Good Dogs Don't Make It to the South Pole

by Hans-Olav Thyvold

  No, I suppose I don’t.

  ‘Let me try to explain. When men work together in a pack, they have to establish a ranking order so the the pack will function properly. That order doesn’t need to be explicit, but it has to be established and respected so that the pack will work from day to day. Just like a pack of dogs.’

  ‘When the farmer, back in the day, as part of his business strategy, started to demonize the wolf to legitimize its massacre, it became imperative to depict the wolf pack as one big snarling hierarchy of power and discipline. A society, no less. The rule of the mighty built into a system, with the alpha male as supreme leader based on his ferocity. But it’s not like that. Should you encounter a wolf pack—and what are the chances of that, Mrs. Thorkildsen?—what you’d really be meeting is a family out for a walk in the park. Family values. That’s what it’s all about.’

  ‘I’m sure you know this better than I do.’

  ‘Right? A wolf pack is rarely more than a dozen individuals, and they’re connected by family bonds. And you must know that under such circumstances, it’s not the father, but the mother who’s boss. She’s neither the largest nor the strongest, but in a well-organized wolf pack, mom is the leader, and she assumes that position without having to constantly slit the throat of anyone who challenges her.’

  ‘Hmmm …’ Mrs. Thorkildsen says.

  ‘Gave you something to think about there,’ I say.

  ‘You did,’ Mrs. Thorkildsen says, ‘and I think what you’re saying might be the explanation for the Chief’s success. And for the demise of the Englishmen.’

  ‘And there you’ve lost me.’

  ‘I can see that, Tassen. The point is that Lindstrøm, in the pack of men who sailed south together, represented the mother figure in a way. Not least for the Chief himself, you see. Lindstrøm wanted to keep things clean and tidy, he kept everyone’s spirits up, he was endlessly patient, he nursed the sick and, not least, he served up the most delicious meals.’

  ‘Not least!’

  I can feel all this talk of food starting to affect me.

  ‘Lindstrøm decorated for Christmas nicer than Mom did. Every year, he built a new Christmas tree with his own two hands, since there weren’t any trees where they were. On Christmas Eve, they sat there in the frozen tundra, around a table that was more plentiful than what they’d have at home. And just like Mom, it was Lindstrøm who woke first in the morning in the little cabin on the coast of the South Pole that lay buried in snow. Only the chimney stuck up over the snow. Lindstrøm was the first to rise in the pitch black polar morning. He lit the stove with the help of a generous squirt of gasoline, put the coffee on, and then the Chief could wake up, and they would drink their morning coffee together.

  Lindstrøm was the only one who almost knew the Chief, the only one in whom the Chief dared confide about his doubts and his fear over a coffee cup in the kitchen. Lindstrøm listened, said only those few encouraging words that were needed, and if there was scolding to be done, he was the only one who could give it to the Chief. Or at least the only one the Chief could take it from. And you should know this—Lindstrøm was the dogs’ favorite.’

  ‘Well, that makes sense,’ I say. ‘He smelled like food. When you smell like food, you’re well on your way to making friends with any mutt you meet.’

  ‘Yes, but I think it was more than that. He’d learned from the Eskimoes how to use dogs. Lindstrøm and the Chief lived among them in the Canadian wilderness for two years. They both learned how to discipline Greenland Dogs, but Lindstrøm understood the dogs on another level, too. He was good at driving the sled, better than the Chief.’

  ‘I’m amazed the big Chief let him drive.’

  ‘In order to become as famous as the Chief did, I’m afraid you have to spend a lot of time thinking about yourself. That is, you can’t afford to spend too much time reflecting on others and what they want. That’s why people like that become so dependent on others. The Chief was dependent on people who took care of all the finances and correspondence and all the other drivel that came with life in civilization. Truth be told, the Chief didn’t care much for civilization, but where else can you hear ovations?’

  The Chief had seen it with his own eyes—how robust men, chosen as the best of the best, could degenerate into filthy, feeble weaklings passively slipping further into a misery of their own making. Men who stop washing their asses. That didn’t scare him. He couldn’t imagine himself in such a condition, but he learned to watch out for the danger signs out there in the cold. The most obvious one had to do with hygiene. A man who doesn’t take care of himself can’t take care of others.

  ‘Lindstrøm was an artist!’ Mrs. Thorkildsen says it emphatically, and it’s not just the Dragon Water talking, but I can hear the echoes underneath.

  ‘Survival …’ Mrs. Thorkildsen takes a dramatic pause. ‘Survival demands that a human being draws on some of their most civilized qualities and, at the same time, that they’re able to throw off some of their civilization. You have to be able to live as the animal you truly are, when required. To handle your own smell. Your stench.’

  ‘What would you know about stench?’ I’m tempted to ask, but now is not the time for sarcastic quips. Mrs. Thorkildsen is excited, and it suits her.

  ‘On the other hand, you can never let go of your decency and culture,’ she continues unabated. ‘You’re there because you’re human, you’re there to be human. Otherwise there’d be no point. So you need something to remind you of who you are when you’re not an animal. Such as a mille-feuille. Or a seal steak cooked to perfection. Profiteroles? Fresh-baked bread and rolls. Pancakes. Coffee. Canned pears with whipped cream. A tiny nip of schnapps to top it off, perhaps? Cheese and port wine. It takes so little, and Lindstrøm had plenty of it.’

  I took note of one of Lindstrøm’s sayings, since it was also one of Mrs. Thorkildsen’s. It goes like this:

  ‘Always have at least one extra bottle hidden away.’

  I’ve waited long enough now, I’ve listened patiently to Mrs. Thorkildsen’s uncritical praise of Lindstrøm, who obviously was a man after her own heart and who surely had plenty of great qualities, but still must be judged for the actions he took:

  ‘So how could such a fine man put dogs on the menu?’ I ask, with a slight sneer.

  Mrs. Thorkildsen laughs her librarian laugh, even though we’re all alone and there’s not a soul to disturb.

  ‘Poor Tassen. Did you think they were sitting there eating dogs for dinner constantly? Dog steak à la Lindstrøm? No, no, Lindstrøm neither served nor ate a single dog. It was only the ones who traveled to the South Pole who did that. Lindstrøm stayed behind in the cabin for the months the journey took, together with the dogs who weren’t going to the Pole, and they all had plenty of food to eat. But he wasn’t completely innocent. Do you remember the stuffed dogs at the Fram Museum?’

  ‘As much as I’d like to forget them,’ I say, feeling the discomfort that still lingered.

  ‘Lindstrøm was the one who put those to sleep and prepared them while the others were at the Pole. He was an expert at it, too. There are lots of stuffed animals that Lindstrøm left behind in the university’s collections.’

  ‘But he’s in the clear as far as being a dog eater?’

  ‘Absolutely. Lindstrøm is innocent on that score.’

  ‘So let’s find the guilty parties.’

  ‘Just one more thing about Lindstrøm?’

  ‘We have a South Pole to get to.’

  ‘I think you’ll like this one. Listen: Lindstrøm, you see, is the one person on the crew who comes nearest to dying on the South Pole expedition. And he has himself to thank, I’d say. For what does Lindstrøm do when the Chief and his chosen men finally take off, and he’s alone at last? What does a good Norwegian do when the sun is shining on the sparkling, snow-covered fields? Sure enough, he straps on his cross-country skis and goes for a run—and that’s what Lindstrøm does, so far and for so long that he goes snow-
blind, far away from the snowed-in cabin.’

  ‘What do you mean, snow-blind?’

  ‘If people go out for a long time in the snow under the sun without protecting their eyes, they lose their eyesight. It returns after a while, but it’s quite painful. Like sandpaper under your eyelids, or so I’ve read.’

  ‘Perhaps an indication that they—unlike Greenland Dogs, for instance—are in the wrong place?’

  ‘Perhaps. Without being able to see, Lindstrøm—who’s terrified now, you have to understand—roams around the frozen landscape aimlessly. He listens for the howling of the Framheim dogs, but it’s too far away and the sound carries poorly across the snow. He has to find his way home without anything to guide him. Every route except for the most direct path from here to the cabin will lead to certain death out in the cold. Lindstrøm is history, for all intents and purposes, it’s just a matter of time. But then he hears a dog bark.’

  ‘Ha!’

  ‘And not just any dog, either. Lindstrøm can tell the difference between all his dogs based on their bark. It’s one of his favorites, who loves her freedom to run around during the day, always with a tail of suitors right behind her.’

  ‘A real bitch!’

  ‘Calm down, Tassen. The point is that Lindstrøm manages to call the dog to him, and she leads him back to camp so he survives and dies an old man in Oslo a whole lifetime later. Isn’t that a beautiful story?’

  ‘Yes, really beautiful. Until they get back to the cabin and Lindstrøm strangles the poor beast and prepares it for taxidermy.’

  27

  The Return of the Home Help. I may have accidentally underestimated the Home Help. In more ways than one. The Home Help, it turns out, has the power to completely change its appearance. Today the Home Help isn’t a hysterical dog-hating woman, but instead a perfectly cheerful man with absolutely no fear of ‘dog,’ who even knows how to scratch. Mrs. Thorkildsen may not understand much of what the Home Help says today either, but he has a fierce appetite for cinnamon rolls, and he has time to listen to Mrs. Thorkildsen and give me scratches, as I mentioned—and that takes care of a lot. Most things, actually. The three of us have had a lovely morning, and the Puppy has just arrived, too. The Puppy doesn’t say no to a cinnamon roll. This is starting to look like a party—if only Mrs. Thorkildsen could get out her Dragon Water and some of that spicy tobacco.

  ‘I thought I could drive you to the store,’ the Puppy says, and for once Mrs. Thorkildsen seems to think he’s had a good idea. At least she doesn’t start discussing it with him. She goes off to get ready, and the Puppy moves closer to the Home Help.

  ‘How do you think it’s going?’ he asks in a low, concerned voice. The Home Help seems a bit surprised by the question, and his scent seems to indicate he’s a little uncomfortable.

  ‘Okay, I think?’ he says, and that should answer his question, but the Puppy isn’t satisfied.

  ‘I’m worried about how she’s getting on. It’s a big house. And the store is far away …’

  ‘She seems to be doing fine,’ the Home Help says. ‘She keeps a neat, clean house, and the fridge is stocked with food. The dog seems to be doing well. At least he’s not too skinny. You know what they say—if the dog’s happy, everything is fine.’ The Home Help laughs.

  I can’t be bothered to speculate about what in the world the Home Help might mean by ‘not too skinny.’ He’s rather robust himself, so he might have meant it as a compliment. As if he can read my thoughts, the Home Help says:

  ‘Good boy.’

  How could I help but love a human with such good instincts?

  ‘But what about all these paper dolls she has?’ The Puppy gestures to the wolves. ‘Is it … healthy?’

  ‘It must have been a ton of work.’

  ‘Sure. But do you know why she does it?’

  ‘No …’ the Home Help says.

  ‘For the dog!’ the Puppy says, waiting for a reaction that doesn’t come.

  ‘Okay. What do you mean?’ the Home Help asks.

  ‘Tassen is the best thing in her life, but sometimes I think she takes it a bit too far, that she treats him almost like a person. She reads aloud to him, for instance. She talks to him and he talks to her. She says Tassen thinks this and Tassen says that. That’s why she’s cut out all these paper dogs, to show Tassen how many dogs Roald Amundsen brought with him to the South Pole. You see? Dogs can’t count, she says, that’s why she’s teaching him this way!’

  ‘They’re Greenland Dogs,’ the Home Help says.

  ‘Oh?’ the Puppy says, his foothold slightly slipping.

  ‘I worked in Greenland once, on the west coast among the Inuits. You can probably hear that I’m part Danish, so I seized the opportunity to earn some good money in my student days—and since then I’ve spent half the year up there. They still talk about Roald Amundsen’s dogs there.’

  ‘I see. But you think it’s okay that she cuts out these paper animals and talks to the dog?’

  ‘I don’t know your mother well enough to evaluate her. Nor is it my job to do that. As far as I can tell, she’s a lady with her wits about her, who maybe isn’t eating quite enough. She’s not the only person who talks to her dog. I think most old ladies do that.’

  Then the Home Help does something that makes the Puppy’s scent change and his heart rate spike. He puts his hand on the Puppy’s shoulder without saying a word. Just sits there for a long while with his paw outstretched, as if he’s asking to be scratched or fed, then says:

  ‘It’s not easy. I know. Your mother isn’t getting any better; there’s no miracle diet or wonder cure that can bring her back to where she was yesterday or the day before. There’s nothing you can do, nothing we can do, except make her journey as pleasant as possible. I can see this is a house full of books, so do you know your Hamsun, by any chance?’

  The Puppy nods his head, and his smell is difficult to interpret now. ‘The Nobel Laureate,’ he says.

  ‘Knut Hamsun,’ the Home Help goes on, ‘described life by painting a picture of a man sitting on the back of a wagon, on his way to the gallows to be executed. The wagon is built in the simplest way, and there’s a nail sticking out and gnawing at his ass cheek. So, he moves over a bit, and it stops gnawing at him.’

  The Puppy gets quiet. The Home Help keeps scratching my neck with calm, even movements. After a long while the Puppy says:

  ‘My grandmother once told me she had made love to Hamsun.’

  ‘What?’ the Home Help says. ‘That’s incredible.’

  The Home Help is enthusiastic, and clearly wants to know more, but the Puppy places an index finger over his lips as Mrs. Thorkildsen returns from the bathroom wearing her outside smell and her outside face. She seems to be in a sparkling good mood.

  ‘Well, gentlemen,’ Mrs. Thorkildsen says, ‘shall we?’

  28

  How to Beat a Greenland Dog. A short introduction by Captain Roald Amundsen:

  A confirmation often happens when one particular sinner has decided to be difficult and will not listen. It consists of, at the first available moment when the sled is stopped, going up to the dogs, removing the disobedient one, and smacking it with the handle of the whip. These ‘confirmations’ can, when they become frequent, require many whip handles.

  It’s bizarre hearing these words come out of Mrs. Thorkildsen’s friendly little mouth. The thought of Mrs. Thorkildsen smacking Greenland Dogs so whip handles snap in half is beyond my wildest imagination. But of course they’re not her words, but the Chief’s. And he’s got more:

  The whip had stopped frightening them long ago; when I tried to keep beating them, they’d huddle together, trying to protect their heads as best they could, they didn’t worry so much about their bodies. Yes, many times it proved almost impossible to get them going, so I had to get help for this work. Two of them pushed the sled forward and the third continued to whip.

  Mrs. Thorkildsen falls silent. It’s a trick. I’ve noticed that—as the atrociti
es detailed in the story of the journey to the middle of nowhere get worse—she increasingly prefers to let the books speak for themselves.

  In the Chief’s dispassionate tone, I soon get the story of one dog, then another lost to the great beyond before the journey from the winter quarters to the South Pole has even begun. It takes so little, since if there’s one thing the expedition has plenty of, it’s dog power. Dogs are killed for any reason you could possibly imagine—because they’re too fat, or too horny, or too stubborn—but, most of all, because they are too many.

  On the November day the Chief and his four chosen men finally swing their whips around and set out in a straight path towards the South Pole, Mrs. Thorkildsen and I have long since lost track of exactly how many dogs are alive and how many have fallen before the great march. It’s becoming a large pack up there on the mantle, while the flock on the floor is larger than ever. Meanwhile, Mrs. Thorkildsen has taken the step of splitting it up. That is, it was really the Chief’s idea.

  She picks up about half of her paper wolves on the floor one by one, with slow, systematic movements. She freezes, her arms full of dogs.

  ‘I can’t say exactly what these ones died of, or when, but none of them survive in the long run. Some of them die of natural causes, I’d guess.’

  I’m about to ask what ‘natural causes’ means for a Greenland Dog in Antarctica, but then I hear Mrs. Thorkildsen say:

  ‘Some of them run away.’

  Run away. These are the happiest words in this whole story so far. I want to hear more about the dogs who ran away, but Mrs. Thorkildsen doesn’t dwell on them.

  ‘Now it’s all about these dogs,’ she says, pointing to the pack that’s left on the rug. ‘Fifty-two dogs, Tassen. That’s two more than the Chief thought they’d have left when they arrived in Antarctica. And those fifty-two are split into four groups … like this.’