The Whiteness of the Whale: A Novel (24 page)

The crewmen swayed and clapped, hooting and whistling. Even Giordano stood rooted. Cigarette ash drooped, fell, and showered his jacket. He cursed and beat at the sparks. The sailor with the guitar played faster, then faster still. Dorée kept pace, hair flying, feet stamping, a whirlwind, a dervish. The sailors clapped harder, shouting, joining in a roar of song as the guitar hammered.

Then suddenly the dancer stretched out a hand, and Sara was shaking her head no, no, but being pulled out nevertheless into the center of the pilothouse. Dorée faced her, snapping fingers over her head, stamping her feet. She tried desperately to back away, but the sailors thrust her forward again, shouting.

“No. I can’t,” she said, and lowered her hands. The flame in Dorée’s tawny eyes died. Then it rekindled as a short dark sailor stripped off his blouse and stepped out to the cheers of his mates.

The guitar became a storm, a passion of music that whirled the two figures at its core. Giordano leaned on the radar, grinning. A junior officer stood rooted beside him, binoculars fixed directly ahead. Past him Sara saw
Anemone
lifted on a sea, genoa rippling as she rolled. Her decks were stained and faded. She looked very small from up here.

A hoarse chorus urged the dancers on. Sweat spray flew from Dorée’s dark maelstrom of hair. Her heels beat a tattoo on the steel deck. She flitted from man to man, reclining in one’s arms, caressing another’s brow, staring deep as a mesmerist into each sailor’s eyes, leaving him dizzy and shaken when, at last, he reached out, and she spun instantly away.

She moved back to the center, and the guitar climaxed, strings a flashing blur. The small man circled her like a stalking lion, one hand on his hip, the other snapping fingers as his head whipped this way and that, flinging off sweat that glowed in the pearly light. The clapping and stamping had merged, synchronized. The sailors swayed; even the roll of the ship seemed part of the dance as Tehiyah Dorée’s flying feet stamped out the flames that seemed to writhe almost visibly around her. And then the strings snapped; she clutched her throat; the scorching smoke overcame her. She slumped, arms and legs outstretched in a lovely mockery of death.

A moment of absolute quiet. Then pandemonium broke, and they mobbed her, hoisting her, shouting. She floated above them, radiant, streaming with perspiration, ecstatic in a way she’d not appeared since Sara had first seen her on the pier in Ushuaia.

Then the young officer lifted his ear from his radio. He beckoned to Perrault. Sara walked over in time to hear, “I’m afraid I have some bad news for you,
Capitán
.”

*   *   *

The wind was even more incredibly cold after the steam-heated warmth of the ship. She clung as the whaleboat swayed and pitched, thumping and yawing its way across. A tightly lashed coil of braided wire, drums of fuel, and crates of fruit and food lifted from the floorboards and crashed down again.
Anemone
grew steadily, but still looked so small.

Guerrico
’s medical officer had said Quill’s liver was failing. His kidney functions were compromised. To combat advanced bacteremia, they needed to run an IV. So Jamie had to go with them, first to the scientific station they were resupplying, then back to Argentina. They’d take the mate back to the corvette in this same whaleboat, but the weather was threatening to worsen, to the point they might not be able to make the transfer. So its crew had to return to
Anemone
now.

Sara hunkered as freezing spray blew over them. Back to our own cooking, she thought. A hundred yards ahead a tiny figure that must be Georgita was paying out the line on the inflatable. The whaleboat hung back until it streamed astern. Then the outboards roared again, and she took fast breaths, looking at the shrinking strip of deadly sea, preparing herself for the transfer once again.

*   *   *

The salon now seemed cramped, dirty, and bitterly cold. The musty air stank of old socks and mold. They’d cleaned up only days ago; how had all this black stuff grown back so swiftly? She stripped off her suit as two Argentines emerged from the aft passageway, banging a litter against one bulkhead, then the other, as the boat rolled around them.

On it Quill’s face lolled, and she gasped. All the fat had melted from his cheeks. Above the beard his skin was jaundiced parchment and his closed eyes made him look as if he were already a corpse. She reached for his hand, but his arms were lashed to the litter and a blanket was strapped over them. She contented herself with patting his chest. “Get well, Jamie.”

His eyelids fluttered, but didn’t open. She patted him again, tears stinging, and went back to see if there was anything she could do.

In the mate’s cabin Perrault was contemplating a
BraBuster
magazine. He stuffed it hastily into Quill’s carry bag as she entered and began jamming in clothing on top of it.

“Will he be back, Dru?”

“With us? No. I just hope they can get the infection under control.” He groped around the headboard until he came up with a red passport. This too went in the bag, which he zipped and shouldered. “Need to get past you.”

She followed him to the salon, where the navymen were feeding the litter up the companionway headfirst. It slid up and out into wind and gray light. Flakes of snow whirled down.

“All right,” said one of the black-clad sailors, whom Sara recognized as the medical officer. “We will leave now. Señor Kimura? You are coming with us?”

“I am staying with these friends, to help defend the whales,” Hideyashi said, but he rubbed his lips with the back of his hand, almost as if to recall the words. His gaze grazed Sara’s, then dropped.

“Just a minute,” said an uncertain voice. Sara turned to see Georgita with a hand lifted, like a child pleading for a bathroom break. “Sir?”

“What is it? We must leave. Strong wind is coming.”

“Sir, I would like to go, too.”

They all twisted to look at her, even the sailors. Dorée said, “Georgie? What are you saying?”

“I want to go home, Tehiyah.” Then she seemed to muster her courage; added, “I think you should too. This is not turning out to be … I’ve had enough. I’m just scared all the time.”

Tehiyah laid a glove on the girl’s arm. “Dear Georgie. But I’ve grown to depend on you.”

She shook her head violently, staring at the deck. “You don’t need me.”

“Believe me, I do.”

A brief light blazed in the washed-out face. “Maybe to clean your toilet, and iron your panties. But—”

Dorée’s smile took on a definite stiffening. “But
what
, Georgie dear?”

“Nothing. Nothing.” She ducked her head. “Sorry I said that. I was upset. And scared. Like I said.”

“So you’ll stay. That’s my girl.”

Norris-Simpson hesitated, gulped, then said, with a quick glance at the now-open companionway, “No. No! I’m not a fool.” She took a step toward the gray light, then turned. Tears brimmed, then streamed down her cheeks. She reached out. “Come with me. Please. These people are all going to die.”

“Don’t say that,” Perrault snapped.

“Really,” Dorée said. “Georgie. Please.” But her tone wavered.

“Tehiyah.
I’m begging you!
”

“Casting off,” came a shout from above.

Georgita bolted. She pushed past them and seized the companionway handrails. At the top she turned and screamed back down, “Tehiyah!
Come with me! Now!
”

Perrault said, “If you want to leave, Miss Dorée, this would be the time.” His voice was respectful, unjudging. Madsen stood behind him, pale, but saying nothing.

The celebrity activist stood irresolute, one enameled nail picking at the rash on her neck. “Well, then,” she drawled. “Just let me get my things.” She stood scratching a moment longer, then strolled aft.

“Hold the boat,” Perrault shouted. “Eddi! Tell them: One more passenger. Tehiyah Dorée.”

“And good fucking riddance,” Sara heard Bodine growl, behind her.

She climbed the ladder and poked her head out. The wind was stronger, all right. The seas were building, turning dark as the clouds passed between them and the low sun. Another storm? Her innards shrank. How many more could they take? Maybe she should climb into the tossing whaleboat with Jamie and Georgie and Tehiyah. Then she smiled grimly. And go back to … what? No job, no life, no one to love?

She’d stay. But it would be an altered dynamic without the flirtatious superstar and her flaccid ghost-servant. A better one, she was willing to bet. It was
almost
worth losing Jamie as well. She just hoped he’d recover. By the sound of it, he was even sicker than they’d thought.

The stuttering drone of a ship’s horn. “Tehiyah?” Georgie’s whine, over the roar of the wind. “They want to go.
Tehiyah!
”

Sara held up a finger—one minute—and looked below. Dorée stood in the center of the salon, a carry bag and a hanging bag slumped at her feet.

“The boat’s waiting,” Sara called. She came down a few steps, to help hand up the luggage.

Instead, the actress shuddered. Dark eyes streaked with gold blinked up at her. “Sara. Am I really going—or staying here? With the whales? And you, and Dru, and Lars?”

“Well—
I
thought you were leaving.”

“So did I.” She shook her head. “But I don’t think I am.” She called up, “Dru, I’m staying.”

“
Tehiyah!
” Norris-Simpson wailed.

“Georgie’s calling you,” Sara said.

“Tell her thanks for sticking with me,” Dorée said bitterly. Then turned and carried her things aft, back to her cabin.

Sara stared after her, astonished. Then clambered back up and stood waving as the boat cast off and grew smaller, lifting and vanishing among enormous leaden seas, the snow flurrying down, harder and harder, until at last she could no longer see it or the distant ship at all.

12

Second Encounter

They zigzagged through fog and snow through a long nightless evening. In the morning Perrault called a meeting and rejuggled the berthing. Madsen, Bodine, Tehiyah, and Eddi stayed put, but Hideyashi got his own bunk. To Sara’s surprise, the captain wanted her to move aft. “Take Jamie’s cabin,” he said. “A little more room for your computer, no?”

She moved with some reluctance. Her once-loathed curtained alcove had become a snug home. But Eddi helped and they pitched in with spray bottles and sponges to clean up the mess in the mate’s cabin. More tattered, much-handled porn magazines went into the trash. They turned up their noses and made jokes as they disposed of dozens of beef jerky wrappers and even less-savory remnants of the mate’s bachelor existence. They cleaned so hard Sara actually began to feel warm, and Eddi took off her jacket and worked in her German army tee with the black eagle on the front. But finally the cabin was habitable and when she plugged in her laptop on a fold-down desk and hung her clothes in the louvered teak vertical locker instead of stuffing them into a bag to mildew she felt as if she’d moved into the Trump Towers. “I’ll miss smelling Georgita’s pee,” she told Eddi.

“Yeah, same here.” They both snickered.

“If you want to do laundry, guess I get washing machine privileges now.”

“Yeah, you’ve risen in the world.” The videographer looked up. “Hey. Is it getting calmer?”

“Seems to be pitching less. Maybe we’re behind an iceberg or something.” Sara sat on the bunk and lowered her voice, not sure how much would get through the walls. The captain’s and the master suites were next door. “I was surprised
she
stayed.”

“I was hoping she wouldn’t. Then at the last minute—bam.” Auer shrugged and the octopus draped across her shoulder writhed. She cocked a biceps and smiled down at an open-mawed green moray as if they shared a secret. “So. Well, what the fuck.”

“Maybe she’s not like we thought. Or at least, not totally.”

“Maybe.” Auer’s lips twitched. She straightened and heaved a sigh. “I got to take the wheel for a while. Can you do it after that?”

Sara said she would, and Eddi left. She looked around the bunk again. Then slowly, slowly, lay down. Eased her eyes shut. And drifted away.

*   *   *

Back in the bubble she steered for hours through scattered chunks of ice varied by larger bergs that oozed past on the horizon, when there was a horizon the snow and fog didn’t shut down. The knotmeter read between eight and ten, not terrific, but the wind was barely ruffling the waves and there didn’t seem to be any reason to go any faster. All that time the sun glowed remotely, coldly, never quite visible, a mere pretense of illumination. Then Dorée squeezed her ankle and said she’d take a turn. Sara could eat; Madsen had made spaghetti.

“Fresh peppers, Lars?” she said, finding a seat at the salon table.

“From the corvette. Hold your plate up. The sauce is out of a can.”

Eddi said, “It’s really getting calm. Calm and foggy. Spooky, after all that wind.”

“I thought we were in for another storm,” Sara said.

“It missed us.” Perrault held out his plate for more. “Well, this is not bad. And our supplies will last longer now.” He slurped noodles. “I feel much better, having Jamie with them. I know you were doing your best, Mick, but I was very much afraid he was not going to make it.”

“Me too.” Bodine looked as if he wasn’t getting as much sleep as he needed. His stubble was solid beard along throat and jawline. Sara almost met his eyes, but he still wouldn’t look directly at her. Ever since their near-close encounter. He reached for a mug of juice. “Look, Dru, what exactly’re we doing right now? Far’s as I can tell, we’re heading away from the fleet.”

“I’m protecting Hideyashi.”

The Japanese smiled, not looking at anyone. He was very cautiously winding spaghetti around his fork, as if he’d never done such a thing before.

Lars said, “If we wanted to protect him, we should have offshipped him to the Argentines.”

“He didn’t want to go.”

“Then you should’ve made him. We’re down here to shut down whalers. Avoiding them isn’t the way to do it.”

He and the captain eyed each other across the table. After a moment the Dane added, “That’s still our mission. Isn’t it?”