Dark Matter (15 page)

To think there was a time when I actually liked snow. It’s horrible. Stinging your eyes. Blinding you, leading you astray. Each time I open the door I let in a whirlwind, and have to spend ages clearing it up (although I admit that this helps keep the water barrel full). And still the snow finds its way in, sifting under doors and through hidden cracks I never knew existed.
Frost is beginning to crust the inside walls of the cabin and gather under the bunks. You wouldn’t think it could get as far as the main room, but it does. I spend hours scraping it off. Mopping up damp, drying towels over the stove.

That stove. Before, it was merely temperamental. Now it’s diabolical; although I can still get it to light if I splash the logs with paraffin. But three times –
three times
– a particularly savage gust of wind has blown a great cloud of smoke down the stovepipe and out into the cabin. Which leaves me black as a chimney sweep, coughing up my lungs, with hours of cleaning ahead. That’s the storm’s vicious little joke. Ha ha ha. Despite my efforts, the walls are now grimy with soot. It’s got into the wood, I can’t scrub it clean.

To cheer myself up, I flouted my ration plan this evening and put our Christmas bottles of champagne to cool in the porch.

To cool? Jack, have you gone daft?

Both bottles froze within minutes, and burst with a sound like a rifle report. I picked out the broken glass and salvaged what I could: a large bowl of frozen mush. I’ve been eating it with a spoon. It’s delicious.

Bit strong, though. Whoops. Jack you’re drunk. Or ‘tipsy’, as Gus would say. Off to bed with you.

Six days and still blowing.

Four days to go till Gus and Algie get back. Although that’s only my guess, and Algie did say ‘at least’ two weeks. And if the storm keeps up, they wouldn’t even set out.

That champagne was too much for me, I went down like a stunned ox. Bit of a sick headache this morning, but Algie’s Effervescing Morning Powder put me to rights.

You’re prevaricating, Jack. Out with it.

As soon as I got up, I went to the north window and peered into the swirling grey. The bear post was back.

Feverishly I rubbed my breath off the glass. There it was. Straight. Tall. Not possible. You chopped it down. You hacked it to pieces with an axe.

The storm must have thrown up another log from the shore. But then why does it stand so upright and still? And isn’t it closer than before, and a little to the right? Nearer the porch?

A gust of extraordinary violence struck the window, and I drew back. When I looked again, the post was gone. All I saw was snow, twisting in columns in the screaming wind. There was no post. There never was a post.

That was five hours ago. Since then I’ve managed to get a sack of seal meat to the dogs. I’ve told Bear Island that I’m fine. I’ve eaten a tin of boiled mutton and another of pears. And I’ve smoked a whole packet of Player’s.

I’ve also flicked through this journal, which was a mistake. I’m shocked at how my handwriting’s changed. I used to write a neat copperplate hand, but since I’ve been alone, it’s degenerated into a spidery scrawl. Without reading a word, you can see the fear.

When the storm blew up, I wrote that I welcomed it. All that about pressure differentials and things I can understand. Bollocks. The constant din, the screaming fury. It’s wearing me down. Grinding away my defences.

I woke to silence. Unbroken, unbelievable silence. Not a whisper of wind disturbing the peace.

The blanket over the bunkroom window had come down, and I was lying in moonlight. The windowpanes were silver squares criss-crossed with black. Putting out my hand, I felt the light seeping into my skin. I was an underwater swimmer, floating in light. Beautiful, beautiful light. I was so grateful I wanted to cry.

At last, disentangling myself from my sleeping bag, I pulled on my clothes and padded to the window.

There before me hung the full moon: huge, shining, golden. Every detail of camp lay sparklingly revealed. Where the bear post had been, I saw only a gentle curve of snow.

Like a recovering invalid, I shuffled about the cabin, tearing down blankets to let in the moon. I got the stove going. I didn’t light any lamps. I didn’t want anything to diminish that miraculous light.

Soon I would go out and tend to the dogs and see if the Stevenson screen was still there, but not yet. The moon drew me. I wanted to gaze and gaze. I hated to waste a moment.

At the north window, I cupped my hands to a pane and peered out.

The storm had cleared the ice from the bay. The moon cast a path of beaten silver over the sea, leading away from Gruhuken. ‘Beautiful,’ I murmured. ‘Beautiful . . .’

I watched it rise higher. I watched it gradually change from gold to silver, losing none of its brilliance. My breath misted the pane. I cleared it with my sleeve. When I looked again, a thin haze of cloud had dimmed the moon to inky blue.

At that moment, I sensed I was not alone.

With my nose pressed to the window, I felt horribly vulnerable, but I couldn’t pull away. I had to look.

Where the bear post had been, a figure was standing.

Around it the snow glimmered faintly; but no light touched what faced me. It cast no shadow.

It stood utterly still, watching me. In one appalling heartbeat I took in its wet round head and its arms hanging at its sides, one shoulder higher than the other. I felt its will coming at me in waves. Intense, unwavering, malign. Such malevolence. No mercy. No humanity. It belonged to the dark beyond humanity. It was rage without end. A black tide drowning.

And still I pressed my hands against the pane. I couldn’t pull away. A dreadful communion.

I don’t know how long I stood there. At last I had to breathe, and the pane misted over. When I’d cleared it, the figure was gone.

I ran to the west window and peered out. Nothing. The radio masts mocked my terror. I ran to the bunk-room window. Again nothing. I ran back into the main room and halted to listen. All I heard was the painful thudding of my heart.

The clouds had cleared, and once again the moon shone bright. The snow in front of the cabin was smooth. Innocent. Nothing to show that something
had stood there. But it had. It had. I had felt its will. Its malevolence beating at me.

At me.

I’ve been wrong, wrong, wrong.

This is no echo.

I stood three feet from the window, staring at my reflection in the pane.

If only I could believe that what I’d seen had been myself. But when you see yourself in a dark window, you see
yourself
: your own face and build. What I’d seen had had no unkempt beard, no wild hair sticking up all over its head. It had no face.

What is it? What does it want? Why is it angry with me? Is it because I destroyed the hut? What can I do to appease it?

Behind me, a crackle of static. The lights of the Eddystone flickered to life. I must have switched it on as I hurried about taking down blankets from the windows, although I didn’t remember. And yet there it was. A transmission.

My knees buckled.
A transmission
. Was that what
I’d just experienced? Something forcing its way through, like blood staining a bandage?

From the doghouse came urgent yowls.
The storm’s over! We’re
hungry!

In a cracked voice I called to them that I was coming soon.

Once again, tatters of inky cloud were drifting towards the moon, like a hand reaching to cover it.

Without taking my eyes from that bright, bruised face, I put on the head-phones and grabbed my notepad. I had to keep watching the moon. If I didn’t, clouds would hide it again and then . . .

GUS HERE STOP

Gus?

Against doctor’s orders, he’d made Algie take him to the wireless station.

My hand shook as I tapped an inadequate reply.
HOW ARE YOU?

SORE BORED CROSS HOW ARE YOU?

FINE STOP

REALLY?

My finger paused on the key.
YES REALLY
, I replied.
BAD DREAMS BUT BETTER NOW STOP

The answer came in a swift staccato rattle.
JACK ARE YOU ALL RIGHT? MR E IS HERE CAN FETCH YOU IN TWO DAYS STOP

NO AM FINE STORM LONG BUT FINE NOW STOP

Why did I say that? Why not,
YES COME QUICK I CAN’T BEAR IT?

Because it was Gus at the other end. Gus the golden-haired prefect whom Jack the eager schoolboy is so desperate to impress.

JACK YOU’RE AMAZING! AM SO TERRIBLY GRATEFUL! EXPEDITION SCUPPERED WITHOUT YOU!

I flushed with pleasure. Gus knew what I was braving to be here on my own; he knew what he owed me. I basked in his gratitude and admiration.

Now he was asking about the dogs.

DOGS SPLENDID
, I replied.
AM V GLAD HAVE THEM ESP ISAAK RIPPING HOUND STOP

As I tapped out my message, my eyes began to sting. It was so wonderful talking to Gus, but it hurt. It made me miss him even more.

JACK YOU MUFF I KNEW YOU LIKED THEM STOP

YES STOP

IDIOT STOP

YES STOP

I sat there grinning through my tears. It felt so good to have him tease me. So normal and warm and human.

On and on we talked, inconsequential chat, but everything to me. At last he said he had to go. I couldn’t think of anything to delay him, so we agreed when next to speak, and said our goodbyes.

I switched off the receiver and stared at my printed notes of his words.

Talking to him had changed everything. It made me even more sharply aware of my isolation, but it also gave me strength. I was no longer the frightened obsessive who’d cowered in the storm and fought an illusory battle with a log. I was Jack Miller, the man who’s keeping the 1937 Spitsbergen Expedition alive against all the odds.

I sat straighter. I took satisfaction in the cabin’s every mundane detail. The orderly tins of powdered egg and Breakfast Cocoa on the kitchen shelves. The clean steel lines of the bicycle generator. I felt the roughness of the table beneath my palms, I sniffed the familiar smells of paraffin, woodsmoke and unwashed clothes. This is my world. Modern. Practical. Real.

Realising I was ravenous, I tore open a bar of chocolate and wolfed it down. The sweetness burned my mouth, the rush of energy made me giddy. I brewed coffee and gulped two scalding mugs. I made a vast bowl of scrambled eggs with sausages and cheese. I lit lamps and tuned the wireless to the BBC. I revelled in each prosaic task.

Just now, I went to the bunkroom window. The sea is black and dotted with icebergs, but they’re few and far between. I was right, the storm has kept the bay open. The dogs have dug their way out of the doghouse and are bounding about in the snow. Near the cabin, the drifts are almost to the window, but a few yards off it’s shallower, and their paws don’t sink in too far. When they saw me, they lashed their tails and yowled at me to come out. They wouldn’t do that if there was anything there. Animals sense these things, don’t they?

But it will be back. I know this. I carry that knowledge inside me like a stone.

What does it want? What terrible thing happened here to make it haunt with such malevolence?

I think of all the savagery I’ve ever heard about. I remember Algie’s love of killing. His indifference to that seal’s agony, his willingness to mutilate the dogs.

What happened here?

I can’t believe I was so stupid.

When I was ‘talking’ to Gus, I was so overwhelmed that I forgot to ask the all-important question: when are you coming back?

And why didn’t he say anything of his own accord?

The 12th of November. By my calculation, that’s the soonest they’ll arrive. It’s three days away. But surely if they’d been about to set off, Gus would have said something. What isn’t he telling me? How much longer have I got to hold on?

I have to go out again. The sky is clear. There’s no cloud to cover the moon.

Yesterday feels like a millions years ago. I remember nerving myself with a shot of whisky and a cigarette to go outside. Then opening the door to a wall of snow.

God, I was relieved. Here was a physical task I could cope with.

The dogs heard me digging and set up an impatient clamour. I hacked my way though and they fell on me, lots of eager muzzles and flailing paws.

When at last I could look about me, I found Gruhuken transformed. The moon shone almost as bright as day. The snow was dazzling. Around me the camp lay radiant and
serene
. Serene. I felt not a trace of dread. No taint of that malign presence. The moon had banished it.