River's Song - The Inn at Shining Waters Series (5 page)

"Oh, Hollywood, they are expert at making it sizzle.""But for the most part the characters didn't get burned in the movies, not in the ending anyway." At least that was true in the movies she'd liked. "I remember they got singed from time to time, but in the end they usually wound up with their true love, presumably living happily ever after."

"Except for
Casablanca,"
Babette reminded her. "And
Gone with the Wind."

"That's true. Perhaps I should've paid closer attention to those films. Maybe I would've learned something useful."

"You had your parents' marriage," Babette pointed out." They were happy."

"Yes, they had a few squabbles, but for the most part they made it look fairly easy. Nothing like what I experienced in my life."

"Just remember this, chérie." Babette stood. "Your life is not over."

Anna gave her a weary smile. "It feels like it is."

"It is only beginning, chérie. Trust Babette." Now she touched Anna's cheek. "But you do not want to look like it is over. You must take care!"And now she promised to bring by a special facial cream on her next visit. "Before it is too late for your pretty face."

Anna walked her back down to the dock, untying her rope and handing it to her. "Thank you for coming by," she said." And remember what you said about how my letters were good medicine for my mother?"

"Oh, yes." Babette put on her broad-brimmed straw river hat, tying the ribbons beneath her chin. "Very good medicine."

Babette grinned. "There ees lots more where that comes from!" She leaned over and reached for the cord to the motor, pulling it out with surprising strength. Impressive for her age, which Anna guessed must be more than sixty now, although she wasn't sure. The engine roared to life and Babette waved." Adieu!"

"That's what you were for me today. Good medicine. Thanks!"

"Adieu!"Anna called back, watching as the small boat sliced a path through the glass-like surface of the river.

Suddenly, Anna had an idea. She would take out the
River Dove.
Hopefully it would still be seaworthy, or at least riverworthy. Hopefully she would be as well.

Anna felt slightly silly as she went to get her canoe. Not for wanting to take a boat ride. There was nothing silly about that. But she felt slightly silly because she'd taken her long hair out of its customary "old lady bun"As Lauren liked to call it, and divided it into two long braids. This was something she would never dare do back in Pine Ridge. Between Eunice and Lauren, the teasing would be unbearable. However, here on the river, it felt perfect. And because she'd brought no casual clothes, she went through her parents' closet to discover some of her dad's old work clothes. Finding a pair of corduroy pants and a tan work shirt, she outfitted herself for a nice little row on the river. And if she fell in, which she hoped would not happen, she would not be the worse for wear. However, she knew that if someone like Eunice or Lauren spotted her looking like this, they would probably laugh.

"Well, let them laugh," she said with determined resolve as she tugged the canoe out from where it had been stored back behind Grandma Pearl's old cabin. She'd brought rags to wipe out the canoe with and, naturally, it was full of spiderwebs and such. But before long, it looked as good as new—or as good as when it had been given to her. The oar was in good shape too. Obviously, someone had made this canoe to last.

She slipped the small vessel into the water next to the dock, then carefully—very carefully—she stepped one foot into the center of the boat and, holding both sides with both hands, she slipped the other in as well. The canoe tipped back and forth a bit but she resisted the urge to leap out; instead she took in a slow, deep breath and, still holding to the sides, she held her torso erect and slowly squatted to a sitting position. She released the breath and smiled at her accomplishment. Now, picking up the oar, she used it to give herself a gentle shove from the dock, which rocked the canoe even more, but once again she took in a deep breath and resisted the urge to overcorrect. Instead, she waited, slowly releasing her breath, and just like that the canoe stopped rocking. Holding itself evenly in the water, the canoe now glided out onto the river, almost as if it knew exactly what it was doing. Maybe it did.

Canoeing came back to her—perhaps in the way people said riding a bike would do, except that Anna had never learned to ride a bike. There was no place on the river to ride to. Boats were the way to travel. Although she'd heard there was a gravel road running out behind the property now, and that it supposedly connected to town, it would take two to three times as long to drive as to go down the river. And most folks thought it was a waste of taxpayers' money.

Anna felt like someone else as she peacefully paddled along—or maybe she was finally just her old self again—but it felt amazingly good . . . and right . . . and true. Even so, she finally got to the place where she knew she should turn back. Really, what was she doing here? Out paddling around the river like she was twelve. And here she had a daughter back home, probably wondering when her mother was coming back. And Eunice was probably piling up the household chores, making a new to-do list, just waiting for her "squaw" to get back to put the place in order again. "It's how she earns her keep," Eunice would tell anyone who was bold enough to inquire about the curious arrangement between the two women.

Anna had no doubts that Eunice shelled out a fair amount of money on account of them. At least on account of Lauren, since Anna lived simply enough. But between her daughter's expensive taste in clothes and her appetite for social activities, not to mention the convertible Eunice had gotten Lauren for graduation, well, there was no way Anna could afford such luxuries. Working for Eunice was her contribution.

"You do realize that you're entitled to some of your husband's assets," the family attorney, Joseph P. Miller, had told her once when she'd run into him at the hardware store not long after Adam had passed. "Why don't you come into my office sometime?"

Of course, when Anna had set out a week or so later, planning to walk into town to pay Mr. Miller a visit, Eunice had stopped her even before she got out the door. "Where are you going all dressed up today?"

"To town."

"What for?"

"To attend to some business." Anna reached for the doorknob, wishing she'd timed her getaway a little better, or perhaps hadn't bothered to wear her good gray suit, one she had sewn for herself and felt looked nearly as good as the ones Eunice spent far too much money on.

"What sort of business?"

Anna had looked directly at her mother-in-law then. Really, it seemed pointless to attempt to keep anything from her. She would find out eventually. Nothing Anna did in this town, and it wasn't much, ever escaped Eunice Gunderson's notice. So Anna told her the truth.

"Well, that's ridiculous." Eunice waved her hand. "Adam's assets ran out ages ago. In fact, if I wanted, I could probably charge you for all the assistance I've given to Lauren and you all these years. But, of course, we're family. I would never dream of doing that. But if you feel you must go see Joe, I'm happy to drive you there myself. Did you make an appointment?"

"No, I, uh . . . well, I just thought I'd drop in."

Eunice laughed. "Drop in? Don't you know he's a very busy attorney? He handles all of the mill's business and I happen to know that this week he has quite a bit on his plate. In the future, I suggest you make an appointment if you care to see him. And keep in mind his hourly rate." She made a tsk-tsk sound. "And it just went up too. Scandalous what lawyers imagine they are worth these days."

Naturally, Anna didn't go see Joseph Miller that day or any other day. She had long since accepted that the only two things Adam left to her were a wedding ring, which she had safely tucked away, and Lauren. She looked at the canoe beneath her, realizing it was probably worth more to her than her wedding ring and, although she didn't love it more than her daughter, it had probably given her more pleasure. Sad—but true.

"Hello over there!"

Anna looked up in surprise. She hadn't heard any other boat motors, but now saw that this was a rowboat, with a grayhaired woman waving from it. "Hello,"Anna called back. She didn't recognize the woman, but then it had been years and people, including her, could change.

"Do you live around here?" the woman called as she clumsily rowed over with an eager smile.

"Sort of. Anyway, I used to."

The woman got closer and peered curiously at her. "I couldn't help but notice your dugout canoe. It seems authentic. Are you a native?"

"Native?"A
nna frowned as she recalled an old Laurel and Hardy movie about African headhunters. Hadn't they called them natives?

"I mean a Native
American?
An American Indian?
Are you?"
The woman looked excited now, as if she'd just made an unusual discovery and might suddenly whip out a camera to document it by snapping a photo of Anna. Or perhaps she planned to trap Anna and carry her back to a Ripley's museum as an exhibit—they might title her cage "the last of her breed."

Anna knew she was being slightly ridiculous, but just the same she did not answer this strange woman.

"I'm sorry." The woman looked deflated now. "In my enthusiasm, I've made it sound all wrong. It's just that I'm so
happy
to see you today."

Anna remained silent, studying the woman, trying to figure her out. Dressed for the outdoors, almost as if she was going on some kind of safari expedition, she looked fairly normal, although her words sounded a bit nutty.

"You see, I'm an anthropologist. I'm doing my doctoral thesis on coastal Indian tribes and their customs. And, well, they are just so hard to find these days. And I saw you in your beautiful canoe and you looked like you could possibly be a descendant of an American Indian tribe. Please, I beg you, excuse my bad manners. Just attribute it to my age and my passion for Indian history. I am sorry to have offended you."

"Well, at least you didn't say '
How.'
"

The woman laughed. "Thank goodness for that. Let me start over. My name is Hazel Chenowith. I'm from the University of Oregon and I'm spending my summer on the Oregon coast, doing research and writing. Today I'm exploring on the river."

"I'm Anna Gunderson," she said politely. "My parents owned what used to be a small general store over on the river. I'm staying there for a few days."

"Oh, yes. Someone told me about that the other day. A man from town gave me a tour of the river in his speedboat, but he went too fast. However, I did see the place, the gray square building with a faded General Store sign?" Hazel maneuvered her rowboat adjacent to Anna's canoe now, close enough for the women to shake hands if they wanted to. Not that Anna wanted to.

"That sounds right."

"And your mother descended from the Siuslaw Tribe, correct?"

"Yes."

"I'm sorry . . . I just heard of her passing the other day. The man in the speedboat mentioned it. Please accept my sincerest sympathies."

"Thank you."

"I was so disappointed to hear of her death. I know it sounds terribly self-serving, but I had sincerely hoped to meet her and speak with her about her heritage."

Anna shrugged. "Well, you shouldn't feel too bad. I doubt my mother would've told you much."

"Why is that?" Hazel removed her wire-rimmed glasses and, pulling out a man's handkerchief, paused to wipe them clean. "That is, if you don't mind me asking."

"My mother was one hundred percent Indian, but she lived out her life as a white woman. Other than her skin, which she guarded religiously from the sun, you would not have known about her heritage."

"So many Indians went that route. And I don't blame them a bit. In fact, I blame the white man." Hazel scowled as she put her glasses back on.

"You do?"

"Of course. Thanks to
assimilation,"
she said the word with disgust, "most Indians were robbed of their language, their art, their culture, their families, their dignity . . . even their lives in many cases—almost everything was stripped away from them. And those who tried to return to the old ways were usually chastised, sometimes by their very own people."

"That's true." Anna remembered how frustrated her mother became over Grandma's return to the old ways . . . how she resented Anna's interest. If not for Daddy, she never would've tolerated any of it.

"And that is what fear and oppression does to people. Such a shame."

Anna simply nodded.

"All I'm trying to do is to preserve what I can while there is still something left to preserve." She frowned. "But I swear it's getting harder and harder to find people who can remember anything. And then—eureka!—you find someone with a memory and that person shuts up tighter than a razor clam."

"It sounds like frustrating work."

She nodded. "And I'm afraid that the true history of the Native American people is going to just disappear altogether. Other than the Hollywood version anyway. And they almost never get that right."

"But they do better than cartoons." Anna winced to think of some of the images her own daughter had seen and laughed at on Eunice's television. Even when Anna attempted to set Lauren straight, it was useless with Eunice around to defend her granddaughter's sense of humor.

"You're probably right. I don't watch much television, but I have seen some degrading advertisements using Indian images as comical characters."

"Why is that, I wonder?"Anna frowned. "Why, in this enlightened age of science and technology, would an Indian still be the brunt of a joke?"

"That's a very good question." Hazel reached for a little notebook, writing something down. And now she brightened." But when I saw you out here today, with your glossy black braids and your lovely dugout canoe, well, I suppose I thought I'd finally gotten lucky."

"How so?"

"You just looked like the real thing to me." Her gray eyes grew wide. "Do you know that for an instant I thought you were an apparition or ghost?"

Anna laughed. "I'm not ready for that yet."

Hazel leaned forward in her boat, peering curiously at Anna. "You are very beautiful, you know. You would photograph nicely."

Anna frowned.

"Oh, dear, there I go again. I probably sound like a silly tourist." Hazel laughed. "Again, you'll have to excuse my enthusiasm. Forgive me."

"As long as you don't start snapping photos of me."

Hazel patted a bag at her feet. "I do have a camera, but I wouldn't dream of taking a picture without your permission.And now I assume that since your mother lived like a white woman, you were raised as a white child and you probably know next to nothing about your Native American heritage."

Anna straightened her spine, holding her head high. "Don't be too sure of that."

"Really?"
Hazel leaned over so far that Anna expected her to topple out of her boat. Hopefully the old woman could swim." Why do you say that?"

Anna thought carefully about her response. Part of her disliked this woman's intense and intrusive curiosity. Really, it bordered along rudeness and almost reminded her of her pushy mother-in-law. But another part of Anna respected what it seemed this woman was trying to accomplish—to preserve some authentic Indian history. Still . . . she was unsure.

"Do you know
anything
about your ancestors?" Hazel persisted.

"My mother's mother, my grandmother, was Siuslaw. And her mother as well. My great-grandmother was born here on the river and lived a normal childhood. But as a young woman she was forced to the reservation. She was with child at the time. My grandmother was later born on the reservation. I understand that in itself was rather unusual since most of the people died from disease or starvation. My grandmother's father was killed for trying to find food for his family."

Hazel looked surprised, perhaps more by the fact that Anna was telling her things than by the actual information. "You're referring to the Siletz Reservation in the mid to late 1800s."

"Yes. And unlike many of her people, my great-grandmother actually survived the atrocities and returned on foot, walking back down the beach from the reservation with her child. She and her sister somehow claimed this land where the store and our home are located. And now that land . . . it belongs to me."