Winter's Child
Man Who Fell from Sky
Night of the White Buffalo
Killing Custer
Buffalo Bill's Dead Now
The Perfect Suspect
The Spider's Web
Silent Spirit
Blood Memory
Girl w/ Braided Hair
Drowning Man
Eye of the Wolf
Wife of Moon
Killing Raven
Shadow Dancer
Thunder Keeper
Spirit Woman
Lost Bird
Story Teller
Dream Stalker
Ghost Walker
Eagle Catcher
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The Ghost Walker: Excerpt
The wind bore through Father John's parka, sending shivers along his spine.
He started down, his boots sliding in the snow. One boot hit something flat and sharp – a boulder – and he drove his foot against it, steadying himself while he extracted the flashlight. It flickered a moment, then went out. He pounded the plastic tube into his glove until a narrow, eerie beam burst over the loglike figure: the boots, the patterns in the black soles, the tops of gray socks. The figure was wrapped in a brown tarp, but hanging from the side was a strip of blue fabric with white stars and red and yellow stripes: the Arapaho star quilt. He recognized the stillness of death. He was looking at a corpse. "Dear God," he prayed out loud, "have mercy on his soul."
Jamming his flashlight back into his pocket, Father John climbed to the road and started for the highway. He was running now, gulping in icy air that punctured his lungs like a thousand sharp needles. He sensed he had passed from cold to
numbness, the beginnings of hypothermia, but his thoughts were focused on the poor dead soul wrapped in a star quilt and tarp and thrown into a
ditch. 'God help him,' he prayed silently over and over, the words matching the rhythm of his boots against the snow.
© Margaret Coel
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