The Frozen Deep

by Wilkie Collins

  ‘The following intelligence from St John’s, Newfoundland, has reached us for publication. The whaling vessel ‘Blythewood’ is reported to have met with the surviving officers and men of the expedition in Davis Strait. Many are stated to be dead, and some are supposed to be missing. The list of the saved, as collected by the people of the whaler, is not vouched for as being absolutely correct, the circumstances having been adverse to investigation. The vessel was pressed for time; and the members of the expedition, all more or less suffering from exhaustion, were not in a position to give the necessary assistance to inquiry. Further particulars may be looked for by the next mail.’

  The list of the survivors followed, beginning with the officers in the order of their rank.

  They both read the list together. The first name was Captain Helding. The second was Lieutenant Crayford.

  There, the wife’s joy overpowered her. After a pause, she put her arm round Clara’s waist, and spoke to her.

  ‘Oh, my love!’ she murmured, ‘are you as happy as I am? Is Frank’s name there too?

  The tears are in my eyes. Read for me—I can’t read for myself.’

  The answer came, in still sad tones:

  ‘I have read as far as your husband’s name. I have no need to read farther.’

  Mrs Crayford dashed the tears from her eyes, steadied herself, and looked at the newspaper.

  On the list of the survivors the search was vain. Frank’s name was not among them. On a second list, headed ‘Dead or Missing,’ the two first names that appeared were: FRANCIS

  ALDERSLEY.

  RICHARD

  WARDOUR.

  In speechless distress and dismay Mrs Crayford looked at Clara. Had she force enough, in her feeble health, to sustain the shock that had fallen on her? Yes! She bore it with a strange unnatural resignation; she looked, she spoke, with the sad self-possession of despair.

  ‘I was prepared for it,’ she said. ‘I saw them in the spirit last night. Richard Wardour has discovered the truth, and Frank has paid the penalty with his life—and I, I alone, am to blame.’ She shuddered, and put her hand on her heart. ‘We shall not be long parted, Lucy; I shall go to him. He will not return to me.

  Those words were spoken with a calm certainty of conviction that was terrible to see. ‘I have no more to say,’ she added, after a moment, and rose to return to the house. Mrs Crayford caught her by the hand, and forced her to take her seat again.

  ‘Don’t look at me, don’t speak to me, in that horrible manner!’ she exclaimed. ‘Clara, it is unworthy of a reasonable being, it is doubting the mercy of God, to say what you have just said. Look at the newspaper again. See! They tell you plainly that their information is not to be depended upon—they warn you to wait for further particulars. The very words at the top of the list show how little they know of the truth. “Dead, or missing!” On their own showing it is quite as likely that Frank is missing as that Frank is dead. For all you know, the next mail may bring a letter from him. Are you listening to me?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Can you deny what I say?’

  ‘No.’

  “‘Yes!” “No!” Is that the way to answer me when I am so distressed and so anxious about you?’

  ‘I am sorry I spoke as I did, Lucy. We look at some subjects in very different ways. I don’t dispute, dear, that yours is the reasonable view.’

  ‘You don’t dispute?’ retorted Mrs Crayford warmly. ‘No! you do what is worse—you believe in your own opinion—you persist in your own conclusion—with the newspaper before you! Do you, or do you not, believe the newspaper?’

  ‘I believe in what I saw last night.’

  ‘In what you saw last night! You, an educated woman, a clever woman, believing in a vision of your own fancy—a mere dream! I wonder you are not ashamed to acknowledge it!’

  ‘Call it a dream if you like, Lucy. I have had other dreams, at other times, and I have known them to be fulfilled.’

  ‘Yes!’ said Mrs Crayford. ‘For once in a way they may have been fulfilled, by chance—and you notice it, and remember it, and pin your faith on it. Come, Clara, be honest! What about the occasions when the chance has been against you, and your dreams have not been fulfilled? You superstitious people are all alike. You conveniently forget when your dreams and your presentiments prove false. For my sake, dear, if not for your own,’ she continued, in gentler and tenderer tones, ‘try to be more reasonable and more hopeful. Don’t lose your trust in the future and your trust in God. God, who has saved my husband, can save Frank. While there is doubt there is hope. Don’t embitter my happiness, Clara! Try to think as I think—if it is only to show that you love me.’

  She put her arm round the girl’s neck and kissed her. Clara returned the kiss; Clara answered sadly and submissively:

  ‘I do love you, Lucy. I will try.’

  Having answered in those terms, she sighed to herself, and said no more. It would have been plain, only too plain, to far less observant eyes than Mrs Crayford’s that no salutary impression had been produced on her. She had ceased to defend her own way of thinking, she spoke of it no more; but there was the terrible conviction of Frank’s death at Wardour’s hands rooted as firmly as ever in her mind! Discouraged and distressed, Mrs Crayford left her, and walked back towards the house.

  XV

  At the drawing-room window of the villa there appeared a polite little man, with bright intelligent eyes and cheerful sociable manners. Neatly dressed in professional black, he stood, self-proclaimed, a prosperous country doctor—successful and popular in a wide circle of patients and friends. As Mrs Crayford approached him, he stepped out briskly to meet her on the lawn, with both hands extended in courteous and cordial greeting.

  ‘My dear madam, accept my heartfelt congratulations!’ cried the doctor. ‘I have seen the good news in the paper; and I could hardly feel more rejoiced than I do now if I had the honour of knowing Lieutenant Crayford personally. We mean to celebrate the occasion at home. I said to my wife before I came out, “A bottle of the old Madeira at dinner to-day, mind!—to drink the Lieutenant’s health; God bless him!” And how is our interesting patient? The news is not altogether what we could wish, so far as she is concerned. I felt a little anxious, to tell you the truth, about the effect of it; and I have paid my visit to-day before my usual time. Not that I take a gloomy view of the news myself. No! There is clearly a doubt about the correctness of the information, so far as Mr Aldersley is concerned—and that is a point, a great point, in Mr Aldersley’s favour. I give him the benefit of the doubt, as the lawyers say. Does Miss Burnham give him the benefit of the doubt too? I hardly dare hope it, I confess.’

  ‘Miss Burnham has grieved and alarmed me,’ Mrs Crayford answered. ‘I was just thinking of sending for you, when we met here.’

  With those introductory words, she told the doctor exactly what had happened; repeating, not only the conversation of that morning between Clara and herself, but also the words which had fallen from Clara in the trance of the past night.

  The doctor listened attentively. Little by little, its easy smiling composure vanished from his face as Mrs Crayford went on, and left him completely transformed into a grave and thoughtful man.

  ‘Let us go and look at her,’ he said.

  He seated himself by Clara’s side, and carefully studied her face, with his hand on her pulse. There was no sympathy here between the dreamy mystical temperament of the patient and the downright practical character of the doctor. Clara secretly disliked her medical attendant. She submitted impatiently to the close investigation of which he made her the object. He questioned her, and she answered irritably. Advancing a step further (the doctor was not easily discouraged) he adverted to the news of the Expedition, and took up the tone of remonstrance which had been already adopted by Mrs Crayford. Clara declined to discuss the question. She rose with formal politeness, and requested permission to return to the house. The doctor attempted no further resistance. ‘By all means,
Miss Burnham,’ he answered, resignedly—having first cast a look at Mrs Crayford which said plainly, ‘Stay here with me. Clara bowed her acknowledgements in cold silence, and left them together. The doctor’s bright eyes followed the girl’s wasted, yet still graceful, figure, as it slowly receded from view, with an expression of grave anxiety, which Mrs Crayford noticed with grave misgiving on her side. He said nothing until Clara had disappeared under the verandah which ran round the garden-side of the house.

  ‘I think you told me,’ he began, ‘that Miss Burnham has neither father nor mother living?’

  ‘Yes. Miss Burnham is an orphan.’

  ‘Has she any near relatives?’

  ‘No. You may speak to me as her guardian and her friend. Are you alarmed about her?’

  ‘I am seriously alarmed. It is only two days since I called here last—and I see a marked change in her for the worse. Physically and morally a change for the worse. Don’t needlessly alarm yourself! The case is not, I trust, entirely beyond the reach of remedy.

  The great hope for us is the hope that Mr Aldersley may still be living. In that event, I should feel no misgivings about the future. Her marriage would make a healthy and a happy woman of her. But, as things are, I own I dread that settled conviction in her mind that Mr Aldersley is dead, and that her own death is soon to follow. In her present state of health, that idea (haunting her, as it certainly will, night and day) will have its influence on her body as well as on her mind. Unless we can check the mischief, her last reserves of strength will give way. If you wish for other advice by all means send for it. You have my opinion.’

  ‘I am quite satisfied with your opinion,’ Mrs Crayford replied. ‘It is your advice I want.

  For God’s sake tell me what can we do?’

  ‘We can try a complete change,’ said the doctor. ‘We can remove her at once from this place.’

  ‘She will refuse to leave it,’ Mrs Crayford rejoined. ‘I have more than once proposed a change to her—and she always says No.’

  The doctor paused for a moment, like a man collecting his thoughts.

  ‘I heard something on my way here,’ he proceeded, ‘which suggests to my mind a method of meeting the difficulty that you have just mentioned. Unless I am entirely mistaken, Miss Burnham will not say No to the change that I have in view for her.’

  ‘What is it?’ asked Mrs Crayford, eagerly.

  ‘Pardon me if I ask you a question, on my part, before I reply,’ said the doctor. ‘Are you fortunate enough to possess any interest at the Admiralty?’

  ‘Certainly. My father is in the Secretary’s office—and two of the Lords of the Admiralty are friends of his.’

  ‘Excellent! Now I can speak out plainly with little fear of disappointing you. After what I have said, you will agree with me that the only change in Miss Burnham’s life which will be of any use to her, is a change that will alter the present tone of her mind on the subject of Mr Aldersley. Place her in a position to discover—not by reference to her own distempered fancies and visions, but by reference to actual evidence and actual fact—

  whether Mr Aldersley is, or is not, a living man; and there will be an end of the hysterical delusions which now threaten to fatally undermine her health. Even taking matters at their worst—even assuming that Mr Aldersley has died in the Arctic seas—it will be less injurious to her to discover this positively, than to leave her mind to feed on its own morbid superstitions and speculations, for weeks and weeks together, while the next news from the Expedition is on its way to England. In one word, I want you to be in a position, before the week is out, to put Miss Burnham’s present convictions to a practical test.

  Suppose you could say to her: “We differ, my dear, about Mr Francis Aldersley. You declare, without the shadow of a reason for it, that he is certainly dead, and, worse still, that he has died by the act of one of his brother officers. I assert, on the authority of the newspaper, that nothing of the sort has happened, and that the chances are all in favour of his being still a living man. What do you say to crossing the Atlantic, and deciding which of us is right—you or I?” Do you think Miss Burnham will say No to that, Mrs Crayford?

  If I know anything of human nature, she will seize the opportunity as a means of converting you to a belief in the Second Sight.’

  ‘Good heavens, doctor! do you mean to tell me that we are to go out and meet the Arctic Expedition on its way home?’

  ‘Admirably guessed, Mrs Crayford! That is exactly what I mean.’

  ‘But how is it to be done?’

  ‘I will tell you immediately. I mentioned—didn’t I?—that I had heard something on my road to this house.’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘Well, I met an old friend at my own gate, who walked with me a part of the way here.

  Last night my friend dined with the Admiral at Portsmouth. Among the guests there was a member of the Ministry, who had brought the news about the Expedition with him from London. This gentleman told the company there was very little doubt that the Admiralty would immediately send out a steam-vessel, to meet the rescued men on the shores of America, and bring them home. Wait a little, Mrs Crayford! Nobody knows, as yet, under what rules and regulations the vessel will sail. Under somewhat similar circumstances, privileged people have been received as passengers, or rather as guests, in Her Majesty’s ships—and what has been conceded on former occasions may, by bare possibility, be conceded now. I can say no more. If you are not afraid of the voyage for yourself, I am not afraid of it (nay, I am all in favour of it on medical grounds) for my patient. What do you say? Will you write to your father, and ask him to try what his interest will do with his friends at the Admiralty?’

  Mrs Crayford rose excitedly to her feet.

  ‘Write!’ she exclaimed. ‘I will do better than write. The journey to London is no great matter—and my housekeeper here is to be trusted to take care of Clara in my absence. I will see my father tonight! He shall make good use of his interest at the Admiralty—you

  may rely on that. Oh, my dear doctor, what a prospect it is! My husband! Clara! What a discovery you have made—what a treasure you are! How can I thank you?’

  ‘Compose yourself, my dear madam. Don’t make too sure of success. We may consider Miss Burnham’s objections as disposed of beforehand. But suppose the Lords of the Admiralty say No?’

  ‘In that case I shall be in London, doctor; and I shall go to them myself. Lords are only men—and men are not in the habit of saying No to me.’

  So they parted.

  In a week from that day Her Majesty’s ship Amazon sailed for North America. Certain privileged persons, specially interested in the Arctic voyagers, were permitted to occupy the empty state-rooms on board. On the list of these favoured guests of the ship were the names of two ladies—Mrs Crayford and Miss Burnham.

  FIFTH SCENE

  THE BOAT-HOUSE

  XVI

  Once more the open sea—the sea whose waters break on the shores of Newfoundland!

  An English steamship lies at anchor in the offing. The vessel is plainly visible through the open doorway of a large boat-house on the shore; one of the buildings attached to a fishing-station on the coast of the island.

  The only person in the boat-house at this moment, is a man in the dress of a sailor. He is seated on a chest, with a piece of cord in his hand, looking out idly at the sea. On the rough carpenter’s table near him lies a strange object to be left in such a place—a woman’s veil.

  What is the vessel lying at anchor in the offing?

  The vessel is the Amazon—despatched from England to receive the surviving officers and men of the Arctic Expedition. The meeting has been successfully effected, on the shores of North America, three days since. But the homeward voyage has been delayed by a storm which has driven the ship out of her course. Taking advantage, on the third day, of the first returning calm, the commander of the Amazon has anchored off the coast of Newfoundland, and has sent ashore to increase his supplies
of water before he sails for England. The weary passengers have landed for a few hours, to refresh themselves after the discomforts of the tempest. Among them are the two ladies. The veil left on the table in the boat-house is Clara’s veil.

  And who is the man sitting on the chest, with the cord in his hand, looking out idly at the sea? The man is the only cheerful person in the ship’s company. In other words—

  John Want.

  Still reposing on the chest, our friend who never grumbles, is surprised by the sudden appearance of a sailor at the boat-house door.

  ‘Look sharp with your work, there, John Want!’ says the sailor; ‘Lieutenant Crayford is just coming to look after you.’

  With this warning the messenger disappears again. John Want rises with a groan—turns the chest up on one end—and begins to fasten the cord round it. The ship’s cook is not a

  man to look back on his rescue with the feeling of unmitigated satisfaction which animates his companions in trouble. On the contrary, he is ungratefully disposed to regret the North Pole.

  ‘If I had only known’—thus runs the train of thought in the mind of John Want—‘if I had only known, before I was rescued, that I was to be brought to this place, I believe I should have preferred staying at the North Pole. I was very happy keeping up everybody’s spirits at the North Pole. Taking one thing with another, I think I must have been very comfortable at the North Pole—if I had only known it. Another man in my place might be inclined to say that this Newfoundland boat-house was rather a sloppy, slimy, draughty, fishy sort of a habitation to take shelter in. Another man might object to perpetual Newfoundland fogs, perpetual Newfoundland codfish, and perpetual Newfoundland dogs. We had some very nice bears at the North Pole. Never mind! it’s all one to me— I don’t grumble.’

  ‘Have you done cording that box?’

  This time the voice is a voice of authority—the man at the doorway is Lieutenant Crayford himself. John Want answers his officer in his own cheerful way.