We run fast that night, gobbling up more miles than I’d managed on the rest of my runs that winter, and when we come back, me sweaty and the dogs panting, it was nearly time for Dad to get up. I threw out the snow hook and brought my team to a stop. Took Flash off the line and led her to her house. I’d been inclined to make Flash my lead once race time come round, and that night had settled it, she was calm and focused and even now as I got her settled she watched me with alert eyes. At least till her attention pulled away from me and landed on Jesse, already dressed for the day, unclipping Zip’s harness. I hadn’t even heard him cross the yard.
Zip lunged and jumped, not trying to get away but still feeling playful after our run. Jesse struggled to keep hold of her.
A queasy feeling rose in my gut, but all I said was, Keep a firm grip on her harness. But don’t pull her to where you want to go. Kneel down and give her a good scratch.
Jesse squatted and held on to Zip with one hand while he stroked her fur with the other. Murmured to her, Good girl, that’s right, his voice and his touch calming her till she sat with her tongue out and her ears soft.
She’ll mind you now, I said. You can lead her to her house.
He walked her over to her spot, then fished some treats from his pocket. Let her lick his face after, then wrestled with her a little. I watched the two of them while I fed the dogs who’d run that night.
Zip always wants to play, I told Jesse as I filled Zip’s bowl. Sometimes you just got to let her know it’s quiet time. All that energy’s what makes her a good racing dog, though.
You’ve got a real way with them, Jesse said.
That’s what Dad always tells me.
He followed me over to the sled. I started winding the rigging up so it wouldn’t tangle.
I’m not going to say anything, he offered.
About what?
I don’t imagine you’re out here in the middle of the night because you prefer to mush at four a.m., he said. When I didn’t reply, he said, Your dad told me you’re mad because you can’t train. But I guess you found a way.
The two of them, chattering like squirrels together. Dad couldn’t seem to keep his mouth shut round Jesse.
He don’t got any business telling you anything about me, I said.
Jesse returned to Zip, begun massaging her feet. After I drug the sled inside, I come back out and found he had moved on to Hazel. She rolled onto her back and let him rub her belly.
You’re pretty good with them, too, I heard myself say. You have your own dogs?
He didn’t answer right away. Shook his head, then said, Well, yeah, at my grandpa’s place. I pretty much grew up there after my parents died. Up in Maine. Grandpa had about thirty dogs, and I was practically one of the pack. He blushed under the light in the dog yard. That probably sounds silly.
No, I said. Sounds familiar.
He fished a treat from his pocket, offered it to Hazel.
I thought you said you was from Montana, I said.
He glanced up. Not from there, he said. Just passed through before I headed up this way.
So you lived in Maine?
He nodded.
With your grandparents.
Right, he said.
They was mushers?
Not really, he said. Mostly just used dogs as transportation or to haul stuff. My grandpa didn’t start mushing till he retired.
Retired from what?
He was a schoolteacher. Then Jesse laughed. Said, He might have been the only musher who would recite Shakespeare from the back of his sled.
He stood up then, so I stood up, too. We was close enough, I could see the spray of freckles on his cheeks and the smoothness of his skin. I was nearly tall as he was, which wasn’t very, and I was broader across. It occurred to me that if we was ever to get into a scuffle, the odds of me coming out on top was pretty certain.
Seventeen’s awful young to come all that way, I said.
What do you mean?
I hesitated. He knew I wasn’t supposed to be training, but he’d agreed not to rat on me without me even asking. Then again, that meant he had something on me. Wouldn’t hurt to let him know I had something on him, too.
I don’t know, I said. Just, you said you was seventeen. And you come clear across the country, up to Alaska. That’s a lot of time on your own. A lot of time wandering round in the woods.
His eyes was gray, almost colorless in the light of the lamp in the dog yard, and his face placid as a lake on a calm day.
You ever do much trapping? I asked.
His face didn’t change as he said, It’s nearly morning. I should put some coffee on. He turned away from me, back toward the house. Stopped just outside the circle of light cast by the lamp, the shape of him visible but the expression on his face lost in shadow. You’re seventeen yourself, aren’t you? he said. Your dad told me you’ve got a birthday coming in March.
So?
So you spend a lot of time alone in the woods, Jesse said. A lot of people would ask about that. A girl on her own in the woods.
So? I said again.
He turned, his voice come over his shoulder. No telling what you might get up to out there. Then he scuffled away, dissolved as he moved into the shadows between the dog yard and the house.
I had stood still as stone when I’d found my trap triggered but the catch missing, the first night I’d snuck out for a run. I had strained to hear if someone was nearby. No movement in the brush, no fall of snow or crunch underfoot as someone slipped away or come closer to watch as I reset the trap. But I had made other stops that night, other opportunities for someone already roaming the woods to keep themselves hid while I drained the catch I did find.
And how long had Jesse been in our woods before that night? What else had he seen?
Just a few words and he had me fretting the rest of the day. That was how Jesse Goodwin worked, I noticed over the next weeks. I never heard him suggest an idea, not once. He never said the first word, just appeared out of nowhere to quietly go about his work till Dad noticed him. Still he wouldn’t say nothing, waiting for Dad to start asking questions or building on the idea that Jesse’d already had. Then Jesse would nod and agree, make Dad feel like he was the one who’d come up with their next project. Water don’t run a straight course, it winds round trees and boulders, snakes through mountain passes, tumbling downhill to reach its destination. Watching Jesse, I begun to learn sometimes it’s easier to get what you want by taking your time and going round the obstacles, instead of trying to plow right through them.
That’s the way the dog wheel come about. Jesse had took to lingering in the kitchen after dinner most nights, either to play cards with Dad or help Scott with his homework. That night, he hunched over the little notebook he always carried in his pocket, a stub of pencil in his hand as he scribbled, lines going this way and that.
It was Scott who piped up first. He’d pushed his math book aside to watch Jesse draw. That looks like Flash, Scott said.
I was set on ignoring whatever Jesse was doing, but at the mention of Flash I had to look up. He had drew my lead dog exactly right, somehow with just a pencil he’d managed to show the intelligent light in her eyes.
But Flash was only a detail in a larger picture. Jesse had drew something like a giant bicycle wheel without the rim or tire. The hub of it was stuck in the ground and it had six spokes, each one ended in a platform. On top of each platform was a box that looked like our dogs’ houses. The Flash he’d sketched was running, attached to the end of one spoke by a lead.