Lindstrøm sits bolt upright. His head slams into the empty bunk above. A howl explodes in the dark. Amundsen turns sleepily to assess the level of injury.
‘You okay?’
‘The travellers are coming home.’
Amundsen closes his eyes. ‘You’re having a dream, Fatty. Go back to sleep.’
‘They’ll be here today at noon.’
Amundsen grunts.
Lindstrøm rubs the top of his bald head. There’s a small amount of blood where his scalp has been scraped. He won’t get back to sleep now. Instead he drops to the floor. Flicking on the lamp in the kitchen, he sees his lucky ladle has fallen from its hook on the wall. Lindstrøm cradles the utensil, his hand checking its rounded hemisphere for dents. Finding no damage, he places it back on the hook, his smile like that of a mother doting on a favourite child. Thank you, he mouths.
Signs and portents – they’re as much part of Lindstrøm’s charm as his cooking. Everyone takes his folk wisdom with a pinch of salt, but nobody dares challenge the cook on his predictions. More often than not, they prove correct.
The hut is pitch black but it’s not the middle of the night – it’s six-thirty. It won’t get much brighter anyway. The days are so dull now that they must keep the lamps burning inside all day if they’re to see what they’re doing. Lindstrøm stacks logs in the stove, sloshes over a liberal dose of paraffin then touches a match to the wood. It flares extravagantly, illuminating the darkened kitchen in its fierce light. The fire roars in the chimney. He peers under the tea towel covering the bowl of pancake batter he mixed up the night before and readies his equipment. Lindstrøm’s workspace has an odd appearance – half laboratory, half kitchen. Two mercury barometers, four aneroids for measuring air pressure, a barograph, thermograph and one thermometer occupy the corner furthest from the stove. Lindstrøm would eye the whole enterprise suspiciously if it hadn’t been he himself who had set up the meteorological instruments. There’s a corresponding meteorological station on the hill with all the outside equipment housed in a tidy whitewashed instrument box that Lindstrøm has constructed this week, complete with a handsome weathervane to show wind direction. He’s very proud of it.
With the kettle heating on the stove the cook begins to grind the coffee. Round and round with the handle for ten minutes he works, his ruddy cheeks shaking with the effort. ‘This coffee mill is not worth throwing to the pigs,’ he mutters in frustration. ‘Might as well chew the beans!’
It’s only the two of them but the morning routine proceeds as if it were a full house. At twenty to eight Lindstrøm opens the door from the kitchen, unleashing the intense heat that has become almost unbearable in the enclosed space. It sweeps into the tight living quarters, which are kept purposefully cold for sleeping. Having lit the lamps he readies the table, making as much noise as possible: clanging the enamel plates and dropping spoons into coffee mugs from such a height it’d wake the dead. There’s movement behind the dark red curtain drawn across Amundsen’s bunk. If the others were home, there’d be swearing by now. Satisfied that his table-setting performance has had the appropriate effect, Lindstrøm returns to his frying pan, where he’ll turn out pancakes with machine-like efficiency until the bowl is empty and the plates are stacked. There’ll be much organising to do when the others return and a whole lot more cooking. The men’s appetites will be insatiable, like greedy ogres in a fairytale. Noon, Lindstrøm nods with conviction.
‘Morning Fatty,’ says Amundsen, yawning. ‘How’s the weather?’
‘Easterly breeze. Fog,’ he says evenly despite not having set foot outside.
‘Temperature?’
Lindstrøm screws up his face. ‘Minus sixteen.’
‘That’s your guess?’ Amundsen reaches for his notebook and writes it down.
It’s a relatively new game, getting the men to guess the temperature each morning. It’s an educated guess he’s after, not a bold-faced fabrication like Lindstrøm’s. At the end of the month the man closest to the actual mean temperature is awarded a cigar, a book, a very nice gold watch. Everyone’s keen for the prize but the game serves another purpose. Every man is finely calibrating his senses, learning to read the environmental conditions and trust in his own judgement, which is a skill more highly prized than a cigar when one’s equipment fails far from home.
The morning passes without much to differentiate it from all the other mornings the two men have shared since the others left. Breakfast is an unhurried affair with equal measures of conversation, reminiscences and companionable silence. Afterwards Amundsen unties the dogs and takes his customary morning stroll down onto the sea ice accompanied by any animals eager for a change of scene. There are fewer seals about. Soon there will be none at all to harangue. The dogs will have to find other pursuits. Icy seal carcasses may be tasty to gnaw on, but they don’t put up enough of a fight for a dog keen on entertainment.
Amundsen barely registers the dogs and their antics. Thoughts occupy him. They steer him ever south, to Johansen and the others. They were due back on Saturday. It’s now Tuesday. Will placing Johansen in charge change things? Group dynamic is vitally important. Especially ahead of the long winter confinement. Nine men all packed like sardines in the Framheim hut. Frustrations, petty annoyances, simmering conflict all have the potential to turn into something much larger, more destructive. And then there is Johansen, always ready to assert his position, hijack the conversation, trading endlessly on his friendship with Nansen as if it conferred special rights. In appointing Johansen leader of the last depot journey, Amundsen had hoped to defuse the tension. Has he instead set himself up for a power struggle?
Lindstrøm was wrong. The day is cold. Almost minus 30 degrees and it’s blowing hard from the south. Days are shorter, the wind just a little sharper. Amundsen cuts short his walk and, wrestling the wind all the way, returns home to continue the repairs he started the previous day on his sleeping bag. Lindstrøm calls to him from the tent where the puppies have been housed.
‘Any sign of Madeiro?’ Amundsen asks.
‘No. Must have fallen into a crevasse or tangled with the wrong bull seal. I don’t want to tell Nilsen.’
There’s a dog lying dead amid the gambolling youngsters. ‘Our poor Angel of Death,’ says Amundsen. The puppy had been christened thus aboard the Fram, so often had the poor wizened creature collapsed under its own weight. Against all odds, it had stayed alive and had even flourished. Until now.
‘Look at him.’ Lindstrøm gestures at another of the pups born on the Fram, the one christened ‘Southern Cross’. His dark coat is a wretched sight – the fur is all but gone from his back. ‘Probably got into a fight.’
Amundsen shakes his head. ‘Looks like disease. Let’s get him out of here before he infects the rest.’
It’s a sorry business, dealing a death blow to a creature so new to the world. A mere skin disorder, no doubt, but one that could decimate their chances of setting off for the pole should enough of the dogs become infected. One thing a sledge dog in Antarctica needs is its thick winter coat.
When Amundsen returns from burying the two dead dogs, Lindstrøm is poised by the door to the hut with a look of mild satisfaction. According to their well-established routine, he should be in the kitchen preparing lunch. It is noon, after all.
‘Look, Chief,’ he says, pointing to dark specks peppering the horizon. ‘I was right. They’re home and not a moment too soon.’