A Good High Place

Chapter 29

c H A P T e R T W e N T Y - N i N e it was unusual for her mood not to match that of The day back then. it’s something that won’t occur for many years. She’s not sure what’s causing it now. But The day seems almost to be teasing her. There is that unformed, cloying feeling, like awakening from a bad dream you can’t quite recall, or would rather not. That vague feeling of dread. She chases the feelings around her head a few times until she catches a glimpse of the problem. luella. Thinking of luella has left her confused and irritable. She knows she’ll feel better if she can find a place to put her. Somewhere she’ll stay. But the trouble is, she doesn’t stay. Kachina would stick her in the back corner of her mind, a place reserved for things she considers useless: umbrellas with holes, shoes with holes, trousers with holes—all that’s unfit for the purposes for which they were intended. To Kachina, there is no greater crime than being useless, unnecessary, extra. even evil has a purpose. despite her conviction that luella and cap have earned their spot in her useless corner, the girl keeps sliding out. The weather is good for early June, warm. Kachina needs some horsetail and nettle for a poultice for izusa’s knees. Though she’s too young for symptoms like this, izusa can hardly make it off her A GOOD HIGH PLACE 153 pallet, and she spends most of her time sitting on her stool near the fire, even in warmer weather like today. Kachina has dried herbs left from last summer, but she wants fresh horsetail and nettle. it’s early to find them, but they will do izusa more good if she’s lucky enough to find them fresh. The poultice would help. Kachina will try hot castor oil packs if it doesn’t. Herbs and medicines are necessary to replace the vine that once connectedheavenandearth,thevinethatmanseveredinhisconceit and stupidity. The concept of fluid, the proportion of blood in the body, equal to the proportion of water on earth—another example of balance. As she walks, Kachina notices some chickweed in a clearing, which is good for the lungs, and a black walnut tree standing alone by a small creek that leads to the river. Walnuts are good in case of poison ivy or warts, but she sees no horsetail or nettle. Sage is an option for people of izusa’s age, but it’s early in the season for that. it might have to be the cedar. it made excellent tea and was good for treating arthritis, and more importantly, Kachina knows she can find it. cedars like low areas, and there’s one particular tree that Kachina likes down on the north side of elk River. She walks up the north side of the rise where she and Topini go to pick morel mushrooms. it’s been a rainy spring, excellent conditions for mushrooms, and they’d picked more than four hundred morels here several weeks ago. izusa and oneida loved to fry them in butter or lard along with a pinch of sage and a touch of raw sap or maple. Kachina notices some trillium left under the trees, but the mushrooms are long gone. As Kachina nears elk River, she sees overhanging willows, swamp cedars, and swales of tag alders, which line the banks and form secluded alcoves, common along the chain of lakes. A boat or canoe could duck into these alcoves anytime if a person didn’t wish to be noticed. Many of the lakes are covered with white-andyellow lily pads, but here in elk River there are few due to the high frequency of boat traffic. The river is short but widens where it joins 154 L.E. Kimball elk lake, and then it empties into Grand Traverse Bay. Many years ago it was narrower, and there were stumps of dead white cedar and bog spruce. Since they added the dam, it appears more like a lake than a river, but it’s necessary for boat traffic to adhere to the original narrows to avoid the hidden stumps. Kachina carries a tin can filled with corn stew that izusa had made for dinner. Food from her own portion, like in the old...