Between Two Worlds (13 page)

Another winter came and went. My sister and I did not conceive.

Days later, Angulluk had not come back. Taking advantage of Mitti Peary’s absence from sewing one afternoon, Duncan slipped away from his chores and sat beside me. He stroked my hair in full view of Ally, Mikihoq, Tooth Girl, and even Marie.

“I’m looking forward to this evening,” Duncan whispered.

“Me too,” I said, using an expression he liked. I felt embarrassed by his affection, though I enjoyed it. Everyone on the ship must have known of our relations. If Mikihoq or anyone else disagreed with it, they did not tell me.

From a small sack, Duncan brought out a game called checkers that he’d made from slices of corncobs and began teaching it to me. I set aside my sewing for a rest, and just as I was settling into a rare, tranquil moment, a crewmember named Officer Sutter stomped in with a pot of something white and gooey.

I shuddered whenever I saw this gray-haired man about the ship, because Duncan had told me that this officer had wanted to trade for me; and though the man
seemed friendly enough and I liked his clean blue uniform with shining buttons and cap, I couldn’t imagine myself with someone old enough to be my father. He now wore a brown shirt, trousers, and shoes all caked with a dried white powder. Even his slick, pointy beard was speckled with the foul-smelling stuff. He crossed the saloon and stood over Duncan and me.

Grease Beard, as I named him, looked around at all of us, then gave me a forceful glance. “Greetings, all,” he said. “I’d like to borrow Billy Bah for a special and important task.”

“What?” I drew back.

“I’m going to put wet plaster on your face, just for a little while. I’d like to make a sculpture of you.”

“No.” I wasn’t exactly sure what a “sculpture” was, but I wanted no part of it.

He touched my face. I squirmed. Duncan protectively put his arm around me. Ally, who was nursing Sammy, gave Grease Beard a sharp look.

Grease Beard sat down on a bench, folded his arms, and looked thoughtful. “I made some casts of Eskimo faces a few years ago when I visited Greenland. They turned out so well, the museum has asked me for more.”

Museum? The museum in New York where my parents died?
I couldn’t breathe.

“Officer Sutter,” Duncan said, glaring at Grease Beard. “Billy Bah doesn’t want to help you. Kindly leave us alone.”

Duncan was taking a risk by speaking against Grease Beard, an officer. Clearly, he was jealous of the man’s interest in me. I pressed Duncan’s hand to my chest.

“Would anyone else like to volunteer?” Grease Beard asked. “Ally?”

Ally shook her head. She moved Sammy from one breast to another and lovingly stroked his shaggy hair. So Grease Beard knew Ally’s name as well as mine. Perhaps the crewmembers talked about us.

Marie sat on the bench, playing checkers with Tooth Girl. She looked up. “Officer Sutter! Are you going to make bronze busts? For the American Museum of Natural History?”

He nodded and smiled.

“That museum is wonderful! I’ve been there, Billy Bah,” she said. “You must let Officer Sutter make the bust. So many people will see your face. You’ll be famous!”

I shook my head. “No, Marie. I don’t want my face in that museum.”

“Well then,” Grease Beard said, “I’ll make a cast of your face, Marie. And I can cast Akitsinnguaq, too.”

“Oh, yes!” Marie clapped her hands and touched their faces. Tooth Girl and her mother caught Marie’s enthusiasm and agreed to what they thought was a game.

Grease Beard went out to fetch more supplies. Duncan whispered, “Let’s get away and go for a walk on the ice. I don’t like this man.”

“No, we must stay,” I said. “I must watch what he’s doing to my friends.” Then, “I could find out something from him about my parents.”

Duncan frowned. “I don’t think it’s a good idea.” We’d never spoken of how my parents died, but probably all the
qallunaat
on the ship knew.

Duncan wrapped my hand in his. Grease Beard brought over the paste and a bucket of water. He draped rags over the dining table and gave Marie an old shirt to put on over her dress and sweater. She twined her yellow hair into a tight bun over her head.

While Tooth Girl looked on with a gaping mouth, Marie sat happily for her treatment. She squeezed her eyes shut as Grease Beard rubbed the plaster on her cheeks and small tapered chin and around her smiling lips. After working on her, Grease Beard plastered Tooth Girl.

Putting their faces on display in a museum seemed like stealing their spirits.

While they sat like white carvings and waited for the plaster to dry, I asked Grease Beard, “Did you know my parents?”

“Yes indeed. I was on that voyage. That was the summer Lieutenant Peary brought back the meteorite—the big iron one that he named Ahnighito, after Marie.” He nodded in Marie’s direction. She could only wave.

“So you knew my mother and father?” I said.

“Yes,” Grease Beard said sadly. “I’m so sorry they died.”

I winced.

“Officer Sutter,” Duncan said, “remember we’re in a room full of children. And this talk is not pleasant for Billy Bah.” I touched his arm to let him know it was all right.

“Were you with them at the museum?” I asked. “When they became ill?”

“No. They were taken to a hospital. I only saw them a few times after we anchored in New York. Now and then the museum called on me to mount specimens of birds and the like, or paint a mural. But I wasn’t there when—”

Duncan said, “Don’t say any more! Can’t you see this is hard for Billy Bah?”

“I would never talk about
that
. Do you think I’m heartless?”

“What are you talking about?” I demanded.

He was washing his large hands in the basin. He stopped and looked into my eyes. “You know all there is to know. They took ill and died.”

“Were you there when they were buried?”

“No, I wasn’t.” He looked away, washing again. “No need to ask more, Billy Bah.”

I let Duncan pull me away. We passed through the saloon, where Marie and Tooth Girl still waited, looking like little ghosts.

Both men were hiding something. One way or another, I’d find out what it was.

That evening, speaking in whispers behind the curtain of his bunk, I asked Duncan what he knew about my mother and father. He said he was from Maine, very far from the museum, but he had read about them in newspapers.

“I read that Minik, the orphan Eskimo boy, was adopted by a family.”

“My parents? When and where they were buried—do you know about it?”

“Nothing.” Duncan stroked my hair. “I wish your life had been easier. I wish your parents were still alive. You’re so beautiful—try not to be sad.” I pulled my
kapatak
over us and we relaxed into the softness of the furs.

Later, he told me about his home in Maine, the ice and the snow there, at times like here, the bright stars at night, and going around the town in sleds drawn by horses. “I wish I could bring you there, Billy Bah. You’d feel almost at home when the snow is on the ground. My ma and pa and little sister would treat you like family. We could live in our own small cabin surrounded by evergreens.”

With a sigh, I said, “There are interesting places there, many wonders. But when I was in America, I was always lonely for my family. I felt lost.”

“Perhaps you’ll change your mind.”

“I won’t.” But I was tempted more than I let on. We talked of the things I’d liked about America: grass and trees, squirrels, colorful birds, and Marie’s kindly grandmother.

We did not talk of the illnesses that could kill my people. Nor did we speak of my husband.

That night, dreaming, I saw Peary’s preserved owl with the glass eyes perched in his caboose in Itta. A short time later, I awoke to howling. I put on clothes, left Duncan sleeping, and slipped out from the forecastle. Cin had escaped from her pen. Head thrown back, ears raised, she joined the howls of the dogs on shore.

“You’re lonely for your dog family.” I patted her head.

I looked to the north. How far had Angulluk gotten on the ice? I longed for him to return. Having feelings for Duncan hadn’t stopped me from missing my husband.

I tied Cin so she’d stay in her pen of boxes. Soon the crew would be up, fetching coal and taking care of the ship, cleaning rifles, and leaving for a hunt. They’d see to Cin. I went back to Duncan’s bunk.

In the morning, Cin was out on the ice being chased by Marie and Charlie the cook. I climbed over the side and ran to grab Cin. Charlie took her to her pen.

“That dog escaped last night. She chewed a hole in a canvas bag. And she chewed a hole in one of the sails in that bag, too,” Charlie grumbled.

While I held Cin, Charlie put on a collar and hooked her to a heavy chain.

This isn’t the way to treat a dog!

Marie yelled, “Stop! Don’t!” Then one sailor held Cin and another pried her jaws open.

“Enough!” I yelled.

Duncan emerged from the darkness. “It’s all right, Billy Bah.” He held me back. I kicked him in the leg but couldn’t break free.

“Stop!” Marie yelled.

Cin thrashed about and made stifled yelps as Charlie filed down her front teeth.

“I’m not hurting the dog,” Charlie replied. “Anyway, it’s over.”

To my relief, Cin appeared as energetic as ever. She jumped up on Marie. Then she gave me a gentle, playful bite on the wrist with her squared-off fangs. She’d already forgotten what had been done to her.

I looked out into the darkness, over the ice.

Every night, Duncan and I talked, and still he would not tell me what he was hiding. We spoke of Grease Beard, as well as Peary, and I began to understand that an insatiable curiosity motivated the
qallunaat
. They wanted to know everything about my people, and just as I collected my own experiences in my secret box of treasures, they slipped their memories into books, cameras, and museums. Did they realize how much pain and fright they caused us?

Even Duncan was surprised, he said, by some of the things the
qallunaat
had done to my people. I told him of the time when I was around six, when Peary invited his workers in Itta to his house for tea and biscuits.

We had gathered in the room where Peary’s men slept in narrow beds. The room had a monstrous black stove with an arm that bent through a hole in the ceiling. Red blankets hung on the walls for warmth, like the furs in our igloos. On this day, Peary put up a white sheet on one wall and set up a camera facing it. Mauripaulak spoke for Peary: “Who wants to go first? Lieutenant Peary is going to take your pictures.”

“I will!” I knew about cameras. I’d seen Peary taking photographs of his wife.

“Then take off your furs,” Mauripaulak said. “Take off everything. Lieutenant Peary doesn’t want any clothes in the photographs today.”

Before I realized what was happening, Mitti Peary grabbed me and pulled off my
kapatak
.

“Stop!” my father said.

“We won’t hurt her,” Mauripaulak said.

Mitti Peary left me in only my fur panties.

People broke into loud talk, dumbfounded. Ignoring my father’s shouts, Mitti Peary positioned me in front of the sheet, and Peary took two photographs: one from the front and one from the side.