Marina didn’t wait to eat breakfast but went straight up on deck. She unwrapped the pemmican and stuck her finger into the grease and put it on her tongue. ‘Urgh.’ Poor father. How he would enjoy his first meal back on the Sea Witch.
‘What time is it?’ she asked Brown.
He looked troubled. ‘Time to leave this blasted place.’
‘Any sign of him?’ Finchin joined her on deck. He had brought her a tin mug of tea and he stood and drank his own, the steam rising in front of his face. Nothing showed that Finchin was tense or in any way worried that her father would not arrive in time. But he kept checking his watch; like her father, he wore one of the new style of watch that was attached to his wrist with two leather straps. ‘It shouldn’t be long, now,’ he muttered.
But still there was no small dark figure on the horizon, no voice urging the dogs on. Finchin went up to the bridge, where he gave the order for the Sea Witch’s engines to be started. When he returned, he came with binoculars. He scanned the horizon. He checked his watch again.
‘The minute I see Father, I want to set off to see him. I’ve got pemmican for the dogs – to give them a treat and make them run this last bit faster. They’ll be exhausted, you see,’ Marina told him. ‘I’ll go on to the ice.’
‘No,’ Finchin said, quietly but firmly. ‘You’ll wait on the boat.’
Brown was on deck, waiting for the order to bring up the anchor. Perkins started yelling from the confines of his cabin. ‘Let me out! Let me out! I need to get there! I can hear her calling for me!’
Jones came out of the Signals Room, his collar up and his cap pulled down, shivering in the cold.
‘He’s coming,’ Marina said.
‘Where?’ Finchin lifted his binoculars again.
‘I just know that he is,’ Marina said, her jaw tense.
‘Brown! Anchor.’
‘But you can’t,’ Marina gasped. ‘You just can’t. Brown! Leave the anchor. He’s coming, don’t you see? My father is coming.’
‘I could have waited,’ Finchin said quietly, ‘if we had seen him in the distance. But I have orders to leave on the hour, Marina.’
‘I don’t care about your stupid orders. You can’t leave him here!’
She saw Jones move towards her, unsure of himself, but knowing that he should say something.
‘Brown!’ Finchin snapped. ‘Anchor! And that’s an order! Or do you want to be court-marshalled when we get back to port?’
Marina heard that grinding clank of the anchor being raised. ‘But please, sir!’ She pulled on Finchin’s arm. ‘Just a few more minutes.’
Finchin’s face did not change, but he did not give the order to raise the gangplank.
‘Aye, we’ve got a few more minutes yet,’ Brown told her as he joined them at the rail, desperately searching the horizon. ‘Keep your eyes peeled. We’ll be off the minute he’s on board.’
Paddy jumped up and put two paws on the side of the boat. His ears were pricked. Could he hear the dogs? Could he hear the sound of her father’s sledge on the snow? He put his head back and yowled.
‘Quiet,’ Marina whispered, patting his side. She narrowed her eyes to focus on the horizon. But Paddy would not be quiet. He yowled and barked.
And then, as if answering some call that only he could hear, he ran down the gangplank and set off across the ice.
‘Leave him!’ Finchin put his hand on Marina’s shoulder. ‘Brown? Get that gangplank raised.’
‘But we can’t leave Paddy!’ Marina shook herself free. ‘And we can’t leave my father.’ She threw down her mug, picked up her sledge and half ran, half slid down the gangplank and on to the ice.
‘Hey!’ Brown shouted after her. ‘What are you doing? Come back!’
‘We need to stop her!’ Finchin roared. ‘Brown! Jones! Follow me!’
Marina heard their boots on the gangplank and their feet crunching on the ice behind her. But she kept after Paddy.
‘Wait, you rascal,’ she called. And the dog did stop. She caught up with him and slipped the harness over his shoulders, expecting any second to feel Finchin’s hand on her shoulder. ‘Go!’ she cried, leaping on to the sledge.
But the men kept after her; they wouldn’t give up. Jones called out to her. She couldn’t listen. Paddy was right to have run away. She couldn’t go back to the Sea Witch with her father missing in this barren land.
When she next looked round, she saw that Brown had given up the chase. He was bending over as if he were winded. Then Jones stopped. He looked like he had a stitch. Finchin kept running for the longest, but even he couldn’t catch an animal bred to run for eighteen hours a day.
Ahead lay the strange landscape of Pechorin Island. Endless snow, pleated by the wind. Rocky outcrops nudging up through thick white blankets like waking skeletons.
How long had they run for? She stopped for a moment and adjusted the scarf she had pulled up over her mouth. Paddy’s breathing eased. She dug in her pocket and brought out the pemmican. She broke off a chunk and held it out for him. He chewed and swallowed and looked up at her for more. ‘We’re going to have to ration ourselves, Paddy,’ she told him. ‘This is all I’ve got.’ Her father’s words floated back to her. A journey is all about planning, Marina. Much more time should be taken in the planning than in the journey itself. That way you will always come back safe.
She had taken no time to plan, but she had had no choice. She could not leave her father on this island. She shook her head to dislodge the image of herself blundering about in the snow. She must not let such thoughts get the better of her. The map of this island in her father’s notebook had clearly shown a dotted
