Between Earth and Sky(52)

Within seconds, Zhawaeshk steadied himself, his sneer gone, his gaze serious as the dead.

“Bekaa! Stop! Look.” Alma pointed at the grave house behind Zhawaeshk, the one he’d been leaning against when they found him. In his backward stumble, he’d kicked a small hole in the base of the house with his heel. His drink had spilled, too, its foul contents seeping into the small birch bark–wrapped bundle beside it. The spirit bundle for his wife, Alma guessed.

Zhawaeshk flung himself to the ground and frantically dried the bundle on his shirt. Fresh tears rimmed his bloodshot eyes. He took the liquor jar and flung it far beyond the houses. A howl burst from his throat and he started to rock, beating his forehead against the grave house roof.

His sobs grated at her heart. She knew all too well the agony of such grief. She reached for Stewart’s hand, but he gave no response to her touch. His fingers remained limp within her hand, his face drawn in openmouthed shock. His lip had begun to swell. Blood stained his jaw. At last, he reached for his hat, which she’d forgotten she still held, and turned to go.

“Wait.” She turned to Zhawaeshk. “I know we shouldn’t have come to you here.” Her throat closed as she struggled to hold back her own tears. “We’re desperate.”

“Go,” Zhawaeshk said.

Stewart tugged on her arm. “Come on, darling.”

Her feet would not move. She looked over the low grave houses, each pointing west, directing the dead toward the hereafter. Despite the sunlight, her skin grew cold.

“It’s not Asku’s time.”

Zhawaeshk looked up at her. “Perhaps it is. He’s a hero now in the eyes of our people. Before, he was nothing.”

“How can that be? Daga. Please. Help me understand.”

Zhawaeshk turned from her and whispered something to the grave. He pulled a chunk of maple sugar and a few strips of dried meat from his shirt pocket. After laying them reverently upon the windowsill, he struggled to his feet. “Help me fix the houses and I will tells you all I know.”

They found a few scraps of wood and a handful of rusty nails alongside the clearing. Hammering with flattened rocks, Zhawaeshk and Stewart squatted side by side and patched the houses. Alma stood beside them, holding Stewart’s coat and jacket, handing them nails, and listening.

Zhawaeshk’s tale pained her. Were it not for a few details she knew to be true, she’d have branded it all as lies. By his recounting, Askuwheteau had returned from Brown withdrawn and bitter. He was offered a job at the agency but refused, wanting nothing to do with the white man, nor the half-breeds who lived like whites in the village. But he had no place among those who still followed the seasons either. He couldn’t hunt or weave a fishing net. Couldn’t build a canoe or skin a deer. Many words he had forgotten. Everyone thought him maminaadizi, uppity. Laughed at his funny white man ways. He tried his hand at farming his allotment and failed. Too proud, Zhawaeshk said. Too angry to ask for help. He sold his father’s allotment and squandered it on firewater. Would have sold his own, too, had they let him. He had no home, no people. Even Minowe kept away. He hung around town like a shadow, drunk and cussing the world.

“What about Agent Andrews? Was there bad blood between them?” Stewart asked. They were at the well beside the schoolhouse now. He drew up the bucket and handed it to Zhawaeshk.

The Indian drank, then looked around the empty schoolyard. The alcohol’s hold seemed to have faded. He was jumpy now, restless. He peered down the thoroughfare, scanned the fringe of nearby trees, then rubbed his arms. “After this summer, when they divided up our timberlands, everyone have got bad blood with him.”

Alma stood a pace off, her mind struggling to reconcile Zhawaeshk’s story with her memories. But something now in his voice—the cut of anger, the hush of fear—commanded her attention. “Why?”

He hesitated, then spoke quickly about crooked ledgers and land deeds, secret deals with lumber companies, favoritism showed to mixed-bloods who’d be more likely to offer up the pine on their new allotments.

Perhaps that explained the tension she’d felt back in the annuity line.

“Was Mr. Muskrat cheated in these dealings?” Stewart asked. He’d taken a small notebook from his jacket pocket and jotted down notes as Zhawaeshk spoke.

“No, he could read the funny marks on those land maps, so he got a more better allotment. But afterward he spoke out for the rests of us. Said they should make the whole process over again so it were fair.”

“And did they? Reallot the land?”

Zhawaeshk shook his head. “Plenty people were happy when Askuwheteau shot Agent Andrews.”

Stewart’s hand flagged. He stopped writing. “You saw him shoot the agent, then?”

Alma felt the world still. Insects ceased their humming. Leaves quit their chatter. Even her heart and lungs seemed to slow. Could it all really end here? Could Asku really have stolen upon the agent and shot him in the back? Bang. Bang. Bang. Each shot sounded in her mind. She could almost smell the gun smoke. Please, not Asku. Never Asku.

“No, I not saw him. We were behind the store with our drink. Askuwheteau got up and went away. Many moments later I heard gunshots. Agent Andrews was dead on the road. No one was there.”

“So it could have been anyone?” Alma said, her voice a bit too loud, her tone more like a statement than a question. “Asku mightn’t have had anything to do with it at all.”