An Old Captivity (27 page)

She turned, and went into her tent without a word to either of them, worried and furious with both the men.

Ross smoked a pipe with Lockwood by the blazing fire; the older man kept the conversation carefully upon safe topics. Then he turned in at about eleven o’clock and the pilot sat on by the fire alone, tired and irritated. If only he could be left alone! He knew that he had hurt the girl and he hated himself for doing it … but they must, must let him alone. He’d never get through this job unless he could give his whole mind and energy to it. He must be left to work in his own way.

He sat crouched over the camp fire, brooding and unhappy. From time to time he went down to the water’s edge and adjusted the mooring lines; then he returned to the fire and sat by it again.

The slow hours went by. At two o’clock he let the seaplane go aground, and stayed with her for half an hour to satisfy himself that the floats were resting evenly upon the sand. Then he went up to the tent, took a tablet of his Troxigin, and got into his sleeping-bag for a short night; by three o’clock he was asleep, restless and uneasy in his sleep.

By nine o’clock they were in the air again. Relations were a little strained; Alix was distant and aloof and the pilot was too tired to make any effort to put matters right. The photography that they had done the previous day had ironed out all initial difficulties and they had little need to talk except in monosyllables. For three hours they sat in the machine flying backwards and forwards on the survey, Ross sunk deep in the depression of fatigue, the girl still smarting at her rebuff.

They landed after that, and beached the seaplane. Lockwood was away at Brattalid with Mayark. Ross and Alix lunched and spent the afternoon in the dark-room tent, talking in occasional monosyllables as they developed part of a spool of film.

When that was over, the pilot went into his own tent, lay down, and sank into a heavy sleep at once. Alix cleared away the photographic gear and put her tent in order; then she began to prepare supper, with Ajago to help her. She was still working when Lockwood came back at about six o’clock.

He asked where Ross was; she motioned to the tent. “He’s in there, fast asleep. I wouldn’t wake him, Daddy—let him sleep. I had a look at him just now.”

He nodded and sat down beside her. “I wouldn’t dream of waking him. Let him get all the sleep he can.”

She smiled, a little bitterly. “That isn’t very much. He’s set his alarm clock for nine o’clock; I said I’d get him his supper then.” She paused, and then she said: “I’ve got a good mind to chuck that clock into the fiord.”

Her father asked: “What’s happening about the machine to-night?”

She said: “He’s going to sit up till four in the morning, as far as I can make it out. Low tide is at half-past five, and he wants to take off at eight o’clock to go to Julianehaab to get filled up with petrol.”

“Can’t he go later?”

“He’s afraid of the fog coming down in the afternoon, like it does sometimes.”

The don nodded slowly. “I see. That means the seaplane mustn’t ground till after three in the morning.”

“I think that’s it. I do wish he’d let us look after that. It’s only just pushing her off, and making sure she doesn’t ground before the right time.”

He shook his head. “He’d never let anybody else do that.”

She said irritably: “I know he wouldn’t. But he’s just wearing himself out over it. I think he’s looking awful.”

There was a silence. Presently her father said: “I really don’t know what to do about it, while this good weather lasts. If only we could have a decent gale he’d have to get her up on shore and lash her down, and then he’d get a real rest. But I’m afraid we’ll never get him to give up and rest while this good weather runs away to waste.”

She sighed. “I know. It’s awfully difficult.”

Lockwood began to tell her of his dig at Brattalid. He had unearthed a runic stone and made a rubbing of it, and he had cleared a good portion of the floor of the big church. The girl said: “I’ll come over with you to-morrow, Daddy. I’d like to see it, and Mr. Ross won’t want me for the flight to Julianehaab.”

They strolled a little way up the hill, and got back to their camp at about eight o’clock. Ajago and Mayark were just leaving to go to their own camp for the night; a stew was ready to be put on the fire for cooking. Alix said in Danish:

“Do you still want to sleep over there? It is much better here.”

Ajago shook his head emphatically. “It is very bad here at night. This is a bad place to sleep. One gets ill.”

The girl smiled patiently. “Nobody is ill here, Ajago.”

The man said: “One is ill. Rogg is ill. This is a very bad place to camp.”

The girl fixed her smile. “All right, you go along to your own camp. Be over here early in the morning.”

She watched them pensively as they went away, then turned and told her father what Ajago had said. He stood for a minute looking after them. “It’s quite absurd, of
course,” he said at last. “But that’s how superstitions grow up in a primitive community. If Ross
should
get ill now, in this camp, the reputation of the place would be enormously increased.”

She turned away, shivering a little. “I think it’s about time to start and cook the supper.”

An hour later the alarm went off; presently Ross joined them by the fire. He was refreshed by his sleep, and feeling well. “It’s funny about this place,” he said. “I seem to sleep a damn sight better in the daytime than I do at night. Has anybody else noticed that?”

The others shook their heads.

The pilot said: “I think the reason is, it’s not so cold. I believe my head gets cold at night, or something. I always seem to wake up with a bit of a headache in the morning. I’ll have to buy myself a woolly nightcap in Julianehaab.”

Alix laughed. “You won’t get that in Julianehaab.”

“Just the sort of place you would get it. The governor’s got one, probably. I bet they all sleep in nightshirts, if they sleep in anything at all.”

They sat smoking round the fire for an hour after supper; then Lockwood and Alix went to bed. Ross went down to the shore and adjusted the moorings; the machine was just afloat. Then he settled down for his long watch; for the first hour or two he sat beside the fire, paying only occasional visits to the shore.

At half-past twelve the falling tide made it necessary for him to move down to the beach and keep on pushing off the seaplane. He sat there drowsily, cold and stiff, getting up every now and then to adjust the ropes. Presently, at about two o’clock, he heard a movement on the path down from the camp. It was Alix; in her hands she held a steaming mug.

“I made you some Bovril, Mr. Ross,” she said simply.

He got up stiffly. “That’s terribly good of you,” he said. “Did you make any for yourself?”

She nodded. “I left mine up by the fire. I’ll go and get it.”

She joined him presently, and they sat down together
on the sandy turf. Both were wearing flying suits and fur-lined boots; they sat together in the half-light warming their hands upon their mugs.

Presently he said: “I’m afraid I was very rude to you last night, Miss Lockwood. I was a bit tired. I didn’t think what I was saying.”

She said: “Oh, that’s all right—I knew you were tired. But, Mr. Ross, can’t we do some of this work for you?”

He said: “I’d rather see to it myself. It’s no work, really, just sitting here and giving her a shove from time to time.”

She did not press the point; she was afraid of irritating him again. And presently he said:

“I suppose you think I’m terribly fussy, don’t you?”

She shook her head. “I’d never think of you like that. But I think you’re working much too hard, Mr. Ross.”

“I’m not. But even if I were, I’d rather do that than have a flock of accidents.”

She was silent for a minute. Then she said gently: “Nobody could hold it against you if anything happened to the seaplane on a trip like this. We ought to have had four or five men to help you—proper engineers. My father sees that now. As for accidents, a fragile thing like that is bound to have an accident from time to time.” She pointed to the seaplane, rocking gently on the dark water of the cove.

He said emphatically, almost viciously: “All seaplanes don’t have accidents. Mine don’t. And mine aren’t going to. Accidents don’t just happen of themselves.”

“Why do they happen, then?”

He sat staring out over the dark water of the fiord to the dim mountains on the other side. The night was very still. He said quietly: “Accidents happen because men are foolish, and reckless, and negligent, and lazy. Sometimes, because there isn’t enough money for what they want to do. One crash in a hundred may have been because God willed it so. Not more than that.”

She was silent.

He said: “Sir David has seen that we’ve got enough money for this trip. If God has set His mind on it, we shall
have a crash. Apart from that, my job here is to see we don’t, and we’re not going to.”

She sat there with him for the remainder of his watch. At half-past three he let the seaplane go aground, and waited till he could see how she was lying. Then they went up together to the camp, taking their mugs with them.

In the half-light she stopped by her tent. “Good night, Mr. Ross.”

He stood before her, broad in his flying clothes, a massive figure dimly seen. “Good night, Miss Alix,” he said. “It was good of you to come down and sit up with me. I am sorry I was short with you that time. Don’t mind about that.”

“I don’t mind,” she said softly.

“Good night, Miss Alix.”

“Good night, Mr. Ross.”

He went into the tent where Lockwood was asleep, took a tablet of his Troxigin, and fell asleep himself.

He slept for an hour and woke up with a violent start, in a great fright. He raised himself upon one elbow and stared round about him, sweating and rather cold. He was terrified of something; he did not know of what. He got up and went out of the tent to see if the machine was still all right; she stood beached upon the sand far from the receding tide. He went over to the girl’s tent and put his ear to it; the steady, even breathing told him all was well. He stood for a few minutes recovering himself; it was a fine, starry night with an icy little draught straight from the ice-cap. Everything was quiet and serene. He had made a fool of himself.

He went back to his sleeping-bag, but he did not sleep again. He lay dozing, half awake, and watched the blue sky framed in the tent door grow lighter into grey, to broad daylight. Presently he heard Ajago and Mayark moving about the camp; he woke Lockwood and got up himself.

That day he flew to Julianehaab to refuel. The machine was practically empty; with the assistance of the Eskimo boatman and his son he put in about two hundred and forty
gallons. It took all the morning to do that. In the early afternoon he went and had a short talk with the governor at his house; then he took off for Brattalid again. He got back to the camp at three o’clock as the fog was just beginning to close down.

A period of very perfect weather followed then, ideal for survey. They flew the next day and the day after that; on the third he went to Julianehaab again to refuel. Then they went on with the survey. The tides, forty minutes later every day, became high in the early morning, later and later as the days went on. The pilot took his sleep in bits and snatches, as and when he could. He could usually manage to get in two or three hours after the test development, and another two or three hours at some time in the night. After a day or two he found difficulty in sleeping in the daytime at irregular hours, and had to resort to his tablets to assist him in his daytime sleep. For that they worked all right, but they became less satisfactory for his night-time sleep. Once in the night, dead tired but wakeful, and with only two hours’ sleep to come, he took two tablets and slept heavily and well. He did not need to take two tablets the next night, because that was a refuelling day and he could get a stretch of over five hours on end; when next he took two tablets they had little effect. The next night, in desperation, with the survey all but finished, he took three.

Two and a half hours later the alarm rang in his ear till it ran down, but he did not wake up. After ten minutes Lockwood shook him gently by the arm, and then more vigorously. Then he called Alix from her tent.

T
HE pilot lay on his back in his sleeping-bag, with eyes closed and his tanned face drained of colour. The girl kneeled by him with her father; they shook him by the
shoulder, without effect. He was inert and limp; his respiration was regular, but low.

The girl said: “It’s a sort of a faint. Wait, and I’ll get some water.”

They sponged his face with the cold water from the stream, and raised his head. But he did not come round.

Lockwood was utterly at sea. “I’ve never seen anything like this before,” he muttered. “I suppose it’s just exhaustion.”

His daughter said: “It’s those wretched tablets he’s been taking, I should think.”

The don said sharply: “What tablets are those?”

“He got them at Reykjavik when he couldn’t sleep. He showed them to me once.”

“I never knew he was taking anything of that sort. Do you know where he kept them?”

There were not very many private places in the tent. After a short search Lockwood found the bottle; it was half empty. He read the label with interest and slipped it in his pocket. “Well, that’s the end of that,” he said grimly.

Alix said: “What do you think we’d better do, Daddy?” A hideous feeling of disaster was in the background of her mind.

Her father did not answer for a moment. He knelt there by the pilot staring down at him. They had laid him in what seemed a comfortable position with his head raised; his face was wet and dripping from the water. “I don’t know,” he said irresolutely. “I suppose we’ll have to wait till he comes round. How many of the damn things did he take?”

She shook her head. “I don’t know. I never liked to ask.”

They became aware of Ajago and Mayark peering in at them through the opening of the tent. Alix got up and went outside to them. Ajago said in Danish: “Rogg is ill.”