The mood stayed sepulchral. There were a few attempts to sing by both the officers in the freezing Great Room astern and the common seamen in their slightly warmer berthing space forward – there was not enough coal left in the hold-deck scuttles for extra heating even if it was Christmas – but the songs died after a few rounds. Lamp oil had to be conserved, so the lower deck had all the visual cheer of a Welsh mine illuminated by a few flickering candles. Ice covered the timbers and beams and the men’s blankets and wool clothing were always damp. Rats scuttled everywhere.
The brandy raised spirits some, but not enough to dispel the literal and emotional gloom. Crozier came forward to chat with the men, and a few handed him presents – a tiny pouch of hoarded tobacco, the carving of a white bear running, the exaggerated ursine cartoon face suggesting fear (given in jest, almost certainly, and probably with some trepidation lest the formidable captain punish the man for fetishism), a mended red-wool undershirt from a man’s recently deceased friend, an entire carved chess set from Marine Corporal Robert Hopcraft (one of the quietest and least assuming men on the expedition and the one who had been promoted to corporal after receiving eight broken ribs, a fractured collarbone, and a dislocated arm during the thing’s attack on Sir John’s hunting blind in June). Crozier thanked everyone, pressed hands and shoulders, and went back to the officers’ mess, where the mood was a little more lively thanks to First Lieutenant Little’s surprise donation of two bottles of whiskey he’d kept hidden for almost three years.
The storm stopped on the morning of 26 December. Snow had drifted twelve feet above the level of the bow and six feet higher than the railing along the starboard forward quarter. After digging the ship out and excavating the cairn-lined path between the ships, the men got busy preparing for what they were calling the Second Grand Venetian Carnivale – the first one, Crozier assumed, being the one he’d taken part in as a midshipman on Parry’s botch of a polar voyage in 1824.
On that midnight-black morning of 26 December, Crozier and First Lieutenant Edward Little left the supervision of the shoveling and surface parties to Hodgson, Hornby, and Irving and made the long walk through the drifts to Erebus. Crozier was mildly shocked to find that Fitzjames had continued to lose weight – his waistcoat and trousers were several sizes too large for him now despite more obvious attempts by his steward to take them in – but he was even more shocked during their conversation when he realized that Erebus’s commander was not fully paying attention most of the time. Fitzjames seemed distracted, rather like a man pretending to converse but whose actual attention was riveted on music being played in some adjoining room.
“Your men are dyeing sail canvas out on the ice,” said Crozier. “I saw them preparing large vats of green, blue, and even black dye. For perfectly good spare sail. Is this acceptable to you, James?”
Fitzjames smiled distantly. “Do you really think we shall need that sail again, Francis?”
“I hope to Christ we will,” grated Crozier.
The other captain’s serene and maddening little smile remained. “You should see our hold deck, Francis. The destruction has proceeded and accelerated since our last inspection the week before Christmas. Erebus would not stay afloat an hour in open water. The rudder is in splinters. And it was our spare.”
“New rudders can be jury-rigged,” said Crozier, fighting the urge to grind his teeth and clench his fists. “Carpenters can shore up sprung timbers. I’ve been working on a plan for digging a pit in the ice around both ships, creating dry docks about eight feet deep in the ice itself before the spring thaw. We can get to the outer hulls that way.”
“Spring thaw,” repeated Fitzjames and smiled almost conde-scendingly.
Crozier decided to change the subject. “You’re not worried about the men conducting this elaborate Venetian Carnivale?”
Fitzjames defied his gentleman’s heritage by shrugging. “Why should I be? I can’t speak for your ship, Francis, but Christmas on Erebus was an exercise in misery. The men need something to raise their morale.”
Crozier couldn’t argue the point about Christmas being an exercise in misery. “But a carnivale masque on the ice during another day of total darkness?” he said. “How many hands will we lose to the thing waiting out there?”
“How many will we lose if we hide in our ships?” asked Fitzjames. Both the small smile and the distracted air remained. “And it worked out all right when you had the first Venetian Carnivale under Hoppner and Parry in ’24.”
Crozier shook his head. “That was only two months after we were first frozen in,” he said softly. “And both Parry and Hoppner were fanatics about discipline. Even with all the frivolity and both captains’ love of theatrics, Edward Parry used to say, ‘masquerades without licentiousness’ and ‘carnivals without excess!’ Our discipline has not been so well maintained on this expedition, James.”
Fitzjames finally lost his distracted air. “Captain Crozier,” he said stiffly, “are you accusing me of allowing discipline to become lax aboard my ship?”
“No, no, no,” said Crozier, not knowing if he was accusing the younger man of that yet or not. “I am just saying that this is our third year in the ice, not our third month as it was with Parry and Hoppner. There’s bound to be some loss of discipline to go along with illness and sagging morale.”
“Would that not be all the more reason for allowing the men to have this diversion?” asked Fitzjames, his voice still brittle. His pale cheeks had coloured at his superior’s implied criticism.
Crozier sighed. It was too late to stop this God-damned masque now, he realized. The men had the bit in their teeth, and those on Erebus who were heading up the Carnivale preparations most enthusiastically were precisely those men who would be the first to foment mutiny should the time come. The trick as captain, Crozier knew, was never to allow that time to come. He honestly did not know whether this carnivale would help or hurt that cause.
“All right,” he said at last. “But the men have to understand that they may not waste even a lump, drop, or drip of coal, lamp oil, pyroligneous fuel, or ether for the spirit stoves.”
“They promise that it will be torches only,” said Fitzjames.
“And there’s no extra spirits or food for that day,” added Crozier. “We’ve just gone on the severely reduced rations today. We’re not changing that on the fifth day for a masque carnivale that neither of us fully endorsed.”
Fitzjames nodded. “Lieutenant Le Vesconte, Lieutenant Fairholme, and some of the men who are better than average rifle shots will go on hunting parties this week before the carnivale in hopes of finding game, but the men understand that it is rations as usual – or rather, the new, reduced fare – should the hunters return empty-handed.”
“As they have every other time in the past three months,” muttered Crozier. In a friendlier voice, he said, “All right, James. I’ll be getting back.” He paused at the doorway of Fitzjames’s tiny cabin. “By the way, why are they dyeing the sails green, black, and those other colours?”
Fitzjames smiled distractedly. “I have no idea, Francis.”