Through Black Spruce (37 page)

I remember how
Moshum
is the one to cut it down from its ropes and carve pieces of it for all of us, how we sit in a circle in the tent and dip bannock cooked over the fire into gravy, eat the goose until our mouths are smeared with grease. Suzanne’s smile is shiny, and it makes me laugh. Night’s come completely and the wind picks up a little. You and Uncle Antoine and
Moshum
listen to that wind and predict a clear morning.

We have to be up early for my first goose hunt. We’ll be in the blinds before dawn breaks, watching the skies to the north, waiting for the geese that will spot our decoys. But before bed, once dinner’s finished and our plates and cups are rinsed in the bay and put away to dry, we sit by the fire and listen to the sounds of the water and bush outside our thin walls.

Moshum
sews in the dim light of the fire and listens to us talk. I don’t know how he manages to see what he stitches in that lack of light. You tell me he can see in the dark, something he learned when he was in the war. My mother says he’s sewn for so long he doesn’t need to see anymore where the next stitch goes. He stitches pieces of moosehide together, hide that he home-tanned over a rottenwood fire. He makes moccasins for Suzanne and me, has just finished a hat for you, of moose and beaver fur, for the coming winter. I think it’s funny watching him sew. Only old ladies do that. Watching him makes my eyes sleepy.

A hand shakes me. I open my eyes. I’ve been sleeping on spruce boughs in the tent. It’s still dark outside. I don’t know whose hand woke me. I see you, Uncle, stirring the fire back to life and brewing coffee over it. I dress quickly when I realize I am going outside for goose soon.

You and Uncle Antoine and
Moshum
eat your porridge slowly, pretending not to see me, stopping every once in a while to say, “Is that a goose I hear coming?” sending me to the entrance of our tent to search. Mum tells us to be quiet so that we don’t wake Suzanne yet. Finally, when you’re all finished with your breakfast and coffee, you light your cigarettes and smoke. I want to drag you all outside right now.

We pull our muddy boots on, our hats and heavy coats. We head out into the cold air of early morning, the sky still black but tinged with pink on the eastern horizon over the huge stretch of water.
Moshum
carries two shotguns, his own big one, and a small one, a double-barrel 20 gauge for me. He walks slowly, carefully, dragging his fake leg over fallen driftwood.

In the blind,
Moshum
directs while you rearrange our decoys, all of them homemade. Once settled, we crouch in our blind made of sticks and marsh grass, a few yards from the water.

I watch as you three load your shotguns.
Moshum
shows me how to put a round in each barrel of mine, how to always point it at the water, where the safety is and how the two triggers work. “Keep it tucked tight in your shoulder when you shoot it,” he says.

Geese already appear, far too high in the lightening sky to shoot at, but close enough to quicken my breath. The next flocks come in lower, and when
Moshum
sees one that’s close enough to him, he cups his hands over his mouth and calls out, his throat tight so that he sounds like a goose.
Awuk. Awuk awuk.

Moshum
calls the geese in. They come closer, seeing our decoys, and set their wings to land, their feet splayed out below them. This moment slows so much I swear I stare my goose in its black eyes.
Moshum
has stopped calling now and crouches behind me. I stand, my head barely above the blind, the shotgun steadied by his hands on my shoulder. He pushes the safety off. He tells me to wait until he says before I pull the trigger.

My goose glides in straight to me. My heart pounds so loud I’m worried the goose will hear. I can feel
Moshum
’s hands help to steady my gun. I don’t think I want to kill it. It’s beautiful.

“Now,” he says, and my finger tenses. The shotgun roars and hurts my shoulder. The world goes almost quiet. Just a buzzing in my ears. The goose drops from the air in slow motion. It splashes into the water close to me. I want the time to return to its normal tick, tick, tick. Time, my world after that, never seems the same again.

Moshum
and I leave the blind and walk to the goose. I hear you, Uncle, say, “Good shot,” in my muffled ears.

I’m surprised to see the goose flap a wing lamely, its eyes focused on the ground in front of it, waiting for us. I was sure I killed it. Maybe we can help it get better. I can’t take my eyes off the bird as we approach, watch as
Moshum
leans and grasps it by the neck, whispering something to it, then kneels on its chest till the animal goes still. My stomach sinks with the finality of this. From that moment, the light in the sky changes just a tiny bit, the light more intense.

I know you watch as
Moshum
strokes the bird as if it’s a pet. He whispers words to it and takes some tobacco from his pocket and places it in the bird’s beak. He plucks a large flight feather from it and places it in my hair.

“There, little Niska,” he says to me in English, smiling. “Now you look like an Indian.” The word
Indian
comes out of his mouth in two syllables.
Ind-yun.
I like it when he speaks English, how he pronounces the words so oddly. It makes me feel a little bit better.

“I dreamed I killed a goose last night,” I say, looking up at him. “I dreamed exactly what happened just now.”

He smiles. “I know,” he says.

Weeks later, when he has cured the goose’s head,
Moshum
patiently and intricately beads it so that it becomes a dazzling jewel, a gift for me to keep and to show my children one day. I think it was the last sewing he ever did. Do you remember? He died not so long after that.

I’m so tired. I lean forward in my chair and rest my head on the bed beside you. I’ll take a short nap now. It’s late. With my eyes closed, the hum of the machines that plug into you are almost peaceful. So easy right now to slip into the black.

I dream of a hand stroking my head. It feels good, like I am a child again. I open my eyes. It’s still night outside. The room is lit low, cast in a green light. The hand continues to stroke my hair.

I want to turn my head, to lift it from the bed, but I’m petrified. For those first few seconds of consciousness, I don’t know where I am. But I know now that I’m in the hospital room, my head on Uncle’s bed, and a hand is patting my hair.

“Ever hungry, me.” The words come out slow, straight from sleep. “I was dreaming of roasting a goose.”

I lift my head slowly. The hand stops its movement. I look at Uncle. He’s looking down at me.

“Is that you, Suzanne?” he asks. “Can you get me a drink of water?”

“It’s me, Annie.” Am I dreaming?

“Oh. Hi, Annie. I miss you. Suzanne will be home soon.”

I watch him close his eyes again. I stand up from the bed and stare down at him. I reach out and gently shake him. He doesn’t respond.

I rush out of the room, shouting for Sylvina.

39
I THINK YOU UNDERSTAND

I ask Dorothy to help me talk Joe into driving us in his freighter canoe from the hospital to Moosonee. Chunks of ice still dot the dark water, and something in this makes me think of a giant rye and Pepsi. Joe drives slow as a
kookum
through the channel and across the river. He’s even built a plywood cabin on top to keep the wind off of me. He placed blankets on the seats for us to cover up. My old buddy, he’s become a sap.

At the Moosonee docks, my war pony waits for us. Joe and Gregor tried to tune up the engine. The truck sits there, chugging and coughing black smoke. Now this makes me think of a cigarette. Dr. Lam says the severe trauma to my head is an excellent cure for smoking. I guess he’s right. I don’t think of it much at all. Maybe I’ll try to sell this idea on late-night TV. I’ll hold a golf club in the ad.

I’m told I won’t be able to go out in the bush to make a living anymore. The right side of my body doesn’t work too good. I might be prone to fits.

Joe continues acting like a granny, setting up my wheelchair and helping me out of his boat, almost sending both of us into the water. Since I’ve woken up, my vision’s sometimes wonky. I sometimes see double, and this throws me off. My world’s off kilter, and it scares me. Right now, I see two of my friend. That’s a lot of Joe. He helps Dorothy push me up the short, steep bank to my truck and lifts me in. It is kind of nice, though, to see two of Dorothy.

“We won’t be long,” I tell him. I hope I’m looking at the right one. A few people waiting for water taxis nod to me. Some smile and give a wave.

Dorothy climbs in the driver side. “Where we going, Will?” she asks. I’ve not told her yet. We only have another hour before I have to be back to the hospital or Dr. Lam says he’s ordering me down to Kingston. Dorothy has already reminded me of this. My short-term memory needs some fine tuning.

“Head down Quarry Road, okay?” I ask.

I must have fallen asleep. Dorothy has pulled over to the side of the road and shakes me. “Tell me where we’re going, Sleepy,” she says.

I rub my eyes and get my bearings. “A quarter mile up,” I say.

When we get to the overgrown rut of a side road, I ask her to turn to the river. She’s figured it out, I think. Her hands grip the wheel.

At the end of the road, she stops by the overgrown foundation. Trees these last twenty years have sprung tall enough along the bank to hide the river. It was once a fine view.

I want to get out of the truck, but I’m too tired. Dorothy and I sit in the cab and stare. I can still make out the foundation in the mud and grass. Just one simple house. No company store. No church in these ruins.

I can still tell which room lay where. It’s my first house, the house I built, with my old father’s help, so long ago. Drifts of snow stubbornly show their backs in the shade of trees. Me, I want to believe wildflowers bloom in this place each summer. Although I only live a mile away, I’ve not ever come back to visit.

“Why here?” Dorothy asks. Her voice shakes, holding back the crying.

I try to find the words. I lift my fingers to my mouth and breathe in. It takes me a moment to realize my body still acts like I smoke. I must look crazy.

“This is where I lost my family,” I finally say. I want the words to say more.

Dorothy’s crying now. “I know,” she says.

Again, it takes a long time to speak. “This is where I want to start a new life with you.” The words are still not right, but they’re a little better. I have to say more. “I don’t mean live here,” I say. “I want to live with you on the island.”

Dorothy looks out the broken windshield.

“I need to say goodbye in the right way,” I say. This is hard, making words with my mouth. When I can continue, I say, “I want to make sure she understands. I want her to know that life isn’t long.”

No more words come to me right away. Dorothy and I sit and consider this field by the river. Wind blows through the alders on the bank, making them bend and nod.

Dorothy takes my hand in hers and I hold it tight. We sit for a long time and stare out. An osprey hangs high up on the currents, making slow circles around us.

“I don’t feel bad here,” I say.

Dorothy leans over and we kiss.

It’s not really what I meant to say. I wanted to say something else, but my mouth can’t make the words. I wanted to say, simply, that my wife, I think she understands. She is that osprey above us, blurring now in my strained vision, drawing circles over our heads. She’s protecting and will always feed our two boys.

Dorothy, my woman, I think you understand.

A few days ago, I returned home. It’s still cold out in the mornings and at night. The blackflies and mosquitoes are now waking up, but I mostly stay inside with a small fire in my stove to keep me warm. No one wants me to be alone at my old house, but I need to prove something to them, to myself, before I travel across the river to live on the reserve with Dorothy.

Just before I came back home, I kicked Annie and her tough-looking skinny boyfriend out of my house for a while to go live with Lisette. Lisette will make an honest couple out of them. Lisette will make them squirm for their freedom.

Before Annie left, I gave her this house. She cried when I told her, and it was with happiness, I think. I never saw that before. I told her I just need a couple weeks back by myself to try and feel normal again. Then this good house, this house you’ve cleaned far too well, it’s yours. All yours.

I’m lying on my couch, half napping, the sun warm on my face, when I hear something that startles me, something I’d forgotten the sound of. At first, I can’t place it. I open my eyes to its shrill call, try hard to search inside my head for where this sound comes from, what, exactly, it is. It calls out again. I sit up best I can, my head pounding from the motion. It’s my phone.

While I struggle to sit up fully, to place my feet on the ground, the phone rings again. The right side of my body feels as if it’s fallen asleep. It won’t wake up. A cane they gave me at the hospital sits across the room, leaning on the kitchen table. I’m trying not to use it. When I go to stand, I collapse on the floor. The phone rings again, as if to mock me. I crawl to it beside my cane in the kitchen, the hip I fell on feeling bruised. I feel like an old, old man.

“Yello,” I say when I pick it up, trying to sound casual, but I’m out of breath. A recorded voice on the other end informs me I have a collect call from Timmins courthouse. I agree to take it. Annie can pay the bill when it arrives.

When the line clicks over, I hear breathing on the other end. A dull panic blossoms just above my intestines, pushing down. “Who’s there?” I ask, ready to hang up out of fear.

“Will?” I recognize the voice. “Me, Will.” Antoine’s voice lets out a laugh.

“You drunk or something?” I ask him.

“Mona,”
he says. “No. Me, I’m not drunk.” He laughs again. “No booze in jail.”

I ask him if there’s any word on when they’ll let him out.

Antoine just answers with a simple, “
Mona
. No word.” He laughs again, a quiet, good laugh.

“If you’re not drunk, why you acting so funny, then? Why are you laughing?”

“These policemen down here,” he says in English. “Ever funny, them. They treat me good. I’m eating good, me, in jail.”

I tell Antoine that if they don’t let him out soon, I’ll figure a way to bust him out.

“When I get home to Peawanuck,” he says, “I’m going to build a new house.” I listen to my old half-brother’s voice, his voice that has spoken, even if rarely, for more than eighty years in this world. He’ll do it. Maybe I’ll get good enough to help.

“These policemen and me, we talk about hunting,” he says. “These white guys, they like to kill moose. They like me to tell them how I do it. Some even take notes.”

“Don’t tell them too many of our secrets,” I say.

“A couple of them,” Antoine continues, “they even told me I did good to kill Marius and his friend. They asked me if I felt bad. I told them I killed lots of people in the war.”

I think about this for a long while. Neither of us says anything. We just listen to each other’s breathing. Even through a phone, the silence between us is comfortable.

I don’t remember much from that day he saved me, and large parts of my last year are erased like a crappy VCR tape in my brain. I do remember Antoine, still as a moose, out by the trees. I remember a man with small glasses that made him look like he was smarter than he was. I know Marius was there, but only because I was told. Sometimes I think I can see his eyes.

I hear fumbling on the other end, a flicking sound that I realize is his thumb on a lighter. He breathes deeply and exhales. When I imagine he lifts his hand to his mouth to draw, I do, too. He wouldn’t think it’s strange. It makes me feel better.

“Our father’s rifle,” he says after a time. “I asked these police to give it back to me when they let me go.”

Our father’s rifle? I try to sound calm when I’m able to speak. “Why do they have it?” I ask.

I can hear Antoine smoking his cigarette, smiling to himself. I make the actions of smoking, too. When I can picture him tapping ashes on his jeans and rubbing them in, I tap mine on my jeans, too.

“When they asked me where I got the rifle,”Antoine says,“I didn’t want to say it was you.” I hear him take another pull from his smoke. “So I told them I got it on the eBay.”

“So who has his rifle now?” I ask.

Antoine must be smoking his cigarette down to its filter. “Government, I guess,” he says.

I think about this for a long time. Eventually, I hear voices in the background. “I got to go, me,” he says.

I tell him once again that if they don’t let him out soon, I’ll break him out. When we hang up, I sit there in my kitchen a long time, the dead line buzzing in my ear.

The government has our father’s war rifle. Me, I don’t think they know what they have there. That gun, it will eventually start talking. And when it does, someone’s going to have to start listening.

Dorothy drives my freighter canoe. I sit in the bow, facing her, watching. She drives down the Moose River like a girl. I wanted to go fast today. I wanted to drive, but when I tried, I couldn’t grip the throttle good, I couldn’t steer with my bum right arm. Dorothy smiles at me, holding her hat on her head in the wind. Joe and Gregor lead in Joe’s freighter. They drive nice and easy for Dorothy’s sake. I’m not used to sitting up front. It doesn’t feel right here. When I shift my weight, the bow rocks enough that, even though I know I won’t, I worry I’ll tumble out. I sit still and take the pain of the narrow wooden bench bruising my bony ass.

The Moose River opens up wide before us. We’ve got the current and a dropping tide. I want to think my body’s slowly getting better. Dorothy makes me do my exercises every day.

Today is the longest day of the year. It’s a day I’ve been looking forward to. All of us, my family, my friends, we are going to spend the next couple of days at my father’s old hunt camp on the bay. Annie has already driven the others out there. I needed more time. And Joe wouldn’t leave till I did. He and Gregor think they need to keep an eye on me. I do tend to fall asleep at inappropriate times.