The Tenderness of Wolves (15 page)

He moistens his mouth, which feels rusty and foul. ‘English,’ he croaks.

‘English! Good.’ The man is overjoyed. ‘Do you know your name?’

Francis hesitates for a fraction of a second, and then it comes out without thinking. ‘Laurent.’

‘Laurent? Ah. Laurent. Yes. Good. I am Per.’ He turns his head and shouts, ‘Britta! Kom.’

The fair woman appears from somewhere nearby, and smiles at Francis. Per speaks to her in their language, explaining.

‘Laurent,’ she says. ‘Welcome.’

‘She doesn’t speak English a lot. Mine is best. Do you know where you are?’

Francis shakes his head.

‘You are at Himmelvanger. It means the Fields of Heaven. Good name, yes?’

Francis nods. He has never heard of it. ‘What river …?’ His voice still sounds strange and weak.

‘River? Ah, we found you … yes. Ahh, a river without a name. Jens was hunting … and saw you there. Very surprised!’ Per mimes the surprise of the man looking for hares but finding instead a bedraggled youth.

Francis smiles, as much as he can. His mouth finds it an effort. ‘Can I talk to Jens?’

Per looks surprised. ‘Yes, I am sure. But now … you are sick. Sleep and eat. Get better. Britta and Line care for you good, yes?’

Francis nods. He smiles at Britta, who giggles unexpectedly.

Per leans down and picks up Francis’s clothes. ‘All clean, yes? And this …’ He produces Laurent’s bag and Francis takes it.

‘Thank you, very much. And thank … Jens for finding me. I hope I can speak to him soon.’

The others smile and nod.

Britta speaks to Per, who scrapes the chair back as he stands up with a satisfied grunt.

‘Now you sleep, Britta tells me. Yes?’

Francis nods.

He allows himself to think of his parents at the homestead. He supposes they will be worried about him, although whether they will worry enough to come after him is another matter. People must have found Laurent by now. What will they think? Will they think he did it?

The thought almost makes him smile.

Line is outside with Torbin and Anna when Britta comes out to tell her that the youth has spoken. Line thinks it is odd that an English youth is called Laurent. She knew a Frenchman called Laurent in her previous life, when Janni was alive. Her English is better than anyone’s, even Per’s, so she is secretly pleased. She has felt protective of him ever since Jens brought him in, slung over the back of a pony, and now she feels justified–she can be the link between him and the others.

Torbin and Anna run up to her, amid a squawking of chickens, ears flapping.

‘Can we see him now?’ asks Torbin, his face flushed from cold.

‘No, not yet. He is very weak. You would exhaust him.’

‘We wouldn’t. We’d be like little mice. Tiny little mice.’ Anna makes little mice squeaking noises.

‘Soon,’ says Line. ‘When he can get up and walk about.’

‘Like Lazarus,’ prompts Anna, keen to fit the stranger into her Himmelvanger-shaped world view.

‘Not quite like Lazarus. He wasn’t dead.’

‘Nearly dead! Wasn’t he?’ Torbin is hopeful of more drama.

‘Yes, nearly dead. He was unconscious.’

‘Yeah, like this. Mama–look!’ Torbin throws himself down in the snow and feigns unconsciousness, which involves, in his interpretation, the tongue lolling from the
side of his mouth. Line smiles. Torbin can always make her smile. He’s irrepressible, indestructible, like a dense rubber ball. He doesn’t remind her so much of Janni, whereas Anna is like Janni reincarnated–broad cheekbones, brown hair, fjord-deep blue eyes. A smile of terrible sweetness, that comes out only a few times a year, and is all the more devastating for its rarity.

The children climb out of the chicken run and head across the yard. Line is supposed to be feeding the chickens, and then helping Britta with quilt-making. She doesn’t have a lot of time to herself, but that’s not what she came for. She likes being in the chicken shelter, stoutly built against winter winds with a steeply raked roof to repel the snow. There is a pleasingly sturdy quality to all the buildings at Himmelvanger. Everything had to be built well, because it was being built for God: dove-tailed joints, double-walled construction, the sweeping lines of roofs, neatly shingled with cedar tiles, each one nearly heart-shaped. The spire on the small chapel, with its painted cross. For ten years it has withstood the worst wind and weather the Canadian winter could muster. God has protected them.

And the people here have accepted her with kindness and grace, even if it is mixed with advice. You should pray more, Line, you should put your trust in God, you should infuse your work with faith and that will give your life meaning. You should stop mourning for Janni, because he is with God now, so he is happy. She has tried to do those things, because she owes them her life. When Janni disappeared–she still finds it hard to say ‘died’, even to herself–she had two tiny children and no money. She was evicted from her lodgings and had nowhere to go. Had contemplated going back to Norway but could not raise the fares. Had contemplated throwing herself and her children into the St Lawrence. And then a friend had told her about Himmelvanger. The prospect of her going to live in a model religious community
was so far-fetched as to be comical. But they were Norwegians, and they wanted hard workers. More importantly, they didn’t ask for money.

Ironically, she had set off in the same direction Janni had taken on his final journey. Or, if not his final journey, then the last time she had seen him. He was looking for work and had met another Norwegian who was going to work for the Hudson Bay Company. They were promised high wages for a season’s work, but it was a long way, up in the north-west, in Rupert’s Land. He would not see Line or the children for over a year, but then, he said, they would have enough money to buy a house. It would be a short-cut to the life they wanted: their own home and some land. Line would not have to wash and mend other people’s soiled clothes; he would not have to bite his tongue and work for fools.

She only got one letter after he left. Janni wasn’t much of a writer, so she hadn’t expected passionate love letters, but still, one letter in six months hurt her feelings a little. He had written that things were not quite as he had expected–he and his friend were billeted with a group of Norwegian convicts that the Company had imported. The men were rough and violent, and formed a clique that was left alone by the other employees. Janni felt uncomfortable being lumped in with these men, but the divisions of nationality were stronger than those of legality. But some of them were all right, he wrote, and he was looking forward to seeing Line and the children the following summer and choosing a site for their house. No messages of love; no endearments; it was a letter he could have written to an aunt. And after that, nothing.

When the next summer came she waited without patience, asking people for news. Toronto was hot and humid; the black flies tormented the children and their cramped, cheap lodgings reeked of sewage. At night she dreamt of wide
open landscapes empty of people, covered in cold, pure white snow, only to wake up sweating and scratching at fresh insect bites. She became bad-tempered and peevish. Then, in July she received a letter addressed to ‘Family of Jan Fjelstad’. It had been sent to the wrong address, and had been opened and the envelope readdressed in childish handwriting. Its stiff phrases regretted to inform her that her husband was one of a party of Norwegians who had mutinied and deserted from the post the previous January, stealing valuable Company property. They had vanished into the wilderness, undoubtedly perishing in the blizzards that swept the country that month. However (the letter took care to note), if by some strange chance they hadn’t perished, they were fugitives from justice.

At first Line simply did not believe it. She kept waiting for her husband to turn up, thinking they must have mistaken him for someone else. The English found Norwegian names confusing, she told herself. She could not believe Janni would have stolen anything. It wasn’t in his nature.

She went to the Toronto office of the Company and demanded to see someone, and a sandy-haired English youth received her in his small office. He was polite and apologetic, but said there was no reason to doubt the letter. There had been a desertion, and although he personally had no knowledge of the people involved, he was sure it was accurate. Line shouted at the youth, who looked angry. He didn’t seem to appreciate that he was talking about the death of her husband and her hopes. She ran out of the office and went on waiting.

But weeks crawled past and he didn’t come back, and she ran out of money. In the end it didn’t really matter what she believed; whether it was true or not, she had to take a decision, so one morning in September she set off with the children on a three-week journey to the ridiculously named Himmelvanger, travelling almost as far as Janni had on his
penultimate journey, to the equally ridiculously named Moose Factory.

That was three years ago, and she has become used to her new life. At first she was sure Janni would find her; before they left Toronto she told everyone where they were going. One day he would ride into the yard on a large horse, and call her name; and she would drop whatever she was doing and come running. At first, she thought about that every day. Then, gradually, she stopped indulging in that fantasy. She grew listless and depressed, until Sigi Jordal had urged her to confide in her. Line wept, for the only time since arriving, and confessed to Sigi that sometimes she wanted to die. This was a mistake. She was besieged by members of the community, each in turn coming to her to urge her to repent of the great sin of hopelessness, to accept the Lord into her heart and let him cast out despair. She quickly assured them that she had (suddenly) accepted God, and he was leading her out of the dark vale of sorrow. Somehow the pretence comforted her; occasionally she wondered if she didn’t half believe it. She would go and sit in church and stare at the sun coming in, following an individual mote of dust until her eyes ached. Her mind wandered pleasantly. She didn’t pray, exactly, but neither did she feel alone.

It was about then that Espen Moland had started paying her particular attention. He was a married man (the community was intended only for families) and his children played with Torbin and Anna, but his interest in her was more than purely spiritual. She was wary at first, knowing that this was utterly proscribed. But secretly she liked it. Espen made her feel beautiful again. He said she was the best-looking woman in Himmelvanger and that she was driving him crazy. Line tutted but privately agreed. Espen wasn’t exactly handsome, not like Janni, but he was quick and funny, and always had the last word in an argument or
exchange. It was peculiarly sweet to hear words of passion from a man who never stopped joking, and it proved to be more than her flesh could stand. Eventually, some months ago, they had started to sin. That was how she thought of it, although she did not feel guilty. Just cautious and careful. She cannot afford another disaster.

Line hears him coming now, whistling one of his made-up tunes. Is he coming to the henhouse? Yes–the door opens.

‘Line! I haven’t seen you all day!’

‘I have work to do, you know that.’

‘Of course, but if I don’t see you, I am sad.’

‘Oh yeah, sure.’

‘I’ve come to mend the hole in the roof.’

He is wearing his tool belt–he is their carpenter–and Line glances upwards to scan the roof.

‘There is no hole.’

‘Well, there might be. It’s best to be on the safe side. We don’t want our eggs getting wet, do we?’

She giggles. Espen is always making her laugh, even when he says the stupidest things. He has slid his arm round her waist and presses himself against her, and she experiences the familiar melting sensation that overcomes her in his presence.

‘Britta’s waiting for me.’

‘So? She won’t notice a few minutes.’

How hard it is to behave properly, even in a strict religious community like this one. He is kissing her neck, his lips hot on her skin. If she doesn’t leave now, she is done for.

‘It’s not a good time.’ She wriggles out of his grasp, breathing heavily.

‘My God, you look beautiful today. I could …’

‘Stop!’

She loves the beseeching look in his eyes. It is nice to know she has it in her power to make someone so happy, just
by touching them. But if she doesn’t walk out of the henhouse right now he might start using those words that send the blood rushing round her skull, obliterating her reason. Dirty, obscene words that she could never speak, but that have an extraordinary, almost magical power over her. It’s not something Janni would ever have done, but he wasn’t much of a talker. In fact the way she feels around Espen is not something she has ever experienced before; she seems to be changing in ways that sometimes alarm her, as though she is riding a flood tide in a paper-light canoe–buoyed up, exhilarated, but not at all sure she is in control.

She forces herself to back away, the inside of her body clamouring for him, and smiles, just at the last minute, so that he won’t think–God forbid!–that she has lost interest.

Outside the henhouse she wipes the smile off her face, trying to think about something else; something repellent, like the smell of pigs, not Espen and his sweet, dirty mouth. She will have to sit with Britta over the needlework, and she has been getting too many sharp and questioning looks from Britta lately. She can’t possibly know, but perhaps something about her has betrayed them. She makes herself think about the sick boy, to sober herself, but somehow that doesn’t have the desired effect now. Instead she imagines lifting up the sheets and looking at his naked body. She has seen what he has; his appealingly golden skin, felt its smoothness …

God! Espen has poisoned her whole mind. Perhaps she should slip into the church for a few minutes and pray; try to conjure up some suitably becoming shame.

It is freezing: the coldest of the five days they have been following the trail. A wind screams down from the Arctic and scours their faces with hail. It makes Donald’s eyes water, and the tears freeze on his cheeks, making them chapped and raw. Water from somewhere also freezes in his moustache, so he started wrapping his muffler across the lower part of his face, until it froze solid with the moisture from his breath, and he had to tear it painfully free before he suffocated. He is cold and exhausted even though Jacob has the lion’s share of the load, since Donald cannot keep up if he carries half.