Coppermine (25 page)

“To say simply yes or no would be rude. It would challenge the spirits. Now you can be the teacher. Teach me about kissing again. Am I doing it all right?”

“Qu-immaqa.”

“Probably yes?”

“Nothing is certain.”

She laughed and kissed him hard.

“You are already a master—a mistress. You kiss very well,” he told her.

“As good as white girls?”

“Much better.”

“Did you know I was born on a stormy day?”

“Doesn’t surprise me.”

She was pleased. “The weather on the day you are born is very important. It was a terrible storm. It raged for hours! It made me strong and—here’s another Miss Calhoun word—
perseverant.
My grandmother massaged me the first day and pulled on my legs and arms to make them grow long and strong, and she sang a magic blessing to me and gave me gifts: a raven skin to be invisible, some of her hair for a long life, and my umbilical cord to connect me to my past lives.”

“And did it?”

“Yes, it did.” She looked at him for any sign of skepticism before she continued. “Even here, in this camp, I wanted to tell you. I have never camped here in this life. When I was little, we never travelled on this river. But I have been here before, long ago. I was a man and I speared fish where I caught them today by that weir. That’s how I knew. I think it was before my grandfather’s time. An earlier life. I had two wives and four children, three boys and a girl. I bet my mother could tell me who I was.”

“You’re certainly not a man anymore.”

She turned to him. “You don’t believe me, do you?”

“I didn’t believe you could catch a fish with your hands.”

She smiled at this deflection. The lights in the sky separated into two ethereal curtains and they watched for a few moments.

“It is a good sign,” Angituk hoped.

“Let’s try and whistle them closer,” Creed suggested.

“No! It would anger the Spirits of the Dead. They are very jealous of us. Especially today. They could make a storm to drive the lights away. Let’s just enjoy them quietly.”

Creed was amused by her fears. She studied his smile.

“I wonder if my father looks like you.”

“What do you know about him?”

“My mother loved him. And he loved her. He was a trapper and trader. A tall man with a beard, and very good-looking, very kind. And a good hunter. He had a pretty mermaid tattoo on his left arm. They lived together on the land for a year. But then he had to go south to his camp … a big village called Edmonton. He could not take her there.”

“Edmonton is where I live.”

“Really! You must know him. His name is Angus McAndrew. Do you know him?”

“No. It’s a very big village.”

“I was told that. They say it’s even bigger than Fort Norman. He said he’d come back to my mother, but he was never able to. I always wanted to go and find him. He could be hurt or sick and I could help him. His enemies could have stopped him. Maybe he has other wives. Maybe I have brothers and sisters! That’s what I always wanted, to be part of a big family. Except for my baby brother who died, it was always only me.”

Creed’s heart turned at her innocence, her naïveté. “Angi, I would like to take you to Edmonton with me, but I can’t. I have orders to escort the prisoners there, and there will be a trial. It will take some time. After the trial I can apply for leave. That means I can come back to Norman and see you.”

Her eyes searched his face. “Yes? You’ll come back to me?”

“Yes.”

“You told me you love me. Is it true? Do you love me?”

“Yes. I love you, Angituk.”

She smiled her flawless, trusting smile. “Good.”

And suddenly Creed knew it was true. He knew it more clearly than he had known anything in his life. Here in her arms he felt that his heart was about to burst. They kissed again and Creed held her body tightly against his, and then tighter still, to remember.

ON THE FINAL NIGHT,
Uluksuk conducted a meeting with the spirits of his land. Perhaps some would follow them farther south, but he was not optimistic. They would stay here and wait for him. There would be new ones in the South. The shaman went a little way out of the camp to be alone, and burned sweetgrasses and purified himself as he had done to conjure the caribou spirits months before on the Dismal Lakes. As Creed and Angituk watched from a discreet distance, the shaman chanted for some time and then spoke in greetings to the invisible host. Angituk explained to Creed as they watched that Uluksuk was speaking to them of his hopes and fears, asking their advice, and answering any questions they might have. Creed could hear him talking, followed by periods of silence. Then Uluksuk would speak again as if carefully answering a question.

The rhythm of this communication with the spirits seemed somehow familiar, and Creed realized it echoed a courtroom examination of questions and answers. He thought then of the trial and what they were about to face. He listened to the sound of Uluksuk’s earnest answers to the spirits, carried to him on the warm wind.

Angituk studied Creed’s pensive expression as he watched Uluksuk and asked what he was thinking.

“I was wondering how to prepare them for all of this. Tomorrow in Fort Norman they’ll see their first white community. They’ve never seen a complete log cabin or a horse or a combustion engine. Edmonton will be like no world they’ve ever imagined. What can I tell them? Where do I start?”

“They aren’t going to hurt them, are they?”

“No.”

“They’ll have food and a bed to sleep in?”

“Yes.”

“Then they’ll be all right,” Angituk told him. “Remember, my people adapt. Just don’t lie to them. Don’t do that. Tell them the truth and they will find their way.”

That night, Creed took out Rouvière’s journal once more and turned to the relevant passages:

The important thing in our dealings with these people from the very beginning is to stress the importance of truth—that we are truthful in our day-to-day dealings and in the values of our greater society and also, and most important, that we bring to them the one true God. In a relationship that we hope will go on for hundreds of years, we must demonstrate that of all the virtues of the white man’s society, we cherish truth above all.

Creed thought about this. Rouvière had been two years older than he was now, had travelled in Europe and worked within the same society as Creed, worked with people and with governments and within the Church. How could he be so naive?

THE FIRST SIGN OF FORT NORMAN
appeared as a wisp of smoke on the horizon still some twenty miles west of their final camp. Creed was back in his field uniform, wool trousers with the yellow stripe and high boots. Creed and Angituk had discussed the good sense in reaffirming her male presentation in Fort Norman for a number of reasons. So she had dressed in her flannel shirt, wool trousers with suspenders, and fedora hat, and had rubbed ashes on her face to simulate the shadow of a beard.

Creed had been watching her as she turned into a boy again and she smiled and went to kiss him with a sudden, rekindled passion. But this last kiss of his was subdued, a gentle warning, and her eyes revealed her subtle disappointment, though it was what she had expected. Reunited with his own people, he would now have to distance himself.

She stepped back from him and took off her hat. She raised her sharpened skinning knife, looked at him, and began to cut off handfuls of her long black hair, the beautiful tresses falling to the ground.

A YOUNG RNWMP CONSTABLE
smoked and chatted with Oberly on the veranda outside the log detachment at Fort Norman, watching the swirling confluence of the Great Bear and Mackenzie rivers. They speculated on spring leave to Edmonton. Over Oberly’s shoulder the young constable noticed four figures approaching along the muddy main street.

“Who’s this, then?”

Oberly turned and squinted for a long time against the sun, low in the sky, as Creed, Angituk, Uluksuk, and Sinnisiak approached.

“My God.” The cigarette fell from his lips. “It’s Creed!”

Creed came up to them, the others trailing behind.

“Creed! Good Lord! We all thought you were dead!”

“Not to my knowledge.”

“Let me find the Sergeant.”

Oberly hurried to the Hudson’s Bay post a hundred yards away. Creed looked back at his three companions, all hesitant to go inside.

“Come on. There’ll be food.”

Uluksuk and Sinnisiak entered the detachment apprehensively. They’d never been inside a wooden building before.

Creed led Angituk and his two prisoners into the mess. Sinnisiak and Uluksuk looked around at the inside of the structure, their eyes wide. They stared at the huge mirror, staying close together and talking quietly.

“Look at that little pond hanging sideways.”

“Why doesn’t the water spill out?”

“They must have strong magic.”

Two other officers were having a drink, and they looked up at the Eskimos with surprise and distaste. Then they saw who accompanied them.

“Creed? Jesus, Creed. You’re back! We heard you were dead.”

“Nope. Still here.”

Creed walked up and addressed the man who was bartender and cook, a burly, moustached civilian drying dishes behind thebar. “What’s on for lunch? You have some stew back there? Four bowls of stew, my good man.”

The cook didn’t move. He looked at Sinnisiak and Uluksuk as they stared around in fascination. “It’s the rules, Corporal. Can’t serve Indians. Same applies for Eskimos, I figure.”

With a strained smile, Creed leaned over the bar toward him as if to whisper. When the cook leaned toward him to hear, Creed grabbed him firmly with both hands by his flannel shirt, popping a button. He held the cook’s grizzled face close to his own. “I said four bowls of stew. Now. You understand?”

The man glanced over at his two patrons, who were watching with interest and amusement. “But … but there are white men in here.”

Creed let him go and the cook stumbled backwards. “That’s all right. My friends aren’t that particular.”

The cook hesitated, then went back into the kitchen to get the stew.

Creed turned around and leaned against the bar. “Welcome to Fort Norman, my friends.”

One of the two officers moved closer to him. “So how far did you get, Creed? You see the Coppermine?”

“I did. All the way to the Arctic Ocean.”

“Really? You got that far? And you still got your scalp?”

The other officer laughed at this. The cook returned with four bowls of stew with spoons and set them loudly on the bar. They had not yet eaten that day and Sinnisiak, Uluksuk, and Angituk quickly addressed the stew, the hunters shovelling it into their mouths with moaning enthusiasm. Sinnisiak gave Creed a thumbs-up.

“They like your stew,” Creed told the cook.

Sergeant Farrell came in then with Oberly and several other officers.

“Creed! I am very happy to see you. We heard you were dead. I was about to send some men out to see. But anyway, you can’t have those Eskimos in here.”

Uluksuk and Sinnisiak had finished and were licking the bottoms of their bowls. More officers arrived to see Creed.

“Let me give you my preliminary report.”

“Your friends can step outside.”

“I’d like them to stay.”

“Come on, Creed.”

“They are my guests.”

“They’ll have fleas.”

“Then so will I.”

The Sergeant looked at the other officers. They wanted to hear the story. Farrell prudently decided to ignore the issue. “So, what happened?”

“In my investigation in search of Fathers Rouvière and Le Roux, I interviewed several people on the Coppermine River and was directed to a place known as Bloody Falls. There I discovered the partial remains of the two priests and determined by a study of the bodies that they had in fact been murdered. I buried them in a Christian manner and continued north to a large hunt camp at the mouth of the Coppermine on the Arctic Ocean to interview witnesses. I proceeded to the hunt camp of the two accused, confronted them, and they confessed to killing the priests and eating their livers. Whereupon I arrested them. And”–he gestured in gracious introduction—”here they are: Uluksuk and Sinnisiak.”

The officers looked at the two Eskimos in shock. Uluksuk and Sinnisiak nodded and smiled congenially at the officers.

“Merry Christmas!” Sinnisiak told them loudly.

The Sergeant withdrew his revolver and pointed it at the two prisoners. “Take them to the cells!”

Four officers grabbed hold of Sinnisiak and Uluksuk, who, in sudden fear at the touch of the white men, began to resist and struggle against them. Jack was frustrated by the sudden brutality.

“They’re all right! You don’t need to—”

More officers joined the scuffle as they dragged them toward the cells in the back. Sinnisiak howled in fear. Creed couldn’t get close.

“They’ll do as they’re told, damn it! Don’t hurt them! Angituk, go and tell them it’s all right, please.”

Angituk hurried to follow the scrum of officers surrounding Sinnisiak and Uluksuk back to the cells.

Creed turned to face the Sergeant. “You can put that away, Sergeant. They’re quite docile.”

The Sergeant put the pistol back in his holster. “They ate the livers?” he asked.

Creed looked at him and nodded.

Just then three more officers came inside and the others returned from the cells. They all gathered around, looking at Creed, and there was a moment of silence before the Sergeant began in an almost accusing tone.

“Let me get this straight, Corporal Creed. You expect us to believe you went into a barren, unmapped territory of one hundred thousand square miles to look for the priests. You found and buried their bodies, then you conducted an investigation, identified the murderers and arrested them, extracted a confession, and single-handedly through the middle of winter brought the accused five hundred miles south to stand trial?”

“Yes, Sergeant.”

“Any thoughts regarding how you managed this?”

“Isuma,
Sergeant. Good luck.”

“Luck? Well, you know what I believe? I believe this calls for a fucking round of drinks!”