My Last Continent: A Novel(66)

Everywhere I look, I see lifeboats and passengers in the cruise company’s bright blue jackets: some in Zodiacs, some on the ice. I scan the jackets for a glimpse of orange, a flash of red.

My throat swells with despair, and I swallow it away and try to breathe. As I study the scene in front of me, I do a rapid triage in my head. The Australis’s lifeboats may be able to navigate out of this maze of ice with the wind thrashing the floes together, assuming they’re manned by crew members; at any rate, those inside are safe for now. Zodiacs are more maneuverable and easier to pilot, though they’re also smaller and more prone to tipping; passengers might be able to get to safety as long as they don’t get stuck in pack ice, which is becoming increasingly likely.

Those who are stranded on the ice need help, and fast—but there are so many of them, and though I know Nigel and the other naturalists and crew members will be following close behind, for now I’m the only one here. I look at the groups of passengers, clustered together like penguins at a nesting site, and realize the agony of the choices ahead, weighing lives against the thickness of ice, weighing my safety against theirs, weighing the fact that there is only one of these victims who really matters to me and I don’t know where he is, and, as much as I’d rather look for him, these people in immediate danger can’t be ignored.

The Cormorant is now at least a quarter mile behind me, and I radio Glenn and give him my position, tell him what the situation is. I don’t see anyone I recognize as Australis crew; they’re likely still on board, trying to get more passengers to safety, and this gives me hope.

As I get closer to the ship, pockets of water widen, opened up by her shifting and sinking, causing ice floes to split and drift. As the water continues to separate the floes—some the size of a dining room table, others the length of a city block—I have to slow down more and more to stay on the same sheet of ice.

Then I find myself at a dead end. Between me and the ship, a mix of brash and bergy bits stretches for twenty, thirty feet. Beyond that is a stretch of ice about the size of ten parking spaces; standing on it are twelve passengers, and there is no direct path to them. My only option is to retrace my steps and take a wide route to the left or right, devouring vital moments while I may or may not get myself any closer. But I have no choice.

I motion with my hands for everyone to stay put, to spread out. And they understand, doing as I instruct while I make my way around. I find a path, but the wind is growing relentlessly, and when I finally reach them, I look back at the trail I’ve marked.

Already the ice has begun to break up in the wind, and through the rolling fog I see that my markers are now in different places than where I’d left them—which means I’ve lost the only way to get these survivors to safety. The ice is too broken to traverse on foot, too tight to come in by Zodiac. The frightened passengers have begun to bombard me with questions, and I hold up my hand to silence them as I grab my radio to call Glenn again.

“We can’t come in any farther,” he says. “The winds are gusting to thirty knots and the ice is at eight-tenths. We’ll need to push back—soon.”

“I’ve got a dozen people here,” I say, “and I don’t have a solid path back.”

“Just hold on. We’ll get a couple of Zodiacs over there.”

But I don’t see how Glenn will spare two more crew members to haul even one Zodiac over the quarter mile I’ve just traversed. We may be stuck here for hours—if the ice holds out that long.

I try to take in a breath, but my lungs freeze, refusing the intake of air, and then my head begins swimming through waves of black. I lean over, hands on my knees, and take short, hiccuping breaths until I feel my chest expand at last.

Finally I straighten up, trying to put on a mask of composure. The wind drives sleet into my face as I look around me. I’m hoping for a glimpse of Keller, but all I see are scared, unfamiliar faces.

There’s a movement to my left, and I turn in time to see a towering iceberg in the distance swaying in the rough surf.

As I watch, it begins to tip.

All unstable icebergs will flip eventually, and when bergs of this size tip and roll, the waves they spawn can be monumental: large enough to wreak havoc on ships, and certainly large enough to be fatal to anyone standing on nearby ice.

“Lie down, lie down!” I yell at the passengers; then I collapse, spread-eagle, on the ice. “Like this,” I shout, raising my head, straining to make myself heard over the cracking ice. “Spread out your arms and legs!”

The passengers follow my lead. I turn my head, my cheek against the ice, to watch the iceberg as it rolls—gracefully, gently, though I know what’s about to come will be anything but.

A moment later comes the rise of the water, the wave moving toward us as if in slow motion. I shut my eyes, digging my fingers into the ice sheet under me, whispering please hold, please hold, my breath warm against the ice—and when I feel the floe lift and sway, rolling us as if we’re on a giant water bed, I visualize us all moving with it, as one, staying put, staying together.

Then I hear the screams of passengers, and I open my eyes. We’re still moving, the ice curving and bending below us, but so far we’re okay. A few people keep screaming, panicking, but we’re all still here. We’re going to make it.

Then, a tremendous crack—the ice begins to split and crumble. I feel a splintering, and, my body acting faster than my mind, I roll away just as a fissure opens up beneath me, a yawning mouth of water where I lay just a moment before. When I hear a shriek, I look over to see a woman slipping into another cleft in the ice. A passenger grabs her arms and manages to hold her there, in the water up to her thighs, until two more passengers crawl over and help pull her out.