Jimmy Bluefeather: A Novel by Kim Heacox Page A

He was the former Jinkaat village public safety officer and now deputy sheriff-in-training, the wheat-haired son of a retired Alaska state trooper who Truman said got the other end of the male chromosome. Instead of doing what he should have done—sell kitchenware in a Seattle Sears—he became a cop. His shoulders sufficed for little more than a coat hanger. Still, you had to admire his fearlessness and determination, even though they would probably get him killed one day. With arms extended referee-style, as if breaking up a fight, he stepped between Tommy and James and said, “All right, what’s going on here?”
    Nobody spoke. Charlie started up his machine.
    Tommy looked wistfully at Little Mac.
    A RAVEN FLEW overhead just then, northbound. Not any raven. Imagine an oracle rising from the dead, a bird with one feather missing, cutting the sky. Imagine the feather in Keb’s hand lifting too. Not a downy feather from the bird’s neck or breast, but a primary feather, broad and black as a January sky.Made for lift and speed. What happened then Keb couldn’t say. It seemed as if hours passed, but in truth only seconds went by. He saw himself on the bird’s back, everything visible from Raven’s eye. Icy Strait appeared below. Up ahead, approaching fast, a vast wall of ice commanded the entrance to Crystal Bay. Keb recognized it as the great glacier that long ago marched down from the mountains and forced his ancestors from their home, the glacier that locked the bay in cold storage for hundreds of years before it melted back. Had it returned? Was yesterday tomorrow and tomorrow today? Raven seemed to float, the shadow of his wings patterned onto the glacier’s deep blue crevasses. Reflected in one wing-shadow, above the ice, Keb saw his own face. In the other wing-shadow, James’s face. Between them, the glacier climbed in fractured towers of ice—the colors separate yet one. The sky was an untended grave, rolling back on itself. Keb forgot to breathe. Then a movement, far below. Approaching the ice was a small canoe, hewn from wood, sharp-prow,
seet
, the most beautiful boat in the world. Keb watched as two men paddled that canoe right through the glacier as if ice were water. Then a voice: “Pops? Pops . . . are you okay?”
    He gasped.
    “Talk to me, Dad.” Keb was flat on the ground, pressed to the earth. He blinked through dusty shafts of sunshine. Hovered over him were Gracie, Coach Nicks, Little Mac, and Deputy Sheriff-in-Training Stuart Ewing, their faces half in shadow, half in bright light. Tyronniemorris Rex was there too, Steve the Lizard Dog, his head cocked in bewilderment. Gracie stroked Keb’s hair. “Say something, Pops. Can you hear me?”
    “I hear you.”
    “Can you sit up?”
    He was lying on his back. He sat up and saw James not kneeling beside him like the others, but removed and strangely dispassionate, still on his feet.
    “You stopped breathing,” Coach Nicks said. “You feel okay, Keb?”
    “Am I breathing now?”
    “Yep.”
    “I feel fine.” Keb got to his feet so quickly that he startled everybody. “Where are Charlie and Tommy?”
    “They left.”
    Keb looked around. His stomach rumbled. “I’m hungry. Let’s make waffles.”

the death of too many dreams
    THE CONFRONTATION HAD unsettled Gracie, Keb could see. She was more fragile these days. “We’ll eat in Ruby’s place,” Keb said. “It has a big kitchen table.”
    “Ruby won’t like it,” Gracie said in a weak voice.
    Keb shrugged. Ruby was in Juneau or Anchorage or Washington. He couldn’t keep track of her anymore. “We need waffles, Gracie. Make them like you used to.”
    “Little Mac will help me,” Gracie said.
    Little Mac smiled, her way of saying yes.
    Old Keb watched James, the radius of his heat, his hands working in and out of fists.
    Coach Nicks and his boys set the table. Truman made orange juice. Gracie pulled out the sourdough starter, added cinnamon, whipped it up, and gave each