‘Right,’ Nev says after breakfast. ‘We’re all set to leave in an hour.’
‘Finally,’ Birdie says.
‘We’re flying out with field boxes with food for three months.’
‘We’re only going for six weeks,’ I say.
‘Better too much than too little,’ he says. ‘The only stuff you need to take are your extra-cold-weather gear and your radios. We’ll take those to Evans with us.’
‘I can feel a “but” coming on,’ Birdie says.
‘But we can never be sure of the weather,’ he says. ‘We could end up being stuck at Evans for some time if a storm blows up.’
‘Better than being stuck here,’ Birdie says. ‘At least we’ll be where they were.’
She’s sitting in the lounge, under a lamp that’s always on. It throws a yellow light over her face, colours her hair even brighter, even spikier, soaks into her cheekbones, her every tiny feature. The lounge, full of books and comfortable chairs, faces south, and the light is always on to guide Scott, Bowers, Wilson, Oates and Evans home. Birdie under the light is a guardian angel, the presence that could bring them back safely. What will we find of them when we get out to Cape Evans, where they left from, and never returned? Will there be anything tangible of them there, something to hold on to and carry with us until we, too, are lost?
Distances become incalculable, shapes indefinable, once we’re up in the air. When we flew into Pegasus, the mountain ranges looked as if they’d been computer-generated, small ripples on a flat surface. Now they’re massive and dangerous, too close for comfort. The chopper rears up into the wind, bounces up and down. My hands contract to fists.
‘It’s always like this,’ the pilot says into our headsets through his mike. ‘This is calm compared to most days.’
The headsets muffle the cacophony of the rotor blades slicing through the air. We can’t hear the gusts that make this flying coffin shudder. Mount Terror and Mount Erebus, two of the four volcanoes that form this island, crouch in the distance. Patches of grey scoria are surrounded by accumulations of snow. And beyond them, far beyond, the cold blue of the sea, fighting its never-ending battle with the ice. We’re diminished by the scale of this place, brought down to size by the immensity and power of this continent and the nature which created it, and harbours it.
We stop off at Cape Royds so we can see Shackleton’s hut. There’s hardly any snow. The wind has dropped when we land, and it feels almost like an English summer. The hut is much smaller than I expected, nestling shyly in a hollow between rising sea cliffs and the slope up towards the centre of Ross Island. Set deep into black soil, its pine has been stripped of colour by the elements.
It feels like a happy place, probably because I know all of the 1908 expedition survived, that they enjoyed being here, revelled in measuring themselves against nature. There’s so much food left here: whole hams, untouched cans of an assortment of preserves. It’s as if they had so much, they didn’t know what to do with it. We even find Shackleton’s signature, scrawled into the casing of one of the beds with a fountain pen. The wind ceaselessly batters the walls, the door, the roof.
Birdie disconnects while we’re here, walks up the rises and down the falls as if she were the only one here. This is nothing but an interlude for her. Beyond her, the sea is black. And glowering, away in the other direction, the glittering cone of Mount Erebus crowned, not in clouds, but in volcanic smoke. A mountain breathing.
After lunch, we’re in the air again for the short flight to Cape Evans, a two-day trudge for Scott and his men. We pass the Barne Glacier, split on its shore side into a hundred huge and monstrous crevasses. And then we see Scott’s hut for the first time, set on a slight slope. It looks tiny from up here, as if it’s about to slide from the land onto the ice. There are tide marks of snow and ice and churning soil around it.
We’re put down on the edge of a small village of tents and containers. The chopper stays on the ground only for long enough to unpack the supplies we’ll need while we’re here, then takes off again from amidst the black scoria and seal carcasses that haven’t moved for a hundred years. I feel a little deserted when it’s gone, and search for Birdie’s gloved hand. I’ve got butterflies in my stomach.
The light constantly changes. It’s never still, never at rest. One moment it’s bright enough to make razor edges from all the shadows, the next it’s soft and almost tangible. Then a cloud flits across the sun and jars everything static into jagged motion. One moment is never the same as another.
A long, low iceberg is trapped in the sea ice. It looks close enough to touch, but is actually miles away. Beyond that, the Transantarctic Mountains rise out of the mist. It’s minus 10C, and feels warm. Seals stretch out on the ice, less than twenty metres away. The only sound is that of our feet on the frozen ground, and the wind pushing its way around the metal containers further up the shore, behind the yellow A-frame tents of the conservation team.
By the time we’ve finished putting up our tents, it’s late afternoon. Nev’s embarrassed, because it took ages to put his tent up when Birdie’s and mine went up in next to no time. I pretend to warm my hands on his face. He just shakes his head.
‘It had to happen sometime,’ he says. ‘And that’s the first time in ten years.’
‘I hope it’s not a bad omen,’ Birdie says.
‘Rubbish,’ he says. ‘No such thing.’
‘So, when are we going to see the hut?’ Birdie says.
‘We’ll get some grub first, and then we can wander over there,’ he says.
‘How far away is it?’ I say.
‘Four hundred metres,’ he says. ‘It’ll take about five minutes to walk. Whatever you do, remember to stick to the flagged path. Things might look safe here, but nothing’s ever really safe, specially at this time of year with the sea ice breaking up.’
‘Understood,’ I say.
‘And where do we get this grub?’ Birdie says. ‘I’m starving.’
‘In the kitchen wannigan,’ he says.
‘What the hell’s a wannigan?’ she says.
‘It’s one of those containers.’
‘Why wannigan?’ she asks.
‘Couldn’t tell ya, to be honest,’ he says. ‘It’s just one of those words we’ve always used.’
‘Fair enough,’ she says.
‘And tomorrow you’ll be cooking,’ he says. ‘One of the others will do it tonight.’
The sun is still high in the sky, a pinhole of light through the threatening clouds. It doesn’t feel like any time at all. I have the feeling that time doesn’t exist here. The sun might change position, but it’s always up there, never down behind the horizon. It dislocates me, this unremitting shining light, as constant as the wind. I wander round the camp, and find the only respite from the wind and the sun is behind one of the wannigans. When I finally find shade and calm, I get out my cigarettes and light one.
‘Ah, another smoker,’ a thick Australian accent says behind me. It’s Ted, one of the carpenters. ‘Mind if I join you?’
‘Not at all,’ I say. ‘Want one of these?’
‘That’s what I was gonna ask you. I always leave mine on the mainland when I come down here.’
‘Leading you into temptation then, am I?’
‘Could say that,’ he mutters. ‘But who cares? I won’t tell anyone if you don’t.’
His skin is burnished by being outside all the time, and his fingers are dirty from his work. He’s worked on historic wooden huts in Australia, and on another hut, Mawson’s, on the other side of the continent. He’s divorced, has one kid. He loves being out here.
‘Don’t you miss your kid?’ I say.
‘Oh yeah,’ he says, ‘but you can’t beat this, can you? Who knows if we’ll ever get the chance again?’
‘Not easy to get out here, is it?’
‘They’re queuing to get this kind of work back home.’
‘Why?’
‘You know, that’s the weird thing. It’s not because of science, not even because of the restoration. It’s because there’s something about the human aspect of that age, something special and grand.’
‘Grand?’
‘Grand in the sense of wonderful, unique, unfathomable.’
‘I don’t understand. It’s a building. Historic, fair enough, but just a building.’
‘Just imagine the thought that went into putting it together, getting it ready. Where did they think they were going to put it? This wasn’t their site of choice. And then they built it in two weeks when they did get here. Almost a hundred years later, it’s still here. Think of the care that went into making those boards, the calculations to make sure all the bits fitted together as they should. You know, people nowadays think those days were so primitive, but they weren’t. Those blokes were innovators and craftsmen. They relied on themselves, their eyes, their hands, not on machines, or on anything automatic. And then they lived here for two years. And others after them. Understand now?’
I nod while he grinds his cigarette out in my home-made aluminium ashtray.
‘And that’s why this is so important,’ he goes on. ‘Because otherwise the world will forget about it. I’m not interested in all that shit about the race to the Pole, or about why some people think Scott’s a Pommie dickhead and some think he’s a real hero. I’m just interested in saving a building that’s got a soul, as far as I’m concerned, a place that speaks of human progress.’ We get up. ‘Sorry, mate,’ he says. ‘I get a bit excited about all this stuff.’
‘I think I’m beginning to understand,’ I say. ‘Not just about you. About this.’
‘You’ll never wanna leave, mate,’ he says. ‘I don’t.’
Dinner is a wonderful curry, concocted from rice, sausages, chickpeas, baked beans, peppers. I don’t think I’ve ever eaten something more satisfying. We wash it down with beer and wine. In the background, the gas burner fizzes. Slow light floats in through the windows. It’s an idyll in here, warm and comfortable, companionable. There’s even some chocolate for dessert.
I look across the table at Birdie. She’s animated, and her cheeks are flushed. She winks at me while she talks to the carpenters. I listen to the cacophony of conversations. It’s fun to sit just outside these circles of words and absorb everyone else’s words. It’s something I’ve never really done before, to learn from others. I’ve been too busy trying to impose my narrow view of the world on others so I can move quickly and efficiently from one thing to another without being involved, or having to think too hard. I won’t ever be able to do that again. Because I’m involved now. And not just because I’m in love. But because the passion these people have for this project, for this period in history, and this building I’ve not even seen yet, is contagious. Because, finally, I realise I have a heart.