The Hunter of the Shadows
by Clinton Green

March 2, 1898: The attentive reader will notice the remnants of torn pages preceding this leave of my journal. Fear not, for my work is not the victim of any conspiratorial censorship, merely some generous editing on my behalf. For the entries I had composed here prior to today were half-hearted jottings, descriptions of daily routines since leaving Punta Arenas a week after New Years’, bound for the Antarctic on board the Nansen ; the first exploratory voyage beyond the Southern Ocean since the ill-fated Mary Swan departed from Puerto Montt 15 years ago, never to return.

Indeed, if one is to be honest, it must be admitted that my half-hearted journal keeping has been more in response to the accepted image of a British officer and gentleman. Due to the nature of my commission, close and regular contact has been necessary with the Norwegian and Belgian men, and thus my time with the other Englishmen on board has been relatively meagre. So when I noticed the regularity of the Englishmen sitting down to scribble in their leather-bound tomes at length (sometimes for hours) after the evening meal, I saw an opportunity to became a contemporary. And to continue in this spirit of honesty, one must admit a craving for the companionship of fellow English gentlemen. I hold nothing against my foreign companions, yet the British blood in my veins would not be denied, and I found myself fishing this small red leather book (a gift from mother on my departure from England) out of my trunk and joining my colleagues in their scribblings. It wasn’t long before I was offered a taste of the ship’s precious supply of brandy or even a rare cigar. Thus, I felt an Englishman again, yet one could not help wondering if my colleagues also filled their journals with the same dreary observations and pedantic details as christened this volume.

But now I have torn out those stupefying pages and started anew, as my colleagues and I truly have something to write of. For the Nansen is trapped in the pack ice and the ship is in uproar.

My three fellow Englishmen place the blame squarely upon the Belgian Captain de Wiencke. No doubt as the ship’s captain, de Wiencke is ultimately responsible for our current predicament, but more to the point are the insinuations that our dear Captain imprisoned us in the ice on purpose , in the quest to Captain the first expedition to winter through the long antarctic night. One can have little doubt that the idea is certainly appealing, especially to the young and adventurous types such as myself and Lt. Caruthers, yet we are all angered at the treacherous manner in which de Wiencke has gone about it. Some of the crew panicked as the ice floes locked in around us, and it took some time for myself to translate to the Belgians and Gaarder, my companion from my previous arctic expedition, to the Norwegians that we had provisions to last us a good three years. The Nansen, a former whaler, was also built to stand up to the batterings of the most relentless of floes and bergs. Indeed, once calm returned after our tiresome translations, I fancied I saw the glint of adventure in some of the men’s eyes. That it was present in Gaarder’s cool Nordic gaze was unquestionable, and the two of us reminisced about our adventures in the North West Passage and discussed the possibilities of the coming winter.

In antiquity, the south was thought to hold a fertile continent containing and abundance of gold, precious stones and other riches. It was not until 1772 when James Cook circumnavigated the globe close enough to the Antarctic circle to discover the icy reality of the south, the confirmation of any land mass hidden behind walls of seemingly impenetrable ice. Not until this century have explorers such as Ross confirmed the existence of numerous islands and the possibility of a peninsula which could be attached to a land mass of continental proportions surrounding the south pole. Will we make the next step forward in overcoming this last great frontier?

March 16: With the passing of each day our prison grows sturdier. Soon after we entered the main body of the ice, it was noted that we were drifting in an south westerly direction. The crows nest was promptly manned, and soon there were several calls of "land-ho!", which proved to be only the ice bergs which continue to surround us. A convenient storm could well disperse these icy sentinels and open up a channel of escape. This is a possibility we all hope for, for even Caruthers, Gaarder and myself are somewhat less enthusiastic at the prospect of remaining in the ice for the winter after certain developments have became apparent over the past fortnight.

Firstly, there is the drift. Although we hold out the vague hope that a change in direction to the north may lead to freedom, there is the possibility of reefs, rocky shore lines and the formidable land ice, any of which would spell doom for the Nansen and her crew. After two and a half months, already tinned meat is less than appealing, although Cook racks his brains daily to invent new recipes and combinations. The men have begun slaughtering the penguins which populate the floe that surrounds us, although the fishy taste of their flesh is far from appetising. Dr Parsons and Mr Saunders, the botanist, have both recommended the storing of penguin meat to supplement our diets throughout the winter. Yet as the temperatures drop, the penguins seem to number fewer each day. The summer days of midnight suns are well behind us as we see less of the fiery orb in the sky each day. The shortening days are more than noticeable to all on board and accompanied by temperatures already dropping to -20 degrees C overnight, the approach of the unknown antarctic winter has taken on a quiet foreboding.

April 21: At the end of March animal life on the ice floe had all but disappeared; penguins, seals, whales, even petrels seem to be deserting us as the long night grows imminent. Yet the quest for fresh meat still goes on in earnest, as men venture further out onto the floe to hunt down the rare penguin or seal. Through cracks in the ice the men have trawled for sea life, and yesterday they brought up a mass of weird sea creatures the likes of which I have never seen; gelatinous bodies covered with tentacles, probiscuses and other unnameable protrusions. The men took their strange bounty to Cook in the hope he could do something with it, but he only shook his head, muttering something in Belgian which was unfamiliar to my knowledge of the tongue. Mr Saunders, however, took a particular interest in the specimens and has preserved them in ice for further study.

We scarcely get more than two hours daylight now, and if the sky is cloudy during this time all are despondent for the rest of the day. We distract ourselves with the collection of meteorological observations and the daily tasks around the ship. Gaarder and I have been conducting skiing lessons on the floe, which the men take part in more out of want for distractions than enthusiasm. In the evening, talk inevitably turns to wives and sweethearts. There is much longing for the company of the fairer sex, and the men have even taken to passing around letters from their sisters to somewhat satisfy the yearnings of their fellows.

May 2 : Tragedy has struck with the disappearance for the hunting party. Seven men set out three days ago on one of the regular hunts for the increasingly-rare animal life and nothing has been seen of them since. We have done our best to search for them, but with scarcely more than an hour’s daylight our efforts have been little more than useless. Gaarder and I agree crevices hidden by thin layers of snow are the most likely culprits. And today a horrendous storm has blown up, with temperatures dropping to -30 degrees C. As I listen to the inhuman howling of the wind outside this fragile retreat of ours, I hold out little hope for those poor souls.

May 25 : All hope has been given up for the return of the hunting party. We have entered the long night.

Our days are made up of relentless darkness, broken only by a vague, sickly yellow haze on the northern horizon at noon. When the clouds do break to reveal the moon, the strange light in this part of the world makes it appear greenish and alien. The departure of the sun was followed by a horrendous storm which has spanned the best part of a week, save for eerie periods of absolute stillness and silence which arrive from nowhere and are gone just as quickly. The wind howls relentlessly and all around us the ice groans and crashes as if it were alive. With temperatures approaching -40 degrees C coupled with the howling of the storm, I have found sleep a difficult proposition. And when I do finally drift off, I am plagued by terrifying dreams involving those horrid sea creatures from the trawl. Looking around the rest of the crew, the pale faces and red-rimmed eyes imply that I am not alone in my sleeplessness. Indeed, Dr. Parsons has become concerned with a physical condition he describes as "polar anaemia"; the symptoms including a certain pallidness of the skin, lack of appetite, lack of sleep, swollen joints and puffiness of the eyes. Parsons has prescribed a diet of the fresh penguin meat and at least an hour per day naked at close proximity to a raging fire (the idea being to make up for the lack or sunlight).

June 1 : When Caruthers and Dr Parsons awoke me from my fitful sleep with their dreadful news, I half believed I was still dreaming and that green, slimy tentacles would issue forth from their coat sleeves at any moment. But soon the reality of the situation became all too apparent, when my fellow Englishmen informed me of the disappearance of Mr. Saunders.

The botanist had been last sighted the prior evening leaving the ship to take advantage of the unusually calm weather with a leisurely stroll on the floe. He promptly walked out of the illumination of the ship’s lanterns and had not been seen since.

Caruthers, Parsons and myself decided not to include Captain de Wiencke in our deliberations over this most-urgent matter, as according to Dr Parsons the Captain had rarely left his cabin over the past week for a severe bout of polar anaemia. I declared I would immediately lead a search party, for I had by far the greatest skiing expertise of the three of us. I stood to dress for the expedition but was suddenly overcome by a wave of dizziness which caused me to fall back upon by bunk. Dr Parsons performed a quick examination and declared I, too, was suffering from the anaemia. After a brief discussion, with much protest from myself, it was decided that it would be foolhardy for a man in my condition to venture out into the icy darkness. Gaarder, the most experienced skier aboard, would be asked to lead the search party with the company of Dr Parsons in case his medical skills were required.

Imagine my surprise when my old chum, Gaarder, flatly refused to take any part in the search. In his heavily accented English, he told us it would be suicide to venture onto the darkened floe amongst the constantly shifting ice-sheets and unseen crevices. When, in a heated tone, I asked him if he realised that a man’s life was at stake, he replied curtly that "it was the English fool’s fault for wandering out there in the first place".

Now, Gaarder measures well over 6 ft. and is probably one of the strongest men I have ever met. Needless to say, he showed no effects for the anaemia, either. Yet both Caruthers and Parsons had to hold me back from at least attempting to give the Nordic giant a sound thrashing for his insolence.

"We have no time to argue", Caruthers said as he pulled me away from the staring Norwegian. He would lead the search instead.

Over the following hour, all of the ship’s rope was gathered together to make one long line which would connect the searchers back to the Nansen. The party set out soon after with Caruthers and Parsons leading, each with lantern in hand, followed by four Belgian sailors in single file carrying the mass of rope between them and feeding it out in their wake. Soon they were in the shadows and the two lanterns became but pinpricks of light before disappearing altogether.

After over two hours the blessedly calm conditions gave way to another horrendous storm. I tugged three times in quick succession on the rope, intending to signal the searchers to return, but found the rope moved easily through my hands as if no one held the other end. Pulling desperately upon the line, the ease of my labour made this all too apparent.

It took us nearly an hour to reel the entire line back under those appalling conditions, only to find nothing at the rope’s end but frozen blood and gore. And, horror of horrors, the last twenty feet of the icy rope covered with a film of blasphemous green slime. I almost laughed out loud, thinking I must still be in the grip of one of my horrid nightmares, the horrid rope so resembled one of the unspeakable appendages which had haunted my fitful sleep. But then the storm sent up yet another ungodly howl and the force of this hellish place blew me clean off my feet. If only, I prayed, if only it was a dream.

June 7 : I am convinced. Something stalks us from the icy shadows.

Two nights ago, de Wiencke emerged from his cabin for the first time in weeks, the very image of madness and degradation; face gaunt, eyes protruding and clothes hanging off his skeletal frame like those of a scarecrow. de Wiencke announced to all that sleep was not possible upon the ship and that he intended to sleep upon the ice. He stumbled down onto the floe, pitched his tent and crawled inside.

At breakfast the next day, I must admit that he did look somewhat better. The Captain’s appetite had certainly returned and although his hair had frozen to his head by the night’s temperature of -35 degrees C., he declared that he had had his best night’s sleep in weeks. Despite the madness of it all, this brief glimpse of positive news seemed to cheer up the four remaining Belgian sailors somewhat, and for the first time in days there was conversation at the meal table (no one dared speak of the fate of Parsons, Caruthers and the others; I felt my mind slipping just thinking about that rope). The Belgians were speaking of joining their Captain on the ice that evening (it seemed we were all suffering from a terrible lack of sleep), when Cook stepped in from the kitchen and said "Stay off the ice, keep near the light. Its the only safe place", before slopping out the gruel and leaving our company before anyone could question his peculiar remark.

So it came to pass that de Wiencke and the remaining Belgians (bar Cook) pitched their tents and spent the evening on the ice. Gaarder and his band of Norwegians dismissed them as madmen. Myself, the only remaining Englishman on board, spent the "day" in my cabin, torn between dozing and a fitful sleep which only brought the horrid nightmares, intermingled with a new blizzard raging outside. At one point in my half-waking state, I fancied I heard something large flopping wetly against the hull, and my mind once again threw up images of the monstrosities which still lay on ice in poor Parsons’ cabin. And when I sat up at my desk to write in this journal, trying to fight off the sleep I had so recently craved, the howling wind almost sounded like a booming voice speaking in an ungodly tongue no sane man would wish to learn.

Finally, I came up on deck to find Gaarder looking down in silence upon the ice. Joining him at the icy rail, I felt no surprise whatsoever to see that the Belgians and their tents were gone.

"It’s almost as if they were never there", Gaarder said, not taking his eyes off the ice.

We are two weeks into the long winter night, and by my calculations we shall not see the sun until at least mid-July.

June 11 : Gaarder and the Norwegians left yesterday. They took off into the darkness on their skis, dragging one of the Nansen ‘s lifeboats behind them on a sledge. Gaarder had calculated our drift over the past two weeks to be in a northerly direction. He and his men would make for open water and then sail for the nearest land, most likely Elephant Island or perhaps even the whaling station on the South Shetlands. Gaarder practically begged me to join them, saying there was no hope for anyone who remained on the ship. I accused him of desertion and suicide in one action, but he only looked at me sadly, knowing I would no accompany him. I wonder if he knew I did not go because I am afraid of venturing into the darkness? His plan is improbable beyond belief, but I believe that if anyone could do it, it would be the burly Norwegian. I silently wished him luck.

"We killed His children, and now he hunts us", Cook said from behind me. I turned and saw him clutching his lantern close to him. This madman was now my sole companion on this ghost ship. I asked him in a level voice whom he was referring to.

"Can’t say His name. Oh no, mustn’t say His name. All the little penguins ran away because His time was coming. And now all the little men are running away, but it’s too late. Too dark, too late...sometimes you can hear His name on the wind, if you really listen. Do you hear it, sir?"

I will not be hunted any longer. I have my pistol, a harpoon, and an impromptu torch fashioned from a table leg wrapped at one end with oil-soaked rags, and I am going down onto the ice. We shall see whom really hunts the shadows.

 How much time has passed? It is impossible to tell. All I know is that it is still dark, and that is all that matters. The wind is howling in all its glory and its words are clear to me now. As I write, I can see my hand is covered by a thin film of frozen green slime, but I mustn’t think on that now. When I have finished this entry, I will not need this torch any longer, only my harpoon. Creeping through the ship, I shall repeat these words over and over, so as not to think about what has become of me, of us all:

That is not dead which can eternal lie

But with strange aeons, even death may die.

Now I shall go and find Cook.

©1998 Clinton Green

http://ClintonGreen.tripod.com/index-4.html