Shadowbrook (72 page)

Bishkek’s look darkened. “Then make many prayers. As many as he needs.”
Ayi!
Just like the Midewiwin. Always reminding you how important they were.
And impossible to know when they spoke the truth and when they were only boasting. Still, better to be sure. “Many prayers,” he repeated. “I will send an elkskin tomorrow. It will snow soon. You will need it.”

Shabnokis cocked her head at the gray sky. “Leaf Falling is too early for snow.”

So, she did not know as much as he did. Nonetheless. “I did not come here to talk about the weather. Tell my son what you told me.”

Shabnokis shrugged. “I have told you and the others many things. Besides, I am old and I forget much.”

“Two elkskins,” Bishkek promised.

“Father, I don’t—”

“Be quiet. I brought you here to listen, not to talk.”

Shabnokis came toward them. “Good skins,” she said. “Not shabby with half the fur gone.”

“The best,” Bishkek assured her.

The squaw priest squatted on the ground and motioned the two men to join her. Corm tried to keep his distance, but Bishkek pushed him closer. The woman wore a buckskin shirt much like that of a
coureur de bois.
The laces that closed the neck were not done up and he could see the wrinkled skin of the flat place above her drooping breasts. No whole-skin otter bag. Maybe she left it in the wickiup because she knew this wasn’t a ceremonial visit. Meaning Bishkek must have arranged everything ahead of time. Which was a little odd since Corm had arrived in Singing Snow without warning and not more than an hour earlier.

“A priest of my lodge, a Miami, died in Thunder Moon. Before the Telling,” Shabnokis said. Corm realized he had lately been too long and too steadily among the
Cmokmanuk
He automatically translated that to two months ago, early July. “I was among those who attended his ending.”

The squaw priest closed her eyes and began humming softly to herself.
“Wa, hi, hi, hi.
It was a bad ending,” she whispered. “He died slowly, with his belly on fire. Before the spirit left him he kept repeating the same thing.
Papankamwa, esipana, ayaapia, anseepikwa, eeyeelia, pileewa.
”

“Those are Miami words,” Bishkek supplied.

“I know.” Corm looked from his manhood father to the squaw priest. She had just repeated the Miami names for racoon, elk buck, spider, fox, possum, and turkey, the symbols carved on the Suckáuhock It was not possible that Bishkek could have told her those things. For one thing he would never betray Cormac. Never. For another, he didn’t have the information. Bishkek had always refused to look at the Súki beads. Corm’s heart began hammering in his chest. “This priest who died, was he named Takito?” Genevieve Lydius’s priest, who’d put Cormac to sleep for three days and nearly got him killed.

“No, I told you before. The one called Takito is not from my lodge. I would
never be at his ending. This one was—” Shabnokis broke off. “He is not yet dead six moons. I cannot speak his name. It is anyway not important.
Eehsipana, ayaapia
—”

“You already told me the six animal names. What else did he say?”

Bishkek made a sound of disapproval.
“Cmokman,”
he muttered softly under his breath, hoping Cormac would be reminded that he was acting white, not showing proper respect. Then, louder so the squaw priest would be sure to hear, “Two elkskins, remember. The very best.”

Shabnokis shrugged. She would allow the scar-face’s impertinence to pass, at least this time. “The fire in the dying priest’s belly,” she said, “it came from two things. One was the evil spirit who was slowly taking away his life. It was so big a spirit that his belly stuck out this much.” She used her hands to indicate a great swelling. “The other was from the shame of making a bargain with a
Cmokman
dog turd priest and not keeping his word.”

Ayi!
Finally some information he could use, though Corm was pretty sure he could guess the rest of the story. “What bargain?”

The squaw priest grunted to show her disapproval of yet another interruption, then continued. “A long time ago the priest of my lodge went to Québec. He met with a dog turd priest and told him that the Miami chief Memetosia was in Albany at a powwow with the other tribe, the English
Cmokmanuk
”

That meant the Midè and Christian priests had met in 1754, the same year Memetosia gave him the Suckáuhock. Corm’s chest roiled and his heart thudded against his ribs. “You said they made an agreement. What—”

Shabnokis turned to Bishkek. “Did you never teach this one any manners?”

“Comamden ezhawepsiyan.”
He can’t help being as he is. “Three elkskins.” Then, so she wouldn’t think he made too easy a bargain: “Small ones.”

“Big,” she corrected.

“If big, only two.”

For a moment it seemed she would continue to haggle, then Shabnokis waved her hand to dismiss the discussion. “Two big,” she agreed. “When he was in Québec the Midè priest promised the dog turd he would get him something rare, something that would make many
Anishinabeg
do his will. He said so when he was dying. We all heard it. Next he told how he had tried to keep his word, but he couldn’t do it. The brave he sent to get the thing he had promised never returned. Even though the priest of my lodge had told the brave that a terrible curse would be on him and his family if he did not.”

“He couldn’t return,” Corm said quietly. “I took his scalp and left his body in the river to feed the fish.”

Shabnokis nodded. “So the spirits told me. That is why I repeated this thing to your manhood father.”

“Two more questions,” Corm said. Bishkek sighed, but Shabnokis did not demand any more elkskins. “This Midè priest,” Corm asked, “the one who died, what did the
Cmokman
priest give him in return? Why would he agree to betray the
Anishinabeg
in this way?”

“For money. To buy firewater.” She turned her head and spat on the ground. “He could not live without firewater. And that is what made an evil spirit come into his belly and grow it out to here.” This time her hands made the swelling even bigger.

“Ahaw.”
Corm had no difficulty believing that a man could need alcohol more than he needed life or honor. He had seen such things before, and not just among Indians. “Do you know the name of the priest?”

“I told you, he is not dead six moons. I cannot—”

“Not him. The
Cmokman.
” It had to be the one they called Père Antoine. Philippe Faucon had told him that the Franciscan was some kind of spy for the English.

Shabnokis shook her head. “I never heard his name. I know only that he was a black robe and—”

“No, a brown robe! It must be a brown robe!”

“Do you think I have so many elkskins that you can be as rude as you wish?” Bishkek exploded.

“Stop berating him,” Shabnokis said. “It is as you said. He cannot help being as he is. There is too much white in him to change.”

Corm leaned forward, making sure she could see into his eyes. “My heart”—he put his hand over his chest—“my heart is
Anishinabeg
All that I do is for the good of the Real People.”

“Ahaw,”
the squaw priest agreed softly. “I know. That is what the spirits say. But the dog turd who made the bargain with the priest from my lodge was a black robe. The highest of the black robes. I cannot change the truth to make it what you want to hear.”

Corm started to get up. He needed to be alone, to think through this information. “Thank you. I will—”

“Wait. There is something else.”

“What else?”

“Only two elkskins,” Bishkek warned. “Big ones, but only two.”

“Two,” Shabnokis confirmed. “Anyway, this is for your bridge person son. The spirits have told me to tell him this: The one you are looking for, the squaw. She eats
kokotni.
”

Cormac stared at her.
Kokotni
was alligator.

“Why do you look so black and eat so little?” Bishkek demanded. “Is my daughter’s food no good in your belly?” More than half Corm’s portion of dried corn stewed with venison was uneaten.

“Lashi’s food is fine, Father. My thoughts fill me up and leave no room for eating.”

“A black robe, not a brown,” Bishkek said softly. “This is important?”

“It means that for two years I have been watching the wrong priest.”

The old man shrugged. “So now you can watch the right one. The spirits tell us things in their time, not ours. They do not make mistakes. Besides, it is good to know about the one you thought was a Huron, no? That too was something you did not know before.”

“Yes. It is very good to know that. I had already figured out that when she said not all trees with red leaves were sumacs, she meant the brave might only be pretending to be a Huron, but now … It is better to have the whole story, not just a part.”

“
Ahaw.
The Suckáuhock that Memetosia gave you, you still have it?” Bishkek nodded toward the medicine bag around Corm’s neck. “I see you still have the medicine bag with the Crane People’s symbols.”

“Yes, but only one bead is left.
Pileewa,
the turkey.”

“And the others?”

“I have given them away. To the chiefs of different tribes.”

“And are those gifts the reason it is said that in the
pays d’en haut
the
Anishinabeg
will accept no more war belts from Onontio?”

“Perhaps.” Lashi had come to collect his uneaten food and she looked at him reproachfully. Corm murmured an apology.

Bishkek waited until the squaw was gone before continuing. “And is your gift the reason they have the dying-without-skin illness in the
pays d’en haut?
Our own people and the Nipissing and Ottawa and Huron, they are all sick with this thing. Did the Súki beads bring them a curse?”

“
Co!
The beads are from our past. They are a treasure, not a curse.” Corm realized that Bishkek had been puzzling over this question for some time. “The dying-without-skin disease, Father, is a white man’s disease. They call it smallpox. No one knows where it comes from, but—”

“Sickness comes from the spirits. How can you be sure it was not your gift that—”

“Father, smallpox can be passed to another person if he touches something that belonged to one who was already sick. I have heard it said that in the Fort called William Henry there were many soldiers sick with smallpox. And the
Anishinabeg
who fought there took scalps. So maybe—”

“The scalps they won, honorably, in battle, that is what gives them the dying-without-skin disease?”

“I think so.
Ahaw.
”

Bishkek was silent for a long time. If your enemy could kill you even after he was dead and you took his scalp, what kind of a world would this be? This was the purpose of a bridge person, to explain one side to the other. Sometimes, though, he would rather not have the explanation. Some questions, he decided, are not just too big to answer, they are too big to ask. “Come, we will smoke. But not with the others yet.” The men of the village had gathered around a large fire and were passing a pipe. “Here first By ourselves.”

Cormac watched the old man prepare a pipe and light it from the embers of Lashi’s cooking fire. Bishkek took the first deep puff, then passed the pipe to him. Corm drew the fragrant smoke into his mouth, held it, then exhaled in the rings that in the past had so amused the young boys of the village. “Tell me something,” Bishkek said, smiling when he saw the smoke shapes in the firelight. “What Shabnokis said about
kokotni,
what did she mean?”

Ayi!
He should have known the old man wouldn’t let that pass without comment. “I knew a woman. I have been looking for her. I think the squaw priest was trying to tell me where she is.”

“This
kokotni,
it is a beast I have heard about, but I have never seen it.”

“It is a fierce thing that lives in the rivers far south of here. I’ve never seen it either,” Corm admitted. “Only heard stories.”

“And this woman, is she a squaw or a white woman?”

“White.” He would not lie to the old man, though he knew how much Bishkek hoped his manhood sons would choose squaws as wives and bring them to live in Singing Snow.

“She must be very brave if she eats this fierce beast.”

“Or very hungry.” Corm smoked, then looked over at the others who sat, and smoked and spoke of better things. He could hear the laughter. “The youngest son of my sister Lashi, I wish to send him on a journey.”

Bishkek turned and looked for the boy called Pondise, Winter, because he had been bom in the moon of No Sun. “How long a journey? He has only just passed to manhood.”

“It is a far way,” Corm admitted. “He will be gone for two moons, perhaps. But if he is clever, it won’t be dangerous. I cannot do it myself because I must return to Québec and see if I can learn more about the black robe.”

“Pondise is very clever. And he often hunts alone, going a far distance, and always returns with a kill. But you must speak with his manhood father if you wish to send him away. I do not have authority over him any longer.”

In the end it was decided; Pondise would go on the journey the bridge person wished him to take. Corm could see how excited the young man was at the
prospect, even though he tried hard to look grown-up and impassive. “If you succeed in this thing it will be good for all the
Anishinabeg,”
Corm promised. Pondise did not say anything, but he stood very tall.