I honestly thought he was some sort of decoration; I never imagined people kept such creatures in their homes.
But then Alex moved his head slightly and said, “Punch the clown. Punch the clown.”
It was nothing more than a frightening coincidence. Eventually I came to realize Alex learned much of his vocabulary from Max.
- - -
Joseph Stalin was not the only voice inside Leonard Fountain’s melting head. The melting man also heard someone named 3-60.
3-60 was not as mean or harmful as Joseph Stalin. While Joseph Stalin urged Leonard Fountain to kill people, 3-60 said nice things to the melting man. 3-60 liked to narrate to Leonard Fountain everything that he was doing, as though she were telling the story of the melting man’s life while it played out in real time.
“You are turning onto Smale Road.”
“Yes. I am,” the melting man said to 3-60.
“You are driving past a cemetery. You are looking at the headstones. Your balls are itchy. You are drifting off the road.”
The melting man swerved back onto the highway.
“Thank you for saving my life, 3-60.”
“You’re welcome, Lenny.”
That reminded the melting man of his younger brother, who was the only person who’d ever called him Lenny.
“But your balls still itch,” 3-60 reminded him.
“Oh yeah.”
“Now they hurt.”
“Well, I shouldn’t have scratched them,” the melting man said.
“You’re very sick,” 3-60 told him. “Maybe you should consider leaving the masterpiece somewhere along the side of the road and just moving on.”
“I have to do what Joseph Stalin told me to do. I don’t want to make him angry.”
“You are driving. You are driving. You are driving,” 3-60 said.
“Yes. I am.”
Tuesday, February 17, 1880 — Alex Crow
While the Alex Crow sank, the crew managed to pull two of the ship’s longboats, as well as the dog sleds, food, and equipment from the doomed vessel.
Mr Warren could not assist the off-loading due to his incapacitation. However, in this past week, Mr Warren’s hand has healed significantly, although he has lost a great deal of mobility due to the shattered bones. Imagine the predicament of a newspaperman who lacks the ability to put pen to paper! Mr Warren has been dictating to Murdoch, but the man is constantly frustrated by Murdoch’s deficiencies in skill.
Let me express how disheartening it was to see the last timbers of the Alex Crow being shut up behind the mouth of this hellish Arctic ice. It was a mournful event for us all, because despite our predicament there was always some insulating sense of safety provided to our little society by the formidable ship. Now we are stripped of nearly everything and left to make some way, which I fear is only a lengthening of our journey toward doom. I cannot believe any of us will survive now.
After a full day’s rest on the ice pack, Captain Hansen and Mr Piedmont calculated a direction for our attempt at reaching the New Siberian archipelago. The journey has been incredibly arduous—the men work without rest, dragging the burdensome boats over impossible crags of relentless ice. Two days ago, on Sunday, it seemed as though our party had only managed to cover a few hundred feet for the entire day’s labor.
The cost on the men has been significant. Yesterday morning, Mr K. Holme, a naval seaman, succumbed to the cold, and today our expedition’s ice pilot, Edgar Baylor, passed away shortly after dawn.
Our crew has lost all hope of rescue. I am afraid that if there was any reasonable alternative to Captain Hansen’s strategy to reach New Siberia, there certainly would be mutiny among the survivors.
Sunday, February 22, 1880 — Alex Crow
A most remarkable occurrence—we reached open water today!
Could it be that those of us who have endured this ordeal will survive? Mr Murdoch during this past week has taken to uttering a repetitive chant of sorts—“Why bother?” he asks again and again. It does give one pause, at times, to consider the point of it all. Why is the will to survive—in spite of the horrors of one’s condition—so profound?
Why bother?
It was entirely unbelievable. When we saw the dark breach ahead of us, Captain Hansen and Mr Piedmont presumed we were approaching Kotelny Island, and that what we saw must have been the rocky shore. This proved to be incorrect as we neared the edge of the ice pack.
So it was with renewed spirit the men bothered to lower the heavy longboats into the sea. The dog teams, however, were forced to turn back in the direction from which they’d come, since there was not adequate room on our boats for everything. I sensed some great relief among the native handlers when they were finally free to leave our ill-fated expedition.
I am in Captain Hansen’s boat. I believe that his leadership has kept the majority of the expedition alive during the difficult journey across the ice, and I have faith that he will bring us safely to the shores of the northern islands where we will find shelter and warmth among the natives there.
This is my hope.
Tuesday, February 24, 1880 — Alex Crow
We lost sight of our sister boat in a vicious storm last night.
One more of the seamen—Richard Alan Culp—died aboard our vessel this afternoon. Once again, our diminished party feels alone and without hope. It is all I can do to tend to their aching bodies, and attempt to inspire some sense of confidence and optimism. I’m afraid this is entirely useless, though. The least I can do is to ignore the constant questioning of Murdoch.
This afternoon, Mr Warren and I huddled beneath the gunwale in a small covered space we’d made with one of the expedition’s tents. I’d asked him if he was still dictating the narrative of our expedition to Murdoch. He insisted that readers would want to have the full account of the loss of the Alex Crow, even if none of us survived.
“Particularly if none of us survive,” I said.
To this, Mr Warren replied, “I cannot think any of us will ever see his home again. Why would anyone think such a thing, given our current state?”
I do not believe we can last one more night in this boat. I have found myself hoping—and that is an odd word to use—that I will not wake to find myself the sole living inhabitant of the boat, that if I am not to make it home again, as Mr Murdoch predicts, that I die before too many others are dropped into the sea.
I realize that death and survival are both extremes of selfishness.
Just before nightfall, from beneath our covering, Mr Warren and I heard Murdoch shouting that land had been sighted, but when we came
