CHAPTER FIFTEEN
"Damn slop. I'm frozen above the knees and mired in quicksand below. You've combined the worst of two worlds, Owen: you've found a subzero bog. This is as much fun as a prostitute with cast-iron underwear."
"You speak from experience, Fritz?"
The little German dragged on a cigarette. "No, I can simply imagine the worst. It's a talent, like finding the only beach in Antarctica that's so warm you wallow in it. Jesus! Mud in an icebox!"
Hart ignored the ribbing. He felt good. He'd slept and then wakened to find the Schwabenland anchored in the volcanic caldera. A boat fetched the two aerial scouts for a hot breakfast. Everyone was jubilant at having found a temporary safe harbor and Greta kissed both Owen and Jürgen on the cheek. The relief was quickly undercut by the report of corpses on the Bergen, of course, but the wrecked whaler was also a perverse reminder that the Germans weren't entirely alone in the world. "We may be able to salvage items we need for repair," Heiden said.
Safety was the first question. The expedition leaders, including Greta, rowed over to the Norwegian ghost ship to investigate the mysterious tragedy. At Schmidt's insistence they went gloved and masked against possible disease. "Don't touch anything you don't have to," he warned.
Hart was content to watch them go, wanting no part of a return to the gloomy Bergen. Instead he volunteered to explore the island for other clues to the whalers' fate. Now he was off the cramped ship and on the crater beach with Fritz, who in truth seemed to relish the freedom as much as the pilot did. The sailor's complaint was understandable, however: the shore was as peculiar as the island's snug harbor. It steamed from a seep of hot mineral water that made the black volcanic sand mushy instead of frozen. Walking was laborious.
The weather had improved, the overcast breaking up. Hart preferred not risking the Boreas in a takeoff in the confined crater— it would be safer to wait for a catapult launch out at sea, he advised— but was willing to climb to the crater rim for a better look at where they were. Heiden had confirmed when arriving by ship that the island consisted of two major volcanic peaks and the usual mantle of snow and glaciers but knew little beyond that. "Perhaps our mishap will prove fortunate if this sheltered harbor can serve as a future base," the captain had mused at breakfast. "Look around with that in mind, Hart." It was the same benefit-from-adversity line spouted by Jürgen Drexler. Maybe the Germans taught it in school.
"Cheer up, Fritz," the pilot now said. "I'm going to take you out of this mud." He pointed to the crater rim, at least two thousand feet above them. "Should be good walking, once we get on top."
The little German let his head tilt back to study the snow-patched pumice slope. The sheltered caldera and its heat apparently prevented the heavy accumulation of snow normally encountered in Antarctica. "God in heaven." He took another drag on his cigarette. "Perhaps you've confused me with those mountain Nazis. I went to sea to stay out of the infantry, my friend."
"No confusion. I asked for you because you're the better conversationalist."
"Ha! A donkey's ass makes better conversation than those robots. As if I'll have breath to gasp a word anyway."
"Exactly. Every trial has its benefits. You Germans keep telling me that."
"If you're relying on Germans for advice you've been on the ship too long."
They started up. The mud ended immediately but the pumice was like climbing a sand dune. Their feet slid backward and puffs of ocher dust colored their trousers. They began aiming for patches of snow, preferring to kick-step their way up frozen crust. The ship's motor launch had landed them on the western, seaward side of the crater. Hart's plan was to climb to the top, follow the rim around to where it faced the other volcano— giving an interior view of the island— and then descend to the opposite eastern crater shore.
Climbing was hard, slogging work. They shed their parkas and paused frequently to rest, the ships shrinking to toys beneath them. The Schwabenland churned out a steady stream of water. The crew had wrapped its breach with canvas to let the pumps get ahead of the leakage, but a more permanent repair was required before they returned to sea.
Cold wind at the crater rim swiftly went from refreshing to chilling and they put their parkas back on. The ocean beyond the crater was indigo this day, dotted with icebergs and fractured platters of sea ice. Far to the south the mountains of the Antarctic mainland formed a serrated wall. Across the caldera lagoon the peak of the other volcano poked higher than their own, still gently steaming. The raw beauty, the wild emptiness, the crisp tug of the air: all were like an intoxicating drug to the pilot. For a moment life seemed scrubbed clean again. The horror of the Bergen and the insane battle with the Aurora Australis could be forgotten.
"Gorgeous, eh, Fritz?"
"Aye." The seaman was still breathing heavily. "Though it would be better with palm trees. And a stein of beer."
They started around the crater ridgeline of hardened lava and crusted snow. Looking down, Hart saw some of the troops carrying shrouded bodies out of the half-sunken whaler. They were ferrying them ashore by longboat.
The pair reached the opposite side of the rim at noon and sat down to eat and drink. The need to fight dehydration reminded Hart of the importance of fresh water to any future German base. Melting snow or glacial ice was laborious. Here, perhaps, the earth's heat would provide a more convenient source. Studying that portion of the crater lit by the low Antarctic sun, he indeed saw liquid water emerging from a point halfway up its inner slope. The stream sank back into the pumice before reaching the crater lagoon but the beach beneath steamed with heat. They'd take a closer look on the way back down, he decided.
A peculiar valley linked their truncated cone to the higher, steeper volcano that still steamed. Hart had heard talk of Antarctic dry valleys but this was the first one he'd seen: a long cleft between knifelike igneous ridges with a frozen lake at its bottom. The surrounding pumice slopes and basalt outcrops looked as barren as Mars. Unlike the rest of the island some combination of wind, heat, and low precipitation kept the valley almost entirely snow-free. It reminded Hart of deserts he'd visited in Arizona.
"I wonder what keeps the snow out."
"Elves." Fritz grunted, tired enough to have sprawled on the rocky ridge with his pack for a pillow and his face turned to the chilly sun. "Lava. A toll gate. Who cares?"
"You don't want to investigate?"
"I don't see any women down there, do you?"
"Where's your spirit of adventure, Fritz?"
"With my respect for your leadership. Lost in the first five hundred feet of that damned pumice slope."
They started back down the inside of the crater. Rather than aim for the beach where he intended to be picked up, Hart angled for the silvery cord of the emerging stream. It originated from shadow at the base of a rocky outcrop on the crater wall.
"A cave," he announced. The water emerged from a spring on the crater flank, steaming in the cold. Just behind the small pool was a dark, tunnel-like opening. "Lava tube, it looks like. I've seen them in the West. Magma runs through them and empties out, leaving a cave behind."
"So it goes into the mountain?" Fritz asked. "Stinks like it." There was a faint odor of sulfur.
"Maybe." Hart took out a tin drinking cup to dip some water, gingerly putting his finger in first. "Warm, but not too hot." Then he sniffed, making a slight face. "Minerals." He offered it to the German. "Smell it."