Bear Island (23 page)

    When we'd first come alongside shortly before noon, the unloading had gone ahead very briskly and smoothly indeed-except for the unloading of Miss Haynes's snarling pooches. Even before we'd tied up the after derrick had the sixteen-foot work-boat in the water and three minutes later an only slightly smaller fourteen-footer with an outboard had followed it: those boats were to remain with us. Within ten minutes the specially strengthened foreword derrick had lifted the weirdly shaped-laterally truncated so as to have a flat bottom-mock-up of the central section of a submarine over the side and lowered it gently into the water where it floated with what appeared to be perfect stability, no doubt because of its four tons of iron ballast. It was when the mock-up conning tower was swung into position to be bolted on to the central section of the submarine that the trouble began.

    It just wouldn't bolt on. Goin and Heissman and Stryker, the only three who had observed the original tests, said that in practice it had operated perfectly: clearly, it wasn't operating perfectly now. The conning tower section, elliptical in shape, m-as designed to settle precisely over a four-inch vertical flange in the centre of the midsection, but settle it just wouldn't do: it turned out that one of the shallow curves at the foot of the conning tower was at least a quarter-inch out of true, a fact that was almost certainly due to the pounding that we'd taken on the way up from Wick: just one lashing not sufficiently bar-taut would have permitted that microscopic freedom of vertical movement that would have allowed the tiny distortion to develop.

    The solution was simple--just to hammer the offending curve back into shape-and in a dockyard with skilled plate layers available this would probably have been no more than a matter of minutes. But we'd neither technical facilities nor skilled labour available and the minutes had now stretched into hours. A score of times now the foreword derrick had offered up the offending conning tower piece to the flange: a score of times it had had to be lifted again and painstakingly assaulted by hammers. Several times a perfect fit had been achieved where it had been previously lacking only to find that the distortion had mysteriously and mischievously transferred itself a few inches farther along the metal. Nor, now, despite the fact that the submarine section was in the considerable lee afforded by both pier and vessel, were matters being made any easier by the little waves that were beginning to creep around the bows of the Morning Rose and rock it, gently at first but with increasing force, to the extent that the ultimate good fit was clearly going to depend as much on the luck of timing as the persuasion of the hammers.

    Captain Imrie wasn't frantic with worry for the sound enough reason that it wasn't in his nature to become frantic about anything but the depth of his concern was evident enough from the fact that he had not only skipped lunch but hadn't as much as fortified himself with anything stronger than coffee since our arrival in the Sor-Hamna. His main concern apart from the well-being of the Morning Rose-he clearly didn't give a damn about his passengers-was to get the foredeck cleared of its remaining deck cargo because, as I'd heard Otto rather unnecessarily and unpleasantly reminding him, it was part of his contractual obligations to land all passengers and cargo before departure for Hammerfest. And, of course, what was exercising Captain Imrie's mind so powerfully was that, with darkness coming on and the weather blowing up, the foreword deck cargo had not yet been unloaded and would not be until the fore derrick was freed from its present full-time occupation of holding the conning tower suspended over the midsection.

    The one plus factor about Captain Imrie's concentration was that it gave him little time to worry about Halliday's disappearance. More precisely, it gave him little time to try to do anything constructive about it, for I knew it was still very much on his mind from the fact that he had taken time off to tell me that upon his arrival in Hammerfest his first intention would be to contact the law. There were two things I could have said at this stage, but didn't. The first was that I failed to see what earthly purpose this could serve-it was just, I suppose, that he felt that he had to do something, anything, however ineffectual that might be: the second was that I felt quite certain that he would never get the length of Hammerfest in the first place although just then hardly seemed the time to tell him why I thought so. He wasn't then, in the properly receptive mood: I had hopes that he would be shortly after he had left Bear Island.

    I went down the screeching metal gangway-its rusty iron wheels, apparently permanently locked in position, rubbed to and fro with every lurch of the Morning Rose--and made my way along the ancient jetty. A small tractor and a small Sno-Cat--they had been the third and fourth items to be unloaded from the trawler's afterdeck--were both equipped with towing sledges and everybody from Heissman downwards was helping to load equipment aboard those sledges for haulage up to the huts that lay on the slight escarpment not more than twenty yards from the end of the jetty. Everybody was not only helping, they were helping with a will: when the temperature is fifteen degrees below freezing the temptation to dawdle is not marked. I followed one consignment up to the huts.

    Unlike the jetty, the huts were of comparatively recent construction and in good condition, relics from the latest IGY-there could have been no possible economic justification in dismantling them and taking them back to Norway. They were not built of the modern kapok, asbestos, and aluminium construction so favoured by modern expeditions in Arctic regions as base headquarters: they were built-although admittedly presectioned in the low-slung chalet design fairly universally found in the higher Alpine regions of Europe. They had about them that four-square hunch shouldered look, the appearance of lowering their heads against the storm, that made it seem quite likely that they would still be there in a hundred years" time. Provided they are not exposed to prevailing high winds and the constant fluctuation of temperature above and below the freezing point, manmade structures can last almost indefinitely in the deep freeze of the high Arctic.

    There were five structures here altogether, all of them set a considerable distance apart-as far as the shoulder of the hill beyond the escarpment would permit. Little as I knew of the Arctic, I knew enough to understand the reason for this spacing: here, where exposure to cold is the permanent and dominating factor of life, it is fire which is the greatest enemy, for unless there are chemical fire-fighting appliances to band, and there nearly always are not, a fire, once it has taken hold, will not stop until everything combustible has been destroved: blocks of ice are scarcely at a premium when it comes to extinguishing flames.

    Four small huts were set at the corners of a much larger central block. According to the rather splendid diagram Heissman had drawn up in his manifesto those were to be given over, respectively, to transport, fuels, provisions and equipment: I was not quite sure what he meant by equipment. Those were all square and windowless. The central and very much larger building was of a peculiar starfish shape with a pentagonal centrepiece and five triangular annexes forming an integral whole: the purpose of this design was difficult to guess, I would have thought it one conducive to maximum heat loss. The centrepiece was the living, dining, and cooking area: each arm held two tiny bare rooms for sleeping quarters. Heating was by electric oil-filled black heaters bolted to the walls but until we got our own portable generator going we were dependent on simple oil stoves: lighting was by pressurised Coleman kerosene lamps. Cooking, which was apparently to consist of the endless opening and heating of contents of tins, was to be done on a simple oil stove. Otto, needless to say, hadn't brought a cook along: cooks cost money.

    With the notable exception of Judith Haynes, everyone, even the still groggy Allen, worked willingly and as quickly as the unfamiliar and freezing conditions would permit: they also worried silently and joylessly, for although no one had been on anything approaching terms of close friendship with Halliday the news of his disappearance had added fresh gloom and apprehension to a company who believed themselves to be evilly jinxed before even the first day of shooting. Stryker and Lonnie, who never spoke to each other except when essential, checked all the stores, fuel, oil, food, clothing, Arcticising equipment-Otto, whatever his faults, insisted on thoroughness: Sandy, considerably recovered now that he was on dry land, checked his props, Hendriks his sound equipment, the Count his camera equipment, Eddie his electrical gear and I myself what little medical kit I had along. By three o'clock, when it was already dusk, we had everything stowed away, cubicles allocated and camp beds and sleeping bags placed in those: the jetty was now quite empty of all the gear that had been unloaded there.

    We lit the oil stoves, left a morose and muttering Eddie-with the doleful assistance of the Three Apostles-to get the diesel generator working and made our way back to the Morning Rose, myself because it was essential that I speak to Smithy, the others because the hut was still miserably bleak and freezing whereas even the much-maligned Morning Rose still offered a comparative haven of warmth and comfort. Very shortly after our return a variety of incidents occurred in short and eventually disconcerting succession.

    At ten past three, totally unexpectedly and against all indications, the conning tower fitted snugly over the flange of the midship section. Six bolts were immediately fitted to hold it in position-there were twenty-four altogether-and the work-boat at once set about the task of towing the unwieldy structure into the almost total shelter offered by the right angle formed by the main body of the jetty and its north facing arm.

    At three-fifteen the unloading of the foredeck cargo began and, with Smithy in charge, this was undertaken with efficiency and despatch. Partly because I didn't want to disturb him in his work, partly because it was at that moment impossible to speak to Smithy privately, I went below to my cabin, removed a small rectangular clothbound package from the base of my medical bag, put it in a small purse-strung duffle bag and went back on top.

    This was at three-twenty. The unloading was still less than twenty percent completed but Smithy wasn't there. It was almost as though he had awaited my momentary absence to betake himself elsewhere. And that he had betaken himself elsewhere there was no doubt. I asked the winchman where he had gone, but the winchman, exclusively preoccupied with a job that had to be executed with all despatch, was understandably vague about Smithy's whereabouts. He had either gone below or ashore, he said, which I found a very helpful remark. I looked in his cabin, on the bridge, in the charthouse, the saloon and all the other likely places. No Smithy. I questioned passengers and crew with the same result. No one had seen him, no one had any idea whether he was aboard or had gone ashore which was very understandable because the darkness was now pretty well complete and the harsh light of the arc lamp now rigged up to aid unloading threw the gangway into very heavy shadow so that anyone could be virtually certain of boarding or leaving the Morning Rose unnoticed.

    Nor was there any sign of Captain Imrie. True, I wasn't looking for him, but I would have expected him to be making his presence very much known. The wind was almost round to the south-southeast now and still freshening, the Morning Rose was beginning to pound regularly against the jetty wall with a succession of jarring impacts and a sound of screeching metal that would normally have had Imrie very much in evidence indeed in his anxiety to get rid of all his damned passengers and their equipment in order to get his ship out to the safety of the open sea with all speed. But he wasn't around, not any place I could see him.

    At three-thirty I went ashore and hurried up the jetty to the huts. They were deserted except for the equipment hut where Eddie was blasphemously trying to start up the diesel. He looked up as he saw me.

    "Nobody could ever call me one for complaining, Dr. Marlowe, but this bloody-”

    “Have you seen Mr. Smith" The mate?”

    “Not ten minutes ago. Looked in to see how we were getting on. Why? Is there something--”

    “Did he say anything?”

    “What kind of thing?”

    “About where he was going? What he was doing?”

    “No." Eddie looked at the shivering Three Apostles, whose blank expressions were of no help to anyone. "Just stood there for a couple of minutes with his hands in his pockets, looking at what we were doing and asking a few questions., then he strolls off.”

    “See where he went?”

    “No." He looked at the Three Apostles, who shook their heads as one. "Anything up, then?”

    “Nothing urgent. Ship's about to sail and the skipper's looking for him." If that wasn't quite an accurate assessment of how matters stood at that moment, I'd no doubt it would be in a very few minutes. I didn't waste time looking for Smithy. If he had been hanging around with apparent aimlessness at the camp instead of closely supervising the urgent clearing of the foredeck, which one would have expected of him and would normally have been completely in character, then Smithy had a very good reason for doing so: he just wanted, however temporarily, to become lost.

    At three thirty-five I returned to the Morning Rose. This time Captain Imrie was very much in evidence. I had thought him incapable of becoming frantic about anything but as I looked at him as he stood in the wash of light at the door of the saloon I could see that I could have been wrong about that. Perhaps "frantic" was the wrong term, but there was no doubt that he was in a highly excitable condition and was mad clear through. His fists were balled, what could be seen of his face was mottled red and white and his bright blue eyes were snapping. With commendable if lurid brevity he repeated to me what he'd clearly told a number of people in the past few minutes. Worried about the deteriorating weather--that wasn't quite the way he'd put it--he'd had Allison try to contact Tunheim for a forecast. This Allison had been unable to do. Then he and Allison had made the discovery that the transceiver was smashed beyond repair. And just over an hour or so previously the receiver had been in order-or Smith had said it was, for he had then written down the latest weather forecast. Or what he said was the latest weather forecast. And now there was no sign of Smith. Where the hell was Smith?