Between Two Worlds by Katherine Kirkpatrick Page A

four walls of the grave went up, I sensed that my parents and Aviaq had returned. I caught glimpses of them watching me. My father looked the same as he always did: like a powerful hunter. My tiny mother seemed tired; she’d lost weight. Aviaq wore a stiff blue dress with a starched white pinafore over it. Her hair was gathered behind her with a ribbon. She looked the way I did in America.
    When we’d nearly completed the grave, my brother made a trip to the village to bring back my father’s large, pure-white lead sled dog. He had been one of the dogs my husband had traded to make me his wife. I turned away when my brother killed him, though I would always remember that gunshot. We laid the dog in the grave.
    After we’d put the last boulder in place, we etched three horizontal lines into it with a knife. “Spirits of our loved ones,” my brother said, “these marks are to remind you not to roam beyond your grave. Stay here until the times when your names will be called. Then you will go into the bodies of newborns, and forget the lives you have lived.”
    “Let me be the one to receive you, Anaana and Ataata!” I whispered. “One of you, come to me in pregnancy beforethe Ancestors swing low in the sky and the stars of winter blaze.”
    Several moons passed and the darkness came, along with its colorful companions, the Ancestors, and the bright stars. A young woman in the village had her first child, a girl, and named her Aviaq. The next child to be reborn was Qisuk, Minik’s father. Villagers who’d known him, and had placed tools and weapons for him in his late wife’s grave, had spoken his name.
    Another winter came and went. My sister and I did not conceive.

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

    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 manseemed 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