Four Quarters of Light by Brian Keenan Page B

hold on tight.’
    On the porch I stood and watched like the abominable snowman in second-hand throwaway clothes. The evening was chill and there was a sense of a new crispness because of the snow that lay all around us. The dogs silently watched for a very brief moment, but as soon as Dan laid out the tracelines and guidelines they jumped up and began howling, yelping and barking with great excitement. The noise was deafening. There was a kind of ritual to this preparation, Dan explained. The dogs get very excited and want to run all the time. You have to be careful to put them in order to stop them bolting off before you are ready to go. You always choose first the older, wiser and calmer dogs who know how to sit and wait; put the younger dogs in last and always put your guide dog in after everything else is done – he will determine the pace and the line you take. I watched amazed at the dexterity of his fingers in a cold I knew to be bitter even in my well-wrapped-up condition. Not once did the dogs stop yapping. This is what they lived for, and I could understand that after sitting half the day in the cold and snow suddenly having this opportunity to go racing off would certainly excite any creature.
    When Dan had finished attaching all the dogs to the sleigh he invited me to climb in. I thought the contraption was ridiculously small and equally ridiculously frail, but I settled myself in. There was a thick kind of tarpaulin that was secured around the incumbent’s waist the way it is done in a kayak to stop the water flowing in. The purpose I suppose was the same here – to stop the spray of snow falling off trees and bushes as you passed from settling in around you.
    â€˜We only really use this for cargo, it’s really a cargo sleigh,’ Dan explained. ‘The tarpaulin is to keep everything dry and everything safe, but for today you are the cargo.’
    I watched as Dan finished his own preparations – fastening and zipping up his ancient anorak, pulling down the fur over his faceand pulling on his long, filthy-looking mittens. I thought how ridiculous we both looked. I suppose in a way he looked like a deep-sea diver; all he really needed was one of those brass helmets. Then I thought of my own position, strapped into this sleigh; I felt like a child of about two years sitting in one of those ancient Pedigree prams you used to see children wheeled about in during the fifties. I was so enclosed and encased in clothes and the greasy old black tarpaulin that not one piece of my flesh peered out. Dan had made sure that no skin was showing, giving me a meticulous once-over.
    Then, without warning, we were off with a sudden jolt. Before I had time to realize what was happening we were tearing through the bush. Dan was right: these dogs could pull a sleigh faster than my imagination had thought possible. Pieces of bush and twig slapped into my face as we careered helplessly through the countryside. I now understood why Dan had been so insistent that no part of my flesh or face show: had one of these twigs caught me in the eye or in the face it would have left a scar I would have remembered for a long time, and not with much gratitude. Dan seemed to use only three or four expressions of encouragement to the dogs, directing them left or right as the trail opened up, then for long periods he would run, jumping on and off to negotiate the sleigh without a word of direction to the lead dog or any of the dogs in front of me. The lead dog seemed to know when to turn right or left and when to charge on bullheaded, and instinctively when to slow.
    I clung helplessly to the low side rails of the sleigh waiting to be tossed out as the dog team charged into a sharp right or left turn, but it never happened. Trying to be helpful, I occasionally leaned into the turns as they came up or sometimes leaned back against them. On one such occasion Dan commanded me not to roll with the turns or resist them.