A Good High Place

Chapter 26

c H A P T e R T W e N T Y - S i X Kachina adds a ham bone to the pot of stew, along with a bit of extra ham, a can of red beans, and then sliced potatoes, a satisfying meal to leave for Topini and Mary crowfeather since she’ll sit tonight with Keane. She gets out the measuring spoons and adds two teaspoons of dried sage and two of dried thyme, a tablespoon of salt, and a teaspoon of pepper. When did she start cooking like this? Measuring everything? Recipes are like road maps. She’d never used either in her youth. it had been seeing her own footprints, studying the way she’d come, that had pointed her way forward. She had walked through time instinctively, listening to The day. But last winter that had all changed. She’d had Keane to the doctor in Traverse, in Keane’s gray Rambler. dr. Glanville told them, in that routine way of doctors, that Keane’s liver wasn’t right anymore, and there wasn’t going to be much he could do about it. He prescribed little white tablets. No alcohol or coffee, he’d said (which made Keane snort and say that would be the day). lots of clean water. Adequate rest. And that had been that. Keane had talked on the way home about how he hoped for an early spring so he could get on the river and about how the new vet working with him, dr. Allen, was coming along fine. And wasn’t that fortunate, since it would give him more time for fishing? She’dtakenKeanehomethen.Hetoldherhewasfeelinggoodbut would nap a bit if she wouldn’t mind. So she made him an infusion of dandelion root and licorice. He’d sipped it, set it on the bedside table, and closed his eyes, fingers interlaced across his chest. it is early February, and they’d gotten a couple feet of snow in the last week, so she grabs Keane’s snowshoes, tells Topini to stay put with Keane and the scrapbook Topini likes with the shiny photographs of Keane’s animals in it. She heads north along the shoreline of the bay for nearly a mile, then straps on the shoes and heads east through the woods. The shoes are a new leather kind, a modified bear paw, more of a long crescent shape than she is used to, which makes lifting her feet easier than the old rounder, wider bear paw. But the leather causes her to sink some in the snow. it has been a gray day, maybe thirty degrees. No wind. She walks two miles, a decent trek, focusing on each shoe as it slices through the snow, clearing her mind of every thought, listening to the sighs and the soft moans of the past, but finally thinking of nothing but her next shoe print in the powder. The synchronized motion, the thoughtless inertia of the shoes. Shoosh, shoosh, shoosh, shoosh. She pulls her hands out of her gloves and plays with what feels like pieces of corn in her pocket and some kind of tissue. She stops, pulls out the tissue, and wipes her nose. Then walks on. And on. evening is fast approaching, and she’ll need to think of dinner soon. She feels cold inside. These are paths she knows like the pathwaystoherheart,sowhydoesshefeeltheyhavebecomehostile? She laughs and starts back along the tracks she’d made. Startled, she realizes she’s been oblivious to the landmarks, focusing on the rhythmic propulsion through the snow. Nothing seems familiar. A rivulet she doesn’t recognize, boulders and stumps she doesn’t know, piled high with a couple feet of snow. She climbs over logs she doesn’t remember, yet the evidence of the brushed snow testifies that she’d been there. evening approaches faster, and Kachina, for the first time in her life, is truly lost. She tries to listen to Theday, but this is her first hint that He’s turned His face from her. 132 L.E. Kimball A GOOD HIGH PLACE 133 Keep walking, she tells herself. The tracks are like bread crumbs, and if she follows them, she’ll find her way back. But the wind has come up, blowing snow into her face with short blasts of frigid air. The snow has a rhythm, comes in waves of frozen fear, her tracks...