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Algie has a secret: he knows.
He may be many things – a brute and a coward, amongst others – but he is not incapable of kindness, and he is not a stranger to love. Also, Gus and Jack are not subtle. Endearingly, he doesn't suspect they are even trying to be.
It's not often nowadays that he finds them alone, he notices. They seem to gravitate together unconsciously, like planets and suns in the lack of any natural light. Algie finds it mesmerising, almost, the way they play off each other: their hands dancing together and away like shy butterflies, Gus' bashful words tripping over each other as he tries to tease Jack. And it's a sweet reminder that even here, at the place where the light has neglected to touch for weeks, warm things can and do grow.
He wants to congratulate them. He wants to push them together. He wants, most of all, to warn them of the danger, because the closer Algie watches them grow, the more oppressive the snow outside seems to become, and for no reason at all Algie is solidly convinced the two are linked. Since arriving at Gruhuken, so removed from anything like Algie's former life, he finds himself relearning himself to be more and more attuned to his instincts, as he suspects Gus and Jack are. So he knows, almost without a doubt, that there is something in the dark, and it hates them with a bitter and burning hatred. He knows this, even though they never talk about it.
He thinks it hates whatever Gus and Jack have the most. He suspects they know this too.
Weeks after the sun sets for the last time, he tags along when Jack goes to take his readings. Isaak accompanies them, tripping through their legs as they walk. Jack doesn't seem displeased by the company, which Algie thinks might say more about the atmosphere of the darkness outside than any fondness Jack might be harbouring for him. Jack takes his measurements in silence.
As Jack moves to leave, Algie grabs his arm, frustrated. He is unsure of what needs saying, only that if he doesn't say something, he thinks he might burst.
“Gus is a good man,” he says painfully, eventually. “He's a good sort.”
His tongue feels thick and clumsy. He has none of Gus' boyish charm or Hugh's sharp wit, only his poor good intentions, so the words fall sadly short of everything he means to say.
Jack shakes his arm free.
“I know,” he says, contemptuous, affronted and proprietary. His upper lip twitches. Jack never has had enough patience for him, Algie thinks, but that's also his own fault. Maybe if he had done something sooner, if he hadn't been so insufferable to Jack to start with, things would be different between them. But Jack is already turning, absent-mindedly smoothing down Isaak's coat with a gentle hand, leaving Algie standing oddly bereft in the snow.
“Jack -” Algie tries, one last time, but at that moment the outer door swings open and he falls silent. Gus is silhouetted on the step and Algie watches Jack's face transform: open, lightstruck, illuminated in the glow of the open door.
There's nothing I can say that he doesn't already know, Algie thinks, and then, somewhat redundantly: it's really love.
Jack walks so lightly across the snow towards Gus that he seems almost to be skipping. At the doorframe, they pause together; Jack's hand moving to clasp Gus' arm, Gus' head inclining to Jack's. For a single moment they are shining together in the light of the small cabin, and Algie feels uplifted, warmed, like nothing in this arctic night can touch them.
Gus ducks inside. The moment ends.
The door closes on them both, leaving Algie in the darkness. He takes a moment to look up at the sky, so utterly, utterly stark. The cold is already settling into his bones, and sickeningly fast, he feels dread rise up in him like nausea for no good reason he can put words to.
Please, Algie thinks to nobody in particular. Let them have this.
He wakes that night to the sound of Gus vomiting into the snow outside.
Stepping onto Eriksson's boat, Algie feels a rush of relief that is sickening in its selfish intensity. For all that Gus' weight, hot and feverish, is pressed against his side, reminding him of the very real danger is in – for all that they're leaving Jack behind on his own with whatever is out in the snow for an unspecified length of time – he can't deny the way it feels to have the weight of Gruhuken falling from his shoulders. Euphoric. Freed.
He pretends he can't feel that his shoulder is wet where Gus' face is pressed into it.
When one of Eriksson's young sailors, tan and strong, offers to take Gus from him, he accepts with little ceremony and leaves to find something to drink. He's celebrating, not mourning, he tells himself as he opens the bottle, although he can feel the relief draining away almost as fast as it came.
It's not until the boat weighs anchor that he's drunk enough and brave enough to go and search for Gus.
He finds Gus in their shared cabin, propped up on the window with his eyes fixed on something back at the beach. Gus isn't crying any more that Algie can see, but his face is twisted into such contortions of pain that he might as well be. Algie suspects that he knows better than to offer water or pain relief; he simply joins Gus at the window, looking out across the growing stretch of ocean.
Jack is standing on the beach, stark and unmoving against the snow. He's so small now Algie can barely see him, and he feels again that sickness-like dread, so strong he almost wants to vomit too.
“We'll be back soon,” Algie says, and his voice sounds horribly guilty and cheerless. “We'll see him again in no time.”
He pats Gus' shoulder. Gus, drained, doesn't turn his head or look away from the beach.
Together, they watch Jack disappear into the darkness.