‘It’s not far,’ she says.
‘Good. I’m too old for walking.’
She doesn’t reply, just keeps walking. She drags me along, almost. Not that I’m reluctant. I can’t help noticing she’s wearing even less than yesterday, not that it should matter. But to a man, it always matters.
And then we’re here. She lets us into the nondescript, whitewashed house. She doesn’t stop, walks straight through to the kitchen and opens the back door. Except it’s not the door to a garden. It leads into a glass tunnel that takes us across the grass into a red-brick building. We step into a huge space. It must have been a factory at some point.
Even on this dark November day, the light is bright in here. White walls hung with huge canvases. Some are covered in angry lines, some in broad, bold strokes. Others are barely marked, just the occasional interruption of white by black or bright colour. And, in between the monumental ones, small pictures break the pattern with their miniscule details, their chatter of pencils and brushes.
‘This is where I live,’ she says. She spreads her arms out wide and turns in two circles. ‘Not in there.’ She points back down the tunnel. ‘Like it?’
‘You are that Storm Moon, then. What can I say?’
‘Not a lot, I guess.’
‘Where?’
‘Just drop your stuff anywhere. We need to talk.’
I do as I’m told. I put down my bag and coat where I’m standing. She’s already moved off into one of the spaces leading off the hall. I follow. She’s in control. I just can’t work out why. Except that I suppose I’d do anything she asked me to. It’s ridiculous to be enthralled by someone so young and tiny and unpredictable.
This room is nothing less than a library. Shelves and books stretch up to the ceiling, all round the windows and above. There’s even one of those classic push-along ladders. Old books and new litter the shelves, spines whole, spines broken, leather, paper, cardboard. The scent of paper fills the room. I feel a sense of excitement. And, dancing in front of the shelves, is that blonde elf, exuberant, commanding, dangerous.
‘You’ll read all these, then?’ she says. ‘So I can be sure you’re committed? So I know I can trust you?’
‘Committed?’
‘You said you were, when you called me. You said you were convinced that this mystery should be solved, that you were addicted. Didn’t you? Didn’t you?’ She stomps up to me, stares at me, her breath hot.
‘Well, yes, but –’
‘No buts. Yes or no?’ she shouts. I need to know. You’re no use to me if you’re not really up for this.’
‘Calm down.’ I move towards her, but she’s too quick for me. ‘Explain this properly.’
She sprints out into the hall again. ‘You explain it,’ she shouts. ‘You tell me what all this is about. You said you knew. You said it. Prove it.’
I give up trying to chase her. I stand there, with my hands on my hips. Does she have any medication she ought to be taking? This craziness might be a bit much, even for me. The thought crashes out of my head as she rushes from one picture to the other, nose up to one, then leaning back from another, skidding and sliding, and her shoes screeching on the wooden floor. And her clothes are so tight I can see every muscle move, bend and flex.
‘You asked me if the mystery interested me,’ I say as calmly as I can. Because she takes my breath away. ‘And it does. From what I’ve read so far.’
‘You mean you weren’t up all night wondering about it?’ She races past me, out of reach.
‘I Googled you last night. And went to see a friend.’
‘What’s her name? What’s her name? Don’t care. Not listening.’
‘It’s a he. And I talked about you.’
‘About me? Not about Henry and the others? Or about those ten days?’
Why’s she not breathless yet? How can she keep racing and talking? How can she be running rings around a man who’s so much older than her, mentally and physically?
‘I don’t want you to talk about me. I don’t want anyone to talk about me. I’m not important. This is what’s important. And those days. Nothing else matters. It musn’t matter. Promise you won’t tell anyone you know who I am.’ She flails at me, drapes her arms round my shoulders. She’s going to faint. ‘Help me, Adam. Please help me.’
‘What can I do when you behave like this?’
She pushes me away. ‘I’m not mad,’ she barks. ‘Just this. Me.’
‘Are you serious about me reading all those books?’
‘You need to know what you’re letting yourself in for.’
‘Reading a load of books, obviously. But you’ve already read them.’
‘You forget one thing,’ she calls across from the largest canvas in the room.
‘What’s that?’
‘Getting there,’ she whispers. ‘Getting there.’
‘What?’
The last echo of our exchange passes away down the tunnel. We both stand still. I don’t speak. What does she mean? I didn’t say I wanted to go out there, to that cold place. People die out there. I don’t want to die. Hell, look where my idiotic attraction to younger women has got me.
She’s probably a psychopath. How many blokes have fallen for this and never got away? This place is big enough to hide any number of bodies.
‘We need to go out there to solve this. We need to find Scott’s tent.’
‘What? How are you going to find it after almost a hundred years? Don’t you think others have had the same idea?’
‘Probably. But most people think the bodies have been crushed by the weight of the snow. That the tent has moved so far with the ice flow it would be impossible to find.’
‘Well then.’
‘But I don’t believe them.’
‘You are mad. How would you hope to find it?’
‘That’s where you come in.’
‘What?’
‘Oh, stop all the whats, computer genius.’
‘Hey, hang on.’ I hold up my palms. ‘I said nothing about being a genius. I just fix machines and networks and mess about with puzzles, like I said.’
‘You’re obviously modest.’
‘So you don’t want me for my body?’
‘Is that what you thought?’ She laughs. She’s laughing at me.
‘I think I should leave.’
‘Not so fast.’ She stands in front of my gear. Her mouth is hard, aggressive. Hands on hips. I can’t take my eyes off her pierced navel. ‘Why are you men all so bloody one-dimensional? Is that all you think about? Getting into someone’s knickers? Pathetic.’
‘I can’t deny that … that I find you very attractive. But …’
‘Oh, but it goes deeper than that, does it? I bet you say that to all the girls. Because that sure is what all the boys say to me. And none of them mean it.’
‘Guilty as charged,’ is all I can say. ‘I’m not going to argue with you. But I can walk away from here. Because I’d never try to take advantage.’
‘D’you even think I’d let you?’ she screams. ‘You patronising bastard.’
‘I didn’t mean it like that.’ My mouth is dry. ‘Look, can’t we just have a cup of tea or something and talk about this like normal people?’
I’m hoping she might switch to her more reasonable self if I keep myself calm, that she might actually talk to me rationally. Even though I know I’m a patronising you-know-what. But I didn’t intend that. I just wanted to avoid saying stuff to her that other men obviously already have. Because I want her to love me. But I don’t think she will. I’m an idiot.
‘OK … OK.’
Ten banality-filled minutes later we’re sitting at the table in the library opposite each other, the teapot and milk between us. I stir my tea slowly and try to choose my words with care.
‘Look, Birdie, just let me talk for five minutes without interrupting. Please.’
She nods. Sips her tea.
‘What happened yesterday was a coincidence. Today isn’t. Yesterday, you ran away. I didn’t know what to do. I Googled you. Found out that you paint. That no one knows who you are. I bought some books to learn more about what you call a mystery. Phoned you. Sooner than we’d agreed, I admit. But I wanted to see you again. And the books dragged me in, got me interested. And all the time I had a picture of you in my head.’
I take the spoon out of my tea. I look at the swirling surface. Another whirlpool.
‘I never imagined … you and me, you know. I wouldn’t presume. And I never thought about going there. I’m too set in my ways. I don’t do adventures. I’m a stick-in-the-mud, a bit lost, and lazy. I couldn’t hack it. I haven’t got your will or your talent. I’d be a burden. And I hate the cold. There. I’ve probably said too much.’
The tea doesn’t make my mouth less dry. I’m sweating heavily. It’s over before it’s even started. I’m demented and misguided.
She takes a deep breath. She smiles and starts to reach out across the table, but stops herself.
‘You’re a very sweet man,’ she says, at last. ‘Have I hurt you? Because you thought I only wanted you for your computers? Because you thought you couldn’t have me?’ There’s an edge in her voice. ‘I’m tired of men pretending to fall in love with me. Or even really falling in love with me because I’m blonde, because I’m thin, because I paint, because I’ve got money.’
‘I …’
‘Let me talk now, without you interrupting. Fair’s fair.’ She puts her hands flat on the table, brushes away an imaginary mark on the shiny leather. ‘You know I’m grateful to you for yesterday. The fainting’s never happened in public before. And you know how important Henry and the others are to me. I can’t be distracted by transcendent emotions. I can’t give myself to this cause and to someone at the same time. But your kindness showed me that you’re an honest man, that you don’t hide behind your words. You only say what you mean. I need someone I can trust. Someone who’s my equal. Who doesn’t want me because of the money, the reputation. Someone who’ll help me when I’m in trouble.’
‘You think you can rely on me?’
‘Yes.’
‘I’d be scared of letting you down.’
‘Don’t be, and you won’t.’ She looks up from her hands. ‘You know, when Scott sent Cherry back to the base, Cherry asked him if it was because he’d let Scott down. And Scott said – no, no, no. And I could never imagine you disappointing me.’
Her words move me. It’s ridiculous, to become this involved so soon, to disappear into a crevasse of emotions, to fall too steeply, too deeply, and here, in this part of London I swore I’d avoid forever, because I thought I’d always associate it with the pain I’d felt then. But I can’t change what happened. And what’s more, I can’t change me. I never could and never will. When I fall in love, I fall heavily. And this time it’s different, I swear it is. This time it’s right.
‘So, what now?’
‘I’m not going to promise to change, because I can’t. I try not to control myself, because then I couldn’t paint. I want things. I can be faithless. And I’m mean.’
‘I’ll live with that. As long as I can defend myself.’
‘Then there’s one thing you should see before you decide if you’re really with me on this.’
A short time later, we’re in the British Library near King’s Cross station, in a darkened room so dimly lit I almost fall over my own feet. She grabs my hand and leads me through the muted voices and whispers, past illuminated bibles and Shakespeare folios, past Beatles and Mozart scores, to a solitary glass box, to an anonymous, temperature-controlled container.
‘This is what they’ve done to it,’ she whispers, her voice a dying cry of betrayal.
I screw up my eyes, look into the case. One slab of text on a white card. I read the heavy black print.
DIARY OF CAPTAIN R. F. SCOTT, 29 MARCH 1912
Scott and his party set out for the South Pole on 1 November 1911. They arrived on 17 January 1912, only to discover that the Norwegian Roald Amundsen had been there one month earlier. The return journey was dogged by misfortune as temperatures fell to below –40 degrees. Evans suffered concussion in a fall and died on 17 February. Frostbite became a serious threat; Oates was the worst affected and on 17 March he sacrificed himself in the hope that without him the others would make swifter progress. However, on 20 March a blizzard descended making it impossible to complete the journey to the next depot only 11 miles away. The bodies of Scott, Wilson and Bowers were found in their tent the following spring. The diary is open at Scott’s final entry, dated 29 March 1912. Add Ms 51035, ff. 38v-39
I look up at the diary. I can scarcely read the pencilled scrawl, because of the dimness of the light.
we shall stick it out
to the end but we
are getting weaker of
course and the end
cannot be far.
It seems a pity but
I do not think I can
write more.
R Scott
Last Entry
For God’s sake look
after our people
The diary is permanently pinned open at this page with straps of transparent plastic, like it’s on the rack. I can’t understand why it’s kept here, rigid, and untouchable.
‘Can’t we steal it?’ I whisper back to her. Our hands are still touching, on the edge of the case.
‘No. That wouldn’t be right, or fair. I want to see if I can borrow it at some point. But first I need to go to SPRI. And then out there.’
I know it doesn’t do to ascribe human qualities to something as inanimate as a little black book. But it has his last words in it. It breathed through his struggles with him, and it survived his death. It saw the bright Antarctic sun. But in here, dusk is permanent. These are words in limbo, words that only add to Birdie’s mystery, that make the pull of the unknown more intense, written in a strong hand, calling out. I want to know how and why this man and those with him really died.
‘So, what do we do now?’ I say.
‘We go to see a doctor.’