I Am Regina by Sally M. Keehn Page B

a scalp has eyes. If Father could see me now, he would be ashamed.
    My stomach aches. All I have had to eat this morning is a bowl of broth. I try to sew together the strips of deerskin Woelfin has given me. I am supposed to be making moccasins, but my hands are stiff and clumsy. Mother taught me how to sew, but not like this, with a needle made of bone and dried sinew for thread. I long for the crisp feel of linen, a fine needle to guide between the threads.
    Using a bone-handled knife, Woelfin scrapes flesh from a raccoon pelt. The hut reeks with the smell of the rotten meat. Mother used to hang lavender from our kitchen rafters to sweeten the air. Woelfin should use it.
    She points her knife at me. “Lazy Tskinnak. Stop poking holes in the deerskin. Go into the forest. Gather food. N’gattopui, I am hungry.”
    â€œWhere is the food?” I ask, careful to speak in the Indian tongue. I sense that Woelfin, like Tiger Claw, would anger at the sound of white man’s words.
    Woelfin glances sideways at me. “Does the wolf ask where his prey is hiding?”
    â€œNo ...”
    â€œGo!”
    Ice crystals blanket the north wall of the hut. I can hear the wind. I want to stay by the fire. Its flames burn bright like orange flowers. I can lose myself in them.
    Woelfin’s knife flashes before my face. I scurry backward and fall over Sarah who has been sleeping near the fire. I want to tell her how sorry I am, but I do not know the Indian words. I reach behind her and grab a basket from under a. bed. The sound of Sarah’s crying haunts me as I hurry out the door flap. I remember the morning, how Sarah’s finger traced my tears.
    Outside, the day is gray and chilly. A woman takes down the stretched deerskin that yesterday flapped in the wind. A dog noses the ashes of last night’s fire. This village is a sad and lonely place.
    I search the garden plots behind the huts for gleanings. There is nothing to be found but withered stalks and leaves. I run down the bank toward the stream. Perhaps I will find fish there. I am not sure how I will catch the fish. I have no net.
    Could I catch them with my hands?
    The stream is frozen. I could find a stone and crack the ice. But I don’t know how to get fish out of the hole. I’ll have to go back without anything to eat. Woelfin will be angry. She’ll beat me.
    Mother never beat me.
    I rest my head against an ash tree that has rooted in the rocky bank. I watch withered leaves flutter in the wind and think of home. There I would find hams hanging in the smokehouse. I would find dried corn and wheat stored in barrels. There would be nuts and dried fruit; cheese, sweet butter, and milk standing in the spring house. Sometimes I would dip my finger into the milk and scoop out the thick white cream. I loved the rich taste of this stolen treat. And there was always fresh baked bread to eat. My mother’s bread.
    Thinking of her bread, I remember, how after supper the glow of firelight touched my mother’s face as she sat with her mending on her lap. Sometimes she sang. I felt so safe and loved.
    If only I could hear my mother now. Her singing would reassure me, tell me, “everything will be all right.”
    I try to sing the hymn she often sang. My throat feels hot and tight. I can but whisper as slowly the forbidden white man’s words come to me.
    Alone, yet not alone am 1,
Though in this solitude so drear....
    I listen to the words I sing and suddenly, as real as touch, I feel my mother’s presence here—a warmth I have not felt in many days. Fingers brush across my arm. Startled, I quickly turn.
    But it is not my mother. Only the round-faced woman who ducked me in the water, who gave me my moccasins and danced with me. The Indians call her Nonschetto, “the doe.” I’stiffen, expecting her to scold me for singing in the white man’s tongue. Strangely, she does not scold. Her warm brown eyes search mine, as