Shaman Pass Read Free Page B

educational display and it’s not just for visitors. Our schoolchildren and other local people will also learn about how we lived before the nalua —” Anirak glanced at Kennelly, who was not only white but also a reporter, and shifted gears. “Before we adopted Western ways.”
    “It’s still not right!” Maiyumerak shouted. “You should put him on the tundra, let the animals take him. That’s the Inupiat way. Back to the earth, like a great big circle.”
    “That’s the old Inupiat way.” Anirak climbed into his truck and spoke through the open door. “Things are different now. We need the money Uncle Frosty will bring in if we are going to keep our tribal school open. Our bingo games alone can’t do the job and picket signs won’t either.” Anirak slammed the door and glared at Maiyumerak through the frost on the window.
    Maiyumerak looked for a moment as if he would whack the Ford again, but he lowered the sign and walked to his snow-machine. Kennelly trotted over and interviewed Maiyumerak as he bungeed the sign onto the dogsled.
    The forklift driver deposited Uncle Frosty on an Arctic Air Cargo flatbed truck as Horace walked up to Active with a clipboard. “I guess you’re supposed to sign this, ah?”
    Active took the clipboard, fished inside his parka for a pen, and signed quickly before the ink could congeal in the cold air. Horace walked out the gate and took the clipboard to Anirak, who rolled down the window of his pickup to sign.
    Silver came back through the gate and stopped beside Active’s Yamaha. “Coming down to the museum? My guess is, Calvin has some more fireworks planned.”
    “What, the Chukchi Public Safety Department can’t handle the IRA? You’re calling in the troopers?”
    Silver turned a withering look on Active’s purple Yamaha, smiled, and climbed into the green-and-white Chukchi Police Department Bronco parked inside the fence.

CHAPTER THREE
    WHEN THE FLATBED WITH its entourage of police, press and Malcolm Anirak reached the museum, Maiyumerak was already there. He was, Active saw, in the process of chaining his Ski-Doo to the hasp that held together the swinging doors of the museum’s shipping dock. The FREE UNCLE FROSTY sign was bungeed upright to a stanchion on Maiyumerak’s dogsled.
    The museum was a brown two-story humpbacked wooden building designed, Active had heard, to resemble an inverted umiaq or whaleboat. Silver pulled up, parked the city Bronco, and, with an expression like an army private sentenced to latrine duty, hurried over to Maiyumerak. “Look, Calvin, fun’s fun but enough’s enough. Unlock that damned thing and get out of the way or I’ll arrest you right now.”
    Kennelly rushed up with his camera and microphone, and Maiyumerak grinned in pleasure, exposing a black hole where one of his front teeth should have been.
    “Go ahead if you want a political prisoner in your jail. Under the United Nations Charter on the Rights of Indigenous . . .” Maiyumerak trailed off to watch Silver’s back as he stalked over to his Bronco.
    The police chief threw open the door, grabbed a microphone, and shouted at the dispatcher who answered his call. “Lucy, get somebody from the city shop over to the museum with a set of bolt-cutters, will you? And tell ’em to be at least reasonably quick about it! Cop time, not village time!”
    He pulled a pair of handcuffs from the seat of the Bronco and walked toward Maiyumerak, who now had a look of alarm on his face. “You can’t cut that chain! It’s for Kobuk.”
    “This is Kobuk’s chain?” Silver put his hand on it and his face lit up.
    “That’s right, he’ll have to stay in the house without it,” Maiyumerak said. “That’s where I left him when I took off the chain but he’s not a house dog. My grandma can’t handle him, she’s too old.”
    “I’ll say he’s not a house dog. He’s a fucking wolf, except about twice as big.” Silver glared at Maiyumerak. “But you should have thought of