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another, duller explosion, a terrible flurry of spray and then the winch drums
were screaming and the masthead block dragging down as the heav y two-inch
whale line went roaring out through the fairlead in the bow.
Gerda came running back to the bridge. 'My shot is no good,' she said. 'I te
ll you I am not so good a skytter as Olaf. The harpoon, he explode outside.
I do not hit the backbone. Slow now please.'
The whale had sounded and the line was still roaring out with the block dra
gged down to the danger mark. I watched one, two splices run through the bl
ack. Each splice meant 120 fathoms of line gone out. Altogether there were
four lengths - three splices. Just when the third splice was reeling throug h
the block we saw the whale surface half a mile ahead.
Gerda was gripping the windbreaker in a frenzy. This was her first whale ind
ependent of her father. It meant a lot to her. The last splice went through
the fairlead. She ordered full speed. And just as I rang the engine-room tel
egraph, I saw the block start to rise up the mast. 'We win,' she cried. 'We
win.' McPhee at the winch was braking now. I could hear the scream of the br
ake drums above the hum of the engines. Then suddenly the line was slack. Ge
rda ordered stop and the winch began to clatter as McPhee took in line. We d
rifted and the line continued to come in slack.
Then suddenly it was taut again, stretched so tight that from a diameter of
two inches it was shrunk to half an inch. It was like a violin string. I tho
ught it must break. The block was down the mast again and the whole ship was
being dragged through the water at about 6 knots. McPhee paid out line on t he
winches. It lasted like that for perhaps a minute - maybe only thirty sec
onds. It seemed like years. Then it was over. It was the whale's last bid fo r
freedom.
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We began to winch in. It was still lashing the water with its huge tail as we
hauled up to it and Gerda ran down to the gun platform and fired another
harpoon into it. There was a sudden spout of blood and then the great brut e
was motionless, lying alongside us like a half-submerged submarine.
'Next time I shoot better, I hope,' Gerda said and took me down to the bows to
superintend the pumping of air into the whale. As one of the hands thrust the
lance with the air pipe into it, there was a cry of 'Blaast! Blaast!' f rom
the tonne. The air hissed as it went into the huge carcase. The harpoon holes
were plugged, a long steel rod with a flag was thrust deep into the an imal
and a moment later we were back on the bridge and off after our next wh ale,
two men working furiously to reload the harpoon gun and rig a new fore-
runner as we went.
I have given this detailed account of our first whale hunt to show the degr ee
of concentration the work entailed. It occupied all our waking thoughts and
energies and when we fell into our bunks we were so tired we slept like the
dead. For whale were plentiful and when we had killed one, another was sighted
almost immediately. The cry of Blaast! Blaast! echoed almost uncea singly from
the tonne and the crack of the harpoon gun slamming its deadly weight of metal
into the whale sounded all day and on through the unending daylight of the
night. When we'd flagged three or four whale we'd put throu gh a call on the
R/T for one of the towing vessels or a buoy boat and go on to the next kill
whilst they picked up our catch and towed it back to the factory ship. All
round us, through good weather and bad, the rest of the c atcher fleet was
working in the same frantic haste. The only occasions on w hich we returned to
the Southern Cross were to refuel and take on provision s and a new supply of
harpoons straightened out in the blacksmith's shop. I
had neither the time nor the energy to think about Nordahl's disappearance and
though I wondered sometimes how Judie was getting on in Larvik's catch er, my
mind was so tired that the image it sketched of her was blurred as t hough she
were a girl I'd met years ago.
Even the announcement over the R/T that the committee of inquiry over which
I had presided had found that Nordahl had committed suicide whilst the bal
ance of his mind was affected by financial worries made little impression i n
the fatigue induced by hard and constant work. Bland had said that he mus t
consider the morale of the men in any announcement he made and I must say
I agreed with him. Whatever Howe might say, I had no reason to suppose tha t
he would not carry out his promise to hand over the evidence to the polic e on
our return to Capetown. And if he failed in this I could always notify the
police myself. Howe's reaction was, of course, very different. 'I told you
what would happen,' he shouted at me. 'I told you they'd try to hush i t up.
But I can wait. I can wait. And sooner or later--' But I was too tire d to
listen to his railing. Too many things demanded my attention for him t o be
able to corner me for more than a moment at a time. And when I wasn't on duty
I was asleep and then not all the angels of wrath calling for venge ance could
have got an answer out of me.
In two weeks we chased and killed forty-six whale. Most of these were shot by
Gerda for I felt it was unfair on the men to assume the role of gunner e xcept
at the end of a good day's hunting. They had a financial interest in the whale
we caught. However, by the end of that fortnight I was becoming q uite a fair
sky tier and the men, who were a good crowd, would ask me to go down and see
if I could get one, laying small bets against each other as t o whether I'd be
successful or not with my first shot. They were very proud of their ship and I
think they were unwilling to accept the idea of a skip per who wasn't also a
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skytter. Towards the end of this period of intense ac tivity an incident
occurred which brought the whole question of Nordahl's d isappearance back
into my mind. We'd had a good day and after our fourth ki ll we radioed for a
towing vessel to pick up the catch. As it happened it w as Tauer III that
answered our call. We were quartering the sea on the line of her approach and
as she neared us she swung off her course and made str aight for us, her sharp
bows cleaving the water at a steady 14 knots. She c ame round in a wide circle
and steamed up almost alongside. Erik Bland was on the bridge and he called to
me on the loud-hailer, asking permission to come aboard and have a word with
me.
Before I could reply, Howe came pell-mell up the ladder to the bridge. He was
breathless and his face was working. He caught hold of my arm, forcing the
megaphone away from my lips. 'Don't let him come on board.' His eyes looked
wild and the grip of his fingers on my arm was like a vice.
'Why?' I asked.
'Why?' He shook me. 'You ask why?' His voice was trembling. 'If that bastard
se
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