Wonder at the Edge of the World

by Nicole Helget

  We wait for what feels like forever for our big door to slide open.

  When it does, the car is flooded with light, and we can feel the cool air circulate. Fob starts to get excited, like he wants to go outside and run around. Eustace shoves a piece of dried meat into his mouth. I peer through a couple of cracks between the boxes.

  A man in a sharp uniform is talking as he runs a cane along the floor of the car. He looks up and down and side to side and then shouts, “All clear! Lock it up.” Then I see Lopez, who is walking behind him, look directly at me as he slides the big door closed again. We’re safe, but we have to stay quiet while the train is in the station.

  For hours, we sit with our ears pressed against the sides of the train car or our heads leaned back against them. The inside steams with heat. Eustace paces back and forth, casting furtive glances at me and the Medicine Head. From the confines of its crate, it starts up its call again. This time, it sounds pleading.

  “Be quiet,” I say.

  “Who are you talking to?” Eustace asks. He frowns at the crate.

  “Never mind,” I say. Eustace is really getting on my nerves. Even Fob bothers me. The way he walks, the way he skulks around, the way he whines and cries. All of it works on my last bit of patience. I press my ear to the train car’s wall again.

  I can hear a husband and wife having an argument about how the husband squandered the wife’s father’s money. Another person says he has to find an outhouse. Somebody else remarks that this town smells like cow manure. I sit quietly and listen to the noises and arguments and confusions of the people.

  The Medicine Head continues.

  What if I just opened the crate but didn’t hold it? Maybe that would cool it down a bit. Maybe it would stop taunting me then. I pry my fingers between the ropes of the knot on top. I make a little wiggle room. When Eustace has his back to me, I loosen the whole thing and the rope falls to my lap.

  Eustace spins around. “What are you doing?” he asks.

  “Nothing,” I say. “Just sitting here roasting to death, like you.”

  Then another train pulls into the station. Its gears grind and squeal to a halt. I peer between the slats of the wood. It’s difficult to see, but I recognize the train, with its leaf-green engine, as one that comes in and out of Tolerone.

  I wave Eustace over. “Eustace!” I say. “Is that a train that comes through Tolerone?”

  “Sure looks like it,” he says. “Think Greeney’s on it?”

  “Certainly,” I say. My stomach flops, and saliva collects on my tongue.

  Eustace and I watch for a long while. We’re both quiet. But the Medicine Head keeps up its taunt.

  I spit on the floor. I shuffle my feet. I clear my throat. The Medicine Head whispers Hold me. I wonder if it means me or Captain Greeney. “You don’t hear it?” I ask Eustace. He ignores me. I don’t blame him.

  We wait for what seems like another long while. My stomach rumbles with what I think is hunger, but it could be from the long train ride or my nerves. I’ve felt stomach-sick since I got on this thing. I try to remember the last time I ate or did anything normal. That all seems like a lifetime ago. I curl over my stomach. Eustace sees me do this and pulls a hard biscuit from his pocket.

  “Thanks,” I say, and bite into it. It’s dry, but at once I feel its nourishing effects on me. My head gets clearer. My muscles strengthen. I don’t feel so tired anymore. But I get that strange tingly feeling, like something is about to happen.

  I listen. There are voices right on the other side of the train car’s wall.

  “I don’t know what it is or does,” one voice says, “but Greeney wants it, and that’s all there’s to it. No sense asking questions because you’re not gonna get no answers.”

  Immediately, I suck in my breath and hold it there.

  “It’s some kind of magic ball he wants,” says a gruff voice. “If we don’t bring him that Medicine Head, he’ll have our tails.”

  Fob shuffles his back legs, as though he’s nervous. Eustace puts his hand on Fob’s neck. I put my finger up to my lips.

  “If you’d a gotten it the last time, we wouldn’t have to be out here in the middle of nowhere,” says another man.

  “We’ll just see how good you are at finding it,” says the first man. “We done everything we could to get its whereabouts last time. If Wonder had just told us where it was, he’d still be walking the earth. It’s his own fault.” Then he adds, “Must be a mighty powerful thing Greeney wants.”

  “Sounds like hocus-pocus to me,” says the third man. “But I hate to be the one who crosses Greeney.”

  CHAPTER 19

  As the day wears on, the temperature rises. There’s not much to do besides be hot and be sleepy in this dark place. I doze off once in a while, and my dreams are filled with wild images, some of my father’s dead face, some of Captain Greeney slipping a rope around my neck. When I wake, my throat hurts, as though I’ve been strangled in my sleep. All the while, the Medicine Head’s crate sits on my lap, or right beside me.

  I’m more worried than ever that someone, anyone, is going to try to take it from me. I loosen the ropes on top of the crate and dismantle the knot, then retie it, making a sheet bend. I loosen them again and make a double sheet bend, loosen, then a water knot, loosen, then a square knot, loosen, and a double fisherman’s knot. Finally, I stop and let the rope hang loose on my lap.

  This train car smells like damp straw, unwashed feet, and wet coats. Hardly any light gets in. Even though we’ve been at a standstill for nearly a day, my stomach hasn’t settled. It wants to empty whatever’s in it, which isn’t much.

  I never felt stomach-sick while walking around on the flat, stay-steady ground.

  I think for a while that we should go back. Is Captain Greeney too powerful for us to outwit? He’s got the authority of the whole United States Navy behind him, for goodness’ sake, and all I’ve got is a smart Negro friend who is breaking just about all the laws in the nation even if the laws are not right, a crooked dog with a fearful nature, and a porter who can’t even speak English.

  Eustace and Fob fall asleep in a heap. I can’t sleep because the Medicine Head won’t quit. It moans and whines and whispers to me relentlessly. The noise of it, along with the heat, makes me want to bust open the door and jump off the train. But I can’t do that. I can only wish it would be quiet. I touch the rough wood of the crate, and I don’t even care when I get a splinter in my finger.

  Do you know what sirens are? Well, they’re not real, so don’t worry if you’ve never heard of one. Sometimes the sailors aboard ships would think they heard women singing off in the far distances of the ocean. Sailors can be on ships a long time, even years away from their wives and mothers, and they get lonely for womenfolk. So the lonely ones who don’t know any better steer the ships right toward the music. Then they crash directly into rocks and wreck the vessels. The music they heard was only the wind whistling through those rocks and not women singing them lovely songs. Like I already said when I told you that story about the woman and her chicken, people do some illogical things when they’re lonely. They forget all about science and let their imaginations run wild. Not me, though. I definitely don’t want to do that.

  Yet I hear it.

  Almost like a whispered lullaby or the faint humming of a far-away child. I thrum my fingers on the top of the crate.

  I want to touch the Medicine Head. It wants me to. It begs me to.

  I slip my fingertips between the lid and the crate. I ease the lid off.

  A scent like dry leather and dust and brittle hair hits my nose. It’s so powerful, I look up to where Eustace and Fob lie asleep to see if they’ve noticed, but they sleep on.

  The Medicine Head sits askew in its straw. If nothing else, I should get it upright again. Without another thought, I hold my breath and reach in and put my hands on it.

  Instantly, my hair blows back, and I feel like I’m on a train, but a much faster train than this one.
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  Clouds race in the sky. Ocean waves crash violently, and I hear what sounds like all the voices of everyone I’ve ever known talking at once. The images slow down, and I’m standing at the prow of a ship, freezing. It hurts to breathe the ice-cold air. My toes ache from the chill and from being cramped in tight boots.

  I see nothing but gray-and-white ice.

  “Note the time, Jenkins,” I hear a very familiar voice say. I try to turn and look, but I’m frozen where I stand.

  “Yes, Captain,” I hear Jenkins reply.

  “The continent of Antarctica. There she is, boys.” My father’s voice causes my heart to rush. A warmth runs through my veins.

  I am with him on his discovery. I squint and try to see where he is, but I can’t. I see dark forms of men, but I can’t make out Father. I look out to where Antarctica should be and see dark mountainous shapes, white mist, and gray sky.

  “We made it,” Father says. “Only the bravest, wisest crew could have managed it. Our names will go down in the history books, boys.”

  I try to move my mouth, my lips, and my tongue. I try to tell him, I’m here! Father, I’m here, too! But my mouth doesn’t work. It’s frozen. My legs are frozen, too. I listen for him to say more, but I only hear the groaning of ice, the crunching of ice, and the squeaking of ice.

  This is as close as the Medicine Head will allow me to get to Father.

  And suddenly, I’m released.

  I let go of the Medicine Head, and I am back in the train car, dark and dingy and hot. I’m sweating.

  I exhale and look around. It’s still dim. Eustace and Fob are still sleeping. I’m panting, but my stomach doesn’t feel sick anymore. My heart is full. I got to hear Father. If the Medicine Head is a dangerous and evil artifact, why would it give me a vision so good, so delightful? Why would it give me just what I need? If all of its gifts were like that one, I could hold the Medicine Head all day, every day, for the rest of my life.

  I want to hear him again. The Medicine Head rests in the straw, face-up. It has no expression. It’s not calling to me or begging me to hold it. But I want to.

  I decide to touch the head again.

  I hold my breath and let the wind come. The clouds, the waves, and the voices pass, just like before. When they slow, I’m back in my Kansas kitchen.

  There’s Priss, looking pretty as ever but older. She’s wearing a new dress, a white one with blue cornflowers all over it. She’s not wearing an apron like she usually does. Mother is at the kitchen table, quiet but smiling a small smile. She’s wearing an old dress, a nice green frock she used to wear in New Bedford. Ruby is standing at a table frosting a round cake.

  “You’ll make a fine wife, Miss Priss,” Ruby says. “Yes, ma’am.”

  Priss is getting married? Who? Is this happening now? No. It can’t be. Priss wouldn’t get married without me. Is this the future? I turn around and around but don’t see anyone else there. But then I spot a train porter’s coat hanging over a chair. It looks just like the one Lopez wears.

  I turn around again, looking for Eustace and Fob, but I don’t see them anywhere. Where could they be? I look out the window to the pigsty, and they’re not there, either. I try to call, Eustace? Eustace! But again, my mouth doesn’t work.

  Out the window, I can see a cloud of dust rising from the road, rolling into the sky like a dark, ominous ghoul. I try to shout Hide! Hide! to all the people in my house. Captain Greeney is coming again! But it stays trapped in my mouth. Everyone continues with wedding preparations. They can’t hear me. And then Captain Greeney is in the yard, dismounting from his horse and yanking a long rope from his saddle. At the end of it is a hangman’s noose. Hide! Hide! I scream to Priss, to Mother, to Ruby. No one hears a thing.

  And then I drop the Medicine Head.

  I am back in the hot dark train car.

  Moments later, before I can even catch my breath and shake the terrible images from my mind, the car door flies open.

  Lopez leaps in. His eyes are big as buttons. He’s speaking loudly and quickly and pointing at me and the crate, where the Medicine Head lies for everyone to see. Eustace and Fob scramble to their feet.

  “Slow down!” Eustace says. “I can’t understand you.” Then he sees me, sees the open crate, and his face gets mad, too. Even Fob barks as though he’s mad at me. I slap the lid on the crate.

  Lopez continues to talk, but a bit more slowly. Eustace is listening and nodding.

  “He wants to know what that is,” Eustace tells me. “He says Captain Greeney’s searching the train looking for a girl from Kansas who has stolen a government artifact.” Lopez looks at me with lowered brows and a pinched mouth.

  “Captain Greeney is evil!” I shout. “Tell him, Eustace. Tell him Captain Greeney is evil. Tell him he killed my father!”

  Eustace translates to Lopez, who is listening and nodding, but his eyes are skeptical, squinted. He exhales loudly.

  “Greeney,” Lopez says, “muy malo.”

  “Sí,” I say. I look him straight in the face. “I’ve got to keep this scientific artifact away from Captain Greeney.” Lopez is staring into my eyes now, and he nods, as if he’s understood every word I’ve said. “I have to take it somewhere safe.”

  “Sí,” he says. He straightens his porter’s coat. I remember how I saw that same coat hanging over my own kitchen chair. “Muy importante,” he adds as he points to the Medicine Head’s crate and grimaces.

  “Muy, muy importante.” I shake the crate a little. “Antarctica.”

  He rolls his eyes like I’ve lost my wits. “Ay, yi, yi,” he says. I know exactly what that means without anyone translating it for me. Lopez stands there for a moment staring at the head. Even over the noise of the other trains, shouting and crashing in the next car can be heard.

  “Rápido,” Lopez urges. “Hide,” he says in English.

  Eustace and I get behind the crates again. Eustace waves and calls for Fob, but he won’t come. He’s taken a liking to Lopez, who has brought him scraps from the dinner cars for the past few days. Fob sits on his hind end right at Lopez’s feet.

  Lopez pats Fob on the rump and motions for us to get our heads down. My heart’s racing fast, like horse hooves. The door bursts open, and the car is awash in light.

  “But, sir, this isn’t a passenger car,” a man says. I see him between the slits of the crates, and he’s wearing a uniform like Lopez’s, but even fancier.

  “I want every car searched thoroughly,” another man says. When he steps in, the light from outside is blocked, and the car grows dim again. He lifts a lantern up to his face, casting a hot glow on one temple, cheek, eye. Captain Greeney looks like a madman. I glance down at the Medicine Head, and it looks like it’s pursing its lips at me, sneering.

  Lopez steps forward and speaks urgently at the two. He gestures to the crates and then spreads out his arms high and wildly.

  “What’s he saying?” Captain Greeney asks the other train worker.

  “Something about dynamite, I think,” the train worker says. “I don’t know. He’s just a porter.”

  Greeney eyes the train car from corner to corner and floor to ceiling. He spots Fob.

  “What’s that dog doing in here?” he demands.

  Lopez sniffs and then points to the crates again. He speaks slowly to the train worker, who looks afraid. His eyes widen, and he tiptoes away from the crates. He takes off his hat and wipes his forehead. He’s very, very nervous.

  “Sir, the porter says the crates carry nitroglycerine,” he says to Captain Greeney. “The chemical being tested as a blasting agent. The dog can smell a leak that could potentially create a big explosion and kill us all, sir. That’s what he said.” The train worker clears his throat and eagerly eyes the door.

  I don’t suppose you’ve ever heard of nitroglycerine. Well, to be honest, I don’t know much about it myself. But I do know it’s highly combustible, which means explosive. I have to admit I am very impressed that Lopez knows more about somet
hing than I do. But I intend to study up on it first chance I get. I don’t like anyone getting ahead of me in scientific advancements.

  Then the train worker adds, “The porter says he’s seen no sign of a runaway girl with a stolen artifact, sir.”

  Captain Greeney raises his head and seems to be smelling the air. “Is that so?” Captain Greeney reaches the lantern toward Fob, who barks loud and snaps at him. Captain Greeney recoils. “All right, porter.” He eyes the crates, but he’s careful not to put the lantern near them. I suppose he’s wondering if they’re really filled with nitroglycerine.

  Captain Greeney walks toward the door, but then he stops. He puts his hand on his chest and begins to shout into the train car. “I would simply like to say that with this missing girl there may be a runaway slave, property of the Millers from Missouri. I would like it known that should this runaway slave come forward and provide the whereabouts of the missing girl, he would be granted his everlasting freedom and my personal protection.”

  I suck in a gulp of air fast and then slap my hand over my mouth because I feel a cough coming. Eustace gets close to my face and puts his hands over my mouth, too. He’s shaking his head no, no, no, and I don’t know if he means “No, don’t cough” or “No, I don’t believe a word he says.” I’m hoping it’s both. The seconds go by, and while it feels like a week has passed, it’s only been half a minute.

  Captain Greeney waits, I suppose, for Eustace to come forward, take his freedom, and give me and the Medicine Head up. But none of that happens because Eustace Miller is the truest friend a girl like me could ever have.

  “Very well,” says Captain Greeney, “continue with your brave duties, porter. Protecting the train from a fiery doom and whatnot.” And then they turn and walk out the door. Lopez shuts it, and the car is dim again. Within an hour, the train is moving east toward New Bedford and the last leg of my journey.