To the Bright Edge of the World

by Eowyn Ivey

I looked directly into its eyes and knew that I understood nothing. —From Make Prayers to the Raven, by Richard K. Nelson, on seeing an Alaska wolverine

It takes a kind of arrogance to think everything in the world can be measured and weighed with our scientific instruments.

Could he have climbed the tree in a fit of fear? It does not suit his character. The Eyak seems an unflappable sort. He looked as if he sat comfortably in those branches, perhaps even slept. I am left vaguely uneasy. As if I witnessed a bird flying underwater or a fish swimming across the sky.

They say he knows these waters so can pilot us to the mouth of the Wolverine River.

?

Built like a brick s—– house, always on the look-out for a fistfight,

?

northern point is but three or four degrees south of the highest latitude yet reached by man?

They made an amusing scene, Mr Pruitt so studious and fair-skinned, with his red hair trimmed boyishly; the grimed smith, in leather apron and rolled up sleeves, looking particularly unhappy with having to stand for his picture to be taken. Mr Pruitt peered out from the black cloth and quietly asked the blacksmith to turn his shoulder this way and his chin that, to which the smith obeyed with considerable grumbling.

I did not expect to be the cause of such a stir. One would think I was to leave on a polar expedition. During tea this afternoon at Mrs Connor’s house, the officers’ wives reacted with everything from alarm to squealing delight to know that I will go as far as Sitka with Allen and his men.

I thanked her but told her I had a raincoat, and that I would certainly remember to pack it in my trunk.

“Imagine a husband so distraught to be separated from you, that he brings you with him!”

Yet nothing could save me from the sense that I had taken several steps back from the other women. I was silent the rest of tea.

I do not go because my husband orders me. I do not go out of some need to prove or earn anything. And while it will give me joy to remain some time longer at my husband’s side, it is not even that alone. Instead, I go because I long to see this wild place for myself.

I set to organizing my belongings. I soon saw the folly in it. It is not as if I have a dozen dresses that I can wear now and another dozen I can pack for later. And so, I have shoved the trunk into a corner and now sit at the bedroom window to write.

When we first arrived in Washington Territory, I was enthralled by all the wild country we saw, and even the barracks seemed a far outpost of civilization. With the thought of Alaska in my head now, however, this neat line of officers’ houses, the cultivated trees and trimmed hedges and clapboard barracks, the muddy roads—it all seems so tame and ordinary.

a young Indian woman walked from the willow brush carrying two dead hares, knelt at sea’s edge to skin them out with a sure quickness. She wears a beaded shift of animal hide & a fur mantle across her shoulders. She gave one rabbit to the Indian camp, her family I presume. Much to our surprise she then walked down the beach to our campfire. She slid the other rabbit into a pot of water we had boiling on the campfire. We heated only tins of beans in the flames for our meal so did not hesitate to accept her gift. We expressed our gratitude, but she did not seem to know our words.

Samuelson asked her a series of questions in her own tongue, which she answered in a near whisper. They spoke a long time. Never once did she bring up her eyes, as if she feared our gaze would turn her to stone. She then walked down the beach towards her own camp, but before she had gone a few steps, she spoke one last time to Samuelson. He nodded. —Well? What did she say? Tillman asked. —She had a husband once. —Pretty young thing like that. Doubt any man would give that up. So, what happened to the fellow? —She killed him, Samuelson said.—Slit his throat as he slept.

After a short time, his prints turned to otter tracks. She kept on them until she came to a bank den. That’s when she saw her husband in his true form—a river otter, being welcomed by his otter wife.

Tillman was disbelieving. I had heard similar stories among Indians, but not such a firsthand claim. —They believe it is a thin line separates animal & man, Samuelson said.—They hold that some can walk back & forth over that line, here a man, there a beast.

When he fell asleep beside her, she cut his throat. In the morning light, she skinned him out. That otter pelt on her shoulders, that there is the skin of her husband. —Jesus, Tillman said. —But you don’t believe a word of it, do you? Pruitt said. Samuelson shrugged.

—What did she say at the last, when she was walking away? Tillman asked. —She says the Wolverine River is no place for men like us.

I understand from General Haywood that you are recently married. Congratulations, Colonel. I surmise that may be the root of some of your reticence in leaving on such an expedition, but you can happily retire to domestic married life upon your return.

I laughed, and said that Allen is true to form—he keeps his thoughts to himself, and it is only once he has quietly determined his course that he reveals his plans to those around him, soldier or wife.

“But my husband must have some flaw?” I inquired. “I have seen his temper, ma’am,”

Just as Mr Pruitt seemed to show some sign of enthusiasm for our conversation, however, we were interrupted by one of Mr Tillman’s passionate but brief toasts: “To Alaska!” to which the crowd cheered, “To Alaska!”

Mr Pruitt leaned closer to me, his eyes on Mr Tillman, and said, “Do you know, Mrs Forrester, that your husband is the only military man I have ever known who is always sober, dutiful, and faithful.” How could I respond to such a pronouncement? “Yes, well, it is a lovely evening!” I offered.

“You are fortunate, Mrs Forrester.” What on earth could he mean? “You still believe everything is golden, all dances and fine stitches and silk,” he said, and here he looked over my gown, which made me quite self-conscious. “But this is all just an illusion, a dream,” he went on. “You have been spared truth. Your Colonel and I, we know. Once seen, it cannot be unseen.”

I only wanted to know how he could be so angry at a commanding officer as to throw about a telegraph machine.

feel a bit as if I’ve been put in my place. Just because I appeared before Mr Pruitt as a well-married woman in a fine gown (borrowed at that), who is he to assume that I have therefore led a charmed and unmarred life, that I am ignorant of suffering?

If he conceals a part of himself out of a misguided desire to protect me, it would sadden me terribly, for it would mean that neither of us knows the other as intimately as marriage would presume.

Pruitt spotted the old Eyak coming across the snow towards us. He moved slowly, elbows & knees askew, clothes flapping in sleety wind. At his pace, the journey was sure to take him hours, yet too quickly he was beside us.

I suspect that, like the Indian woman, the skittish animal will be more trouble than it is worth.

but if I can learn a bit from Mr Pruitt aboard the steamer and continue to study the manuals over the next months, is it possible that I could learn to make my own photographs? Well of course, Allen said, and he wouldn’t spend too much time fretting over those cursed hand books, either. “You just have to do it and figure it out for yourself,” he said, “and I have no doubt that you will.” It is something I love very much about him. He goes not in search of obstacles, only the paths around them. Anything seems possible.

Oh, I do hope I am so fortunate as to see the puffin bird. Are the illustrations I have seen accurate? Does it possess such a sweet and comical expression?

was not somewhat disappointed, for there was little to observe. In the dusk, especially to my inexperienced eyes, the bats could have been barn swallows or oversized moths. Yet for all that, it was marvelous—the nights of anticipation and then, in the sky above me, the fleeting silhouettes of their wings.

That is the excitement. We catch only glimpses, a burst of movement, a flap of wings, yet it is life itself beating at shadow’s edge. It is the unfolding of potential; all of what we might experience and see and learn awaits us.

Hope is a bat flap

The bride wore a dress of heavy white satin and a tulle veil, and carried a bouquet of pale pink Bennett roses.

The newly wedded couple leaves next week for Vancouver Barracks in the remote Washington Territory where the Colonel is to be stationed.

Between Science’s measuring and my God’s condemning, I find no room for the Soul. No room for my feathered lungs to expand. I would gasp and gasp, only wanting the cold fingers to release their hold.

my entire self is being altered, steadily and dramatically, and that something tremendous has begun.

How is it that my maternity, such an ordinary, everyday occurrence of humankind, can feel utterly singular and overwhelming to me?

Though I show no outward signs of maternity, he falls over himself to help me to my feet when I leave a chair, and even while he is working at the desk, his eyes are often upon me, as if he is in awe of something I have done.

don’t like to leave you this way,” he said, with his hand still rested there. Of course he will go, and I will manage best I can. I am still the same woman he married, I remind him—no more or less competent. Yet there is something quite tender, even vulnerable, about this new side of Allen.

Also during my visit, I made the mistake of asking the doctor if I could please borrow one of his books on midwifery or obstetrics, as I wish to learn more about the physiology. What does the fetus look like? What anatomical features has it developed? He has several books on his shelves that I am sure could satisfy some of my curiosity. I might as well have thrown a dishpan of dirty water over his head. For a moment he was speechless, and then at last sputtered that it was not “suitable reading.”

He said his books are completely inappropriate for women and laymen, and that the reading would bewilder me.

am grateful for everything she has taught me, yet there is so little pleasure in her presence.

So you won’t go to Alaska after all! Did you lose your nerve? Good heavens, it is all for the best. Wouldn’t you have had a miserable time? Did the General forbid you? They probably thought you’d be a nuisance or suffer horribly from seasickness.

All in all, afternoon tea was even more unbearable than normal. Since I do not yet feel free to share the true reason for my staying behind, I endured their remarks without retort. Sarah Whithers, bless her, seemed genuinely disappointed, as if she too were being denied the journey, but Mrs Connor gloated, as if she had known all along it wasn’t to be.

The tall one, called Skilly, said until the salmon return in summer, the Wolverine River is the ‘place where men starve.’

—What of these river tribes, said to be so fierce? They must eat something, even in the winter months, I asserted. Several of the Indians responded, but the trapper seemed reluctant to translate, only did so after I prodded. —They claim the Midnooskies above the canyon survive only by relying on human flesh. As for the woman, she is silent, but clearly has thoughts of her own.

or if they are quick-witted, they are worldly & cynical.