Ice Palace by Edna Ferber

Author:Edna Ferber [Ferber, Edna]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 978-0-345-80614-7
Publisher: Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group
Published: 2014-03-04T00:00:00+00:00

16

“WHY DO THEY EAT all the time?” Chris asked Thor. The plump little fishing scow was bouncing its way across the waters from the cannery to the distant fishing grounds. “They eat and eat and eat. Six meals a day. It’s frightening. They can’t be hungry all the time. Why do they eat?”

“Lonely, probably,” Thor replied. “Out of their accustomed element. Not secure. We’ll talk about it this evening, maybe. When we’ve got things shipshape on the boat.”

She had asked the same question of Bor Maunch, the cannery manager. Maunch had just grinned. “We feed our workers good and they like it.”

Bor Maunch wished she’d shut up and not ask so many questions. Why? Why? Why? He was sick of it. She sure took after old Thor Storm, nosey like him. Of course she rated the Special Treatment, being Czar Kennedy’s granddaughter and all, and anyway he had had written instructions before she came. Visitors didn’t come often but when they did you showed them around, gave them a good meal, a couple cans of the best grade red salmon and that was it. But not this kid.

Why don’t you use Alaska workers instead of all these people from Outside? Why do the Filipinos eat apart from the rest? Could I eat one meal with them, I like to taste different kinds of food.… Your Grandpa wouldn’t like that.… But Grampa Thor would love it!… I mean your Grandpa Kennedy wouldn’t like it.… But I’m here with Grampa Thor.

Bor Maunch was sick of it.

On her arrival they had given her an astonishing suite, there in that wilderness of water and mountains, with only the cannery looming out of the water on piles, like a monster on stilts, to mark the hand of man. Amazed, Chris surveyed a sitting room, bedroom and bath. A white bearskin rug on the floor, chintz curtains, a radio, deep-cushioned chairs, a couch, lamps.

“But it’s absolutely luxurious!” Chris had exclaimed at sight of this splendor. “I thought it would be like a camp.” Somehow, she felt disappointed, resentful. “I might as well be at the Baranof Hotel in Juneau.”

“Nothing’s too good for Czar Kennedy’s granddaughter,” Bor Maunch assured her. “This place was fixed up like this for the Big Boys like Dave Husack and Kleet and those. General Cass Baldwin came once. They don’t get here once in a hundred years, but they like it this way when they do come.”

“I think I’ll sleep on the boat where Grampa Thor is.”

“No! No, you can’t do that, Miss Storm.” There was genuine alarm in his voice. “Czar would have me—–” His tone changed to a wheedling jocularity. “You’re better off here, Miss Storm, that’s a fact. Anyway, Thor’s busy loading up, he can’t be bothered with anybody on board now. They’re due out Tuesday morning. You’re staying here.”

“I am not. I’m going out on the tender with them.”

“That’s too rough for a young lady like you.”

She was rather surprised to hear herself saying, “I like it rough.”

He wagged his head in an unconvincing imitation of admiration.

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