Each of the next three days the party travelled eighteen miles or more, often walking knee-deep in freezing water or stumbling through rotten ice that sliced at their clothing and skin. There was near total silence among them but for the encouragement shouted by Buchan and they moved forward with the somnambulant expressions of sleepwalkers. Partway through each day’s march Peyton lost all feeling in his legs and feet and watched them moving as if they belonged to another man’s body. Even Richmond seemed to have exhausted his reserves and plodded stupidly ahead, sometimes falling to his hands and knees. At night most of the group complained of swollen legs and Buchan had them rub their calves with a mixture of rum and pork grease, which offered some relief. Each night one or more of the party started awake from a dream of Butler’s perfectly blond head on a stake, of Bouthland’s eyes as dead and sightless as the mole on his cheek. Some tried desperately to stay awake then for fear of where their dreams would take them, but exhaustion always pulled them under. In the morning Buchan roused each man personally and he worried at their heels throughout the day to keep them out of the river and moving towards the coast.
On the last leg of the trip, when they were in sight of Little Peter’s Point and only a few hours’ heavy slogging from the Adonis, a peculiar elation came over the group. The men shouted encouragement back and forth to one another and laughed when they stumbled and spoke incessantly of the food they would eat and the hours they would sleep when they gained the ship, as if all they had been through on the river was a nightmare they’d suddenly woken from together. Even the wrenching guilt of abandoning the marines naked and beheaded on the lake left them briefly.
Already the men had begun remembering the expedition as a series of distinct episodes, the words for the tales they wanted to tell beginning to form in their minds. It was knowing they would live to recount them to others that made them giddy and filled them with a strangely inarticulate hope those last hours on the River Exploits. Like everyone else around him, Peyton felt drained and perfectly clear, bleached of everything but the urge to speak. All the way across the Arm with the Adonis in sight, he thought only of seeing Cassie, of looking her in the face and saying, “Listen to me now. I have a story to tell you.”
SEVEN
The governor leafed through the report as Buchan ate his meal. He had returned from wintering in England only days before and was still trying to digest the news that awaited him. He sipped distractedly at a glass of brandy but hadn’t bothered to order food himself. He had no appetite.
“I blame myself for this,” Duckworth said. He lifted the papers he was reading from and shook them gently.
Buchan set his fork and knife across the plate and placed his forearms on the table. He bowed his head slightly. “It was bad luck,” he said. “Bad luck all around.”
Duckworth nodded at the papers again.
“They were afraid, Your Worship. They acted out of fear.”
The governor said, “I blame myself for this.”
“I will not allow you —”
“Don’t patronize me, Lieutenant.” Duckworth lifted his brandy to his mouth and held the glass under his nose. “David,” he said softly. “Marie is keeping well, I hope.”
“Fine, yes.”
“And the girl?”
“Couldn’t be better, by the last correspondence I received. I hope to have them join me if I’m to be posted here longer than another year.”
Duckworth set his glass back on the table. He drummed his fingers against the wood. He wondered how much longer he was likely to be here himself. “Would you like to stay?”
Buchan was wiping his mouth with a napkin. He looked at the governor. “What I would like,” he said, “is to have the opportunity to return to the Red Indian’s lake.”
“Out of the question.” Duckworth pressed a hand to his stomach as if he’d suffered a sudden stab of pain. “It is plainly too dangerous.”
“Those men died in the course of duty.”
“They died in the course of a reckless expedition undertaken to satisfy my own personal whims.”
Buchan smiled across the table. “You do yourself a disservice, Governor. Which I understand completely, but will not condone.”
“Lieutenant.”
“We have always known that risk accompanies the righteous course.”
“Goddamn it man,” Duckworth shouted and then caught himself. “Goddamn it,” he said again, barely above a whisper. He pointed a finger across the table. “You cannot have stood over those men lying headless on that lake — headless, Lieutenant — you cannot have witnessed that and be so sanguine.”
“The most sensible way I can think to honour the memory of my marines, Governor, is to carry on in this endeavour until we are successful.”
Duckworth shook his head and turned away, as if he was trying to avoid an unwanted kiss. “You are still a young man in these things, I see.”
Buchan picked up his knife and fork. “Now it is you who patronize me.”
“There will not be another expedition to the winter camps. It is too dangerous.” Duckworth sighed. “My constitution will simply not survive it,” he said.
“For now, I will accept that. But I want permission to return this summer, to try again to make contact with the smaller bands on the coast. I think it would be prudent to have a presence among the settlers besides. In case any among them are planning to exact their own measure of revenge.”
The governor helped himself to a huge mouthful of brandy. “This job will be the death of me,” he said.
Buchan nodded. “Thank you,” he said.