The Nature of Ice (24 page)

Their chance was slipping away. It was not for himself that he minded, but for Paquita, his innocent girl who had no inkling of his fate. He imagined her spirit shattered after all these months of waiting, the despair of his non-return and the unanswerable
how? when?
She had a right to understand the fickle allure of ice that had snatched her mate away, to know the manner of her betrayal.

Ninnis had been running alongside his sledge when he crossed the crevasse, while Mertz's weight had been distributed across his skis, and Douglas's own along the length of the sledge. Douglas and Xavier had talked it through for days, nights, unable to sleep, certain now that the concentration of Ninnis's weight onto a single footstep had caused the snow bridge concealing the crevasse to collapse. Did Cherub have a sense, through his strange, recurring dreams, that he would not return?

The chance of a search party happening upon their bodies this far out was infinitesimal. They were separated from the hut by one hundred miles and another formidable glacier. The stories of their journey on the plateau—the telling of three lives—were held inside their diaries. Unthinkable that they might also be silenced, entombed within a cap of ice.

XAVIER WOULD DRINK NOTHING NOW. Douglas drained the tea himself and wrapped X in his arms to stem the shuddering.

While he felt sorrow and regret for himself, it was shame that racked his conscience at the prospect of letting down all those connected with the expedition—all who had believed in him. But as he supported Xavier and stroked his hair, his shame changed shape to guilt at the vehement wish that his companion would surrender quickly to death so that he might go on.

He prayed to God to help them both.

OUTSIDE A RISING WIND, DRIFT eddying around the tent, the atmosphere a bowl of chaos. Xavier fitted again, his jaw clenched in the strange, inexplicable way of the dogs on the ship. Again he fouled his trousers and Douglas cleaned him with handfuls of snow. Xavier was sliding deeper into delirium, his speech incoherent.

At eight in the evening he opened his eyes and glared unblinkingly at Douglas.

‘What is it, X?'

Xavier gave a guttural cry and yanked himself to a sitting position by grabbing the tent poles. With an implausible strength he seized a leg of the wooden frame and snapped it from its apex. He struggled to escape the prison of his bag, the burberry tent slapping his face, his efforts as painful and pathetic to watch as a dog with a broken back. He flung out his arms at the tent, hit Douglas, punched at anything within his reach. Xavier moaned as he thrashed,
O Yen
,
O
Yen
, over and over, the incantation to his God or his pain or whatever meaning lay within his words vying with the wind that wailed across the ice.

Douglas held him down—until he quietens, he told himself—
There, Xavier; hush, old friend
, a bodyweight of sorrow pressing down like a pillow on his face.

PAQUITA
DELPRAT

‘MCGONIGAL. RIGHT ON CUE.'

Malcolm beckons Chad into his office with his pinkie, the gesture a momentary diversion from scratching his newly trimmed beard. Freya sits at the corner of Malcolm's desk, her injured leg propped on a chair, staring, gloomily, through a window of white. The bay, normally in panoramic view from the station leader's office, remains obscured by driving snow.

‘Perhaps you can explain to your cohort here the function of an incident report.' Malcolm turns to Freya. ‘Chad's filed a few in his time.'

Chad pulls up a chair beside her. ‘What's wrong, Freya?'

‘What is wrong,' Malcolm enunciates to Chad, holding up a sheet of paper like a stray sock, ‘is that here I have an incident report, signed by your partner in crime, that reads like an account of a Sunday picnic—all that's missing is the chicken and champagne. While here,' he grabs another page from the printer and snaps it, ‘is a dieso's report advising that we have yet another bloody quad bike—let's see,
steering arm bent,
suspension arm rooted
—to add to our growing inventory of equipment under repair. The diesos have enough work on their summer program without you blokes adding to the list.'

Chad takes a deep breath. ‘The bikes got us home.'

‘Not to mention our illustrious artist-in-residence here,' Malcolm continues, unbothered by squalls hammering the windows behind his head, ‘who hobbled into my office this morning like a lame mule. What the bejesus happened out there?'

Before Chad has a chance to speak, Freya turns to face him. ‘I told him I wasn't paying attention.' She looks and sounds jaded. ‘The sun was in my eyes, the lead was wider than I thought. I was going too slow to cross it and too fast to stop.' She turns back to Malcolm and Chad guesses that she's repeated this story a dozen times before.

‘She was unlucky,' Chad says. ‘Her back tyres clipped the edge of the lead.'

‘The bike toppled,' Freya says. ‘It went over and slid, and I went with it.'

‘What were you doing, McGonigal? Sitting back on your haunches watching the show?'

‘Chad was right in front of me,' Freya lies. ‘He pulled the bike off my leg.'

‘Why didn't you radio in right away?' Malcolm looks as gruff as Chad's old headmaster, lacking only a cane. ‘We could have got a helo out there.'

‘We would have,' Chad said, ‘if the VHF hadn't gone in the drink.'

‘We were so near Bandits Hut. And when we got there, I didn't see the need to call it in.' She turns away from Malcolm to face Chad again but she doesn't meet his eyes. ‘It was a mistake, Chad. The accident . . . I wasn't thinking properly when we were out there.'

‘You're damned right on that count,' Malcolm snaps.

Chad feels his gut tighten. He turns to Malcolm. ‘I don't understand the problem. We went on to the hut, re-strapped Freya's leg and elevated it. Nothing was broken. She seemed fine—' He glances in her direction, waiting for a confirmation that was not forthcoming. ‘We stayed at Bandits overnight and the next morning Freya spoke to Charlie on the nine a.m. radio sked. Then we drove back to the station. End of story.'

End of story
, Malcolm mouths.

‘Freya, you did nothing wrong,' Chad begins, but she only looks away.

Malcolm wrinkles his brow in confusion. ‘Don't take me for a turkey, McGonigal. Does she look fine to you? Does she?'

She looks decidedly overcast.

Malcolm scratches inside his thermal collar like a dog beset with fleas. ‘Synthetics. Loathe them.' He scowls at Freya. ‘I hope you have plenty of catch-up work to fill in your time.'

‘Why?' she says, an edge in her voice.

‘You won't be going out again until you're cleared by Dr Ev. She says you'll be out of action this week and most likely next.'

‘No!' Freya cries. Chad has never seen her so upset. ‘We're due to go out with the Casas before they leave for Mawson Station. You agreed.'

‘I can't help unfortunate timing,' Malcolm pontificates, rocking in his chair. ‘Antarctica is an unforgiving place, Freya. Especially for the novice. Now, we're all of us human, all fallible.'

Chad shakes his head: Malcolm on a pious roll.

‘You had a close call this time,' Malcolm drones on. ‘My advice is to consider this a valuable lesson for the future. If I were you—'

‘You're not me, Malcolm, and I have all the valuable lessons I can stomach for now—an injured leg and your words to remind me of my
inexperience
and
poor judgment
.' She turns back to Chad. ‘I didn't mean this to involve you,' she says quietly. ‘I'm so sorry. I didn't mean for any of it to happen. It was all wrong.'

The underlying meaning kicks the breath from his chest.

Malcolm slides the incident report across the desk as though returning an article of dirty laundry. He looks with puzzlement at each of them. ‘A new one by Friday, thank you, minus the creative writing.'

He dismisses Freya with a regal wave: ‘Off you trot,' and Chad rises from his chair to follow. ‘Stick around, McGonigal. You and I need to settle this Mawson Station issue.'

Freya limps across the room and gathers her crutch at the door.

Malcolm smirks. ‘Or should I say,
off you hop
?'

Freya turns at the doorway, set to blow a gasket, by the look of her. ‘At times, Malcolm, you can be a prize arsehole.'

Malcolm waits until she hobbles out of view. ‘She seems to have eased into the swing of things. Hopping mad,' he chortles, his body racked with mirth.

FREYA DESPAIRS AT HER DIGITALS of Lichen Lake. She sits at her laptop, chin propped in her hand, while a gale buffets the studio. She scrolls through incorrect exposures, deletes amateurish errors of aperture and focus, sends to the trash a series of snow-white feathers, clusters of orange lichen, starbursts and bubbles trapped within the ice—all taken with a filter inadvertently left on. The best of her shots look under par, hardly worth keeping. Had she stayed at the station she would have saved herself no end of trouble. Saved them all.

Freya abandons the ruined images, shuts down her laptop and turns to
This Everlasting Silence
, her Christmas gift. She ponders the inscription on the opening page. TO FREYA. A NEW SIDE TO YOUR HERO. SECRET SANTA. Not from Chad at all. Another tick to reckless fancies. Going by the fastidious strip of corrector fluid obscuring the previous owner's name, the book of love letters has to be from Malcolm. Shipshape Malcolm. A new side to us all, she thinks wryly, shuddering as she recalls the morning's sermon.

She begins with the photo section, and is taken aback at the sight of an inked red stamp: DAVIS STATION. ANTARCTIC DIVISION LIBRARY. Freya thinks of the yearly library sales at home where Marcus picks up cartons of aged titles for a song. But this little paperback looks next to new. She turns back to the imprint page: published last year.

The preface explains the conditions under which Paquita and Mawson wrote:

Their correspondence was not a conventional exchange of letters where one correspondent replies to the latest letter from the other. The extreme isolation of Antarctica in that era made such an exchange impossible . . .

How was it for Paquita, knowing her letters would not be delivered or read until the ship returned to Antarctica months later, and all the while receiving nothing in return?

Freya reads that soon after Douglas Mawson left for Antarctica, Paquita Delprat, along with her young brother Willy, was whisked away to Europe by her mother, to assemble her trousseau and ease the months of separation. Paquita collected Belgian linen and household fineries. Henrietta introduced her youngest daughter to the sophistication of European culture; they attended gala performances and met with her elder siblings and relatives in Holland.

How fanciful her benign, genteel world must have seemed to Douglas, her image an opiate against the ceaseless roar of wind.

9 Wagenaarweg
Haag 10
May 1912

My Douglas, mine.

I'm feeling so absolutely healthy and happy tonight despite
the distance between us that I want to write to you. I wrote you
a letter on your birthday but it wasn't a success. I know you
thought of us thinking of you then. And we did. It was you all
day long . . .

I hope you don't mind but I'm quite Dutch. I've never
been so patriotic as now. I'm so awfully proud of my country
and next year when we are together we must find time to
come here . . .

I got your letters safely and just when I was wanting
something from you. How different our lives are at present!
My man, I wish I had been there to help you when you were so
worried before you landed. What a lot we shall have to tell
each other when we meet again. I want to come with you next
year to Europe. I don't think anything will prevent it. You can't
think how glad I am we came away this year. We seem to be in
quite a different world altogether. I don't think I could ever live
happily in Adelaide again as before—that is if it wasn't for you,
of course. When we have a home of our own it will be quite
different. I'm picking up such a lot of ideas! I've got a book for
them. And houselinen is busy being picked! I've got some old
Dutch brass already and have my eye on more. Our house will
be the house in Adelaide, in Australia. Douglas dear, aren't
you glad we've got each other? I'm feeling the fellow feeling so
very strongly tonight. No more boarding houses for my man.
No more nasty dinners and having to go away every night.
Always together—I'm a very jolly person to have about!

I hope everything goes well with you now. We aren't
worrying about not hearing per wireless yet. But I hope we do
soon hear. Scott will return about the same time as you. I hope
you come first. He will be disappointed at Amundsen getting to
the Pole first. How thankful we are that you aren't bound for
there. Don't you go and stay away another year! You're under
contract to return next year less than a year from now . . .

Willy is growing up. He fell in love on the boat and has
been repeating the experiment ever since. Unfortunately it
makes him sometimes grumpy. Leinte is also a duck. And as for
Mother I don't know how I shall ever leave her even for you.
Yes I do though. There is only one you. I'm sure you don't love
me as I do you. Women always love the most and miss the
most. Well I wouldn't like you to miss me as much as I do you.

With my whole heart & my lips your Paquita.

The sparkle of words fits her portrait: the girlish roundness of her face, tilted towards the photographer's light. Yet Paquita's gaze, beneath her wide-brimmed hat, appears intent, evocative, as one who is only now gaining the trappings of womanhood.