Starfish (7 page)

A LARGE
man on a big horse stopped suddenly, just as he had made his way through the high pines above the small meadow in the midst of the great mountains. Something was different. It had snowed off and on for the last two days, and now that he had enough pelts and meat, he was looking forward to returning to the small lodge to rest and repair some of the traps that had been damaged over the course of this long winter.

“Smoke, that is what it is, smoke,” the man said aloud, a slight Caribbean accent punctuating the word “smoke.”

The man dropped back down from the ridge, his horse plowing through the snow and into a small clearing hidden in a large stand of birch and aspen. The man then cupped his hands, raised them to his mouth, and made the call of a barred owl.

He seemed to sing the words “Who? Who? Who cooks for you?” But that was only how it sounded.

A small boy on horseback joined the man. He was trailing two horses that carried loads wrapped in heavy waxed canvas. The boy and the horses seemed to appear from out of the thin mountain air.

“I think it'd be best to keep moving,” the man said to the boy. “Looks like someone might be down in the lodge.”

The small boy did not reply, but simply stared back at the large man with big dark eyes.

“We'll skip the stop this time and hope they're gone when we get back in a month or so,” the man continued. “That fallen cabin sure is pleasant in the springtime.”

The boy again did not say a word, but this time replied with a nod.

“Well, it's agreed, then,” the man said with a smile, “maybe next month.”

The large man and the small boy urged their horses forward and melted into the maze of snow-covered trees that stood before them.

The man's name was Avery John Hawkins. The boy, he was silent.

W
OLVERINE
• A B
ROKEN
C
HAIR
• U
LYSSES'S
W
RATH
• T
HE
H
OLE IN THE
C
HIMNEY

LIONEL WOKE
to an explosion of commotion. The lodge was filled with low, guttural snarls and the sound of a great collision. Ulysses paced wildly across the back of the room.

“Open the door, maybe he just wants to leave,” Beatrice said, her voice calm.

She was no longer sleeping but standing over a large, snarling wolverine, holding it back with the end of a broken broom.

Lionel scrambled to his feet and ran to open the door. The wolverine did not take them up on the invitation.

“Get that broken chair,” Beatrice instructed.

Lionel ran back, grabbing the broken pieces of a fallen chair that lay strewn across the floor. Lionel had seen wolverines before, but he had never seen one this agitated. The dog-sized animal viciously attacked the broom, sending the splintered ends flying across the room.

“The chair, Lionel,” Beatrice repeated.

Lionel held the chair out in front of him like the lion tamer from the traveling circus that had stopped by the boarding school one summer. The wolverine turned its focus to Lionel, swatting at the chair's legs with its long claws, practically pulling it from his hand.

“Start moving him toward the door,” Beatrice said as she ran to the other side of the room, returning with a long stool.

They backed the animal slowly toward the door, Lionel using every bit of strength that he could muster to keep the wolverine from knocking the chair from his hand—or worse, getting past it.

He took his eyes from the wolverine for a moment as they pushed the snarling beast past the bundled supplies. Lionel saw their grandfather's rifle and wondered why Beatrice didn't use it. when he looked back from the rifle a second later, the wolverine splintered the chair and swiped at Lionel's leg with a powerful swoop of its long claws.

Lionel felt the creature's paw take his legs out from under him. Before he could move, Beatrice was in between the wolverine and Lionel, pushing the creature back with the stool. She stood close to the open doorway, but the wolverine refused to leave.

Lionel glanced down at his leg. Four long lines of blood appeared on the leg of his torn long underwear. He looked at the wolverine and thought that it might kill them.

Lionel grabbed his lower leg and pulled himself back toward Ulysses, who kicked and bucked wildly toward Beatrice and the wolverine. Beatrice looked over her shoulder and jumped out of the way as one of Ulysses's kicks came dangerously close. The wolverine did the same, twisting sideways in the crooked doorframe and then flattening itself to the ground to avoid another powerful kick. Beatrice seized the opportunity, sprang to her feet, and pushed the door closed on the wolverine. She then dropped the door's wooden latch to secure it.

The wolverine clawed and scratched at the worn wood, sending splintered pieces through the exposed cracks. Beatrice leaned on the door with all of her weight until the wolverine realized that she was not going to let it through. Lionel sat up, and through the dingy windows saw the still-snarling animal slowly waddle through the windblown drifts of snow. Lionel looked down at his leg again, and then fell back against their bundles of supplies.

“I don't think that the wolverine liked us in his house,” Beatrice said as she knelt at Lionel's side. “It looks like he got ya.”

“Just a bit, eh?” Lionel said, trying to be brave.

“Yeah, just a bit,” Beatrice replied, pulling up the leg of his long underwear. “I'll get some soap and water on it, and it should be all right. we did pretty good, huh—I mean all of us?” Beatrice reached up and scratched Ulysses's long face.

“Yeah, Beatrice, pretty good,” Lionel said, as the pain slowly drifted up his leg.

Beatrice wet the end of Lionel's torn underwear and wiped the blood away. “The good news is that it ain't all that deep,” she said, “and now you're a part of that wolverine forever.”

“How do you figure?” Lionel asked.

“Well, you ain't never gonna forget it. You'll have yerself that scar as a reminder,” Beatrice said as she dabbed at the cuts with a torn piece of cloth.

“How did he get in here?” Lionel asked, looking anxiously around the room.

“I don't know. I heard something. Sat up, and he was there,” Beatrice said, looking over toward the hulking pile of the chimney's stacked rock. Then she noticed something and got up to investigate.

“Oh, I see. Look, look here. There's a hole.”

Lionel crawled to his feet, and limped over to Beatrice at the chimney. There in the side of the crumbling pile of stone was a large crack that he hadn't seen when he had first found the lodge.

“It must have happened when the chimney fell forward, huh?” Lionel said.

“Yeah, I guess so, and now we ruined his hiding place,” Beatrice said. “He'll be all right, now that winter's about over.”

Lionel looked out the grimy window at the freshly fallen snow that surrounded their new home.

“How's the leg?” Beatrice asked.

“I think it will be all right,” Lionel answered. “You okay? You sure got sleepy.”

“I'm better now, I just get tired,” Beatrice said, and they both collapsed in a pile on the buffalo robe in front of the fire.

“I'm going to think about that wolverine,” Lionel said. “Like Grandpa told us.”

“Grandpa?” Beatrice asked.

“Yeah. I'm tryin' to keep my eyes open and listen,” Lionel said again, more to himself this time.

S
LEEP
• S
ILK
G
OWNS AND
T
OP
H
ATS
• T
HE
M
EADOW'S
G
REEN
• T
HE
G
REAT
W
OOD
• S
URPRISE

BEATRICE AND
Lionel slept on and off for the next few days, taking turns getting water from the stream, stoking the fire, and preparing small meals from the provisions that their grandfather sent with them. once rested, Beatrice thought that they should assess the cabin for additional supplies, and upon further investigation Lionel discovered an old trunk and a phonograph under the rubble at the far end of the lodge.

The children had never seen a phonograph or the hard wax cylinders that were labeled “Edison Gold Moulded Records” that accompanied the machine. It took the children the better part of a morning to figure out how to work the apparatus, but when they did, they were grateful that Edison, whoever he was, had left the cylinders for their enjoyment.

The trunk had long since been scavenged for anything of real use but still held an eclectic assortment of moldy silk gowns and a coat with long tails. Beatrice took to wearing a dress of ivory silk and pearl buttons, Lionel a long coat and a hat whose crown looked liked the cylinders that spun the music. The late-winter days were perfect for dressing up and then dancing to the scratchy sounds of Edison's collection. Beatrice was happy, as happy as Lionel remembered ever seeing her. And Beatrice was right about the snow; although it was still freezing at night, the days were sunny and the snow was melting.

At the start of the third week in the lodge, Beatrice tore her ivory gown while cutting wood. She referred to the frock as “stupid,” and returned to the faded blues of her dated school uniform.

“I'm wondering how long our supplies will last,” Beatrice mused as she folded the torn garment.

Lionel turned from the hearth, where he held the last of the elk that their grandfather had given them over the fire. Beatrice looked concerned.

“How long do we stay?” he asked.

And then it dawned on him. How long were they planning on staying? when was Grandpa coming? Lionel had never thought about it. Jenkins and Lumpkin had been trying to drown Beatrice, and then they ran. They had never made a plan. It just worked. or had so far. Now, Beatrice was worried about the supplies.

Beatrice decided that they should go hunting, but just in the immediate area around the lodge. Although a lot of the snow had melted and there were patches of green grass and saturated moss across the meadow, they thought that they should stay close to the lodge until they heard from their grandfather.

The next day Beatrice loaded the rifle, and they went out across the meadow to the edge of the woods. Trees spiraled above them, and Lionel felt a stillness to the place that reminded him of the chapel back at school. For some reason, once they were in these great woods, they spoke only in whispers.

Lionel walked behind Beatrice, doing his best to stay within her exact footsteps. The ground was thick with a thousand years and a thousand layers of the giant trees. Moss-covered branches and rotting trunks of all shapes and sizes lay scattered like discarded bones around the ancient trunks that towered high above their heads. They saw two deer, a rabbit, and some squirrels, and although Beatrice fired twice, they would return to the lodge empty-handed.

They walked back without speaking, Lionel wondering how Beatrice had missed the animals. He tried to remember the last time he had seen Beatrice fail at anything. Then Beatrice froze.

Lionel watched as her eyes went wide and swept the high trees.

“What is it?” Lionel whispered.

“There's someone else in the woods.”

Lionel did not hear anything except for the wind in the tops of the trees, the distant murmur of the stream, and their own uneven breathing. Beatrice crept forward. Lionel closed his eyes and tried to lower the creaking groan of the swaying trees in his ears. He took a deep breath, and then he heard—or more, felt—something…someone behind him.

Lionel spun around, and there, standing not two paces away, was their grandfather.