Journey of the Pale Bear

by Susan Fletcher

  My son. Ha!

  “Arthur,” he said now. “Please eat.”

  The smell of roasted meat made the juices in my mouth gush like a spring. I had dreamed of a meal like this. But I didn’t turn around.

  “Arthur . . .” The doctor sighed, a sound that seemed to rise from somewhere deep inside him. I heard a rustling of cloth, and a thump, and I knew he had sat down beside me.

  The ship rocked gently, in quiet seas. I heard the creak of the lines, a rumble of voices. I took a deep, long breath, and in the space of it recalled that it was the doctor who had persuaded the captain to take me on when I was destitute, and that I had pledged to help with the bear—not steal her away. I recalled that the doctor had had little choice but to obey the captain’s orders, but that I had betrayed his trust of my own free will.

  Presently, I heard the clunk of the bowl on the deck, and I knew that the doctor was leaving. I longed to turn round, call to him not to go. But I couldn’t. I heard the thump of the door as it shut behind him.

  And I was alone again.

  The second night, when the doctor came, I turned my back on him again, still unwilling to face him. But I smelled cod and bacon fat and fresh biscuits, and again my mouth began to water. I had devoured the previous night’s supper after he had left, so I couldn’t now feign to be so angry that I refused to eat. So when he offered me the bowl, I took it.

  I sat cross-legged, and tucked in. The doctor lowered himself to the deck beside me and, as if betrayal did not hunker like a wolf between us, began to relate what had befallen him on the ship.

  He had, he said, come looking for me during the storm. When he found the bear cage open, he had searched for both of us, but at last had to abandon ship. The following day, when storm and tide had ebbed, the Queen Margrete stood high and dry. She had not cracked up on a rocky shoal but had gone aground on the sandy shore of a coastal island. She was not badly damaged after all; they made temporary repairs in a few days and soon refloated her.

  Meanwhile, they had sent out men to look for me—and for the bear. The doctor had gone himself, but a thick fog had settled in, making the search difficult. They had combed the island from one end to another, to no avail. After that, they had searched parts of the mainland as well, but had found no trace of us. Then some few of the sailors, seeking provisions at a village on the mainland, heard rumors about a boy and a large, pale bear.

  “Then I knew you were alive,” the doctor said, “or at least, that you had survived the wreck. Whether you would continue to survive the bear . . .”

  The doctor’s voice went to gravel; he cleared his throat.

  I glanced up from my supper and, for the first time, caught his eye. I quickly looked away.

  “That, I did not know,” he concluded.

  I picked up a chunk of cod and stuffed it into my mouth. I chewed. I swallowed.

  “The trapper,” the doctor began.

  “You didn’t send him to find me,” I said. “Don’t pretend you did. You sent the trapper to catch the bear.”

  The doctor said nothing. Then, “Arthur . . .”

  His voice was so tender, I couldn’t abide it. I stood, and the bowl went clattering to the floor. I lurched away from him and faced the wall. The ship rocked gently beneath my feet. The lantern cast shifting shadows across the timbers.

  In a moment, the doctor went on, as if nothing had happened. The captain had hired the trapper, he said. The ship had limped east, to a port town the captain knew of, to finish repairs and to resupply. After I cut the bear from the noose, the trapper had rowed across the bay in a small boat he had stowed by the shore.

  “He told us where you had been and in what direction you were bound. So,” the doctor said, “we set the second trap.” He paused, and then went on. “Arthur, she would never have reached Norway. It’s too far to swim, even with the sea ice in winter.”

  Someway, I had known that, even though I had tried to believe she might make the journey home. Now I heard the snap of the sail above, and the creaking of lines. Outside the storeroom, one of the sailors broke into a mournful song. I turned to glance at the doctor. He was gazing into the shadows, seeming lost in his own thoughts. There was a gaunt look about him that I had not marked before.

  He had gone searching for me, in the storm, and after. He knew I had released the bear and had not tried to return her to the ship, but he had not scolded me, nor even reproached me. Before, he had taken time to teach me, seeming to value me both for what I could do at present and for what I might learn to do in time.

  It seemed that all the weariness in the world had gathered in the chambers behind my brow, in the acreage between my shoulder blades. I wanted to lie down. I wanted to close my eyes.

  But I knew that I could choose to be a child and continue to spite him with my turned back . . . or I could be a man and look him in the eye.

  I squatted down before him and gazed full into his face. He blinked, seemingly startled, and then his eyes crinkled at the corners—a warming of his countenance yet too sad to be called a smile.

  “What will become of me?” I asked.

  “The captain is fuming now, but he’ll cool down soon enough. He’ll need you when we reach London, and, after that . . . My guess is he’ll let you go.”

  Let me go. So I would be free. Free, at least, to choose whether to bind myself to the Welsh princes, or to my stepfather, or to some other master.

  “What will become of her?” I asked.

  “She belongs to the king,” the doctor said, not asking whom I meant. “Once we’ve turned her over to his protection, we may never hear word of her again, but we can trust that she’ll be well cared for.”

  Again, I tried to imagine what the bear must be thinking about what had befallen her—and about my part in it. But a single word—betrayal—pierced me so violently and hard, I had to hold my chest with both hands to keep my heart from splitting.

  “Will she ever be free?”

  “No,” the doctor said softly. “That, she will not.”

  CHAPTER 40

  A Cartload of Trouble

  THE DOCTOR, AS it happened, was right about the captain. He let me bide my time in the storeroom for a week or so until the last of the repairs were finished, and then we set sail for London. Some days later the seas went dead calm, and the shouts and thumps and scrapes and creaks and footfalls welled up in a clamorous wave, and I knew that we had come in to port. Soon, I heard the grate of a key in the lock, and the doctor stood before me, holding my belt and my boots. “Put these on,” he said, “and be quick about it. Captain’s released you to pacify the bear.”

  But my boots no longer fit. Either my feet were yet swollen, or they had grown, or the callouses had layered over them too thickly. So I left my old boots behind.

  The bear was pacing, hunched and taut, and I could see from her gait that her wounded rear leg still pained her. And yet she was magnificent. The bloodstains had gone from the fur near her arrow wounds and from her leg. Someone must have showered her with bucketsful of water, for she was all-over clean and even whiter than I had remembered. The raw size of her, to which I had accustomed myself on our sojourn, struck me with renewed force.

  As I approached, she lifted her nose in the air, then swiveled her great head in my direction. She made a sound, then—a sound I cannot describe, a sound so filled with surprise and longing that for a moment, the world blurred before my eyes, and I had to duck my head.

  I drew near to the cage, and the quivering black snout stretched out to me, sniffing at my eyes, sniffing at my cheeks, sniffing at my neck and shoulders and belly. I reached both arms through the bars and dug my fingers deep into the fur behind her ears, all the way down to the skin.

  “Arthur,” the doctor said.

  I swallowed. Drew back from the cage and looked about me. The crew, I saw, was silent; many had turned from their work to stare. Thorvald nodded. Hauk scowled. Ottar, to my astonishment, gave me a quick, small smile and then droppe
d his gaze to the deck.

  The doctor jerked his head, signaling me to look directly behind me.

  The captain.

  I straightened.

  “I don’t want any missteps with the bear on shore,” the captain barked at me. “If she slams herself too hard against the bars, the cart could tip over, and that would be indecorous, to say the least. Your job is to keep her peaceable, do you hear me?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “There will be a procession through town, and she’s to be passed in review before the king. Don’t go within the cage—the bear’s the attraction—not you.”

  One word snagged at me. The king?

  “Arthur! Do you ken me?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  The bear was to pass in review before the English king?

  “Very well,” the captain said. “Stay beside her up to the Tower of London gates, but don’t go in. The bear will be Henry’s problem then, and welcome to it!” The captain paused for a moment, and then in an easier tone, said, “You’re not planning on escaping with her again, are you? Traipsing all over London? Maybe crossing the great bridge, the two of you rogues together, or wreaking havoc in the fish market, or claiming sanctuary in the cathedral?”

  The captain cracked a smile. A wave of uneasy laughter coursed through the men.

  “No, sir,” I said.

  “Very well, then,” the captain said. “Your friends . . .” He cocked a wiry eyebrow in the direction of the doctor and at Thorvald beside him. “Your friends have been petitioning on your behalf. Without them, you’d be in a cartload of trouble. And you might be yet, if you don’t do as I command. If I’m satisfied, I’ll release you into the doctor’s custody, and then I wash my hands of you!”

  CHAPTER 41

  Birthright

  AFTER THAT, IT was as if a brisk, blustery wind had come upon us, for the air filled with shouting and creaking and clanking, and men swarmed all across the ship, and I had to cling to a corner of the bear’s cage to avoid being jostled and swept off my feet and maybe trodden underfoot. A crane appeared overhead, and some intrepid sailor climbed to the top of the cage and set the hook.

  I held my breath as the cage lifted off the deck and rose into the air above us, tilting and twisting. The bear slid from side to side, bellowing, scrabbling with her great feet and thudding against the bars, and a well of pity opened up in my heart. At last, the crane arm came to hover over a large, flatbed cart on the quay. Four men tied ropes to the cage, and amidst much shouting and maneuvering, the cage dropped onto the cart with a resounding thump.

  I ran across the gangplank, dodging two sailors who were unloading cargo, their curses ringing in my ears. I made my way to the bear’s cage and slipped between the bars. The bear snuffled at my face, my neck, my chest. I was murmuring to her, trying to comfort her, stroking the wide, flat space between her eyes, when an angry, honking cry sounded behind me. I turned to see a tall man dressed in King Haakon’s livery. He had a long, pale, equine face, and hair so blond it was almost white. He stabbed an indignant finger in my direction and went on in that honking voice of his—something about an outrage, something about a disgrace, something about a sordid, tattered urchin, by which it was clear that he meant me.

  The captain appeared beside him and spoke in a placating tone. I couldn’t hear what he said, but soon the horse-faced man bleated out something to a servant, who disappeared into the crowd and reappeared before long with an armful of clothing. Horse Face motioned the servant toward me; the captain said, “Arthur, put those on! And don’t dawdle!”

  And so I had to leave the cage, and strip off my clothes before the captain and the horse-faced man and God and everyone, and don the tunic and cloak and cap and stockings, which were of a finer, softer wool than any I had felt in all my life. And boots! Fine, supple leather boots, which were nonetheless too big for my feet. And all the while the captain was reminding me that I must walk beside the cage but not go within, that I was not to draw notice from the bear, for nobody had come to see me. He told me that King Haakon’s envoy (the horse-faced man) would precede us along the route through the streets, and that when we came to the English king, I was to bow low, then stand aside and say nothing, not a single word, upon pain of death.

  And then there was a commotion with a horse—a fine, white steed; a horse fit for a king—which was charged with pulling the bear’s cart. Except this horse took one look at the bear, and then his eyes rolled back in his head, and he began to plunge and kick and whinny. Presently, an ox was brought out to do the job, which displeased the envoy exceedingly because he did not deem the ox fine enough to represent King Haakon—he judged it a disgrace—but the bear must be pulled by something, and so the ox it was.

  At last, we set off through the streets of London. The sun had crested noon on this balmy, summer’s day, and many folk came into the streets to watch. Soon, we formed ourselves into a procession, with the envoy going first, and a small contingent of Norwegian guards, and then a larger force of English guards, and then the ox, and then the bear, with the doctor walking to one side of her, and I to the other. Fine shops and inns and houses rose steeply to either side, but the streets themselves churned with mud and refuse, and before long my new boots looked as if I had been working all day in the fields like a peasant farmer. The procession grew as we went, adding on behind: a juggler, a small troupe of musicians, a stilt walker, and three acrobats who could turn cartwheels and walk on their hands. And yet, as we passed, all eyes were on the bear.

  I think they would have liked her to be ferocious. Mothers clutched small children’s hands, pulling them away from the cage. A drunkard stumbled beside us for a while, miming fear and horror. A troop of ragtag boys trotted alongside, snarling and growling at the bear, as if exhorting her to behave as a bear ought. One of them prodded her with a stick, no doubt hoping for a savage snap of teeth, or spine-tingling roar, or a delicious jolt of terror if the bear lunged against the bars of her cage. I guessed that some of the spectators wouldn’t have minded if she broke out of her cage altogether and mauled a drunkard or two before she was recaptured.

  And I, too, expected the bear to become skittish—at the very least, to pace in her restless way. I expected to feel the familiar running thrum in her. I thought she might snap at the boy with the stick; I thought she might swat a paw at the wretched drunkard. I feared that the captain might deem I had made a poor job of pacifying her; he might lock me up again.

  But a strange sort of calm had come over her. While the whole human pageant strutted and whooped, she held herself with grave dignity. Did she sense that forces she didn’t understand had overtaken her; that life had finally closed in and trapped her; that it was useless to protest?

  Perhaps.

  But as I watched her, the clamor all about me seemed to grow dim. In my mind’s eye, I saw the stillness of a pale Norwegian sky in the moments before snowfall. The bright pulse of the aurora in the hush of night. I heard the silent ringing of the stars in their northern circuits, and the squeak of ice beneath my boots. I saw the flicker of moving water inside a frozen cascade; I caught the clean, mineral scent of ancient frost.

  And now, as I gazed at her, the bear seemed to grow even larger in my imagination. Not just the solid bulk of her, but large in another way—large enough to hold all of it, all of the land that was her birthright, within her skin and bones and blood.

  CHAPTER 42

  Old Enemy

  SOON, THE HOUSES and shops fell away to either side. We passed out of the town and into a wide meadow, toward a tall, gleaming-white tower surrounded by castle walls and a moat.

  The captain had said Tower of London. That must be where the bear was bound.

  As we drew near, I saw that part of the outer castle wall before us—the western wall—had collapsed into heaps of stony rubble that spilled into the moat. Workmen swarmed like bees over a latticework of wooden scaffolding set against the sections of wall that yet remained.

  Jus
t outside the moat stood a broad pavilion striped in orange and yellow and aflutter with festive banners. At first it seemed to me as if there was a garden within the pavilion—masses of reds and blues and browns and greens, shifting like blossoms in a gentle breeze. But before long the blossoms took on the shapes of gowns and robes and capes, and soon, I could make out the faces of the elegant lords and ladies who wore them.

  And now one figure detached himself from the rest and strode out to greet us. He gave a great, loud bark of a laugh and called back to someone in the pavilion. A fur-lined purple cloak streamed from his shoulders, and many fine rings glittered on his fingers, and a golden circlet sat upon his brow.

  Henry. The English king.

  He held up a hand, motioning for us to halt.

  Shouts rang out. Ahead, the Norwegian soldiers bunched up and came to a ragged halt. But the ox was slower to obey; he nearly plowed into the English soldiers, scattering them in disarray. The envoy shot out of the turmoil and went to bow before the king. They exchanged words I could not make out, and then both of them—the envoy and the king—made their way back toward the bear. Toward the doctor and me.

  The doctor doffed his cap and bowed, and I did too. The king halted so near, I could have taken two steps, reached out my hand, and touched the fur on his royal purple cloak.

  My father’s old enemy, the English king.

  I was glad that the bear remained calm, her great black nose exploring, as if to seek out scents hidden in folds and crevices of air. I was glad of my new, fine raiment, for it would have been unseemly to stand two steps from the King of England in the dirt-and-blood, dung-and-sweat–stained garb that had served me all the way from Norway. I wondered what my mother would think if she could see me now, bowing before King Henry.

  But the war with England had never been her fight, and it had ended not long after my father died. She would likely be grateful simply to know that I yet lived.