‘The Kinchuinicks believe the heart and the penis to be the sacred parts of a man, Henderson. You should be shamed by neither. We have a saying, that a man gives life with his penis and lives life with the heart.’ She snorted to herself at some hidden thought. ‘Though I have seen men who live life for pleasure only and give life with nothing.’

Henderson’s high colour had left him, but he was unchanged in his resolve. ‘I not Kinchuinick.’

She shrugged, smiled, and wrung out the cloth. ‘Then it will be the head only. The heart and penis will have to soothe themselves.’

He lay back, relieved, letting the woman continue pressing and dabbing at his forehead, and then noticed that the boy’s attention had returned to something he had stuffed down his beaded belt and was now retrieving surreptitiously. It was his crucifix, the beautiful mahogany and ivory gift that his father had given him on his graduation day.

‘You like?’ He gestured weakly to the object in the boy’s hand.

Walks Alone registered alarm at being caught and looked to his mother for reproach or defence. She offered neither, dropping the cloth back into the cooling water to administer more attention to the pale man.

The boy looked back at Henderson and nodded.

‘It is son of … it is Great Spirit. He come here and we live because he die.’

Walks Alone stared at Henderson’s mouth as he said this, trying to make sense of the words, and failed. He looked back at the figure of Christ as if it would speak more clearly, and when it did not, to his mother. Her interests were elsewhere.

‘Does the balsam water soothe your fever?’

Henderson looked into her black, almond-shaped eyes. Although it stung the skin, making it tingle, it was soothing his brow, there was little doubt. Somehow he felt more calm now, his thoughts beginning to recover from their turbulence. ‘Yes. Thank you.’

She shrugged in reply as though his thanks were of no consequence. The boy still clutched his precious crucifix. Henderson very much wanted to bring this young soul to Christ, but the base human in him wanted his keepsake back. He could read the child like a book, the face waiting to be told he could have the trinket, but Henderson could not bear to lose it. He held his hand out for the cross and slowly the boy gave it up into his big pale palm.

The minister’s fears were creeping on his flesh again. This strange couple would not be with him forever. And then what? What would come with the night, and with his dreams?

James Henderson’s fingers closed around the wood and he held it tightly to his breast. He expected the boy to have a tantrum now. He could be no more than eight or nine years old.