The morning they left the winter camp was overcast and cool. Man Killer shared her canoe with two orphans and after what seemed like an eternity, the canoes were loaded and they shoved off into the big water. The Water Spirit had heard their prayers and Gitchigoomie was no worse than it was on most days. They had traveled many miles when they finally made their camp where the Brule emptied into the big water. There, they would rest for the night. Weather permitting, they would leave the following morning and continue on their journey, which might last an entire week.
Although no one knew it then, the band of Ojibwe was about to spend its last summer in the place known as Meenon or Blueberry country. They paddled their canoes up the Brule River, making many portages along the way where the whitewater gurgled over large rocks that would smash the small birch-bark canoes into pieces. There were always the young and the old and the sick to tend to. Still, the summer season was a time to look ahead after a winter of disease and death. The English had come to trade and they had given more than the band had bargained for. The traders had brought smallpox and diphtheria into their camp and many had died. There were many young orphans and they were passed around by the women to be fed, which was their way. No one should go hungry.
Man Killer carried two of these children in her canoe. She had never had children of her own and most thought that she was too old to have any, even if she could find another man to marry her. Even in her mid-thirties, she was by far the most beautiful woman of their numbers, but Man Killer had already outlived all three of her husbands. Some whispered that she was bad medicine. Most, never dared to speak of her at all. She wondered why she had been cursed for so many years. How had all of the other women seemed to find their men with such relative ease? What caused men to die after marrying her? She hadn’t killed any of them, not that anyone actually believed her. The Old Ones had told her that she may not have put a hand on any of her former husbands, but she had certainly killed them in their sleep. She was close to the end of her child-bearing years and the thought of it made her eyes water.
Man Killer went about her business after the old women had come to reclaim the two children who had been put in her charge. They did not want her to become too attached to them, or the other way around. These children now belonged to all of them and it was important that they understood this. They would learn many things and never again feel the horror of losing a parent. Man Killer understood this, but it didn’t make it any easier in her loneliness. The children had been a nice diversion and the day had been filled with their little songs.
Man Killer slept very little that night as she worried about the days ahead. This would be a very different trip than all of the others. The spotted sickness had claimed so many during the winter that it gave their village an uneven feeling. Many of the Old Ones were gone and they had taken their great wisdom with them. She missed them, all of them, and felt a lingering sense of betrayal when she thought about an individual for too long. The orphans were what really troubled her. While they would look out for these children as if they were their own, they had never traveled with so many in tow. The rivers would still run with the white water, making their journey very difficult and extremely dangerous.
Then, there were also the Sioux to worry about. The band seemed to be split on what to do about them. Two of the white traders had visited in their village for a few days. The men had traded them four rifles for some biwabik, or iron, which the white men seemed very interested in. The biwabik had yet to be forged into anything of value and the village thought the men to be very poor traders. Rifles were needed if they encountered the Sioux. Traders were rare these days, partially because of the disappearance of the small furry animals, but mostly because of their refusal to trade goods for alcohol.
The village also liked these men because they were great storytellers. They liked to sit at the fire from sun to sun, where they would spin their tales in a mixture of French, Sioux, and Ojibwe, adding sign language when their words failed them. There had been a lot of talk after the men had left, for they had reported that a troublesome band of Sioux was camped near their summer home at the head of the Brule.
Many of the trappers and traders had inquired about her, but they had all shied away when her story was told.
The world was changing before her eyes and Man Killer wondered where that would stop. Would the white men be happy with taking so many of the trees, or would they want to cut more of them down? How long would it be before they grew back? What about the little animals, could they hide their families until the last of the trappers had left the area? She didn’t like change and she wished she could somehow slow things down. She wanted to find a husband and time was running out.
Huck