The Snow Child by Eowyn Ivey Read Free Book Online Page A

the cabin where a wild cranberry bush grew. She picked a handful of the frozen berries, returned to the snow girl, and carefully squeezed the juice onto her lips. The snow there turned a gentle red.
    She and Jack stood side by side and gazed at their creation.
    “She’s beautiful,” she said. “Don’t you think? She’s beautiful.”
    “She did turn out, didn’t she?”
    Standing still, she became aware of the cold through her damp clothes and trembled.
    “Chilled?”
    She shook her head.
    “Let’s go in and warm up.”
    Mabel didn’t want it to end. The quiet snow, the closeness. But her teeth began to chatter. She nodded.
    Inside, Jack added several birch logs to the woodstove and the fire crackled. Mabel stood as close as she dared and peeled off wet mittens, hat, coat. He did the same. Clumps of snow fell onto the stovetop and sizzled. Her dress hung heavy and wet against her skin, and she unbuttoned it and stepped out of it. He unlaced his boots and pulled his damp shirt off over his head. Soon they were naked and shivering beside each other. She was unaware of their bare skin until he stepped closer and she felt his rough hand at the small of her back.
    “Better?” he asked.
    “Yes.”
    She reached up over his shoulders where his skin was still cool to the touch, and when she pressed her nose into the crook of his neck, melted snow clung in droplets to his beard.
    “Let’s go to bed,” Jack said.
    After all these years, still a spot within her fluttered at his touch, and his voice, throaty and hushed in her ear, tickled along her spine. Naked, they walked to the bedroom. Beneath the covers, they fumbled with each other’s bodies, arms and legs, backbones and hip bones, until they found the familiar, tender lines like the creases in an old map that has been folded and refolded over the years.
    After, they lay together, Mabel’s cheek against his chest.
    “You won’t really go to the mine, will you?”
    He put his lips to the top of her head.
    “I don’t know, Mabel,” he whispered into her hair. “I’m doing the best I can.”

CHAPTER 5
     
    J ack woke to the cold. In the few hours he’d slept the weather had changed. He could smell it and feel it in his arthritic hands. He propped himself on an elbow and grabbed at the nightstand until he found a match and lit the candle. His back and shoulders were stiff as he eased his legs over the side of the bed. He sat on the edge of the mattress until the cold was unbearable. Not far from the pillow where Mabel slept, frost crept between the logs with its feathery crystals. He swore quietly and pulled the quilt up over her shoulder. A warm, secure home—he couldn’t even give her that much. He carried the candleholder into the main room. The heavy metal door on the woodstove clanged noisily as he opened it. A few coals smoldered in the ash.
    As he reached for his boots, through the window he saw a flicker. He stood at the frost-edged glass and peered out.
    Fresh snow blanketed the ground and glittered and glowed silver in the moonlight. The barn and trees beyond were muted outlines. There, at the edge of the forest, he saw it again. A flash of blue and red. He was groggy with sleep. He closed his eyes slowly, opened them again, and tried to focus.
    There it was. A little figure dashed through the trees. Was that a skirt about the legs? A red scarf at the neck, and white hair trailing down the back. Slight. Quick. A little girl. Running at the edge of the forest. Then disappearing into the trees.
    Jack rubbed his eyes with the heels of his hands. Not enough sleep—that had to be it. Too many long days. He left the window and stepped into his boots, leaving the laces untied. He opened the door, and the chill air sucked the breath out of him. The snow crunched beneath his boots as he walked to the woodpile. It was only as he was returning with an armload of split birch that he noticed their little snow girl. He set the wood on the ground and with empty