Basil Copper: The Great White Space

Scarsdale looked unusually serious as he made this pronouncement and he made an imperious figure as he sat before the fire in the gloom of the big study, the light from the shaded lamps catching the fleeting expressions of his face, half shadowed by the beard.

‘This was why I chose you,’ he resumed after a moment. ‘You are not only a first-rate photographer and a man with a scholarly background who would understand my views. You also have other attributes which are admirable for my purposes. You have physical courage, youth and strength, and you have already demonstrated your spirit of adventure by seeking out the tasks you have already accomplished. All of which taken together adds up to a pretty convincing package from my point of view.

‘The three scientists I have already chosen to accompany me are first-rate people and eminent in their own fields, but none of them have the physical strength necessary for certain aspects of our task. That will have to be up to you and I. I need at least one other man who is a man of action, an adventurer as well as a technician. My own capabilities I have already proved to my satisfaction. Are you game?’

‘I don’t know what the devil you’re driving at. Professor,’ I said. ‘Neither do I know where we’re going or what we’re going to do when we get there, but I wouldn’t miss this trip for anything. As long as I’m able to photograph and you indicate the sort of equipment I’m likely to need that’s all that matters to me.’

The Professor struck his thigh with a long sigh and clasped me by the hand. The gesture was a theatrical one and he drew his hand away almost immediately with a muttered apology as though he were ashamed of the movement, yet it was a perfectly apposite one. He did look like a man who was worried over his future plans and it did also appear that my agreement had solved his particular problems.

I smiled and said that though I had now agreed to come and that nothing would turn me from my purpose so long as he wanted me, I would still like to know more about the project. I appreciated that he didn’t yet want to tell us where we were going and the precise nature of our enquiries but I would be interested to hear more of the enigmatic matters of which he had already hinted.

Scarsdale sat back in his chair and drained his coffee cup before replying.

‘The lights,’ he said. ‘I have been engaged in research for many years on such matters. My particular line of enquiry directed me to the remote region for which we are bound. After a great deal of difficulties — some of them, I am compelled to say, caused by my own ignorance and foolhardiness at the time of which I am speaking, I achieved a partial success. The expedition I am mounting, plus the skills of its members combined with the special equipment, much of which I have myself designed, should now be able to score a complete success.’

Scarsdale paused again and then went on. ‘You will find some strangeness, I daresay. The title of the project is the Great Northern Expedition. Yet we are not going north. This is a purely diversionary measure designed to placate the press and the wider world. The scientists and other colleagues who have long sneered at my efforts in this field, may think and say what they will. But secrecy as to our intentions is a prime necessity. I must ask you to behave with the utmost discretion and must also urge you to move in here with us within the next week. This is in order that you may train with your companions and get to know us well before we embark.’

He looked at me enigmatically for a moment.

‘You have no ties, I take it? A fiancee, sweetheart or…?’

‘Any other entanglement,’ I finished for him. ‘No, there is nothing of that sort. I am a completely free agent. I have a permanent housekeeper in London and my solicitor looks after my affairs. I am often away for long periods, so there will be nothing new in your business.’

Scarsdale nodded satisfaction.

‘As a matter of interest how long should we expect to be away?’ I asked him.

‘At least a year' was his reply, given without the slightest hesitation. ‘It goes without saying that proper contracts will be drawn for your signature before we leave England. And the commercial value of your photographs and films will be your own, once we have made arrangements for our own material.’

‘That is extremely generous of you, Professor,’ I said. ‘We may take everything as agreed then, apart from details.’

We had just risen to our feet when there was a crash at the door and a tall, thin form stood in the entrance. The worried face of Collins could be seen at the intruder’s elbow.

‘By God, Scarsdale, this is a definite liberty!’ said a high, thin voice like a woman’s. ‘How are we to master these extraordinary contraptions if we can’t manoeuvre without you worrying about some damn potato patch?’

‘Come in. Van Damm,’ said Scarsdale smoothly, propelling me forward down the room.

‘I’d like you to meet the newest member of the expedition.’

Cornelius Van Damm was, as I have indicated, tall and thin, but it was not only his fluting, effeminate voice that had such an extraordinary effect upon those meeting him for the first time. When we had both exchanged nods, perfunctorily acknowledging Scarsdale’s sketchy introduction, and the Professor had brought us all back towards the fireside, I had more leisure to study him. Both he and Scarsdale engaged in a form of bickering which I later came to realise was a pose, a role both played to the full; the Professor emphasised his virile, bear-like qualities while the doctor developed a waspish querulousness which suited his squeaky voice.

Underneath it all lay a profound theatricality, a streak common to both men; both were distinguished in their own spheres; in addition to being a first-class electrical engineer, Van Damm was learned in many fields, being also a geologist and metallurgist as well as a fine revolver and rifle shot. He was to find his talents fully exercised on the Great Northern Expedition.

Fortunately, neither of the two remaining members, whom I had yet to meet, had such temperaments as those of Van Damm and the Professor: they preferred to leave the limelight to the two prima donnas, and were both immensely practical and phlegmatic by nature, which was no doubt why Scarsdale had selected them in the first instance. As for myself, I had no great axe to grind, as I have already indicated, and preferred merely to observe and practise my own specialised subject of photography.

Now, as the two men snapped at one another in the firelight, the older man biting off his words like a pike swallowing a tasty morsel, the Professor blandly riding rough-shod over the other’s objections, I was amusedly summing up the doctor. What I saw was a man of exceedingly gaunt aspect; with a great craggy face, from which a pair of humorous brown eyes shone from within deep sockets. His thin sandy hair grew evenly over his scalp so that his skull resembled nothing so much as a pineapple; a delicate wisp of moustache bisected his face and a gold pince-nez, depending from a delicate silver chain, dangled from his third waistcoat button. He wore a green corduroy jacket, the waistcoat was of some dark brown material, and his trousers were of grey flannel. Over the whole was a sort of long brown dustcoat, such as that worn by stockmen or cattle-drovers in the Old West, and the dark brown riding boots, stained with mud, which completed his outfit, marked him as one of the oddest and most individual of men.

However, he presently grew calmer and seeming to recollect my presence, turned to me and grasped me by the hand; still with a red flush on his cheeks and a slight stammer in his voice, when he turned to interject an occasional remark at the Professor, he proved himself an entertaining speaker. Later I was to discover that his eccentric exterior concealed one of the kindliest of men.