The Pole (15 page)

As I ran I kept turning to the side, trying to keep an eye on Mr. Marvin's progress. It was hard to tell if he was gaining or falling behind, but I did know that the distance between us was growing as he angled off to the side. Was he taking a better line than the one I was following—the one George had taken? I couldn't think about that. I trusted George, and I'd made my decision. No matter what, this was the way I was going.

Mr. Marvin was still running along beside his team, moving hard. I was almost at the pressure ridge
where George had made his right turn and vanished from sight. I'd be there in a few seconds and then the race between us would be going on out of sight. I looked back one more time before I took the hard right cut and slipped behind the pressure ridge.

My breath was coming hard and short and I could feel the cold air searing my lungs. Maybe George could go on running—maybe Mr. Marvin could do the same—but I couldn't. I jumped up onto the runners. I had to let the dogs take me for a while. I peered past the dogs. I couldn't see George—the route ahead was marked by high ridges—but I could see one of the markers, glistening red in the moonlight.Thank goodness for the moonlight.

When I'd first heard that the sun was going to set in November and not come up again until some time in February, I was almost afraid. I thought it would simply be three months of darkness. But it wasn't like that. With the high moon, midday, especially when the moon was full, you could see clearly and see well into the distance. And there was a full moon today. That was why the race was being held at this time. There was enough light to see clearly right now and there would be much more by the time it got to noon. That was still about four hours away. If I was lucky, if I ran hard, I could be more than halfway through by then.That's when I'd stop for a break. Feed and water the dogs and eat something myself as well.

I rounded another pressure ridge and in the distance I could see George. The route ahead was straight and flat and clear and he was so far in front of me that he was just a tiny speck on the horizon. At least I knew I was going the right way. I heard the sound of dogs barking off to the side—it was Mr. Marvin! He had cut around another ridge and was on the flat, almost parallel to me! I jumped off the runners. My legs were feeling strong and my lungs were clear. I yelled at the dogs and, with my weight gone from the sledge, they surged forward.

Our two sledges were coming together, both of us heading toward the distant marker. At one point it looked as though Mr. Marvin was ahead, then me, now we seemed to be virtually even. His sledge slipped in beside mine. There was no more than twenty feet between us, and my lead dog was the only lead I now enjoyed. As the two teams came together the dogs started barking even louder. It was as if they were cheering each other on, or saying hello, or maybe insulting each other.

Above the din of the dogs Mr. Marvin was yelling, urging his huskies on. I began yelling at my dogs too, but it felt as though my voice was lost. Slowly his sledge started to pull away, just a little at first and then, dog by dog, his team began to get clear of mine. Finally he was obviously ahead of me. There was no point in pushing the dogs any
harder. I jumped up onto the runners and eased off the reins.

Lightning kept pulling the team forward. He didn't want to give up the chase. Maybe I wanted to quit, but he didn't. I felt bad. I jumped off the runners and started yelling as loud as I could and the team surged forward.

Mr. Marvin had finally stopped running and was riding the runners. He was a big man—he had to outweigh me by sixty or seventy pounds—and his dogs would be working much harder under the additional weight. I wouldn't make my dogs work. I was going to be running until we caught him, until we
passed
him. The gap of ice between us—which had been opening up—was now becoming smaller. Mr. Marvin still hadn't noticed us gaining. It was as if he'd figured that once he'd passed I would just give up and let him go. And that might have been true … but neither of us had figured on Lightning. Maybe he'd underestimated both me and the dog.

We were getting closer and closer and closer and—Mr. Marvin looked back over his shoulder. He looked shocked to see me there. I expected him to jump off and start running, yelling at his dogs to pull him forward. Instead he brought one hand up to the side of this head and saluted me! Now
I
was shocked. I just grinned and saluted him right back!

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

I STAYED UP
with Mr. Marvin for almost an hour. We talked—or really he talked and I listened. He told me things about the ice, about the Arctic. He knew a lot. He wasn't friends with any of the Eskimos, but he was always asking them questions, learning from them. He didn't see them as equals, but he did know that we were living in their world, and they knew their world much better than he did.

We travelled side by side. George had disappeared long ago and none of the others had caught up to us. We couldn't even see them, and the only dogs we could hear barking belonged to our two teams. It was almost as if we were the only two people in the world. The two of us and twenty barking huskies.The sound of barking dogs was as much a part of the Arctic to me as the wind rushing by or the noise the sledge runners made as they slid over the ice.

I stayed with Mr. Marvin as long as I could before he started to pull away.The first time that happened
he yelled for me to pick up the pace. It wasn't angry yelling—he was encouraging me. I kept up with him as long as I could but eventually I knew I had to back off. I yelled for him to go on without me. Once more he gave me a salute, but this time he did something else. He yelled back, “Well done, lad, well done!”

That made me feel good inside—and a bit guilty. I wasn't falling back just because I was feeling tired and couldn't keep up. We were coming up to the marker where I would be going off course. I couldn't very well do that with him watching. How would I explain it? But maybe I should have told him and invited him to come along—maybe that would have been the sporting thing to do.

Up ahead I saw the red marker, the one that marked the place where I was supposed to cut off course. I slowed the dogs down. It looked just the way Matt had described it. There was a big pressure ridge—as big as a house. I could see the tracks of the two sledges that had gone before me shooting off to the right.This was it. I'd been counting the markers. This had to be the place—unless I'd miscounted.

I brought the dogs to a halt. Almost instantly they slumped to the ice. I walked alongside the team.They looked tired—tongues hanging out, chests heaving up and down. They needed the rest. I undid the canvas—careful not to disturb the Baby Jesus too much—to reveal the wooden box that held food for
the dogs. I took off a mitt, reached in, and grabbed a piece of walrus blubber. The dogs were now all looking at me like I was the most important person in the world. Right then, I was.

I tossed the first piece toward Lightning. He leaped up into the air and grabbed it. I threw the second piece to Blackie and then a piece to each of the dogs. I then offered Lightning a second piece. He'd already devoured the first one, and besides, it was sort of like his extra pay for being in charge.After all, the captain of a ship got paid more than the third-class sailor.

There was a spot where the ridge rose up more gradually. I started up the incline. It was steep but certainly easy enough to climb … for me. But how hard would it be to get a team and a loaded komatik up the slope? I got to the top and looked beyond the ridge. I needed to see the way I was going to travel.

Fanning out in waves was a series of pressure ridges.They looked like a little mountain range. Matt had said they went on for about two hundred yards and that there were four or five of them, with sections of flat ice in between. All I had to do was read the compass—travel due north—until I cleared the last ridge and I came to a big stretch of flat ice. Although it was almost noon and as bright as it was going to get, there was no way I could see beyond the ridges to that flat ice.That was where I'd be back on course, having cut almost two full miles off the route.

I needed to see more. I dug in and climbed to the very top of the ridge, scanning the distance. In the direction I had come there was nobody to be seen. In the other direction, the way I should have been travelling, the way passed by Mr. Marvin and George, I couldn't see anything either.They were long gone.

Part of me wanted to simply go back to the dogs and continue on the course. Finishing third wouldn't be bad. Of course, that was assuming that nobody else would overtake me. But this way was going to cut miles of distance and at least an hour off my time. It wouldn't be that hard. As long as I went straight north it would work. I tapped my hand against my pants pocket. I could feel my compass. It was time.

I dropped down to my bottom and slid down the pressure ridge, moving much faster than I'd come up. I slid to a stop right before slamming into the dogs.A couple of them jumped to their feet and tried to scurry away but were held in place by the lines and the weight of the other dogs. I got to my feet and brushed off the snow.

“Come on, Lightning,” I said as I grabbed the dog's harness and pulled him to his feet. He willingly came with me and the rest of the team, pulling the sledge, followed along.

Lightning hesitated at the start of the slope. “Come on, boy!” I yelled and yanked on the lead.We started up. One of my feet slipped and I slumped down to all
fours, releasing the lead, but Lightning kept on moving up, leading the rest of the dogs. He got to the top and then stopped. I pulled myself up and went to his side. The downward slope was steep, almost as steep as the way we'd come up. If the dogs ran fast and kept running they could get onto the flat and keep the sledge behind them. But if they stopped running then the sledge would sweep into them, smacking the last dogs in their hind legs, maybe hurting them.That was a risk I didn't want to take.

I grabbed Lightning's harness and pulled him partway down the slope. I yanked him to a stop when the sledge reached the crest. It was balanced right there on the top edge, teetering slightly. I kept a hand on the harnesses, walking back along the team until I got to the final dog. I started to untie one of the leads that connected the dogs to the sledge.The knot undid easily.That wasn't the one that worried me. Now the dogs and sledge were tied together with just one lead. One lead was stopping the sledge from going backwards down the ridge along the route we'd travelled. I needed it to come forward, but not too much or it would slide down and onto the dogs.

I nudged the last dog, and he nudged the dog in front of him and the sledge pulled a foot forward. It was now perfectly balanced. I put a foot on the sledge, holding it in place, and undid the second lead. As it dropped to the ground I felt the sledge start to
slide backwards! I jumped on the front of the sledge and it tipped dangerously forward and started down the slope!

“Mush! Mush!” I yelled at the dogs.

They jumped forward a split second before I tumbled onto the sledge as it started down the slope. I tried to regain my balance but was helpless. I grabbed on, hoping it wouldn't throw me off, or tip or hit the dogs or—I bounced up in the air and landed back on top of the load as it hit the flat ice! I sat up as it slid across the ice. It had worked. The sledge was in one piece and I hadn't hit the dogs— the dogs! Where were the dogs? I turned around and burst into laughter. Lightning, leading the rest of the team, was running along behind the sledge. It looked as if they were trying to push it along.The sledge was slowing down and the dogs were starting to run alongside. Finally it came to a stop and the team stopped, almost right in front of me.

As I started to climb off the sledge I looked down. Baby Jesus was right underneath me.

“Sorry,” I said, feeling stupid talking to a doll, but guilty for landing on our Saviour.

I got to my feet and grabbed the leads. I pulled Lightning forward and positioned the dogs in front of the sledge. I looped the leads around the front of the sledge, tied them off securely, and then gave the command for the dogs to pull.

THE TEAM PULLED
the sledge up another slope. This had to be the last ridge.Then again, I'd thought that for the last two. We'd gone over nine pressure ridges altogether. Matt had said five—but maybe he'd meant five big ones. Some of them weren't that high, and I'd found places where I could drive the team right up and over. I was always careful when I had to move too far one way that I cut back to try to maintain a straight line. I kept checking my compass and we were heading due north. Besides the compass, I was also using the moon to guide us.

A couple of the ridges had been high and hard. There was one—I think it was the seventh—that I thought I might have to unload the sledge for, but in the end I was able to avoid that completely. I felt good about that. It wasn't just the time or work—I didn't want to disturb baby Jesus. He was sound asleep, eyes closed, perched on top of the komatik.

I'd been in the ridges and off course for a long time. I didn't have a watch but I figured it had to be at least forty minutes. It was getting close to noon and the midday moon was almost due north.This had to be the last ridge, and just on the other side of it would be the open ice and I'd be back on route. It had to be right.

I pulled at Lightning's harness and he pulled the team and the sledge forward. I slipped and put a hand down to steady myself and then got back to my feet.
This was taking a lot more time and energy than I would have thought. Maybe this wasn't such a great shortcut. I could only hope that Matt knew what he was talking about.

I reached the crest of the ridge. In front of me, as far as I could see in the midday moonlight, was flat, flat ice. No ridges, nothing but open ice. I felt like yelling out loud. Instead I commanded Lightning to go down the slope. I stood there as dog after dog made the descent, then the sledge, and I grabbed onto the handles as they passed. The slope was long and gentle and I rode along. I brought the sledge to a stop at the bottom. Now I just had to turn left and keep going.