Текст книги "East "

Автор книги: Эдит Патту

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White Bear

Warm place.

Skin itches, all the time.

Plunging into cool water, relief.

Purple eyes. A child.

Up above on the rocks.

Smiling down unafraid.

I remember.

Long ago.

A ball.

A red ball.

Then nothing.

Lost.

The girl above.

Falling.

Purple eyes shut. Her face.

Floating, bruised.

Lift her up, above water.

A boy. Pale eyes, frightened.

Thin arms. Raises her to him.

Takes her away.

Alone.

Rose

FATHER TOLD ME THAT my first gift was a pair of boots, made of the soft leather of reindeer hide. Which was very fitting, for I loved wearing boots.

I always wore my older brothers' and sisters' hand-me-downs, though that never bothered me. The boots had already been resoled many times by the time I got them, but I must have put more miles on those boots than all of my brothers and sisters together.

By the time I was five or six, I had already gone missing more times than my parents could count. One of my favorite games was to imagine myself a bold explorer, like my grandfather and great-grandfather. I had made it my goal to discover and claim every square inch of the land that lay within walking distance of our farm.

On the day I first saw a white bear, I had slipped out of the house when my sister Selme was distracted by a frog I had hidden in a pan in the kitchen cupboard. I climbed the stone wall that lay to the northeast of our farm and ran through the meadow, but instead of climbing the rocky crag (which I'm told I had fallen off of and then nearly drowned when I was two years old), I headed due north. I walked a very long way, finally coming upon a small grove of trees. There, standing among them, was a white bear. It stood very still, watching me.

I stopped, staring with delight at the snow-white fur. I wasn't close enough to see its eyes clearly and what expression they held, but I was too young to be afraid, so I smiled widely at the animal. It gazed at me for a short time, then turned and lumbered away. I tried following, but it had vanished. Soon I got hungry and turned toward home.

I didn't tell Mother and Father about seeing the white bear, especially Mother, because I knew she'd insist on keeping me even closer to home. "You see!" she'd say. "Dangerous wild animals are out there. It's not safe."

I told Neddy, though, and was disappointed at his reaction. He frowned and said in that superior, older brother tone I hated, "You mustn't go anywhere near a white bear, Rose. They are dangerous and fierce creatures, with long, sharp teeth that will gobble you up. They are always hungry and they move very fast." He acted like he was some kind of expert on white bears.

I didn't pay any attention to him. From then on the white bear was my imaginary companion on all my explorations. I would pretend that I was riding along on its white-fur back, the two of us a fierce duo conquering and claiming new lands by the score.

I spent much of my childhood longing, in vain, to see a white bear again. It was extremely rare to see white bears in our part of the country. They were ice bears, isbjorn, that usually made their home in the snowy north.

White Bear

Watching for the child.

The girl with purple eyes.

Purple eyes.

And her smiling mouth.

Standing in the trees, watching her.

The girl.

Taller.

Unafraid.

She moves toward me.

Purple eyes, trusting.

Cannot.

Not safe for her.

Hunger.

Hunger.

Hunger.

Must go.

Quickly.

To feed.

Now.

Then return.

Neddy

WHEN ROSE WAS FIVE, she began to weave. The first thing she made was a belt with a crude design of a white bear. Those were her two passions: weaving (or sewing) and exploring with her imaginary white bear.

Inside the house she could always be found weaving belts on her small, rigid heddle loom. When we had more belts than we could ever use (some of the farm animals even sported Rose's belts), Mother taught Rose to work the household loom. By age eight Rose was her older sisters' equal when it came to weaving.

Then one day, taking a basketful of eggs to Widow Hautzig, Rose laid eyes on the widow's loom. Widow Hautzig was a local craftswoman who had a small business weaving coats and rugs and various other items to sell both in nearby Andalsnes and to wandering merchants who would take them to fairs and markets farther afield. To Rose, who knew only our own rough one at home, the widow's loom was large and impressive. It was twice as tall as Rose, and the wood was polished and carved with simple designs.

Unfortunately, Widow Hautzig was a grouchy old woman with no patience at all for a small, wild girl desperate to learn all about her beautiful loom. More than anything in the world, Rose longed for a loom of her own, a fine big one like the widow's. But she knew that was impossible, that Father would never be able to afford it. Still, Rose was stubborn, and she would not rest until she had found a way to get the Widow Hautzig to let her use her loom.

When she was nine Rose found out that Widow Hautzig had a weakness for chanterelle mushrooms. So Rose trained her favorite dog, Snurri, to sniff out chanterelles in the forest. After much hard work she struck a deal: In exchange for a weekly basket of chanterelle mushrooms, Widow Hautzig would teach Rose how to work her loom. Though the lessons were short and very disagreeable (often Rose would come home in tears over some gibe of the widow's), still Rose was a determined pupil, and before long the baskets of chanterelles were being traded for a chance to actually do her own weaving on the loom.

She could only do this during the very short breaks between Widow Hautzig's own projects, some of which took a long time to complete. And Rose would have had no time at all on the loom were it not for Widow Hautzig's rheumatism. When her rheumatism was acting up, the widow would take a long rest, sometimes even as much as a fortnight if it was a particularly bad bout.

"Thank God for Widow Hautzig's rheumatism," Rose would say every night before bed. Mother once overheard her and scolded her, so Rose was careful to whisper those words to herself from then on.

Even with Widow Hautzig's rheumatism, Rose never could weave anything that required more than a few days' work. Then, one day, as she was trying to discourage Snurri from digging under Widow Hautzig's storage hut, Rose saw something through a crack in the woodwork of the hut. There were no windows in the hut, but it was not locked, and without asking permission, Rose entered the small building. The inside was cloaked with dust and cobwebs, but Rose barely noticed. Her eyes were riveted by a good-sized loom leaning against the far wall of the hut. The frame listed at a precarious angle; the warp beam and heddle rods were splintered; there appeared to be no crossbeam at all; and a tangle of decayed and unraveled warp thread sprouted from top and bottom, but Rose was not discouraged.

It took Rose a long time and many baskets of chanterelles to convince Widow Hautzig to let her try her hand at fixing up the broken-down loom, which had been the castoff of an old aunt of the widow's. In return the widow made Rose clean the filthy old storage hut until it was spotless.

Rose then cajoled Father and me, as well as Willem, to help her repair the loom. Widow Hautzig offered no assistance, and even insisted that it not be removed from her property. She also complained unceasingly of the small amount of noise we made, hammering and sanding and such.

I was appalled when Widow Hautzig did not give Rose the loom outright, since she had no use for it herself. What rankled even more was that die nasty woman even continued to demand chanterelle fees for the use of the loom we repaired, and made Rose work in that windowless, unheated hut.

Nevertheless, I'd never seen Rose so happy as when she could grab a few moments to go off and work on the loom.

I wrote a poem about Widow Hautzig. It began

Hautzig the weaver, queen of the dead.

The strands in her loom dripping with red.

Lips dry as bone, her hair made of snakes,

The souls of her victims to Hel she does take.

Well, maybe I exaggerated. But only a little.

Rose

THE FIRST THING I MADE on Widow Hautzig's loom was a table runner. It had a simple reindeer design in the weave, and I was absurdly proud of it. My next projects were a shawl for Mother and head scarves for my three sisters. Then I made a jacket for Neddy and a pair of breeches for Father.

The last thing I made on that loom was for me. A cloak. It took me nearly half a year to finish. It was during this time that things went so wrong with the farm.

Father told me the bad luck began the year I was born. The barley crop failed, and that setback was followed by an unusually harsh winter that killed off our largest sow. Since then there had been blight that killed our fruit trees, a sickness that went through our poultry, not to mention a heartbreaking series of crop failures. By the summer when I was working on my cloak, there was so little to go around that it didn't seem right to be hunting chanterelles for Widow Hautzig; nor was there much time for weaving, other than that which was strictly necessary. We were all working so hard just to keep from starving. And there was no extra wool for spinning.

For a long time I had been in the habit of scrounging for tufts of wool. I would find them stuck to fences and the bark of trees. But it really wasn't enough, and it was only thanks to Father that I was able to finish my cloak at all. He brought me wool, clumps that he had bargained for from neighbors, and he insisted that I take breaks from chores to go chanterelle hunting with Snurri.

Widow Hautzig's tongue grew sharper over the years. She was unsympathetic to our ill fortune, sometimes even openly cruel about it, making nasty remarks about my father's farming abilities. I would have stopped going altogether had I not been on the verge of finishing my cloak. It was the best piece I had ever made. As our life got worse and worse at the farm, I even thought I might sell it, to bring in badly needed money, but Father wouldn't hear of it. He said the cloak belonged to me. The next thing I made, he suggested, we would sell.

I showed the cloak to Neddy first. I met him coming home from Widow Hautzig's, the material folded in my arms. It was a sunny day, with a brisk autumn wind blowing, and I was feeling a little breathless, irrationally excited about the thing I was carrying.

He knew at once. And smiled his dear, slow smile. "Show me," he said simply.

I started to unfold the cloak, then, impatient, I shook it out. It caught the breeze, billowing up between us. Then it flapped into Neddy's face and we both laughed. He took hold of his end and I held tight to mine. We lowered the cloak and Neddy saw the pattern for the first time.

"A wind rose," he said, then realizing, "your wind rose."

I nodded. "Do you think Father will like it?"

"Of course. It is beautiful."

I laughed again. I couldn't help it, for I knew he was right.

"Look," I said, pulling the cloak downward and gesturing for Neddy to lay it on the grass. "Now I'll never be lost, no matter how far I travel." Glancing quickly up at the sun, I pulled off my boots and, in my stockinged feet, positioned myself at the center of the cloak. "See, I am the compass needle," I explained somewhat proudly.

"Put it on," Neddy urged. He took the cloak from me and fastened it at the neck.

The cloth felt warm and solid and good around me.

"Fit for a queen," Neddy said, holding up the ends and pretending to be my courtier. I laughed, remembering the games we'd played as children; I'd be Queen Rose and he would be my loyal wizard or squire or tutor, whatever role he felt like playing that day.

Then he let go of the cloak, and the wind grabbed it again. Neddy tried several times to catch hold of it, and we were both laughing until tears came into our eyes.

It was then I saw the bear. Neddy and I were standing near a thick cluster of whitebeam trees, and it was through the trees that I saw it. That is, I saw its eyes and could make out a faint blur of white fur through the branches. We looked full into each other's eyes for what seemed a long time. Neddy was still going on about Queen Rose, but his voice faded and I was aware of only those black eyes.

I should have been frightened, with a large wild animal not fifty feet away, but I was not.

White Bear

Unafraid.

Her mouth. A smile.

Piercing.

So long ago, so much lost.

Alone.

Always alone.

A cloak. Catching the wind.

Colors.

North.

South.

East.

West.

Purple eyes.

North south east west.

East.

Unafraid.

Neddy

ROSE WHISPERED SOMETHING, but I couldn't hear it. Her eyes were fixed on the trees that lay a stone's throw away.

"A white bear, Neddy," she said, louder.

But by the time I turned to look, there was nothing there.

Rose dragged me over to the whitebeams and the two of us examined the ground for markings of a large animal. "You believe me, don't you?" Rose asked. There was nothing to show a bear had been there.

And yet I believed her, though I did not say so.

"'Tis almost suppertime," I said abruptly, and began to lead the way back. Rose took off her cloak and, folding it as she walked, trotted along beside me.

"What is it, Neddy?" she said.

"Nothing," I replied, trying to keep my voice normal. "It's gotten late..."

But I was lying. I was frightened. Not of the white bear, at least not for myself.

"Are you sure?" she persisted.

"Yes."

Rose gave me one last sidelong glance.

"I wish you had seen it, Neddy. It was so large, and its eyes..." she said. "I get this feeling it wanted something. And that it was sad."

"Must be your imagination," I said, making my voice light and teasing. "This time of year it's still too warm for a white bear. And you know they don't come this far south, even in winter. Perhaps it was a white doe. Their eyes sometimes look sad."

But of course I was lying. For I had seen the eyes of a white bear, that time years before. And I felt sure it was the same one.

I knew about white bears. After that day when I had looked into the eyes of the white bear that saved Rose, I set out to become an expert on them. I would interview everyone I came into contact with, to see if they had ever seen a white bear or if they knew anything of white bears. Most knew nothing. My main source of information turned out to be a peddler who had traveled into the far north and had once even been on a Saami expedition of white-bear hunters.

"Before going out on the ice to hunt the white bear," the peddler told me, "the Saami taught me. They said I must know the isbjorn by heart if I was going to hunt him. They called him the Great Wanderer or Ghost Bear. Other names they used are: He Who Walks Without a Shadow. Ice Giant. Nanook. The Traveler. Great White. Sea Bear." The peddler paused, letting those names settle into my memory.

"The white bear is a solitary wanderer, never moving with a pack or even a mate. He walks on all fours, but when he stands he is nearly ten feet tall." The peddler raised one hand as far as he could above his head.

"He lives by his sense of smell," the peddler continued. "There is a Saami saying about white bears: 'A pine needle fell in the forest. The hawk saw it. The deer heard it. The white bear smelled it.'

"His eyes are black. His nose is black. His paws are black and the five claws on each of his paws are black. The rest of him is snow white."

I listened to the peddler, my eyes held by a scar carved into the skin just below his hairline. Maybe a white bear had given him that scar, with a thrust of black claw.

I learned more. I learned that the white bear's habitat lay well to the north of us, in the region where snow can remain on the ground for twelve months of the year. It is true that an occasional white bear had been known to travel as far south as our farmhold, but only very rarely and only during the deep winter months.

I learned that the white bear's eyesight is not as good as its sense of smell, but that it is still very strong. The bear has an extra eyelid to protect its eyes from snow glare, and it can see underwater and through a driving blizzard.

I learned that of all bears, the white bear is the most fur-clad, every inch of it covered except its nose and paw pads, and the fur is dense and soft. It has forty-two teeth, including long, sharp canines for piercing flesh. It eats meat but can also survive on berries and grasses if it has to. The white bear's strength is legend. It is said it can kill with one swipe of its paw.

I even wrote a white-bear poem. It began

Ghost bear wanders, always alone,;

king of the north,

dispensing death from his traveling throne.

It was shortly after this effort that I decided I wouldn't be a poet after all.

Father

THE DAY ROSE CAME HOME with her finished cloak she seemed different, as though something had happened, something important. Neddy, too. They were both quiet, inside themselves. It didn't seem to be a quarrel between them. I asked Rose if Widow Hautzig had been unkind or hurtful that day, but she said, "No worse than usual," and then shook out her cloak to show me.

I stared at the cloth, amazed. I was hardly able to fathom that my own Nyamh, my Rose, had created such a thing. It had more color and inspiration than anything Widow Hautzig could even have dreamed.

"Your wind rose," I said.

"Yes, Father. I hope you do not mind that I copied it."

"Of course not. It is..." I faltered, suddenly realizing that the lie was there, too. Unknowing, Rose had woven the lie into her cloak.

I began speaking again, expressing my admiration for her artistry. I think Rose sensed something, though, for I felt her puzzled glance on me several times as everyone gathered around to exclaim over the cloak. Eugenia prepared a special meal that night, scraping together what she could from our sparse larder, in honor of Rose's accomplishment.

I think that day, the day Rose brought home the cloak, was the last our family knew of happiness. She was almost fifteen years old then, but we had been suffering ill luck for a long time, since the year she was born. Occasionally the thought would cross my mind that our "luck" had been affected by the lie of Rose's birth, but I would quickly berate myself for being as superstitious as Eugenia.

I was not cut out to be a farmer. When we first moved from Bergen to the farm, we were fortunate, but when things went poorly, my decisions made them go still worse. By the autumn when Rose finished her cloak, we were barely scraping by and my children knew more of hunger than I could sometimes endure.

One of the factors that had contributed mightily to our reversal of fortunes was the fact that Eugenia's cousin, who had fallen on hard times of his own, had been forced to sell all his landholdings. Our farm had been purchased by a prosperous merchant who lived a distance away, in the city of Oslo. It was more than a month's journey by horse to Oslo, and thus we never saw the merchant, nor even heard directly from him. All of our communications came by messenger from the merchant's deputy, a man called Mogens. Our rent did not go up right away, but slowly, over time, it did rise, and eventually the rent was nearly equal to what we could produce, with very little left for us. Over the years our two eldest children left the farm. Nils Erlend set out for Danemark, where he hoped to make his way, and Selme Eva married an ironworker and moved with him to a village in Njord far distant from us. We rarely heard from either of them.

The day after Rose brought home her cloak, we'received a final blow. A letter arrived from Mogens saying that due to lack of payment of rent, we must vacate the farm in less than a month.

Except for the cousin who had originally owned the farm and Eugenia's sister, who had emigrated to Iseland after her husband deserted her, there was no one left alive in Eugenia's family. We would not have considered burdening our two eldest children with the dire news, especially since neither of them was doing much more than getting by. The only people we could turn to were my family.

With a heavy heart I composed a letter to my brother, who ran the family farm. I was not at all sure he would take us in, for we had fallen out of touch many years earlier. Even if he did take pity on us, it was a long journey to the place where I grew up in central Njord, and I worried that we would not even have the wherewithal to undertake it. We had already sold the wagon and all the remaining farm animals just to cover our debt to the man who owned the farm.

But as I looked upon the gaunt faces and worn, frayed clothing of my family, I knew there was no other choice.

There were moments during those dark days when I was lost in despair. I believed myself to be a failure as a husband and a father, and was submerged in the guilt of what I had brought my family to. I even thought of ending my own life.

Eugenia was my anchor then. Despite her superstitious notions, she was a strong and loyal woman, and it was she who kept us all together and alive in a way that was truly remarkable. Never did she blame or castigate me, or rail against her fate. Somehow she made every spoonful of food stretch to two, and found ways to make even the most threadbare of clothing serve.

It is also true that she was wont to come up with tortured reasons, based on superstition, for why our fortunes had turned so ill. Still, she stolidly shouldered the burden of our poverty and kept us going.

Then Sara, our third eldest, fell ill.