening Killigrew, Ursula and the other ten men passed through a patch of open ground where tripe de roche were so plentiful they had no difficulty in eating their fill, or at least as much of the disgustingly bitter lichen as they could cram between their blistered lips. If only Qualtrough and Strachan could have kept going this far, Killigrew would not have had to worry about them finding enough to eat until a rescue party could reach them, but it was too late now. He thought about sending someone back to tell them about this spot; but every one of the men who had come with him was so far gone they would be lucky to cover the remaining twenty miles to Fort Hope, without making them cover the additional four miles there and back to where they had left Strachan, Molineaux and Qualtrough.
It was Kracht’s turn to build a fire. ‘May I have Herr Strachan’s Brillenglas, mein Herr?’ he asked Killigrew. He snapped his fingers and grimaced, trying to remember the English word. ‘For making fire?’
‘The lens, you mean.’ Before leaving Molineaux, Qualtrough and Strachan, Killigrew had taken the assistant surgeon’s spectacles and snapped them in half, so that both parties would have something to start a fire with when the sun was shining.