There’s a low range of jagged hills in the distance and I’m realising it’s impossible to tell how vast they might be without buildings of any kind to offer a sense of scale. A strange feeling of smallness and stillness settles over me as the arctic silence falls, broken only by the crunch of gravel beneath the sled runners and the soft sounds of the dogs’ feet on snow, mingled with their panting breaths.
It’s so quiet I’m increasingly aware that I should probably say something to Stellan. I quickly glance up and find him staring commandingly out at the landscape ahead like a particularly shaggable Sir Ernest Shackleton on the prow of theEndurance.
‘How fast are we travelling?’ I ask.
‘Around twenty-five miles per hour.’
‘I thought Europeans used kilometres instead of miles?’
‘You could use the old Sámi measurement of distance? The distance a reindeer can travel before stopping to urinate.’
I laugh and look up at Stellan’s inscrutable eyes. Is he joking? I remember his dry sense of humour and how he liked to tease me. He told me once it was the Finnish way. If you make fun of someone it shows that you must be good friends. Is that what we’ve become? Friends? If that’s the case, shouldn’t he be chattier than this? I realise I’m going to have to work pretty hard to get to know Stellan again after all these years. I’ll ask him about the dogs. He definitely came to life back at the dog shed surrounded by cute mutts.
‘Don’t they mind the cold? The dogs, I mean. Poor guys, what a hard life!’ Although, I think to myself, they don’t exactly look unhappy.
Every now and then a dog turns back its head and glances at Stellan as if to check he’s pulling his weight, which I know he is; I can hear his boot scuffing the gritty ice as he helps push the sled along whenever we hit a slight incline. The dogs are bright-eyed and focussed. Would they be so keen to pull us along if they didn’t enjoy racing through the snow?
‘They couldliveoutside permanently if they needed to. They can withstand temperatures of minus fifty. Not that they’d ever have to. And they have lots of company and food, and they cost me plenty of money in vet bills each year, believe me. They’re the most pampered pups in Lapland.’ Stellan says this with fondness in his voice.
‘So how long have you been doing these trails for?’ I ask, only having to raise my voice slightly over the sound of the runners, but this isn’t graced with a response.
I glance up and find Stellan is still staring ahead. There’s that little furrow between his eyebrows again. His eyes pinch and crinkle against the ice cold air rushing against our faces. I’m about to ask him again – it’s possible he didn’t hear me – when he briefly lets his eyes fall to mine.
‘Just sit back and take it all in,’ he says. ‘Talking is silver, but silence is golden.’
So, that’s me told. I look ahead at the dogs leading the way into the white beyond. I’m stung, if I’m honest. Cheeky sod. But he might have a point. The landscape seems to call for peace and solitude. There’s something about these dramatic wilds that renders small talk very small indeed.
Stellan seems to know I’m brooding as I feel a tap at my shoulder. He hands me down the silver flask of warm berry juice. There’s nothing else for it but to graciously accept it again, unscrew the cap and pull the blankets high over my chest. Settling back on the little pillow, I let myself be whisked away into the grey arctic light.
We make our way in silence out onto a wide plain and I suddenly realise we’re crossing a huge frozen lake. I panic slightly at the idea of the frigid water beneath us but resist the urge to ask Stellan if we’re safe because I know how capable and sensible he is. He wouldn’t put us at risk.
I’m passively watching the white world slip by again and sinking back into the cosy stupor when I make out a dark, hunched figure on the lake ahead. Stellan seems to be steering the dogs in their direction.
‘Woah,’ he calls out into the silence. The dogs skip to a graceful halt and I hear the crunch of the brake behind me. Nari and Niilo pull up behind us. They’re still chatting happily. Good for them. I’m guessing Niilo doesn’t agree that silence is chuffing golden.
‘Come round here and stand on this brake, Sylvie.’
I like how he says my name.Sylvie.So soft and romantic in his accent…
‘Sylvie? Are you asleep?’
‘No, no, here I come. What do you want me to do?’ My legs have seized up a bit with the cold and it’s surprisingly difficult to swing them up and over the side bars of the sled, but I only wobble slightly as I get my balance.
‘You stand on this. If you step down, even for a second, the dogs will be gone.’
Transferring my weight for his, I slip my foot onto the brake as soon as Stellan steps off, keeping the sharp metal blades pressed firmly into the ice. I’m nodding seriously and hoping I look confident because I certainly don’t feel it as Stellan stalks off across the lake towards the man who seems to be fishing over an ice hole.
The scene looks ancient, more like an echo of the past than something that could possibly happen in this day and age. I mean, where has this guy come from? He has no sled and there isn’t a building, or even a tent, anywhere to be seen. How can he spend his days alone on the ice? How strange. Whilst I’ve been in my superheated classroom and nipping out at lunchtimes to Costa, he’s been out here. I shake my head in wonder. My little flat and everything I know feels a million miles away from this world.
I watch as Stellan exchanges a few words with the man and stoops to offer him something from a paper bag, which the man accepts with a nod, and then Stellan turns back towards the sled. Within moments he’s back in charge of our transport and I’m back under my blankets and we’re off again. I wave to the fisherman as I glide by and he raises his gloved hand in silence.
‘Who was that?’ I ask as the dogs pick up speed.
‘He lives beyond the fell. He’s caught only two fish this morning so he didn’t have any to sell me.’
‘But you gave him something?’
Stellan snorts a reply as he tosses the same paper bag down onto my lap. ‘Salmiakki. Try it.’
