Once downstairs, Astrid and Millie finished the dinner dishes while Grandmother Killdeer made them all large mugs of hot cocoa. It was one of her specialties. She gave it a kick by adding a pinch of cinnamon and cayenne.

When the kitchen was in order and everyone had their cups of steaming cocoa, Winona, Astrid, and Millie retired to the living room to take a closer look at the treasures unearthed from the chest.

Grandmother Killdeer cozied herself in her overstuffed red corduroy armchair. The vibrant fuzzy fabric was worn thin on the arms from years of loving use. She placed her cocoa on the end table next to her chair, switched on the lamp occupying its center, and began thumbing through the old photo album.

The girls settled on either end of the long, faux velvet sofa. They set their mugs on the secondhand coffee table littered with heat rings. Grandmother Killdeer had long since given up policing the use of coasters. Astrid shifted a stack of her grandmother's gossip magazines to make room for the tin and popped the lid. She chose a letter at random and began to read.At the other end of the couch, Millie read the dates artfully scribed on the cover of each black, leather-bound journal: 1884-1885; 1886; and 1887-89. Deciding it would be best to start initially, Millie cracked the leather cover of 1884-1885.

November 26, 1884 It has been roughly six months since Chief Foster's hunting party discovered me wandering on the Grand Ronde reservation. I had no memory of where I had come from, where I was going, or who I was. I understood no language spoken to me, nor did I have a native tongue of my own. All food was alien to me, and nothing whatsoever seemed remotely familiar. It was like my past had been scrubbed from my mind.

The kind people calling themselves Kalapuya nursed me back to health, for I had suffered greatly at the hands of the elements. When I had recovered enough to travel, they took me to a nearby Quaker settlement to see if anyone there could claim me or perhaps had heard of someone fitting my description.

No one in the area knew of me. A more exhaustive search conducted with the local sheriff turned up nothing as well. It was as if I had dropped from the sky.

Luckily, whatever ill had befallen me, it did no permanent damage to my ability to learn. Within six months, I was able to converse fluently with the Kalapuya, and the Quakers taught me not only to speak English but also to read and write. At the behest of Brother William, I keep this journal, hoping that writing about my experiences will help me remember my past.

I have been living with the Kalapuya and learning their ways this last half-year. They have taken to calling me "Lakayo," which means far away. How far, I may never know. The Quakers, or Friends as they prefer, have named me Abednego from the book of Daniel in their holy book called The Bible. The Friends say this name is befitting me because I survived the wilderness by the will of their God.

Millie stared dumbfound at the journal entry. She didn't know what to expect from Astrid's great-great-great grandfather's journal, but she certainly hadn't expected him to be anything other than Indigenous. She peered at Astrid and her grandmother. They were both engrossed in discovering the past as much as Millie.

"Grandmother Killdeer?" Millie's voice was soft and tentative.

Winona raised her eyes from the photo album and regarded Millie with her kind expression. She saw that Millie's finger held a place in the closed journal clutched in her hand. "What do you think so far?"

"I expected him to be Native. From the Kalapuya tribe," Millie said. "He was a white man?"Grandmother Killdeer nodded. "He was a white man with the most beautiful sapphire-colored eyes. Some in our family say it's where we get our blue eyes. But it being a recessive gene and all, I doubt he was the sole contributor."

"Did he ever remember who he was?" Millie asked, reaching for her hot cocoa."Are you sure you want me to tell you? It might ruin the story."

Millie thought as she stirred the chocolate. She weighed her curiosity against prolonged suspense and deciding that instant gratification was more to her liking. "I'd like to know."Winona closed the photo album. "No, he never did. The Kalapuya took him, mostly because Mary Foster, the chief's daughter, demanded her father help him. They married soon after and had three children."

"Did he ever figure out what had caused him to lose his memory?"

"That too remained a mystery. The doctors were sure it was a head injury, but when he was found, he didn't show any signs of having received a wound to his head, not even a scar. Some thought he might have experienced something so frightening that the shock made him forget everything that happened before that moment and that he would soon recover, but he never did."

"Wow." Millie couldn't imagine forgetting everything she knew, all the people she loved. "That must have been super scary. Thank goodness good people found him."

Grandmother Killdeer nodded in agreement. "Considering everything he must have gone through, he was very fortunate to have wandered onto the Grand Ronde Reservation."

"What are you talking about?" Astrid asked. She'd finished reading the first love letter and placed it back into its envelope.

"Your four times great grandfather," Millie replied. "He was injured, and the Kalapuya found him wandering around with no memory."

"Is that what's in the journals?" Astrid asked, her interest piqued. "Grandmother's told me a little about him. What else did it say?"

"That a hunting party found him wandering on the Reservation and took him. They call him Lakayo, which means far away," Milled said. "And then the Quakers called him Christopher after the patron saint of travelers."

"Look at you, Millie Downing. Throwing Chinook around like a pro. We'll have you speaking like a native yet," Grandmother Killdeer chuckled.

"So he went from having no name to having two," Astrid said. "He was the man with two names."