FIFTEEN
Henry Meloux lived on an isolated peninsula called Crow Point that jutted into an inlet far north on Iron Lake. There were two ways to get to Meloux’s cabin: You used a paddle or you used your feet. Cork guided his Bronco along the paved county road north, then turned east onto gravel. He drove until he came to a tall, double-trunk birch that marked the trail to Meloux’s. He parked and began to walk. For almost a mile, the trail cut through national forest land, then it crossed onto the reservation. Cork had walked the trail many times. If what George LeDuc said was true, Alex Kingbird had recently done the same.
When he broke from the trees, Cork saw the small cedar-log cabin perched at the far end of the point, set against a sky full of sluggish gray clouds. He was upwind, and in a few moments Walleye, Meloux’s old dog, had his scent and let out a couple of lazy, requisite barks.
Meloux had just brewed a pot of coffee and he offered Cork a cup. Though he was an old man, in his early nineties, it was clear from everything about him that he still had a lot of road ahead before he found his way onto the Path of Souls. He walked slowly, but that was less the result of age than patience. Meloux was a member of the Grand Medicine Society, one of the Midewiwins, a Mide. His life had been engaged with healing the bodies and spirits of those who sought him out. He’d helped Cork on many occasions and, in one significant miracle of healing, he’d brought a traumatized Stevie O’Connor back to a wholeness of soul. Not long ago, Cork had been of significant help to Meloux, locating a son lost to the old man for decades, healing a wound so painful to the old Mide that it had nearly killed him. The threads that bound these two men together were many and long and ran deep.
Meloux’s hair was like a long breath of white wind. He wore overalls, a flannel shirt, and scuffed boots. Cork sat with him at the table in the old man’s one-room cabin, a place that felt as welcoming as home. It was furnished simply: a bunk, a table and three chairs handmade from birch, a cast-iron stove, a small chest of drawers. Meloux used kerosene lanterns. He drew his water from the lake. Twenty yards toward the trees stood an outhouse.
“Alex Kingbird,” the old man said. “Kakaik. A name to be proud of.”
“You called him Kakaik?”
“That was his name.”
“Not legally.”
“Legally?” Meloux laughed. “A man is who he wants to be.”
“Who was Kakaik?”
“To me, someone who asked questions. In that, he was like you.” The old Mide smiled.
“Did he come for healing?”
“I think that was not in his mind. But probably it was in his heart. He wanted to be a man of clear thought. He did a lot of cleansing.”
“Sweats?”
“And other things.”
“What did you think of him?”
Meloux had brewed the coffee in a dented aluminum pot on his stove. Like Cork, he drank from an old, blue- speckled enamel cup.
“If I lived in the days of my ancestors,” he said, “he would have been a man I wanted as a war chief.”
Walleye had settled himself in a corner of the cabin. He’d stayed alert for a few minutes, but when it was clear the men were going to pay him no attention, he dropped his head on his paws and closed his eyes.
“Henry, did Kingbird say anything to you about Lonnie Thunder?”
“Thunder. He took the name Obwandiyag.” The old man didn’t seem pleased with the choice. “You know about Obwandiyag of long ago?”
“No.”
“He was an Odawa war chief. To most white people he is known as Pontiac.”
“Pontiac. Big name for someone with a heart as small as Thunder’s. Did Kingbird talk about him?”
“Obwandiyag weighed on Kakaik.”
“Did you advise Kingbird?”
“He did not ask for my advice. But he did bring Obwandiyag here. Now there was a man full of fear. The white girl had died, the fault, Kakaik said, of Obwandiyag. He hoped I could help Obwandiyag find courage, find purity of spirit, find the warrior’s heart.”
“Did you?”
“Obwandiyag did not want my help. He left before I could do anything for him. I did not see him again.”
“Kingbird was hiding him, trying to protect him, I suppose. Did he give you any idea where?”
The old man put his cup on the table. “Is it Obwandiyag you’re hunting or the truth about Kakaik?”
“I think they might lie along the same path.”
The Mide nodded. “There is hope for you yet, Corcoran O’Connor. I do not have an answer for you. But I have advice, if you would like it.”
“I’d appreciate it, Henry.”
“I would take a hawk’s-eye view of the situation.”
Cork waited. “That’s it?”
“That is all I have to offer. Unless you would like more coffee.”
Cork stood up, and Meloux after him. Walleye worked his way to his feet and padded to the table.
“ Migwech, Henry,” Cork said, thanking the old man. At the door, he paused. “A hawk’s-eye view?”
Meloux shrugged. “It is a place to begin.”
SIXTEEN
Lucinda often walked to the Gun Sight, bringing lunch to her husband, and to Uly as well on those occasional days when he helped his father there. She enjoyed the stroll through Aurora. That Monday, she thought it would be a good idea for both herself and Misty to get out for a while. Well-meaning people were calling and stopping by and although Lucinda was grateful, she was also weary of having to respond to their concern.
The sky was overcast but didn’t seem to threaten rain. Lucinda settled Misty in the stroller, made certain the baby was warm enough, and set off.
Having to care for the baby full-time wasn’t difficult for Lucinda. In truth, it gave her a sense of purpose she hadn’t felt since Uly had become a teenager and pulled away, retreating into himself in the way teenagers did. A baby was a good deal of work, but a baby let you know you were needed. And the needs were so simple really, and so blessedly direct. You fed her when she was hungry, changed her diaper when she was wet or soiled, held her when she was fussy, smiled at her when she gazed up at you with her eyes full of wonder. God never took, she’d always tried to believe, without also giving. Alejandro and Rayette had been taken, but little Misty had been spared and put into Lucinda’s keeping.
Will’s shop was on Oak Street. Before he bought the building, the place had belonged to a florist. Whenever she first walked in, Lucinda thought she caught the faint fragrance of roses, but the scent vanished immediately, replaced by the acrid odor of the solvents Will used to clean polymer weapons.
Her husband knew firearms. He was also an expert with that other elegant instrument of warfare, the knife. He was a dealer, with a clientele of collectors worldwide. He was also an expert gunsmith and was often engaged in making something that was of custom design. They had saved carefully all their lives, and with his marine pension they easily had enough to live on. His need to work had nothing to do with finances. In a way, Lucinda believed, it kept him connected with the military life, which was the life he knew best.
He was in the back room when she pushed the buzzer. For security, he kept the door locked. There was a sign above the buzzer button that read PUSH FOR ENTRY. Will had a camera mounted outside and positioned in a way that let him see who was at his door. She heard the reply buzz and the lock release and she rolled the stroller inside.
“Back here!” he called.
At the front of the shop were rifles, shotguns, and handguns mounted in display cases behind security glass.
