The Sun At Midnight

Which, she thought, mischievously, could mean a very silent trip.

The muffin had blueberries in it and was warm enough to melt the butter she had lathered on it. After rinsing her hands at the sink, Kathrin cut some of Pam’s homemade bread, put the slices between two metal racks, and went over to the stove to toast them. ‘Did you sleep well?’ Pam asked.

‘Fine,’ Kathrin said warmly, sensing Pam was worried about the next few days. In a clear voice she added, ‘I’ll be leaving again this afternoon. As Jud’s donating money to the station, I’m duty bound to find him a herd of mus-koxen.’

‘Charmingly put,’ Jud said from directly behind her. ‘What time?’

Hoping her start of surprise hadn’t shown, Kathrin turned the rack to cook the other side of the bread. ‘About four,’ she said, not looking at him. ‘It’ll be at least a three-hour hike, maybe more if they’ve moved further up the valley. Pam and I will look after the food.’

‘I’ll be ready,’ Jud said.

There was a note in his voice that sent a shiver down her spine. She had no reason to be afraid, she thought stoutly. Once or twice a day she checked in with Garry on the portable radio; and if Jud’s company became intolerable, she’d simply come back to camp and leave him out there. ‘Wear rubber boots and bring your own tent,’ she said coolly.

‘Yes, ma’am.’

Her cheeks flushed from more than the heat of the stove, Kathrin accepted a heaped plate of bacon, eggs and hashbrowns from Pam and went to sit down beside Calvin, who was regaling anyone who would listen with his latest findings on the role of blue-green algae in the ecology of the Arctic lowlands. Despite his loudly expressed interest in women, Kathrin often suspected Calvin was more interested in the convoluted sex lives of algae than the rather predictable amatory activities of humans. Listening with one ear, she tackled her food with gusto and kept a wary eye on Jud, who was talking to Pam by the stove. Now that she was over the initial shock of seeing Jud again, she was going to manage the next four days just fine, she thought optimistically. She was a grown woman—she could handle a dozen Juds.

This mood stayed with Kathrin through the day, a very busy day. She washed her clothes and hung them on the line between the storage hut and the kitchen, she brought her notes up to date, and she carefully accumulated everything she would need out on the tundra, knowing from experience that what she forgot she had to do without. By now, she had loading her backpack down to an art. At three forty-five she zipped up the last compartment and hefted the pack to check its weight. Not bad. She’d carried heavier.

Now to find Jud.

But first she halted in front of her mirror, pulling her hair out of its ponytail and brushing its shining weight back from her face. Nimbly she started braiding it, having discovered this was the simplest way to look after it when she was camping; and all the while her eyes looked back at her.

Her features were long-familiar and taken for granted: straight brows, straight nose dusted with freckles, level brown eyes. In repose her face was like a good drawing, the lines strong and sure. However, when lit by emotion it was transformed to a vivid beauty, elusive enough that she tended to discount it.

She was wearing a turquoise turtleneck under a wool sweater softly patterned in turquoise, mauves and browns, a favourite combination of hers in which she knew she looked well. Her hooded jacket was as dark a brown as her eyes; her corduroy trousers were also dark brown, tucked into high rubber boots. Tiny gold earrings shaped like seagulls twinkled in her lobes.

After fastening her braid, Kathrin brushed on lip gloss and put it in the pocket of her jacket. I’m delaying the inevitable, she thought. I don’t want to go out there and face Jud.

Quickly she stooped, lifting her pack on to one of the bunks and then swinging it in place on her back. Binoculars, gloves, notebook, pencil. She was ready.

She took one last, steadying look around the hut before going outside. Jud was standing in the road waiting for her, his face, tanned, unsmiling, giving nothing away. The sun gleamed in his hair while his eyes were a distillation of all the blue of the sky. With a jolt of surprise Kathrin realised that Pam was right. Jud was a very handsome man.

She stopped in her tracks. More than handsome. He exuded a highly charged masculine energy of which she was sure he was unaware, coupled with an air of utter self-containment: an intriguing paradox that bore no relation to the Jud she had grown up with. It was as though, she thought slowly, she were suddenly seeing him for the first time.

He said caustically, ‘It’s too late to change your mind.’

She tossed her head. ‘I said I’d take you to the muskoxen and I will.’ In a surge of adrenalin she added, ‘I’m the one who jumped the ravine—remember?’ The ravine was on the far boundary of Thorndean, an outcrop of granite where ferns grew lush and green, and water dripped mournfully in the murky shadows among the rocks. It had long been a haunt of the ravens. ‘The summer I was twelve you dared me to jump across it—and I did.’

‘I never thought you would.’ A reluctant smile tugged at Jud’s lips. ‘I was crazy to dare you and you were crazy to do it...that was the day I tore my shirt.’

He had also scraped the skin from his ribs and she had been the one to smooth on antibiotic ointment that she had stolen from her mother’s medicine cabinet; as if it were yesterday she could see his teeth gritted against the pain. She said tersely, ‘Let’s go. I want to find the herd before we stop to eat.’

‘Can’t handle the memories, Kit?’ he jeered.

Exasperated, she said, ‘You have a choice here, Jud—you can stand talking to thin air or you can follow me.’

Suiting action to word, Kathrin set off past the radio shack for the nearest rock ridge. Soon her boots were crunching among loose stones and shell fragments, and her stride had settled into its natural rhythm; although Jud’s longer stride was right beside her, the tension of his presence lessened as she filled her lungs with the crisp, pure air. This was where she wanted to be. Perhaps it didn’t matter who was with her as long as she could inhabit this immensity of space.

He said casually, ‘Karl was saying this whole area was under the sea not that long ago.’

‘That’s right. The weight of the ice cap pressed the land down. But as the ice melted, the land rose. You can see a whole series of beach ridges ahead of us.’

‘So tell me about the blue-green algae of which Calvin is so enamoured.’

She laughed almost naturally and described their role in the slow evolution of the Arctic soil, finding Jud’s questions intelligent and his own knowledge considerable. They descended the first ridge and skirted a lake. A pair of loons flew overhead. Jud spotted a phalarope, Kathrin a sandpiper; and their boots brushed the tiny Arctic flowers, glossy golden buttercups and purple-striped campion.

For the next hour they climbed steadily towards the plateau, beyond which lay the valley where the muskoxen roamed. At about six o’clock Kathrin said breathlessly, ‘We should fill our water bottles at this stream. And let’s take a short break.’ Loosening the straps, she lowered her pack to the ground.

The stream gurgled out of the hillside between rocks carpeted with green and scarlet mosses. Chewing on some trail mix, Jud said reflectively, ‘Colour leaps out at you here, doesn’t it? The flowers and mosses are so vivid, so full of life.’

She had often noticed the same thing. She said eagerly, ‘I think it’s because at first glance the Arctic offers a kind of sensory deprivation—dun-coloured tundra, grey rocks, and the white of last year’s snow. Even the sky’s pale blue, as though the ice cap has sapped it of all its strength. So the flowers make straight for the heart.’

‘You love it here.’

She nodded. ‘I feel as though I’ve come home...I don’t know why.’

His eyes fixed on hers, Jud said, ‘It’s a land pared to the bone. No euphemisms possible—only truth.’

She knew instantly that he had shifted from the landscape to the personal. For a moment she looked around her at the vast sweep of land and sky, recognising that her anger early that morning now seemed petty and unworthy of her. She said gravely, ‘Jud, seven years ago my world turned upside down. I’ve done the best I can since then, in my own way, to deal with that. But I really don’t want to talk about it...please.’

He was hunkered down very close to her, the breeze ruffling his hair. ‘You think I stole that money.’

‘I know you did. You confessed, didn’t you?’

‘Ivor made the phone call, Kit.’

‘He couldn’t have—I was with him at the time.’

‘You were in love with him.’

‘I wouldn’t have lied, Jud!’

‘You did lie.’ As she made a sudden move, he stayed her with one hand on the sleeve of her jacket. ‘You were young and vulnerable and very much in love...perhaps it was inevitable that you supported Ivor over me.’ A harsh edge to his voice, he added, ‘I just need to know the truth, that’s all.’

There was a scar across his knuckles, a scar white as bone. Staring down at it, because she could not bear the force of his gaze, Kathrin said, ‘How did you hurt yourself?’

‘In prison—I was on a labour gang for a while,’ he said impatiently. ‘Kit, the truth...surely this place deserves the truth.’

When she looked up, her eyes were deep, troubled pools of darkness. ‘I’ve told you the truth. Just as I told it at the trial.’

In total frustration Jud picked up a chunk of granite, banging it so hard against a boulder that chips flew; the noise seemed a violation of the unfathomable silence of the tundra. ‘I thought better of you than this,’ he said.

In a clumsy movement Kathrin scrambled to her feet. ‘You’re proving my point—this is just why I don’t want to talk about what happened,’ she cried. ‘What’s the use? It’s over and done with. Finished.’

He stood up as well, balancing his weight on the rocks. ‘I could have photographed muskoxen on lots of other islands in the Arctic. I came here because I saw your name on the roster of scientists at the camp...I always figured you’d end up somewhere like this.’

‘Then maybe you’d be better off going to one of the other islands,’ she said steadily.

‘I’m staying here.’ He paused, his eyes narrowed. ‘There’s something else I should tell you—some time in the next week or so, Ivor will be coming here, too.’

Kathrin’s heart gave a great lurch in her breast. ‘What did you say?’

His face as immobile as if it had been carved from stone, Jud repeated, ‘Ivor will be visiting the camp in the next few days—he pilots the company helicopter.’

‘No!’ She took two steps backwards over the uneven ground, all the horror of that last meeting with Ivor invading her as if the intervening years had never happened. ‘Not Ivor—not here.’

‘You’re still in love with him,’ Jud accused savagely. ‘For God’s sake, how can you be so blind?’

Scarcely hearing him, Kathrin whispered, ‘Tell me you’re joking, that this is some kind of cruel game. This isn’t a place Ivor would choose to be; he’s not like you and me—why would he come here?’

‘To make money—why else does Ivor go anywhere? Mining, Kit. Uranium and silver. That’s why Ivor’s coming here.’

Her heart was pounding as if she had run all the way from the camp. ‘I never want to see him again,’ she said raggedly.

‘Too bad. Garry told me you’ll be one of the people Ivor will be interviewing. The effect on muskoxen of overhead flights and survey crews,’ he finished mockingly.

Standing as he was on the rocks, Jud towered over her: a man hardened beyond belief. ‘You’re out for revenge, aren’t you?’ Kathrin faltered. ‘That’s what your game is—revenge.’

‘Truth. Not revenge. There’s a big difference. And—believe me—it’s no game.’

She had no answer for him, no reserves to draw upon. In her overwrought state the panorama that only minutes ago had been the harbinger of tranquillity now seemed bleak and inimical, no more home than, ultimately, Thorndean had been. Seeking refuge in action, she hauled on her backpack, turned her back on Jud and headed up the slope as fast as she could.

CHAPTER THREE

AN HOUR later Jud and Kathrin reached her tent, a brave yellow triangle on the hillside. Neither of them had spoken a word since they had stopped by the stream; while Kathrin had forced herself to an outward composure, her emotions were still in a turmoil. Ignoring Jud, she set up the viewing scope on its tripod and scanned the width of the valley. ‘No sign of them,’ she said finally. ‘That means at least another two hours to get beyond those cliffs. We’ll have to check the river valley as we go.’

‘I think we should eat here,’ Jud said.

‘Fine by me,’ she answered indifferently, fiddling with the knobs on the tripod.

‘Look at me, Kit.’

‘I hate it when you call me that name.’

‘It’s what I’ve always called you and I plan to continue.’ He went on in a level voice, ‘I had to tell you about Ivor—I didn’t want you meeting him the same way you did me.’

‘Oh, sure,’ she said sarcastically, ‘you’re the soul of kindness.’

He ran his fingers through his hair in exasperation. ‘I’m damned if I’m going to spend the next four days trading insults with you! It’s a waste of time and this place asks better of us. Let’s for heaven’s sake call a truce.’

‘I don’t trust you,’ she blurted.

Jud flinched. But his recovery was so quick that Kathrin was left to wonder if she had imagined the pain that had so fleetingly tightened his features. He said irritably, ‘Then let’s bring it down to its lowest level. We’re the only people within ten miles of each other—surely we can at least have a little civilised conversation as we eat.’

It seemed a sensible request. Not that she felt sensible. ‘I suppose you’re right,’ she said.

‘Good. If you want to take down your tent, I’ll get supper.’

Anything that kept them busy with separate tasks was fine with Kathrin. She cleaned the dirt from the tent pegs, slid the poles together, and folded everything into a neat bundle, which she stowed on top of her backpack. Then, once again, knowing how easily a lone animal could be missed, she traversed the valley with her scope.

Supper was Pam’s beef stew with home-made bread, and was eaten largely in silence, for Jud, despite his request for civilised conversation, had withdrawn into himself. Seated on a boulder, Kathrin scrubbed her plate clean with a piece of bread. ‘I wonder why food tastes so good out here?’ she ventured.

For a moment she thought Jud hadn’t heard her; he was gazing across the valley, and in profile looked more like the boy she had grown up with than the stranger he had become. Then he said, so quietly that she had to strain for the words, ‘Perhaps because there’s room to breathe.’

In swift compassion she said, ‘How did you ever survive being in prison, Jud? Five days in a classroom used to be more than you could take.’

‘I went so deep inside myself that nothing and no one could touch me. I’d have gone mad otherwise.’

He had spoken without emphasis, in a way that was completely convincing. She remembered the slow seep of blood through his blue shirt all those years ago and the stoicism with which he had borne her awkward ministrations, and wanted to weep. It was on the tip of her tongue to cry, ‘Why did you do it?’, for this was the one question whose answer had always evaded her. But she quelled her words before they could be spoken. He had called for a truce, and she had said she did not trust him. It was not for her to ask that question.

Her voice credibly calm, she said, ‘Then this is the right place for you to be.’

He glanced over at her and almost conversationally said, ‘You know, you’ve grown into a very beautiful woman, Kit.’

Her jaw dropped. ‘Who, me?’

A rare smile lit up his face. ‘No one else here.’

Ivor had never told her she was beautiful. Ivor had favoured exquisitely groomed blondes, and if they were rich, all the better. ‘I’ve got freckles.’

He poured boiling water out of the pot on the little gas stove into two mugs containing instant coffee, and passed her one. ‘Is that a crime?’

‘Women in Vogue don’t wear fleece pyjamas and don’t have freckles.’

‘But the women in—’ He broke off. ‘Good lord, where’s my camera?’

As he grabbed for his pack, she looked over her shoulder. A big dark-winged bird was flying straight for them. ‘It’s a jaeger,’ she said with a grin. ‘A parasitic jaeger. Stercorarius parasiticus, to give it its—duck your head!’

But Jud was standing up to adjust his lens, and as the bird swooped overhead, his shutter clicked busily. For a moment the jaeger hung in the air, perfectly poised, its tail fanned and its streamers gracefully punctuating the sky. Then it dived again, and with a burble of laughter Kathrin watched its passage stir the parting in Jud’s hair.

The jaeger passed over them twice more before flying off in the direction of the sea. Jud lowered his camera. ‘I’m sure I got at least one good shot there,’ he said, ‘and maybe two. It must have had a four-foot wing span.’

‘Forty-two inches,’ Kathrin said obligingly, laughter lingering on her face. ‘It’s a good thing we ate all the stew—they’re not called pirate-birds for nothing.’

‘To hell with the stew—I thought it was after my scalp.’

‘It did give you a new hairdo,’ she chuckled, and reached up with one hand to smooth his hair back in place. But Jud was taller than she remembered, so that she had to stand on tiptoe; and his hair, for all its thickness, was silky to the touch. She had somehow expected it to be coarse and springy. Taken aback, she realised with a frisson along her spine that what she really wanted to do was stroke it as she might have stroked the smooth pelt of a wolf, in wonderment and pleasure. Of their own accord her eyes flew to his face.

He was standing very still, the camera dangling from one hand. Yet it was far from the stillness of repose: he blazed with an energy that gathered Kathrin into its orbit as naturally as the act of breathing. Her hand drifted from his hair to his face, her fingertips tracing the ridge of his brow and the jut of his cheekbone, all the while achingly aware of how warm his skin was. Then she touched the corner of his mouth and heard the sharp inhalation of his breath.

Only a tiny sound, but it broke the spell. Her hand dropped to her side and she said incoherently, ‘Jud, I’m sorry—I don’t know what came over me to act like that, I—I must have been out of my mind...I’ve never behaved like that with you before, never. I promise it won’t happen again, truly.’

She backed away from him, her dark eyes filled with panic, and because she was not looking where she was going she stumbled on a hummock of grass. Jud grabbed for her arm. Through the layers of her jacket and her two sweaters she was aware in every nerve of her body of the strength of his grip, and of the current of energy that seemed to surge from his body to hers. A man’s energy. Called up because she was a woman...

Frightened out of her wits, Kathrin pulled free. ‘We’ve got to go. Please let go, Jud!’

He did so instantly. But her blood was still beating in her ears, destroying the tundra’s silence and with it her peace of mind. Striving for the ordinary, she said inanely, ‘We didn’t finish our coffee.’

‘I’ll make more when we reach the muskoxen,’ Jud said with a casualness that did not ring true.

He was as shaken by what had just happened as she was, Kathrin thought in disbelief. Yet what exactly had happened? She was not sure that she knew. She was less sure that she wanted to know. Certainly there was no way she could have put the strange intensity of the last few minutes into words.

Jud knelt to replace his lens cap on the camera. Glancing up at her, his voice almost normal, he said, ‘Before that jaeger arrived, we were talking about women and beauty, weren’t we? I know one thing—I’ve never seen a woman in Vogue as beautiful as you, Kit. Because there’s intelligence and character in your face. Character you’ve earned over the last few years, I suspect...were they difficult years?’

How could she talk about the past—especially to Jud—when the present was filling her with such confusion? ‘This conversation doesn’t qualify as a truce. Anyway, what I did in those years is really none of your business.’

With a violence that startled her Jud said, ‘Do you know what keeps knocking me off balance? One moment we’re back where we always were, having fun in the outdoors, laughing because a bird’s just dive-bombed us...then sud-denly I’m aware that you’re a woman. Not a girl. A woman. A beautiful woman.’

With uncanny accuracy he had mirrored her own perception, that the two of them were on a seesaw that kept tilting between the past and the present. But she didn’t want to be alone on the tundra with a man who saw her as a beautiful woman; a man whose hair was soft to the touch. ‘We were like brother and sister,’ she said defiantly. ‘I don’t want that to change, and there’s no reason why it should. And now we’d better get going...I need to get some sleep at some point tonight.’

‘You want things simple and tidy, don’t you?’ he said ferociously. ‘Jud was once like a brother to me so he’ll always be a brother to me. Life’s not like that; surely you’ve learned that much?’

Kathrin dumped her cold coffee on the ground and shook the last droplets from the mug. ‘We’re here to look for muskoxen. Not the meaning of life.’

‘If we’re alone out here for four days, we’re going to find more than muskoxen,’ Jud said grimly, and bent to dismantle the little stove.

A few minutes later they set off, Kathrin in the lead, Jud behind her. But as she trudged through the bleached grass, she knew Jud would follow her lead only as long as he wanted to—and no longer.

* * *

The muskoxen were in the next valley, grazing in the meadow beyond an outcrop of rocks. ‘There they are!’ Kathrin exclaimed, as excited as if she’d met old friends. ‘It’s the same herd. I call the bull Bossy and the cow that doesn’t have a calf is Daisy. You can tell the other two cows apart by the degree of shedding—Clara’s only just started, and Sara’s well along. Their calves must have been born within a couple of days of each other, I can’t tell them apart.’

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