A PROPER ENGLISH GENTLEMAN

I must have drifted off because Jenkins is gone. He must have left to find something to eat and if he doesn’t come back soon, I’ll assume the something ate him.

I’ll miss him. Not the specifics of him, mind you. After all was said and done, he was a stupid, uncouth little man with rotten teeth and far from the best of company. But he was company and by the looks of things he might be the last company I’ll have. Oh well, I should have known, when I signed up for this Arctic expedition, it wasn’t going to be a regatta.

What I didn’t sign up for was the ship getting stuck in the infernal ice, leaving some of us to try and walk out over the sea and land, only to end up at this God forsaken piece of nowhere.

Oh, the tyranny of hope! When 12 of us set off from the ship, under the impression there was a British whaling station just on the other side of the island, we had been led to believe it was a bastion of civilization in the Arctic wilderness. Instead, the remaining four of us, who managed to survive the harrowing 16 day journey, found nothing but this abandoned shack, my present palatial surroundings, teetering on the edge of yet another expanse of ice.

Inside there was one rope strung cot, two chairs, one table and a rusty iron stove. Such were the lilliputian dimensions of the shack, Smithfield and Porter volunteered to take the last sled and explore down the coast in hopes of finding help. We divided up what little was left of our supplies and that was the last we saw of Smithfield and Porter, leaving Jenkins and I to fend for ourselves.

Perhaps I have been a bit harsh in my description of Jenkins. He was certainly not one that you would have thought of as fourth for whist. But this little Cockney from the Docklands of London had an almost feral aptitude for survival. In truth, I would have perished long ago without him.

In the few remaining hours of sunlight left to us each day he foraged for any available food and fuel. I am not ashamed to report that on one occasion, we gorged ourselves on a semi-decomposed seal pup that he found. He also managed to scrounge most of the scraps of wood that we used to keep at least a semblance of a flame in the stove. He had ascertained correctly, that in this barren Arctic wilderness, there was more food than fuel and when our precious limited supply of oil ran out, wood would be our only source of heat and light.

We were down to the dregs of the oil. As it was our only shelter, we couldn’t very well use the wood from the walls of our shack for fuel. So we slowly fed the furniture to the flames. If the members of my club, or, God forbid, my wife, could have seen Jenkins and I on our  last night together , I would not have to worry about dying of hunger or cold. I would have died of the shame.

There we were, fully clothed, huddled together under three moth-eaten blankets, in the cot that we had shoved up against the stove.. The cot would be the last of the furniture to be fed into the flames as we would not have lasted the night lying on the bare frozen floor. We were chatting like an old married couple.

“‘She’s not a bad lookin’ crumpet.”

Jenkins was referring the reproduction, the shack’s sole decoration, just barely visible in the flickering lamp light. It was crookedly hanging on the wall just over the stove.

“I’m quite sure that her Highness, Her Majesty Queen Victoria, would feel heartened by your approval.”

“It’s a shame she’s got to go.”

“I beg your pardon?”

“You two related?”

I was speechless. The non sequitur and lack of food had left me slightly lightheaded.

“I just figured all you knobs were related and you would take exception to me feeding her to the flame. The way I see it, the paper she’s on and the frame around ’er ‘ead could be the last things we’ll find to burn.” I saw his point.

That was the last thing I remember him saying before I drifted off. And now he’s gone, leaving me alone with Her Majesty. For the life of me, literally, I don’t think I can bring myself to consign her to the dying embers in the stove.  After all, if I must die, at least I will die a proper English gentleman.

The harsh Arctic winds shake the cabin and make Her Majesty dance upon the wall.

“God save the Queen!” Was my mind going? It sounded like Jenkins!

I staggered out from the cot and threw open the flimsy door of the shed. There stood Jenkins. A rotten toothed smile spread from ear to ear.

“I found Smithfield and Porter!” He was pulling a sled that was stacked high with driftwood, the carcass of a large sea lion and a small barrel of oil.  

Like a proper English gentleman, I would not assume to bother him with any prying inquiries. We embraced and proceeded to unpack the sled.