"He had only the one child, and he idolized him. But the boy was not strong, and Joe quarreled constantly with his wife—I think her name was Isabel—because he thought she ran around too much to parties and lunches—and didn't give Tommy proper care. Well, maybe she was a bit flighty, but it certainly wasn't her fault that Tommy caught diphtheria. The child came down with it, that's all. Well, I guess the little fellow didn't have much
resistance. He was really just a baby, about two or three years old, the size of this Tommy. Anyway, he was dead in four days. And Joe Henderson never spoke a word to his wife. He looked at her when she cried and sobbed and held the little body—just looked at her.
"From that day on he was driven. He drifted through cities and towns, working only to eat and never long at one thing.
"It was only when he struck into the Northwest that any peace came to him. He seemed to take a sort of satisfaction in the rigor and the hardships. At least he had something tangible to fight— the cold. He prospered for a while, and he did pretty well. He came to be known as a steady man, one that left the Indian women strictly alone. Every three or four months, of course, he'd go on a binge. Then he'd talk about Tommy to anyone who would listen.
"Well, the Hudson's Bay Company needed a man here, and Henderson got the job. He's been here four years now. The first year he lived alone. He hated women—you couldn't trust them. Hadn't his own wife killed Tommy? But you've seen him, a big fiery man with red blood in him.
"I was glad when I came in from a couple of months on the trail to find Uaawa with him. I thought it might soften him a little to have a woman around again. And it did, for a while. But as soon as the baby was born, he changed. Of course, he shouldn't have called him Tommy, but he did. And I think it hurt him every time he looked at the child, to see the dark Indian face of him. The other Tommy had been fair.
"He blamed Uaawa for a lot of things—for the boy's black hair and brown face. Then she is a woman, and he didn't trust her. He questioned how she dressed him, what she fed him, where he played. The woman is Indian, and maybe that saved her from going out of her mind. She didn't fight back, not when he beat her and kicked her around, and she didn't go back to her people. That wasn't her way. She was too Indian. And she chose a typical Indian revenge, or maybe it wasn't revenge at all. That's the trouble with the Indian mind, you can't understand it.
"She began by giving this child, this Tommy Henderson, an Indian name. Of course Joe was furious. But in spite of the beatings he gave her, she continued to call little Tommy by his Indian name. When Joe isn't around, she speaks to the child in the Beaver language, and the boy has come to understand that language. He knows the myths and legends of his mother's tribe. There's no doubt the woman is making an Indian of Tommy Henderson.
"It's probably very simple. She sings the songs that were sung to her by her mother, and tells her son the only stories that she knows. Or it may be a pride in her own people. Perhaps she doesn't want the boy to be ashamed before white men. Yes, perhaps it is only that she wishes him to understand her people, to have pride in them. Or perhaps it is as Joe Henderson says—the woman is jealous and spiteful. The child has all his love, she none of it. For the child, Joe will do anything. He's Tommy, and he loves him. Being Indian and being a woman, Uaawa knows this giant of a man who kicks and curses her can be made to suffer through his son."
I thought it all over, a long time.
"I think he's made a mistake. I don't think he's fair to the Indian woman. You're right, though. It's all because of the first Tommy, and you can't help but be sorry for Mr. Henderson."
Mike didn't say anything. The complicated, tangled pattern of lives, where they touch and intertwine—it's impossible to unravel it. I was sorry I had tried. Who can know anything about anything? Especially when they're sleepy.
Seven
Mike left early for his office. I promised to be over as soon as I'd done the dishes and help him straighten up out there. Well, with only two of us it didn't take long to get the dishes out of the way. Then I had a good idea. I thought I'd put up a lunch, and we could eat in the office. It would be fun, a sort of indoor picnic.
I began slicing bread for sandwiches. Suddenly I whirled and faced the room. There was nothing there, of course, but I felt that there was, and I worked uneasily. The feeling of being watched became stronger. Again I turned, this time toward the window, and I laughed with relief; for there, staring in, was a round-faced girl about six years old. I opened the door gently and smiled, so she wouldn't be afraid. But she bounded off like a deer, stopping a safe distance from the cabin to turn and stare.
"Wouldn't you like to come in?" I called.
She just stood there regarding me silently with enormous black eyes.
"Come on," I coaxed. But as she didn't move and it was cold with the door open, I shut it and went back to making lunch.
She came silently, so silently that I hadn't really heard her, but I knew she was out there. I went to the door again, this time with a sandwich in my hand. I opened it and held out the sandwich. She looked at it and held out her hand. I gave it to her, and she fingered it carefully all over, then stuffed the whole thing in her mouth. I had decided that she knew no English, so I motioned to her to come inside. She watched my gesture with intent, curious eyes. But the only response was the continued chewing of that sandwich. Again the cold drove me in.
I counted over the sandwiches and tried to guess how many Mike could eat. I felt a cold gust on my hack. The door was open. I continued working and waited for the slight click the door gave when it was closed. The click came. I smiled to myself.
I didn't hear her move, but pretty soon the dark head was at my elbow and the dark eyes on the food. Excitement throbbed in them at the sight of the thick, buttered bread and the slices of meat. I reached down another sandwich to her. Again it was fingered all over with wonder and awe before it was popped whole into her mouth. Two other sandwiches followed. But the last one was not eaten. She carried it off. Stealthily, quietly, she was gone from my elbow, and when I turned to look, gone from my house. My stock of sandwiches being pretty well depleted, I started to work on some new ones. I had finished and was wrapping them when my door opened again.
A brave in full Indian dress with much beadwork nodded solemnly at me, stalked to the best chair in the house, and sat down. Behind him followed aunts, sisters, uncles, and cousins. Each gave me a nod or a grunt and then sat in my chairs. The last chair was finally occupied, and still they came, seating themselves ceremoniously on the floor.
When they were all in, you couldn't have stepped for Indians. They sat there regarding me steadily and silently. I didn't know what they wanted or why they were here, or what I was expected to do about it. Some fifteen children were gathered in the doorway, chattering excitedly, and in the middle of the group was my little friend, waving her sandwich triumphantly, and at the same time protecting it from the sudden onslaughts of the other children.
"Holy St. Patrick!" I said aloud and stared hopelessly at the thirty expectant faces and the sixty hungry eyes that stared back at me. Could it be that they expected me to feed them?
I couldn't just stand there with my mouth open, I had to do something. I was Sergeant Flannigan's wife. I had a position to keep up in the community. I thought of a speech, saying I was not settled yet but that we'd all have a nice party soon. But,
looking into the rows of swarthy, stolid faces, I was convinced that they wouldn't understand my speech, that the only thing they'd understand was food. It was plainly my move, and thirty people were waiting for me to make it. I did. I put on a gracious smile.
"What a lovely surprise! I am very glad to see all of you here."
While I was saying this in a loud voice, I was rapidly counting noses. Twenty-eight grownups and twelve children. I had seven sandwiches. By cutting each sandwich into four parts, I would have twenty-eight pieces, each an inch long. Well, Mother had served hors d'oeuvres that weren
't any larger than that. And there was still a little meat left. The children could have that. I would put on tea. That, at least, there'd be enough of, except, of course, they'd have to drink in relays because there were only ten glasses.
Well, it was the strangest and silentest tea party ever given. I cut up the seven sandwiches and passed the pieces around. They were accepted gravely and gravely swallowed.
But the ice wasn't really broken until tea was served. Then the noise of much sucking, smacking of lips, and gusty sipping—I took this to mean my guests were enjoying themselves. So I smiled and beamed and asked who would have some more tea. This was the only thing I said that they seemed to understand.
When they had had all the tea they could drink, the gentleman who had led the procession rose. This was the signal for general departure. The women smiled shyly, and when the last one had pushed the last child out before her, I had to keep looking at the ten glasses, the crumbs, and the spot in the corner where one old crone had kept spitting to assure myself that I had just given a tea party.
In March the thaw set in. The snow had become pockmarked. Millions of tiny, shallow holes appeared in it as it sweated. The winter was almost over. We had missed the last mail delivery. There were only two during the winter, and when Mike told me there were none at all during the summer I cried.
But whenever I got awfully homesick and lonesome for
Mother, something happened. And something happened now to take my mind from thoughts of home. I stooped down in the snow and examined the prints carefully. By putting my fingers close together and jabbing them into the snow, I tried to imitate the impression there. It wasn't a dog track because it came in from the woods and circled the house again and again, each time drawing in closer. I remembered how the dogs had whined last night. I was excited now, and I ran back to the house.
"Mike! Mike!" He came to the door. "Look at the tracks! What is it?"
He bent down as I had, to study them. But to him they meant something.
"Wolf," he said, straightening up. "You wouldn't think he'd come so close to the house. But you never know what a wolf's going to do. I saw one once that seemed to be dying. He just staggered along, and overhead a raven watched him. Finally the wolf sank down in the snow and lay still. The raven swooped down, settled on him, and prepared to eat—only it was the wolf that ate the raven."
"You mean a wolf is smart enough to pull a trick like that?"
"Yes, and I wonder what deviltry brought this one so close to the house."
Mike looked up. Overhead the trees had lost their silvery-white finery, and their bark was black and wet where it had melted.
"How'd you like that hike I've been promising you, up to the Bull? The snow's gone now except for these few inches."
I had been wanting to go to the Bull. I'd heard about it from the Indians who dropped in regularly once a week for their treasured tea parties. It was a gigantic rock shaped exactly like an enormous buffalo head. It guarded the entrance to the Ne Parle Pas Rapids a few miles up. Whenever I teased to go, Mike had put me off, saying the snow was too soft and treacherous for our snowshoes this time of year.
"What do you think about that wolf coming so close?" I asked as I swung off with Mike.
"It's an interesting thing." And it was interesting to me that
he could talk and walk at such a pace. "But it's really the prairie chickens that are making them so bold."
"Prairie chickens?"
He grinned. "Rabbits to you."
It made me mad, his making such a mystery of it. "Go on," I said.
But he didn't go on. We had struck the high ground above Hudson's Hope. And from there the eastern Rockies could be seen, Backbone-of-the-World, the Indians called them. There they were, range after range of them, shading from purple to the faintest blue. The mist rose about their base, making them look like sky islands. Mike held my hand very tight. It was wonderful to share things like this, especially as I always got kissed.
We walked on. The spruce rose in dark towers above us, and everywhere and from everything the snow was going. After a while I remembered about prairie chickens.
"Well, every seven years or so there's a disease that breaks out among them. It seems to be some sort of head and throat infection. Anyway, they die off like flies. And of course both the timber and the black wolf feed mostly off them. So when the prairie chicken gets scarce, the wolf goes hungry."
"But can't a wolf eat other things besides rabbits?" I asked.
"Oh, yes, they hunt caribou herds, picking off the young, the sick, the crippled. And if they're ravenous, sometimes they will attack a full-grown animal. They go after mountain sheep and goats and even moose. But those herds are always on the move, and if they don't happen to be in the same vicinity, old wolf gets vicious. He has to be either ravenous or mad to come into the post."
"Do you think ours is mad?"
"I hope not," Mike said. "I don't want our dogs coming down with hydrophobia."
I must have looked pretty sick when he said that because he reassured me at once. "Don't worry, Kathy, I'll put out meat with a little strychnine rubbed through it. That ought to get him."
But I didn't like that either. Now I was sorry for the wolf.
"Maybe he'll go away," I said, "or die naturally."
"Wolves don't die except three ways—mange, distemper, or poison."
"Can't they be shot or trapped?"
"Not as a rule. They're too clever. They're so trap-shy that hunters can keep them away from a carcass of a deer by laying a piece of metal on the ground."
"I still don't like it. I hate to poison him."
"If we don't," Mike said, "he'll start ripping our dogs to pieces."
I sighed. Things weren't like this in Boston.
"But, Mike—" My hand was gripped so hard the bones ached. I looked at Mike. He relaxed his grip and pointed. I followed the direction of his arm. I saw nothing. Just a snow bank. But I kept staring at it very hard. I knew there was something there, and I wanted to find it. I wanted to be a woodsman like Mike. Then I did notice something, a thin stream of vapor rising from the drift. Mike led me away. When he considered we were far enough from the drift, he stopped.
"You saw it, didn't you, Kathy?"
"I think so. That little bit of moisture rising up?"
"That's it!" Mike was jubilant. "And can you guess what it is?"
Well, I couldn't, so he told me. "It's a bear hibernating. The thin little trickle of steam is his breath. He'll be waking up any time now, though."
I marveled at Mike. He had the sharp sight and the cunning of an Indian.
He pointed out the Bull to me, and, sure enough, the great rock was a perfect buffalo head, even to the shaggy neck which we began to climb. It was fascinating, this world of Mike's. But I was too much of a stranger in it yet.
A crunching like glass splintering filled the air. What now, I thought, and looked at Mike. He gave a triumphant shout into the face of the Bull. And the Bull threw the cry back to us. Again and again we heard it sounding in the crevices.
"Now you're going to see something." And Mike pulled me up to the top.
Below us a long strip of white earth heaved like a huge writhing snake. White sandstone cliffs looked down as it pushed up on itself, splitting cakes of ice loose. In the open space water moved. It was the Peace River crunching and gnawing at the ice layer that covered it. Blocks of ice and frozen snow were beginning to pile up on themselves, and a chunk as big as my head was struck from both sides and sent catapulting thirty feet into the air. Then larger pieces went flying and popping—one ice block the size of our double bed jumped past us into space and then fell back, cutting a jagged hole through which water foamed and spurted. Tormented, the river strove to free itself. Faster and faster now the cakes were being shot into the air. All around they leaped and fell. The noise was deafening. For miles up and down, the Peace spat out gleaming ice that flashed a moment in
the sun, then crashed heavily back.
"The river's angry," I whispered, but even through the din Mike heard me.
"Not angry. It shakes winter off as we rub sleep from our eyes."
"How did you know, Mike?"
"About the breaking up? It comes about this time every year. And when you've been in the country as long as I have, you can usually hit the day."
"But how? I don't see how."
"Well, the snow starts to melt, and when there's just a bit left and it's just so soft, well, then you figure it's time for the breakup."
I had to laugh. He sounded just like Mother, a perfect cook who could never tell anybody how she made things.
The barrage of ice blocks continued as more and more river broke loose. In half an hour it flowed freely, carrying the melting blocks along. The ice cakes still jostled and whirled against each other, but only occasionally now did a piece get lifted into the air.
This experience made things different for me. Things I had
thought of as static, lived, had a violent insurgent life of their own. The river was like the bear; it hibernated for the winter.
I tried to tell Mike a little of what I felt about it.
Mike was a woodsman. He understood. "All of it, the forests and the mountains and the rivers, they've got their moods and their feelings, just like a person. The Indians recognize this—just as they know some places are good and some are evil. Why, there are places in the forest you couldn't pay an Indian to go into."
"Because they're evil?" I asked.
"Yes, or cruel, like the rapids qui ne parle pas. That means the rapids that don't talk. That's why they're so treacherous. Usually you hear the murmuring of rough water well in advance and are able to do something about it. But here there is no sound, no warning. The first thing you know you're in them. The water drops two hundred and forty-three feet in a couple of minutes, and no one has gone through it alive. Once they put an empty boat in the rapids and waited down below to see what happened. Not even a board or a splinter of that boat came through. It must have been pounded to pulp."