Kolymsky Heights (13 page)

On the nineteenth of September the
Suzaku Maru
negotiated the Bering Strait, rounded Cape Dezhnev and radioed her arrival in Russian waters. The captain had his notification acknowledged, and set himself to wait in patience.

He regretted the loss of the tuna cargo for Murmansk and was hopeful that something might turn up at Green Cape. He thought it very likely. From radio traffic he knew that fish in the area had been plentiful. His refrigeration capacity was limited but if the stuff was boxed and ready-palleted he would lift it.

In the matter of instructions the Russians were not so much tardy as crafty. They waited till the last moment to catch you. They knew it would cost him nothing, except a few hours’ loading, to carry the stuff along to Murmansk. On the other hand,
he
knew that nothing else was going his way. All the Russian vessels were now going the other way, to the ice-free ports of the Pacific; his, certainly, was the last foreign ship of the season. He could wait.

His charts showed him at roughly three and a half days’ steaming from the mouth of the Kolyma river; which was where he suspected they would have the stuff sitting in barges. Foreign vessels were seldom allowed upriver to Green Cape itself; and crewmen were not allowed ashore at all. God alone knew what the Russians feared: that foreigners might seduce their citizens, tempt them to smuggle the gold and diamonds of the area. No. They were simply
Russian
: suspicious by nature, crafty.

That he had no cargo for Green Cape did not at all displease him. No trudging there and back up the Kolyma. He had been keeping close watch on the weather reports, and they were not good. The storms of the past few days had abated but in the frigid calm the icepack was spreading rapidly from the north. He wanted to be away and out of it, Murmansk well behind him, before the whole sea froze. They would know this in Green Cape. They wouldn’t delay long. They’d call him.

But by the next day, when he was again on watch, they still hadn’t called, and the captain hummed to himself. Cat and mouse.
He
was evidently supposed to call. Any fish you want carried? Nice price. Well, he wouldn’t. Let
them
call. It was
growing colder and the wheelhouse windows were on permanent defrost. The new crewman, Sung, brought him up a flask.

‘What’s this?’ he asked.

‘Hot soup, captain.’

‘M’hm.’ He hadn’t asked for it but the man was showing willing, a welcome change from his surliness in the first few days. His face was badly marked, one eye black, the nose swollen, mouth cut about and puffy. The bosun had evidently taken him in hand. The captain had noticed the bosun sporting a bandaged finger himself and had tactfully refrained from inquiry; a too-enthusiastic collision with the Korean’s face, he saw. The bosun had to keep order his own way, and a heavy hand was sometimes needed with the scum they had aboard. The captain kept himself above it, preferring to regard them as criminal children – simple-minded ones, very often. This one was now gaping all about him, the view here much better than from deck.

‘First time north?’ the captain asked him gruffly.

‘First time, captain, first. Is it Siberia?’

‘Yes. Chukotka, this region.’

‘Near Murmansk?’

‘Three thousand miles near.’

He saw the fellow gaping again, but realised after a moment that he was doing it over his shoulder. ‘Look, captain, look! They’ve got aeroplanes!’

The captain turned and saw a small one rising above the ice strip at Cape Schmidta, now going astern on his port beam. He studied it through his glasses for a moment and as he turned away noticed with astonishment that the Korean was bending over the chart table; that he actually had the impertinence to be tracing with his finger the pencilled positions of their track. The captain had not long before added the last point reached:
Cape Schmidta: 1648
hours
.

‘All right. That’s enough,’ he said curtly, and watched the
man go. Simple-minded idiot! He watched the plane a little longer, and commenced humming to himself again. From Cape Schmidta it was under 420 miles to the Kolyma. They had less than forty-eight hours to call him now.

Sung, going below, knew that he himself had less than four hours now. He didn’t know how much less. As well as Cape Schmidta he had seen Wrangel Island on the chart, directly north. When the cape and the island were in position, he had been told, there were 420 nautical miles to go to his destination. The time of arrival depended on their speed.

He sat down again to the letter he had been writing. He had left it open on the fore ends table, and saw from the grinning faces around that one of the Koreans must have read it out to them. The salutations and loving sentiments were exceedingly high-flown and imaginative. So was the account of his heroism in recent icy storms. He hadn’t mentioned being beaten up by the bosun. Now the storms were over and they were sailing seas no one else dared sail and going fast as the wind. He paused a little over the last words.

‘How fast we going?’ he said.

The man opposite hid his smile and listened for a moment to the engines. ‘The normal. Nine knots,’ he said.

‘Only nine?’ Sung said, disappointed, and wrote on.

Nine knots into 420 nautical miles came to just under forty-seven. Forty-seven hours to go. Or rather forty-seven hours from the last marked timing, which was 1648. It was now after 1730. He had less than
three
hours. He had less than two and a half. It would have to be at 2000; eight o’clock.

At eight o’clock he went to the heads and locked himself in. He unzipped his jeans and produced his penknife. The small bulge was in the waist of his long johns and he carefully unpicked the stitches. The capsule was wrapped in a tiny polythene envelope and he removed the envelope. To ensure complete
and rapid ingestion he had been told to bite it; in which case it would take twenty hours to work, as it had with Ushiba. Ushiba’s dose had been much bigger, to secure a spectacular and unmistakable result. He wouldn’t be as ill as Ushiba, but he would be very ill indeed.

He put the capsule in his mouth and bit it. There was the faintest taste, vaguely clinical, and then it was gone. Twenty hours to wait; until 1600 tomorrow.

He didn’t relish the hours ahead. In particular he didn’t relish being in the hands of the bosun.

Between 1600 and 2000 the watches were split into two-hourly shifts, the first and second dog watches. Next day the captain took the second dog and came on at 1800, very fractious.

The ship was off Cape Shelagskiy and swinging wide, to stay well clear of Chaunskaya Bay. Some kind of military base was in there, at Pevek, and the Russians were suspicious – as ever – of anyone coming near it.

The mate handed over the ship and went below, and the captain stood at the chart table, humming. Still nothing from Green Cape. What the devil was up with them? He was barely twenty-two hours away. Either they
had
no fish, or they were playing games with him. Well, to hell with them! They could keep the fish. Or send it by air. Yes, very good, let them try that.
He
wouldn’t call, anyway.

He brought the ship’s head round after half an hour and kept distance with Ayon Island, steadying his course. No more compass changes now till after the Kolyma. He would sail right past. He wouldn’t stop now if they begged him.

The mate came hurriedly into the wheelhouse. ‘Captain,’ he said softly, and motioned him away from the helmsman, ‘there’s some trouble below.’

‘What is it?’

‘The new hand. Sung. He’s in a bad way.’

‘The bosun been at him again?’

‘No, no. He has a fever. He’s vomiting badly. In Ushiba’s bunk.’

The two men stared at each other, and the mate slowly nodded. ‘I think you’d better take a look at him,’ he said.

The captain went below. He found Sung being held by two men as he hung out of his bunk and vomited into a bucket.

‘Captain, sir!’ The bosun anxiously drew him aside and explained.

It seemed that Sung had tried to turn out for his watch, the first dog, but had kept falling over. The bosun, recalling that the man had somehow banged his head on the deck a few days ago, had thought this might be a delayed reaction and had told him to take a spell off. But then he had started being sick. ‘And shaking. And turning green,’ the bosun said, peering into the captain’s eyes.

‘How long has it been going on?’

‘Over two hours. First dog! At first I thought nothing of it. There didn’t seem any need to −’

‘Was it like this with – with –’

‘The same. Teeth rattling.’

The captain thought for a moment.

‘You destroyed the mattress?’

‘Mattress, cover, blanket, everything. All fresh, from the stores.’

‘And scrubbed out the bunk?’

‘With my own hands. Antiseptic. A whole bucket of it.’

‘Captain, captain!’

He was being called, hysterically. Sung was calling him.

‘All right, what is it? I’m here.’ The captain went and leaned over the bunk. He saw with dismay the complexion, the glassy rolling eyes, the chattering jaw. The man was gesturing wildly. ‘Send them away, captain! Only you! Only talk you. No one else – send them away!’

‘All right,’ the captain said, and told the men to step back.

‘And bosun! No bosun. Only you, captain!’

‘Very good. Leave us, bosun. What is it?’ the captain said.
The man had gripped his arm, and with his other shaking hand was pointing to his face. His teeth were chattering so much, the captain had to bend closer. ‘Bosun marked me, captain. See my face. No leave me with bosun!’

‘All right.’

‘No with bosun – like Ushiba in heads! No like that, captain. No with bosun. He mark me again – mark me bad!’

‘All right. I’ll see to it,’ the captain said, chilled by the man’s extensive knowledge of Ushiba; evidently fore ends’ tattle.

‘Promise, captain! Promise you no leave me!’

‘I promise. I’ll see to you myself. Rest quietly now. I have to look into some matters.’

Which he certainly did. He went straight to his cabin and reached for the Mariner’s Medical Dictionary. The ominous symptoms told him nothing new, but he read through them all again most hungrily. The man would be having convulsions soon, and diarrhoea. He couldn’t be left where he was. It was the bunk. Antiseptic was no use against a virus. It might even have activated the virus.
Water-borne v
… . Whatever had activated it, Sung had now got it. It was the bunk; Ushiba’s bunk. But with Ushiba there had been the convenient haven of Otaru to dump him in. Where in this godforsaken waste of the Arctic was he to dump Sung?

For a moment the golden idea of dumping
Sung in
the Arctic glowed in his mind, but died immediately. Fore ends’ tattle … Somewhere in this waste there would be a medical station. He rumbled through his
Notices to Mariners
for the area. Longitude 170.

Pevek: sick bay facilities
. Well, not there – a military base. He continued west through the consecutive sheets, longitudes 169 to 163, and found nothing – nothing at all to find in this desolate area – and came on 162, and the ultimate irony.

Tchersky: Hosp. & Isolation wing (Call Green Cape
).

Call Green Cape! Which he had vowed not to call. Which he now would
have
to call. He looked at his watch, seven o’clock, and decided there was no point in calling them now. They
would have closed down for the night. He was still twenty-one hours away. Morning would be time enough; before noon, anyway. That would still give
them
time to call him. And give him time to work a few things out.

At 2100 Sung was removed to the after heads, in convulsions but not yet diarrhoeic. He became diarrhoeic shortly after, and the captain hosed him down himself. The mate spelled him on the bridge during the night, which was a restless one, for he looked in on Sung every hour. The man looked bad. His head threshed on the stretcher, his teeth rattled, and he gurgled continuously. Also his deepening pigment seemed to show up the bruises more, which worried the captain. The bosun had volunteered twice to take charge, but the captain kept the key himself.

At eleven in the morning, still sleepless, he called Green Cape and received a cheery response.

‘
Suzaku Maru, Suzaku Maru
, hello! Good to hear you. Maybe we have something for you.’

The captain smiled grimly. Playing games after all. For certain they had something for him. And now they’d got him. His Russian was rudimentary but serviceable.

‘Green Cape, is good to hear you. I have something for you, too.’

‘For us? What for us, captain?’

‘I have a sick man aboard. I need assistance.’

‘What’s the sickness, captain?’

‘I think jaundice, I’m not sure.’

‘It’s not a problem. What’s your ETA?’

‘My ETA is 1600, repeat 1600.’

‘ETA 1600, good. Captain – you want a cargo?’

‘What’s the cargo?’

‘Maybe fish. Boxed and palleted.’

‘Salt or frozen?’

‘Maybe both. You want some?’

‘How much is there?’

‘Maybe not much. It depends.’

Of course it did. It depended on the rate.

‘Well, let’s see,’ the captain said.

‘For sure. We’ll see! Okay, captain.’

‘And my sick man?’

‘We’ll let you know.’

They’d let him know. At the last minute they’d let him know. It was their way. They certainly wouldn’t let him know before 1400.

At 1400 they let him know.

‘
Suzaku Maru, Suzaku Maru
! Green Cape here.’

‘Hello, Green Cape.
Suzaku Maru
.’

‘Captain, you are to stand off Ambarchik. A medical officer will board you there, okay?’

‘Stand off Ambarchik, okay,’ the captain repeated. ‘Where off Ambarchik?’

‘A boat will meet you at the point. You follow that boat, captain. We made all the arrangements, okay?’

‘Okay. Thank you, Green Cape.’

He knew Ambarchik well enough. He hadn’t made this passage for three or four years. Another one of the line’s ships had been doing it, the one they’d broken up a few months back. Still, he remembered the place. It stood at the eastern mouth of the river. Several mouths led out of the big messy estuary, but he recalled that this was where they liked to keep the fish, waiting in barges. It was waiting for him there now, he didn’t doubt it: they had ‘made the arrangements’ …

He now had to make some himself. He went below and let himself into the after heads.

By 1530 when a voice from the bridge reported they had the
boat in sight, Sung was cleaned up and in the captain’s cabin. Rice water had abated the diarrhoea but an arrangement involving towels and a rubber blanket was still necessary. The man was snugly wrapped in blankets and the stretcher was on the cabin floor so the retaining straps were no longer required. He was lightly sedated, his head still moving restlessly, eyes open and glazed, some gurgling coming out of him. The captain had thought it unwise to put him out completely. In the case of Ushiba a fast exit from Japanese waters had been required. In this case the ship would be in Russian waters for days: time enough for them to stop him whenever they wanted. It was common sense to let them find out right away.

The boat led them round the point, and once they were in the estuary the captain changed places with the mate and took the ship in himself. He saw an old hand from Green Cape watching him through glasses in the boat, remembered him from years back, and returned his wave. And he nodded to himself as he saw where he had to pick up his buoy: half a mile offshore, near the first of the small islands. Four barges were strung together there, all laden. About a hundred tons, the captain estimated. The haggling would begin after they’d taken Sung off.

It was half an hour before the quarantine boat arrived, and he had the ladder out waiting. The medical officer, a bulky individual hugely wrapped in a dogskin coat and cap, came nimbly enough up the ladder, and the captain went down to meet him. To his surprise it was a woman and he led her down to his cabin, somewhat moody. He knew right away he had got a bad one here, haughty and officious, unlike the jovial rascals he knew from Green Cape. She looked down at Sung while divesting herself of her coat, irritably shaking off the captain’s efforts to help her.

‘How long has he been like this?’

The captain briefly outlined the duration and symptoms of Sung’s illness, omitting all mention of Ushiba.

‘Why is his face bruised?’

‘Seamen fight.’ The captain shrugged.

She looked at him sharply, and bent to Sung.

‘This is not jaundice,’ she said presently.

‘I thought the yellow –’

‘Jaundice is present, but this is not all. Have you kept specimens of his faeces?’

The captain admitted that he hadn’t, and by way of lightening the atmosphere remarked mildly that the process was continuous and that she might yet find some.

She looked sharply at him again.

‘The man is very ill. I will need more details. Show me his quarters.’

A purgatorial half hour began for the captain. The termagant examined not only Sung’s bunk, now bare again, but every inch of the fore ends, the galley and the heads. Fortunately the captain was the only Russian-speaker and he saw to it that nothing compromising came out of the crew.

But he observed with gloom that the light was going. The haggling over the fish had still to be gone through, by which time it would be too dark to load. He would have to stay overnight.

‘Very well,’ she said, back in the cabin. ‘I will take him to the isolation wing at Tchersky. I need his documents. Do you intend waiting for the results?’

‘How long – the results?’

‘Five days.’

‘No,’ the captain said.

‘Then I will take his belongings, also. They will need treatment, in any case. What is your destination, captain?’

‘Murmansk.’

‘I’ll contact them. Of course, if this is what I think, they won’t let you in. You understand that?’

‘Won’t let me in?’ the captain said.

‘It’s a highly infectious fever. You would be well advised to stay here until we can identify it.’

‘But the sea will freeze!’

‘Then go on, if you want. I can’t stop you. Or turn back.’

‘I have a ship full of cargo! I have to pick up more cargo here.
For
Murmansk.’

‘What cargo?’

‘Fish. Tons of it, out there in the barges.’

‘That’s quite impossible. I can’t allow it. You have fever on this ship.’

The captain felt himself unhingeing. He couldn’t pick up the fish. He couldn’t stay here for five days; he’d never get out at the other end. He couldn’t go back to Japan with a shipload of cargo for Murmansk. And they might not let him in to Murmansk.

‘Well, decide for yourself, captain. I have no power to prevent you, but I definitely prohibit the loading of any fish. Meanwhile, the first thing is to get this man off the ship.’

And this was the first thing that happened. Sung was loaded into the quarantine boat and taken upriver to Tchersky. And the captain, after frantic cogitation, arrived at a decision, and took it, fast.

1820. Ambarchik. Weighed & left. Speed 13 knots
.

General direction, Murmansk.