Pym_ A Novel - Mat Johnson [132]
Let me say here that I never saw the remains of any more of the species and so can’t make concrete assertions about them. Nor do I have any information other than what I am currently presenting. But out of respect for all who must have fallen in the ice’s collapse, regardless of race or species, Garth and I did say what words we could, and acknowledged the already present silence. After this, there was little more for us to do but move on. It was time to sail for Tsalal. Or to die in the noble effort of trying.
Following a groggy Pym’s instructions, we rode to the southernmost point of what was once Tekeli-li, to the edge of the Ross Sea, and waited for the tide to begin its recession. Then, making our own room in the boat next to our semiconscious passenger, we pushed off into the water. Once we had sufficiently broken free from the mainland, Garth and I pulled our paddles in, letting faith and the surprisingly strong current pull us away.
The following I take from my written notes, composed during the journey. While I can’t pretend strict accuracy in these dates, since we didn’t have the battery power to run the electronic devices necessary for even figuring that out, I will note that they are accurate to the best of my knowledge. As was done before, they are given principally with a view to perspicuity of narration, and as set down in my pencil memorandum:
March 1
Although it is a region of novelty and wonder, I am glad to be leaving that world behind. When I think back to Thomas Karvel and his dome, I do not wonder about the last moments of his life, or of his art or even of Garth’s lost collection—both of which are taboo subjects with the big man. No, despite all the free time, I find myself thinking about Karvel’s pigeons. Or rather, why is the white dove so highly regarded because of its lack of pigmentation? How is it that something so minor as the color of a bird’s feathers can make the difference between being regarded as the international symbol of peace and being the urban symbol of filth and nuisance? It might be argued that this disparity has to do not just with the vagaries of shade but rather with differences in breed, but since I can’t tell the differences in species, that distinction would be lost on me. What then about the mice? my mind drifts to. Why are albino mice deemed worthy to be kept as pampered personal pets while their nearly identical darker brothers are viewed completely as pests? Does whiteness hold so much value for us that its presence is a wealth in itself?
Pym is awake. No, he has begun to wake, his consciousness rising in cycles, then sinking back into a stupor as the wealth of alcohol poison in his system works its way out again. In the last cycle, finding himself in a sailboat at sea, he weakly demanded to know where we were taking him, despite the fact that earlier he had mumbled to us the site we should depart from to find it. “Tsalal, dog,” Garth said to him. “Tsalal,” Pym said back in a hissing sound that sizzled off his lips until he drifted to unconsciousness once more.
March 2
On the following morning, Arthur Pym woke up once again, this time more coherent than I had ever seen him, and extremely thirsty and complaining of nausea, a symptom that only got dramatically worse when we told him yet again where we were going.
March 3
True to his word, the instructions Pym had given earlier proved to be right. This is to his great luck, because his endless nonsensical discussion of coppering versus whaling in the New England maritime economy is annoying and, had he been wrong, I know I would have strangled him by now. Amazingly, around the three of us there stretched an expanse of broken ice which filled the water’s surface like the foam atop a fountain