My Last Continent(65)

As I watch where penguins leap from the surf, I think of the bag we have back at the research station—a canvas sack filled with penguin tags sent to us by fishing boats—the tags of all the penguins that died in their nets, or birds they found dead in the water or on shore. I touch the tag in my pocket, the one I took off the bird who was killed on the road, one of so many.

Finally I turn away from the water, from the waves rattling with yet-undiscovered penguin tags, and head toward the station, resisting the urge to look back.





HOURS BEFORE SHIPWRECK


North of the Antarctic Circle

(66°33'S)





Brash, pack, slush, rotten, black, pancake, frazil, grease, fast—there are so many words for the different types of ice conditions in Antarctica, so many ways for a ship to find herself in trouble. And now, as the Cormorant continues north through loose brash, I wonder about the conditions farther south, where the Australis is. At the first sign of stormy weather, Glenn had gotten us out of there, just as the Australis had been venturing in.

It would be less dangerous if the sea farther south were simply impenetrable—but I know that if it looks navigable, a pressured captain trying to please an overzealous cruise director might take a chance. The Australis can pass through the harmless frazil and grease ice—the beginnings of the freezing process—and she can sift her way through the pancake ice: the round, flat formations that float close together in the early stage of creating compact sea ice. Yet when the salt begins to seep from the ice into the ocean below, when the wind shoves the pack together, when the hummocks and ridges grow taller and taller, the ice becomes more and more difficult to maneuver. As the ice solidifies and sticks together, the terrain becomes more like ground than like sea, and eventually it becomes impossible to turn back.

Our passengers, thanks to our hasty retreat from the sea ice after the landing, are both fascinated and worried—and full of questions and misperceptions at happy hour in the lounge. One passenger refers to the Cormorant as an icebreaker, and I correct him.

“A true icebreaker not only has to have a strengthened hull,” I say, “but also has to have the right shape and enough power to drive the bow up onto the ice. What breaks the ice isn’t just the hull but the weight of the boat.”

“So why don’t we use an icebreaker?” the passenger says.

“They’re very expensive,” I say. “And they don’t usually have stabilizers, like we do, so you can imagine how much more seasick you’d be. We’d never take passengers into ice conditions thick enough to require an icebreaker anyway.”

I glance at my watch. It’s almost time for dinner, so I excuse myself and steal my way to the satellite phone in the business center. When I’m connected to Keller’s quarters, I offer up a silent plea for him to be there.

I hear his voice and nearly drop the phone with relief. “Keller, it’s me.” Before he can say anything else, I blurt out, “There’s something I need to tell you. I didn’t have time on Deception Island.”

“I know,” he says. “I didn’t mean to pressure you with that ring. I know marriage wasn’t ever in your plan, and I—”

“It’s not that,” I say, talking quickly, aware, as ever, that we never have enough time. “I really didn’t want to tell you this on the phone.” I take a breath and stutter it out. “I’m—I’m pregnant.”

I hear only static, and I wait for a moment, then say, “Keller?”

Nothing.

My stomach turns over. While I’ve assumed that he’d be happy with the news, maybe I’m wrong.

I think of the Australis, heading south—surely she’d have turned around by now, but even so, the sat phone connection could be dicey. I hang up and make the call again. This time, I can’t get through at all, and I slam the phone down.

I look at my watch and sigh—I’m supposed to be at dinner by now. I try calling one more time. Reluctantly I give up and head for the dining room, where the only empty seat is next to Kate and Richard. Richard still wears a seasickness patch behind his ear.

“Until this trip, I had no idea there were so many different types of ice,” Kate says. “It’s like the Eskimos having a hundred different words for snow.”

“That’s just a myth, Kate,” Richard says.

“What?” she says.

“It’s an urban myth,” he says. His face looks flushed, and he keeps blinking his eyes, as if trying to focus. “Any credible linguist will tell you that the Inuit language may have a number of different ways of referring to snow, but it’s basically no different than in English, where we have wet snow, powder, sleet, slush, blizzard, and so on.”