Death on the Ice (49 page)

The going was good, the snow firm, and all the ponies pulled well. In spite of his continued truculence, even Christopher occasionally stopped twisting and bucking and put in a good spurt. Bowers, who had initially been sceptical about the horses, nursed and encouraged Victor every bit as attentively as Oates might have. Oates spotted him slipping the pony a biscuit from his own ration.

Not bad, he thought, for a bunch of twisted old cripples. Even as it went through his mind, he felt a twinge in his thigh, as if his body was telling him it wasn’t only the horses that were damaged goods.

They were only a few miles into the march when they passed the first ominous marker. There was a black and brown patch of oil sullying the snow and two dented petrol containers had been tossed aside. A little further on was a tin, which Scott stopped to examine, causing the party to bunch up. Oates stayed well back, not trusting Christopher. It was Cherry who crunched over the snow and told him what was inscribed on the metal. A message from Evans. ‘The big end has gone on one of the tractors.’

‘What’s a big end?’ asked Oates, as Christopher tried to free his head for a bite at the young Cherry.

‘I don’t know, but it’s pretty vital judging from the Owner’s expression. There is a dot in the snow over there.’

He pointed due south. Oates squinted through his goggles, but could make out very little. ‘What is it?’

‘One of the motor-sledges, Bill Wilson reckons.’

Oates knew the mechanic Day would have worked his fingers to the bone to save it. It wasn’t an idle expression. He’d seen him strip great rolls of skin from his hands as he fiddled with nuts, bolts and wires. He wouldn’t have abandoned a motor-sledge unless there wasn’t another yard to be had from it. ‘How far have we come?’

‘On to the barrier? Four miles.’

Anger flashed through Oates. ‘Three motors at a thousand pounds each. Nineteen ponies at five pound. Thirty-two dogs at thirty shillings. I tell you, Cherry, if Scott fails to get to the Pole he jolly well deserves it.’

Cherry, shocked into silence, walked back to his sledge, hoping that Soldier was wrong and it was still his dark-fed depression speaking.

The next day, they came across the second machine, surrounded by a halo of burnt oil where it had spilled its guts in spectacular fashion. Scott’s face told Oates all he needed to know. He’d witnessed other commanders panic as misfortunes piled up. He prayed Scott wasn’t one of those. Somewhere ahead the four tractor-men had switched to man-hauling, with still the best part of the four hundred miles to go to the Beardmore.

Looking at the forlorn machine, its useless tracks already half covered with drifting snow, Oates realised there was something else he hadn’t considered. Unlike a horse or a dog, when a lump of metal broke down, you couldn’t even eat it.

B
OTH MEN AND ANIMALS
welcomed the rest stop at the ‘One Ton’, the depot of food and fuel they had laid the previous season, just short of eighty degrees. Fourteen long days of fighting blizzards, soft snow and headwinds meant that every night they were, in Oates’s words, ‘dead cooked’. He noticed something else, too. His feet sweated in the fur boots far more than he expected. Unless he was careful, the moisture froze at night. He had experimented with different sock and insulating hay combinations, but couldn’t get it right. Too swaddled and they perspired. Too little insulation and he risked frostbite in the deep snow.

While the others fired up the stoves in their tents, Oates set about building yet another snow wall to protect his charges before feeding them. The horses stood in a line, stock-still. Green waxed covers lay over them, but the exposed sections of their skin glistened with iced sweat. They were shivering and hungry. Christopher would be fed first, because he would create a terrible fuss if denied. The horse confounded Oates. Every day it was a struggle to make him move, but he refused to stop for lunch, instinctively knowing when the day’s march was finally over. Oates had not had a midday break for the best part of two weeks now.

‘Need a hand, Soldier?’

Oates looked up. It was Scott. ‘I am fine, sir. You should eat.’

‘Bill’s cooking.’ He picked up one of the blocks Oates had cut and carried it across to the foundations that had already been laid. ‘These have been horrid marches, haven’t they? But they are doing well, aren’t they? The horses.’

Not as well as Meares and his dogs, Oates thought. At every camp the huskies pulled in looking fresh and eager after their later start. Scott had told Meares to set out even later each day so as not to out-run them. Oates knew Cecil resented cooling his—and his animals’—heels like that. He never hesitated to point out that the horses and their handlers were comparatively beat. They hadn’t even caught up with Evans and his team, who were still up ahead, man-hauling towards the Beardmore. Had they been using dog teams, they would have scooped them up by now.

‘Better than the tractors,’ said Oates, tactfully.

‘Yes, well. But to have got the motors here and working is a feat in itself. One day, they’ll come good, you’ll see.’

Oates didn’t want to be drawn into that argument. Surely they hadn’t come to blaze a trail for someone else? ‘You know, the ponies are losing condition, skipper. Jehu and Chinaman particularly.’

Scott glanced over at the nearest pony. The wind lifted its cover. Sure enough, the blown snow was clinging to the vertical spas of bone that were its ribs.

‘There’s something else.’

Scott sighed. ‘There always is.’

‘They are burning a fierce amount of energy breasting through the snow. To keep them in condition, I have had to up the fodder. We are going to be short before we reach the glacier.’

Scott looked to argue, but held it in. Oates had already heard him disagreeing with Bowers about the sledge loadings and carping with Cherry about his handling of his horse. The compendium of delays and setbacks was testing his temperament. ‘I think they will keep it up.’

‘No,’ said Oates firmly. ‘You don’t understand. We’ll lose them all if we divide the food equally and try to get each and every one there. I know Bowers wants to ditch some fodder to lighten their loads. Perhaps he’s right. And then we’ll have to start killing the weaker ones to make sure there is enough fodder for the stronger.’

Scott blanched. ‘Already?’

Oates began cutting another block for the snow wall.

‘Already?’ Scott repeated.

‘Soon. There is no room for sentimentality now.’

Scott knew he was referring to their argument at the same spot months previously, when Oates had been for killing and depoting the ponies closer to the Beardmore. Scott had tried to get them back alive. And he was to be blamed for that? Since when was trying to make the best use of a creature a weakness? ‘Do your best, Soldier,’ he said brusquely.

Scott turned into the flurry and walked back towards his tent. So much for lending a hand, Oates thought, as he staggered over with the new ice-brick.

A few minutes later, Taff Evans yelled in his ear. ‘Skipper said we should help.’ With Taff and Crean cutting and hauling the wall was built in twenty minutes, and the horses fed within the next quarter of an hour. As he squelched across for his hoosh, Oates noticed once again that his feet inside the finnesko were soaking wet.

‘Come on, Jehu. Come on, fella. I know you’re hungry, but I can’t waste fodder on you. Not now. All right, one last biscuit. You’ve earned that. Steady there. I know. You don’t have to show me how strong you are. I know you have a few days left, but we have to keep the others’ strength up. Those snow-drifts, they are a bugger, aren’t they? Up to your chest. And not just the horses—’

‘Are you all right, Titus?’

‘Yes, Atch. Best it’s me. Isn’t it, Jehu? Don’t worry, Christopher won’t be far behind. I know he deserves it, but he’s still pulling all day without a break. Like Taff says, he has the devil up his arse, doesn’t he? I reckon Chinaman next, then either Christopher or Victor. Although Victor will break Birdie’s heart, I think. Never seen a man become a horse-lover so quickly. Over here, come on. Away from the others. Has to be done. You’ll go to a good cause, and not just your colleagues. I tell you, Day and Evans and those tractor-boys, have you seen them? Day is thinner than a pencil. All that man-hauling. Didn’t expect it to start quite so early, y’see. So you are going to have to feed him up. It’s worrying, because he’s been on pemmican. Same as us. But it’s the hauling. Worse fucking thing he has ever done, he said. Boring as hell. He says they ran out of conversation on day three! Well, much the same here, I suppose. Marches are getting quieter, have you noticed? Nobody is talking about Tennyson much any more. Day says he doesn’t fancy the thought of hauling all the way to the Pole. Teddy Evans won’t complain, though. Left a little here, lad. If the Norskies are going like Meares and Dimitri, though, God help Captain Scott. You know, there is a bit of record here. Just a little, but we can take some comfort, I suppose. Well, the Owner will. He’s got Shackleton at his back, and the Norskies at his front to drive him on. But he reckons we are about fifteen miles further on than when Shackleton had to kill his first horse. I know, it’s not much consolation, is it? But we are ahead of Sir Ernest and that counts for a lot in some quarters. I’m not sure now whether I want the Pole. I’ve forgotten what it is like to have warm feet. I suspect you have, too. Cold hoofs. It’s miserable, isn’t it? I’ll get your friends, some of them anyway, to the glacier, then it’s job done. I’ll go back. Make sure I catch
Terra Nova
. Perhaps do some studying for major on the way back. Oh, all right. Lots of studying. Major Oates. Sounds good, doesn’t it? Pick up your hoofs here. Bit of a drift. I reckon we are far enough away now. On the other hand, it would be good for the army to be there, wouldn’t it? The Inniskillings represented at the Pole. Well, we aren’t even at the glacier yet. Just come here. Steady. Goodbye, fella, and thanks.’

My Beloved Kathleen,

It is 9 December. The fourth day of a wet blizzard that has kept us in our tents. All, except for Oates, who goes outside into the blankness of the snow to feed the remaining ponies. He shot Christopher before the storm hit. The bullet entered the skull, but the beast didn’t die. It stampeded away from him into camp. Nearly trampled poor Crean before we got another shot in it. I have been troubled by the death of the ponies. Jehu had plenty of fat on him, so was not as far gone as we thought. But I was hardly disturbed by the shooting of Christopher, given the pranks he has performed.

The enforced delay has meant we have consumed food meant for the Summit radon, food we had designated for the plateau. We will have to make it up with pony hoosh.

I am not sure what we would have done without Oates. The temperature is +32 or +33F, even with the blizzard, and the movement of the horses makes for much slush, so he is getting very wet and is feeling the cold more than most of us. He has already suffered frostbite on his nose, as has Meares. He gets little relief inside the tent, with its dripping socks and sodden bamboo. Everything is chill and damp, and the only noise is the patter of snow and the crack of canvas. Bill Wilson keeps the spirits up as best he can.

I have sent Day and Hooper back to Hut Point with a couple of the dogs. Both are pretty much done in. We named one of the depots, the one below One Ton Camp, Mt Hooper. He seemed quite pleased to have something called after him en route. Teddy Evans is putting a brave face on it, but, he too, has been dragging a sledge for a month now. Man-hauling isn’t for everyone.

I am going to tell you something I should have told you in New Zealand, but I didn’t want to worry you nor think I was blaming your brother. I think the horses were very poorly selected. They have struggled the whole time. We have to beat them through the deeper drifts now, which is cruel but necessary. If it wasn’t for the Soldier they would have been as much use as the tractors. (Five years I wasted on those machines and I could barely get five miles out of them in the end.) So, Oates was right about the horses. Not sure I can find the words to tell him, though. Mind you, he won’t admit that the snowshoes actually work; I wish we had brought more, because they tend to break after a few hours.

I have just been outside. The wind is dropping and shifting to the North. Perhaps tomorrow we can carry on. There is no food left for the ponies, but Oates thinks he can work them as far as the barrier as long as the going improves. If is a terrible business. Thank God for Soldier.

Birdie Bowers cut the hoofs off Victor after Oates had despatched him. He has buried them in the snow. He says he will retrieve them on his return journey; he wants something to remember his old friend by. And people accuse me of sentimentality towards animals!

I should try and sleep now if the noise will allow, because we will need all our strength and good fortune for tomorrow. I pray this is not a widespread atmospheric disturbance across the whole region and is just localised trouble. To get such a blizzard in December can only be rotten luck. Let us also hope we have not chosen a bad season for our efforts. My love, as always, to both of you. At least I know you are safe and well at home with Peter.

T
HE LECTURE WAS PRECEDED
by a piano recital. The builders and proprietors of the small but acoustically perfect Bechstein Hall on Wigmore Street also owned the piano shop next door, and took every opportunity to display their superior German instruments.

Kathleen Scott sat at the rear, on the raked section of the stalls, and listened to Artur Schnabel play a piece by Schubert and a rather taxing one by Beethoven. When he had finished and the applause had died, he stood and announced in heavily accented English: ‘Ladies and gentlemen, I feel sorry for you. I think sometimes I am the only person in the room who enjoys the Beethoven’s Diabelli Variations. I get paid, you pay for tickets and you suffer.’