Edie Kiglatuk's Christmas Read Free Page B

just might be a vehicle pulling something behind it. She smiled, going back to her snowmobile and, taking a route that put her downwind of the moving shapes, she manoeuvred herself across the ice at the foot of the fiord. On the other side she dismounted and strapped on her cross-country skis. Silently, she made her way across the slopes.
    The sky had cleared now and the moon seemed brighter, its light reflecting off the snow, throwing a deep blue gloam across the landscape. She was not far from the moving figures now; a herd, as she had suspected, though as she was downwind from them they had not detected her. She could see the light of Willie’s snowmobile now and in its back beam, the man himself, untying the komatik. Inside, there was a small dark shape. She opened her mouth to call out, then decided against it. When he had finished detaching the komatik, Willie began to lay out something on the snow. When that was done, he stood back and, staying very still, began to whistle, softly at first, then more insistently. Edie waited for what seemed like a long time. She sensed the herd drifting slowly away. Then slowly, something seemed to emerge from the gloom and a juvenile caribou appeared in the light of the snowmobile, making its way slowly and deliberately towards the spot where Willie stood until it was right up close, nuzzling his pockets for food. He stroked and patted it for a while, whispering in its ear to reassure it, then slowly and with great delicacy, he lowered a harness over its head, tucking the sealskin straps around the animal’s ears, its modest little rack of antlers and whisking bobtail.
    When the animal was harnessed up, Willie went back to the komatik and, lifting the sleeping little girl out of the back seat, he clambered in and sat her down on his lap. As sleep released her, and she saw where she was, she began to leap up and down, gurgling with delight. Then picking up the reins, Willie shouted ‘ Ha! Ha! ’ and the caribou began to move forward. Feeling the motion, the little girl squealed. Willie shouted ‘ Hoowoop! ’ and the deer broke into a trot. Before long, they were going round and round in large circles, the little girl starting up ‘Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer’, her father joining in.
    And when they had sung all the verses of Rudolph four times over, Edie stood and skied down the small slope and positioned herself in the light of the snowmobile. She heard Willie shouting ‘ Iq! Iq! ’ at the caribou and the komatik slowed. The little girl grew quiet again and finally Willie pulled up the sled alongside Edie.
    Willie smiled. ‘I thought you’d figure it out eventually,’ he said. He didn’t seem angry, only perhaps a little sad.
    â€˜Tommy got family too,’ she said.
    He flashed her a look, angry maybe, a bit regretful. ‘I’m real sorry how it turned out with Tommy. I never meant for him to die. I punched him all right, hard too. But when I left him he was on his feet, like I told you.’
    â€˜Teacher!’ the little girl said, pointing excitedly at Edie.
    â€˜This teacher’s a clever lady,’ Willie said to his daughter.
    â€˜Clever lady,’ Aggie agreed.
    â€˜You two get to spend much time together?’ Edie asked.
    Willie poked his finger into Aggie’s belly and began to tickle her.
    â€˜Her mother don’t let me see her.’ He picked up the little girl in his strong arms and began to fly her through space. ‘Says she isn’t mine.’ The baby began to shout joyously. ‘I guess she didn’t want Tommy to find out. She was with him when we …’ he tailed off. ‘She was scared of him, even then. I did her a favour in a way.’ The wires in his neck grew taught and his nostrils flared and he looked up at Edie with a sour expression on his face. ‘Oh I know I’ll have to pay for it. I know that all right.’
    He stood the little girl in