by Eva Pohler
“I don’t believe in pure evil,” Ellen said. “Remember what the chief said? He said that great evil is made by great pain. Whatever spirit is tormenting us is doing so because of its own torment.”
“Maybe the ghost had nothing to do with the car not starting,” Sue said.
They continued on in silence. Many minutes passed. Sue’s pace slackened. Ellen thought that perhaps an entire hour had gone by since they’d first set foot toward the main road.
“We should be to the road by now,” she said. “Didn’t Karen say it was only a mile?”
“I believe so,” Sue said. “But maybe she was mistaken.”
“We’ve walked more than a mile,” Tanya said. “I walk two miles nearly every day, and this feels longer than my usual route.”
“Maybe it’s because I’m slowing you down,” Sue offered.
“No, that’s not it,” Tanya assured her.
Up ahead, a flock of over thirty crows flew from the canopy onto the dirt road, about twenty yards away.
“What’s this?” Tanya muttered as she slowed her pace.
Sue stopped in her tracks. “Why are they staring at us?”
“They aren’t staring at us,” Ellen scoffed, but Sue was right. Ellen took a few steps forward and froze.
“Yes, they are,” Tanya said. “Maybe we should turn around.”
“They’re giving me the creeps,” Sue whispered. “It’s like they want to eat us.”
Ellen shuddered. “Ugh. Don’t say that.”
Tanya backed away from the birds. “This doesn’t seem natural.”
“I shouldn’t have left the circle of protection,” Sue said.
“You should have brought the salt out with you instead of the pie and cinnamon rolls,” Ellen complained.
“Cinnamon roll,” Sue corrected. “I ate the rest last night and thought one of you might like the last one. I was trying to be thoughtful.”
“Oh, what do we do?” Tanya whispered.
Suddenly the flock lifted from the dirt path and flew directly toward them. Ellen and her friends screamed and scattered.
Ellen pushed through the trees and brush and into the surrounding woods, flapping her arms to shoo away the birds. She felt one of them in her hair, causing her to shriek and blindly swat the air overhead as she went wildly forward, getting scratched by the thorny underbrush along the way. A thick gnarly root snagged her foot, and she stumbled to the ground, hurting her ankle in the fall. When she tried to stand up, she winced with pain. Her ankle could not bear the weight. She fell back onto her bottom onto a patch of cool dirt.
At least the birds had gone. But where were Sue and Tanya?
“Sue?” she cried. “Tanya?”
When they didn’t answer, she shouted again. She continued to cry out for them until her throat hurt. She glanced around for the water bottle she’d dropped during her scare with the birds but didn’t see it.
“Damn,” she muttered.
Her lips were parched, and her throat was sore, and she could really use a drink. She sat there for a few minutes as tears pricked her eyes. Then she tried once again to climb to her feet, thinking she couldn’t be that far from the dirt road. Sue and Tanya would have an easier time finding her if she could make it out of the woods and into the open.
She winced as she staggered a few feet in the direction she had come.
“Nope,” she muttered. “You’re not going anywhere in this state.”
As she fell back to the ground, she lost her balance, rolled onto her back, and struck her head on a rock, knocking her out cold.
Ellen blinked and rubbed her head. How long had she been out? Dusk had fallen and, together with the thick canopy overhead, had diminished the visibility in the woods.
“Sue?” Ellen cried out. “Tanya?”
She climbed to her feet and winced at the pain in her ankle. It had swelled the size of an orange.
“Geez,” she muttered. “I hope it’s not broken.”
She hobbled through the brush, in spite of the severe pain, in the direction she believed was the dirt road—however, nothing looked familiar in the growing darkness, and she wasn’t sure if, in her fall, she’d gotten turned around.
After many minutes had passed, Ellen wondered if she’d been going the wrong way. Without the sun, it was difficult to tell. She leaned against the trunk of a tree and sighed. Tears of frustration welled in her eyes.
“Anyone there?” she cried. “Can someone help me?”
A twig snapped in the distance.
“Tanya?” she shouted. “Sue?”
Brush rustled but not from the wind. Something was in the woods with her, and it was getting closer.
“Tanya? Is that you?”
Ellen began to tremble. Could it be a bear?
She backed away from the sound of snapping twigs and rustling brush. Her heart pounded against her ribs. She could barely feel the pain in her ankle as she held her breath and scrambled through the woods. Where was that damn dirt road? She tried her best to pick up her speed, but the thing in the woods quickened its pace, too.
Panting now from fear and pain, she stubbed the toes of her good foot against a rock, and down she went with a cry. Before she could clamor to her feet again, something emerged from the brush and stood over her, just a few feet away.
It was a white buffalo, and it was glowing.
“Help me,” the buffalo said.
Ellen lifted her brows, realizing it wasn’t an animal, but a man—or the ghost of a young man.
“Who are you?” she asked.
“I’ve gone by many names. My father and mother called me Rabbit, because one of my legs was longer than the other, and whenever I walked, I appeared to hop. The teachers at Holy Family Mission called me Randal Smith.”
“Was your father called Talks to Buffalo and your mother called Crow Woman?”
The beast nodded.
“Were either of them also called Minatsipoyit?” Ellen asked.
“No. Why?”
Ellen shook her head, wondering if there were someone other than the Crow Woman haunting Talks to Buffalo Lodge. “Never mind. Why do you need my help?”
“My body is lost,” he said. “My mother won’t find peace until it’s found. And she wants justice—or vengeance.”
“Where is it? How did you die?”
“I don’t know. I can’t remember much. I think I was strangled.”
Ellen’s mouth dropped open. “By whom?”
“I don’t know. But it happened at school, in my twelfth grade.”
“Holy Family Mission?”
The beast nodded. “My mother won’t rest. She’s angry—angry that I was taken from her, angry that I was murdered, angry that my killer got away with it, and angry that she didn’t know any of this until she died and found me trapped in the buffalo skin. Can you help me?”
Ellen licked her dry lips. “I think your mother tried to kill me and my friends. Or is there someone there with her at the house?”
“She hates white people. She doesn’t trust you.”
Ellen supposed she didn’t blame her. “Can’t you convince her to trust us? It would make it easier for me to help you.”
“I don’t think so. When you return to the house, take one of the Blackfeet with you. That might make a difference.”
Ellen sucked in her lips and nodded.
“There’s something else,” the white buffalo said.
“I’m listening.”
“I can feel the white buffalo pulling toward another. It belongs to someone else now. I don’t know who. I thought, when you touched it, that it belonged to you. It responded to you. Did you feel it?”
Ellen nodded.
“Maybe you are meant to find its rightful owner. Maybe, if you can find my body, the buffalo will lead you to him. I’m not sure if I can leave until you do.”
Finding the hide’s rightful owner seemed impossible to Ellen. Where would she start? “I’ll try my best. But for now, can you help me? I’m l
ost, and I have a hurt ankle.”
“I already have,” he said.
She furrowed her brows and looked around.
“Open your eyes,” he said.
“Huh?”
“Ellen, open your eyes!”
With a gasp, Ellen blinked to find Tanya and Sue bending over her, where she lay on the ground in the woods.
“Thank God!” Tanya cried. “I thought you were dead!”
Ellen carefully sat up. Light filtered through the trees. Her head throbbed. “Not dead, but I think I’ve broken my ankle. How long was I out?”
“That depends on how long ago you passed out,” Sue said. “We’ve been searching for you for over an hour.”
“Only an hour? It seemed longer. How did you find me?”
Sue and Tanya exchanged enigmatic looks.
“What?” Ellen asked.
“This is going to sound strange,” Sue said. “But, well, we thought we saw a white buffalo, and this is where it led us.”
“Then it disappeared,” Tanya said. “Strange, right?”
Ellen’s mouth fell open as she remembered her dream. “Yes, but I believe you. I think it visited me in a dream.”
Tanya offered a hand to Ellen. “Come on. Let’s get out of here.”
Ellen groaned from the pain in her head and her ankle. Once she was on her feet, her friends each wrapped an arm around her waist to help her along.
“Do you know the way?” she asked them.
“The road is just over there,” Sue said. “We were closer to the main road than we thought. Tanya and I could hear cars on the road as we were looking for you.”
“That’s good news.”
As they hobbled through the brush, Ellen told them what Rabbit told her in her dream.
“But if he died at Holy Family Mission, wouldn’t he have been found and buried by now?” Tanya asked.
“Obviously not,” Sue said, “yet that’s a long time for a body to have gone undetected. I’m not sure where to begin to look for him.”
They stepped from the woods and onto the dirt road.
“Thank God,” Ellen said. “Which way do we go now?”
“Hmm. Don’t we want to go right?” Sue asked.
“No, I thought left,” Tanya said.
Ellen sighed. “Great.”
Just then, the wind whipped their hair back. Ellen almost fell, but her friends caught her just as a white buffalo whirled past them on the road and then disappeared.
“You must be right,” Sue said to Tanya. “We should go left, if we’re to believe the white buffalo.”
They trod along the dirt path for another five minutes, when the paved road, at long last, came into view.
Even better, a car was pulled over on the side of the road, and the driver was bent over a phone.
As they neared the car, Ellen recognized the black Honda Accord that belonged to Karen Murray.
“Karen?” Ellen shouted as they approached the vehicle.
A window rolled down to reveal, not Karen, but Terry Murray.
“What in the world?” he said. “How did you ladies end up here?”
“We could ask the same of you,” Sue said. “But we won’t, because you’re a sight for sore eyes, if there ever was one.”
Chapter Eight: The Jesuit Priest
“Someone else better drive,” Terry Murray said after Ellen and her friends had asked for a lift. “I thought I was sober enough, but I nearly hit a tree early this morning. I’ve been sitting here, rather stunned, ever since.”
“I’ll drive,” Sue offered as she helped Ellen into the backseat.
Terry climbed in behind the driver’s seat beside Ellen.
“It’s good you had the sense to pull over,” Ellen said. “Have you thought about getting professional help?”
Tanya climbed into the front passenger’s seat as Sue went around and got behind the wheel.
“I have help, for all the good it’s done me.”
“Is there something else the matter, Terry?” Ellen asked as she strapped herself in.
“I won’t bother you with my troubles.” He burst into tears. “Karen left me last night. We were at the casino, for a date night, trying to patch things up, and, like always, I drank too much. She told me not to come home. Then she got a ride and left me there.”
“Oh, no,” Ellen said. “I’m so sorry.”
Tanya glanced back and frowned but said nothing.
Sue started the engine. Ellen was relieved when the car came to life.
“Where should we go first?” Sue asked.
“Better drop me at my sister’s house,” he said. “I’m sure she won’t mind giving you a ride. Take this road for another mile and then turn left.”
Sue pulled off, and they sat in awkward silence for a while.
Then Ellen asked Terry, “By any chance, do you know what Minatsipoyit means?”
“Stop talking,” he said.
Ellen blushed. “Oh, I’m sorry.”
“That’s what it means,” he said. “Mina tsipoyit. It means stop talking.”
Ellen spent the next several days in her room at Glacier Park Lodge with her ankle on ice. She’d seen a doctor and had discovered that it wasn’t broken, just sprained, and had been told to stay off it for at least a week, or until the tenderness went away. So, she spent her days on pain medication watching Netflix while Sue and Tanya visited the casino, the shops, and the restaurants.
Although Sue had gone back with Karen Murray to Talks to Buffalo Lodge to retrieve their purses and anything else she could carry, and she’d had the rental towed back to the rental place, they’d decided to leave the heavier equipment until Ellen could return to help with another investigation, if they could convince Karen Murray to accompany them.
Ellen was about to begin another episode of Downton Abbey when her phone rang.
Not recognizing the number, she said, “Hello?”
“Hello, Mrs. Mohr?”
“Yes?”
“This is Father Gonzales, from Holy Family Mission Church.”
“Hello, Father. Thanks so much for getting back to me.”
“I’m sorry it’s taken so long, but I think you’ll be interested in what I’ve discovered.”
Ellen sat up in her chair. “Really? What is it?”
“I think you’d better come for a visit. It’s a story better told in person.”
Ellen sighed. “Unfortunately, I’ve sprained my ankle. Is there any chance you’d be willing to come visit me at Glacier Park Lodge?”
“I could come in an hour, if that’s convenient.”
Ellen smiled. “That would be great. My friends should be back by then. Call when you arrive, and we’ll meet you in the lobby.”
An hour later, Ellen and her friends sat with Father Gonzales in the great lobby of Glacier Park Lodge, with its forty-foot pine posts and colorfully upholstered rustic furniture. They each sipped cups of coffee as Father Gonzales reported his findings.
The Jesuit priest was an attractive young man in his mid-thirties with short brown hair and round, dark eyes. His lips were thick, and he spoke with a Spanish accent. Ellen suspected, without asking, that he was originally from Central America.
He sat on the edge of his seat, leaning with his elbows on his knees, and spoke with an animated demeanor.
“Before I share the details of what I’ve learned,” he began, after introductions and small talk had been made, “I want to explain something about Holy Family Mission.” He cleared his throat. “We know now that the goals of the boarding school in the late 1800s and early 1900s were wrong. Mostly Western European Jesuit priests and Ursuline nuns—not to mention the American pioneers—were horrified by the polygamy and pagan sun worship of the Native Americans. It was thought to be uncivilized and a barrier to eternal salvation.”
“But not anymore?” Sue asked.
Father Gonzales blushed. “Well, morally speaking, we still don’t approve of polygamy and paganism, but we’ve
also learned to respect cultural customs that are different from our own. You see, back then, the goal was to stifle the Indian to save the soul. The priests and nuns emphatically believed in their work. They felt they had the precious souls of the Indian children in their hands—that they were responsible for them. And they made great sacrifices to answer the calling to save the children.”
“What sacrifices?” Ellen wanted to know.
“Have you ever visited Montana at any other time of year?” he asked.
The three women shook their heads.
“The climate is brutal. Summer lasts for the blink of an eye, and it goes straight to winter, with no spring to speak of. Farming in such conditions in those days was all but futile, and food was scarce. The men and women who served often died on the job—from starvation, frostbite, hostile Indians, or exhaustion. People today seem to imagine a bunch of haughty, power-hungry priests and nuns that enjoyed controlling their victims, when, in fact, they served at great costs to their personal well-being.”
“I doubt they suffered more than the native children and their families,” Tanya muttered.
“I don’t doubt you’re right,” Father Gonzales said. “Suffering that was made worse by the goals of the U.S. government.”
“In what way?” Sue asked.
“Well, you see, while the priests and nuns wanted to save the soul of every man, woman, and child, the federal government wanted to make the tribes docile and easy to control, through the indoctrination and assimilation of their children. The church couldn’t have done it without federal funding.”
“Forgive me, Father,” Ellen began, “but what’s your point in telling us this?”
Father Gonzales clasped his hands together. “I stumbled upon an interesting document from 1909 regarding Randal Smith—er, Rabbit. It declared him missing and presumed dead.”
Ellen’s brows shot up. “Why didn’t you say?”
“Because there’s more to it,” he said. “You see, this puzzled me, especially when I found no mention of it in any of the newspaper records online.”
“So, what do you think happened?” Sue asked as she glanced excitedly at Ellen and Tanya.
“I decided to comb through the books of letters that have been left behind by the Jesuit priests and brothers who’ve served at Holy Family Mission over the years. I focused on those written in 1908 and 1909 and found the diaries of three different priests. I read through them and was shocked by what I uncovered in one of them—in the letters of Father Jerome Galdas.”