Free Ahab's Wife by Sena Jeter Naslund Page A

to the contents of an encyclopedia. But when I began to expatiate, it amazed me how little I knew, and that, really, it did not require the day, but only the morning to get through it all. That afternoon, in the shade of the cottage, we pretended to eat from our pantry of mud pies and gossiped about the goats as though they were people.
    More glorious than the gulls, the clouds alone dominated the tower. If it was stolid permanence, they were playful change. They filled my head even as they filled the great dome of sky, and when I thought of sewing my mother the promised quilt, I wanted to fill it full of clouds. “Patched Clouds” my aunt and I called it, and the quilt was such variations of white and blue, and a full year in the fashioning, that Auntie almost cried to say good-bye to it and to fold it in the box to send back to Kentucky. I promised Aunt to make her a quilt representing the waves, which would be easy triangles, tipped with red at sunset. Aunt said that I learned much of geometry in making quilts, and that a proper tessellation took a kind of imagination. I did like to control the colors. My first sewing in Kentucky, which my mother had commenced in the same effortless way as my reading, had been a sampler of the alphabet, with the motto Love One Another .
    As the summer reached its conclusion, Uncle Torchy asked if I had my letters ready for the Camel and if there was one for my father. I surprised myself by saying I would write it that evening.
    Dear Father, you asked if Uncle has explained the workings of the Lighthouse to me, and the answer is that he has not, for I have not asked. Nor have I yet climbed up into the Lighthouse. But I have contemplated it in many different ways. Perhaps it is a Trojanhorse—it appears to be a gift from the gods, but really it harbors death and destruction?
    Why, when I tried to write to my father, did my thoughts turn dark? I had never thought that before.
    I have been reading the I liad and the Odyssey this summer, and whenever I come to the name Ulysses, for he is given the Roman variant of his name in this translation, I think of you. But it is I and not you who has gone from home.
    I sighed and looked unhappily at my letter. He had written a kinder letter to me, of pumpkins and yarn balls. Again, I saw his hand diving for my cheek. I thought of how the sea eagle smites the sea and comes away with a fish in its talons.
    Uncle has taken me fishing many times, and I can manage a small boat by myself. Of the fish we catch, scrod is my favorite to eat. I help Uncle keep his log of passing ships, as the government requires. He says my eyes are very keen. We keep a very large garden here so that the packet boat will not have to bring too many groceries when it comes. Probably the boat will come tomorrow, but if it does not I will add to this letter. Please ask Mother to read those of hers to you. In the meantime, I remain, your daughter, Una.
    The Camel did come the next day, but she had a new master, and he had not known to gather our letters from the post office in New Bedford. We were able to send out letters, and our groceries and fire-wood were aboard, but there was no news from Kentucky to savor. My second summer on the Lighthouse closed sadly.
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    T HAT SECOND WINTER , bereft of the letters from my parents, I became gray with isolation and loneliness for the world. That winter was fiercer than the one before, and when I went around to the backside of the tower in the late afternoon, I found that spray had been blown all the way up the hundred-foot cliff, and it coated the stones with silver rime. We saw only a few ships a week plying the rough ocean.
    That second November I felt especially hemmed in by grayness, for not only the tower but also the sea and sky were paler shades of gray. It occurred to me one evening when I knew it was time for sunset, though the sky had been a uniform colorless hue the whole day, that if I could elevate myself, I might get