survived by eating it until he made his way into friendlier territory.
Open up, said Clemence, and filled his mouth.
But that was not how it happened, said Mooshum. For I was there. I was hunting with some Blackfeet warriors when they caught Liver Eater. They planned on delivering him to the Crow Indians because he had killed so many of their people. I was sitting with that young Blackfeet who was supposed to guard him, but he wanted to kill Johnson so bad his hands twitched.
I talked to Liver Eater in the Blackfeet language, which he sort of understood. Liver Eater, I said, half the Blackfeet hate you so much they’re gonna stake you down buck-naked and skin you alive. But they’ll cut off your balls first and feed them to their old ladies right in front of your eyes.
Say there! said Clemence.
The Blackfeet’s eyes just glowed, said Mooshum. I said to Liver Eater that the other half of the Blackfeet wanted to tie him securely between their two best war ponies and then charge the opposite directions. The Blackfeet boy’s eyes sparked like candles at that. I told Liver-Eating Johnson that he was supposed to decide which of these fates he would prefer, so that the tribe could make preparations. Then we turned our backs on Liver Eater and warmed our hands over the fire. We left him to work on the rawhide thongs that bound his wrists. His ankles, too, were bound with strong ropes. Another rawhide at his waist fixed him to a tree. He had plenty to work on with his teeth, which were none too sturdy and that’s the point. You never saw a white trapper’s teeth, but they hadn’t the habits we Indians had of scrubbing our teeth clean with a birch twig. They let their teeth rot. You could smell his breath a mile before a trapper came into view. His breath generally smelled worse than the rest of him and that is saying a lot, eh? Liver Eater’s teeth were no different from any trapper’s. And now he was trying to chew off his cords. Every so often, we would hear him curse and spit—there went one tooth, then another broke off. We panicked him into chawing until he was all gum. Never again could he bite into an Indian. But we planned to make him helpless altogether. This young Blackfeet and me. He had a potion from his grandma that would make your eyes cross. As soon as Liver Eater fell asleep and snored, we dabbed that medicine onto his eyes. Now he couldn’t shoot straight. He would have to become a sheriff. That is, if the Crows did not kill him. Still, you don’t leave a rattlesnake alive to bite you next time you walk the path, I said to the Blackfeet, even if he don’t have fangs.
I wish we didn’t have to give him to the Crows, said the young man.
They need their fun, I said. But just in case he gets loose we should make sure he cannot pull the trigger on a gun. We could chop off his fingers, but then the Crow would say we’d stolen some of him.
There is a centipede if it bites a man his hands will swell up like mittens for the rest of his life, the Blackfeet told me. So we made little torches for ourselves and went around hunting for this bug, but while we were away Liver Eater did manage to escape. When we returned all we saw was the chewed straps on the ground surrounded by broken brown teeth. He got away. Then he made up the story about eating the Indian’s leg because unless he had a good story who’d believe a toothless cross-eyed old bugger?
Exactly, said Clemence.
Awee, I’m going to miss that Sonja, said Mooshum, winking at me.
What?
Oh, said Clemence. Whitey says she cleared out. She played sick yesterday and he came home to find her closet empty and one of the dogs gone with her. She took off in her old rattletrap car he’d just fixed to run smooth.
Is she coming back? I said.
Whitey told me her note said never. He said he slept with the other dog, he was so broke up. She said he’d best clean up his act. Amen to that.
The news made me dizzy and I told Cappy we needed to go somewhere. He said his usual polite and traditional thank-you to Clemence and then we biked away together, slow. Finally we got to the road that led, though it was a long ride off, to the hanging tree where Sonja and I had buried the passbook savings books. We stopped our bikes and I told Cappy the entire story—finding the doll, showing it to Sonja, her helping me stash the money in those bank accounts, and then where we put the passbooks in the tin box. I told him about how Sonja insisted I keep quiet so as to not put him in danger. Then I told him about Sonja’s diamond stud earrings and the lizard-skin boots and about the night Whitey beat on her and how it looked like she was planning to get away from him and I told him how much money I had found.
She could get real far on that, he said. He looked away, offended.
Yeah, I should have told you.
We didn’t talk for a while.
We should go dig up the little box anyway, he said. Just to make sure. Maybe she left you some money, said Cappy. His voice was neutral.
Enough for shoes like yours, I said as we rode along.
I offered to trade, said Cappy.
It’s okay. I like mine now. I bet she left me a goddamned note. That’s what I bet.
We both turned out to be right.
There was two hundred dollars, one passbook, and a piece of paper.
I looked inside the passbook. It was ten thousand.
What the hell, I said to Cappy.
What’s she mean, what you saw?
I struggled. I wanted to tell the whole dance, every howl, every gliding move, and show him the tassel. But my tongue was stopped by obscure shame.
Nothing, I said.
I split the cash with Cappy and put the passbook and letter in my pocket. At first, he wouldn’t take the money and then I said it was so he could get a bus ticket to visit Zelia in Helena. Travel money, then. He folded the bills in his hand.
We started back home and halfway there we scared up a pair of ducks from a watery ditch.
After a couple miles, Cappy laughed. I got a good one. How come ducks don’t fly upside down? He didn’t wait for me to answer. They’re afraid of quacking up! Still happy with his wit, he left me at the door to have dinner with my mother and father. I went in and although we were quiet and distracted and still in a form of shock, we were together. We had candied yams, which I never liked but I ate them anyway. There was farmer ham and a bowl of fresh peas from the garden. My mother said a little prayer to bless the food and we all talked about Cappy’s run. I even told them Cappy’s joke. We stayed away from the fact of Lark’s existence, or anything to do with our actual thoughts.
Chapter Ten.
Linda Wishkob rolled out from her car and trudged to our door. I let my dad answer her knock and slipped out the back way. I’d finally worked out my thoughts in regard to Linda and her banana bread; although these thoughts did not make sense, I couldn’t argue myself out of them. Linda was responsible for the existence of Linden. She’d saved her brother, even though she knew by then he was a skin of evil. She now
