Starfish_ A Novel - James Crowley [40]
Barney handed Corn Poe a small wooden bowl. Corn Poe’s fingers disappeared into the bowl, then reappeared covered in a paste of what appeared to be black ashes. He spread the concoction onto to his face and then passed the bowl to Barney, who did the same. Lionel wasn’t sure what they were trying to do, and this was the first time that it occurred to him that neither Barney nor Corn Poe did, either. It seemed like they were making it up as they went along, but so far, he thought it was better than sitting back at school in the chapel.
“Now it’s time to dance,” Corn Poe said, attempting to rise. He stood up for a minute, teetered back and forth, and then stumbled to the ground, landing on top of the little kid. “Whoa, I guess I got me a tad bit of the light-headed.”
Corn Poe crawled, mumbling, toward the opening, then threw the flap upward, filling the sweat lodge with crisp evening air. The coolness hit Lionel, driving the dizziness from his head. The little kid and then Tom followed Corn Poe, and soon Lionel did the same.
It was dark, and a thousand stars now littered the heavens. Lionel took a deep breath, then followed Corn Poe and the other children’s voices as they cascaded through the darkness from somewhere down toward the creek.
Lionel reached the creek just as Corn Poe jumped from its muddy bank. He disappeared for a second under the swirling waters and then shot up and pulled himself to shore. Tom and the little kid followed, and then Lionel.
Lionel hit the near-freezing water and felt a jolt run through his body. He broke the surface and in a few short strokes was at the muddy bank. He drank from the cold creek, and then Corn Poe and Tom pulled him to his feet.
“I don’t know what time it is, but I sure as hell know I’m woke up after that,” Corn Poe said.
Beatrice and Barney ran down and jumped in, and a drum began to pound back at the campfire. Lionel pulled on his clothes, put the bear claws back around his neck and under his shirt, and went up to join the others.
The small fire had grown. The smaller children, led by Corn Poe, piled on a variety of brush, and it grew, lighting the surrounding trees with an eerie black-orange glow.
Corn Poe and Tom began to shuffle around the fire to the drum, stopping occasionally to let out a yell of one sort or another. The rest of the children joined them, followed by Barney, who appeared out of the darkness, shivering and wet from the creek.
Lionel saw Beatrice across the fire from him, adjusting her knife on the beaded belt that hung around the long deer-skin shirt that their grandfather had made for her. Her hair was wet, and she wore a single line of the charcoal paste across her eyes like the mask of a raccoon. Lionel felt glad that she was his sister. He watched as all of the children entered the circle moving around the fire in a slow shuffle. Beatrice fell in, and Lionel watched as she got lost dancing to the slow beat of the drum and the snap of the roaring fire.
Lionel was dizzy again, but this time it was different. His mind was light, but his body was still coordinated. He joined the others, falling easily into the uncertain, irregular rhythm of the child drummer. Lionel thought about the bear in the stream and the three hawks and the eagle they had seen the first time he had gone to their grandfather’s, before he had ever even heard of the boarding school. He continued to dance, thinking about Beatrice and staring lost into the fire.
Lionel was not sure how long they danced. He felt his body growing tired but continued to move. At some point he noticed Corn Poe leave the circle but watched as he returned, holding a green glass bottle. It looked like the bottle that the Frozen Man was holding when he offered the necklace.
Corn Poe pulled a cork out of the nose of the bottle, tipped it high over his head, and drank. He lowered the bottle with a grimace and let out a shrieking yelp. He handed the bottle to Tom Gunn, who drank and passed it along to Barney Little Plume. Barney drank repeatedly and then passed it to Beatrice. “I took this