We don’t know much about animals’ capacity for hope. We do know that they grieve, that they are joyful and playful and mischievous and clever. We’ve seen animals work together toward a common goal, and we’ve seen them use tools to get what they want. Despite what many believe, they are not so different from us.
Yet we can’t know their hearts and minds; we can only watch their behaviors. One winter, I watched an Adélie penguin minding her nest during an unexpected snowstorm. Soon covered with snow herself, she didn’t move. Her eggs would never hatch, and even if they did, her newborn chicks would freeze, or drown—but still she didn’t leave them. Was this instinct? Or was it hope? Did she wish, as I’m wishing now, for something that by all accounts would be nothing short of miraculous?
During the journey home, I remain confined to my bunk. I don’t sleep, though I need the rest, and with every sway and dip through the Drake, I cling to the sturdy wooden slats of the bunk and dare to hope—even as part of me wonders whether hope is only a blind instinct as well.
And, with nothing but time to think, I try to piece together what happened to Keller.
Richard must have still had medication in his system, and he was apparently suffering from some mad, misplaced belief that he was helping the rescuers—whatever the reason, he decided to go back into the water to search for that elusive person he’d been obsessed with rescuing. Kate said he seemed desperate to assist, to prove he could do something good, perhaps to make up for his rock-climbing stunt on Deception Island, which he still felt bad about.
She’d seen Richard getting into a Zodiac with Keller, and she’d shouted after him, but they were too far away to hear. She saw Keller and Richard arguing, Keller pointing back toward the Cormorant several times, then finally tossing up his hands, as if he realized he couldn’t argue with Richard anymore. Then they took off in the Zodiac. That was the last Kate saw of them.
They must’ve been heading for the Australis, looking for more victims, dodging the pack ice, their path steadily growing narrower. From what Glenn told us, the ice had closed in after the Cormorant retreated to Detaille, making rescue efforts nearly impossible. At that point, only one other small cruise ship had arrived to help.
Keller would have been constantly stopping and backing up, turning around to try to find a good route. I can see him clearly in my mind—the weight of each passing moment on his tensing shoulders, the reluctance to let even one opportunity to find more survivors slip by. When one route dead-ended in a sheet of ice, he would try another, and then another.
At some point, Keller took off his life jacket and gave it to Richard.
This I know because Kate said when Richard got into the Zodiac, he wasn’t wearing a life jacket, but Keller was. Richard’s body was found only because he was buoyed by a life preserver, and the fact that Keller has not been found is likely because he wasn’t.
Keller, still determined, would aim their rubber boat into the narrow channels of ice, firing forward at full force, the ice tearing at the sides, scraping as it broke away beneath them. He would know that the Zodiac’s multiple compartments allowed for some damage, and that, at a time like this, saving lives was more important than salvaging a rubber boat. He would push ahead, and gradually the ice would begin to loosen its grip as the river widened. They would emerge into a broad lake of liquid that allowed them to turn back in the direction of the Australis.
Keller would have been too focused on the ice ahead to pay much attention to Richard. And Richard, unable to think clearly, would have been focused only on finding that survivor he thought he’d left behind. Was it possible he’d seen something that wasn’t there? I remember Keller’s words: It’s thanks to his delusion about someone else being out there that we found you.
Is it possible to hate Richard for finding me, and losing Keller?
During the course of the rescue, I heard crew members say they’d glimpse a body writhing on the ice and approach it through the fog and snow only to find, once they got closer, that it wasn’t a human but a seal. Or they’d see a jacket floating by, only to fish it out and discover it empty.
I don’t know what could have gotten Keller out of the safety of the Zodiac without a life jacket unless it was to help someone. Someone who was there, or someone who Richard thought was there.
Keller would kill the engine, bring the Zodiac up hard against the side of the ice—and this is where I’m at a loss.
I can only surmise that Richard believed he saw something, and that Keller believed him, too. I envision Keller on the ice, looking around.
Perhaps he did see someone. Or Richard insisted someone was there. Maybe he pointed, and Keller ventured forward, walking gingerly, peering into the water from a safe distance away.