Alaska (158 page)

With that he kissed the trembling child and indicated to Kendra that she, Kendra, must now take over.

But the teacher did not hear him, for at the moment when Amy first entered her room, Kendra had been struck by an overwhelming sensation: That's the little girl on the magazine cover! and the similarity between the child of six or seven and this maturing girl of fourteen was so striking that Kendra put her left hand to her face and bit her forefinger. It was a miracle, nothing less, that a replica of the child whose photograph had lured Kendra to this remote spot should now be entering her classroom.

It was also a command: she had been called here to serve this child.

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'You'll check her out,' Afanasi said as he prepared to leave. 'She can read and write some, but it's been a long time since the few weeks she was in school last year.'

And with that, he was gone. When Kendra, too startled to react promptly, left her standing there, the girl in the class rose, went to Amy, and led her to a chair which one of the boys dragged into the circle; by that thoughtful gesture the strange child, reared alone at the edge of the world, was made welcome.

On Kendra's third day on the job she happened to find in one of her desk drawers a pamphlet which stated that the North Slope school district, of which her school was a part, contained 88,281 square miles with a total population of 7,600. Feeling already a sense of pride in what she called 'my northern turf,' she waited till school ended, then went next door to see if she could borrow Mr. Hooker's hand-held calculator, and he said almost gruffly: 'The school's supposed to supply you with one,' and he rummaged about in his desk until he came up with the fine one which had been intended for her. When she thanked him, he said: 'I probably got some more junk around here that's yours. I'll sort it out.'

The gift of the calculator surprised her, but the more she saw of this remarkable school, the more impressed she was with its generosity. Each child was given a free toothbrush, toothpaste, pencils, ballpoint pen, notebook, all reading material, a breakfast snack, a hot lunch and full health services. Teachers participated in the bonanza too: fully paid hospitalization, a life insurance policy of twice the yearly salary, no rent on housing, heating or electricity, plus the famous Thrift Plan, which Afanasi explained: 'You're invited to deposit six percent of your salary with us. Twenty-six hundred and forty dollars a year in your case. We add fifty percent to it, and on the total we pay you eleven percent each year. We don't want our teachers to go hungry.'

To test her Calculator, she engaged in the kind of silly game that academic people find pleasure in pursuing: What state is about the same size as our school district; and how many of our smaller states would have to combine to be as big as we are?

Using the almanac supplied by the school, she found to her intense delight that the state nearest in size was her own: 88,281 square miles for North Slope, 84,916 for good old Utah! and the thought that she was involved in a school district bigger than all of Utah staggered her.

She then proceeded to a second calculation, and found that North Slope was bigger than the ten smallest states combined, starting with Rhode Island and ending with West Virginia, but before gloating she did have the courtesy to question: Yes, but what about the population? and she found 965

that these ten states had a combined population of more than 26,000,000 while North Slope had fewer than 8,000. Only then did she grasp the enormousness of her part of Alaska, and its emptiness.

Chubby-faced Amy Ekseavik, the newcomer, was proving to be a tough little customer; during her first two weeks in school she rebuffed any attempt to break down her reserve, and in her rugged self-determination she repelled students and teacher alike. As an only child living far from the village, she had never had friends, and the concept of being congenial with people or trusting them was alien; she had the gravest suspicions about her fellow students, and since her father and mother had treated her harshly, she could not imagine that Miss Scott was going to be much different, so for some time the atmosphere in the classroom was tense.

At this point Kendra consulted with her principal, and she discovered that where school matters were concerned, Mr. Hooker was a cautious, battle-scarred veteran who approached every problem from the point of view of 'How could this hurt me? And if there's potential trouble, how can it be defused?' With that strategy dominating, he was not at all happy to learn that the new teacher was having trouble with her new pupil, because he had reason to believe that Amy Ekseavik was for some reason or other the special concern of Vladimir Afanasi, a member of the North Slope school board, and therefore she was a child to be handled carefully.

'You say she's intractable?' Kendra was often surprised at Mr. Hooker's vocabulary, for although he had acquired an M.A. in education from Greeley, in Colorado, one of the best schools of its kind, he really was a boob, but one with latent possibilities, so she shared her apprehensions with him.

'Amy's like a wild creature, Kasm. I wonder if she was abused at home?'

'Not even a remote possibility. Afanasi doesn't like her parents, but he says they're not brutes. Eskimos never maltreat their children.'

'Then you think it's just the result of her being raised alone?'

'Possibly, and it might also be that she finds herself the youngest of your students.

Maybe she would be happier, all around, if she dropped back to elementary school.

I've been able to thaw out such children.'

Automatically, and with force she would not have used had she thought about how it might be taken, Kendra cried: 'Oh, no! She's where she should be. Her peers'll help her along, and I certainly aim to make her feel comfortable . . .'

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Suddenly realizing she was treading in a sensitive area, she backed out, saying 'help her learn,' at which Principal Hooker smiled with a depth of understanding that surprised Kendra: 'You mustn't identify with her too strongly, Miss Scott.'

'Please call me Kendra that is, if you want me to call you Kasm.'

'Agreed. So you want to keep her? But is she learning anything?'

'She's very bright, Kasm. She shows a great capacity to learn.'

'Then stay with her. Congratulate her when she does something well, and don't be afraid to rebuke her when she stumbles.'

So during those haunting autumn days when the sun sank lower and lower in the sky, as if to warn the people of Desolation: 'Soon I shall be gone, soon night falls upon you,' Kendra worked to break down the reserve of this aloof, almost wild child who had been thrust into her life, and she was fortified in this difficult task by the fact that over her desk at home she had tacked that National Geographic

cover showing the other Amy as a six-year-old, and the determination of that fur-bound little girl heading into the blizzard consoled her: Any child raised like that would have to be tough at age fourteen. My Amy's just the way she should be now, and it's my job to show her how much better she can be at twenty.

So the difficult educational process that all young animals must undergo if they are to be first-class polar bears or eagles continued, with Kendra applying constant love and pressure and tough little Amy resisting with all her might. The other three students, children of normal upbringing whose individual peculiarities had been knocked into conformity by contact with other children as opinionated as they, progressed rapidly under Kendra's guidance, so that Desolation High was functioning at a rate that had to be classified as far more than satisfactory.

At a church supper that marked in an accidental way the end of autumn and the beginning of the long night of winter, several parents told Kendra: 'We hear only good things about you. It was God's will that sent you to us,' but the people with whom Amy Ekseavik was boarding said: 'She never mentions school. Is she doing all right?' and Kendra said honestly: 'She seems to be coming along.'

IN SEPTEMBER, OCTOBER AND EARLY NOVEMBER THE citizens of Desolation often referred ominously to 'the com—

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ing of winter,' and Kendra supposed they were referring to the problems of perpetual night, but one day in early November she learned the real meaning. Since the weather had grown cold, down to two degrees below zero with a light snow covering the ground, she had begun to wear her Eskimo garb, and very comfortable it was. But on this morning when she hurried from the Teacherage to the school building, she was struck by a wind of such cruel force that she gasped and puckered her face, and when her students came in swathed in protective clothing, they asked: 'How do you like real winter?'

The thermometer stood at minus-forty-two, but the howling wind roaring across the Chukchi from the wastelands of Siberia was so powerful that Barrow radio reported the wind-chill factor as 'minus-ninety-one and dropping.' It was a cold that Kendra had never imagined, let alone experienced: 'Hey, you guys. How long does this continue?'

and they reassured her: 'Not many days,' and they were right, for after three bone-shattering days the wind subsided and she found that minus-twenty-two without a gale was quite bearable.

Now, in the depth of a real arctic winter when people had to draw together for survival, she learned what a superior educator Kasm Hooker was and what a superb citizen Vladimir Afanasi was, for now the gymnasium, which had accounted for more than half what it cost to build the school, became the focal point of the community. There were feasts at Thanksgiving and Christmas to which all the villagers except the parents of Amy Ekseavik brought frozen whale meat, smelts, torn cod and wonderful stews made of duck, goose or caribou. But above all, there were basketball games. Indeed, Kendra sometimes felt that the soul of Desolation Point, at least in winter, resided in the basketball games which attracted almost everyone in the community. But it was basketball as she had never seen it before, because Desolation High had only those two boys, and although they were quite good at dribbling and shooting, they did require at least three other players to make a five-man team.

The problem was resolved in this way: it was agreed by any team which played Desolation that two boys who had graduated earlier would be allowed to play, with Mr. Hooker serving as the fifth member, it being understood that he would not shoot or guard the best player on the opposing team. But whom could Desolation play? Barrow High School had a fully competitive squad of fifteen, but the six other small schools on the North Slope did not. What the school did was a tribute to the imagination of Vladimir Afanasi, who explained the situation to Kendra prior to the first big game:

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'We have the money, so we pay the travel expenses of other schools to fly up here and play a set of three informal games, sometimes only two. The village goes crazy.

Our boys have a great experience. And the players on the visiting teams have an opportunity to see what northern Alaska is like. Everybody profits.'

The first team imported under these conditions was from the little Yukon River town of Ruby. Eight players flew in along with the coach and the school principal, and for several days when no sun appeared, Desolation thought only of basketball, and since there was no difference between night and day, the games were scheduled for five in the afternoon, and they were something to behold, for the Desolation team consisted of Kendra's two high-school boys, Jonathan Borodin, the graduate who owned the snowmobile, another boy who had graduated two years earlier, and Mr. Hooker, six feet one inch tall and weighing one hundred and fifty-seven. They appeared in handsome warm-up jackets that had cost ninety-seven dollars each and pale blue jerseys proclaiming in bright golden letters NORTHERN LIGHTS. Since three of the players were noticeably short, with Jonathan Borodin of average size and Mr. Hooker reaching toward the stars, they were quite a mixture to look at, but once the whistle sounded and Referee Afanasi tossed up the ball, a game of wild charges and changes ensued.

Kendra was amazed at how skillfully her two students could play, while Borodin was still the star shot maker he had been when regularly enrolled in school, but at halftime the score was Ruby 28, Desolation 21. Of course, if Mr. Hooker had been allowed to shoot, or had he been, permitted to guard the star of the Ruby team, the result would probably have been different. Nevertheless, Kendra was proud of her team and cheered lustily for it.

That night the Desolation team lost 49-39, but the next night the local team, even though it was a hodgepodge, sank shot after shot and won by the comfortable margin of 4436. Next day, before the chartered plane came to take the Ruby players back to the Yukon, four hundred and forty miles due south, the two teams shared a huge breakfast of scrambled simulated eggs, a sausage made of various meats and muffins provided by Mrs. Hooker. All agreed that the Ruby visit had been a sensational success, and one of the visiting players said in a formal speech of thanks for the hospitality: 'I still believe that after we leave, the sun will come up,' and one of Kendra's boys, who had starred in the second game, responded: 'Come back in June, you'll be right!'

Now Kendra experienced the full wonder of life north of 969

the Arctic Circle in the winter, those seemingly endless weeks of prolonged night, broken by a few hours of silvery haze at noon. Sometimes when the sun nibbled at the edge of clouds hanging over the Yukon River far to the south, Kendra would look out her schoolroom window and see shadowy figures, not distinct enough to be identified, moving slowly through the village, and she would think: I'm caught in a dream world, and none of this is real. But then the twenty-two hours of complete darkness would set in and she would say to herself: This is the real arctic. This is the one I came seeking. Then she would luxuriate in the blackness, as if only she of all the students who had graduated from Brigham Young could have the courage for such an adventure.

She was disposed, therefore, to enjoy the experience at Desolation, and whenever the women of the village arranged a festival of some kind, she helped them decorate the gymnasium and serve the refreshments, until all came to acknowledge her as a member of their community. Reports from her class were reassuring, except that dour Amy Ekseavik, the boarding pupil, volunteered no comment about her whatever.