My Lead Dog Was a Lesbian

by Brian Patrick O'Donoghue

  My dilemma was resolved when the mushers at the head of the line decided to camp. Stripping to my wet skivvies, I dove inside the sled bag. Would have been warmer if I took off the damp underwear first. But I was hoping my sleeping bag would absorb some of the moisture before I had to face another day in those wet clothes.

  Shivering inside the sleeping bag, I had doubts about the plan. The blotter effect was an untested theory and might dampen the sleeping bag for no useful purpose. I forced myself to eat and drink, and tried to stay positive.

  The musher from Elim had said something about a “short cut.” The comment was made in passing. Herrman forgot about it, working his sled on that tricky sidehill trail. Out of the blue, the villager suddenly ordered his dogs over the hillside. He was showing off, sure. But the local musher knew the trail, and two could play this game. Sepp gave the word, sending his team over the edge. Herrman stuck to the local musher like glue down the steep incline. What a ride. What a ride!

  Later, resting in Golovin, Sepp concluded that Cooley and the others must be stuck on that hill. Just as well, he thought. That ride was more than most of them could handle. There was no reason for Herrman to stick around, not with White Mountain a mere 18 miles away. He checked in there at 8:30 A.M., Saturday, March 23, starting the clock on his mandatory six-hour layover.

  Herrman later denied yelling anything. It was puzzling to him. Everyone sounded so certain. Even Cooley, whose word Sepp respected. Some of them were actually mad at him, as if HE was responsible for their extra night on the little hill. It was ridiculous. Utterly ridiculous. Sepp’s conviction weakened in the face of the group’s certainty. Maybe, just maybe, he had said something. He might have blurted “Aieee!” Something like that. Sepp wasn’t at all sure that it had happened—involuntarily, of course—but he couldn’t rule out the possibility. Funny things occur when one is mushing off the side of a mountain. That was the truth. But he never yelled “Help.” No matter what people thought they heard. He, Sepp Herrman, never called for help. He would have remembered that.

  CHAPTER 12

  Last Hurrahs

  In the morning I was damp, but warm. My polypropylene underwear actually felt dry to the touch. Maybe there was something to those moisture-wicking fiber advertisements, though I’d never experienced much benefit wearing soggy polypropylene socks.

  Daylight revealed plenty of markers on the trees ahead. Convoy leaders had missed them in the dark because the reflectors were dusted with snow. Had I been in front, I think I would have spotted them. But it didn’t matter now.

  Local villagers were sipping their Friday morning coffee as our group streamed into Golovin. Terhune and I were the last to reach the cluster of dog teams parked by the village hall. A sly smile shone through Terhune’s scruffy beard.

  “I’m not staying,” he said. “I’m leaving as soon as they’re all inside.”

  Not only were our dogs fresh from last night’s forced camp; White Mountain lay only 18 miles away.

  “It’s time to remind these people it’s a race,” I agreed. “But I’ve got to find a bathroom before I go anywhere.”

  I was swimming in gas. My bubbling gut felt ready to explode, and I didn’t want a repeat of Koyuk. Terhune wanted to get a cup of coffee. Playing it cool, we packed our sleds for departure, then sauntered inside the checkpoint.

  Cooley was interrogating the checkers about Herrman. Most of our companions looked as if they were ready to relax for a good spell. I grabbed a cup of instant coffee and headed for the bathroom.

  Terhune and I soon strolled back to our dogs.

  “Let’s go,” he shouted, reaching for his hook.

  “Daisy, Daisy on by!” he said, directing his lead dog past the teams crowding the checkpoint. It was a perfect place for a breakout. The snow was hard packed across a wide area from local traffic, and the trail exiting the village began 100 yards ahead.

  The movement of Terhune’s dogs sent other teams into a howling frenzy. Mushers spilled out of the checkpoint. Bedlam ensued. Shouts mixed with barking, while local villagers clapped and cheered, applauding Terhune’s getaway.

  I was right behind Jon approaching Gunnar Johnson’s team. But then my dogs bunched up. Bo seized the chance to hump Raven. I leaped off the sled and separated the lovers.

  “All right! All right,” I shouted, still intent on following Terhune.

  Other mushers were madly pitching gear at their sleds. As we were passing Johnson’s parked sled, a tussle erupted in the middle ranks of my team. Pig, Digger, and Spook all had their teeth locked on a big chunk of meat. Wading into the center of the melee, I ripped the meat free and threw it at Johnson.

  “What kind of bullshit is this Gunnar! Leaving meat on the ground next to your sled?”

  “It wasn’t on the ground,” he protested. “Your dogs dived inside my sled bag and pulled that meat out.”

  “Oh, sorry about that.”

  Looking over his shoulder, Terhune watched my dogs seize the meat. He nearly fell off his sled laughing at the resulting mess. So be it, he thought, watching me fall behind.

  Daily welcomed the sudden excitement. Lounging in the checkpoint, he had overheard Lenthar talking about staying to do a load of laundry. That was too much. He felt like grabbing the other musher and screaming “LET’S GET OUTTA HERE!” This absurd maneuver of Terhune’s was just the jolt everyone needed.

  While I fought for custody of the meat, Chad decided it was his turn to mount Raven. I broke up that love affair before it got started, and quickly got the team rolling. It was too late to gain any advantage. Everybody but Gunnar was already moving out, chasing Terhune. So much for my great escape.

  Gunnar and I joined the tail end of the chain leaving Golovin. He was carrying the Red Lantern for once, but that didn’t last. Another tangle halted us dead. This time Digger had pounced on Raven, my disruptive princess of love.

  “Go ahead, Gunnar,” I said, leaping off the sled to pull the dogs apart.

  “Are you sure?” he said.

  “Yeah, go for it.”

  I had the team lined out in about ten seconds flat. That much I was getting good at.

  Terhune couldn’t hold his lead. Never had a chance. Daisy’s trotting speed had dropped to five, maybe six, miles per hour. The others closed in on him less than a mile out from the checkpoint. Terhune cursed to himself. He hated to see this. But there was nothing to be done. Dogs can only do what they can do. Terhune pulled aside and let the faster teams by, watching the smug looks on the faces of every racer who passed him.

  “What happened?” I said, shocked to see him parked there.

  Terhune shrugged.

  I’d been angry with myself for blowing that escape. Yet here we were together in the back of the train again.

  “Well, we sure showed them.”

  “Yeah,” Terhune growled. “Next time FEED your dogs first.”

  The sun was out and it was warm, 20 or 30 degrees above zero.

  “At least it’s a nice day,” I yelled back. “I don’t even need … my parka.”

  Sharp as an eight-by-ten photo, I recalled my big coat draped over a chair in the checkpoint bathroom. “Son of a bitch,” I gasped, staggered by the magnitude of my screwup. I considered continuing on without it. It was so warm. Nome was so close. One word restored reality: “Topkok.”

  The area surrounding the Topkok Hills was one of the most dangerous on the trail. Mushers were sometimes trapped for days on the hillsides, or in the windy valley below. Continuing without that parka put my entire race in jeopardy. I stopped the team and dragged my dogs off the trail, waving Terhune ahead.

  “What’re you doing?”

  “Left something behind,” I said grimly.

  Grabbing the lesbian’s collar, I pulled the team back around and mushed toward Golovin.

  What a pisser, thought Daily, watching me turn back. His own dogs were flying, soaring at a previously unimaginable pace behind Bogus. The lead dog appeared to actually smell Nome
; Tom didn’t know how else to explain it.

  My dogs broke into a joyous lope. Returning to Golovin, an easy three miles back, was obviously a popular idea with the team. I hadn’t even parked when one of the ladies staffing the checkpoint burst through the door with my parka under her arm.

  “We found it as soon as you left,” she said. “You didn’t need to come back for it. We would have sent it to White Mountain on a snowmachine.”

  I sighed. “Came too far to take that chance.”

  Facing the exit trail, I snacked the dogs and petted them, trying to make a game of this latest pilot error. The crew responded as I hoped, wagging their tails, acting perky. But their spirits crumbled when I ordered Harley and Rainy to move out again. The lesbian didn’t want to go at all. Raven’s crotch was suddenly more interesting than anything waiting ahead. Harley froze, torn between my demands and the lure of Raven.

  “Go ahead! Go ahead, Harley!” I insisted.

  The big dog looked at me, a forlorn expression written on his face, then he lurched ahead, dragging Rainy to work. My dogs stumbled out of Golovin like POWs. Their ears were down. Pauses were frequent. All thirteen dogs had to relieve their bladders, or take smelly dumps, or both. I was the Bad Guy riding the heavy sled.

  The accusatory looks didn’t impress me. We were only going eighteen miles. Not a damn one of them was really tired. Hungry, yes. They hadn’t had a hot meal since Elim. But my fine athletes couldn’t be tired, not after that extra break on Little McKinley. They were just disappointed. And I couldn’t blame them for that. I had broken the all-important Deal.

  The dogs pulled and I fed them at each checkpoint: that was our unspoken compact, which had been reaffirmed at every stage of the last 1,000 miles. Every stage, that is, until Golovin, where I had broken that trust—twice in a single morning.

  My assumption was vindicated as the dogs broke into a lope scenting White Mountain. The morning’s betrayal was forgotten. Happy days were here. Ears perked, shoulders pitched forward with effort, Deadline Dog Farm’s finest pulled with abandon. A checkpoint was ahead. Dinner was about to be served, thus reestablishing justice throughout dogdom as they knew it.

  “HEP, HEP, HEP.” That simple phrase was all it took. Bogus kicked the team into overdrive, and Tom Daily easily beat everybody else into White Mountain.

  Jacked by his team’s performance, Tom spent the next 45 minutes proudly greeting incoming teams. He wasn’t paying attention as the checker, who was late coming down from the lodge, made his rounds.

  Daily was bummed when he saw the time sheet later. It had Lenthar arriving first at 11 A.M., March 23. Daily was listed as fourth, adding an unwarranted 36 minutes to his mandatory 6-hour stop.

  “Jesus” he said, “you can’t win in this thing.”

  I shared Tom’s disappointment in the White Mountain standings. Thanks to my parka snafu, I had arrived 70 minutes behind the closest musher ahead of me, and some two hours behind the Mormiles, Terhune, Daily, and Lenthar. Those were teams I expected to beat; 55 miles didn’t offer much opportunity for a rebound. But a lot could happen. Look at Swenson.

  After serving the dogs a meal, I unhooked little Raven and escorted her to the picket line for dropped dogs. I hated myself. Wasn’t I the guy who had planned on mushing every dog to Nome?

  Now I was abandoning a hard-working girl merely for being in heat, a situation I should have been able to deal with. But I couldn’t, and that was the truth. That mating on the ice was nearly disastrous. The fight and the subsequent delay leaving Koyuk offered further proof that Raven’s presence threatened the entire team.

  The little black dog whimpered as I walked away. I hesitated, and Raven flopped on her back, legs spread, inviting me to stroke her. My princess deserved no less for hauling me 1,100 miles.

  “You did a good job, little girl,” I said, rubbing her tight belly. “Too bad the boys won’t leave you alone.”

  I was tired as I trudged up the hill to White Mountain Lodge. If there hadn’t been a free meal waiting, I would have gladly slept with the dogs on the frozen river below.

  Inside the clean lodge I felt decidedly out of place. The thick steak, rolled napkins, and polished forks—all seemed unreal after three weeks on the trail. And the lodge’s interior was so hot I felt light headed.

  My nap was interrupted. Mowry was on the line. The Coach berated me for not dropping Raven sooner. But that was just in passing. The Mowth wasn’t calling to criticize. He sought to motivate me with a new shining goal.

  Though I had already been defeated by the Poodle Man, the Russians, Madman, and over 40 others, Mowry said, a means yet remained to salvage Deadline Dog Farm’s reputation. His old dogs—the team Old Joe had repossessed last spring—were pulling Don Mormile’s sled. Catherine was also mushing a Redington team. The way Mowth saw it, if I beat those two teams to Nome, the feat would command respect throughout Knik. That wasn’t just his own opinion, Mowry stressed. No less an authority than Marcie had agreed.

  “Bri,” he said. “Beat the Mormiles at all costs. Got that? BEAT THE MORMILES AT ALL COSTS!”

  “Hey, those dogs look sort of skinny,” said Plettner, offhandedly. She was picking up the pans from her team’s second full meal at White Mountain.

  My dogs did look kind of bony. I cooked them a second meal. Plettner watched approvingly as my dogs sucked up the steaming pans of food. She was putting the last touches on packing, her own six-hour layover nearly complete. Shortly before six in the evening, Sunday, March 23, Plettner mushed out on the frozen river below White Mountain. Don Mormile followed close behind.

  Watching the teams quietly slip away, I knew I’d never catch Plettner. The Mormiles? That game was still afoot. We’d find out soon enough.

  I looked the team over. Even with bellies full the dogs’ ribs—rising and falling with each breath—looked more defined, all right. Bo, Digger, and Harley, in particular, appeared strikingly gaunt. It was their attitudes, however, that showed the most change. Three weeks ago Cyrus would have been pacing and whining. Like soldiers or laborers everywhere, he and the others had learned to snatch a meal or rest whenever it was offered.

  Even our maniacs now exhibited workmanlike calm. In leaving Raven behind, I was losing the one dog left in the team who barked at the first hints of departure. The changes were subtle, but profound. Pig no longer squirmed. Spook even welcomed my touch as I placed on booties.

  In terms of pulling, the dogs had become a fine-tuned engine. When I let off the brake, tug lines snapped taut, and the team pulled in unison. Whisper “Whoa,” and the dogs halted on a dime. The had become a single unit, possessing ability beyond the sum of the individual members. Though I didn’t know it, I hadn’t entered the race with a dog team. But I had one now.

  Mushing from White Mountain, I was an hour behind the nearest sled. The trail and sky merged in a seamless gray landscape. I switched on my headlamp although it wasn’t yet dark. There was comfort in the line of reflectors glowing in my beam. With Raven gone, I had 12 dogs left. Rainy and Harley were in lead. The odd couple had brought us most of the way. No reason to change now.

  I had, incredibly, forgotten to get a weather report. The failure nagged at me as light snow began falling an hour out of White Mountain. “Here it comes,” I whispered. “Three feet of snow in two hours. The biggest blizzard Nome’s ever seen.”

  Daily had reentered the void. Judging from the slope, the team was probably climbing Topkok Hill. But it was just a guess. Tom couldn’t see anything except the dogs and his sled. The world beyond was utterly white. This whole Iditarod was like wandering through heaven, the musher thought, a white misty place, with no beginning or end and nothing but dogs for company.

  Topkok’s bare crown was serene. The fog lifted as Daily and several other mushers descended toward the valley below. The Nome Kennel Club’s shelter cabin waited at the bottom. Plettner, the veteran, knew better than to dally in this stretch. Wind seldom rested in the so-called “Solomon Blowhole.” When
it did blow, a layover in that cabin could mean the difference between life and death. On rare moments when it didn’t, only fools stopped to visit.

  Sepp Herrman was already closing in on Nome. Plettner’s final drive was also underway. Cooley urged the others to assemble at the shelter cabin, and then mush together into Safety. Doc figured he’d brought his rookies too far to let one stray into the Bering Sea.

  Don Mormile was outside the cabin working with his team when Terhune’s dogs popped out of the darkness. That meant I was the only driver still on the way.

  “You’ve got to stop,” Mormile began. “Cooley says—”

  Terhune cut him off. “I told you people, if you stop again—I don’t care what the goddamn reason is—I’m going around. I don’t want nothing to do with this group!” Ordering Daisy past the parked teams, Terhune rounded the cabin, followed the markers into the brush, and vanished.

  Mormile went inside. The group got a chuckle out of this latest declaration from Terhune. No one felt threatened. This was, what, the third time the sourpuss had tried to get away? Those Kenai dogs were slower than dirt. When would he give it up?

  As far as Daily could tell, Terhune couldn’t get ten feet without screaming bloody murder at his poor lead dog. Daily saw nothing noble in it, not when the price was being paid by those poor tired dogs.

  It mattered to Terhune. Every inch between him and those other people mattered. Rounding the shelter cabin, the musher switched off his headlamp. His dogs were slow, but they were tough, like him. Jon Terhune and Daisy meant to show them all.

  I was startled by an approaching light. It came so fast I knew it had to be a snowmachine. The driver, a burly Alaska Native, stopped alongside the trail and beckoned to me. As I drew closer, the man smiled and reached inside his suit. He pulled out a tall bottle of Bacardi 151.

  “Here, take a swig,” he said, handing me the rum.

  “Wind blew down the markers through here,” the snowmachiner said, as I handed back his bottle. “Don’t worry. I put in new ones for you guys. You won’t have no trouble.”