The Broken Lands (22 page)
Authors: Robert Edric
They endured in this uncomfortable fashion for six hours, and then, as suddenly and violently as it had arrived, the wind fell, by which time the depression was filled with ice.
Reid was the first to pull himself free and to scramble back up to the rim. He saw blue sky all around them, darkening in places, but still clear, and already streaked yellow where the sun shone diffused and wavering through the airborne ice.
He climbed out of the hollow and walked a short distance, searching for the telescope he had dropped while running for shelter. The
once-dark ground was now uniformly white, and the thin covering of fresh ice crunched beneath his boots. He followed a trail of broken cases and spilled food until the polished brass tube glinted in the sun and was revealed to him.
once-dark ground was now uniformly white, and the thin covering of fresh ice crunched beneath his boots. He followed a trail of broken cases and spilled food until the polished brass tube glinted in the sun and was revealed to him.
He was joined by Fitzjames and Reddington, and all three looked to the north and saw the tail of the storm still driving over the land and sheeting it white as it went.
“Should we stay where we are?” Reddington asked, but before anyone could answer him the sudden crack of moving ice distracted them all, and looking back to where they had come ashore they saw that the once-smooth and shallow ice had ruptured in a series of curving blocks, and was being driven upon the land for a distance of twenty or thirty yards, plowing up the loose stone ahead of it as it went. The noise had come from the distant edge of this ice, and hearing it again they all watched as more of the frozen surface rippled and burst and then thrust itself along the shore.
“It felt so solid and stable when we were crossing it,” Reddington said, dismay and disbelief rising almost to panic in his unavoidable observation.
“She’ll settle and refreeze,” Reid told him. “Too early to be breaking open to stay open. Farther north, perhaps, but not this far in.”
Despite this blunt reassurance, Reid too could not completely disguise his surprise at the swiftness and extent of this early breakup.
“Are you sure?” Fitzjames asked him. “Look over there.” He pointed to the center of the channel. A dark lead had opened up, narrow and straight, and stretching for as far as they could see in both directions, as though it were a thin film on a shallow sea, suddenly pierced and then riven by the fin of a cruising shark come unexpectedly to the surface.
Looking out over this, and seeing ahead of them the remnants of the distant cloud, Fitzjames realized that the time had come to turn back to the ships before they were cut off. He looked along the path to the hollow and saw the line of their spilled provisions, many of these now irretrievable.
The ice continued to grind against the land as they turned their
backs on it and began to salvage what had not already been lost to them.
backs on it and began to salvage what had not already been lost to them.
Two of their remaining three casks of lemon juice had been smashed. Their canned provisions lay all around them, shining like giant coins in the returning sun, and these were gathered up and stacked beneath the rim of the hollow.
The seamen excavated a hole in the side of their inadequate shelter and lit a fire on which they cooked a meal, after which they awaited the onset of darkness.
A watch was posted, and at two in the morning Fitzjames was woken by Goodsir with the news that a dense fog was forming around them. He left his sleeping-bag and climbed out into total darkness. The two men sat together and discussed the events of the day, both conscious of the impenetrable void which surrounded them, but reassured by the few noises—the sound of men snoring or turning in their sleep—coming from below. Goodsir said he thought that Fairholme had suffered more than a mild concussion during their scramble for shelter. He was presently asleep, having had his wound dressed, but earlier he had woken shouting in a neardelirious manner, stopping immediately upon being grabbed and held. For several minutes he had not known where he was and nor could he remember what had happened to him.
If there had been any doubt in Fitzjames’ mind earlier, then he knew as he listened to Goodsir that there was now no alternative but to turn back at the first opportunity.
The fog blanketed them for the whole of the following day and night, during which they were unable to move. Anyone walking ten feet beyond the rim of the shelter was completely lost to sight, his loudest shout muffled at only twice that distance.
An inventory was made of everything they had salvaged, leading to the alarming discovery that they only had enough food to last them a further ten days on full rations. Fitzjames immediately reduced this to two-thirds, which, allowing for the generosity of their traveling-rations, would not prove too great a hardship. Their greatest loss was that of their lemon, and three-quarters of the vinegar in which their pickled foods had been preserved.
Eventually the fog lifted, and they left the hollow two days later.
Reddington supervised the loading of the remaining sledge, but the weight proved too great for it, and having removed the excess this was distributed among the men to carry.
Fairholme was not fully recovered from the blow to his head, and after a few minutes’ exertion in the harness alongside Reid, he collapsed unconscious and could not be revived for several hours, during which time he too was carried so as not to delay them any further. Coming round later in the afternoon, he called to be put down, insisting that he could walk unaided, but after only a few steps he stumbled and fell again, and from then on he required help in walking. His head wound reopened in the fall and bled heavily into his eyes and mouth.
On their first day of traveling north along the shifting border of ice and land they made only two miles, reaching the site of the Eskimo camp, by then wholly obliterated, as dusk fell.
“We stumble,” wrote Fitzjames in his journal, the uneven hand betraying the conditions under which the words were written, the word itself broken in half, as though he had paused, undecided about what he truly wanted to say. “We marched out with every hope and expectation of success, and of fulfilling our goal of discovery, but we stumble home.” He wrote no more.
They had been marching north, retracing their steps along the edge of the frozen strait for three days. They pulled and carried their provisions, grateful when the heavy cases and cans could finally be emptied and discarded.
Fairholme continued to lose consciousness, and they constructed a stretcher to carry him rather than waste time repeatedly tending to him where he fell.
Frustrated by their first two attempts to cross the ice, they were finally able to make headway several miles north of where they had previously crossed the frozen channel marching west.
Reid and Reddington went ahead of the main party, taking with them the two marines in the hope of encountering game.
They had all lost weight, and some were starting to feel the ache
of scurvy in their joints, made worse by their exhaustion and the blight of despair which already infected the weakest among them.
of scurvy in their joints, made worse by their exhaustion and the blight of despair which already infected the weakest among them.
Fairholme could not eat for five days, despite Goodsir’s attempts to liquefy his food and help him to take it through a straw.
On the second day of their crossing, the ice beneath them started to judder and shift, only inches, but sufficient to let them know that they had exposed themselves upon dangerous ground and that they might all now become sudden victims of its capricious nature. Each time this happened they stopped walking and waited for the movement to pass, as though the ice were some stalking creature and their movement betrayed them to it.
With Fairholme unable to fulfil his duties as surveyor, it fell to Fitzjames and Goodsir to continue plotting and calculating their progress. Their compasses spun uselessly, repulsed and attracted in equal measure by the contradictory forces of the buried Pole to the east. The two men calculated independently the speed they were traveling and thus the distance they covered each day, but in the absence of any reliable landmarks their calculations varied greatly, and they were forced to the realization that their estimates were in truth little more than poorly informed guesses.
On the fourth day of crossing the ice, the horizon ahead of them rose in a succession of low ridges, and they convinced themselves that this was an extension of the range through which they had come on their outward journey.
They were possibly twelve days distant from the ships, and after a week of two-thirds, and then five days of half-rations they had all continued to weaken, and were now resting for as long as they walked. Where previously they had made ten, twelve or even fifteen miles a day on their outward march, they were now achieving as little as four or five, and this only through the greatest of efforts.
Camping in the shelter of a ridge they lit a fire and cooked on this the two geese the marines had brought down during their crossing. Their spirits were sufficiently raised by the meal for them to discuss what the coming season held in store once they were back on board the ships. This forced optimism did not last long, however, for upon opening a case marked canned vegetables they discovered
instead only rolled strips of lead sheathing, intended for making repairs to their boats. The case weighed sixty pounds and they had been hauling and carrying it for fifty-one days. At the sight of this, one of the seamen threw himself down beside the lead and started trying to tear it apart as though it were card, weeping and beating on the ground, and then throwing each piece of sheathing as far as his strength allowed, until finally he knelt exhausted and silent, the dark lumps strewn around him in an almost perfect circle like the numbers on a clock face. No one approached the man. The frustration and anger he was releasing was the frustration and anger of them all.
instead only rolled strips of lead sheathing, intended for making repairs to their boats. The case weighed sixty pounds and they had been hauling and carrying it for fifty-one days. At the sight of this, one of the seamen threw himself down beside the lead and started trying to tear it apart as though it were card, weeping and beating on the ground, and then throwing each piece of sheathing as far as his strength allowed, until finally he knelt exhausted and silent, the dark lumps strewn around him in an almost perfect circle like the numbers on a clock face. No one approached the man. The frustration and anger he was releasing was the frustration and anger of them all.
Fitzjames and Goodsir left the others and walked to where they were able to mount a block of ice and look out over the darkness below.
“Even on these reduced rations we have less than half of what we need,” Goodsir said, his voice low.
Fitzjames knew this, and felt angry at the useless reminder.
“What do you suggest?”
Goodsir paused before answering. “That the strongest of us continue due east until we find the ships and then return with help.”
Fitzjames shook his head before he had finished speaking. He had considered a similar plan the previous sleepless night.
Goodsir pressed him, listing those of them he believed were still capable of making the journey, and those who had long since become weak and a hindrance.
“And what if those who set out to reach the ships don’t find them?” Fitzjames said, knowing that this was unlikely to happen, but being something else he had considered as they covered shorter and shorter distances each day and with no exact idea of either their true course or position.
Goodsir abandoned his plea. The two men continued walking away from the others, pausing occasionally to turn and look at one another, silently sharing their fears.
They finally agreed that if they left the easy ground and turned directly over the low ridges then they might at least come within sight of the parallel channel upon which the ships sat, that they
might even see the ships themselves, no more than specks in the distance perhaps, but nevertheless within sight and reach and a boost to their failing spirits. Then, Fitzjames conceded, they might split into two parties, the strongest of them going on ahead to send back help.
might even see the ships themselves, no more than specks in the distance perhaps, but nevertheless within sight and reach and a boost to their failing spirits. Then, Fitzjames conceded, they might split into two parties, the strongest of them going on ahead to send back help.
They returned to the others and told Reid and Reddington of their decision.
Not until three days later did the uneven land begin to level out and then stretch ahead of them in a long downhill slope to the eastern horizon.
They drank the last of their lemon juice and vinegar, all of them by then showing signs of scurvy, all of them enervated and sore, and some bleeding and bruised and vomiting and wanting only to stay where they were in the hope of being rescued without any further effort being wrung from them. But this too was out of the question: their return to the ships was not yet overdue, and even when this point was reached a further week or more might be allowed to pass before any attempt was made to find and assist them. Fitzjames pointed this out, but only to those who would not be alarmed by the news.
The next day they traveled three miles over easy ground, and at the end of it they were all too exhausted to pitch their tents or stake out their groundsheets. They slept where they sat or fell, some pressed face to face in twos and threes, and others wherever they could find any shelter.
There was a light fall of snow during the night, and Fitzjames woke to see that the wind had blown it in among them, icing their faces and hoods, and already frozen hard where it collected in their exposed hair and beards.
He tried to climb free of his sleeping-bag and push himself up, but the numbness and then the pain in his legs caused him to fall back down. He rubbed his thighs and calves and slowly felt his circulation return. Brushing the ice from his own face he saw on his gloves the slivers of frozen blood from his lips and from where new sores had opened on his cheeks and neck. He felt too where his
callused knuckles had finally ruptured, and he dare not uncover his hands for fear of what might be exposed.
callused knuckles had finally ruptured, and he dare not uncover his hands for fear of what might be exposed.
Beside him, Reid stirred, and he too forced himself upright. He began to cough, shaking violently at each exertion. He had difficulty opening his eyes and turned to Fitzjames for help. Reid’s face was by then gaunt, the skin of his cheeks tight with hunger, his own eyes and mouth blemished with liquid sores.
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