The Snow Child Read Online Free PDF Page A

Whatever happened at the Bensons’, it was good to be out of the cabin. She had not left the homestead for weeks. Jack, too, seemed more chipper. He clicked his tongue at the horse and, as they followed the trail off their property, he pointed out to Mabel where he had been clearing and told her of his ideas for the spring. He described how the horse had nearly killed him that day, and how it had spooked at a red fox.
    Mabel threaded her arm into the crook of his.
    “You’ve accomplished a great deal.”
    “I couldn’t have done it without the Bensons. Those work horses of theirs are something else. Puts this beast to shame.” He gave the reins a gentle shake.
    “Have you met his wife?”
    “Nope. Just George and his sons. George used to be a gold miner, when he was younger, but he met Esther and they decided to settle down and have a family.” Jack hesitated, cleared his throat. “Anyways, he seems like a good man. He’s sure been a help to us.”
    “Yes. He has.”
    When they arrived at the Bensons’, someone came out of the barn hoisting a flapping, headless turkey. It was George, she thought at first, but this person was too short and had a thick gray braid hanging below a wool cap.
    “Must be Esther,” Jack said.
    “Do you think so?”
    The woman raised her chin in greeting, then wrestled with the huge dying bird in her arms. Blood splattered about her feet.
    “Go on up to the house,” she called out to them. “The boys’ll help you with the horse.”
    In the cabin, Mabel sat alone at the cluttered kitchen table, while Jack disappeared outside with George and the younger son. With her hands in her lap, her back straight, she wondered where they would eat. The table was heaped with stacks of catalogs, rows of washed, empty jars, and bolts of fabric. The cabin smelled strongly of cabbage and sour wild cranberries. It wasn’t much bigger than Jack and Mabel’s, except it had a loft where she assumed the beds were. The cabin was catawampus in a dizzying way, with the floor dipping to one side and the corners not square. Rocks and bleached animal skulls and dried wildflowers lined the windowsills. Mabel didn’t move, yet she pried just by allowing her eyes to wander.
    She jumped when the door banged open.
    “Blasted bird. You’d think it’d know enough to just give up the ghost. But no, it’s got to raise hell when it doesn’t even have a head left on its body.”
    “Oh. Oh dear. Can I do something to help?”
    The woman stomped past the table without removing her dirty boots and threw the turkey onto the crowded counter. A lard tin fell with a clatter to the floor. Esther kicked at it and turned to Mabel, who stood flustered and slightly frightened. Esther grinned, stretched out a bloodstained hand.
    “Mabel? Isn’t that it? Mabel?”
    Mabel nodded and gave her hand over to Esther’s vigorous shake.
    “Esther. But I suppose you already figured that out. Good to have you out here finally.”
    Under her wool coat, Esther wore a flower-print shirt and men’s denim overalls. Her face was speckled with blood. She pulled off her wool hat and fuzzy stands of hair stood on end. She swung her braid over her back and began filling a large pot with water.
    “You’d think with all these men around here I could find somebody to kill and pluck a turkey for me. But no such luck.”
    “Are you sure there’s nothing I can do?” Perhaps Esther would apologize for her appearance or for the disarray in the house. Maybe there was some explanation, some reason.
    “No. No. Just relax and make yourself at home. You could fix us some tea, if you’d like, while I get this damned bird in the oven.”
    “Oh. Yes. Thank you.”
    “You know what our youngest went and did? Here we raise a couple of turkeys for no other reason than to cook on occasions such as these, and he goes out and shoots a dozen ptarmigan yesterday. Let’s have these for Thanksgiving, he says. What do I need with a dozen dead ptarmigan on