Starfish

by James Crowley

  “It might just be my opinion,” their grandfather said as he turned the roasting meat, “but taking that buck’s life with a bow is more honorable than with a rifle. It shows a mutual respect ’cuz it’s more difficult. Gives them deers a fighting chance.”

  He cut a piece and handed it to Lionel with a wink. “I’ll leave the rest of this with you, Beatrice. Least I could do, seeing you sent the deer my way.”

  They ate the roasted venison and finished the last of the preserved stewed tomatoes that he had sent with Lionel and Beatrice when they had left his cabin on the river what now seemed like a lifetime ago. while they ate, their grandfather told them of his trip to the Boss Ribs’ and then to the outpost.

  Grandpa had left his cabin shortly after they had and wandered with Corn Poe in a roundabout way back to the Boss Ribs’ place. He said that Corn Poe got a beating from his father for leaving, but Grandpa thought it was more for the work that didn’t get done around the place as opposed to the family truly missing the boy.

  Lionel felt bad for Corn Poe, but Grandpa said that he was fine and a good boy, aside from talking a bit too much. From the Boss Ribs’, Grandpa rode his mule to the outpost to get news from the boarding school about the children’s and Ulysses’s disappearance.

  The soldiers had questioned him when he arrived, and Grandpa told them that he had not known that the children were missing and was only at the school to visit them. The soldiers thought that this was a strange coincidence, but he acted as though he was mad at the priest, Brother Finn, and the captain for losing his only living kin. Grandpa told Lionel and Beatrice that he did not like to lie and prided himself that he hadn’t done so since he was a kid, but that under the circumstances he did not see that there was another option, and that there was something about it that he had rather enjoyed.

  The government sent out several parties to try to recover the horse, Lionel, and Beatrice, but due to the rough weather, and against the persistent argument of Sergeant Jenkins, they had turned back. There was a disagreement among the military men as to whether the children, let alone the horse, had even survived the initial storms. They also doubted if a boy, let alone a little girl, could make it through the late-winter snow and up into the mountains. Unfortunately, they planned to resume the search after the thaw.

  Grandpa also heard that after a visit out to the Boss Ribs’ place, and thanks to Corn Poe’s big mouth, the soldiers were under the impression that the children had taken the horse to Canada. Lionel thought that Grandpa had begun to like Corn Poe’s more mischievous side. He also thought that something about his grandfather seemed different. He seemed to be happier, and he now wore a second hawk’s feather in his hair.

  The three cleaned up from their supper and stoked the fire for the still-freezing night. Lionel washed the dishes with water carried up from the creek, while Beatrice and Grandpa unloaded the rest of the supplies from the travois behind the old mule. There were more canned preserves and vegetables, small burlap sacks of seeds for a garden, sacks of grain for Ulysses, more ammunition for the rifle, and a variety of other essentials such as flour, corn meal, matches, bar soap, and long tallow candles.

  After washing the dishes, Lionel turned his attention toward Grandpa’s bow and small quiver of handmade arrows. He marveled at the simple beauty of them, and before he knew it, found himself taking an arrow and placing it on the strung bow. Lionel heard Beatrice and Grandpa laughing as they came toward the door and thought that he might get in trouble for going through his grandfather’s things. He spun around to replace the items, but as he did, he felt the arrow slip from the taut sinew string.

  The arrow shot across the room just as Beatrice and Grandpa entered, then ricocheted off the stone fireplace.

  “What in the hell?” Grandpa fell backward, knocking Beatrice to the floor and watching the arrow sail out the open door into the moonlight.

  Lionel didn’t know what to do, so he dropped the bow.

  “I see you found the bow.” Grandpa laughed as he slowly got back to his feet. “It’s not bright to monkey with something that you know nothing about. That’s how people get hurt.”

  Beatrice just stared at Lionel. Lionel felt like he was about two feet tall.

  “Let’s unpack the supplies and I’ll tell ya all about it. Tomorrow I’ll show you how to make your own bow and maybe, if you promise to hold your fire, teach you how to shoot.”

  They unpacked the supplies as Grandpa continued to tease Lionel about his archery skills. Lionel didn’t mind, as it sure seemed to make Beatrice laugh. when Beatrice did laugh, which was not often, it was infectious. It started low, as a giggle, and slowly grew. She laughed herself into a coughing fit several times over the course of that evening.

  Once the supplies were unpacked and their chores were done, the children settled in before the fire and their grandfather, sitting with his pipe in one of the old creaking chairs. They sat in silence for a while as Grandpa asked them to think about the day and to be happy for what they had. Lionel fell asleep lying next to his sister, appreciating the warmth of the buffalo robe. He did not remember having any dreams when he woke up the next morning.

  Chapter Seventeen

  AN ORDERED LODGE • SMOKING GAME • OLD MAN AND THE BUFFALO • THE GARDEN • STRAW MAN

  THE FOLLOWING day was busy and reminded Lionel of the hectic times back at the boarding school. They got up early and ate a breakfast of cold venison, canned peaches, and coffee. Then Grandpa led them to one of the small outbuildings that stood in shambles within the woods that surrounded the meadow and fallen lodge.

  They cleared away the dense undergrowth, revealing the small encampment’s smokehouse. Grandpa informed them that they must treat the game they killed if they wanted to preserve it and avoid getting sick.

  Grandpa knocked out a small hole in the side of the building with an ax and converted two old bean cans to replace the little building’s rusted stovepipe. He placed the cans into the hole to keep a flow of air to the fire that they were going to build to smoke the meat.

  Grandpa started the fire in their latest addition and asked Lionel to gather wood and stack it against the log sides. Then Grandpa and Beatrice cut the rest of the venison into strips, laid it out in the sun, and covered it with salt. Grandpa said that the salt would help to pull the moisture from the meat and prevent it from spoiling. They hung the salted strips in the smoky room; then Grandpa showed them how to clean the rest of the deer, carefully preserving each and every part.

  “We’ll make all kinds of tools for ya with the bones, and I’ll bet we can fashion some sort of a shirt, maybe some leggings, from the hide.”

  “How about arrows? when are we going to make the arrows?” Lionel asked.

  “Don’t you even think about that until we get these chores done,” Grandpa replied turning his attention to the main lodge. He determined that although the roof seemed structurally sound, despite its sloping state, it wouldn’t hurt to reinforce the sagging support beams.

  They went into the woods, and Grandpa selected two tall, straight pine trees with Y-shaped branches near their tops to serve as the new supports. Grandpa thanked the pines for their service and then carefully cut the trees so that they fell where Grandpa instructed them. Lionel told Grandpa how he had led Ulysses directly into the lodge when Beatrice was tired after their long journey, and Grandpa thought that it was such a good idea that they should do the same with newly fallen timber. Grandpa also pointed out that by taking this course of action, they were in no way comparing Beatrice to the fallen logs.

  They tied the trees to Grandpa’s mule and dragged them right into the big main room. Then Grandpa tied a length of rope toward the top of one of the logs and threw the other end over the lodge’s main support beam. He tied the loose end of the rope to the mule, and in no time they hoisted the log up and secured the V-shaped end into place as an additional brace. Ulysses watched them through the window from the meadow and seemed to approve of the process and the mule’
s work. They did the same with the second log, and when they had finished, Grandpa said that he would sleep easier that night.

  Then, they cleaned the lodge. This really reminded Lionel of being back at school. Grandpa said that there was no way that the children could keep their heads straight if their lodge wasn’t in order, so he sent Beatrice out to find a pine bough and showed her how to fasten the branches and some long dried grass to replace the broken broom. He then sent Lionel down to the stream with an old rusted bucket, and when he returned, put him to the task of cleaning and scrubbing every square inch of the lodge with an old bristle brush that they found in the small open-sided stable.

  After the windows were washed and the lodge’s floor scrubbed, they cleaned out the stable and assessed it for supplies. over the next few days, they built a new outhouse from lumber that they found lying across the rafters of the stable, and they patched the sunken roof and collapsed side of the lodge as best they could. They salvaged what remained of the rat-ravaged grain stores and organized an array of rusting tools and farm implements.

  Lionel looked around at their little lodge and the outbuildings. He could not believe how much they had accomplished in the short time since their grandfather had arrived. “Looks pretty darn good, don’t it?” Grandpa said, almost as if he was reading Lionel’s mind. “But I’m wondering if you could do one more thing for me.”

  Lionel nodded and followed as his grandfather led him down to the stream.

  “Remember me tellin’ you how Napi created the land for the animals?”

  “Yes, sir, of course.”

  “Then he created the people, right? Our people.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “This here’s the serviceberry,” Grandpa said, reaching out to a spindly clump of bushes that grew near the stream. “Napi told the first people, the ones with the stone knives, to use this to make their arrows.”

  Lionel’s face lit up in anticipation.

  “Listen to me, Lionel. I want you to pick only the straightest branches you can find.”

  Lionel thought he was going to burst. He found several options and showed them to Grandpa, who carefully selected an assortment of the branches and boughs and brought them back to the front steps of the lodge.

  Grandpa pulled a stool out into the late afternoon sun and sat down with his pocketknife in hand. “But did you ever wonder how the people knew what it was they should eat?”

  Beatrice stepped out from the late afternoon darkness of the lodge.

  “Well,” Grandpa began, “old Man gathered the people and showed them the buffalo. ‘You must go down to the Great Plains and hunt them,’ Napi told them. The people did, but the buffalo killed and ate them.”

  “Ate them?” Lionel interrupted. “Buffalo don’t eat people.”

  Grandpa skinned the thin bark from the slender branches with his knife and continued, ignoring Lionel’s question.

  “Now, old Man, he’s a traveler, always on the move, so one day he came across the dead hunting party and felt bad. old Man decided that the buffalo should not eat man, but that man should kill and eat the buffalo.

  “The old Man went out and found some of his people who were still alive. ‘I don’t understand. I created the buffalo for you to eat. why do you let them kill and eat you?’

  “One of old Man’s children stepped forward. ‘we don’t have any weapons, and the buffalo does. He has horns to cut us down and is very fast and powerful.’

  “Napi thought about it and realized that he must give the people something to even the odds against the buffalo.”

  “Like you and the deer,” Lionel interrupted.

  “So old Man went out and searched the land,” Grandpa continued, winking at Lionel. “Down by the river he found and cut some long thin branches of this here serviceberry bush.”

  Grandpa held the branch out for emphasis.

  “Napi took the longest, widest, strongest branches he could find, stripped back the bark, and strung a strong piece of sinew to the end. He bent the branch and tied the sinew string to the other end to create the bow.”

  Lionel thought of his first encounter with Grandpa’s bow, hoping that his next attempt would prove to be a greater success.

  “The old Man then took the thinner branches and placed them on the string. He pulled the string tight and saw that although the smaller branch flew, it did not fly with any accuracy. The old Man looked to the air and saw the birds and how they flew, dove, and darted. He called to the birds, and the birds gave him feathers from their wings. The old Man tied the feathers to the end of the branch and again placed it onto the bow. This time the branch flew with greater accuracy but wouldn’t stick when it hit its target. The old Man decided to tie some of the hard stones from his pocket to the wood. He did this and once again put the branch with the feathers and stone to the bow. He pulled back on the string, and the branch flew, hitting its target with great accuracy and result. The feathers gave direction, the stones power.

  “The old Man turned to the people and said, ‘This is the arrow. You should put it on the bow and go to hunt the buffalo.’

  “The people went out to look for the buffalo and found ’em. The buffalo also saw the people and thought, Here is our food, we should go and eat them. But this time the people did not run, and when the buffalo circled around them, they took the arrow and the bow and shot the buffalo.

  “You know, they say that when the first buffalo was hit, he cried out, ‘A fly bit me.’ Then just fell over dead,” Grandpa said as he stripped the last small branch of its bark. “You two should scour the woods for some feathers from our flying friends.”

  Lionel and Beatrice did as they were told, and although the feathers were more difficult to locate when one was actually looking for them, they returned with an assortment of discarded tail and wing feathers from a turkey, raven, and even a blue jay. Grandpa split the quills of the feathers with his folding knife and carefully tied them to the ends of the slender sticks.

  “I think we can hold off on the arrowheads until you get a better idea of how this all works,” Grandpa said as he attached a sinew string that he had made from the deer that now hung in the smokehouse.

  They spent the rest of the day, and in Lionel’s case into the early evening, practicing with their new bows and arrows. That night they roasted venison over the fire, and Grandpa sat smoking his pipe and carving an assortment of arrowheads from the bones of the deer.

  The next day, the bows and arrows were set aside as Grandpa taught Lionel and Beatrice how to dig a garden. There was a rusted shovel, a hoe, and a pick from the stable; and with Grandpa standing over them, the children soon turned a sunny patch of the meadow into a good-sized rectangle of rich, black soil. They selected an area close to the stream for hauling water, and then Grandpa sent them into the woods to gather dried leaves and moss that he spread and mixed into the freshly turned soil. As they dug, their grandfather was busy lashing and then weaving an odd assortment of grass and tree limbs.

  “What is that?” Lionel asked, eager to take a late-morning break from the heavy digging.

  “You’ll see” was all that Grandfather said. “You’ll see.”

  After they had turned the soil to Grandpa’s satisfaction, he sent Lionel into the lodge for the sacks of seeds that he had brought on his old mule.

  “We’ve got tomatoes, corn, carrots, turnips, sunflowers, squash, pole beans, and maybe even some watermelon,” Grandpa said as he showed the children how to plant the precious seeds in their carefully built up rows. “You’re going to have pay close attention to these crops: they’re your life now.” once the seeds were planted, Grandpa sent them for rusty bucket after rusty bucket of water.

  “Plenty of water, plenty of water,” Grandpa repeated as he continued to weave the grass, leaves, and tree branches together with his thick hands.

  The suspense was killing Lionel. “What is it?” he pleaded.

  “Why, don’t you see?” Grandpa said, rising from the old cr
eaking stool that still sat in the yard. “It’s the straw man, who’s going to protect all your hard work.”

  Sure enough, standing almost as tall as Grandpa, there was his creation. The straw man’s lifelike arms, legs, and chest were a tight weave of serviceberry boughs and tall grass that grew on the banks of the stream. His head was the leaf-stuffed old grain sack that Ulysses was pulling when Lionel awoke that first day in the meadow.

  Grandpa fastened three turkey feathers to the straw man’s head and hung him on a tall lodge pole toward the far end of the garden facing the river.

  “I think he’ll do a fine job, but this is a team. Don’t you leave it just to him now, you hear? No, sir, you’ll have to watch for yerselves too, especially for them old rabbits or squirrels. Squirrels love corn. So, watch ’em!”

  That afternoon, they continued to practice with the bow and arrows, and that night they found themselves once again in front of the fire with Grandpa telling them stories from when their people ruled the Great Plains.

  “The soldiers never did make us leave, ya know,” Grandpa said between long draws from his pipe. “I’m pretty sure we’re the only tribe whose reservation is on our own hunting grounds, not where the government told us to go. we stayed where we were, and although our land is a bit smaller, we’re still here.”

  Chapter Eighteen

  LIONEL’S NIGHTMARE • BEAR CLAWS • GRANDPA’S CANDOR • GRIZZLY

  EARLY THE NEXT morning, when it was still dark, Lionel woke up covered in sweat with Grandpa standing over him.

  “You’re having a dream, Lionel. Take a deep breath. It will be all right.”

  Lionel sat up and looked around. He was in the little lodge in the meadow by the stream. Beatrice slept soundly next to him; Grandpa crouched beside them, eerily lit by the low firelight.