Ordinary Wolves by Seth Kantner Read Free Book Online Page A

porcupine, but I hadn’t heard a mourning moose. I was proud of Abe, proud of his omniscient knowledge of the land.
    â€œNever heard anything like it before,” he said, pleased.
    We jounced on.
    â€œAbe, why do you think greatness is bad?” My question startled both of us. I stiffened, mortified. He snapped ice off his mustache. “I mean—. Burning your best paintings. And acting like you don’t know how to hunt when travelers are bragging.”

    When Abe spoke, he used his historical-problems-with-the-world voice. He had a degree in art and history; Iris often teased that his degree was history. “This book I’m reading, the author argues that our heroes aren’t heroes at all and have traditionally—”
    I stopped listening and watched frost-laden twigs pass. Abe liked to mull things over until he got them complicated. A discussion with him was like rolling a log uphill in sticky snow. Ideas glommed on. I started to offer ten-year-old facts, but the dogs sped up and we dropped into a slough and lost the trail of the conversation when the team piled up on the leftovers of the calf moose. Backbone, hair, hooves, and the head with the nose and eyes chewed down, all scattered in a red circle. Fine wolf trails and deep moose trenches mapped out the battle.
    The dogs bit at the frozen blood and woody stomach contents. Abe bent, careful not to let go of the sled handlebar. He touched a clean wolf paw print. “Soft,” he mused. “Been back to finish her up.”
    The dogs raced west, up a narrow slough. “Abe,” I whispered, “should we maybe not shoot that ma moose? She’s had enough bad luck. Didn’t you want to shoot a barren cow, to be fatter?”
    I wanted to get out of the overhanging willows before she charged. The snow was soft and deep. Anyone knew moose were more dangerous than bears. Especially on a dog team. As a child, I had been petrified during the night with fear of a moose dropping in our ground-level skylight. The thrashing black hooves would crack our skulls. The wind would sift the igloo full of snow. Shrews would tunnel under our skin and hollow us out, and when travelers found our bodies we’d be weightless as dried seagulls. Abe nourished the nightmare, shrugging, conveying the impression that, sure, given time, my prophecy was bound to come true. Abe was that way. Realistic, he called it.
    He ran behind the runners, dodging willows that tried to slap his eyes. He panted over my hood. “Might be the only moose in fifty miles that doesn’t care either way.”
    I knew I could argue with him, and he’d leave the animal. He’d welcome the discussion—and the chance not to kill. I shut my stiff lips. Willows whipped past. Abe climbed on the runners and rode. He cleared
his throat and whistled encouragements to the dogs. I squinted in frustration, thinking, Now I’m definitely not going to get to shoot.
    â€œMy parents split up after the war,” Abe said. “People didn’t do that back then. That-a-girl, Farmer. Haw. Haw over. I was thirteen then.”
    In the sled I stared at my mukluks. Shocked—not that his parents divorced, but that he was telling me. His past was always as distant as the cities.
    â€œI came home from school one day, in trouble with Sister Abigail for saying I trusted animals more than people. Dad’s flannel shirts were all gone from the floor and the backs of chairs. I knew without those shirts, he was gone. He went off hunting fame or fortune, I guess.” Abe sounded like he was telling himself the story, too. I stayed silent, pretending indifference. Those seemed to be the manners I’d been taught; I just couldn’t remember learning them.
    â€œEven in Barrow, I usually drew animals instead of shooting them. I would’ve liked to be a hero. Of course I wanted to be one. It just felt . . . phony. Wearing the clothes. Strutting and flexing.