Windigo Island Read Free Page A

signaled Jenny to hang back while he crept to the structure. A single window faced the lake, and Cork slipped up beside it. The windowpane was lifted a few inches, enough for air to circulate but not enough to let in rain. He could hear the murmur of voices inside but could make out no words. He glanced back to where Jenny remained crouched among the aspens in her olive green poncho. She held up her hands signaling, Cork supposed, So, what’s up?
    He was about to hazard a glance through the window when the pane slid up fully and a familiar old voice inside said, “You come like a thief, Corcoran O’Connor. My front door has no lock. You are welcome to enter as a friend.”
    • • •
    There had come a time, finally, when Henry Meloux accepted the reality of his situation, which was that he could no longer live alone. It had come to him as the result of a strange illness that had made him weak for a long while. That’s when Rainy Bisonette, his great-niece and also a public health nurse, had come to Crow Point. Her purpose was not only to minister to Meloux but tolearn from him the healing ways of the Grand Medicine Society. When little Waaboozoons had been given to them—by the hand of Kitchimanidoo, the Great Spirit, Meloux was certain—the dangerous circumstances of that gifting had forced the old Mide to confront his mortality, to put his life on the line for the little guy, and this, in the incomprehensible way of the Great Spirit, had been his own healing. Rainy had stayed on, even after Meloux’s recovery, both to learn and to help the old man who was, after all, somewhere near a century old. Two summers ago, Cork had helped build the one-room cabin that was Rainy’s. And since then, he’d often spent the night with her, sharing her bed and blanket and the blessing of her warm body.
    Rainy stood in Meloux’s cabin, a cup of coffee in her hand, listening as her great-uncle made the introductions.
    “Daniel English,” the old man said, indicating his guest with a nod of his head.
    As Cork had surmised from the boot prints on the trail, Daniel English was a big man, well over six feet tall. Cork judged him to be in his late twenties. English was quite clearly Indian, though Cork couldn’t have said what his tribal affiliation might have been. His hair was raven-wing black, his eyes almond, his nose like a hatchet blade set in a broad face. He wore jeans and a blue work shirt with the sleeves rolled up to expose his powerful biceps. There was one other thing that Cork noticed about him from the get-go: those dark eyes took in everything, and in a way that made Cork think, Cop.
    “Daniel English,” Cork said. “That name’s familiar to me.”
    English said, “We’ve met before.”
    “Oh?”
    “I was ten,” English said. “Visiting Uncle Henry with my mother. You dropped by.”
    “Eudora English,” Cork said, remembering. “You were Danny then, and smaller.”
    “You were in a sheriff’s uniform and wore a gun. I was afraid of you.”
    “The uniform went a while ago. Same with the gun,” Cork told him. “This is my daughter Jenny.”
    English hesitated when Cork’s daughter reached out, an awkward move. When he finally took her hand, which was small in his own, he did it with care, as if afraid he might break her fingers.
    “Henry’s really your uncle?” Jenny asked. Because on the rez, sometimes familial titles were bestowed though no blood connection was involved. People of a certain age were all cousins, and to them the next generation were uncles or aunts, and above them were grandmothers and grandfathers. To the Ojibwe, traditionally, the community was family.
    Meloux spoke up to clarify. “He is the son of my sister’s granddaughter.”
    “My nephew,” Rainy said.
    Cork noted that the clothing English wore was dry, but he could see no rain gear, which made him think that the man had been there awhile, before the storm broke. A good deal of talking had probably gone on, and