The Snow Child: A Novel (17 page)

At the sight of the girl peeking in the window, Mabel startled, but then smiled and raised her hand in greeting. When the child waved back, affection surged through her.

Faina, child. Come in, come in.

The child brought the smell of snow in with her, and the air in the cabin cooled and brightened. Mabel unwrapped the scarf from her neck, took her mittens, fur hat, and the wool coat. The child let her do this, and Mabel hugged the clothes to her breast, felt the chill of winter, the coarse wool, and the silky brown fur. She draped the scarf over the back of her hand and marveled that her sister’s dewdrop stitch would adorn this little girl.

What were you doing?

The child stood at the table with one of the pencils in her hand.

I was drawing, Mabel said. Would you like to see?

She set the child’s outdoor clothing on a chair and left the door cracked open, so a draft could move through the cabin and cool the girl. Then she pulled a chair out for her and sat beside her.

This is my sketchpad. And these are my pencils. I wanted to draw a picture of the basket you gave us. See?

Mabel held up the drawing.

Oh, the child said.

It’s not very good, is it? I’m afraid I’ve lost any skill I might have had.

I think it is very nice.

The child skimmed her fingers across the paper surface and rounded her lips in wonder.

What else can you draw? she asked.

Mabel shrugged.

Anything I set my mind to, I suppose. Although it won’t necessarily look the way it ought.

Could you draw a picture of me?

Yes. Oh, yes. But I must warn you, I’ve never been very good at portraits.

Mabel put the child’s chair near the window so the winter light shone on the side of her face and lit up her blond hair. For the next hour, Mabel glanced from sketch paper to child and back again, and waited for the girl to protest, but she never complained or moved. She was stoic, her chin slightly raised, her gaze steady.

With each stroke of the pencil, it was as if Mabel had been granted her wish, as if she held the child in her arms, caressed her cheek, stroked her hair. She drew the gentle curve of the child’s cheekbones, the peaks of her small lips, the inquisitive arch of her blond eyebrows. Self-contained, wary and brave, innocent and knowing… something in the turn of her head, the tilt of her eyes, hinted at a wildness Mabel wanted to capture, too. All these details she took in and memorized.

Would you like to see?

Is it finished?

Mabel smiled.

As well as I can for today.

She turned the sketchpad toward the child, not knowing what reaction to expect.

The child took in a breath, then clasped her hands in delight.

Do you like it?

Oh, yes! Is that me? Is that what I look like?

Have you never seen yourself, child?

The girl shook her head.

Never? Not in a mirror? Well, I have just the thing. Much better than any drawing I can manage.

Mabel went to the bedroom and came back with a hand mirror.

Do you know what this is? It’s a little glass, and you can see yourself in it.

The child shrugged her small shoulders.

There, do you see? That’s you.

The girl peered into the mirror, her eyes wide and her face somber. She reached out and touched the shining surface with one fingertip, then touched her own hair, her face. She smiled, turned her head side to side, brushed her hair away from her brow, all the while watching in the mirror.

Would you like to have the picture I drew of you?

Faina smiled and nodded.

Mabel folded the portrait until it was a square small enough to fit in the child’s pocket.

When the little girl was gone and dinner finished, Mabel knitted by the woodstove. Outside, the wind tore down the river valley, and she thought she could hear another sound, too. A mournful baying.

“Is that the wind, Jack?”

He stood at the window, looking out into the blackness.

“Nope. I think it’s those wolves upriver. I heard howling the other night, too.”

“Would you stoke up the fire? I feel I’ve caught a chill.”

She watched him put birch logs to the fire, the flames catching on the papery bark and flickering light against the cabin walls. Then he went to the window and looked for some time out into the night, the way she always did.

“Is she safe?” Mabel asked. “That wind’s blowing so savagely. And the wolves.”

“I expect she’s all right.”

They stayed up unusually late. Jack went outside several times to get more wood, despite the stack of logs just inside the door, and Mabel continued to knit, though her hands were tired and her eyes burned. Finally they could stay awake no longer and crawled into their bed together. They fell asleep to the sound of the wind blowing down the valley.

I
t was mid-February when a parcel addressed to Mabel arrived, wrapped in brown paper and delivered via train to Alpine. Jack brought it from town, along with a few supplies bought with the last of their credit at the general store.

Mabel waited until he went back outside before she sat at the table to open it. Could this be it at long last? It seemed ages ago that she had written her sister to ask about the book. For several weeks she had been hopeful, but when it hadn’t come she assumed either her sister couldn’t find it or was not interested in the query.

She was tempted to tear open the package but felt the need to be calm and collected. She heated a kettle of water and steeped a cup of tea. When it was ready, she sat at the table and unknotted the packing twine and carefully unfolded the paper. Inside were two separately wrapped packages. The larger one looked distinctly like a book, but Mabel chose to open the smaller first. It contained several fine drawing pencils as well as sticks of charcoal. She turned to the larger package and unfolded the brown paper slowly.

The book was just as she had remembered it—oversized and perfectly square, a shape unlike any children’s book she had ever seen. It was bound in blue morocco leather. An exqui
site snowflake design was embossed in silver on the front cover, and the same silver gilding decorated the spine. She placed the book flat on the table in front of her and opened it. “Snegurochka, 1857” was written lightly in pencil in the upper corner of the blue marbled endpaper. “The Snow Maiden.” It was her father’s neat writing. He had collected many books on his travels, and some he brought back especially for her. He kept them on a shelf in his study, but whenever she wanted to look through them, he would pull them down and sit her on his lap while he turned the pages.

With the book in front of her, Mabel could have been back in her father’s study with its scent of pipe tobacco and old books. She turned the first page. On the left was a full-color plate overlaid with a sheet of translucent paper, on the other the story, written in blocky, illegible letters. It was in Russian! How could she have forgotten? Maybe she had never noticed. Although this had been one of her favorite childhood books, she realized now that she had never actually read it. Her father had told her the story as she looked at the illustrations. Now she wondered whether her father had known the words or had invented the story based on the pictures.

It had been many years since her father had died, but now she recalled his voice, melodic and rumbling.

“There once was an old man and woman who loved each other very much and were content with their lot in life except for one great sadness—they had no children of their own.”

Mabel shifted her eyes back to the illustration. It was similar to a Russian lacquer painting, the colors rich and earthy, the details fine. It showed two old people, a man and a woman, kneeling in the snow at the feet of a young girl who seemed to be made of snow from the ground to her waist but to be a real child from her waist up.

The snow child’s cheeks glowed with life, and jewels crowned her blond hair. She smiled sweetly down at the old couple, her mittened hands held out to them. Her embroidered cloak spilled from her shoulders in a shimmer of white and silver, with no clear distinction between the cloak and the snow. Behind her the snowscape was framed by a stand of black-green spruce trees and, in the distance, snowy, sharp-peaked mountains. Between two of the trees stood a red fox with narrow, golden eyes like a cat’s.

She reached for her cup of tea to find that it had gone cold. How long had she stared at that single illustration? She sipped the cool tea and turned the page. It was night. The little girl ran into the trees. Silver stars glittered in the blue-black sky above her as the couple peered sadly out of their cottage door.

With each turn of the page, Mabel felt lightheaded and torn from herself.

She picked up the book and held it closer to her eyes. The next illustration had always been her favorite. In a snowy clearing, the girl stood surrounded by the wild beasts of the forest—bears, wolves, hares, ermines, a stag, a red fox, even a tiny mouse. The animals sat on their haunches beside her, their demeanors neither menacing nor adoring. It was as if they had posed for a portrait, with their fur and teeth and claws and yellow eyes, and the little girl gazed plainly out at the reader without fear or pleasure. Did they love the little girl, or did they want to eat her? All these years later, Mabel still could find no answers in the wild, gleaming eyes.

She closed the book and traced the embossed snowflake with her fingertips. She began to gather the brown wrapping, and it was then that she saw her sister’s letter tucked into the folds of paper and nearly discarded.

Dearest Mabel,

What a joy to read your letter, to see your lovely handwriting once again and know you are alive and well. It must sound terribly outlandish to you, but to all of us here it is as if you have been banished to the North Pole. It was a relief to know you are warm and safe and even have welcoming neighbors. They must be a rare blessing in that wilderness. I am pleased, too, to know you will once again pick up your sketchpad. I have always known you to be a talented artist. Won’t you send us some little drawings of your new homeland? We are anxious to share in your adventures.

As to your request for this book, it is a pure stroke of luck that I was able to send it to you. A student from the university, a Mr. Arthur Ransome, has been sorting through Father’s collections and was particularly enamored with this book. Of all subjects, he is studying fairy tales of the Far North. I had no attachment to the book, so allowed him to have it for his studies. When I received your letter, I was thrilled to recall that I knew precisely where it was. Of course, I practically had to pry it from the young man’s hands. He cautioned me that it was a rare find and should be treated with great care. He was appalled to learn that I would be mailing it to you in the farthest outreaches of civilization.

As I prepared to send the book to you, I happened to notice that it is all written in Russian. Unless you have learned the language while in Alaska, I was afraid you might be at wit’s end to discover the book is unreadable. Before I wrapped it, I asked the young man to tell me something of Snegurochka, the Snow Maiden.

Mr. Ransome says the story of the snow child is of similar import in Russia as Little Red Riding Hood or Snow White in our own country. Like many fairy tales, there are many different ways it is told, but it always begins the same. An old man and an old woman live happily in their small cottage in the forest, but for one sorrow: they have no children of their own. One winter’s day, they build a girl of snow.

I am sorry to say no matter which version, the story ends badly. The little snow girl comes and goes with winter, but in the end she always melts. She plays with the village children too close to a bonfire, or she doesn’t flee the coming of spring quickly enough, or, as in the version told in Father’s book, she meets a boy and chooses mortal love.

In the most traditional tale, according to Mr. Ransome, the snow child loses her way in the woods. She encounters a bear, which offers to help her find her way. But she looks at the bear’s long claws and sharp teeth, and fears he will eat her. She refuses his assistance. Then along comes a wolf, which also promises to lead her safely to the cottage, but he is nearly as ferocious looking as the bear. The child again refuses.

But then she meets a fox. “I will take you home,” he vows. The child decides the fox looks friendlier than the others. She takes hold of his fur scruff, and the fox leads her out of the forest. When they arrive at the old couple’s cottage, the fox asks for a fat hen in payment for her safe return. The old people are poor and so decide to trick the fox by instead giving him a sack with their hunting dog inside. The fox drags the sack into the woods and opens it. The dog lunges out, chases the fox, and kills it.

The snow child is angry and saddened. She bids the old couple farewell, saying that since they do not love her even as much as one of their hens, she will return to live with her Father Winter and Mother Spring.

When the old woman next looks outside, all that remains are the child’s red boots, red mittens, and a puddle of water.

What a tragic tale! Why these stories for children always have to turn out so dreadfully is beyond me. I think if I ever tell it to my grandchildren, I will change the ending and have everyone live happily ever after. We are allowed to do that, are we not Mabel? To invent our own endings and choose joy over sorrow?