Wonder at the Edge of the World

by Nicole Helget

  “Here’s a good one,” I say. “It could be a cornerstone.”

  Somehow, building a fence to keep the pigs from getting out seems like the best thing to do right now. I yell at the sows to “get the heck back,” and it feels good to yell and get my nerves out that way. Eustace laughs at me. We work, finding stones that seem to fit together, and then stack them up.

  “I’ll mortar it later,” he says. “But this’ll keep those hogs from wandering for now.” He tilts his head toward a piece of snakeskin. “You feeding these pigs snake? Makes them crazy if you do that,” he adds matter-of-factly, as though it were a fact and not an old wives’ tale. “They’ll turn vicious on you if you let them eat venomous serpents.”

  I nod. “Just one—a big rattler I found.” Then I add, “These hogs’ll eat anything.”

  He shakes his head. “I know it. You got to be careful around them. They’ll eat you if you’re not minding your backside.”

  I search the snouts and eyes of our sows and put my hand up to the slats of the fence. A couple of the sows come grunting up and sniff my fingers.

  “You’d better get someone to snip their tails for you, too, or they’ll bite each other’s tails off.”

  “I don’t even like pigs,” I say. “I don’t know why Father ever thought he should be a hog farmer.”

  When Captain Greeney had Father dismissed from the navy, Father assured us he’d have no trouble finding employment on a whaling ship or at a college or anywhere. But then the order for the return of the entire treasure trove came. Father refused. To be honest, I don’t remember a lot of these events. I remember what Father told me about them instead. Also, I was just a kid, and even though I was a smart kid, everything was very complicated.

  One thing that always bothered me was when Father or Mother would say “It’s complicated” to every blasted question I’d ask.

  “But, Mother,” I’d say, “why do we have to leave New Bedford?”

  “It’s complicated, Hallelujah,” she’d say.

  “But, Father,” I’d say, “why does the government want to take your collection?”

  “It’s complicated, Hallelujah,” he’d say.

  I don’t know about you, but I don’t like that answer. One thing I intend to do if I ever have children is to tell them the answers to the questions they ask instead of simply saying “It’s complicated.” I, for one, can recognize a complicated situation myself. What I want to know is why and how it’s complicated.

  Anyway, refusing to give the collection to the government meant my father had to run. To be honest, I don’t know if he was justified or not, which is a difficult thing to admit when you love your father as much as I love mine. The older and smarter I get, the more I realize that my father was an extremely intelligent person, but not a perfect one.

  So we had to steal away and come west. We found land in Kansas, and Father found a nice hiding place for his things. “When Greeney gives up,” Father always said, “we’ll make a museum out here. The first one!” But instead of giving up, Captain Greeney persisted. And instead of building a museum, Father built a pigsty, a shoddy one.

  “Well,” says Eustace, “maybe your father ought to have learned more about them first because pigs are very smart animals, and there’s good money in them if you know what you’re doing.”

  I know I should defend Father, but Eustace has a point. Father had no head for farming.

  “This one,” says Eustace, pointing to a pig with a weary face, “has a rotten tooth. We ought to get it out of him, or he could get poisoned all the way through.”

  “We’d better get the fence fixed first, or the pigs will crash through it,” I say.

  “Good idea,” says Eustace.

  We work quietly for a minute or two. I don’t know if there’s a sound more satisfying in the whole world than the clacking of stones together. I have always liked that clean, low, pleasant sound. I remember running around as a child in New Bedford clapping the flat rocks from the beach together. Eustace and I work in turns. He places a rock, then I place one.

  “Well,” he says finally. “What are we going to do?”

  I drop a rock onto another rock. I don’t look at him, but I say, “I’ve got to hide the Medicine Head somewhere no one will ever find it.”

  He drops a rock on top of the one I just dropped. “Where’s that?”

  I fit another rock on top of that one. “I don’t know.”

  All the sounds of the day fade away.

  Eustace steps over the fence and goes to the pig with the toothache. The pig stands in a shady corner of the sty, leans against it, looks miserable. Eustace bends over the hurt pig and presses on his backside. The pig lies down. Eustace puts his hands above the pig and says “Stay,” real calmly, and the pig stays put. Eustace catches a cricket and feeds it to the resting pig. The pig chews on it as though it’s a real satisfying treat.

  “Boy,” says Eustace. “That tooth is infected something terrible. Look how that pig’s whole jaw looks swollen and oozy.”

  I look. “Yes,” I say. “It sure has festered.”

  “We need some cold water to rinse it and calm the wound,” Eustace say. “Or ice, if you have it.”

  Cold water. Ice. Yes. Those are good for calming angry wounds.

  The pig looks a picture of misery. The eye on the side of his rotten tooth is red, with a puffy lid.

  “You pull his tooth while I hold on to him,” Eustace says.

  “No sirree,” I say. “I’ll hold on to him while you pull his tooth.”

  “Suit yourself,” Eustace says. “Hold him tight.”

  I put my arms around the pig’s middle and brace my legs in the dirt and my backside against the fence. “All right,” I say. “I’ve got him.”

  Eustace closes in on the pig and grabs his head. He wiggles the pliers into the pig’s mouth and then clamps down on the bad tooth. “You got him?” he shouts back at me.

  “Yes!” I say. “I already said so, didn’t I?”

  Then Eustace starts pulling, and the pig jerks and hops and stomps like he’s been hit with lightning. I hang on for dear life. When Eustace finally holds the pliers with the tooth up in the air, I let go. Just as I do, the pig rears up and kicks me in the legs. I fall into a fresh pile of manure.

  “You did that on purpose!” I shout at Eustace. The anger in my body feels like a lightning storm. My fingers and toes feel sharp and mean.

  “Did what on purpose?” he says. He reaches out a hand and pulls me to standing.

  “You wanted me to fall down!” I accuse.

  Eustace uses his hands to help wipe me off. “You know that’s not true, Hallelujah Wonder. You know it’s not.” Then he turns from me and walks away.

  The pig scrambles to his feet. Blood drips from his mouth.

  “Why don’t you go get a cold drink of water and sit down in the shade,” Eustace says. “You need to cool down.”

  “Maybe I will!” I shout at him. My tongue is thick. My neck muscles tighten. I step out of the sty and start walking toward the drinking barrel. I kick a couple of stones, I look up in the sky as I walk. There’s the moon out in the middle of the day. I get to the drinking barrel. The water looks black and quiet. Patches of ash float on the surface. I yank the dipper from the side of the barrel and slap it onto the water’s surface. Water sprays in every direction. I lift the dipper to my mouth. The water rushes over my teeth and tongue, and I swallow. A calm flows down my throat and to the center of my body. I take another drink. My neck relaxes. The water ripples gently. The black surface reflects the moon.

  Cold.

  Calm.

  The moon.

  I stare into that barrel for a good while, just looking at the moon on the surface of the water. It seems peaceful.

  Landing on Antarctica is like stepping on the moon, Father said.

  “Hey,” I whisper. No one hears me. I lower the dipper again to collect cold water to rinse the pig’s wound. I turn back toward the sty and to
ward Eustace. “Hey!” I shout as I go across the yard.

  Eustace looks up at me. “Hay is for horses,” he says.

  “Hey!” I shout again. I’m running along, sloshing water. “I know what to do! I know what to do!”

  Eustace tilts his head.

  I hand him the water dipper. He goes to the pig and pours the water over his jaw. “There you go, pig,” he says. “You’ll feel better now.”

  “I’ve noticed something about the Medicine Head.” I wait and see if Eustace will ask me what, but he doesn’t. “It seems to become more powerful the hotter it is. And it seems to quiet down the colder it is.”

  Eustace rubs the snout of the pig and pats him on the head.

  “Are you listening?” I ask Eustace. He looks up at me. I widen my eyes at him. “So?” I say. “Are you?”

  “What?” he says. He cocks his head. “What have you noticed?”

  “So,” I say, “the Medicine Head needs to be kept cool.”

  Eustace smiles with one corner of his mouth. “Well, it says that right on the crate you read to me. To keep it cool.”

  “Eustace!” I snap. “I know that.”

  “All right,” he says. “Go on, then.”

  “So,” I say, “where’s the coldest place in the world?” I cross my arms and wait.

  His eyes go up to the sky and then off to the horizon. He bites his lip. Then he nods and closes his eyes. “I can’t think of a colder place than Antarctica,” he says.

  “Right,” I say. “Antarctica.”

  “Antarctica,” Eustace repeats. He doesn’t have the slightest bit of disbelief in his tone. He just says it matter-of-fact-like, and that’s another reason I like Eustace.

  “Antarctica,” I say, “is a place Captain Greeney couldn’t get to. He tried and failed when Father succeeded.”

  “That’s right,” says Eustace. “He had to turn back.”

  “Right,” I say. “He wasn’t as brave and persistent and smart as Father.” I sigh. “But I think I am.”

  “Hm-mm,” says Eustace. “But how are you going to get it to Antarctica?”

  “There’s only one way,” I say. “There’s only one port in the world that has ships good enough to get to Antarctica.”

  “Hm-mm,” says Eustace again. “New Bedford, Massachusetts.”

  “That’s right,” I say. “New Bedford, Massachusetts.”

  Eustace slaps his hands on his thighs. Then he points at me. “I’m going with you,” he says.

  “Well, I don’t know why you wouldn’t,” I say. “You don’t have anything else to do worthwhile around here. You’ve just been sitting around on your bottom your whole life, not doing anything.” I say it kind of mean, and I even know it’s a lie, but Eustace knows I’m not mad at him. He knows that’s just the way I talk sometimes when I’m excited and teasing.

  “We’d better finish this fence for Priss first,” says Eustace.

  We build in silence but for the rhythmic collisions of rock against rock and the music of crickets.

  CHAPTER 14

  It’s getting hot again, and the work on the fence and the pig has made me sweaty. I go to the house to wash up a bit. When I lift my head from the washbasin, I’m surprised to see Mother standing there behind me. I hadn’t even heard her. She doesn’t speak to me, but her eyes are wide and expressive.

  “What is it, Mother?” I ask. “Are you all right?”

  Her lips tighten, turn whitish pink. She’s clutching a satchel to her chest. I recognize the scent of it before I recognize the shape of it. It’s Father’s satchel, an old black leather case that he took everywhere. Sometimes, he said, he used it as a pillow. Aside from his collection, this satchel was his most prized possession. It was where he kept all of his notes, research, and important papers.

  I reach for it.

  Mother steps away from me, just a little bit.

  “I don’t understand,” I say. Why won’t she just talk? I know she can. I remember when she did. It’s not that hard. I do it all the time.

  She steps back toward me and presses the satchel into my arms. I take it. She shuffles to her rocking chair, sits down, and closes her eyes to return to her silence.

  I touch the top of the satchel. I remember my father pulling papers out of it and shoving papers into it. I lift it to my nose and sniff. There he is, tobacco and dust.

  “Thank you, Mother,” I say. I’m glad I didn’t shout at her.

  Memory after memory floods me. After long, frustrating days in the field or with the pigs, Father would pull out his satchel, sit down at the table, and pore over his studies. He’d be happy again. Farm work did not make my father happy. You can ask anybody about that. Especially Eustace. Lots of times, when Eustace would come to see what Father was doing in the field, planting beans in rows rather than in between corn plants, for instance, Eustace would take off his hat and scratch his head and say, “Well, I’ve never seen it done like that before.”

  Father would try to explain. “This is the newest method, Eustace.”

  Eustace would nod, but he’d also say something like, “Don’t need to use as much soil or space the old way.”

  I leave the kitchen and dash up the stairs to my room. I toss the satchel onto my bed and stare at it for a while. I’ve always wanted it. I’ve always wanted to look inside and read my father’s handwriting, his thoughts, his notes. But at this moment, I’m afraid to open it. My room feels airless and heavy with heat. The Medicine Head seems to be whispering again. I lie down on the floor and peek under the bed. It’s still there, right where I left it.

  “Be quiet,” I say to it. “I’m not listening.” But I am. I’m sweating. Bad, cloudy thoughts and bad, mealy feelings mix around inside me. Sadness. And anger. And fear. My mind flip-flops like flapjacks these days.

  I unbuckle the satchel and lift open the top to reveal papers set carefully on the satin lining. Father’s papers. I touch them delicately, and I select a newspaper. I tenderly unfold a New Bedford Times with the headline “Local Man’s Discoveries Discredited” and read:

  Captain Charles Wonder was charged today with falsifying records and theft of United States property. Captain Wonder will face a Naval Court-Martial to strip him of his rank, return him to civilian status, and hasten the return of a priceless cache of items collected on several voyages at sea. Captain Wonder was chief scientist, naturalist, mineralogist, botanist, map-maker, and taxidermist aboard the ship Vivienne, part of the United States Exploring Expedition between the years 1835 and 1842, which resulted in the discovery of the continent of Antarctica for the United States.

  According to Captain Cornelius H. Greeney, who also was a member of the United States Exploring Expedition as the captain of the ship Saint Mary, “Mr. Wonder has behaved in ways unbecoming a representative of the United States Navy, has claimed to have discovered lands I, myself, discovered a full week before his ship reached the continent of Antarctica, and has kept for himself artifacts and jewels and gold, which are rightly owned by the United States. I will not rest until this man is revealed as the charlatan he is and I have in my hands the objects, worth millions, that should rightly be in my charge.” Captain Greeney has taken over the responsibilities of Captain Wonder. He is a member of the Seaman’s Bethel Chapel and is a prominent member of the abolitionist movement to eradicate slavery from the nation.

  Captain Wonder is married to the former Clare Seton, the daughter of Horace Seton and a pillar of the New Bedford community and leader in the abolitionist movement.

  Have you ever read something bad about someone you love in a newspaper? Probably not. Well, I’ll tell you. It doesn’t feel too good.

  I put it down, on top of another paper with the headline “Captain Wonder Dishonorably Discharged Amid Scandal.” The creases of the newspaper are almost worn through, which means Father opened and reopened these articles again and again.

  To tell you the truth, I don’t know why Father kept the artifacts, why he didn’t ask someone to h
elp him, why he allowed Captain Greeney to destroy his reputation. I do know he said that Captain Greeney intended to sell them off to the highest bidders, who would put them in private collections in dark and dirty smoking rooms in their gothic mansions. I suppose Father couldn’t stand the thought of his stuffed caracal cat, his thunder eggs, his mounted piranhas, his Egyptian pharaoh’s headdress, and, particularly, his Medicine Head sitting in places where he couldn’t study and learn from them. But I don’t know for sure. Maybe he simply wanted to keep them for himself. Though he told me and taught me a lot, he didn’t have time to teach me everything or tell me all I needed to know.

  I feel sad when I think about him sitting and reading all these nasty half-truths and lies about himself, but then my stomach clenches and a gush of bitter bile comes up my throat. I swallow it back down, leaving a sour taste in my mouth. I think of the man responsible for this misery, for Father’s death, and I clench my fists and promise Father that I will get revenge.

  I know that in most families, a son is responsible for upholding the family name and for carrying on the knowledge and trade and work and wealth or property or herds or acres of the father. But since Father had no sons who lived through childhood, it’s my responsibility instead. It’s usually the daughter’s duty to find a suitable husband and make a suitable home and have clever children for her parents to be fond of, and then take care of her aging parents in their waning years, but I’m certain those things can wait until after I’ve avenged Father. And in any case, I haven’t seen a single boy or man around these parts whose attention I’d like more than I like my scientific pursuits. All the boys around here look too much like Kansas: stringy, dusty, and boring.

  I touch the newspapers one more time, and I’m about to close the satchel when I notice the corner of a folded piece of paper sticking out between all the old newspapers. It seems strangely clean, when all the others are yellowed and brittle. I pull on it carefully. I unfold it and am surprised to see my own name at the top.