Kit's Wilderness (9 page)

A
llie was evil. There was ice in her eye. She’d been enticed, cast under a spell. All the goodness was frozen in her.

She tiptoed toward me with her hands raised like claws.

“Here’s evil come for good Kit,” she hissed. “Here’s icy cold and frost to freeze his heart. Here’s bitter winds to freeze his soul. Touch my finger, feel the frost there. Touch my cheek, feel the snow there. Look into my eye, see the ice there.”

She came closer, closer; the evil smile grew on her face.

Then she giggled. She danced on the frozen snow. She kicked a storm of white around her.

“Jeez, Kit,” she said. “It’s great! I love it! I just love it.!”

We laughed and walked on.

She’d been rehearsing all afternoon. They were putting on Burning Bush’s version of
The Snow Queen.
The day it started, Burning Bush had looked around the class with a smile on her face.

“Now, then,” she said. “I wonder if I can find what I’m looking for. What I need is somebody that can be really, really evil. Somebody that can look in your eye and send a chill into your heart. Somebody that can be really good, but that can turn suddenly and be really bad.”

She looked and looked and grinned and grinned.

“Who could it be?” she whispered.

And everybody laughed.

“Allie Keenan!”

Burning Bush smiled. “Allie Keenan. Of course. Who else?”

Allie giggled again.

“It was great when she picked me. And doing it, it’s just . . . Jeez, Kit, man!

“And guess what,” she said. “Guess who looked into the hall and smiled, and even winked at me. Dobbs! Terminal Moraine Tectonic Dobbs!” And she danced again. “I’ll be a star!” she said. “I will! I will! I’ll be a star!”

Then she skidded and slipped flat on her back with a thump and she laughed some more.

“It’s great,” I said. “You’ll be fantastic.”

“Thank you, Mr. Watson. Perhaps you’d like to be my agent.”

I pulled her up and we walked on.

“How’s Grandpa?” she said.

“Seems okay now. But it’ll come again. No stopping it.”

She clicked her tongue. “Give him my love.” Then she grunted. “Ugh. Look. Just look at him.”

It was Askew’s father, leaning at the fence. He rolled his head and stared at us. His eyes were red-rimmed, his mouth hung open in a drunken grin.

“Here they are,” he slurred. “Here they are. Ha!”

We crossed over so we wouldn’t have to pass close to him.

He swung his arm out with a flourish.

“Make way! Let them pass!”

He tottered, gripped the fence again. He let out a string of curses.

“What you looking at?” he shouted. “Eh? Eh? What you looking at?”

“Brute,” whispered Allie. “Pig.”

“Come on,” I said. “Hurry up.”

He lurched across the ice on the lane, stood and staggered in our way.

“Where is he?” he slurred. “Where’s that stupid son of mine?”

We stood there.

“Eh? Eh? Where is he?”

“Jeez, Kit,” said Allie. “Come on.”

We walked forward, stood a few feet away from him.

“Get out the way,” she said.

“Aha! Madam says get out the way.”

I gripped the ammonite in my fist.

“Yes,” she said. “Get out the way, you slob.”

His jaw hung loose. He snarled. He wiped his lips. “I said, where is he?”

“Gone for good if he’s got any sense,” said Allie. “And I said, get out the way.”

He took a deep breath. We stepped back as he came closer. He slipped, caught his balance, glared.

“I’ll . . . I’ll . . .”

We crossed the lane again, hurried on.

“I will,” he said. “I will. What you looking at?”

We looked back, saw him tottering, waving his fist.

“Look at him,” she said. “Jeez, Kit. Just look at him.”

I shook my head. “You’re really brave,” I said.

She shivered. “It was just an act, Kit.”

T
he snarling woke him, then the sound of his mother’s screams. Lak gripped the stone axe in his fist. He saw the huge silhouette of the bear in the entrance to the cave. The dying embers of the fire reflected in its eyes. His brothers and sisters cowered against the inner wall. His mother stood before them, her arms outstretched, protecting them. His father crouched low, a rock in his fist. The bear snarled again. It lurched further in, its great paws raised, the great claws glistening. The cave was filled with the stench of its breath. His father leapt from the shadows, struck the bear’s head with his rock. The bear swept him aside and he lay unmoving on the earth. Now Lak sprang forward. He caught the beast between the eyes with his axe. He struck again at the bear’s arm as it came toward him. He tried to strike again but the bear threw him back against the wall. The children whimpered and screamed. Lak struck the bear’s back. He stretched high and struck its head again. His father stirred, yelled at the beast. He flung the rock and it struck the bear’s shoulder. Lak struck again—the arm, the neck, the head again. The bear roared and bellowed as it reached down, knocked Lak’s mother aside, grabbed one of his sisters by the deerskin that swaddled her and lifted her and carried her out into the night.

They crouched together, whimpering, terror in their eyes, terror in their hearts.

“My baby!” cried Lak’s mother. “Little Dal! My baby!”

Lak ‘s heart thundered. He entered the hell that all boys enter as they come of age. He gripped the axe.

“Our baby!” cried Lak’s mother. “What will we be without our baby?”

Lak held her for a moment.

“Stay here,” he whispered. “Wait for me.”

And he hurried out into the night.

Already the bear was far away, across the ice. Lak hurried, moving quietly on his deerskin-clad fret. He followed the bear up onto the rock. It moved upward, toward the crags. He kept losing it, then seeing its silhouette against the thick-starred sky. He heard the baby’s cries. He followed, his brain a storm. How could he conquer this beast? What could he do when he was so small against it, when the baby was so delicate? He followed the bear from crag to crag. Dawn came, frail light trickled from the east. The bear headed downward now, toward another valley of ice. There was a narrow passage between steep rocks. The bear hesitated before it blundered onward through the passage. Lak ran like the wind, up onto the rock above the passage. He overtook the bear, running high above it. It raised its head as he passed. It snarled, then blundered on. Lak waited, squatting low on the rock, the axe tight in his fist. This was where the bear would come out from the passage. He heard its fret, its grunted breath, he heard the baby’s cries. He waited. As the bear came out he swung the axe against its skull. He struck again and it reeled. And again. And again. The bear roared and tottered. Lak leapt from the rock and as he leapt he struck again. It tumbled. He struck again. It lay on the rock. The baby lay crying on its silent chest. He lifted her and held her tight.

“D
ad! Dad!”

Mum was calling from downstairs. “Dad! Tea up!” He wasn’t with me.

“Dad!”

I went out of my room, looked down at her.

“Wake him up, Kit, eh?”

I knocked on his door, called softly, “Grandpa!”

No answer. I opened his door. He wasn’t there. Just the impression of his body on the quilt. Snow drifted across the window. I went back out, went down to her.

“He’s not there,” I said.

“Dad!” she called. “Dad!”

We looked in the kitchen, in the living room, found nothing.

“Oh, Kit,” she whispered. “Where’s he gone?”

I went to the front door, peered out through the snow, saw the kids out there, obscure little figures sliding and throwing snowballs.

Mum’s hand trembled on my shoulder. “Kit, where can he have gone?”

“He’ll be fine,” I said. “He can’t have gone far.”

We stared at each other.

“Call the doctor,” I said. “I’ll go and find him.”

I pulled my coat on and went out there. I narrowed my eyes against the falling snow. I grabbed a boy as he ran past me giggling.

“You seen my grandpa?” I said.

“Eh?”

His face glowed with the cold. His eyes were shining with delight.

“Eh? Eh? My grandpa. You seen my grandpa?”

A snowball thumped into the back of his head. He screamed and giggled.

“Let me go, Kit! They’re coming for me!”

“You seen him?”

“Who? No. Not seen nobody. Get off me! Let me go!”

I shoved him away. He sprinted off with snowballs cascading all around him. The gang raced past me in pursuit.

“Come on, Kit!” one of them yelled. “Let’s get him!”

The snow intensified. I started to run, back and forward across the wilderness, all alone. I ran through knots of children playing. I bumped into snowmen, skidded on slides. I kept calling, “Grandpa! Grandpa!” I grabbed others as I ran. “You seen my grandpa?” I kept asking, but they were lost in themselves and their games. “Eh?” they said. “Eh? Eh?” I shoved them all away, ran again. I zigzagged, spiraled, yelled and yelled, and came to a halt, gasped for breath, stared uselessly across the wilderness and saw him at last. He was all alone, with his head bowed forward, snow gathering on his hair and cardigan.

“Grandpa!”

He just stood there as I went toward him, as I dusted the snow off him, as I took my coat off and laid it across him. I took his arm, tried to lead him away. He wouldn’t move.

“Come on, Grandpa,” I whispered.

There was nothing in his eyes as he looked at me.

“Come on,” I whispered.

He snarled. “Gerroff,” he said. His voice was harsh, thick, nothing like Grandpa.

I tugged him gently.

“Gerroff, I said.”

“Grandpa. It’s me. It’s Kit.”

He yelled, like an animal, or a baby.

“Aaaaaah! Aaaaaaah!” He yanked his arm away, tried to run, tumbled into the snow.

I knelt beside him.

“Get him off me! Help! Help!”

A few children gathered around us. They watched. I heard giggling.

“Tell my mum,” I said. “Go on. Run and tell her I’ve found him.”

Grandpa cowered. “Get him off me!”

“Go on!” I yelled, and at last someone sprinted away.

I held my arms around his shoulders. He squirmed, told me to get off. He started to cry like a child.

“Tell him to leave me alone!”

“Grandpa,” I whispered. “It’s Kit. You’ll be all right. We’ll be home soon/”

I wiped the tears from his cheeks with my fingers.

“Jeez, Kit.”

It was Allie, kneeling beside me. She glared at the watching children.

“Get lost!” she told them. “Go on! Go to Hell!”

Together, we tugged him to his feet. He was trembling with cold, whimpering with fright.

Allie stroked his brow. “It’s me,” she said. “Allie. Fairy Queen. The good bad girl.”

At last we saw Mum running through the snow. She held him with me and Allie.

Grandpa stared at our faces.

“It’s us,” Mum whispered.

“Gerroff!” he yelled. “Get them off me!”

Then the doctor came, carrying his bag through the snow. He gave Grandpa an injection that calmed him down. Grandpa let us lead him through the snow toward home. A snowball thumped onto his back and there were screams of delight as a gang of kids ran away. At home, Allie and I sat downstairs and heard them moving about above us. Melting snow seeped through my clothes. Bitter cold. Allie hunched forward with her chin resting on her fists and stared at the blank wall. Nothing to say. I thought of Lak moving across his wilderness and I feared for him and for the baby. I tried to stop thinking of this and to think of Grandpa instead, but I couldn’t stop the story from telling itself inside my head.

“Look at this,” said Allie at last.

She had a penny in her palm. She passed her other hand across it and the penny disappeared. She passed her hand across again and the penny appeared again.

“Magic,” she said.

“Do it again,” I said.

She did it again.

“I have to do it in the play,” she said. “The Snow Queen teaches me magic. She shows me how to get rid of little things at first, like this penny. Then she shows me how I can use the magic to get rid of the things that get on my nerves. I get rid of things I don’t like, little irritations like cabbage and math books. Then I start on living things: a dog that barks too much, a bird that wakes me up in the morning. Then I get more evil and I turn on my brother, who keeps telling me to stop being bad and to be good. I just magic him away. It’s only when I start to miss him and to see how cruel I’ve been that I learn how to make the lost things appear again.”

Allie held the penny in her palm. It disappeared and appeared beneath her hand.

“It’s really good,” I said.

Soon Dad came in out of the snow and gave us a grim smile and went upstairs. Then an ambulance with its spinning blue lights pulled up in the lane. They brought Grandpa downstairs with a blanket across his shoulders. His face was gray and his eyes were blank and his feet shuffled. As they took him out, Allie went to him and kissed his cheek.

“Hurry home,” she said.

Dad went off with him in the ambulance. Mum came back in and sat beside us.

“He’ll be all right,” I whispered.

“Yes, son.”

“Show Mum your trick,” I said to Allie.

Allie put the penny on her palm.

“Now it’s gone,” she said. “Now it’s back again.”

“It’s from Allie’s play at school,” I said. “She learns how to make things disappear, then she learns how to find the lost things again.”

“Do it again,” said Mum.

The penny was lost and then found again.

Mum lay back in her chair. She clenched her fists. Tears streamed from her closed eyes.

“Do it again,” she said. “Do it again. Find it again.”