“This medicine help maybe.” Moon Song knelt before Isabella. “I try help?”
Isabella didn’t protest. She merely watched with mild curiosity as Moon Song smoothed the healing poultice on the blisters and sores and raw skin and bound them up with strips of cloth.
“No walk. No move,” Moon Song instructed. “Let medicine work.”
Isabella merely closed her eyes and leaned back against the boulder again.
“Is she going to be all right?”
Moon Song shrugged. She had bigger worries than Isabella’s feet. She was starting to get the feeling that wolves were following them again. The smell of blood from Isabella’s foot would most definitely interest them, and who knew how long that trail would linger. She could imagine a wolf pack sniffing along the trail they’d taken. They were on flat ground. No cliffs for shelter. Her great fear was that they might be regrouping, getting ready to attack again once night fell.
“This not good place,” she said. “Not tonight.”
“Tonight? Are you picking up on something?”
“Maybe. Maybe not. Just feeling.”
“Then we can’t stay here, and I can’t carry her far. I doubt she can take more than a step or two on those chewed-up feet.”
“You stay here. I will try find better place before it get dark.”
“Don’t go far,” he said.
“Why?” she teased. “You scared stay here by self?”
“No,” he said. “But I am afraid of losing you.”
The tenderness in his voice when he said that made her heart feel funny, and she did not want her heart feeling funny around this man. She was still trying to forget that unfortunate kiss. She left to do her explorations without another word.
She discovered that they were on a small peninsula. It didn’t go very far out into the lake but far enough that the trees were stunted and scraggly from being exposed to the cold wind coming off Lake Superior’s winter water. At first she was disappointed. She had come nearly a mile, and there was no sign of a cliff or even any large rocks that they could use to fortress themselves in for the night.
There was no reason to continue farther. This was as far as they could bring Isabella. Then she saw something that made her heart leap up, and she started crashing through the underbrush, shoving limbs away from Ayasha’s face, hoping she was seeing what she thought she was seeing.
What a discovery! The scraggly trees sheltered a Chippewa longhouse. This was one of the more permanent structures that her grandmother’s people constructed. They built them to house several families when the smaller family groups met together to work at a specific task. Just like the longhouse her grandmother’s people had in the stand of sugar maple they tapped and boiled down into sugar and syrup. Or the longhouses they built in favorite fishing spots to catch their winter supply. Or near the wild rice fields when that harvest was imminent. Her people were not nomads, but they did move around through the various seasons to be closer to whatever natural supplies they needed to cache a larger variety of food.
The camp was cold and abandoned but looked as though it had been used as recently as last summer. She entered the longhouse through a piece of leather hung over the doorway. It had been well built and was still sturdy. It even had sleeping benches built into the walls, which would be a great improvement over sleeping on the bare ground.
She investigated every inch, evaluating the possibilities.
There was an old bearskin that had been left behind. Far beneath one of the sleeping benches, she found a small iron cooking pot. It was quite a prize. Her guess was that the woman who left this behind had missed it when she got home. A pocketknife with one blade broken but one working blade left was wedged in the crack between another sleeping bench and the wall. Although she scavenged around the longhouse one more time, nothing else came to light. Still, those two items were quite a find. She walked back outside and stopped in her tracks, wondering if her eyes were playing tricks on her. There, leaning against a tree, was what looked like a perfectly sound birch bark canoe.
She ran to it, overjoyed. Wouldn’t Skypilot be thrilled with her discovery! Her joy turned to disappointment when she saw that it had a great hole in one side of it. That was the reason, no doubt, that it had been abandoned.
Still . . . a sturdy shelter, another knife blade, a ratty bearskin, a small cooking pot, and a useless canoe were a whole lot more than they had an hour ago. If they had to camp for a few days, she was grateful that Isabella had chosen to collapse near this place, otherwise they might have passed by without ever seeing it.
She wondered if Skypilot would consider this an answer to the prayers she’d heard him whispering throughout the night last night as he sat vigil over all of them. If so, she was going to enjoy telling him of her discovery.
“You were gone for a long time,” he said when she got back. “Were you foraging?”
“No. I find good thing.”
He listened intently as she described the Chippewa camp she’d found. “How far did you say it is?”
“Mile maybe.”
“It would give us some decent shelter while we wait for Isabella’s sore feet to heal up?”
“Oh yes.” Then she looked up at the sky and sniffed the air. “Better start. It rain soon.”
He glanced up into the sky.
“Isabella?” He bent over the sleeping woman. “It’s time to wake up. We need to see if you can walk.”
He helped her stand while Moon Song kicked the fire apart so it would burn out and then picked up her flint and the bundle of dwindling moss.
As happy as she was about finding the longhouse, it was the damaged canoe that was making her heart sing. Much of the building of canoes was considered women’s work among the Chippewa. Therefore, she knew exactly how to repair it. It took a long time to make a good, waterproof craft, but once built, a birch bark canoe was buoyant and sturdy and would be the very best way to get them out of here.
It would be a relief to hand Isabella over to her own people. Moon Song could hardly wait.
14
Skypilot had never had the chance to examine an Indian dwelling up close before. He was intrigued by the workmanship and the intelligence that had gone into making this one. There was a fire pit in the center, just like the woodstove in the middle of the logging camp bunkhouse, with an opening at the top—again, just like the bunkhouse.
He had anticipated that the log structure he and the other shanty boys normally lived in would be the better shelter, but now he wasn’t sure. That shanty at Foster’s camp was better than most, but the walls still leaked moisture. The smell of dozens of dirty bodies and unwashed feet never went away. He wondered if the cattail mats he saw layered upon the outside of this longhouse might not be better insulation in the long run than the green logs that grew frosted in the winter with condensation from the men’s breath. He and his lumber camp buddies knew the value of wearing layers of clothing, trapping the air between each layer for maximum warmth. It stood to reason that layering cattail mats over a longhouse would have the same effect.
He sat Isabella down on a sleeping bench.
“Stay here,” he instructed.
Then he took the cast-off bearskin outside and shook it out. The thing was filthy—but at least it would provide a bit of cushion.
The minute he and Isabella entered the longhouse, Moon Song disappeared to look more closely at that canoe she was so excited about. He was excited too, except that he had never been in a canoe and wasn’t looking forward to getting into this one.
“Is it usable?” he called out of the longhouse opening.
“I can fix.”
“You know how to repair a birch bark canoe?”
“No.”
“Then how in the world do you think you can . . .”
“I help Grandmother build one.” Her hands explored the ragged edges of the hole. “I think I know how to repair.”
Moon Song peeled and split the shallow black spruce
tree roots that she ripped up out of the ground. Then she drilled holes through the canoe with the tip of her knife as well as through the new birch bark patch she had cut off of a tree. She threaded the root strips in and out, so close together that they almost overlapped.
“Is there anything I can do to help?” Skypilot asked.
“Get sap from spruce tree.”
“How much?”
She nodded at the iron kettle beside her. “Fill it up.”
An hour later, they had a fire built, the patch had been stitched onto the canoe, the sap had melted, and Moon Song had feathered the end of a small branch and used it as a brush with which she’d redaubed not only the patch but every seam in the canoe.
He inspected the lightweight bark boat. How could it possibly withstand the punishment Lake Superior could give it? “Will it hold all of us?”
“Yes.”
“Won’t the lake tear it apart?”
“No. We fine.” She laid down the brush. “Canoe dry while we sleep.”
There was still supper to accomplish—more fish. Afterward, she cleaned out the small iron pot, then put all the fish bones, skin, and heads into it, along with anything else she deemed edible, including the leftover mussels that Isabella had ignored, covered it all with water and set it to simmering on the coals. It was a noxious-looking liquid.
“What’s that for?” he asked.
“Fish broth. Drink in morning. Very good.” Then she left him to go hunt some more moss for the baby.
Moon Song was grateful for the sleeping benches. This made it possible for her to put the baby in between her and the wall of the longhouse, with her back to Isabella, her knife at the ready in case the woman tried anything else. She felt sorry for Isabella, but Ayasha came first.
She could tell that Skypilot didn’t know what to do about Isabella. Finally, he tied her to the bench, for fear she’d awaken and try to do some damage to one of them. That cloth rope was not going to hurt her. In fact, she doubted that it would do a thing to hold her back if she wanted to escape.
Moon Song slept little during the night. The wolves kept howling. Her instincts had been correct. The wolves had regrouped after the loss of their leader, they were near, and they were hungry. The shelter they were in wouldn’t keep out a determined animal, but it had afforded enough protection to make them think twice.
She also slept little because she was planning what had to happen tomorrow.
The canoe would be fine. It was a well-built craft to begin with, and she had repaired it well. She knew Lake Superior’s moods and knew she could make many miles safely in that canoe if the weather held. Her greatest concern was Isabella. It was a risk to take that crazy lady with them. It took skill not to accidentally tip a canoe over. If Isabella suddenly decided to jump out, and who knew what she might get in her head to do, she could capsize all of them.
Toward morning, she decided that if they were going to get safely to Marquette, they would have to leave Isabella behind. Her fear was that Skypilot would not allow it. If so, she would be forced to leave without him, even though she desperately needed his strength for the long canoe voyage.
The next morning, she and Skypilot carried the canoe to the water, slid it in, and tethered it. The fishing was good, and they caught several large trout, enough to feed them and leave some behind for Isabella. As they ate, she kept an eye on the white woman to see if there was any spark of sanity coming back into her eyes. There wasn’t. It was as though her body was alive but the rest of her was dead. Isabella did at least feed herself, but the whole time she did, she sat there staring into space.
“She stay here.” Moon Song nodded toward Isabella. “We go on alone.”
Skypilot’s head jerked up. “You can’t be serious.”
“You want to drown?”
“Of course not.”
“She stay here. We will have others come get later. One, two days maybe.”
“We can’t leave her here by herself for two days,” he said. “There’s no telling what she’ll do.”
“In canoe she is a danger.”
His jaw set stubbornly. “I won’t abandon an innocent woman. We have to take her with us.”
“You ever paddle a canoe?”
“No. I’ve paddled small rowboats, but I’ve never even been in a canoe.”
“Canoe tricky.”
“I’ll stay here with her, then.”
She frowned. “You think the townspeople listen to this Chippewa woman? You think they send help because Moon Song say so?”
He hesitated. “I don’t know.”
“You are strong. We get to town faster.”
He looked relieved. “If it’s only muscle you need and someone the people from town will listen to, I’ll go and you stay.”
The man had never handled a canoe in his life. He had no idea what he was talking about. They could stand here and argue, or he could find out for himself that there was more to this than he realized.
“You do that.” She stood up and crossed her arms. She could hardly wait to watch him try.
“You mean now?”
“Here.” She picked up one of the paddles she’d found beside the canoe.
He took it and looked at it doubtfully. “You do mean now.”
He finished the last piece of fish and then followed her down to the lake.
It took exactly six seconds for him to turn the canoe over and get dunked. He came up out of the water, spluttering, and then righted the canoe. She could tell he was angry, and couldn’t help rubbing it in a little.
“You want help?” She smiled. “I hold it steady for you.”
“You will not!” His face was grim. “I’ll get the hang of this if it kills me.”
She stood back and watched as he tried several more times and overturned it each time. His bulk, lack of experience, and the buoyancy of the craft made it a difficult task. She kept quiet as Skypilot learned a lesson, and it was an important lesson to learn. It hurt her to see this good man struggle, but a canoe could save a life or take it. One clumsy move could capsize everyone.
Finally, he was in the canoe, but barely. He sat like a child, with legs outstretched before him, grasping the sides of the canoe, trying to balance himself. So far so good, but he had managed to get himself into a difficult position from which to paddle.
“Here.” She handed him the paddle. “Try Indian way of sitting on knees.”
She held the canoe steady while he repositioned himself, then she gave it a gentle shove out into the water.
It was hard not to feel sorry for him. He knelt in the middle, trying to paddle while the canoe acted as though it had a mind of its own. It didn’t take long before he was going in circles. When he floundered close enough to shore, she waded in and caught the nose of the canoe.
A lesser man would have been cursing by now, but instead, Skypilot simply admitted defeat.
“You were right,” he said. “This is much harder than I imagined. You pretty much grew up in one of these, didn’t you?”
“Yes.”
“Do you really think we can leave Isabella alone here?”
“Only choice.”
“I’ll try to talk to her.”
She waited while he had his little talk with the crazy lady. She could hear him reassuring her that they would send someone soon to come back and get her.
Moon Song wasn’t convinced that Isabella cared whether they came back or not. From what she could tell, the woman would lie on that sleeping bench until she starved to death unless someone made her get up and move.
“I think she understands what we’re planning to do,” Skypilot said. “At least she nodded that she did. I removed a couple of the sleeping benches and braced them against the door when I left. If she’ll leave them there, I think they’ll be sturdy enough to keep the wolves out if they come sniffing around later on.”
“We hurry.” Moon Song tied a long piece of white cloth to a branch that hung out over the water. “There
,” she said. “Make easy to find longhouse.”
Once again, she held the canoe while he climbed in.
“You sit in front,” she instructed.
“In front? I figured you would want to be in front since you’d be steering.”
“The person in back steer.” She leaped in, positioned herself in the back, pulled the paddle from the bottom of the canoe, and began to paddle. She saw Skypilot reach for his.
“No,” she said. “Wait. Get feel for canoe. Then you help.”
Skillfully, she set the canoe’s nose out into the lake. The water was calm. If the big timberman in front of her could keep from capsizing when he started to help, they would make good time.
“You think you can paddle now?” she asked. “Without falling out of boat?”
“I hope so.”
“Try.”
He dipped the paddle in and gave a mighty shove, making the canoe tip to one side. She sighed. She was afraid of that.
“Not so hard. Long way to go. Make muscle last.”
It took a few more instructions, but eventually they worked out a rhythm, and soon the canoe was skimming across the water.
“You do realize there are things that I’m good at, don’t you, Moon Song?” His voice, usually so filled with confidence, was subdued. “I’m not a complete dunce about everything.”
“Oh yes!” she said brightly, as though praising a small child. “You read marks on paper very, very good.”
He laughed out loud. “That doesn’t amount to much in a situation like this, does it, Moon Song?”
“You fight wolves good too.” Her voice grew husky at the memory. “You save our lives.”
“You’ve also fed us and saved our lives,” he said. “I am sorry if I’ve ever treated you like you were ignorant.”
She didn’t say anything.
“I have treated you like you were ignorant in the past,” he said. “Haven’t I?”
She thought back. Had he? He had been kind, but he had frequently treated her like she was one of the children he had taught at the lumber camp during his convalescence.
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