There’s a general murmur of agreement. With each passing day they appreciate in starker relief the monumental scale of their ambitions and the potential for it all to end in tragedy.
‘We’ve been lucky? Don’t you mean me?’ Helmer scoffs, recalling how heavily he had fallen across the wide gash of a crevasse. His skis had got tangled in the pulley hook of the dogs’ traces. Locked at a right angle by his skis and unable to haul himself to safety, Helmer was rendered powerless. Of course his team used the delay to launch into a vicious brawl. Half-in, half-out, the heavy sledge had teetered dangerously closer to the edge with each jarring movement of the dogs. It took four men more than half an hour in gusting winds to bring the situation under control, sweating, swearing, fearing the loss of the sledge, their provisions, a team of the best dogs and a man into the bargain.
‘What about me?’ protests Bjaaland, who almost lost his entire sledge down a yawning chasm in the midst of Johansen’s crevasse field. The rescue had pushed the entire team to the brink of exhaustion. Finally the sledge had been unloaded in its precarious position, crate by crate, at great personal risk to Oscar who had volunteered to be lowered into the hole.
‘Looking down and seeing those horrible spikes of ice. If Bjaaland hadn’t broken every bone in his body on the way down, he’d have been impaled.’ Oscar whistles in unpleasant recollection. ‘Where the dogs had crossed was the narrowest part of the crevasse. Either side of that, it opened up wider than a street. None of us would have escaped if we’d been spread out.’ He stirs his bowl of pemmican, blowing the steam away with his own misty breath.
‘Down there you’re out of the blasted wind at least.’ Sverre’s laugh develops into a dry cough.
‘Do you think the dogs can tell where to cross?’ Oscar asks.
Sverre frowns. ‘Not sure about that.’
‘Dumb luck,’ adds Amundsen.
Considering the dangers, the dogs are performing well. Two have been shot. One for being too scrawny, the other for being too fat. Neither could keep up the pace of the other dogs, who dash off each morning with such a lust for life that the men have allowed themselves to be towed behind the sledges on their skis – a luxury that will no doubt be short-lived.
A daily average of 27 kilometres is a most respectable distance, particularly when achieved in one stretch without stopping for food or drink. Some days the surface is heavy, impeding the dogs’ forward momentum. Other days the surface is sticky like glue. Still other days the snow is grainy and loose. On the rare days when it is firm underfoot, it is almost a pleasure to be out. There is similar variation in the weather. It can be minus 35 degrees one day, minus 10 the next. Not surprisingly, the men are attuned to even the mildest changes in temperature, especially when nature calls.
Amundsen decides they will build a cairn every 5 kilometres. It will make navigating home a little less random and save on time, as they won’t need to take observations and calculate their position. They’ll also establish a depot for every degree of latitude they gain, leaving a portion of their provisions at each stop, which will cut down on the weight of the sledges and the burden on the dogs. They will soon start to lose condition. This next stage will be far from pleasant for these unfortunate creatures, soon to be reduced to cannibals. Competing in a race of their own, the dogs will need to earn the right to life. According to Amundsen’s calculations, of the forty-two dogs that set out, only twelve will return.
CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT
Amundsen points one ski pole south. There can be no mistake where he means to direct the men’s gaze. The landscape could not be more different from the monotonous barrier surface they’ve spent the best part of a month crossing. The Transantarctic Mountains are like the fortifications holding back the vast polar ice cap; a daunting prospect for the most accomplished mountaineer. Somehow the Norwegians will have to find a way through the maze of summits with their dogs and sledges.
‘Never thought I’d be excited to see bare rock,’ says Helmer.
‘Reminds me of the glaciers back home,’ Amundsen says admiringly.
Helmer just squints in the bright sunshine.
Amundsen’s eyes don’t stray from the view. ‘Did I ever tell you about the little adventure I had with my brother on Hardangervidda? I nearly died.’
Helmer doesn’t ask for details. He’s silent. The gigantic peaks stretching out east to west before him present quite a foe.
‘That’s our way up,’ says Amundsen simply.
Rather than an orderly route south, the glacier presents a jumbled mess of obstacles and pitfalls. Thankfully the weather is still and clear, but having to guide the dog teams so carefully around jagged blocks of ice, gaping holes and frightful chasms will slow their progress significantly. Planning will only take them so far at this critical stage of the journey. To navigate successfully through this mountain range they’ll need a fair dollop of luck. Amundsen hates the very thought. Expect the unexpected, plan for the worst – this is his personal credo; however, it cannot guarantee their success in this instance.
‘Sixty days’ provisions, that’s all we take.’ Amundsen directs the unloading. All unnecessary weight is stripped and cached.
‘I hope we make it back within your timeframe,’ sighs Bjaaland. ‘Else we’ll all be going on a diet.’
Nervous laughter ripples through the company.
‘Keep your jokes to yourself,’ snaps Amundsen. ‘They’re not funny.’
Bjaaland straightens his back and catches Oscar’s eye. The look passing between the men says it all.
Uncertainty is a heavy burden for Amundsen. More so than for any other man merely seeking personal glory. He faces an immense cost of failure. Thoughts of Scott and his motor sledges continue to torment him like an out-of-reach itch. The British could well be chugging their way to victory by now, having followed Shackleton’s well-documented route up the Beardmore Glacier.
And here we are, striking out into unknown territory, Amundsen stews. Sharing moments of self-doubt is not in his nature. Neither is losing. For now, he will keep his anxiety concealed behind a curtain of ill-humour and irritability.
After so long skiing on the flat, the men tackle the uphill slopes in a clumsy fashion. The first few days of climbing through loose deep powder are arduous and they struggle to develop technique. At least there is the thrill of being the first people to see this dramatic landscape, and the novelty of naming vast swathes of this newly discovered land after kings, dignitaries, benefactors and members of the expedition. As they venture higher up and deeper into the mountains, Captain Nilsen, Fridtjof Nansen and Queen Maud are the obvious winners – even Amundsen’s housekeeper Betty has had a peak named in her honour. At night in the tent Amundsen announces that their route will henceforth be named the Axel Heiberg Glacier, after a wealthy sponsor. There are grunts of acknowledgement but ultimately dinner holds more interest. They are all exhausted.
Bjaaland is one man at home in the mountains. The uphill skiing that the others are still trying to perfect is an effortless ballet for the champion skier. Amundsen has sent him ahead of the dogs, part encouraging presence, part human prey for the eager teams to chase down. Often the slope is so steep that the men harness up twenty dogs to get one sledge moving. Each dog claws its way up the slope, panting, its belly low to the snow. Try as they might, they’ve yet to catch Bjaaland, but their ardour has carried them over a lot of difficult ground in an impressively short time.
As well as steep climbs, there have been numerous descents – some of them hundreds of metres in length. Every descent elicits a chorus of groans. A spot of downhill would normally pass for entertainment, but in the current context it is nothing but a cursed necessity. When you’ve fought so hard for uphill victory, it hurts to give up even a metre of altitude. Helmer wraps rope around the sledge runners to ensure they don’t pick up too much speed on the way down. Trying to control a rampaging dog team and a sledge weighing several hundred kilograms involves nerves of steel and ce
rtainly the presence of mind to get out of the way should another team come barrelling out of control. Capsizing would signal disaster. Stubberud’s lovingly honed sledging boxes do not have the structural integrity to survive an impact.
Every morning the men step from the tent, alive with a sense of wonderment at the majesty of their surroundings, but the feelings of awe fade as muscles that were pushed to their limits the day before start to complain in earnest. They still don’t know where they’re going or if their chosen route will deliver them to the polar plateau. Every day the distance seems greater, the challenge all the more unreasonable. The sun beats down without respite, its white acid light reflecting off every imaginable surface. Their lips are dry and cracked and thirst is a constant. Speaking only intensifies their dehydration, so they abandon conversation unless absolutely necessary.
‘Should’ve kept to the east,’ Bjaaland says.
Amundsen doesn’t slacken his pace, instead points the way forward with his pole.
‘But it’s pointless. We’ll need to backtrack.’
Refusing to stop, Amundsen simply says, ‘The compass points south.’
‘There’s no sense to it,’ Bjaaland complains. He’s thoroughly sick of getting to the end of a strenuous climb only to discover, when looking back over the terrain, that there was an easier way up.
For Amundsen it is like listening to the constant grizzling of a child, one who he prefers to ignore.
But Bjaaland craves a response. ‘Your problem is you can’t admit you’re wrong,’ he says dejectedly.
Now Amundsen stops. He regards Bjaaland in stern silence. When he finally speaks, his voice is chalky dry. ‘Olav Bjaaland: on reaching the Antarctic plateau you will be relieved of your duties and return to Framheim.’
‘What?’ Bjaaland splutters. ‘What have I done wrong?’
‘Your negative attitude. You will return to Framheim.’
‘But I don’t know how.’
‘Then Sverre will take you.’
It’s like it was with Johansen, only, in the middle of nowhere, it’s far worse. His first instinct is to object loudly, but Bjaaland can tell by the way Amundsen clenches his jaw that to argue now would have little effect. Bjaaland looks to Sverre, who is too far behind to have heard the exchange, but he’ll soon know all about it.
‘This is disgusting,’ Sverre fumes to Bjaaland in the privacy of their tent later that evening. ‘Two able-bodied men … and he wants to send us back? The man’s got a screw loose.’
Bjaaland nods vigorously. ‘We could die out there on our own.’
Even as Sverre and Bjaaland rail against their leader, Helmer and Oscar refuse to hear one bad word about the chief. Both men would follow him into the abyss if he asked for volunteers. Their confidence is not misplaced. Amundsen’s sound planning and infinite patience in working out every last detail have brought them safely to 85.36 degrees south; the same principles will carry them forward to 90 degrees. It may feel an eternity since they set off from the barrier but it has only taken the team four days to travel 77 kilometres up the wholly uncharted Axel Heiberg Glacier.
‘I’ve seen it all before,’ says Helmer. ‘The chief ’s just focused on his outcome. Bjaaland should ask for forgiveness and see what he says.’
Mentally and physically exhausted, Bjaaland has lost the naïve sense of adventure he felt on leaving Framheim. Good-natured conversation and camaraderie have been sacrificed to fatigue and anxiety. This is polar exploration, raw and unpleasant, and he’s not sure it’s for him. Even so, he’ll not be deprived of victory at the pole after getting this far.
‘I’m sorry,’ says Bjaaland.
Amundsen does not look up from his diary.
‘I really am so sorry. It won’t happen again. I promise. I don’t want to go back. I want to carry on to the pole.’
‘Hindsight is a wonderful thing,’ Amundsen sighs as he notes down the various ‘shortcuts’ they’ve failed to spot from below. In time they’ll be crossing back over here from the opposite direction and every bit of ground they can make up the better – however tired they feel now after climbing the Axel Heiberg Glacier, they will feel ten times more exhausted on their return from the pole. The men have earned two days of rest. There is a fearful challenge ahead of them.
‘Very well, Bjaaland,’ says Amundsen. ‘You may stay.’
CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE
Amundsen recognises it as a failing, a weakness in his character, but he cannot take part in the slaughter. They’ve already christened this camp ‘the Butcher’s Shop’. It is too awful. His dogs. They have demonstrated unstinting loyalty, applying their vigour day after day for weeks on end to accomplish the selfish whim of man. Surrendering every ounce of energy hauling the provisions up the glacier, they have nothing left to offer up but their own flesh. If he and his men are to reach the South Pole, much will be due to the dogs.
Inside the tent Amundsen pumps the Primus to ease the flow of fuel. Even though he’s expecting it, the first gunshot makes him flinch. The abrupt violence of the sound seems out of place in the gloom of early evening, in such pristine surroundings. Echoing off the mountains, other shots ring out in quick succession. There is no need to count. Amundsen knows there will be twenty-four such reverberations, all eventually absorbed by the whistling of the wind and the howling of the survivors.
Feasting on the entrails of their former companions, most of the remaining dogs do not care where their latest meal comes from. For them, loyalty to fallen comrades cannot compete with desperate hunger. A few are reluctant at first, sniffing the bloody mounds suspiciously, then licking them, before eventually tucking in with gusto. The effort of the last few days has taken a lot out of them. Requiring more sustenance than their daily rations of pemmican deliver, the dogs will eat anything left lying on the snow and will happily stoop to thievery if an opportunity presents itself. Several days ago Amundsen had to wrestle one such villain to the ground and make him return the morsel he so brutally tore from another dog’s mouth. It was a brave, if somewhat foolhardy, action on Amundsen’s part. Viciousness has become a common trait. Among the eighteen strongest dogs who have been spared, another six will eventually be sacrificed to the cause – which ones is yet to be determined, but this is now very much a dog-eat-dog world.
When it comes to raging hunger, the men are little better off than the animals, and fall on their rations at the end of the day with single-minded focus and little in the way of conversation. Tonight should be no different. Having gone through the motions of lighting the stove and warming the tent, Amundsen surrenders all dinner preparations to Oscar.
‘It’s blowing out there now,’ says Sverre. The last one to enter the tent for the evening, he removes his boots and peels back the multiple layers of stinking woollen socks. Nobody complains. Over the weeks, the men have grown more tolerant of the rich spectrum of odours emanating from their companions.
Amundsen looks up from his diary. ‘Prevailing winds are from the south. The northerly slopes are all iced up. The ones facing south are completely free of snow.’
Helmer sighs, knowing they’re going to get the same treatment. ‘A southerly wind full in the face.’
‘Well, we can pick up the pace now. Lighter sledges, better surface.’ Amundsen offers what he hopes is an accurate assessment. He can’t afford for the men to lose heart in the face of the most challenging section of their journey.
‘I don’t like our chances of setting off on schedule if these gales continue.’ Sverre peers over Oscar’s shoulder at the contents of the bubbling pot of pemmican.
‘Well, let’s hope it settles in the next forty-eight hours,’ says Amundsen. ‘The dogs need a chance to digest the good feed they’ve just had.’
‘A good feed,’ says Sverre. ‘Just what I’m looking forward to.’
Oscar nods absent-mindedly as he considers the plate of what he assumes are the choicest cuts. As the evening’s chef he has the special job of figuring out how to cook dog. He
’s never eaten it, let alone had to take responsibility for turning it into something palatable. Should he try to disguise its flavour? Cut it in small cubes so it’s easy to swallow without too much thought as to what the poor creature’s name was? Camilla? Madeiro? Oscar knows they’ll not be eating those particular dogs tonight – but their turn could easily come somewhere down the line.
‘I’d like to see Scott eating his motor sledges!’ scoffs Helmer.
‘What does dog taste like?’ Oscar asks.
‘Like meat.’
‘Does it have a flavour, I mean?’
Helmer shrugs. ‘Meat flavour.’
It may have been a source of anguish to kill the dogs, but now that the evil deed is done, nobody seems fussed about eating them. For Helmer, Sverre and Amundsen, tonight’s stew is just another of many dog-meat dinners consumed over their years conducting business in polar regions. It will be a first for Bjaaland, but the skier appears not the least bit squeamish about the prospect. He’s just as fixated on filling his empty belly as the dogs themselves.
Oscar doesn’t enjoy handling the meat. He’s already had a hand in the killing and the ghastly job of skinning the poor brutes. Now he wants rid of it. Chopping the flesh roughly, Oscar drops it from thumb and forefinger into the pot of bubbling pemmican.
‘Soup,’ he says, trying to convince himself that the dish has nothing to do with the animals that carried them up the steep glacier.
‘You don’t need to cook it forever,’ Helmer says gruffly. ‘Dish up, I’m starving.’
Oscar gives the pot another stir. ‘It’s barely cooked. It’ll be tough as old shoe leather.’
‘Chewy’s fine.’ Amundsen extends his cup in the direction of food.
‘I’m ready,’ adds Bjaaland, freeing up his utensils from the bag.
Oscar can see that the urging will not cease until each man cradles his serving of dog stew under his nose. Carefully he ladles out steaming spoonfuls.
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