Chapter 13 Chapter Thirteen Franklin

(front missing) "He is my patient." Gu Deser spoke stubbornly and boldly.Sir John had never expected the little ship's doctor to be so obstinate. "I've got to get him where he can be operated on, and get the bullet out of him as much as possible. If not, at least stop the bleeding. Bring him in, thank you guys." The crew carrying the Eskimos looked at their expedition commander, wondering what to do.Sir John was momentarily bewildered beyond words. "Hurry up." Gu Deser ordered in a confident tone. The crew obviously took Sir John's silence as acquiescence, and carried the gray-haired Eskimo up the snow-drifted ramp and onto the deck of the Erebus.Goodser, the Eskimo girl, and some of the crew followed, some of whom supported young Hartney.

Franklin could hardly hide his fright and fear, and stood still looking down at Lieutenant Goer's body.Second Soldier Pikington and Sailor Morfin were untying the rope that fastened Guoer to the sled. "For God's sake," said Franklin, "cover his face." "Yes, sir," said Morfin.After a day and a half of driving on ice sheets and ridges, the Hudson Bay blanket had slipped from Goer's face, and now the sailor pulled it back up. Sir John could still see the hole in the handsome lieutenant's gaping mouth through the indentation of the red carpet. "Mr. DeVos," said Franklin quickly.

"Yes, sir." The second officer, DeVos, moved over and touched his forehead with his fingers. He had been supervising the crew to untie the ropes that bound the lieutenant's body.Franklin could see that the second officer, whose face was sunburned and turned red, was scarred by the wind, and had a beard and beard, was so tired that he could only salute. "You have to make sure that Lieutenant Guoer will be sent to his cabin, and then you and Mr. Shakin will prepare for his burial under the supervision of Lieutenant Fairhorn." "Yes, sir," DeVos and Fairhorn answered in unison.

Ferrell and Pikington, though exhausted, refused the assistance of others, and lifted the lieutenant's body.Guo Er's body was as stiff as firewood.One of his hands was bent, and the outstretched palm, blackened by sun or decay, looked like a claw frozen in the air, poised to grab prey. "Wait a minute," Franklin said.It occurred to him that if DeVos were to be dispatched, he would have to wait hours before he could hear the second-in-command of the party report to him formally, and that the hideous ship doctor had gone away with the two Eskimos. "Mr. DeVos," said Franklin, "after you have roughly arranged Lieutenant Gore's body, come to my cabin and find me."

"Yes, sir," replied the second mate wearily. "However, you can answer me first, who was Lieutenant Guo Er with in the end?" "All of us, sir," said DeVos, "but the last two days we've been on or near King William Land, Sailor Best was with him, just the two of them. Charlie knew Guo Everything Lieutenant Hall does.” "Very well," said Sir John. "Go and do what you have to do, Mr. DeVos. I shall hear your report shortly. Best, you come with me and Lieutenant Colonel Fitzgerald now." Walk together." "Yes, yes, sir," said the sailor, cutting the last leather cord from the harness, for he had no strength left to untie the knot.He didn't even have the strength to raise his hand in salute.

Seaman Charles Best stood, and addressed Sir John Franklin, Lieutenant Colonel Fitzjian, and Captain Crozier (the HMS Terror's captain, who happened to Visiting for other business) reported that the three Preston patented luxury skylights above their heads were opalescent from the light sourced by the constant sunlight throughout the day.Edmund Hall, Franklin's squire, also occasionally acted as secretary, sitting behind the officers to take notes.Best stood as a matter of course, and Crozier suggested that the weary man should be refreshed with a little brandy.Sir John looked disapproving, but he agreed to ask Lieutenant Colonel Fitzjian to bring out a little wine from his private collection.The spirits seemed to reinvigorate Best.

When Best, who was shaking slightly, was reporting, the three officers interrupted him with questions from time to time.As he described in detail the arduous journey to King William Land, Sir John could not resist urging him to skip to the events of the last two days. "Yes, sir. Well, after being attacked by lightning and thunder near the stele on the first night, we found... footprints, footprints... in the snow. We wanted to sleep for a few hours, but we couldn't, Guoer The lieutenant and I set off south with a little provisions, and Mr. DeVos took the sledge and what was left of the tent and poor Hartney, who was freezing cold at the time, in the other direction. We said to each other 'tomorrow After seeing', the Lieutenant and I headed south, and Mr. DeVos and his men headed toward the ice at sea."

"Have you any arms?" asked Sir John. "Yes, Sir John," said Best. "Lieutenant Gower has a pistol, and I have a shotgun. The other is in Mr. De Vos's party, and Private Pikington has a Mauser. .” "Tell us why Lieutenant Gore divided you into two teams," said Sir John. Best didn't know how to answer for a while, but then he got the hang of it. "Oh, he told us that he would follow your orders, sir. After the camp near the stele was destroyed by lightning and the tents were damaged, most of the team members had to go back to the temporary camp previously set up on the sea ice. Lieutenant Guo Er and I Keep going, intending to deposit the second message tube somewhere further south along the coast, and drop by to see if there's any unfrozen water to the south. Turns out there isn't any, sir. I mean, unfrozen. No doors at all. , don't even fucking think about it... you can't see a reflection of water under the dark sky."

"How far have you two traveled, Best?" Fitzjian asked. "By the time we got to Great Bay, Lieutenant Gore reckoned we'd walked four miles south across snow and frozen gravel. The bay was much like Beach Island Bay where we had wintered the year before. But you know, even though we It's on land, how hard it is to walk four miles in fog, wind, and ice, sir. We probably actually walked at least ten miles to make it four miles. The bay is frozen solid, and here As solid as a pile of ice. Here in the summer there is often a patch of clear water between the ice in the bay and the shore, but there isn't even a drop of water there. So we cross the opening of the bay, sir, along A raised headland went another quarter of a mile or so, and Lieutenant Gore and I set up a stele there, not as tall or as handsome as Captain Ross's, I'm sure, but solid, and high enough, It can be seen at a glance. We piled stones to eye level, and put in a second message file in a fine copper canister, which the lieutenant told me was exactly the same as the first."

"And then you turned around?" Crozier asked. "No, sir." Best said, "I admit that I had no strength at that time, and so did Lieutenant Goer. We walked really hard that whole day, and even the snow ridges were difficult to cross. There was heavy fog, and we only had occasional glimpses of the coast when the fog cleared a bit. It was mid-afternoon by the time we had erected the stele and put the message in, but Lieutenant Goer had to keep going south along the coast for six or seven miles .Sometimes we can see things, but most of the time we can't. We can hear, though."

"Hear what, boy?" asked Franklin. "Something that's stalking us, Sir John. There's a big thing that's breathing, and sometimes barks... You know, sir, like those white bears, like they're coughing?" "You recognized the sound of a bear?" Fitzjian asked. "You said you were the largest thing in sight on that piece of land. If a bear was following you, when the fog cleared a little, you would definitely see it." "Yes, sir," said Best.He frowned, as if he was about to cry. "What I mean is, no, sir. We can't be sure that's a bear, sir. Under normal circumstances, we might and should have seen it. But we didn't and couldn't see it. .Sometimes we hear it coughing right behind us, in the fog, fifteen feet from us, and I point the shotgun at it, and Lieutenant Goer loads his pistol. We wait, almost holding our breath Breathe. But when the fog cleared, we could see a hundred feet away, but we couldn't see anything there." "It must be an auditory hallucination," said Sir John. "Yes, sir," Best agreed, but in a tone that revealed that he did not understand Sir John's language. "The ice on the shore makes strange noises," said Sir John. "It might be the wind." "Oh, yes, yes, sir, Sir John," Best responded, "except there was no wind then. But the ice...then there is a possibility, sir. There is always a possibility." His tone was as if Saying it's impossible. Sir John changed the subject, looking a little annoyed. "Before you came in, you mentioned that Lieutenant Goer was dead...killed after you joined up with the other six people who were staying on the sea ice. You can go straight to this part." "Yes, sir. Well, it should be close to midnight when we go south as far as we go. The sky ahead of us has lost sight of the sun, but the sky glows golden... midnight here you It should be clear, Sir John. For a while the mist thinned and we climbed up a rocky knoll... not really a hill, but a plateau about fifteen feet above the flat frozen gravel all around... …We could see the coast meandering southwards to a blurry horizon, and often caught glimpses of icebergs that had piled up along the coast jutting out on the horizon. There was no water. Everything was frozen solid all the way down. So we turned around and headed back. We No tents or sleeping bags, just cold food to chew. I lost a tooth because of it. We're both very thirsty, Sir John. We have no stove to melt snow or ice, and only Lieutenant Gower A little water from the water bottle inside the coat and vest. "So we walked all night. We walked for an hour or two in the twilight of what was barely a night, and then we kept walking for hours, and five or six times I walked until I fell asleep, just going around in circles until Finally fell to the ground. Lieutenant Gore grabbed my arm, shook me, and led me in the right direction. We passed the freshly laid stele and crossed the bay. About the sixth bell, the sun climbed high in the sky , we walked to the place where we camped the night before, near the first stele, I mean the Sir James Ross monument. In fact, it should have been two nights ago, when we were hit by the first thunder and lightning When the blizzard hit. We kept going, following the sled trails on the icebergs off the shore, and then onto the sea ice again." "You say, 'the first blizzard with thunder and lightning,'" Crozier interrupted, "meaning there were other blizzards? There have been several blizzards here during your absence, but the most violent one The field seems to be in the south." "Oh, yes, sir," said Best, "even though the fog was thick, and the thunder would rumble every few hours, our hair blown out of our heads as if trying to get out of our heads, and whatever we had on us The metal -- the belt buckle, the shotgun, Lieutenant Goer's pistol -- would start to glow blue. We lay down on the gravel to find a place to squat and try to make ourselves a part of the ground while the world was all around us Explosions, like gunfire at Trafalgar, sirs." "You were in Trafalgar then, Sailor Best?" Franklin asked coldly. Best blinked. "No, sir. Of course not, sir. I'm only twenty-five, sir." "I was in Trafalgar, Sailor Best," said Sir John forcefully. "I was signal officer of the HMS Bellevon, and thirty-three of the forty officers on board were there. You were killed in this operation. Please restrain yourself, and in the next report, don’t use metaphors that you have not experienced, whether it is explicit or implicit.” "Yes, yes, sir... sir." Best stammered, his tone was not only tired and sad, but also tinged with fear of saying the wrong thing. "I'm sorry, Sir John. I didn't mean...I meant...I shouldn't...that is to say..." "Go on, sailor," said Sir John, "but just tell us what happened in the hours before Lieutenant Gore's death." "Yes, sir. Well... without the help of Lieutenant Gore--God bless him--I couldn't have climbed over the iceberg that was in the way, but we did eventually, and went straight to the sea ice, Headed towards Sea Camp, which was only about a mile or two from us, where Mr. DeVos and the others were waiting for us. But we got lost after a while." "How could you get lost?" Lieutenant Colonel Fitzjian asked. "Aren't you following the ruts of the sled?" "I don't know, sir," Best said, his voice languid with fatigue and sadness. "It was foggy. It was very foggy. Most of the time we couldn't see ten feet in any direction. The sun made everything sparkle and made everything look flat. I guess the same ice We may have climbed the ridge three or four times, and each time we climbed, our sense of direction became more confused. Plus on the sea ice, the snow was blown away by the wind in places, leaving no trace of the sledge boards. But as a matter of fact, sirs, I think that Lieutenant Goer and I both fell asleep on the way, and unknowingly lost the ruts of the sled." "Well," said Sir John, "go on." "Okay, next thing we heard gunshots..." Best went on. "Gunshots?" Lieutenant Colonel Fitzjian said. "Yes, sir. There were musket shots and there were shotgun shots. In the fog, the shots echoed around the icebergs and ridges. It sounded like shots were coming from all directions at the same time, but the shots were very close to us. .We started shouting hello in the fog, and soon DeVos answered our call. Thirty minutes later—the fog took so long to lift a little—we stumbled to sea camp. The team took advantage of our About thirty-six hours of my absence had the tent mended, roughly repaired, and pitched beside the sledge." "Is the shot going to lead you to them?" Crozier asked. "No, sir," Best said. "They're shooting bears and Eskimos." "Explain clearly," said Sir John. Charles Best licked his cracked and bumpy lips. "Mr. DeVos can explain it better than I can, sirs. Basically, they got back to sea camp the day before and found the cans all open and scattered and ruined. They thought it was a bear Good job, so Mr. DeVos and Dr. Goodser decided to shoot the bears that were sniffing around the campsite. Just before we got there, they shot a mother bear and her two cubs, which were being processed The meat. But they heard something moving around, sirs, much like the coughing and breathing in the fog I mentioned earlier. And then I guess it was the two Eskimos, the old man and his woman Walking over the ice ridge, but in the fog it looked like just more white fur. Private Pikington fired his musket, Bobby Furrell fired his shotgun. Furrell got neither Hit, but Pigeonden caught the man in the chest, and he fell. "By the time we got there, they'd taken the shot Eskimo, the woman, and some white bear meat back to camp on the sea ice, leaving trails of blood on the ice, sir, our last hundred or so yards Just follow the blood, and Dr. Goodser is saving the life of an old Eskimo." "Why?" asked Sir John. Best didn't know how to answer, and the others didn't speak. "Very well," said Sir John at last. "How long was it after you joined Second Mate DeVos and the rest of the camp before Lieutenant Gore was attacked?" "Not more than thirty minutes, Sir John, and probably less." "What provoked the opponent to attack?" "Provocation?" Best repeated.His eyes looked out of focus. "You mean, say, to shoot the white bear?" "I mean, what were the circumstances of the attack, Sailor Best?" said Sir John. Best touched his forehead and opened his mouth for a while before speaking. "Nothing set it off. I was talking to Tommy Hartney, and he was in the tent with his head bandaged, but he was sober, and he didn't remember it from sometime before the first lightning storm. Anything. Mr. DeVos was supervising Morfin and Ferrell setting up the two alcohol stoves to cook some bear meat. Mr. Goodser had already taken off the old Eskimo's fur coat and was about to Digging a horrible hole in the old man's chest. The woman had been watching, but I didn't see where she was standing, because the fog had thickened again. Second Soldier Pikington was standing by with a musket Waiting. Suddenly Lieutenant Goer yelled: 'Quiet, everyone!' We all shut up and stopped talking or working except for the hiss of the two alcohol stoves and the sound of melting snow bubbling over the cauldron, I guess We wanted to eat white bear meat stew. Then Lieutenant Goer took out his pistol, loaded the gunpowder, cocked the hammer, and walked a few steps away from the tent, and then..." Best stopped.His eyes were completely out of focus, his mouth was still open, and the saliva attached to his chin glistened.He looked at something that did not belong in Sir John's stateroom. "Go on," said Sir John. Best's mouth moved, but no sound came out. "Go on, sailor," said Captain Crozier in a softer voice. Best turned his head to Crozier, his eyes still fixed on something in the distance. "And then..." Best began, "and then...the ice just rose, Captain. Just rose, and surrounded Lieutenant Gore." "What nonsense are you talking about?" Sir John reprimanded after a moment of silence. "The ice cannot rise straight up. What do you see?" Best did not turn his head to Sir John. "The ice rose straight up, like we've seen with those ridges that pop up. Except it wasn't a ridge, it wasn't ice, it rose straight up and had a... shape. A white shape, a shape. I remember it had... claws, no arms, at least not at first, but claws, really big, and teeth. I remember those teeth." "That's a bear," said Sir John, "a polar white bear." Best just shook his head. "It's very high. That thing seems to rise from under Lieutenant Gore...surrounding Lieutenant Gore. It's really...high. Twice as tall as Lieutenant Gore. You know he's very tall compared to ordinary people , but the thing was bigger than him. When the thing...surrounded him..., Lieutenant Goer seemed to disappear. We shouted loudly, Morfin was lying on the ground looking for a shotgun, and the second soldier Pigginton ran away He pointed his musket at the thing, but he dared not shoot because the thing and the lieutenant were now one, and then...then we heard the crushing and breaking." "Is that bear biting the Lieutenant?" Lieutenant Fitzjian asked. Best blinked and looked at the ruddy lieutenant colonel. "Bit him? No, sir. The thing didn't bite him. I didn't even see its head...not counting. Just two black circles floating twelve or thirteen feet in the air...yes Black, but red, you know, like when a wolf turns its head at you and the sun hits its eyes just right. The sound of crushing and breaking is Lieutenant Goer's ribs, chest, arms The sound of breaking bones." "Did Lieutenant Gore cry out for help?" asked Sir John. "No, sir. He didn't make a sound." "Did Morfin and Pikindon shoot?" asked Crozier. "No, sir." "Why not?" Best smiled weirdly. "Why, there's nothing to shoot at all, Captain. A second ago, the thing was still there, rising above Lieutenant Gore and crushing him like you or I would crush a mouse. But then One second, and it's gone." "What do you mean it's gone?" demanded Sir John. "Couldn't Morfin and the Marines have shot at it as it fled back into the mist?" "Escape?" Best repeated.His eerie, uncomfortable smile became more pronounced. "The shape didn't run away, it just went back into the ice again, as if the sun went behind a cloud and the shadow of the thing suddenly disappeared. By the time we got to Lieutenant Gore, he was dead. His mouth was open. Big, but there was no time to scream. The fog had cleared by then. There were no holes or cracks in the ice. There were not even breathing holes for harp seals to breathe. Only Lieutenant Goer lay there, the whole The man was crushed. His chest was sunken, his hands were broken, and his ears, eyes, and mouth were bleeding. Dr. Goodser pushed us all away, but he couldn't do anything. Guo Er was dead, And it's starting to get as cold as the ice beneath him." Best's weird, obnoxious smile flickered in and out, his cracked lips trembling but still parted enough to show his teeth, and his eyes were even less focused than before. "You . . . " Sir John stopped, as Charles Best lay unconscious on the deck.