Twilight in the South 317 



Olsen and C. F. Olsen, like terriers on the scent of a bloodhound. 

 Since no whales had been delivered for two days, the whole ship's 

 company was immediately in a turmoil, mindful as ever of its quota, 

 of the rapid passing of the season, and thus of their individual bo- 

 nuses, and worried by the leakage of radio intelligence regarding 

 the better luck of other expeditions. The bosun had the hval kra 

 ready and waiting for the first whale that could be maneuvered into 

 position at the base of the shpway. Within seconds, it seemed, the 

 great body was gliding up to the afterdeck, and the head flenser was 

 upon it before it came to a stop. The whalemen attacked the body 

 like ones possessed, while winches raced and a fantastic web of 

 twanging wire cables grew above the corpse, apparently with total 

 disregard for safety, so eager were the crews to get the whale into 

 the works. 



They had just rolled the body over so that the head flenser could 

 mark the cuts on the other side when a short blast from the siren 

 brought all hands to a temporary halt. Then a loud-speaker blared, 

 "To save time, weather report; to save time, weather report . . . 

 [unprintable] weather expected, wind rising to ninety, exceptionally 

 narrow front and localized, but sure to hit us. That is all." The sub- 

 stance of this was then repeated in Norsk. For a moment after the aw- 

 ful voice went dead, as only an intercom can do, nobody moved. The 

 Shetlanders glanced at the sky and, already in the silence, a gentle 

 moaning could be heard somewhere aloft. Then a thick Scots burr 

 remarked, "Aye, she's a-comin'," and immediately the winches began 

 to clatter again and the long-handled flensing knives flew once more. 



An hour later, whale number two was on the afterdeck, and all 

 was furious activity. Steam belched from the cooker traps, blubber- 

 boys raced back and forth feeding these gaping maws with strips of 

 oozing fat, and flensers whirled and danced. On the forward deck 

 the lemmers cursed while they hacked away at vast steaks that rose 

 from the deck on vibrating cables. Winches rattled and roared here 

 too and bone saws screamed as every man strained his every muscle 

 to clear the decks of as much whale as possible before the weather 

 broke. 



Almost all the operations in the processing of a whale on a mod- 

 ern factory ship are fraught with danger, even in the best of weather 

 and when the annual quota is already assured, but under pressure 



