That man said he kept a human spirit which was a wind in a bottle for just such cases as death or near death. This scared the people. But that was that. The bottle was now emptied.

While this is being done, Argentine walks away and out into the forest and gathers greens. When she returns she boils them and then she leans over the sleeping man and she puts a plaster on his terrible wound with forest greens and mosses, and with a candlestick and lantern she sits beside him and sings and spoons boiled herbs into his mouth at night. Sometimes he feels a hand on his chest, but no pain. He dreams that she can see his heart. He believes she can. It is a good heart.

When Thomas has his spirit back and can sit up and his heart has been covered with something like bark, they all sit in silent council for days. He understands what is being said. This is the way it used to be. The speaking is done through the eyes and through the soul and heart. A person can feel what is considered. Intelligence is passed all around, knowledge is shared. Decisions are made this way, primal, primary. Stories are told. For Thomas, he is emptied of all his stories and secrets, even his deeds, and one time he thinks, We keep nothing. What we are shows on our faces, our every move, our grasping, the way we consume others or ourselves.

The ceremony begins and it is never what those who are not Indian think, wish, hope. They want something more. They want so much, as if they have nothing. But now it is asked, What has he nourished himself with? What has he given the world and what has he taken? It is like judgment day for those who are questioned by a god in the sky or an angel who does the accounts.

For some time afterward all that can be done is to sleep. The room is full of his even breathing and snoring. No nightmares. Then the man named Feather wakes him and beckons to him. He gets up and washes and they go out, pull the ancient canoe into the ocean, and paddle, invisible in the light, as if they are ghosts transparent as dragonfly wings in the misty light and maybe they pass to the other side of something. All the clouds soon lift from the sky and the sun comes to their faces, glints off the ocean. No one can ever tell what it is, but travelers to other worlds return with special light.

In one world it all matters, the truth, all the many truths. In real worlds for those travelers, it is all the same.

The tribesmen and tribeswomen take him in, Thomas Witka Just, grandson of Witka. Even so, they are still questions, the people. Some are even shaped like questions, those who have bent backs. And there are the questions to be asked.