My Last Continent: A Novel(71)
I make it only about ten yards before I begin to pass survivors on the ice, wet and shaking in the freezing rain and sharp wind. I help guide them to the Cormorant and ask if they know Keller, but his name doesn’t register—these people are barely capable of responding to even the most basic of questions. The state in which we’re finding the survivors—and the fact that we haven’t heard anything from the Australis in the past three hours—means that something more than an ice collision has happened on that ship. There’s no leadership, no order, and the result is turning an already grave situation into a tragic one.
I continue to describe Keller to one passenger after another, but no one knows him. Despite the slickening of the ice under my feet, I begin to make tangible progress toward the Australis, and a fifty-yard stretch with no stranded passengers allows me to hope that things may not be as bad as they seem.
Then, ahead in the mist, I encounter a group of twenty survivors, immobile on a large swath of ice. I find a secure trail to them and begin leading them back toward our ship, a shivering procession of cold bodies and warm breath, of fear and blind faith.
And then I realize that while I’ve been following a slightly different path back, I should have seen the Cormorant by now, or someone should’ve seen me; I’d radioed that I was bringing in more passengers. I strain my eyes ahead, but through the mist I don’t see even the shadow of our ship. This could mean only one thing—that with the winds at thirty knots, Glenn had to pull back, and this means that we’re stranded.
I radio Glenn again but get no reply. I look back at the passengers, who form a long, evenly spaced train of cold, frightened souls.
I try again. “Cormorant, this is Deb, do you copy? Request position. Over.”
When I look down, I see that the light on my radio is out. Either the charge is gone, or it’s been destroyed by water or by impact or by a combination of the two. I stare at the device, then shake it a couple times, as if to wake it up. But nothing changes.
I hear a rumbling in the distance and glance up. A few seconds later, two Zodiacs emerge from the fog, with Thom in the lead boat. He weaves among the floes with a preternatural skill, giving the other driver a clear wake in which to follow him, and a moment later he pulls up alongside the ice. I want to hug him with relief.
“Where’d Glenn run off to?” I ask.
“He’s landing passengers at Detaille. I doubt he’ll be back; the ship got banged up pretty bad trying to get out. Messed up at least one of the propellers.”
I do a quick calculation in my head. Detaille, a small island to the north, is probably an hour away by Zodiac, depending on ice and weather, and if the Cormorant is there, the rescue will continue by Zodiac only, with at least five hours before more help arrives.
“Any sign of Keller?”
I shake my head.
Just then we hear it—seven short blasts of the Australis’s horn, followed by one long one. The order to abandon ship.
Thom steps out of the Zodiac, planting one foot on the ice. “I’ll get Nigel to request backup, and we can—”
I shake my head. “There’s no time.”
“Do you need a Zodiac?”
“The ice has gotten too thick over there. I’m better off on foot.”
“Okay,” Thom says. “I’ll catch up with you as soon as we take this group back.”
“Thanks,” I say, meeting his eyes. “See you soon.”
“See you.”
Our promise to meet later feels, like Mayday, like a code of sorts. Something that means good luck. That means be careful. We aren’t going to say those words; we aren’t going to admit that we’re now in the middle of something far more serious than we’d imagined. But we both understand.
I turn back in to the haze and begin walking carefully along the ice. As soon as I’m out of sight of the passengers, I pick up my pace. Though the ice feels solid, I know it’s risky, but I don’t want to waste any more time. I’m rushing toward the Australis, completely hidden in the fog, when I stop short.
I haven’t replaced my inoperable radio. I look around, hoping to wave down Thom, hoping someone is still there, but they’ve all disappeared.
ORCAS HAVE EARNED the name killer whales neither because they hunt humans—they don’t—nor because they are whales—they aren’t. This is something I often find myself explaining to passengers: that orcas are dolphins, highly skilled hunters of seals, whales, and other dolphins. They’re fast—they can swim up to thirty miles an hour—but, more -important, they’re creative. They hunt in packs of five to fifty, and if they come upon a group of seals lounging on the ice, they circle in formation, slapping their tails on the water, creating waves that break up the ice or roll the berg. If that doesn’t work, they lift the ice with their noses.
About four years ago in the Gerlache Strait—on the peninsula, between the continent and Anvers and Brabant Islands—I saw a pod of orcas knock a leopard seal off a berg. Then, like cats playing with a mouse, they let the seal climb back up again. There were two pups among the pod: The orcas were training their young to hunt, the leopard seal their unwitting assistant.
Nature can be cruel, and down here its mercy depends upon which side of the ice you’re on. I am, for the moment, on the right side, watching the glassy black fins glide in lazy circles just beyond the ice I’m standing on. About two hundred feet farther is what’s left of the Australis.