The Shadow of the Wolf, Page 2

  As soon as the first knot was undone, I saw big brown eyes staring out at me. Hastily, I untied the other knots.

  “It’s a flying squirrel, Libby. There was a nest of them in the chimney. The other squirrels got away, but this one seemed tame.”

  The squirrel was so tiny he fit into the palm of my hand. His fur was brown on top and white underneath. On either side was a fold of skin reaching from his front to his back leg. Papa said the folds stretched out like wings so the squirrel could glide from tree to tree. His feathery tail curved over his body like a plume. He had enormous brown eyes, shiny as acorns. “That’s so the squirrel can see at night,” Papa said.

  “Can I keep it?” I asked. I was afraid that, like the doll, he might be snatched from me.

  “Yes, Libby,” Papa said, “as long as you take good care of the creature.”

  “Can he stay in my room at night?”

  “He can,” Papa laughed, “but you may be sorry.” He wouldn’t tell me why.

  When it was time for bed, I closed the door so the squirrel couldn’t get away. I placed him carefully on my dresser in a little nest made from my hankies. In the blink of an eye, he glided from the dresser to the rafter. From the rafter he dropped down to the bedstead. From the bedstead he swooped to the chair. He wouldn’t stay still. All night long I heard him gliding about the room, so that I hardly slept. In the morning I found him curled up asleep in my shoe.

  Papa explained that flying squirrels only go about at night. “They rest during the day. I think if you want any sleep at night, I had better build a cage for the squirrel. What will you call him?”

  “Icarus,” I said. Mama had taught me the story of the boy who tried to escape from the Greek island of Crete by fashioning wings of feathers and wax. He could fly at night, but when daylight came, he flew too close to the sun. His wings melted and he fell into the sea.

  Early the next morning Fawn walked through the front door without a sound. Papa says if she had a mind to, Fawn could walk up to a deer without scaring it away. Over a year had passed since Fawn and I had seen each other. Her hair was braided now, like a young woman’s. She was no taller than I, but somehow she seemed older.

  We were quiet at first, but then words came tumbling out. We both talked at once, hurrying to tell one another all that had happened in the last year. Soon it felt as if no time had passed at all.

  “I must return to the village now,” said Fawn at last. “This morning we take up our fish nets. Would you like to come and help us? It is women’s work and you would be welcome.”

  Papa said, I’m going to the Indian village this morning to meet the chief. I can take the two of you with me in the wagon.”

  At the Indian village Fawn’s mother, Menisikwe, welcomed me. Fawn’s little brother, Megisi, who is just William’s age, was strapped to Menisikwe’s back in a cradleboard. Megisi wore no clothes. Instead, he was surrounded with lichen, which the Indians first softened and then used like a diaper. When it was soiled, you had only to throw it away. When she was washing William’s diapers, Mama often said that the Indians had a better idea.

  The women tucked up their skirts and waded into the lake. Nets fashioned of bass-wood twine had been put out the night before and fastened to poles stuck in the lake bottom. As the nets were pulled up, I could see hundreds of wriggling fish caught in the mesh. The women dragged the nets onto the shore with much laughing and shouting. They freed the fish and placed them in large birch-bark baskets. Most of the fish were what our French Canadian neighbors in Saginaw had called poisson blanc, or whitefish.

  I tried to help, although Fawn freed five fish to my one. Sometimes one of the women who had pulled loose a large fish would throw it at a friend, giggling as the woman tried to catch the slippery fish. The fish, laid out across racks to dry in the sun, would be food for the winter.

  At noon I shared a bowl of corn soup with Fawn. In the afternoon we dug up potatoes and beets. At last Menisikwe said that Fawn might leave her work for a little, and the two of us walked along the shore of the lake.

  The shore was covered with gifts. There were stiff white gull feathers, clamshells whose insides were like pearl, and stones in every shade of pink and green. What we liked best of all were the pieces of driftwood worn by water and wind into strange shapes. We took turns guessing what each piece of driftwood looked like—a bear, a turtle, a boat?

  By the time we returned to the village, Papa was ready to leave. There was a serious look on his face. We heard him talking in a low voice to Sanatua. “Those men will stop at nothing to get the land the Ottawa wish to buy. But I do not mean to let them have it.”

  I was glad Papa was standing up for the Indians, but I could not help feeling worried, for I remembered how angry Mr. Blanker had been with Papa. As I said good-bye to Fawn, I could see that Papa’s words had troubled her as well. “You won’t have to go away again, will you?” I whispered. She only shook her head.

  Each morning Mama would set lessons for me. As soon as my work was finished; I would climb into the wagon and drive with Papa to the Indian village. There I would help Fawn with her tasks. We would go into the woods to find firewood. We sat cross-legged for long hours while Menisikwe showed us how to weave mats to cover the wigwams. We hunched over buckskin shirts; embroidering them with beads. We wove rawhide into a frame of ash to make snowshoes.

  The snowshoes were shaped like a bear’s paw. They were painted in bright colors and decorated with tassels.

  Menisikwe made Fawn do over anything that was not perfectly done the first time. When I made a mistake, Menisikwe was more patient. I think she expected less of me because I was not an Indian.

  Sometimes Fawn’s face clouded over when her mother scolded. She looked as if she would like to answer back. Yet she never did. Once when we were alone, I asked, “Why is your mother so strict?”

  Fawn sighed. “If a snowshoe breaks miles from our village, someone may freeze to death. If a heavy snow comes and we have not gathered enough wood, the tribe may die of the cold. We cannot be careless in anything we do.”

  Papa spent many days meeting with Chief Ke che oh caw. They were making plans to buy a piece of woodland near the Indians’ village. The land had the maple trees needed to make syrup. It was also good hunting land for grouse and pigeon. There was a small lake that would provide fish and ducks and a meadow where corn could be grown. It was the same land that Mr. Blanker wanted to buy.

  Papa said Fawn and I might go with him on the day he was to begin surveying the woodland. He left us at the small lake and went off to mark the boundaries of the property. I’ll be back in an hour or two,” he told us. “Stay by the lake and don’t go wandering off.”

  Mama had given us bread and smoked ham, and Menisikwe had sent along a basket of dried blueberries. That morning there had been a frost. The grass had stood stiff and white. Now a warm sun was making the frost disappear. We settled under a maple tree. Its leaves were so red that in the sun it looked as if it was on fire. One by one the leaves fell slowly into our laps. We were choosing the showiest ones when we heard a strange noise overhead. It was a high-pitched whooo, whooo. The next minute there was a noisy flutter, and a dozen great white birds alighted on the lake. They were swans.

  Fawn and I held our breath as the swans moved over the water, making soft whistling sounds. All at once they took off in a great commotion. Something had startled them. A minute later we heard voices. At first I thought it might be Papa coming back sooner than he had planned. Fawn shook her head. In a moment she was scrambling up into the branches of the maple tree. She motioned me to follow. The branches were low and close to one another, like steps. In no time we were high up off the ground.

  A wagon made its way around the shore of the lake. Two men climbed down from the wagon. One of the men was Mr. Blanker. His companion was a big man with broad shoulders and arms like tree trunks. “You can be sure this is a grove of bird’s-eye maple,” Mr. Blanker said. “I cut down just such a tree here la
st summer. That man, Mitchell, will be surveying here for the Indians any day now. If we want these trees; we’ll have to hurry.”

  The other man shook his head. “There’s a risk. This land don’t belong to you. I’ll be needing a little extra money to calm my nerves.”

  “You do your job and you’ll get your money.”

  The two men dragged a great crosscut saw from their wagon. They walked toward our tree. We heard the rasp of the saw as it was drawn across the tree. Fawn grabbed my arm. “Do what I do,” she whispered. She let out a bloodcurdling howl. I did the same.

  “Indians!” the men shouted. “The trees are full of them!” They dropped their saw and ran toward their wagon. In seconds they were gone.

  We had to wait up in the tree for nearly an hour before Papa came back. All the while we were afraid that the men would return for their saw. When we told him what had happened; Papa looked worried. “I should never have left you girls here alone.”

  The worry changed to a smile as we described how our howls had frightened the two men into running off and leaving their saw behind. “Well, Libby,” he said. “You and Fawn were very brave. And Sanatua was saying only yesterday it would be a great help to the Indians if they had a crosscut saw! It would make it easier to get firewood. We can tell him that you and Fawn arranged for Mr. Blanker to lend him one.”

  I would have sat up in the tree for another hour to hear such praise from Papa.

  That same week Fawn and I had our first argument. We were in the woods gathering acorns. I wanted them for Icarus. Fawn was gathering them for her mother, who would pound them into flour. Fawn and I tried to catch tumbling oak leaves. They were the very last leaves to fall from the trees. We would reach for a leaf, sure that this time we would catch it. We never did. Moving a hand through the air made the light leaf change direction. The leaf floated out of reach. We might as well have tried to catch a falling star.

  We were laughing at how foolish we looked when we heard a strange sound, like a child whining. We stood perfectly still. The cry came again, this time like a howl. It sounded close by. We looked all around us. Then we saw, almost hidden by leaves, a struggling animal. Its leg was caught in the steel jaws of a trap.

  “It’s a dog!” I said.

  “No,” Fawn said. “It is a wolf. And the trap has my father’s trap mark on it. We must find a log and kill the wolf.”

  I was horrified. “You can’t do that! We have to let it go.”

  Fawn looked at me as though I had lost my mind. “Why should I let it go? There will be money from the wolf’s fur and a bounty as well. We need the money to buy seeds for next spring’s planting.”

  I paid no attention to Fawn. I was on my knees trying to figure out how I could release the wolf. At first I had been afraid that the wolf would bite me with its sharp white teeth, but it seemed to know I wanted to help it. “Fawn,” I begged, “please do something. You know how this trap works.”

  Fawn only shook her head. “If I let the wolf get away my father will be angry with me. We trap animals because the white man gives us money for the skins. Our land has been taken away. The animals are all that are left to us.”

  Fawn’s words made me angry. “I didn’t take your land,” I snapped. “My papa is helping to get it back.”

  The wolf lay very still, looking up at us with its green eyes. There was dried blood where the trap dug into its leg. I began to cry. Fawn picked up a dead branch. I covered my eyes so that I would not see her kill the wolf. When I opened them, I saw that she was using the branch to pry apart the trap. Gently, she released the wolf’s leg. “You must tell no one what I have done,” she said to me.

  Eagerly I promised. Together we watched the wolf. At first it just lay there licking its foot. I had never seen a wolf that close before. Warily; I reached my hand out and ran it over the wolf’s soft coat. The wolf licked my hand. I was not sure I liked my hand being that close to the wolf’s sharp teeth, but nothing happened. Still, there was something frightening and mysterious in being so close to a wild animal.

  We watched as the wolf gathered its strength and struggled to its feet. It stood for several minutes, holding up its injured foot. Slowly, the wolf hobbled away into the woods. Twice it stopped and looked back at us. Soon it was lost among the trees and tall grasses.

  I was careful not to give away our secret. But that night I had a question for Papa. “How can the Indians use cruel traps with steel teeth?”

  “Once the Indians used a different kind of trap,” Papa said. “Poles were pounded into the ground to make a circle. In the middle was an opening. When the animal walked into the opening and began to eat the bait, a board was released that closed off the entrance. But now the traders sell traps with steel teeth to the Indians.”

  That night I dreamed of the wolf. In my dream the wolf had no injured foot. It bounded through the woods, nimble and happy and free.

  Winter rushed in across Lake Michigan. An angry wind blew off the lake day and night. It shook the house and rattled the windows. When I went down to the lake for a pail of water, I had to hang on to the trees to keep from being blown away. Snow hid everything. The trail to our house had disappeared.

  Papa had to put runners on our wagon so that we could go to La Croix for supplies. At the cooper’s shop you could buy not only barrels but flour and salt and potatoes. The cooper, Mr. Rouge; even had a few lengths of cloth. Papa placed me in the sleigh between him and Mama. William was wrapped so tightly in a blanket that all you could see of him was his nose.

  Our horses, Ned and Dan, stepped through the snow. Their breath came out in clouds of steam. The trees wore armfuls of snow on their branches. As we brushed against the branches, the snow tumbled down on us. Snow birds fluttered up, white and quick, like the flakes that flew around us.

  As we passed the Indian village, I thought of Fawn. I had not seen her since we had let the wolf go. If it weren’t for the smoke escaping through the holes in the wigwams, you would think the Indian village deserted. The men were out hunting and minding their trap lines. Fishing had all but stopped. When the nets were pulled up, the fish froze right in the mesh. The women were in their wigwams, preparing the few animal skins that the men had been able to bring home. Game was becoming scarce. I thought of how welcome the wolfskin would have been. Sanatua had told Papa that soon the Indians would have to make their living as farmers. It was more important than ever that Papa help them to buy back their land.

  At last we reached Mr. Rouge’s cooper’s shop, a small log cabin near La Croix’s great cross and church. Rouge means “red” in French, and the name fit the cooper very well. He was a great hunk of a man with a ruddy complexion and a red nose shaped like the beak of a hawk. He made us very welcome, urging us to take the seats next to the stove. He bustled about, taking our wraps and handing out mugs of hot cider.

  Mr. Rouge’s two boys helped in the shop. They were twins, two years older than I. Their names were André and François. They were tall and slim, with faces still brown from the summer. Their black hair was slicked back with some sort of grease. They wore identical shirts and trousers. “Bet you can’t tell which of us is which,” André said to me. I looked very hard at them and could not.

  The twins opened their mouths and gave me wide smiles. I thought that was odd, but I smiled back anyway.

  “No,” François said. “That’s how you tell us apart.”

  When I looked again, I saw that François had a gap between his front teeth. André did not. “What if you aren’t smiling?” I asked.

  Mr. Rouge laughed. “Ah, but my boys are happy creatures. They smile all the time.”

  The twins appeared good-natured. Still, there was a great deal of snickering and poking between them. “You must excuse my boys’ manners,” Mr. Rouge said. “They don’t know how to behave in front of a young lady. You have the lads all aflutter.”

  At this there was even more snickering and poking. I blushed. I had no wish to agitate the twins. In fact, I
heartily wished that they would just disappear.

  While we were talking, a hen ran into the room. Mrs. Rouge hurried after it. She was a small neat woman, as plump as her chicken. She apologized. “I keep the chickens in our storeroom in the winter.” After a chase, the hen was rounded up and closed in with the other chickens.

  Before we left, Mama and Papa invited the Rouges to come and spend Christmas Day with us. A whole day with the twins! I did not see how I could stand it.

  Because we were so busy preparing for winter there had been no time to see Fawn. I begged Papa to take me along with him on his next trip to the Indian village. Papa was helping the Indians petition the United States Government to allow them to become citizens of America. They wished to vote and to have the protection of the law. Papa and Chief Ke che oh caw were going to ask other chiefs to join the La Croix tribe in their petition.

  “Do you think our government will listen to you and let the Indians vote, Papa?” I asked.

  “Not this year, Libby but surely one day it must come about.”

  Mama had a sly smile on her face. “When it does, Rob, you must also ask them to let women vote.”

  Papa shook his head. “You can’t be serious, Vinnie. That day will never come.”

  When we arrived at the Indian village, I ran to find Fawn. She was standing at the entrance of her wigwam wearing the snow-shoes we had made. “I am going to find some wood for the fire,” Fawn said. “Winter has come so early this year. Our wood may not last.”

  “I’ll come with you,” I said.

  Fawn went to borrow snowshoes for me. When she returned, she helped me strap them onto my boots. At first I stumbled with every step. But Fawn showed me how to lift one snowshoe over the other, and soon I was stepping lightly over the snowdrifts. It was a strange feeling, for I was walking over the tops of grasses and shrubs buried under the snow. We each carried a basket on our backs to hold the wood.