Scattered Bones (4 page)

These are temporary homes, camps really. The Cree travel through the fall and winter, hunting and trapping, returning in late spring to spend the summer months at Pelican Narrows. The kids run wild, swim, play games and pick berries. The women dry fish, tan moose hides, craft birch bark baskets, and gossip – boy, do they gossip. The men fish for pickerel, hunt ducks, and gamble. This goes on for hours, since in June the light doesn’t fade until close to midnight. The teenagers, well, this is their big chance to sniff out the opposite sex, and that’s about all they’re interested in.

Although the Cree have been spending summers at Pelican Narrows for hundreds of years, there’s still an impermanence about the place. Arthur thinks that if ever the fur-bearing animals are wiped out, as well they might be given the number of white trappers flooding in, the village will vanish into thin air. It wouldn’t matter to him; he’d just move on.

The Treaty Party has arrived several days earlier than scheduled so that many families are away on berry-picking excursions. Messengers have been sent to fetch them in. In the meantime, the Indian agent, Bob Taylor, has decided to proceed with those present. Everyone, except perhaps Arthur Jan, is frightened of this man. Even his appearance is menacing. He is short yet stocky with a barrel chest and muscular arms. Sinister black eyes. Bald except for a fringe above his ears. A sharply defined moustache and little goatee. Arthur thinks he looks a lot like Lenin.

The Peter Ballendine Band, named after its original chief, welcomed its first treaty party in the summer of 1900, and the ritual of this annual event established then has hardly changed in twenty-four years. A wooden table has been set up on the porch of the post office attached to the Hudson’s Bay Company’s store. The Indian agent – everyone calls him Taylor as though his first name, Bob, is too soft a sound for such a formidable man – sits at one end on the right, Arthur Jan as Justice of Peace in the middle, and Doc Happy Mac, who, has taken time off from inoculating the children to act as recording clerk, on the left. Behind Taylor stands Band Councillor John Custer. A wooden pipe is clamped in his mouth; he sports sunglasses; and, to emphasize the formality of this event, he is dressed entirely in black – a suit with baggy pants and out-of-shape jacket. A smart but crumpled fedora barely contains his long, wayward grey hair. The chief’s medal of honour displaying the Dominion of Canada’s crest is pinned to his chest. The actual chief, the beloved Cornelius Whitebear has sent his regrets. He is ill. Joe Sewap stands next to Councillor Custer. His job is to translate Cree to English and English to Cree. Waiting patiently in line down the steps and onto the path are the families.

As each is called, the head of household, his wife and children crowding behind him like a gaggle of geese, comes forward and hands Taylor a card. Most are ragged and greasy with age.

“Michael Bird, his wife, two girls and three boys,” the Indian agent reads, and then barks, “Any births or deaths in this family?”

Joe Sewap translates smoothly, although he thinks it’s ridiculous that, after twenty years as Indian agent, Taylor still doesn’t know enough Cree to form a sentence.

“One boy drowned last summer,” Councillor Custer answers.

Doc Happy Mac amends the records, and Taylor counts out seven piles, each with five newly minted one dollar bills taken from the stack of $1,500 sitting in the centre of the table. The money is passed to Arthur Jan who carefully counts it. “Correct,” he announces, and the payment is handed over.

The proceedings run smoothly enough, although every now and then a case involving unusual circumstances breaks the pattern.

An elderly man shuffles forward and hands over a letter written by Father Bonnald on the family’s behalf. Beside him stands his grandson who drools down his chin and sways incessantly from side to side. Taylor reads the document and then questions the old man through the translator Joe Sewap.

“You say this idiot is your grandson and that his mother died while giving birth to him?

Translation, then a nod of agreement.

“Why didn’t you apply for his treaty money long ago?”

The grandfather says nothing, but stands motionless, his twenty-year-old grandson grinning and bobbing beside him.

Taylor eyeballs the two, his tone of voice growing even sterner. “It’s through your negligence that this oversight has occurred. And now you and your priest expect the Canadian government to hand over the substantial sum of $120. I hardly think that’s fair to the Canadian taxpayer. Do you?”

No emotion flickers on the elder’s face.

“I’ll take it up with the Department, but I can’t promise you anything.” With a backward wave of his hand the Indian agent dismisses the two.

Soon after, a man in his thirties dressed in heavy work clothes hobbles forward. He explains in accented but understandable English that he hasn’t received his treaty payments for five years.

“And why not?” Taylor demands.

“I am a returned soldier, a sharpshooter with the North Saskatchewan Regiment.” He rolls up his trousers, exposes a leg crisscrossed with scars. “Wounded twice. At Vimy Ridge. Here on the ankle and here on the knee. I was in the hospital for a long time, and afterwards I needed to make some money. I have a family, you see. So, on my way home, I took jobs, anything I could get – helping with the harvest, working construction on the roads. I thought the government was sending treaty to my wife, but it never arrived.”

“How are you feeling now?” Doc Happy Mac interjects.

“Okay, but my legs ache at night, and they’re so weak that sometimes I fall down. I don’t know how I’m going to do on the trap lines. You know, in the heavy snow...”

The Indian agent abruptly butts in, “We won’t go into that. I’ll send a report to Ottawa.”

Once all the payments have been made, the families scatter. With money in hand, the celebration can begin.

Arthur Jan races after the crowd, shouting out in a mixture of Cree and English, “Ladies and gentlemen, the Northern Lights Trading Post has just been restocked. The latest dress material! Wait till you see the new calico! Wonderful colours! Ladies’ and men’s hats. Ribbons and bows. All are on offer. Can you feel those dollars burning a hole in your pocket? Come along. Bibi Ratt will be happy to serve you.”

Out of the corner of his eye Arthur spots his competition, Russell Smith, the Hudson’s Bay Company manager, staring at him. Arthur smiles and waves heartily. Russell is to Arthur as a mouse is to a lion.

Chapter Five

Arthur suddenly feels done in.
The long, nerve-wracking journey, first to New York for his important business meeting, then the train ride across Canada babysitting The Famous Writer and his brother, and finally the arduous Treaty Party canoe trip to Pelican Narrows, have taken their toll. He climbs up the hill to his house, lets himself in, pours a whiskey, and says hello to his old friend, Reginald the parrot, sitting in his gilded cage. He is ridiculously fond of this bird, a gift from a lover he had met in a Moose Jaw brothel. Arthur makes sure that Reginald has water and seed, and then stretches out on the sofa on the screened-in veranda.

Oh how he loves this place. Given it’s a twenty-minute walk from his trading post – even taking the shortcut through the grave yard – its location is a bit of a nuisance. It’s situated directly north of the HBC store, and the Smiths, Florence in particular, have made no bones about it – they don’t like him there.

But spread out below is that spectacular panorama. Nothing in the world is so beautiful, Arthur thinks, as Pelican Lake mirroring a glorious red/yellow sunset. He picks up a porcelain figurine sitting on the side table. It’s about ten inches high, dressed in a yellow clown suit with bright red buttons. It has a mauve ruff around its neck and wears a pointed red-brown hat. It’s stepping forward, its arm outstretched as though to shake hands. With its pointed chin, long, pickle-like nose, heavy black eyebrows, and skinny moustache it bears an uncanny resemblance to Arthur himself, and this always makes him laugh. The character Pulcinella, from the Commedia dell’Arte, made in Strafford-le-Bow during George II’s reign, it cost a fortune, but Arthur loves it. It’s his favourite of all the beautiful things he has painstakingly collected over the years.

“I’ve come a long way from the haberdashery department of Debenham & Freebody,” he says to himself. A long way from the workman’s cottage in the old borough of Southwark, Central London, where he had grown up.

His father had been respectable enough, a skilled cabinet maker, but there were six sons in the family, so, although Arthur was a bright and industrious student, upper school education was out of the question. He showed more talent for chatting people up than handling a lathe, so a position was found for him as a stock boy at Debenham & Freebody. He was scarecrow-thin and slope-shouldered with crafty blue eyes and a pasty face, but he spent his evenings in the library pouring through newspapers and periodicals, teaching himself the fashion trade. Within a year he had been promoted to junior salesman in the haberdashery department. He still remembers with pleasure the striped flannel coats with patch pockets and brass buttons, the brilliant white shirts with their tall, stiff-winged collars, the polka-dotted silk ascots. It didn’t take him long to evolve into a rakish smooth-talker who knew exactly how to please his customers.

One afternoon, a certain Mr. George asked, “Wouldn’t you like to have tea?” “I’d be very pleased, answered the young clerk,” and
thus began his trade with older, wealthy men. Arthur was as manly as
the next chap, but if these pansies wanted to bugger him, well that was the price he paid for a taste of the good life.

Mr. Leroy-Hutchins was his favourite. A dealer in smaller
objets d’art
, he’d take a piece out of his cabinet, and describe where it came from, how it was made. Arthur smiles now, thinking of one he particularly loved – a perfume bottle in a shape of a cat, the stopper a mouse in the animal’s mouth. He loved to rub the glassy, white and gold surface, so smooth and cool to his touch.

“It’s Chelsea porcelain ,” explained Mr. Leroy-Hutchins, as he kissed Arthur on the neck. “Circa 1755.”

Arthur had already sensed that he was in trouble, so he wasn’t surprised when he was summoned to the boss’s office. Private detectives had followed the young clerk to some of the finest hotels in London where he was regularly met by one or other of Debenham & Freebody’s important customers.

“We’re not running a depot for rent boys,” thundered Mr. Peabody.

“Screw off,” Arthur yelled, and ran out of the office before he could be fired.

When a grudge-bearing co-worker of Arthur’s informed his parents, they were horrified. With five brothers just making their way in the world, a steamy sex scandal was the last thing they needed. How to get rid of the depraved thorn in their side? The propaganda pamphlets put out by the Dominion of Canada depicting golden wheat fields provided the answer. Arthur’s father gave him ₤50 pounds and a third class ticket on the Pannonia, a steamship owned by the Cunard Lines. “See you don’t disgrace yourself. Well, in that vast, cold country maybe it doesn’t matter,” were the pater’s parting words.

Arthur arrived in Montreal in June, 1908, age twenty-two, cocky as a bantam rooster, ready to make his fortune. In an uncharacteristic flight of fancy, he chose the place with the most exotic name, Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, and boarded the next train heading west. He carefully selected his homestead – a quarter section of black/brown, supposedly fecund soil situated north of the infant city. But he quickly discovered that he loathed farming. Cutting down trees, clearing the land, seeding, harvesting – he detested it all. But what really got to him was the monotony, the tediousness of the same work performed over and over again like some dance from hell. On top of that was the unbearable loneliness. What did a former sales clerk of fancy men’s goods have in common with a hardened wheat farmer? Even their daughters, longing for a good-looking young man with fine manners, felt uncomfortable when he chatted them up. Always, in the end, they rejected his advances.

Arthur hung on for three long years, built a shack on his land, and broke the required thirty acres. The very day he picked up his deed at the land office, he sold his farm to an American. For a handsome profit, thank you very much.

The one thing he did like about his new home was the boreal forest with its dark, foreboding spruce trees and many sparkling lakes. He wrote home, “The largest lake trout I caught was fifty-two pounds, but I heard of others to top that.”

When the Paris-based trading company, Revillon Frères, offered him a job loading the scows that travelled the northern lakes, he enthusiastically accepted. By this time the effete Brit had developed into a man of sinewy muscle with a remarkable imperviousness to physical discomfort. “I’m no longer the skinny, little runt whose ears you used to box every day,” he wrote to one of his brothers.

That first winter, Arthur met Bibiane Ratt at the La Ronge poker game and the two decided to team up. They naturally headed north into uncharted territory.

Reindeer Lake, 140 miles long with deep, clear water, dotted with thousands of islands, was still virgin territory for white trappers, and there weren’t many natives there either. That first season, Arthur’s and Bibiane’s haul included beaver, mink, marten, lynx, red and silver fox. A lot of money came in, but it was dangerous work.

By midspring the ice was clear of snow, but overnight a storm had dumped another couple of feet on the lake. Arthur was mushing his dogs hard, trying to get back to the trading post before nightfall. Suddenly he spotted a couple of ducks swimming in open water just ahead of him. The dogs took after them. Arthur hollered at the team, but the lead wouldn’t listen. He jumped off the sled and grabbed the reins, running alongside, pulling, pulling, praying the dogs would turn. Finally they did, making a sharp left, but although the sled turned too, its momentum carried it forward, toward the open water. Arthur managed to pull out his knife and severe the leads so the animals were freed, but the sleigh spun ahead, into the black hole. There was no way he would just stand by and watch his valuable cargo sink to the bottom, so he grabbed onto the toboggan. Suddenly he too was spinning, into the frigid water.