Scattered Bones (24 page)

He’s relieved when Joe walks in the door. “How’d you make out?” he calls out.

“I think Mr. Jan has forgotten that I can read. He didn’t try to hide the labels from me. All these boxes are going to New York City, to a Mr. George Heye.”

“Son of a bitch,” the priest shrieks.

The Dance

Saturday evening

Chapter Twenty-Nine

Joe prays that the famous writer
won’t make
an ass of himself. During their three weeks of travels they’d become friends of sorts – Joe laughed at Sinclair’s jokes; Sinclair never stopped talking about what a great fisherman Joe was – so Joe feels protective of him. But how to prevent the man from becoming the laughing stock of Pelican Narrows when he’s as drunk as a skunk? Divert his attention maybe. Joe heads in his direction, but just at that moment Pelican Narrows’ finest musicians, the fiddlers, accordionist, and spoon players, strike up a lively rendition of ‘Rig-A-Jig-Jig.’

Sinclair Lewis staggers to the centre of the dance floor. His long, grasshopper legs wobble a pathetic version of the rise and grind, while his arms flail about in six/eight time making him look like a duck about to take off. The music’s so fast, The Distinguished Author can endure only about forty seconds before he stumbles to the sidelines just as the raucous laughter – directed at him – begins to swell.

Arthur Jan hushes the crowd. “We’re only moments away from announcing the winners. Patience everyone.” Since it’s Arthur’s warehouse that has been transformed into a dance hall and he has put up the prize money, everyone shuts up, at least for a few seconds.

Joe’s pretty sure he did well. His footwork, he feels, was rapid and intricate, and he’d included several steps he’d devised in the hope of adding spice to that old turkey,
The Red River Jig
. Still, he knows he has no chance of winning – the competition was too stiff.

The first prize is announced and he’s proven correct. Raven Jared is the champion, and everybody agrees he should be. He’s Métis so rightly comes by his jigging talent. Moreover, he’s famous. He once danced one hour and fifty-two minutes without resting for an instant, sixty-seven different steps included in his repertoire. Although he was baptized Pierre-Luc, he’s always called Raven because he reminds everybody of the famous trickster. Since Joe likes this skinny bird of a man, he’s not unhappy at the decision.

He’s less sanguine when his bête noir places second. Joe was sure he had danced rings around Moses Rabbitskin. Then he hears his own name being called. He climbs on to the little stage and graciously smiles as he accepts third prize. Two bucks is nothing to sneeze at, especially when his boat motor needs an overhaul. And there is Izzy Wentworth beaming at him. That certainly makes it all worthwhile.

Now the musicians can begin warming up for the evening’s main event. There are two callers, Solomon McCallum and Florence Smith, which is fortunate since the square dance will go on for hours, probably until sunrise. Solomon can’t carry on a conversation in English, yet somehow he has acquired a complete square dance vocabulary. Everybody agrees that, although his is a more powerful voice and he certainly knows his stuff, Florence is better. She’s full of surprises, and there’s great fun in that.

“Grab your partners,” yells Henry Highway, the accordionist.

Like everyone else Izzy and Joe dance fast and furious as Florence calls out, “Bow to the partner, bow to the corner, join hands, circle to the left. Hey now, don’t step on her foot!” Never mind the noise, the heat, the bodies rushing past, their eyes remain locked. They exist only one for the other.

Finally a break is called. All rush to the side tables where heavily buttered slabs of raisin bannock are piled high, and tea, loaded with milk and sugar, is poured.

“Isn’t Florence Smith terrific?” sings out Harriet Bird as she nudges closer to Joe. For months she’s been trying to catch his attention, but he’s been as responsive as a dead walleye. This was understandable given his great tragedy. But if he’s come back to life, she wants a chance to snare him. So does Marguerite Linklater, Madeline Ballendine, Flora Michel, Helen Bear and Juliette Bird. Suddenly a crowd of sweating females is pressing in on this prize. Izzy decides she’ll go for a walk. Her reckless
pursuit of Joe week after week has resulted in a resolution she intends to keep. She’s jealous, yes, but she will not be humiliated further.

She stands outside, staring at the shimmering moon, until ten minutes later Joe shows up. “Thank goodness I escaped that bunch,” he says. She breathes a sigh of relief. He is hers after all – she feels it in her heart. A warmth floods over her.

They find a copse of white birch, well hidden from the path; the trunk of a fallen tree provides a bench of sorts. They sit shoulder to shoulder holding hands. They are silent as though the moment was too precious to be disturbed by words. Finally he turns to her, looks directly into her eyes, says in a low, flat voice, “My head’s clear now and I’ve come to a decision. I have to tell you the truth even if it means you’ll hate me.”

“Never!” Izzy pipes up.

Joe takes a breath and then, almost in a whisper, begins what is a long confession.

“I once loved someone so much my heart still aches at the thought of her. I lost her, and I haven’t been able to get over it. I’ve been crippled, actually. Wanting to be alone, barely able to talk to anyone. But since you’ve come into my life, I’ve felt a stirring of something, a glimmer of hope maybe. But I don`t know. Am I too broken to be of use to anyone? After I’ve told you what happened, you’ll have to decide.”

“I’ve already decided. Nothing you could have done, nothing that could have happened to you, will ever change my opinion of you.”

“Wait, please. I have hidden a very dark secret. You will be the only one I tell it to. If it ever comes out, it would destroy my family, my people.”

He looks up at the sky, pinpricked with brilliant stars. Is silent for a minute – he seems almost to be praying. Then he begins his story.

Joe’s Confession

Chapter Thirty

I’d studied so hard
for so many years
with Father Bonnald that I was shocked and angry when Mother unexpectedly stepped in and forbade me from attending college in Quebec. No matter how hard I pleaded, nothing would change her mind. I was to learn the Cree way of life and that was that. I had met my relatives only once or twice and then only in passing, yet I was expected to spend three whole winters with them. I’d be miserable, I knew that.

“Your grandfather is old-fashioned, it’s true,” Mother told me. “He believes the Indian way is the best. And he may seem stern. But he loves you and wants the best for you.”

I wasn’t convinced, but I caved when she added, “I know that your father – that wise and brave warrior, George Sewap – would have wanted it too.”

In August of 1918, just after I turned seventeen, Mother arranged that her family, the Blackfish and Charboyers, travelling from Cumberland House, 300 miles to the south, would stop in Pelican Narrows to fetch me. Together we would continue on our way, hunting and trapping, eventually, after a few months, setting up winter camp. Since Grandfather considered our town to be a white man’s cesspool, he wanted his time here to be as short as possible. I had better be ready.

Since I was a small boy, Father Bonnald had taken me hunting, so I was used to handling a rifle. In fact, I was considered something of a crack shot. No, I didn’t need to worry about that. It was everything else.

Right away I found out how clueless I was. On the morning we were to leave, I was told to help dismantle camp. I stacked the poles that formed the skeleton of the wigwams in a neat pile and was about to load them in a canoe, one of six that made up our party, when Uncle Raymond came striding over.

“Why would we bring those damn things? We have a whole forest full where we’re going.Leave them right where they are. Someone else will make use of them.”

I had carefully selected a half dozen books I wanted to bring along, but when I showed up at the dock, everyone laughed at my bundle. Their baggage was so light – a few clothes, a packet of sewing supplies, a few caribou skins for blankets, a small box of store-bought provisions, tea in particular, a pouch of medicinal herbs, a papoose, rifles, ammunition, fishing rods, that was about it. I felt ridiculous, and got rid of my load, all except for the
Daily Book of Psalms
which Father Bonnald had given me and, a favourite of mine, Henry Thoreau’s
Walden
. Later, that would seem a stupid choice.

I was assigned to Grandfather Blackfish’s wigwam, my designated home for the entire journey. Our group included my grandmother, my cousin Lucy whose husband had died months before of tuberculosis, her boy and girl, ages six and eight, and my great grandfather, Isaiah Blackfish. Another wigwam was occupied by my uncle Raymond Blackfish, his second wife Charlotte, their two sons, Leon and Cornelius, Charlotte’s elderly mother, Maria Morin, and a friend, of sorts, Charlie Laliberté. The Charboyers, who were related by marriage to the Blackfishes, made up the third group. This family included my aunt Louisa, her husband, Harold, my cousin, Harold Junior, his wife, Rita, a baby, and an orphan girl called Marguerite Settee. Years before, her parents had drowned when their canoe overturned in a violent storm on Lac La Ronge. She had been brought up by the Charboyers who now regarded her as their own daughter.

The women were kind, poking at my ribs, laughing that they’d have to fatten me up for the winter. But the men were cool; out of the corner of my eye I’d catch them looking at me scornfully. I came to realize that, because I had grown up in a world they considered was debauched, I had to be soft and spoiled. Yet I had power and influence simply because I had lived in white society. And it didn’t help that I was so sullen. I was still angry about not going to college, felt bitter and resentful, and didn’t mind showing how unhappy I was. My bad temper, of course, irritated the adults.

The first day of travel, nine hours of paddling, utterly exhausted me. As soon as we set up camp, I flopped down in the wigwam and fell into a deep sleep. The next thing I knew Grandfather was poking me with his toe. “Wake up,
kakepatis
, stupid,” he roared. It turned out that I had committed a terrible crime. I had fallen asleep on the wrong side of the wigwam.

“Can’t you see that the cooking and food supplies are stored on this side so the women can easily get at them? The hunting and trapping equipment are on the men’s side. That’s where you belong even if you’re hardly what I’d call a man. You’ve been assigned a particular spot at the rear where you must remain, no matter if you are sleeping, eating or mending fishing nets.”

As a final humiliation, he spat out, “And make sure that you don’t curl up like a dog. You sleep with your head against the rear wall, your feet towards the fire.”

I felt totally confused. And utterly embarrassed. “What a lot of bullshit,” I said to myself. There was not a note of affection or warmth in my grandfather’s voice. He despised me, I was sure of that.

Fortunately, I did make one friend right away, my paddle mate, Charlie Laliberté. He was short and skinny with the biggest nose I’d ever seen on an Indian. Unlike the others who were perpetually glum, he was always cracking jokes and laughing at them himself since nobody else did. He liked to hum Cree lullabies as well as belt out Christian hymns, and once, when the camp fires were lit in the evening, I spotted him performing a wild jig to music he apparently heard in his head. He was generous and sympathetic and always tried not to cause offense. While they couldn’t help liking him, the other men considered him a lightweight. This was to be expected. He was not a Rock Cree like us, but an unreliable Swampy from the south. I never did figure out how Charlie ended up with my relatives.

My young cousins, probably because they didn’t know that I had been corrupted by the white man, attached themselves to me. The eldest, Leon, at fifteen two years younger than me, was a tall good-looking kid, but so quiet that I thought he might be a little slow. Eleven-year-old Cornelius, on the other hand, was as outgoing as his brother was shy. He never stopped chattering, asking questions, dissecting the world around him. He drove his parents to distraction, but I liked him a lot.

The first weeks of travel were hectic. Rain or shine we would wake before sunrise, gobble down a little tea and bannock, dismantle the wigwams, pack the canoes, and set off. It was rutting season, the perfect time to hunt moose and woodland caribou. If we could slaughter enough game now, we’d be sure to survive the winter. Of course, big animals weren’t found every day, so we also went after beaver, fisher, otter, ptarmigan. Once I shot a half dozen ducks in short order and I thought maybe the men were looking at me with new respect. We fished like crazy – whitefish, trout, walleye, pike, and, when we got further north, sturgeon which were not only delicious but the source of the oil used by the women in cooking, heating and many other things.

One day I spotted a big black bear crashing through the wood. I was excited, and shouted at Grandfather that I’d better go for my rifle. Another mistake. With disgust in his voice, he scolded me. “We never kill bears. Why? Because they are so much like us humans. They are sacred.” In my experience bears were shot all the time. People in Pelican Narrows loved bear steak. How was I supposed to know that this bunch considered it a sin?