Death on the Ice (34 page)

‘Impossible,’ said Scott. ‘We don’t have room. Not now we have built the icehouse for the mutton.’ The construction of the freezer to hold beef and mutton had eroded the available deck space even further.

‘Then it’s a waste of time taking the ponies. These ones, anyway.’

Oates moved among the animals, logging up the faults as he went, careful not to get a kick or a bite for his trouble. Windsucker. Spavined. Narrow chested. Pigeon toed. Stiff hocks. Old. Lame. Aged. Ringboned. One of them sounded as if there was a bag of nails loose in his lungs. ‘Forty-five tons.’

‘You are just an old pessimist, Oates. Not an ounce over thirty. Or we’ll pay for it in coal. Birdie, you’ll organise getting it shipped over here, eh?’

‘Sir,’ said Bowers. Scott called him his little treasure, because of his unquestioning willingness to work. ‘What sort?’

‘I have been offered a good price on compressed.’

‘It should be linseed,’ objected Oates as he stroked the coat of the nearest animal. It felt stiff with dirt. ‘The horses need the oil.’

‘Linseed? That’s a lot more. What do you think, Birdie?’

The little man flinched. Oates tipped him the wink. Bowers hated conspiring against the Owner, but he was sure Oates knew what he was doing. ‘Oh, aye, sir, the Farmer’s right. Should be linseed.’

‘Linseed,’ agreed Anton.

Scott sighed. ‘Very well, thirty tons. Of linseed. Let me know how much that will cost. Titus, I think you should organise some training of the animals. For the sledge-pulling.’

As Scott walked back to the dogs, Oates whispered to Birdie. ‘Get thirty-five.’

Bower’s eyes widened. ‘But—’

‘Get thirty-five, but the bill made out to thirty. Skipper won’t be able to tell the difference with his naked eyes. I’ll pay for the five out of my own pocket.’

‘You are a wicked man, Farmer Hayseed.’ Bowers liked to tease Oates about his continuing affection for scruffy dress, but after years of well-pressed and polished uniforms, he was enjoying being slovenly.

‘And we need bran, two tons, oilcake, six tons, and two tons of hay.’

Birdie wagged a finger. ‘You’ll be in trouble.’

Oates shook his head. ‘We’ll be in trouble if we don’t get all that, at least.’

‘Titus!’ Scott shouted from down the hill. ‘We need to name them and assign a school. Birdie has the list of patrons. Meares and I will do the dogs.’

‘Right, skipper.’ As with the huskies, each pony had been sponsored by a school or college. Eton had one, Bedales, Liverpool. St Paul’s, as well as a few individuals and gentlemen’s clubs.

‘This is a beggars’ expedition,’ said Oates, taking the list from Bowers. ‘You know I have to write to Trafalgar House, Winchester to thank them for funding my sleeping bag?’

‘It’s been a terrible worry for him,’ said Birdie, indicating Scott. ‘Come on, let’s christen them and apportion them a sponsor. Look at that one. With the teeth and the flared nostrils. He looks like he went to Eton.’

Oates laughed, not wanting to tell him the nostrils were actually split. Five pounds a horse. He wouldn’t give five pence for some of them. Crocks, at least till he could see what- a good feed and decent grooming could do. But they were what he had to work with and, ultimately, it wasn’t their fault that the wrong men had been sent to buy the horses.

Before they left Port Chalmers, Oates wrote up the events in his diary.

It seems the Owner upset protocol when he didn’t ask Mrs Evans for the first dance at one of those dreadful balls. This, she claimed, was a terrible snub for her and her husband. Teddy Evans backed her up, much to the Captain’s dismay. Then, Mrs Scott and Evans have had a magnificent battle, a draw after fifteen rounds. Mrs Wilson flung herself into the fight after the tenth round and there was more blood and hair flying about than you see in a Chicago slaughterhouse in a month. The husbands got a bit of a backwash and there is a certain coolness which I hope they won’t bring to sea or into the hut with them.

It had been Cardiff all over again. Banquets, inspections of the ship by sightseers who marvelled at how small and crowded everything was, stupid questions.

He had heard someone ask who he was and Mrs Scott’s tart reply. ‘That’s Captain Oates. Hard to tell, but he is an officer.’

He had distracted himself by helping build the horse stalls, squeezed in between sacks of coal, beneath the fo’c’sle. They were comfortable enough, which was more than could be said for the men below them. The deck planks were spaced so wide, waste from the horses ran down into the hammocks and the mess room. Bowers had called him plenty of names when he got his first mouthful of hot piss while asleep. They were going to have to caulk up the planks.

Oates wished he had played a part in the horse selection. But Captain Scott had his own way of doing things, he supposed. White-only ponies indeed.

‘Farmer! Come up here,’ Birdie shouted. ‘Almost two-thirty. We’re casting off.’

As if to underline his words, the engine began to clank away.

Oates closed the notebook and went up top. There were few to see them off; most of the crowds had gathered at Lyttleton for the blessing, which had taken hours. Here, there were no more than two dozen, although there were numerous craft out at sea.

‘My goodness but you look smart. And shoelaces, too.’

It was Kathleen Scott. She would be taken off with the other wives at the heads. Oates looked down at his old uniform, which, as requested, he had brought along for high days, holidays and fund-raising banquets. ‘Thank you.’

‘You can look like a dashing cavalry officer when you want to, then.’

She had been rude about him and his hobnail boots at the races in Melbourne, even though he won his event. ‘When required. Aren’t you drawing this out till the bitter end? Staying on till the last moment?’

‘I suppose I am. Wife’s prerogative.’

Kathleen Scott’s prerogative, Oates thought, but said nothing. He had, rather begrudgingly, come to admire the way she did things according to her own lights.

‘So, if I don’t get another chance, good luck, Captain Oates.’

‘Thank you, ma’am.’ Oates squeezed himself between men and machinery and stores. There was hardly room to place a foot between the provisions and equipment and it was easy to turn an ankle whenever the boat moved. The Plimsoll Line was a long-forgotten concept, submerged permanently below the waves. The icehouse was surrounded by the three motor sledges and scattered around them two-and-a-half tons of fuel for the experimental machines.

Overloaded, said some of the ratings. Even more so than
Discovery
, and she had been dangerously top-heavy. Oates didn’t want to think about the crossing facing them. Whenever men talked about the legendary storms of the Southern Ocean, he changed the subject.

Eventually, he zigzagged his way across to witness the gangplank being pulled up and the ship finally turned towards her destination. What a relief that would be. It was the closing days of November now, six months since he had joined the expedition.

One of the dogs went for him and he slapped it aside. The huskies never missed an opportunity for a snap and there wasn’t room to separate man and beast properly on board. They were chained wherever there was a free post. Dimitri, the Russian dog-driver, did his best to calm them, but he said they wouldn’t be happy till they were on the ice. He wondered if the same would be true of Meares, who seemed to have become a full-time pessimist.

Oates reached the plank and glanced down at the dock. There was a familiar figure standing at the bottom, looking up nervously, as if deciding whether to take the first step to come up it.

Tryggve Gran.

‘Ahoy there,’ Oates said quietly. ‘Isn’t that what we sailors say?’

‘I believe so.’

‘Are you coming aboard?’

The Norwegian shrugged. ‘Am I welcome?’

‘I don’t know.’ He turned to Birdie and Crean and Taff. ‘Lads! Is this no-good Norskie welcome on board?’

‘That bollocks?’ said Crean. They all laughed. ‘I suppose we can squeeze him in with the horses.’

‘Or in the icehouse,’ said Bowers. ‘Get him used to the cold.’

‘I think that’s a yes,’ said Oates.

Gran strode up the gangway, and Oates shook his hand. From the bridge came the barked instructions that began the sequence that would finally get the
Terra Nova
underway. The tugs fore and aft—the
City of Christchurch
and the
Dunedin—
let loose with their whistles and the waters at their sterns began to churn.

The
Terra Nova
’s deck vibrated with increased urgency as Lashly stoked up its engines. A shriek of steam escaped from the whistle on the runnel. The dogs began to whimper and the gulls screeched back at the ship. The gangway was pulled up and secured. The ropes to the tugs sprang tight and
Terra Nova
, her own lines and chains now neatly coiled on the deck, edged away from the dock. There was a cheer from the quay and a louder one from the crew. It somehow managed to convey hope, excitement and apprehension.

‘Welcome back, Trigger,’ said Oates as she moved towards the breakwater. ‘Let’s go to Antarctica.’

Kathleen stood on the stern of the brig and raised a hand in farewell to her husband. Scott waved back from the bridge of
Terra Nova
, which was rounding the heads, followed by a flotilla of small boats, trailing like gulls.

‘There they go. It’ll be two years or more before we see them again,’ she said.

‘I think I might be hysterical,’ said Hilda Evans, sniffing into her handkerchief.

‘What, even more than usual?’ asked Kathleen.

‘Please, Mrs Scott,’ admonished Ory Wilson. ‘Haven’t we had enough unpleasantness?’

They had indeed, and not just because of the imagined snub at the ball. Taff Evans had fallen in the harbour during the blessing of the
Terra Nova
by the Bishop of Christchurch. Teddy Evans had demanded his dismissal, which Scott initially agreed with. Then came rumours that Teddy had pushed Taff in. Wilf Bruce swore he had seen the nudge that unbalanced the drunk.

Kathleen had repeated this and caused a flaming row between both the wives and between Scott and Teddy.

At the end of the day, Taff was back on the crew roster, although reduced to quarter-pay.

By way of revenge, Teddy Evans had brought up the incident of Mr Hull, the young man on the steamer from Cape Town who had made eyes at her. Hull had written her a very unfortunate and hot-headed letter, full of inappropriate poetry and declarations, which made even Con angry. Jealousy was not one of his faults; but she had, he said, goaded him beyond reason.

Still, she had calmed things down between them. She forced on him a two-hour walk. Talking calmly, slowly, she had told him of her love as they strolled arm-in-arm on the cliff, hundreds of feet above the estuaries of the Avon and Waimakariri. Far behind them were the Kaikoras, the peaks snow dipped, the light shifting the aspect every few minutes. Despite her best efforts, she had found New Zealand suffocating and suburban. But if its society was parochial, she had discovered its natural beauty could restore her spirits.

As they walked, pressed together for the last time for at least two years, possibly as long as three, she explained that, unlike the other wives, she liked the company of men. Hull had been interesting, an expert on Australia. She had been curious about the Aborigines. Scott shared her curiosity and so must appreciate that.

He had forgiven her, although she thought there was nothing to forgive. She never thought of marriage as a vow of silence. It was not, should not be, a nunnery.

‘You know, I think perhaps the wives should be chosen as carefully as the men if they are to come along.’

‘Or have none,’ he said.

‘Not even me?’

‘No. You can come. Captain’s privileges.’

‘I have a confession to make, Con.’

He narrowed his eyes. He wasn’t sure he wanted to hear her confessions. ‘What is it?’

She spoke softly, so as not to alarm him. ‘When I first met you, my main thought was, here is the man who could be the father of a son I could love.’ She put a finger to his twitching lips. ‘No, don’t say anything. I think I convinced myself that I loved you. I certainly felt something, but I don’t think, in retrospect, it was love.’

His voice was the merest whisper. ‘Go on.’

‘Well, the strangest thing happened. I find that I love the man who gave me the son every bit as much as I love the son himself. More, perhaps.’

He should have been angry, but couldn’t bring himself to be. There had been an initial deception, perhaps, but nature had made amends. ‘You sound surprised.’

‘Grateful.’ She had stopped them and stared into his eyes, which flashed green like the ocean below them. ‘If anything happens, or seems likely to happen, don’t worry about us. We’ll be all right. Peter and I. You know that, don’t you?’

‘You won’t miss me?’

‘Like my own heart. That’s not what I mean. The other wives don’t understand, with their ceaseless wailing. You have enough to worry about out there, without a weak-willed wife distracting you. You will come back to me, I know. But if you don’t, we’ll honour you every day. We will survive it. So you must not fret for us.’

He’d laughed. ‘I think I understand.’

‘The others don’t. They think I don’t care. I will not kiss you goodbye on the ship, Con. There is a finality, a sadness in that. Don’t expect it. I don’t want anyone to see us parting in sorrow.’

‘Just as long as you kiss Peter for me when you see him.’

‘I shall smother him in kisses. And I’ll kiss you now.’

And, on the bluff above the harbour that held
Terra Nova
, the tiny speck of a ship that would carry Robert Falcon Scott away south, she had done just that.

‘Scot used to say the worst part of any expedition was over when the preparation was finished’

The Worst Journey in the World
, Apsley Cherry-Garrard

T
HE CITY OF LIGHT
was full of soldiers. Actually, it was full of officers, Tryggve Gran noted, not regular soldiers. There were French and Belgian, of course, but also English, Irish, Ulstermen, Scots, Canadian, South African, and plenty of dominions he did not recognise. The beds of the Empire had been emptied and there were many pillows that would never see a young man’s head again. How many soldiers in the trenches had lasted as long as he had? A handful, so he heard. Most of those who survived the first Mons were taken at the Somme or Wipers. The war might miss you at a particular skirmish or battle, but the killing machine got you in the end.