Death on the Ice by Robert Ryan Read Free Book Online Page A

was, she felt overstuffed and overmanned. Which made for short tempers.
    There was worse than a few squabbles and the skipper’s sharp tongue, however. The ship leaked. Not a little, but prodigiously. Because of the hull’s complex, multi-layered structure, the source of the tons of seawater washing around its innards proved maddeningly elusive. Re-caulking had not solved the problem. The bilge pump could barely cope. Furthermore, she was a greedy beast. The engines consumed coal as if it were plankton being fed to a great whale.
    Scott stood on the open bridge. They were two days out of Funchal, steaming south, and he knew his timetable was crumbling, even though he was still so very far from the ice. It was certainly partly Discovery ’s fault. The ship pitched and rolled in the deep ocean swell, all wasted motion. The large overhanging bow, designed to crack polar ice, and the bulbous stern gave her excessive buoyancy. As they had found in the Bay of Biscay, a following sea could lift and turn her like a stray cork. Learning to keep her safe and stable would require a strong nerve and plenty of practice.
    He could sense the strain of the engines through his feet, a rough vibration, like a horse tiring, its breathing becoming ragged. Smoke streamed from the funnel, thick and gritty, as if the fuel was only half burned. She needed much more efficient engines. The current ones had cost ten thousand pounds. He couldn’t help but feel they had been nutmegged.
    It was at moments like this that Scott could sense the brown fog of melancholy rolling through his brain. He could fight it off, with an effort of will, but it left him tired and short tempered. Yet he could not let the men see what a struggle it was for him to remain organised and steadfast. They simply assumed he was a martinet.
    He examined the sky between the rigging and masts. It was a rich blue, dappled with feathery dabs of white cloud and the cruciforms of the curious petrels still following them. Despite the rather unpredictable swell, it was good sailing weather; the canvas was filled, giving some assistance to those feeble engines. But it wouldn’t last.
    At the end of his watch in the crow’s nest, Armitage had pointed to a dark streak in the West, a strip of charcoal scribbled over the sky. He had warned that it could be something building and indeed, it had grown blacker in the past hour. If not that storm, then some other would catch them. How would the ship respond?
    ‘Skipper.’
    Scott started, plucked from his reverie when Shackleton stepped up on to the bridge, his face pearled with spray. Fully aware of his captain’s habit of daydreaming, Shackleton wiped his eyes clear and waited while Scott composed himself. He handed Scott the coal consumption figures he had been asked to fetch from Skelton, the engineer. Scott groaned. They were worse than he thought.
    ‘Thank you.’
    Shackleton stepped forward, keeping his voice low. ‘Sir, you know the men were expecting a briefing at Madeira.’
    ‘Were they?’ Scott screwed up the paper into a ball. ‘What gave them that impression?’
    ‘There was a rumour.’
    ‘If only we could use rumour to feed the engines.’ He held up the crumpled consumption figures. ‘I think we need to address this first.’
    ‘How? We can hardly re-coal in the Southern Ocean. What do you propose?’
    Scott tutted. No RN officer under his command would make so bold as to ask such a question. ‘Will you watch your tongue, Mr Shackleton. You aren’t with Union Castle now. All in good time. All in good time.’
    The Discovery gave a lurch as an oblique roller sideswiped her. Scamp, Scott’s Aberdeen terrier, lost her footing and there was the sound of claws scrabbling on wood as she slid into Scott’s ankles. He scooped the animal up and stroked its wiry muzzle. The dog whimpered appreciatively. ‘So tell the galley to break out some of the lamb we loaded at Funchal for this evening. And the