The Snow Child (35 page)

Then he wondered—would she kill it? The possibility sickened him, and he didn’t know why. Because the girl was willowy, with delicate features and small hands? Because the swan had wings like an angel and flew through fairy tales with a maiden upon its back? Garrett knew the truth—the swan meat could feed the girl for weeks.

She began to unbutton her coat. Spellbound, Garrett watched even as he felt he should look away. She set the coat on a bush behind her, then her hat as well. She wore a flowered cotton dress with what looked like long underwear beneath it. She bent and removed a knife from a sheath on her leg.

The swan strained at the willow bush that anchored the snare. The girl held the knife and crept slowly around a hummock to the other side of the swan, trying to position herself behind it. But it followed her, turned its head and hopped around to face her. She would never be able to take it head on. The bird’s beak would cut through her skin, break her small bones. It hissed again and swept its wings at her, not to fly but to attack. Garrett lowered himself to the ground, not wanting to be seen.

As the girl stepped toward the swan, the beating of its wings became more powerful, swirling the snow and air, and its hisses turned into a terrible, cracking growl. She circled quickly around its back and jumped onto the swan. Its free leg gave way and it crumpled, but its massive wings still beat beneath her. The girl held tightly, her face turned to the side, and grabbed the swan’s sinewy neck. She slid one hand up until it clenched just below the bird’s head and she held it at arm’s length. It seemed fatigued from the struggle, and for a moment both were still. Garrett could hear the girl breathing.

But then the swan’s neck writhed in her hand and it lunged toward her face. The beak glanced across her cheek. She shoved the swan’s head down into the wet snow and spread herself on top of the bird. Garrett could imagine the heat of the swan’s body beneath her, could hear the bird hissing and sputtering and that growl from somewhere in its strange round body. The swan fought, then calmed, and the girl reached with her knife toward its head, slid it under the neck, and cut sharply upward.

She wiped her face with the back of her bloody hand and then, beneath her, the swan’s wings flapped weakly, spasmed, were still again. The girl collapsed beside the bird, its dead wings stretched broad. The blood spread brightly beneath them and the snow fell.

She didn’t move for some time. Garrett’s legs were stiff from the cold, and he felt the need to stand but, mesmerized, could not.

For the next hour, he watched as she gutted the swan and cut off the head and black webbed feet. Steam rose from the body cavity and strewn entrails. She set aside the liver, the plum-sized heart, the sinewy neck. She steadily skinned the swan until she held a sagging pelt of white wings, white feathers, and bloody skin. Garrett expected her to throw it aside, but instead she laid it out in the snow and carefully rolled it up, the wings folded within the skin. She put the pelt inside a sack. Then she dragged the cleaned carcass away from the kill site, where the scraps and blood would attract ravens, magpies, and other scavengers. Garrett watched her climb a small spruce at the edge of the clearing and begin to tie the carcass and sack to a limb.

She was facing away from him, so as quickly as he could Garrett crawled back the way he had come. When he reached the spruce trees, he hid behind one and watched her kneel in the marsh and scrub her hands and the knife blade in the snow. Then she put on her coat and hat. Garrett turned down the hill and ran.

The snow had stopped and it was beginning to clear. Twilight hinted at winter to come. Twisting swaths of fog rose up from the river, and as he ran down the mountainside, it was as if he were descending into clouds. Overhead he heard a V of migrating snow geese cry their goodbyes into the purpling sky, and for the first time in his life, the sound frightened him.

CHAPTER 39

M
abel and Faina were cutting out paper snowflakes to decorate the little spruce tree in the corner of the cabin when the Bensons showed up unannounced with Christmas gifts. Esther shoved the door open without knocking, and Faina bolted to the opposite side of the room, her eyes wide with fear, her muscles taut as if ready to spring. For a moment, Mabel feared the girl would try to break out the glass window. She went to her and gently took hold of her wrist, hoping to calm her with her touch.

Esther stood stock-still, her mouth gaping. Mabel would have found it amusing had it not been for Faina’s terror.

Mabel straightened, still holding on to the girl’s arm, and took a slow breath.

Esther, she said. I would like you to meet Faina. Faina, this is my dear friend Esther.

Just then George and Garrett bumped noisily through the door behind her, and Esther waved a hand and shushed them as if they were about to startle a woodland creature.

It’s the girl, George, she whispered without taking her eyes off Faina. She’s here. She’s right here, in front of me.

George laughed out loud, but behind him Garrett was silent. The boy’s eyes were dark and wide, until he caught Mabel looking at him, and then he stepped back behind his father.

Mabel nudged the girl.

Hello, Faina said quietly.

My God, Esther said. She is real. Your girl is flesh and blood.

The next few hours were awkward. Esther tried to include Faina in the barrage of gifts and treats, as if she’d known all along she would be there.

Oh, here. This one is for you, Esther said, handing her a wrapped package.

Faina was silent, and at first did not even put out her hands to accept it. Mabel and Jack both moved to intercede, but stopped themselves. The girl took the package and with a somber expression held it in her lap.

Well, go on then. Aren’t you going to open it? Esther said.

Faina looked so frightened and confused, her cheeks flushed an unhealthy crimson, that Mabel longed to open the door to let her escape into the cold.

Do you need help, Faina?

The cabin was stiflingly hot. No one spoke. All eyes were on the girl. Finally Faina began to pull away the paper. When at last she held up a flower-embroidered handkerchief and smiled as if in polite recognition, Mabel thought she would faint with relief.

Thank you, Faina said, and Esther’s eyes glistened.

As the two families gathered for dinner, the tension eased. Faina remained quiet, but she was well mannered, carefully passing dishes when prompted and giving a small smile here and there. Garrett, however, seemed incapable of speaking or looking at anyone, particularly the girl. Her very presence seemed an affront to him, and Mabel did not know what to make of it.

“You know the boy is catching a pile of lynx this year,” George said around a mouthful of fruitcake. “The hare population is up, so there are a ton of cats all over the valley.”

“Is that so?” Jack asked.

Mabel looked at Garrett, and his face called to mind that first summer he came to work on the farm—irritable, petulant.

“Well? The man asked you a question.” George swung his arm across the back of Garrett’s chair. Garrett looked back down at his plate and mumbled incoherently.

“Hmmm,” Jack said agreeably, though Mabel knew he had not heard Garrett’s response either.

“What’s the matter with you, boy? Speak up. You’ve got nothing to be ashamed of. You’ve been doing some good trapping this year.”

“Yeah, I guess I’ve gotten a few.” And then his head was down again and he poked at his dessert without ever taking a bite.

Was this the honorary son, the one who now cast sullen looks in everyone’s direction? Wasn’t it at this very table that Garrett had shaken Jack’s hand and said it would be a privilege to be farming partners, to inherit the homestead when that time came?

For the rest of the evening, the boy did not utter a word.

George and Esther went on with their stories. Mabel cleaned up dinner and paced behind Faina. The girl was shrinking in her chair, beads of sweat gathering on the bridge of her nose. Mabel fanned her with a napkin and wiped at her temples.

Too warm, much too warm, Mabel whispered to herself.

At last the Bensons said it was time to leave, and Mabel was relieved to usher them all out the door—George, Esther, and Garrett to their horses and wagon, and Faina to the snowy forest.

CHAPTER 40

G
arrett cursed and urged his horse up the steep hill to follow the footprints. He ducked to avoid a spruce branch but still managed to get covered in snow. When he reached the top of the ridge, he reined in the horse, shook the snow from his shoulders, and leaned from the saddle. The tracks were old, shapeless indentations beneath several inches of snow, but they were hers. The horse shifted, antsy to either go back or go on, so Garrett went on, following the tracks as they wove among the spruce trees.

He was tired of the girl. For six years he had listened to Jack talk about her. Faina, Faina, Faina. The angel from the woods. And yet, for all the talk, never once had Garrett seen hide nor hair of the girl. Each winter he watched for her tracks, half hoping he’d spot them, half hoping Jack and Mabel were crazy. Sometimes he would think he saw a flicker in the brush, but it would only be a bird.

So how was it that this winter was different, that everywhere he went the forest snow was riddled with her tracks and he couldn’t be free of her?

Everything about the girl filled him with guilt. He had shot her fox and told no one. He had spied on her. Again and again his mind returned to the scene, to the girl’s struggle with the swan. The emotions it sparked bothered him, but he could not leave it be.

As he pursued her he told himself he was only going where he wanted—toward the mountains, toward the wolverine. And it was true. Wolverine roamed higher in the alpine country, closer to the glacier. He would never catch one in the lowlands where he trapped coyote, fox, beaver, and mink.

He followed the tracks up into a narrow ravine where boulders were hidden by the snow. The horse stumbled occasionally, and finally Garrett dismounted and led the animal. Although getting on in years, the gelding was still steady and sure-footed, and knew the mountains like few other horses.

Garrett’s traps and chains clanked in the burlap sacks strapped behind the saddle. Water ran down through the boulders, beneath the snow. At any moment he expected to see the stout, bearlike paw prints of a lone wolverine. Instead he saw small tracks, this time fresher. The girl again. Probably today. Garrett paused, hands on his knees, to look at the trail. Bare traces on top of the snow, like a lynx or snowshoe hare. The girl was nearly as tall as Garrett, so how could she be so insubstantial as to not sink into the snow? Irritated fascination twisted in his gut. He stomped ahead, erasing the delicate tracks with his boots.