I see Keller in a Zodiac near the beach at Detaille—at least I think it’s him. I reach for my binoculars before realizing they’re gone—lost to the sea, probably. I can’t bear to think about how much detritus from the ship, from its passengers, is going to end up at the bottom of this ocean—and, worse, floating on its surface, and later in the bellies of penguins and seals and whales. The victims we’re seeing now are only the very first of what eventually will be too many to count.
I hobble my way up one more level to the crew deck, the one Keller and I sneak off to for moments free from tourists, questions, demands. It offers a better vantage point, and from here I continue to look for him. The Zodiac I’d thought he was in has disappeared.
I try to breathe slowly through the tangle of anxiety in my chest. When my ankle begins to throb I lean heavily on the rail with my forearms. My hands, in dry gloves, are still burning, and my face is unprotected from the cold and wind. I shouldn’t be outside in this condition, but I don’t know how else to be.
I’M STANDING AT the porthole in the stateroom when the nausea hits. I stumble to the cabin’s tiny bathroom just in time. Afterwards I sit there on the floor for a few moments to catch my breath.
I hear a knock on the cabin door. I get to my feet just as Kate enters.
“How’re you doing?” she asks. “I heard you broke your ankle.”
“Just a fracture.” I turn away from her and stumble toward the porthole, swallowing hard against another wave of nausea, my hands hovering around my middle. “I hate being stuck on board like this.”
“I know the feeling,” she says.
“Your husband does, too,” I say, turning around. “Did you hear? About how he found Keller and they found me?”
She nods, then wraps her arms around herself. “I’m glad. I mean, I know he screwed up the first time—”
“Don’t worry about that. We’re all grateful he snuck out again, as stupid as it was. I should thank him. Where is he?”
“Up in the lounge, I think,” she says. “I asked him not to come down here because you need to rest.”
“This is your cabin?”
“I wanted you to have a quiet place to recuperate. Richard and I aren’t going to get any sleep anyway.”
“You didn’t have to do that.”
She smiles. “And you’ll be happy to know he’s taken off that patch, finally.”
“Good.”
Kate takes a step closer, studying me. “Are you okay? You look really pale.”
“I’m just a little queasy, that’s all.”
She glances at the bandage on my forehead. “That doesn’t sound good. I should go find Susan.”
“No,” I say. “Not necessary.”
“But if you hit your head—”
“It’s not that,” I say. “I’m pregnant.”
Kate smiles, then turns to the little coffee bar all the staterooms are equipped with. “Peppermint tea,” she says over her shoulder. “I’ve been drinking it like water. It helps a lot.”
After handing me the mug of tea, Kate sits down on the bed across from mine and asks me how far along I am. I repeat what Susan had told me, with a little difficulty, my stomach beginning to churn again. I take a few sips of tea but can’t handle more and put the mug on the top of the storage compartment between the beds.
Kate takes a blanket from the closet and lays it over me. The gesture is so kind that I don’t have the heart to tell her I’m already too warm. Sitting cross-legged on the other bed, she tells me she’s planning to tell Richard about her own pregnancy as soon as they’re off the boat, maybe over a nice dinner in Ushuaia or Santiago, when they’re back on land and everything is feeling more normal.
Maybe it’s the sound of her voice that soothes me, or the exhaustion catching up with me, or the fact that the nausea is finally abating—I let my eyes shut, and the next thing I know, I’m waking up with a shudder.
Kate is gone, but when I raise my head I see Susan across the room. She’s got her back to me, rummaging in her medical bag.
“How long have I been asleep?” I ask. “Where’s Kate?”
She doesn’t answer but comes over with a glass of water. “How’re you feeling?” she asks.
“Not bad. A little sick earlier. Better now.” Yet when I sit up, my head spins, and I feel a bolt of pain shoot through my temple.
Disoriented, I lie back down and try to look out the porthole, but all I can glimpse is a faint glow of light. The ship’s not moving, but I don’t otherwise have a sense of where or when. There’s no clock down here, and my diver’s watch is gone. “What time is it?”