The Rope Eater Read online

  I recall one night in particular—it was punishingly cold and I was huddled in the deckhouse with Reinhold and Pago when the doctor emerged from belowdecks and rushed muttering past us. His coat clinked with vials and his arms were spilling over with torn scraps of paper. He marched out on deck and sat in the lee of the mast. The night was very dark, so I could catch only a glimpse of him now and then as moonlight flashed off glass. He was on his knees, hunched, with the bottles in a circle before him; even in the darkness I could see his back shuddering, his breath skipping out in ragged clouds. A ghastly yellow light flared in front of him. He had piled the paper inside the circle of bottles and was pouring the contents of one flask on it. It burned with a bright, even chemical light, first yellowish-green, now syrupy yellow. It lined every fissure of his face and tipped every edge of his clothing in its unnatural, jaundiced light. His lips were pulled back tightly as he squinted into the paper and he seemed to be speaking rapidly to himself. He waved his hands over the glowing core of paper and it flared red. He reared back, then leaned over it again, his beard nearly touching it. The phosphorescent light was smokeless and perfectly steady, like a tiny star brought into being on the deck of the ship. It had the coldness and distance of a star too, but its steadiness offered no comfort, spoke instead of unnatural manipulation, of light that was not light though it was not darkness. Over it, Architeuthis grinned, his long, even teeth catching the glow, his head nodding rapidly. The glow extinguished suddenly and the doctor rose and shuffled past us to the hatch.

  West was seen on deck less often during this time, but took to playing his Pianola in the long twilight; the creaking of the ship in the Arctic silence grew into moaning, resolved into melody, and died off into the blue-black darkness.

  We steered from east to west to east again, never sighting land, or anything besides ice and more ice. On the fifth of September we finally sighted land to the west, and made for it. We pulled out of the pack and into a sheltered bay, open to the southeast, about three miles across. The bay was filled with pancake ice—plates of ice four or five feet in diameter, upturned at the edges, like a crowded field of lily pads. The land was low—icy, snow-capped hills with black rock protruding. A few forlorn clumps of grass poked out along the edge of the shore at the head of a gravelly beach. I went ashore with Dr. Architeuthis, the captain, and some others. While the doctor gathered samples, the captain had us gather the grass, which he hoped to use as both insulation and—boiled into a vile paste by Hunt—protection against the onset of scurvy. Reinhold and I moved inshore, tearing at the clumps between the frozen rocks.

  “Hey, what’s this? Kane,” he called out, “come have a look at this.”

  He was standing in front of a set of symmetrical circles of stone about six feet across. In the center of two were blackened traces of fire. We called the doctor, who pored over them.

  “Tent circles,” he said. “The rocks were used to hold down the edges of a skin, probably caribou.” He rooted around in the center of one, pulling out shreds of a skin.

  “Is it recent?” asked Griffin. “Perhaps the Eskimo could help direct us.”

  “I doubt it,” replied Dr. Architeuthis, “but it’s impossible to tell from this. Nothing rots in the cold—could be ten years old, could be a thousand. I estimate it’s at least that old, probably, given that there are no tribes in this area now, and no memories of them from the eastern tribes.”

  It was unfathomable—they looked a year or two old; you could easily imagine a man lying out the rocks, setting a fire on the small platform, gathering his family around in the cold. That these tent circles could simply be sitting out, for a thousand years, unregenerate in the march of days and the wash of seasons—it was repugnant, unnatural.

  The others remained rooting around and then returned to the gathering of samples. I wandered down along the bay, pulling at the low tufts of grass. Beating my arms about me, I trudged until the rest of the party were specks in the distance. I counted steps from one clump to the next, counted stalks in each clump, and sang snatches of songs under my breath as I worked.

  So counting and so singing I moved out onto the southern arm of the bay; here the wind had swept the rocks clean and there were only traces of ice between the rocks. The pancake ice glittered in the evening sun and the Narthex sat placidly at anchor. I sat, now singing, now whistling, and watched the tiny men scramble over the shore. The cool air was soothing, and gradually I calmed; gradually my heart ceased its skittering and resolved to a steady pad. I spread my armload of grass behind me and reclined on the rocks, let the sun whisper brightly over me.

  The crack of a rifle brought me to. Shadows stretched now over the bay and the wind blew colder. I saw a boat’s worth of men making their way through the pancake ice. I grabbed up the grass and hastened back. By the time I reached them, the beach was dark and the sky purpling with the push of night.

  “Had a nice nap, did you, Kane?” said Hume shrilly. “Left the others to do your work?”

  “I moved down the beach. Sir.” I dumped my armload into the boat. He moved up beside me.

  “You’re a lazy bastard and insolent to boot, and if my stew weren’t waiting on board I’d flog you right here.” He gave the order to shove off.

  We pushed out of the bay in the morning before a stiff breeze and light snow. Whatever Dr. Architeuthis had gleaned from our stop did not change our course.

  As I had now seen the map and knew our destination, Dr. Architeuthis began to teach me more about what we were measuring and how to measure. He taught me first the observation through a sextant, and then the layers of math that refined and honed it, until I could determine the boat’s location with precision.

  During a lull, we went ashore and he showed me how to survey this unknown coastline, sighting from point to point and sending crossing arcs back to build a picture of the land. Farther up the coast, he sent me ashore with Pago to map a set of bays and points on my own. It was cold and long work, my hands freezing and the pencil seeming unable to mark the paper, but the anonymous land took shape under me, became bounded and known. As we moved on, that small pocket of the known floated in my mind, my mooring point in the whole of this boundless desolation.

  The doctor brought me into the lab also and showed me the work under way there. He brought me first to the terrariums along the windows. Inside the steamed glass, I could see a dense knot of vines hanging in the center, tendrils winding around each other and spiraling out in all directions.

  “Lovely, isn’t it?” said Dr. Architeuthis. “I call it the ouroborus vine. It is able to withstand very low temperatures and long periods of dormancy. When it grows, it is capable of growing very aggressively on a small supply of nutrients. The vines support each other out to a certain distance; then they collapse, strangle each other, and the nutrients are returned to the core plant. That way it can spread if there is fertile ground around it, and feed on itself if not.”

  He led me to another corner, where a pot of dark brown liquid bubbled into a condenser.

  “This, I hope, will carry us through in the far north. Meat is simply the stored energy of the sun, concentrated first in plants and then in the flesh of animals. By concentrating further the vital essence of a range of foods, and combining them into a singular form, I hope to capture both the inherent energy available in them and the whole spectrum of necessary nutrients. Much of what we eat is composed of excess water or useless bulk. Here,” he offered, handing me a bowl of brown paste that was bubbling slowly on a burner. I took a small spoonful—it was vile, tasting of chemicals in reaction, bitter and metallic. The doctor laughed.

  “Taste is, for now, a secondary consideration.”

  The remainder of the lab contained instruments related to finding our way. He had arrays set up for testing ice and water samples, for monitoring the effects of pressure and the yields of various gases in combination. He showed me sketch maps of the underside of icebergs, built up from soundings and currents and saline variati
ons, building a void up from the pieces of data. He showed me the centrifuge and theodolite, the hydrometer, and their uses, as well as the scientific processes to follow—the observation, the collection of data, the recording of anomalies and exceptions, the vigilance around the position and deployment of instruments, the precise intervals of measure.

  On deck, he taught me to identify the great range of birds that passed over us in long streams—phalaropes and kittiwakes, brants and fulmars, eiders, old-squaws, and scoters.

  It was marvelous to begin to understand the rivers of air in their courses, and the rivers of sweet water flowing through the salt. Once I traced a warm water current with great precision for over 120 miles, tracking it within the shadowy bounds of the ocean flow, discovering for myself through the gauges when it turned and rose, when it tumbled into pools, when finally it spent itself out into the broad reach of a channel. Dr. Architeuthis showed me the same in the liquid earth—rivers of rock flowing out from the center and along the surface; he showed me the arc of the Sandwich Islands, the wake of a river of rock erupting from beneath the huge and shifting plates of land.

  Despite my new proficiency and position as acolyte, I was still forbidden a further look at the map. I was never allowed in the laboratory without him present, and never permitted to come near the wall that held the map.

  And so a week passed, and two weeks. By now we knew our way, how to find the leads that Griffin saw, to plant the ice anchor for a warp, to brace for ramming. We moved efficiently through our paces and our ugly, awkward Narthex fairly danced along. The murmured traces of our meeting seeped out on night watches and in hurried snatches in our bunks—equal parts of hopeful greed and anxious dread—and dispersed.

  The cold, clear air and the blaze of sun seemed to purge us of our poisons—eyes became clear and muscles lean and strong. Faces took on sharp lines and bodies stood straighter. There was no illness among us, no colds or fevers, no injuries. We awoke each day with greater vigor, more enthusiasm, bursting with strength, like waves rising and gathering. We flew to our tasks, to our meals, took reluctantly to our bunks. Despite our odd clothes we were warm even in the coldest weather. Only Preston took on a peculiar waxy paleness.

  The dogs, too, changed with the shift north. They crackled with energy, snapping and snarling, whining for no reason. When we moored near large floes, Reinhold brought them to the ice and harnessed them to sledges. Once they had resolved their wrangling, they flew with easy grace. At night they slept now in tight individual balls instead of loose clumps, as if each were drawing up into his individual self, to be measured individually by the cold and darkness.

  The sour greed of the meeting flushed out in our sweat, and hope built again the dream of days—Reinhold dreamt of rabbits, and I? I saw that new and fresh world, emerging from the slow march of numbers that I produced for Dr. Architeuthis. I could not see a life beyond that first step, onto that untrammeled land, but it made no difference—over me I saw great torrents of air bounding over each other, and the unrestrained earth pulsing out her treasures into bright water.

  I had a growing certainty that the march of these days, that my encounter with the captain and my choice to sail were not random occurrences, but the steps of a path that my heart had driven me toward—whatever it was, a reward for my sufferings, suited to them, earned by them. It was indistinct and glorious— beyond my capacity to imagine, yet exactly suited to me, and myself worthy of it at the limits of my potential—and so I suppose it was in its own way.

  I continued to be driven toward it—I noticed in myself a greater appetite and phenomenal energy. I felt as if I should never have to sleep, as if I were bursting with strength—for once I felt the equal to my heart. My mind, too, was seized by a tremendous thirst. I felt that I could understand all the world if I could but pass it before my eyes—and in me no hint of creeping loss; rather the steady, impossible hope that every day I could wake to such energy, such easy absorption, and not crumble again into indolence and confusion. Each step of my passage fell into its place as a necessary part of my progress—my heart, its ceaseless clamor, had driven me here to make me strong enough to hold it, and now, in this realm of crystal and light, was ushering me into a new world, a stronger, purer, better world that I was to share with these new men. And ahead of me unfolded—it is a grand word but suited for grand days—my destiny.

  The ice thickened daily, and the sun grew more reluctant to rise with the morning; the load of ice on the lines grew thicker as we rose, and it returned through the day. We had several days of steady storm and snow, but the Narthex slipped up on the floes like a lady into a carriage, and we waited restlessly for the weather to break. Even belowdecks, Griffin found tasks to keep us busy— shifting cargo, piling coal, patching leaks. Much of our time was spent in preparing the ship for the day—not long distant—when the ice would cease to open for us and we would have to overwinter. The captain planned to have a space in the hold left open, which we affectionately dubbed the Ballroom, for our exercise. We unpacked lanterns and lamps for reading a library of books Griffin had included, and even a small printing press that we set up. Adney declared himself editor in chief and began an epic poem in limericks to carry us through the winter. Griffin also produced a great heap of scrap furs, which we took and stitched onto our patchwork clothes.

  On the evening of September 17, the clouds fell away and treated us to a spectacular sunset: the clouds arranged themselves in layers, starting just above the horizon, and as the sun fell, it caught each one in turn, blazing red-gold, while the ones above retreated into purple and indigo and the ones beneath turned from gray to silver to radiant orange. The water was black and the ice shades of amber and blue. The sun dropped below the last layer of clouds and shone out as bright as day over the ice for a moment, then flickered into crimson and elegantly slipped beneath the horizon.

  The next morning the captain summoned us to the deck.

  “Boys, we’ve gone off soundings now—that may mean we’re in the channel that leads to the islands, and it may not. With the thickening ice we can’t move the way we ought, so we’re splitting into three teams for testing: Dr. Architeuthis, Creely, Preston, and Kane to the east; myself, Hume, Pago, and Adney to the west. Reinhold will head north with Ash and the dogs. You’ll march out two weeks, taking samples as directed by the doctor, then return to the ship, and we’ll turn her nose into winter harbor. Clean the decks, pack your boats, and be off.”

  We packed the smaller iceboats—they were around eight feet long and fit four men very comfortably within their high gunnels. We lowered into the water quickly and moved slightly north of east. Hunt and Aziz gave us a hearty cheer from the deck as we wended away.

  The weather was pleasantly cold—about ten degrees—and the skies low and overcast, with a wind pushing down steadily from the north. I was pleased to be free of Hume, whose sour face had hung over me as I scrubbed and loaded. We made fair progress, only dragging the boat twice over broad floes and rowing steadily the rest of the time. After the herky-jerky pace of the Narthex, it was a pleasure to move so steadily; Creely started a shanty and we all pulled in time. On deck my energy had built to restlessness, and I was happy to have the oar to strain against, to feel the pull of my back and arms, the rush of blood in my veins. Here was the work I had sought; the soft rush of my oar and the surge of water past the gunnel gave me the impression of tremendous speed, of shooting ahead, dancing through the ice with the clumsy Narthex far in our wake. The fragile sides of the boat skimmed through light brash into channel after channel; the mass of obstinate ice seemed unable to thwart us now, unable to snatch us as we passed, and I taunted the yards under my breath as we passed them. Dr. Architeuthis steered us away from distant icebergs, and the associated morass of pressure ridges and debris fields. When our way was blocked, we slid up on the ice edge, strapped ourselves into the rue raddies—a torso harness rigged by Ash before we parted—and pulled the boat to new water. The ice-boats had runners built
into the bottom and, despite their sheathing, moved well over the snow.

  After five hours we stopped on a floe for a pot of tea and I could barely swallow mine before I was chafing to leave again. As the afternoon wore on, the wind shifted around to the east and blew directly on our backs. This slowed us somewhat, but we still made excellent progress. By eight, when we stopped to camp on a floe, the doctor estimated that we had made sixteen miles.

  The tent was tiny. The doctor explained that the less space there was for our bodies to heat, the warmer we would be. We could only cram in when it was time for sleep and then only head to foot to head. Creely and Preston crowded in and hunched over the stove, while I remained outside to help the doctor with his experiments. They passed out our hoosh, and the doctor sent me, despite my protestations, back into the tent to rest. The stove had made the tent wonderfully warm and dim, and gradually the warmth of our stomachs spread to our heads and we started to drowse.

  Once we extinguished the stove, however, I began to feel the damp cold of my bag; my right side was against the outside wall of the tent and I felt the seep of cold air penetrate my layers of clothes. It was impossible to move enough to get warm again. We think of cold as numbing, but it does not. It crawls and prods and pricks and stabs; it envelops us in discomfort but does not then release us into numbness. So I squirmed and shook and panted, trying to find some warmer pocket of my bag that would distract me long enough to sleep. My muscles ached from the long day of pulling, and the cold made them throb; twice my leg shot straight out and locked in a cramp and I cried out despite myself. Beside me, a lazy drone arose from Creely’s bag as he snored steadily. Late in the night, the doctor came in, his feet pushing out into my face. The cold settled on my head and commenced pounding dully. I could as well have marched through the night for all the rest my sleeping brought.