Read Online Soapstone Signs by Jeff Pinkney - Free Book Online Page B

are out there somewhere.
    We make our journey in Mom’s canoe. Mom’s canoe is made of cedar strips and covered in white canvas. She takes very good care of it.
    Mom and I have packed bannock mix, strips of smoked whitefish and some water. We have a first-aid kit, bedrolls and a small tent. She has also packed her rifle in case our camping gets interrupted by wapask , the white bear. I have never seen her take her rifle out of its cover, but Dad once told me she is a better mark than he is and that’s one of the reasons he’s so good to her.

    I have packed one of the soapstone pieces from Lindy. I will be ready to start a new carving as soon as my signs and whispers tell me what is waiting for me inside the stone.
    â€œWhat if we run out of food?” I ask Mom.
    â€œThen we hunt and we gather. Food is all around us.”
    â€œWhat if the fish won’t bite?”
    â€œThen we learn to be hungry—that will make us better hunters.”
    The blackflies are biting. “I wish there were no bugs!”
    â€œWithout the insects, there would be no blueberries or belugas,” Mom says. “The insects help turn the blueberry flowers into berries. They also act as food for the fish, and those fish go on to feed the belugas.”
    â€œOkay,” I say, “but I wish the blackflies would just eat the blueberries instead of biting us.”
    â€œMe too,” says Mom as she passes me some bug spray.

    We paddle out onto the river. With the current flowing toward the bay and the tides pulling in the opposite direction, the river creates tiny “tut-tut” waves. The waves don’t go one way or the other but lift straight up into tiny peaks and drop back down again. Little drops are left hanging in the air for a split second. If you listen, it sounds like the gentle tut-tutting of a hundred tongues. It’s like the river is thinking but can’t make up its mind about something.
    I have tut-tuts in my ears and blueberries and blackflies in my thoughts. But mostly I’m thinking about belugas and keeping an eye peeled over the water. We are paddling to a place called an estuary, where the salt water of the bay and the fresh water from the rivers inland meet.
    There is lots of time to think when you are paddling a canoe.
    I think about being a human being, and how when I breathe the air I can feel the breath come in and out of me. I can feel the wind against my body, and I know that it is gravity holding me to the ground. I can see when it is light or dark, and I can feel when it is hot or cold or wet or dry.
    Lindy taught me to use my senses to be aware of signs and messages from the world around me. I wonder about the beluga whales who breathe the air like we do, and I wonder about all the signs that they can feel, smell, taste, see and hear in the water.
    I think about the fresh water from the river mixing with the salt water in the bay. And I think that must be an important sign for the whales.
    I think about how belugas can see, hear, feel, smell and taste just like we can. But they also have an extra sense that lets them bounce sound through the water around them. This is how they know what else is in the water, like friends, food or danger. I think the belugas must know secrets about the water that people have not thought of yet.

    At first, I think we’ve paddled up beside a long gray river rock. Then I realize that the long gray river rock swam up beside us!
    The wapameg is almost as long as our canoe and gently breaks the water beside us. I am tingling with excitement but do not feel scared.
    I look up at Mom, who is paddling gently while the whale swims beside us. She motions for me to look across to where a bigger beluga is gliding slowly toward us. This whale is longer and wider, white like snow and floating as gently as a cloud in the sky.
    â€œShe is the mother,” my mom whispers as the big white wapameg comes slowly alongside. Little Wapameg must