The Pole (8 page)

I'd learned to trust his eyes. Maybe I'd learned to trust mine more, too. I was seeing things more clearly, more quickly, noticing little differences that I hadn't noticed before.

Captain Bartlett screamed down an order from the crow's nest for the ship to come to, and within seconds it tilted to one side and followed his direction. I had the strangest thought that it wasn't anybody steering or responding to his order but the ship itself simply listening and doing what it was told.

For the first time since we'd left the Etah Fjord, there was land on both sides of us.We were working our way deeper into a bay, a harbour, where the ship would be spending the winter. This was the same place they had wintered before—the farthest north that any ship had ever travelled. Captain Bartlett had done it!

There were times when I'd had my doubts. Over the past five days we'd been stopped repeatedly. We'd doubled back, tried new routes, sent men out with axes and pry bars and dynamite. One day we'd
barely travelled ten miles. And I was told that the day before we'd sailed almost twenty miles but only gone three miles north.

I looked out at the coast. It was rough, rocky, and barren. If there was life to be seen it wasn't going to be from this distance with the naked eye. I pulled up the binoculars that hung around my neck. George had lent them to me.They were hard to focus, but I worked until I had a better look at the shore. The rocks and ruggedness were still visible, but I could also see what looked like grass—probably muskeg— and patches of colour … flowers.

I caught sight of movement against a cliff. It was small and fleeting, and then I focused. It was birds. Dozens—no, there were
hundreds,
maybe
thousands
of birds flying up and down and around the cliff face. They had to be nesting. Amazing. This wasn't just ice and snow and rock. Even up here, farther north than any man could live, life existed. Birds and flowers, seals and polar bears, and, of course, all the things that lived beneath the surface of the ocean and the ice.

“See anything interesting?”

I put down the binoculars. It was Matt.

“I see nothin' that
isn't
interestin'.”

Matt smiled. “That is a very good answer. Are you going to be happy to be on solid land?”

“I will be, but not as happy as the Eskimos.”

“You're right about that. They don't seem to like being cooped up on a ship. I can't say I won't be glad to get the dogs off, as well.”

“Think how I feel!” I said. “You're not the one cleanin' up after 'em.Will we be landing today?”

He nodded. “As soon as we drop anchor, everybody will be put to work to set up a camp on shore.”

“I thought we'd be staying on the ship … living onboard.”

“Some people will stay on the ship, but it's important to get everything that's needed off the ship as quickly as possible.You can never tell about the ice.”

“But … but we're here … we don't have to worry about the ice now,” I said.

“We always have to worry about the ice.Whether we're moving or not, the ice is always moving. Depending on the winds and currents, the ice can raft, pick the ship up, rip open a hole in the bottom, or tip it onto its side.”

How could that be?

“Last trip here, the ship was caught in shifting ice and tilted up close to forty-five degrees,” Matt said, holding his arm out to show the angle of the ship. “Then, just as it looked like the
Roosevelt
was going to be lost, the ice opened, released the ship, and she settled back down into the water.”

“If that happened, if the ship was lost, how would we get back home?”

“You've been tending to the answer,” Matt said. “Dog teams and sledges would take us down Ellesmere and eventually back to Etah.”

“That sounds simple enough,” I said.

“Simple, but not easy. It would be very difficult, especially if we didn't have enough dogs. How are the dogs?”

“Another one died yesterday.” It was a big, white-faced male dog. He'd been getting sicker and sicker, losing it through both ends for the past few days, throwing up and getting the runs. I couldn't help picturing the dead dog being thrown overboard. I knew there really wasn't another way to do it—it wasn't like they could bury it—but it still struck me as harsh.What would we do if a person died? No, we wouldn't do
that
.

“How many dogs have died?” Matt asked. “Fifteen.”

“Thank goodness the Commander had the foresight to bring close to two hundred and fifty dogs along.We still have more than we need.”

“We do, but there are more dogs that aren't well.” The sick dogs were throwing up and had the runs, making the mess on the deck even worse.

“How many more dogs are affected?” Matt asked.

“At least as many again.”

“We still have enough. The dogs will do better once we're on shore, once we can separate them.
Getting the healthy dogs away from the sick ones can only be a good thing.”

“I hope so.”

“Now, there's still time to get some grub before we drop anchor.You hungry?”

“I think I could eat a bite or two,” I said, with a grin.

I TENTATIVELY PUT
one foot down on the ice, and then the other. This was silly. I knew it could hold me, like it was already holding the dozens of men and dogs and sledges and crates that were already on the ice.

Matt had, of course, been right. No time was wasted. Within thirty minutes of dropping anchor they had started to unload the ship. Between my shipboard tasks—including scrubbing and cleaning the deck after the dogs had been brought down to the ice—I'd been watching.The first men, driving a team of dogs, their sledges loaded with equipment, had started off across the ice toward land.

The
Roosevelt
now sat in the middle of a solid sea of ice. The path that we'd broken to get here had refrozen.The ice had a different hue, and I could still see the path we'd travelled, but there was no more open water.The ship was locked in place. Funny, the last thing I'd wanted for the past few weeks was for the ice to be solid. Now, as I was standing on the surface, I wanted it to be as thick as possible.

There was a strong wind, whipping up snow and blowing it almost horizontally across the ice. I pulled the hood of my parka tighter around my head and moved over until I was shielded from the wind by a pile of wooden crates stacked to form a protective wall.

There was a blur of activity all around. All of the dogs that weren't being used to ferry supplies to shore were pegged down on the ice. Being off the ship seemed to agree with them as they looked frisky, as though they were happy to be on solid land … solid ice.

Equally happy were the Eskimos. I didn't think they liked being confined to the ship any more than the dogs did. They were working, but there was laughter, and it seemed like everybody was smiling. They must have felt like they were home. I knew they were far from Etah, but this was a lot more like what they were used to than being penned up on a ship.

Me, I liked the ship. I enjoyed sitting in the galley, at the big table, sipping a cup of tea or coffee and talking to Cookie. I liked being up on the deck. I was feeling a lot more comfortable in the rigging. Heck, I even liked the little section of the sleeping quarters I shared with five other crew, including Angus, who could snore so loud that it drowned out the noise of the ice against the hull.

I looked around for Matt, or the Commander, or any member of the expedition. None were here. They'd all probably gone in with the first sledges—the first komatiks—to start setting things up.The Captain and all the rest of the crew were still onboard.

As I stood there, I saw a team pulling a komatik coming back toward us. As it got closer, the barking of the dogs got the rest of our dogs excited and they joined in. It sounded as if they were cheering them on. I wondered who was driving the team. It would be best if it was the Commander. If it was, I could ask him if I could go along, drive in with a team and go to land. I wanted land under my feet. Of course, that was only part of it. I was just plain curious, and I wanted to know where they were making camp and what it looked like.

“Ya cold, Danny?”

I turned around. It was the Captain.

“A little, I guess, sir.”

“Gonna get a whole lot colder before this is over. Remember, this is summer.”

I laughed. “Not like any summer I've seen before.”

“So what are ya doin' down 'ere?” he asked.

“Just watchin'.”

“Ya can learn a lot, just by lookin'.You're a curious sort of lad,” he said. “Just remember, curiosity killed the cat.”

“I'll be careful, sir. Just lookin', that's all.”

“Do ya want ta do more than just look?” Captain Bartlett asked.

I didn't know what he meant.Was he was trying to trick me or—

“I'm goin' to shore. Do ya want to come along?” he asked.

“Could I?”

“Wouldn't ask if I didn't mean it.” He paused. “Besides, probably the best way to keep ya safe is to keep one eye on ya. Let me pick out the dogs and—”

“Could I pick the dogs, sir?” I asked.

“You?”

“I've spent a lot of time with them, you know, cleanin' up and such,” I explained. “I know 'em real well.”

“Knowin' 'em an' knowin' which ones will work as a team are two different things,” Captain Bartlett said. “But … go ahead, give it a whirl.”

CHAPTER NINE

I'D PICKED OUT THE DOGS
, one by one. The Captain hooked up the first two and then showed me how to hook the third up to the line.With the fourth dog I did it myself. He checked the lead, making sure I'd tied it the way he'd shown me. He didn't say anything, but then he didn't check the rest after that, so I must have done it right.

The dogs were being tied together in a sort of fan pattern, two dogs together, each pair on a separate lead, angling away from the sledge.That was different from what I'd expected or seen back at Etah.

“How come they're not being tied together in a straight line?” I asked Captain Bartlett.

“You questionin' how I'm doin' things?” he asked.

“No, sir!” I exclaimed, practically saluting him.

He smiled, and I realized he was just joking with me again.

“On solid land you tie them straight, best way to get the most power pulling forward,” he said. “Can't
do that on the ice. If the lead dog broke through the ice the whole team would go through into the water, maybe drown the lot, maybe even take the sledge and driver with them.”

A chill went up my spine and I suddenly didn't feel so safe standing on the ice.

“By tyin' 'em this way, in a fan pattern, only a couple might go in and the rest would stay on top, pullin' the stragglers out. Make sense?” he asked.

“Yes, sir.” I hesitated before asking the next question, but I wanted to know. “Is there any danger of
us
fallin' in?”

“Always a danger.”

That wasn't the answer I'd been hoping for, and I started worrying that the ice under my feet wasn't as thick as I'd thought.

“You just stay close to me, an' if anythin' bad happens I'll take care of it. Ever fallen through ice before?”

“No,” I said, shaking my head. “I was sort of hopin' to keep it that way.”

“Not much chance of that.”

Again, not the answer I'd wanted to hear.

“First time is the worst,” he said. “Important thing to remember is not to panic. Just close your mouth and wait to pop to the surface.We'll get ya out.”

Instinctively I closed my mouth and nodded my head.

“Scared?”

“Should I be?” I asked.

“Not today. Pretty thick,” he said, and he stomped his heel against the ice.

That was the first thing he'd said that made me feel better.

“… At least 'ere. Close to shore might be tricky.” So much for feeling better.

“Go and get the last dog,” he ordered.

“Yes, sir.”

I walked very slowly across the ice, wondering if each step might be the one that put me through the ice. I selected the final dog—the tenth dog—and tied him into place.

I had been careful with each dog I'd picked. I wanted animals that wouldn't bite me or any of the other dogs. These were the nicest dogs—and I knew the dogs better than maybe anybody except the Eskimos. Some of the dogs—often the biggest, strongest males—were nasty. I had avoided those ones. I wanted the dogs that wouldn't cause me any problems.

All the time I'd been choosing the dogs, others had been working to load the sledge. One of the big wooden crates had been placed on it and then other objects had been tied onto the top.

“Nice-lookin' team, Danny,” Captain Bartlett said. “Couple of those dogs are small. Not the most powerful, but then we're not goin' far. Now, come, I'm gonna show ya how to drive 'em.”

I followed him to the back of the sledge.

“You and me are gonna take turns runnin' and ridin'.When you're ridin', you put your hands here,” he said, pointing to two handles that extended at the back of the komatik. “Ya have to take this lead,” he said, grabbing a long piece of rawhide that led over the sledge and was connected to the leashes of all the dogs. “And ya put your feet on these runners,” he said, pointing down. “Actually, put one foot on the runner an' push with the other, like this.”

He grabbed the handles, holding the lead with his right hand, and put his left foot on the runner.With his right foot he pushed against the ice.

“Like that. Okay?”

“I can try.”

“Good, 'cause it's time to give it a whirl.”

Now I didn't feel so sure or so brave. He handed me the lead. I grabbed the handle with one hand and placed one foot on the runner, and stood there, waiting.