26. In which an order is given and there is a gamble
IN WHICH AN ORDER IS GIVEN AND THERE IS A GAMBLE
“It’s impossible,” Winston said, face grim. “The planks have opened five inches. I can’t—”
“Winston, you must. You can do anything. Please,” Hester said, but as she looked down upon Winston in the gloom, his head bowed and his shoulders slumped, she realised. Realised that he was right. She helped him out of the bilge with shaking hands and wrapped a blanket around his shoulders.
There was so much water flooding in.
Gallons upon gallons of it. She wasn’t sure if it was the biting cold or the pain in her heart that made her shake so.
“It’s too much now. She can’t take it. She’s done admirably,” he said, his voice cracking as he ran a hand down the wood panelling of the wall. He bundled her into his arms, squeezing tightly, and she let him. Leant against him and let him hold her up as her legs threatened to buckle beneath her.
A great grinding and banging had her covering her ears, and the floorboards ratcheted, twisting and splintering.
“No,” Hester whispered. Winston’s arms wrapped her tighter, his heart beating beneath her hands. She wanted time to slow, to reverse, even. To go back to the days of sailing on the open sea, the salt breeze in her hair and the sun on her face, the wheel under her palms.
She bit back a sob.
Winston brushed her hair back from her face. “I know. I know what she meant to you.”
“Everything. She means everything.” She hardly knew which way was up, a yawning trench of grief opening inside of her.
“There will be another ship, somewhere out there. Somehow.”
She shook her head. Wanted him to stop talking. “How could there be? I could never afford—”
“Don’t think about it now. There are things to do. To prepare.”
He pulled her along beside him, holding her up.
They passed through the corridors that she could navigate blindfolded, up the companionway steps, dodging the ones she knew would squeak, and out to the deck, grey clouds blanketing the sky.
She paused for a moment, laying her hands on the wheel, running her fingers along every knot in the wood, like old friends she had memorised the feel of.
The two crews were hurrying about the deck, though the Valour’s crew were slower, more wary. Fliss approached, her mouth set in a grim line, arms folded.
“What’s happening?” Hester asked.
Fliss gestured to the port deck. “Septimus gave the order to lower the lifeboats and to get the dogs and stores onto the ice.”
“He what?”
The starboard boats had both been lowered.
Red hot rage filled her veins. She whirled to the port deck, where Septimus was overseeing the lowering of the two boats there. What the fuck was he doing with her boats?
She ducked out of Winston’s arm and marched over. “What in Holy Hell are you doing?”
He did not look at her. “Lowering the boats, what does it look like I’m doing?”
“I don’t remember dying and you becoming captain.”
He turned to face her and said smoothly, “That’s right, you didn’t die. Because I saved you. It was time to lower the boats, and you were nowhere to be found.”
He had not just thrown that in her face, had he? “I was helping fix the leaks! You are not in charge here. You do not give the orders on my ship.”
“What does it matter, who gives the order?” He scoffed. “And who names their lifeboats such: Death, Tempest, Misfortune and Thirteen. What a stupid joke.”
“I wouldn’t expect you to understand my sparkling wit and wry humour. And don’t change the subject. You know as well as I do that it matters.”
Septimus threw his hands up. “Would you have me take them back up, then?”
Hester snarled and stepped closer, fisting her hands into the breast of his coat. “No.”
A memory flashed into her mind. That night in Havenport when he had tied her to the chair on the Intrepid and leant over her, his hands either side of her shoulders. And the words he had spoken then. I will sink the Valour.
She shoved him backwards. “I suppose you’re happy now?”
He scowled, fists clenched, jaw tight. “What on Earth do you mean?”
“Isn’t this what you wanted? You threatened this. You threatened to sink her, and now she is sinking. She is dying. I hear her screams.”
“You are raving. Why in God’s name would I be happy about any of this?”
“Hester, come. Fighting won’t help. Come and cool off,” Fliss said, laying a hand on Hester’s shoulder.
She shook it off. Could not bear Fliss touching her, could not bear the deep knife-wound to her heart that she felt whenever Fliss was around. “He is undermining me! He thinks women shouldn’t be on expeditions such as this. Shouldn’t make the decisions, shouldn’t captain a ship.”
Septimus bristled. “That’s not—”
Hester drew her fist back and threw a punch towards his face. Septimus deflected it with a forearm and stepped back. “Get a hold of yourself, witch,” he hissed.
But Hester couldn’t quell the rising need to hurt something, anything. A red haze descended as she replayed those memories of his threats and his taunts and his accusations. Every muscle in her was tense, ready to fight.
“I hate you,” she bellowed as the deck arched.
“Make your mind up,” he muttered, turning back to the lifeboats.
Winston dragged her back, though she fought against him until he cried out, clutching his face where she’d hit him. She stopped and placed a hand on each side of his face, kissing his nose, and then sank into his arms, sobbing.
“Winston, I’m sorry,” she said between breaths of burning cold. “Make it better. My heart hurts. You always fix things for me.”
“I know,” he said, holding her close. “Come on, you need to be strong for the crew. Can you do that?”
Hester took a deep breath and nodded. She wiped away her tears, thankful again that her magic had dwindled to nothing and would not conjure a storm.
She took the comfort that Winston offered, sinking into him, balling her fists in his coat, pressing her forehead into his chest. “It is only a matter of time now.”
October 27th 1915, Weddell Sea
“She’s going, boys,” Hester said, the ship shuddering around her, the darkness suffocating.
Winston and Rufus put their arms around her shoulders, and they walked from the companionway to the deck.
The roar of brine rushing into the hull made her shiver, and they clambered over the broken deck planks, a sickening sensation leeching into her stomach.
Some of the planks were pointing skywards, sticking out from the once-smooth deck like jagged shark teeth, pointing towards the blanket of stars that swept across the night sky.
They descended the ramp, Hester leading the way to the gathered crews milling about on the ice, the dogs barking, their breath clouding in the night air. Was it the last time she would be on board? It seemed likely.
“Get the tents up, and then we’ll discuss the plan that Peggy and I have drawn up,” Hester said. It was a numb sort of feeling. As though her thoughts had stopped moving.
“You will run the plan by me before you tell the men,” Septimus said, his arms folded.
“And women,” Fliss said, hands on her hips.
Septimus glowered. “Don’t remind me.”
Hester turned from Fliss. Couldn’t look her in the eye. Missed her worse than a lost limb. She turned to Septimus. “You haven’t asked very nicely, so…no,” Hester snapped, striding off to help pitch the first tent. She was aware of how she sounded. Childish. But then again, she didn’t care.
Septimus grabbed her arm, hauling her back, his fingers digging in. “Involve me in the decisions, witch.”
She relished the tight pain. Did not pull away. “Like you involved me in yours? When you had my lifeboats lowered to the ice?”
He snarled. “I did that because I deemed it urgent, and I didn’t know where you were. And because I thought—I thought we were a team.”
“You didn’t look very hard for me.” Hester snatched her arm back and stalked off again. A team. Maybe they’d been close to that. But not close enough.
“Stop being infuriating!”
“It is you who is the infuriating one, let me assure you,” Hester shouted, stabbing a finger towards him. “I have just abandoned my ship. Did you feel like talking to anyone after the Intrepid sank? No. So leave me alone.”
“Fine. I’ll leave you alone for now, but in future I will be included in the plans.”
“Fine,” Hester said with a sneer.
“Fine.”
“You already said fine.”
Septimus turned away. “Shut up.”
Hester flipped her middle finger up at his back and left him standing there. She shook a canvas tent and poles from a bag and stomped her way over the ice to spread the canvas, yanking at it with venom.
She seethed, hissing like Satan. Knew she should have involved him, but the stunt he’d pulled two days ago when he’d lowered her boats had left her reeling.
She couldn’t understand why he’d done it.
An unwanted vision of him pressing her against the wall in the Ritz stole across her thoughts, and she kicked at the snow again and again until Winston came over and stopped her, placing his hands on her shoulders.
His grey eyes met hers. “That’s not going to get the tent up, is it?”
“No,” she huffed, her chest heaving.
“I can’t imagine how you must be feeling, but let us help.”
He was right. None of them could imagine how she felt.
Apart from Septimus. Which was galling because she could hardly go to him.
She laughed hysterically at the idea and gazed back at the Valour, lying mortally hurt in the ice.
And as the ship sank further into the sea, so did Hester’s hopes and dreams for her future.
There would be no more adventures. No shimmering sense of endless possibility.
Who even was she without the Valour? She closed her eyes and dropped to her knees.
Crunching footsteps drew closer, and someone crouched in front of her. She opened her eyes to find Mei there, and her eyes held a softness she had never seen before.
“Hester,” Mei said gently. “I’m going to light the stove and make hot milk, and we’re going to put the tents up. That’s all you have to think about right now. Putting the tents up. The rest will come later. Come on now. One step at a time.”
Mei and Winston hauled her to her feet, and Hester numbly began erecting the tent, blocking out all thoughts as she worked.
Half an hour later the tents were up, and the crew stood around waiting to be assigned to quarters.
“Alright,” Hester called, hardening her heart against her woes.
“Tent number one, Myself, Winston, Mei and Rufus.” She supposed she’d have to ensure that her back was covered when she slept, to hide the wings that seemed to appear every night.
“Tent two, Fliss and Emlyn.” She glanced up at Fliss, whose eyes were red and puffy.
Emlyn had his arm wrapped around her, heads leant together.
Fliss would be devastated about the Valour too.
But what comfort could she offer that Emlyn couldn’t?
Her throat tightened, and she continued, “Tent three, Betty, Peggy, Valerie. Tent four, Arnold and the Boss.”
Hester’s eyes darted to Arnold and Charlotte.
It was a gamble. If she was wrong, Charlotte would be rightly enraged.
But Hell, she wanted someone to be happy.
Maybe forcing the matter was crude, but she knew Charlotte.
Knew she would never make a move, and Arnold was being far too chivalrous—it wasn’t like him at all, which only cemented the idea she had that he was hopelessly in love.
Arnold’s glee at the announcement was poorly disguised, but Charlotte hurried towards her.
“Hester—did you get that right? It seems most inappropriate,” Charlotte whispered.
“Marjorie won’t fit anywhere else. You’ll have to share with Arnold,” Hester said.
The look of panic on Charlotte’s face almost had her going back on the decision.
But no, she cared about Charlotte. Wanted her to find happiness.
“There is no other option. It’ll be fine, don’t fret.
” She turned away before Charlotte could argue.
The Intrepid’s crew were wandering over after setting out their own camp, and Mei was passing out hot milk.
Hester dredged up her finest attempt at bravado and addressed the crews, “Firstly, thank you all for the steadfastness and good morale you have shown over the two-hundred and eighty-one days that we have been stuck in the pack ice.” A cheer went up, mugs of milk clinking together, though Septimus glowered on the edge of the group, arms folded and shoulders hunched.
“We are three-hundred and forty-six miles from Paulet Island, where the Argentine government keeps a supply shed. We will aim there.” She put her hands on her hips. “And then we go home.”