The Ringed Castle - Dorothy Dunnett [192]
Robert Best said, ‘None of you has spoken of Russia.’
‘No,’ said Danny. His voice, not without effort, came through the darkness, lightly jocular. ‘And do you know why? Because, of all of us, only one man is thinking of Russia, and he is thinking of it to the exclusion of you and me and Ludo and poor Adam out there, which is why poor Adam is out there.… Lymond is thinking of Russia, and if Ivan Vasilievich were not three-quarters crazy, he should never, never, have allowed him to go.’
The next day, there was frost in the shrouds. Through the morning, the mist broke a little and the four ships could see one another as Chancellor took them ahead slowly, rounding the great bulk of the Kola Peninsula on their left, which would take them out to the wide, foggy expanse of the Frozen Sea itself, and their clear passage west. A wind rose and freshened, north by east as they came up to Cape Orlov, while the temperature dropped so that the straining sails sparkled with ice and the seamen, reducing sail as the short vessels blundered and pitched, found their hands ripped and raw with the sheets. Then, backing with a shriek north by west, the wind turned into their faces and blew a full gale.
The Edward fired off a cannon before she turned about, and making south-east, pennant streaming, led her three labouring vessels to the safety of Tri Ostrava Point, six miles to the south, where they anchored. Once secure, the conferences in the pilot’s cabin went on, Chancellor writing this time to Buckland’s dictation. Three and a half leagues north of Cape Orlov, Latitude 67°10’, twenty-two fathoms. Big broken shells and stony sand on the tallow.… Lymond, standing beside him, struck tinder quietly and lit the lantern.
Chancellor looked up. ‘Christ, what time is it? I ought to go and see to the Russians.’
‘I have,’ Lymond said. ‘They are Pskov green. There is nothing anyone but God the Great Navigator can do about it.… I suppose we are convinced that it is possible to get past North Cape at this time of year, in this weather?’
Buckland was staring down at his notes. ‘It shouldn’t have broken so soon. When this blows itself out, we shall know better.’
Chancellor said, ‘We have to try, because of the cargo.’
‘Of course,’ said Lymond. ‘No cash, no Swiss. I merely make the point that I do not wish to spend the winter in a driftwood hut shooting barnacle geese and jumping through small hoops with Laplanders.’
Chancellor laughed. ‘Eden. It was a figure of speech.’
‘Then what about Herberstein?’ Lymond said. ‘He says Lappian hunters like to leave their wives with visiting merchants for safety, and if the wife is cheerful on his return, the hunter will give the merchant a gift. If you hadn’t seen a Lapp lady, it would almost persuade you to merchanting. Ah, well. Take heart. At least, gentlemen, the gnats have all perished.’
The wind from the north blew for three days, and, when it finally changed, the weight of ice on the rigging held them stationary one day longer until it was shed, while a fair south wind blew maddeningly outside the anchorage. The following day, they called the shore parties on board and set sail again with a light north wind for Cape Orlov, which they had passed five days previously. It was Saturday, 15 August, and they were barely out of the Bay of St Nicholas.
And so there unrolled before them, although only one of them recognized it, the slow and terrible course they were to follow, without either the clear light of heaven or the curses of Malacoda, Alichino or Calcabrina; Ciriatto, Graffiacane or Rubicante.
Instead, lost in whiteness, enclosed in snow, whirled by storms and floating in sparkling mists, the flotilla moved; touching, swirling, floating haphazard as river ice from point to point, with the two ghost ships of Willoughby riding silently with them, who had been this way before, and had been lost in it, and were to be lost again, not to rise. And