Bone River (38 page)

I remembered a time when Papa had come back late from a collecting trip to find me at the fireside with Lord Tom and Bibi’s grandson Willy and his sweetheart Melia, who was teaching me a Chinook fishing song after an evening of storytelling. I remembered how soft was her voice to start, how it had grown louder and the others had begun to pound in rhythm and the whole thing had crept so beautifully into my blood that my own voice had raised as well, my own hands beat time upon a log. I felt wild and free and happy that night, and Papa, emerging from the darkness, had seemed to me at first a strange spirit from one of
Lord Tom’s stories, and I’d shrieked in surprise and terror until I realized who it was.

When the others had gone, Papa told Lord Tom to unload the canoe, and when Tom gave him a worried frown, saying, “
Sikhs
,” in this warning voice that made my father bristle, Papa had snapped roughly,
We’ve no need of you just now, Tom.
When Lord Tom left, Papa took both my arms hard, forcing me to look at him.
You are not a savage
, he’d said brutally.

Of course not.

Then why are you acting like one?

Papa, it was only singing.

Only singing.
He made a small laugh.
Only singing. With such small things does it begin.
He’d relaxed his hold, looking so disappointed my heart ached.
Leonie, you are too immoderate. You know this. But you
must
guard against it, or you’ll become like them. Savagery and licentiousness are always waiting. If we give in to them, we become little better than animals. Is that what you want?

No. No. I’m sorry. I won’t do it again.

He’d sighed and released me, and I threw myself into his chest, hugging him tight while he stood there awkwardly. After a moment, he put his arms around me, stroking my hair, murmuring,
You are my daughter, Leonie, and I love you
.

I felt his forgiveness then, and I vowed never to give him another reason to fear for my degeneracy. But as hard as I tried to fight such things, I’d given in more than once. Not just to singing, but to my sensitivity and my fancies, to my fondness for dancing. I had an excessive nature; this interlude with Daniel had only proved it. I knew Papa and Junius were right. Who was I to question those who knew me best?

I had been content once; I could be content again. Couldn’t I?

The question went round and round. I could find no answer I wanted to keep.

It was a long time before I slept.

I
WOKE EXHAUSTED
, questions still in my head and no closer to a decision. Junius was up already, pulling on his trousers, and when I stirred, he looked over at me and said, “We’ll have to return Mac Wilson’s canoe sometime in the next few days.”

A quick hope flared, the thought that perhaps I could have another day to think, a day without either of them. I said, “Why not today? You can take Daniel with you. He can follow in the plunger.”

“He’s not skillful enough.”

“He managed it during a storm.”

“With you directing him, no doubt,” Junius said. “I want to check things over today, but we’ll all make the trip later this week. I know you’d like the chance to go in to town.”

“I’ve so much to do here. The mummy—”

“Not cut into yet, I see.”

“No, not yet. I’ve only just finished drawing her.”

He gave me a reproachful look. “It couldn’t have taken you three weeks, Lea. You had days while I was gone. What the hell else were you doing?”

In pure defense, I snapped, “It took me some time to recover from almost drowning. And just because you aren’t here doesn’t mean your chores don’t need to be done. And there were Papa’s journals to read, too. To see if he’d said anything about her.”

“You shouldn’t waste your time with those.”

I frowned and sat up, pulling the blankets with me against the cold, ignoring his comment. “There
is
something in Papa’s journals that’s interesting, June. Not about the mummy, but...he keeps talking about an experiment. Do you know what he means?”

“An experiment? What does he say about it?”

“Nothing I can put a finger on. Something to do with the Indians, and whether environment can overcome blood. Mostly cryptic remarks, but he did say he’d told you about it and that you promised to stay vigilant.”

Junius put on his shirt and buttoned it. “You know your father. He was always prattling on about some theory or another.”

“Yes, but this one seemed important. And he refers to it over and over again.”

“Hmmm. Something about skulls, maybe? He was doing a lot of measuring back then. Phrenological stuff.”

“Yes, he mentions all that. But I had the impression this was something...living.”

Junius let out his breath. “Well, I don’t remember it. Hell, it’s been twenty years, Lea. You can’t expect me to remember all his crazy nonsense. I’m sure it’s nothing to worry about.”

“I don’t worry about it. I just find it curious.”

Junius nodded, obviously distracted. He said, “When I sent the canoe off to Baird, I sent a letter with it telling him about the mummy.”

My father and his experiments fled my thoughts. I pushed back the blankets and rose from the bed. “You did? But we agreed—”

“We agreed you would cut into her before I got back,” he pointed out. “I thought you would be finished with her by now.”

“Junius, you promised her to me. You should have waited.”

“It’s not my fault you took so long,” he said. “You should have had the boy help if you’re so reluctant. I’m certain he wouldn’t be.”

“I’m not reluctant.”

“Then no harm’s done, is it?” Junius gave me a stern look. “Baird probably already knows about it, in any case. If it was in the newspapers in San Francisco, word’s undoubtedly got to him by now. So do your job, Lea. Cut the thing apart and be done with it. Then we’ll send it on to Baird.”

My legs felt unsteady; I sat on the edge of the mattress.

Junius came over, patting me on the shoulder. “We’ll send your notes with it. Give them to me as soon as you can, and I’ll write everything up.”

“You’ll tell him it’s
my
study, won’t you?”

“Of course. Didn’t I say I would?”

But there was something so facile about the way he said it, and I wasn’t reassured—though that was foolish, I told myself. Junius loved me; we were in this together. It was only Daniel’s resentment putting words to my own.

I swallowed my anger and watched Junius leave and then I got dressed. But the conversation had only for the moment put aside the questions I’d struggled the night with, and I wished it were possible to lock myself away in this room, to not see anyone or do anything or feel the struggle within me, and the moment I pinned up my hair I thought of Daniel saying “You’ve disappeared.” I knew it was true; I felt it. A strange bifurcation, two halves of myself.

Who are you?
The mummy’s voice drifted into my head.
Who are you?
and
I brought him for you
, but now, away from Daniel, I wasn’t certain I trusted the voice. It was my too-vivid imagination, the one that only told me what I wanted to hear, the one that
made right everything wrong I’d done, that justified an immorality I knew I should feel more intently than I did.

I lingered until one moment more would cause questions, and then I went downstairs, my chest tightening, wondering what I would say when I saw him, what I would feel. But Daniel was not there, nor was Junius. Only Lord Tom, sitting at the kitchen table, looking through a book. It was a moment before I realized it was my notebook, the translated stories, and he had it opened to a picture I’d sketched one night while I was alone with Daniel, the story of the Chinook tribe’s creation, illustrated with Quoots-hooi cracking eggs and throwing them down the mountainside, one transforming into the legs and arms of an emerging Indian.

Lord Tom looked up slowly, as if he could not bear to tear his eyes away from the book. “When did you do this?”

I stopped short. “Oh, I was only playing. I know they’re not very good, but—”

“It
is
good,” he disagreed. “Though Quoots-hooi is rounder and uglier.”

His praise warmed me. “I was remembering her from that mask Papa had.”

“Not a good one. A lazy artist. You are much better.”

Nervously, I said, “You should put that away,
tot
. Before Junius comes back in. It will only annoy him.”

He ignored me, leafing through the pages. “There are no other pictures.”

“Only the one. I was telling the story to Daniel, and I—” I broke off, glancing away, not wanting to say why that story in particular had stayed in my head, why I’d chosen it to draw.

Lord Tom closed the book and pushed it aside, back to where he’d found it, beneath my father’s journals. “Your father’s writings are here.”

I nodded, disconcerted at the change in subject. “Yes. I’ve been reading them. I was looking for some clue to the mummy. I thought he might have written about her.”

Lord Tom frowned. “Why would he have done so?”

“I think he found her before I did.”

Now he looked vaguely alarmed. “Why do you think that?”

“Because of this.” I pulled the leather thong until the tooth and beads of the necklace I wore emerged from the neckline of my bodice, and held it out for him to see. “Do you remember this? Papa used to wear it all the time.”

“I remember.”

“I found it in her dress. I don’t know why it was there. Junius says it must have fallen into the basket, and I’m not sure Daniel doesn’t think so as well, but I think Papa found her once before. I think he found her and—”

I stopped. Lord Tom’s expression had frozen. He looked carved as a totem sitting there, staring at the tooth as if it paralyzed him.

“
Tot
?”

He blinked, coming back into himself again. “You must put her back,
okustee.
Bury her.”

I sighed in exasperation and let the tooth drop. “Not this again. Is it still bad luck you’re worried about? Because I’ve been researching her for weeks and nothing’s happened—”

“He says you nearly drowned.”

“But I didn’t. She’s not bad luck,
tot
.”

“If he had not been there, you would have drowned.”

“But he
was
there. And it was the mummy who brought him.”

Lord Tom frowned at me, obviously confused.

“It’s what she told—” I stopped short. My imagination again and dreams.
It’s not real, Leonie.

“What she told you?” Lord Tom finished slowly. “In a
dleam
?”

I nodded slowly. “Yes. A dream. I know it’s not real, but...it seemed so.”

Lord Tom’s voice was urgent when he said, “Spirits will lie to you,
okustee
. It is what they
do
.”

“But...what if she wasn’t that kind of a spirit, but a...a guardian spirit instead? What if she’s
my
guardian spirit?”

He looked doubtful. “Spirits lie.”

“Then why...?” I foundered. The whole conversation was absurd. My father would never have countenanced it. Junius would condemn me. Only Daniel felt for her what I did. He seemed to understand the strange...connection I felt for her, but now, without him here, those feelings seemed ridiculous, impossible to explain. I should not even
want
to explain them. But Lord Tom had been the one to teach me about the spirits. I knew I could make him see. I wanted him to understand. “If she’s bad, she’s good too,
tot.
I...I wish I knew
what
she was. I wish I knew why Papa reburied her—”

“Reburied her?”

“That’s what I think happened. How else would the necklace have got there? I think he dug her up, but he knew something about her wasn’t right, so he buried her again. But I can’t see it. I can’t find the reason, and—”

“Because she was a
mesachie tomawanos
.”

“Papa didn’t believe such things,” I said impatiently. “He wouldn’t have reburied her because she was a bad spirit.”

“Some things cannot be known. Some things
should
not be known. Put her back.”

“I
can’t
. Even if I wanted to, I couldn’t. Junius wants to send her to Baird, and—”

“What if they find something you don’t want to see?”

I frowned at him, puzzled. “Why do you say that?”

“Things are not always what they seem,
okustee
.”

I said a little desperately, “Junius wants her gone too. But I...I’m not done with her. I can’t explain it, but...Bibi said she wanted something from me. That the mummy wanted something from me. And I feel that too. I think...”

“You think
what
?” Lord Tom asked gently.

I met his gaze. “I think that if I could discover the truth of her, I would know what to do.”

Lord Tom was quiet. I felt him searching my face. I felt him looking for something. I thought he would ask me to elaborate. I thought he would say, “About what,
okustee
?” but he didn’t, and that troubled me, that he didn’t ask it, that whatever he saw in my face seemed to satisfy him, because he only sighed, and tapped my notebook. He said, “Make Quoots-hooi uglier. Then you should draw the stories.”