Darwinia

I have to be succinct, due to limitations of strength and time. (Light comes fitfully through these high stone embrasures, filtered by oilcloth or animal skins, and I have to make a contribution to our survival even if it’s a modest one — mainly helping Diggs, who has lost the use of his left arm, to cook our meager suppers. He’ll need me soon. Diggs is stoking the fire now and Wilson Farr has gone for a bucket of snow.)

After we left the Bodensee, and as we approached the Alps, we were attacked by a band of armed Partisans whose only apparent motive was to murder us and plunder our supplies. We lost Ed Betts, Chuck Hemphill, and Emil Swensen in the first volleys — would have lost more if we had camped closer to the tree line. Tom Compton’s quick thinking saved us. He led us around one of the region’s huge insect middens, a trap into which the pursuing Partisans stumbled and were consumed. Those who did not die in the nest fled or were shot.

They weren’t the only victims. One of the insects managed to inject its poison into my bloodstream. By nightfall I was at death’s door, according to Dr. Farr. I was not expected to survive, and most of the rest of the expeditionaries suffered numerous major or minor wounds. Preston Finch survived with only a twisted ankle, but his spirit was crushed; he spoke in monosyllables and abandoned the leadership role to Sullivan and Tom Compton.

When the survivors had rallied sufficiently to limp back to the ruined encampment they found the scientific equipment and samples burned, the animals slaughtered, rations and medical supplies stolen.

It pains me to think of it even now. All our work, Caroline! All Sullivan’s voucher samples, his notes, his plant press, lost. Both of my cameras were destroyed and the exposed plates shattered. (Sullivan broke the news when I eventually regained consciousness.) My notebook survived only because I kept it on my person at all times. We did manage to salvage a few other notes, plus writing implements and enough scraps of paper that many of the surviving expeditionaries are keeping their own winter diaries.

I couldn’t mourn the dead, Caroline, any more than I could open my eyes or do more than draw breath while the poison burned through my body.

I mourned them later.

The wounded needed rest and food. Once again, Tom Compton was our salvation. He cauterized my insect bite and treated it with the sap of a bitter weed. Dr. Farr accepted this wilderness midwifery because there was no civilized medicine left to us. Farr used his own medical skill to bind wounds and set broken bones. From the remnants of our supplies we fashioned a more defensible and less obvious camp, in case more Partisans were lurking. Few of us were well enough to travel.

The logical next step was to seek help. Lake Constance was only a few days behind us. Erasmus would have gone back to his hut and his kraal by now, but the boats were waiting — unless they too had been discovered by hostile forces — and the journey down the Rhine would be less difficult than the journey up. Figure a month to reach Jeffersonville, less than that for a rescue party to return.

Tom Compton volunteered to go, but he was needed to help shelter and treat survivors. His hunting and trapping experience meant he could forage for food even without ammunition for the rifle he carried. In fact he took to hunting fur snakes with a Bowie knife. The animals eventually learned to shy at the smell of him, but they remained so docile that he could slit a snake’s throat before the dumb beast realized it was in danger.

We dispatched Chris Tuckman and Ray Burke, unhurt in the attack, to seek help. They took what remained of our tinned food (a pittance) and a tent that hadn’t burned, plus pistols, a compass, and a generous portion of our hoarded ammunition.

Three months have passed.

They haven’t come back.

No one has come. Of the original fifteen, nine of us remain. Myself, plus Finch, Sullivan, Compton, Donner, Robertson, Farr, and Digby.

Winter came early this year. Icy sleet, and then a granular, relentless snow.

Sullivan, Wilson Farr, and Tom Compton nursed me back to a semblance of health — fed me vegetable gruel and carried me, when we were forced to travel, on a travois rigged behind a wild snake. For obvious reasons, I lost weight — more, even, than the rest of us, and we’re a hungry crowd these days.

Caroline, you should see me. That “little belly” you complained of is only a memory. I’ve had to make new notches in my belt. My ribs are as plain as the tines of a pitchfork, and when I shave (we have a mirror, a razor) my Adam’s apple bobs like a cat under a bedsheet.

As I said, we found shelter for the winter. But the shelter we found -

Caroline, I cannot begin to describe it! Not tonight, at any rate.

(Listen: Diggs at his work again, his forked-branch crutch knocking the stone floor, water hissing as the kettle goes over the fire — he’ll be needing me soon.)