Dawn had broken cold and gray, exceedingly cold and gray, colder and grayer than you could shake a stick at. After all this was the Yukon, the Frozen North, the Land of the Midnight Sun and 2-for-1 snowcone offers, and it had every right to be that way. Yes, the Yukon — where temperatures plunged a hundred degrees in the blink of an eye; the Yukon — where passing clouds froze solid and fell from the heavens; the Yukon — where entire forests petrified overnight only to shatter like glass with the first touch of the rising sun.

Afternoon had broken cold and gray. Cold cold cold. Brrrr. Up and down the valley as far as the eye could see, a thick blanket of snow lay like vanilla ice cream, smooth and creamy. Through this vast white dessert moved two figures.

Not just any man could survive in this harsh wasteland. A special breed flourished here: Men of the North, tall, beefy and proud. For this was the Yukon, where a man’s worth was measured by the number of leotards he wore under his furs, where a man might not still be a complete man anymore if he dallied outside too long. Such a man was Pierre, a trapper of mostly French-Canadian origin with just a little Eskimo and Japanese and a touch of the sun. Alongside him trotted his faithful canine companion Frisky, a huge shaggy beast of uncertain ancestry whose love for his master and for fresh blood were a legend throughout the North.

The sun hung low in the sky. It was a sign too cryptic for any pampered city-dweller to decipher; but for one whose animal instincts were awake to the primeval rhythms of nature it could mean only one thing: night was approaching. If night fell with Pierre outside he would freeze up like a statue and become the laughing stock of the whole Yukon. People would flock from miles around to gawk and point and pose for souvenir photos. It was harsh, yes — but it was the way of the Men of the North.

All day Pierre had been trudging along the river bank, through snow so deep it was over his galoshes. But now in his haste he ventured onto the frozen surface itself, past the regularly-posted signs that read: CAUTION: YUKON RIVER — NO SWIMMING, NO PICKNICKING. There was less snow out on that wind-swept ice, which made it faster going for him. But Pierre did not trust the river. Rivers, he mused, were like women: beautiful, hard, treacherous. Sometimes with a woman you suddenly discovered that she wore false teeth or had a contagious disease. Rivers were the same: there were places where you could break through and be instantly transformed into an ice sculpture. At least then nobody would find your body and laugh at you. There is nothing a Man of the North hates like being laughed at.

Shortly before nightfall Pierre stepped onto just such a weak spot in the ice — as yet unmarked by warning tape — and fell through past his knees. Frisky immediately clamped his jaws around Pierre’s head like a monkey wrench and pulled him out of the hole, but it was too late. His frozen toes snapped off like so many ice cubes from a tray. Both legs would go too unless he could thaw them out right away. Painfully he staggered to the river bank and gathered a few sticks of driftwood for a fire. Removing his fuzzy pink mittens, he searched his pockets for a match but could only find a butane lighter. Kneeling down by the kindling, he flicked the striker of the lighter. It sputtered briefly, then exploded, blowing off his right arm up to the elbow. “Sacre bleu!” (Aw heck!) he exclaimed, cursing his ill fortune. He would never play the accordian again.

Night had fallen cold and gray. In fact it was always like that in the Yukon: sometimes a bit colder, sometimes a little more on the gray side, but always both cold and gray. It was no wonder that package holidays to Mexico were so popular.

Francois stood looking out his cabin door, deep in thought, having a last smoke before retiring. Of course he thought about the Yukon, for he too was a Man of the North. But he also mused on his past: Fifi, Gertrude — yes, and Antoine. The seedy night-life of Montreal, a promising career in the ballet…

Then Francois spied two shadowy figures moving toward him out in the snow. As they approached he saw that both were big and ugly and covered with fur. He realized with a sigh of relief that the one walking upright must be good old Pierre, the other one his dog Frisky. Francois could not help but notice that Pierre was hobbling badly and that he was missing the better part of his right arm. He was too polite to mention it, though.

The three of them met wordlessly, went inside and sat near the roaring fire. Pierre took off his galoshes and thrust both feet into the flames.

“Ala mode, Pierre?” (How are things, Pierre ?) asked Francois after about an hour.

“Coup d’etat,” (Oh, not so bad) Pierre replied tersely. “Coma se llama ustad?” (Nippy, isn’t it?)

“Ja, ich bin schwul,” (Yes, quite nippy) agreed Francois.

Several more hours passed in silence. Pierre’s legs burned away in the fire, leaving two charred stumps.

Suddenly Frisky leapt up and sank his fangs deep in Francois’ throat — for he was a Dog of the North, and had his occasional odd moments. They rolled around on the floor, biting and rending, for several minutes until Francois was able to snatch a red-hot poker from the fireplace and beat the dog senseless. Pierre found all this quite amusing and laughed uproariously. He barely noticed the other man coming at him, poker in hand. Francois struck Pierre repeatedly about the head. Pierre seized a heavy stool and returned blow for blow. The tiny cabin shook.

Dawn had broken cold and gray, as usual. The two men awoke simultaneously, glanced around at the mangled interior of the cabin, and at each other. Then they both broke out laughing at last night’s antics. Francois started slicing up Frisky’s cold corpse for breakfast while Pierre began whittling a pair of wooden legs. For this was the Yukon, and they were Men of the North.

Yeah, I’m a brain surgeon. Go ahead, laugh — laugh, you human jackal!
Everyone else does. Sure, I dive through people’s think tanks. Why not? It’s a living. So maybe it’s not the world’s most respectable occupation. Maybe I never get invited to the best parties. Who cares? I’m not missing much, if the ones I go to are any guide.

Just the other day I was at a party, sucking a bottle of single-malt whisky and minding my own business, when some goon asked me what I did. I could’ve said anything — garbage man, malpractice lawyer, male prostitute — any lie would’ve been OK. But oh no, that would’ve been too easy. A stray streak of honesty was lurking in my alcoholic haze, like a mugger in a dark alley.

“Brain surgeon,” I said quietly, so only that one idiot would hear. But he broke out in a belly laugh that drew everyone’s attention. Naturally he had to bray to them about it, and they all hooted as if it were the funniest thing since World War II. I just sat there, wearing a good-humored expression and wishing it weren’t so far to the .45 in my glove compartment.

As always, some sadist stepped out of the crowd, pointed to his head and said, “Hey, old man, I don’t want to put you to any trouble, but I’ve got this terrible headache just here …” Of course I knew what was coming. I suppose at that point I should’ve throttled him, or jumped through the
window, or faked a heart attack. But I never do. The fatalist in me makes me wait until it’s too late. The next thing I know, a table is cleared off, my
patient is lying there, and a crowd has gathered to gawk. It’s no good
trying to refuse: “Aw c’mon, don’t be a spoilsport!” they jeer.

Let me tell you, it’s no holiday in Waikiki to perform brain surgery, even in a modern and fully equipped hospital with the best professional help available. But it’s a whole new ballgame to do it in someone’s dim,
smoke-filled living room, with drunken forklift drivers and secretaries as
your assistants, and standard household items the only surgical instruments at hand.

How, for instance, do you remove a chunk of skull in those conditions? Unless your host happens to have a precision tungsten high-speed circular saw lying around, you have to improvise. You might need to use a rusty hacksaw, or a hammer and chisel (to crack the cranium open like a walnut), or to just pick up an ax and chop away like a lumberjack. It’s a tricky business, however you do it.

Once inside, though, it’s clearer sailing: you simply remove the unwanted gray matter with an ice-cream scoop and fill the empty space with champagne corks or old newspapers. OK, sometimes I’ll get carried away and take out a little bit too much, maybe even from spite. I’ve never noticed that it makes a big difference. Anyway, no one’s thought to complain yet.

Afterward you probably have to reattach the missing piece of skull, unless you can somehow distract everyone’s attention and just cover the hole with a baseball cap. But if I’m really set on doing a good job, I try to avoid superglue, which doesn’t hold that well on bone. I find that a couple of finishing nails usually work a treat, or else good old duct tape.

Sounds peachy, right? Not so hard? Wrong. Because everyone, it seems, always wants to join in the fun. Rarely will I perform fewer than a dozen such impromptu operations in a single alcohol-fueled evening. Why, some people enjoy it so much they even stand in line twice (if they can still stand). No matter how tired and drunk I am they keep coming at me, tittering and taunting and insisting that I do just one more.

I guess I’ve said enough. Though I try to see the bright side of my occupation, I can’t help looking back bitterly on all those wasted years at
medical school. How could I have been such a fool? Well, maybe the sordid story of my life can serve as an example for others to avoid. As for me, my bed was made long ago — now I have to lie in it. While wearing a facemask pumping general anesthetic, if possible.

Few cases in the history of military punishment have aroused as much controversy as the execution of Private Spot, the only dog ever shot for treason in time of war. The debate still rages half a century later, and the only point of agreement is that in this case man’s best friend was his own worst enemy.

Spot was the only puppy of poor Dalmatian immigrants. His father, a sailor, ran off with a French poodle while Spot was still on the nipple. His mother abandoned him soon after, leaving on a one-way ticket to Hollywood to try to break into the glamorous world of pet food commercials. Alone and with nary a bone to his name, Spot joined the US Army Canine Corps when he was barely old enough to walk without a leash.

The Army became more than just another doghouse — it was his whole life. It not only fed and groomed the callow cur; it also de-wormed him, removed his ticks and gave him a flea collar to call his own. The Army was there to pet and to scold him, to occasionally rub his tummy, to give him a sense of purpose. Whenever Spot piddled, the Army stepped right in, and it was tough Army discipline that finally housebroke him. Under its firm care he grew to a tremendous size, sitting four feet tall and weighing 250 pounds in his stockinged feet.

Spot tried to be a good dog. He learned to sit, beg, roll over and play dead in record time. In advanced training he soon mastered the fine arts of pointing, fetching and — in due course — killing. But his traumatic puppyhood had left him with a sharp temper. Woe betide the comrade who playfully pulled his tail or called him “Spotty”: Spot was inclined to disembowel those who teased him. Though he always gave the corpses neat, regulation burials, it was still bad for morale. He was reprimanded time and again, to no avail: the more they called him a very bad dog the more he believed it, until Spot would actually wag his tail at the approach of his Master Sergeant bearing the rolled-up copy of Stars and Stripes.

He began to seek bigger game and, like so many dogs, he found what he sought. When war broke out in Korea, his was one of the first units sent overseas. There he seemed to be in his element: He was always first to advance and last to retreat, and whenever there was a dangerous job to be done it was Spot who raised a bedraggled paw to volunteer. He won a Silver Star for gallantry and — his greatest pride — a liver-flavored doggie treat for obedience. General MacArthur himself once walked him around the block, even sharing the same tree. And yet, behind the cheerful façade of gore and slaughter, all was not well. Unbeknownst to his fellows, Spot was becoming dangerously unstable.

Perhaps it started when his best friend was captured and eaten by the North Koreans, or else the time half his platoon was run over while chasing a tank. Or was it the day his tail was shot off by an enemy sniper? It was only a light wound but he took a lot of kidding about it, at least until he buried his fangs in the neck of the chief kidder. The Army fixed him up with a prosthetic tail, but Spot never really felt like a whole dog again.

Then there were the enemy propaganda tactics. Every day leaflets were dropped on the tired, hungry hounds, claiming that just over the communist side of the lines were all the treats a dog could dream of, and promising unlimited use of exotic chew toys for those who surrendered. Every night Madame Poochee, the Peking Pekinese, tormented them with her fiendishly personalized broadcasts. “Hello, dog soldiers,” she would whisper sexily. “This message is for all of you across No Beast’s Land, but especially for Duke, Rover, Spot and the other brave boys of Company B. It’s so, so sad that you must lie out there in the cold, cold mud, when you could be warm and cozy with Madame Poochee. Why waste your lives for all the fat, lazy ones at home? Does your sweetheart even think of you? Whose bone is she chewing tonight?”

“The bitch! The bitch!” Spot would mutter. In time he might well have cracked under the strain, but events soon took a dramatic turn for Private Spot. During a surprise enemy attack he was cut off from his unit, and was last seen atop a pile of North Korean soldiers, madly tearing off the exposed limbs of the foes who swarmed about him like ants. Presumed dead, the courageous canine was awarded a posthumous Congressional Medal of Honor; and his story would end there were it not for one last trick that fate had to teach.

One day a great bald beast wandered into the American lines. It limped along on three legs and a prayer, had a mad gleam in its good eye, and carried a half-splintered wooden stick in its bloody maw. Close examination revealed it to be a dog, and the dog tags told the rest: It was Private Spot. Diseased and delirious, Spot was unable to respond to the joyful yaps of his comrades for some time. When he did it was to denounce them as “enemies of the pooch proletariat” or other snippets of communist dogma. He was soon found to be carrying pictures of Chairman Mao and an autographed copy of the Little Red Book, not to mention fleas.

Every cur has his breaking point, and Spot had reached his in a prison cell in Manchuria. Captured by the North Koreans then handed over to their Chinese masters, he was tortured daily, and twice on Sundays. Though their methods were known to be barbarous, the full extent of the Communists’ depravity was not grasped until his comrades realized that Spot’s woof was two octaves higher than before. When he finally cracked he was made to sign statements condemning capitalism, the New York Yankees, mom, apple pie and flea collars. As if this were not enough, he was then subjected to a final indignity: the Chinese threw a stick and told him to fetch and return it to his own countrymen and face their ridicule and the inevitable punishment that awaited him at home.

At the court-martial, the defense doggedly tried to prove Spot innocent by reason of insanity. They showed that he had been so systematically brainwashed that he would only eat fish and rice, calling everything else “the decadent bourgeois fodder of the capitalist running-dog lackeys.” They also pointed to the recurring nightmare in which he sang a duet with Margaret Truman as evidence that he was no longer a sane animal. All through the hearings Spot refused to defend himself and instead simply drooled quietly or, now and then, snapped at some phantom in the air. Nobody was surprised when a verdict of “guilty” was returned.

As dawn broke the next morning, Spot was carried out to the firing squad, being too weak to walk. But whereas another dog might have begged or whimpered, Spot maintained his proud bearing to the bitter end. Refusing the chaplain’s blessing and a final doggie treat, he managed to sit rigidly at attention as the firing squad took aim. His prosthetic tail wagged almost imperceptibly. Just as the volley was fired, he gave one last salute with his good right paw. Then, for the last time, Spot rolled over.