Brian's Winter (12 page)

It was most definitely not a natural trail. Something had come along here. There were no tracks, just the smooth, flat, wide depression, and Brian squatted by the side of it and tried to visualize what had made this path.

Something came by here, he thought, and then no, not something but
somebody
came by here.

A person.

Ahh, he thought—another person in the world. He had come to think there were no other people and here was this strange track. Almost certainly a person made it but in what manner…

Then he saw the edge of a print. On the side of the flattened area, just to the edge, was one clear wolf print. It was as plain as if the wolf had stepped in plaster and made a cast; in the soft snow from the warm weather there was a wolf print. One. Heading out on the lake.

Somebody with a wolf?

No, that didn’t work. Somebody walking, pulling something, and then coming on an old wolf trail and covering the tracks, all but one.

Pulling what—a toboggan of some kind? Somebody coming along pulling a toboggan on an old wolf trail out here in the middle of the wilderness?

Out
here
?

It was insane. Brian wasn’t sure where he was, had no true idea how far the plane had come off course before he crashed, but he was certain nobody could have pulled a toboggan from civilization out here and for a second he doubted that he was seeing what he was actually seeing—a track left by a person. Perhaps he was hallucinating.

But he shook his head and it was still there, all of it, and if he was dreaming this or hallucinating it then he would have to have hallucinated all of it, the wolves, the moose kill, the popping sounds…

No. It was real.

So what did he do?

Follow the tracks, he thought—don’t be stupid.

But which way? There was no indication from the flat surface of the track of any direction. Just the wolf print, heading out onto the lake.

Well, why not? That way was as good as any and Brian set off, walking on the track itself, which was like a packed highway. If he was not particularly excited, it was because in truth some part of him did not believe what he was seeing, what he was doing.

He crossed the lake and went into the woods on the other side and there was no change, just the hard-packed trail out ahead of him, and he kept moving, seeing the wolf prints more often, especially where the trail curved around a tree—the prints would be on the outside—and in this way he passed the day.

Toward midafternoon he was hungry and stopped to eat from the meat in his pouch, eating snow to wash it down, and then he set off again and just before dark he caught a smell he knew well.

Smoke. Just a taint on the faint breeze that had come up. Some of the dry dead wood and a bit of pine, he thought, sniffing, and then it was gone, and he kept walking, thinking he must be close now, or the wind had carried it far and in the evening light he came around a corner past a large evergreen and was facing four wolves.

Except they weren’t. They looked like wolves at first, large, slab-sided gray beasts in the dim light, but then he saw they were tied, their chains leading back to trees. They were watching him come and wagging their tails, and he knew they were dogs.

Four huge malamutes.

The one on the left whined softly and wiggled, trying to get him to come and pet, and Brian stood there, stunned, when beyond the dogs he saw a crude log shelter covered with brush and a skin door. As he looked, a Native American man with a rifle stepped out of the door, saw Brian and nodded.

“It’s you—I wondered when you’d come by.”

Brian stood, his mouth open.

“We’ve got beaver cooking here, plenty for all of us.”

“I…

“But how…why…who?”

“Smelled your smoke three weeks ago. I didn’t want to bother you—there’s some in the bush want to be alone. Figured you’d be here before this but come on in…” He turned and said something back into the shelter and two small children came out and stood next to the man and a woman looked out over his shoulder.

“I…don’t know what to say.” And Brian knew he meant it. He hadn’t spoken to a person in…he had to stop and think. The days weren’t there anymore—always they had been there in the back of his mind, every day, the count, and now they were gone.

The man disappeared back inside the hut and Brian still stood, the dogs whining softly, wiggling to be petted, and in a minute the man’s head popped back out.

“Are you coming inside?”

“I…,” Brian started, then stopped and kicked out of his snowshoes and walked inside the hut.

They were a Cree trapping family and they had worked this area for three years. As soon as the ice was frozen on the lakes they flew in by bushplane and set up camp, trapping beaver, fox, coyote, marten, fisher and some lynx, living on moose meat—the popping sounds Brian had heard were the man, named David Smallhorn, shooting a moose for camp meat—and supplies brought in by air.

The plane came back every six weeks, bringing more fuel and staples—flour, rice and potatoes—and school supplies for the home schooling of the two children. Brian stayed with them for three weeks until the plane returned with the next load.

The Smallhorn family were scrupulously polite and because they had lived in the bush and didn’t have television, they knew nothing of Brian’s disaster. They thought he must be another trapper. It wasn’t until after they’d eaten beaver meat broiled over a small metal stove in the log hut that David leaned over and asked:

“How come is it you have skins for clothes and stone arrowheads? You look like one of the old-way people…”

And Brian explained how he came to be in the woods, talking about each day as it had come, as he could remember it, until it was late and the children’s heads were bobbing with sleep and finally David held up his hand.

“Tomorrow. More tomorrow. We’ll take the dogs and toboggan and go back to your camp, bring your things here, and then you can tell us more and show me how to shoot that thing”—he pointed to the bow—”and how to make arrowheads.” He smiled. “We don’t use them anymore…”

And Brian slept in his clothes that night in the hut with the Smallhorns and the next day watched while David harnessed the dogs and they set off on snowshoes. The dogs followed behind, pulling the toboggan, and in one trip they brought back all that Brian owned, including the meat supply. Brian sat another evening and night telling them of all the things he had done and become. He showed them the bows and fish spears and killing lance while they ate boiled potatoes and moose hump and had coffee thick with sugar, and the next morning Brian went with David on his trapline. They walked on snowshoes while the dogs followed, pulling the toboggan, to load dead beaver from trap-sets, and it came to be that within a week Brian was almost part of the family, and within two weeks he had to force himself to remember living alone and surviving. By the third week, when he watched the bushplane circle and land on the lake ice on skis, the truth was he almost didn’t want to leave. The woods had become so much a part ofhis life—the heat of it seemed to match his pulse, his breathing—that as he helped the Smallhorns and pilot unload, he felt as if he were unloading gear and food for himself, as well as the family; as though he would be staying to watch the plane leave.

But when it was done and everything unloaded, the pilot looked at him and nodded to the sky. “There’s weather coming in—I want to be gone before it hits…” Brian stood by the plane, his hand on the wing strut, looking at the Smallhorns, who were standing by the pile of supplies.

In the long hours of darkness, they had sipped tea and eaten greasy beaver meat and talked, and David knew Brian enough to know why he hesitated. He left the pile of supplies and came forward and smiled and waved an arm around at the country, all the country, all the woods and lakes and sky and all that was in it. He knew, and he touched Brian on the shoulder and said:

“It will be here when you come back. We’ll keep the soup hot…”

And Brian turned and stepped up into the plane.

Gary Paulsen is the distinguished author of many critically acclaimed books for young people, including three Newbery Honor books:
The Winter Room, Hatchet
and
Dogsong
. His novel
The Haymeadow
received the Western Writers of America Golden Spur Award. His newest Delacorte Press books are
Nightjohn, Mr. Tucket, Call Me Francis Tucket,
and
Father Water, Mother Woods: Essays on Fishing and Hunting in the North Woods
. He and his wife have homes in New Mexico and on the Pacific.