Scattered Bones (31 page)

After the two leave, Florence decides to sneak off to the beach for a smoke – and to hide. Doc Happy Mac is officially off duty and there’s bound to be more beaten-up party-goers showing up on her door step.

She plunks herself down on her usual log seat, lights her pipe. Artemis and Athena curl up at her feet. She loves these pugs – they’re the only creatures who seem genuinely happy just to be alive. It’s beautiful outside, the thin, milky light playing tag on the waters before her. She has so much to do, and she’s already exhausted from staying up all night. If only Sally were here to help.

Florence had visited her yesterday, and there she was, as usual, lying in her bed, her face to the wall. Florence couldn’t help but yell, “You stop this nonsense, Sally Sewap. Everyone misses you. I miss you. Your son misses you. Father Bonnald misses you.”

But, of course, the priest would miss her. Sally had been his slave her entire adult life. She is rebelling at last. Yesterday morning, Florence had been set to deliver the lecture she’d been rehearsing for a month. “Father Bonnald you must get rid of that annoying brother of yours. His ridiculous dithering has driven Sally mad.” But the priest was nowhere to be found.

“And that might have been my last chance,” she sighs.

~•~

For the first
six months after the Smiths’ arrival at Pelican Narrows, Sally and Florence had hardly spoken to each other. Sally was the housekeeper of the Roman Catholic priest, and a Cree, so that pretty well ruled out a friendship with the store manager’s white Anglican wife. Then one night a fire had broken out in the HBC store – containers of Kerosene had mysteriously blown up. Florence had assumed that Bibiane Ratt was responsible but, as usual, nothing could be proved.

The blaze was contained without too much damage being done, but Russell, in his anxiety to save the antique HBC canoe, had defied the smoke and flames until he himself was ablaze. Florence had doused him with a bucket of water, and carried him over her shoulder to safety. She treated the blisters that quickly formed on his chest and arms with Percival’s Lotions. This did no good; his pain was excruciating. He screamed so loudly that Florence thought his heart might give out under the strain.

Just after midnight, there was a knock on the door and in walked Sally Sewap with her medicine pouch. She patted a mixture of swamp tea and larch pine all over his body, and soon he was able to sleep, at least a little. The next day she forced a purgative down his throat. “That’ll remove the smoke particles in his lungs,” she insisted.

He coughed and spit and swore, but within days Russell was well enough to walk around.

A week later Florence walked over to the Catholic rectory and presented Sally with two bars of scented soap imported from Britain as a thank you gift. The two women struck up a conversation, discovered that the healing arts were a common passion, and soon became fast friends.

Bit by bit Sally unveiled her trove of herbal remedies. A potion made from the inner bark of the speckled alder bush relieved sore, itchy eyes; the root of the rattle-pod, when chewed and the juice swallowed, alleviated stomach ache; pitch of the black spruce mixed with grease was used on skin rashes, scabies and burns. Every ailment imaginable found relief in some concoction: berries, flowers, leaves, roots, bark, moss.

The two began trekking into the bush, searching out rare specimens – the Wentworth girl often tagged along. Both women loved the sounds of the forest so few words were exchanged. They didn’t need to speak, they were in perfect harmony.

One day in mid-August, four years ago, Sally announced that she had permission from Father Bonnald to visit her family. An old aunt was fading; Sally must say goodbye to her. “She’s been important to me all my life. She’s a medicine woman, a very famous and wise one, and I want to thank her for all she’s passed on to me.”

When Florence asked if she could go along, Sally looked dubious –
would the elderly shaman want anything to do with a loud, curious white person? Probably not. Finally, though, she had given in, not so much because Florence had begged like a dog, but because the hunting season was upon them. No one else would go with her.

The trip took twelve days. The two women paddled south on Mirond and Corneille Lakes, then down the rock-strewn Sturgeon-Weir River, enduring dozens of portages – around the Birch, Leaf, Snake, Spruce, Rat, Two Mile and Crooked rapids. They crossed the huge Amisk Lake to Sturgeon Landing – this was where the new residential school was scheduled to be built. Sally wouldn’t even glance at the spot. From there it was another three days, often in driving rain, until finally they arrived at Cumberland House.

Since Sally’s aunt lived some ways from the village, they had to walk another half day through heavy bush. As they finally approached the plain little cabin, late in the afternoon, Florence suddenly felt uneasy. Supposing the old woman ordered her off the property? She was famous for being a loner, refusing to have anything to do with the Blackfish or Charboyer clan. What should Florence do? But Betty Cheechoo, or Judique as she preferred to be called, welcomed them both.

She was a short, rotund woman, with pudgy cheeks, a rose pod of a nose, and small, bright eyes. Her long hair, still black although flecked with gray, was worn in braids down her back giving her a youthful air. Where Sally got the idea that her aunt was fading Florence had no idea. The moment they walked in the door she began a lively discourse on her interpretation of Cree philosophy which didn’t stop until they left.

The world, Judique believed, was a perpetual battlefield where forces of good and evil were forever struggling for supremacy. Humans, poor things, were caught in the middle. It reminded Florence of the universe populated by all those eccentric Greek gods and goddesses she had come to admire so much. Zeus zapping the world with lightning bolts would fit right in.

According to Judique, nothing happened by chance, everything in the universe was interrelated. Although the medicine woman made it clear that events were not predetermined. They could be altered through intervention. People were victims of fate only if they couldn’t interpret
the patterns playing out around them, and act on them.

“If tragedy strikes, say a man’s young wife dies while giving birth,” Judique said, “it means that man’s lost his knack of reading the signs. His
pawachi-kan
had deserted him for some reason. Or, maybe somebody with a stronger, more dangerous
pawachi-kan
blinded him.” When the terrible small pox had struck, for example, she blamed it on the Indian being too fascinated by the white man’s enticements. The guardian spirits had been ignored.

Shamans were smarter and craftier than other humans – their
pawachi-kans
, who were the colossals of the spirit world, made sure of that, coaching them to divine the future through dreams and signs. The intricate workings of the universe were
not
a mystery to a healer like Judique. Curing illnesses, or predicting where game animals could be found, or foretelling the sex of an unborn child were all a result of her mediation between human and gods.

Of course, there were good shamans and evil shamans. The latter might persuade a foolish
pawachi-kan
to do something destructive – kill a human on whom the shaman sought revenge, for example.

“My
nikawis
is definitely a good medicine woman, a holy one, really,” Sally interjected.

The old woman frowned at her – surely everybody knows
that
. She continued, “We humans are but little white clouds being scattered here and there by the wind. The Great Creator gives wise people like me the power to look into the heavens and understand how best we can survive the never-ending storm that rages between
mitho-kikwi
, good, and
machi-kikwi
, evil.”

Judique talked nonstop for a week, pausing only for a smoke and to nibble on some bannock and smoked fish. Now and then she’d snooze for a few hours. Sally eventually got bored and went berry picking, but Florence’s attention never faltered.

In the hut there was only one chair, rickety with part of the seat webbing missing. It was this dais from which Judique held forth. Florence had to perch on the hard little bed, her back aching, her legs numbing. The old woman applauded her fortitude. “If you had been lucky enough to be born a Cree,” she said, “You might have been a shaman, even a great one.”

“Well,” thought Florence, “maybe I will never be able to forecast how an irritable spirit feels on a particular day or how it will take revenge on whoever offended it, but maybe I can become a soldier in the universal battle between Good and Evil.”

On her return to Pelican Narrows that fall, she organized a band of disgruntled Cree men, about a dozen in all, most of them wardens at St. Bartholomew’s Church. She named them Warriors Against Wickedness. Since then, for a good three years, they have regularly gathered late at night on a plateau not far from Father Bonnald’s grotto, and, under Florence’s strict command, they have marched. She had learned a lot from an uncle who was a sergeant during World War One and had never stopped talking about how he drilled his men almost to death. Her bark echoed through the bush. “Parade, turn right. About turn. Turn left. Company retire.”

They were a straggly, undisciplined group, with only one real soldier amongst them. Harold Bear was a veteran of the Great War, had the bullet wounds to prove it, but he was now so discombobulated by his experience that he could give no leadership, only staggered about trying to follow Florence’s orders. Her army sometimes laughed out loud at her commands, her pretence, and yet she knew they were sincere. The last vestiges of Cree life are crumbling away like sand dunes before a raging storm, and they will do anything to stop it. Tonight they tackle their first assignment. General Florence Smith knows that they will do well.

But Florence didn’t forget another of Judique’s important teachings – helping others was the true Cree way. She persuaded Sally that they should open a dispensary/clinic in a lean-to built at the side of the Hudson’s Bay store. Sally provided Indian remedies, Florence, the hands-on knowledge she had acquired through Red Cross courses.

Yesterday afternoon Florence had proudly shown Doc Happy Mac around. “My Lord, you girls are amazing,” he exclaimed. “Everything from pulling teeth to healing fractures. Hope those Indians appreciate you.”

What the doc wasn’t told was that Sally has given up on life and Florence is stuck with the entire load. Well, soon somebody else will have to take over.

Chapter Thirty-Five

Florence glances up
at Arthur Jan’s house.
There’s no sign of life. Arthur’s likely down at his dock, getting ready to leave. She climbs the path leading up the hill towards his place, Athena and Artemis puffing beside her. Even before she gets there, she can smell the gasoline. The Warriors Against Wickedness have properly carried out instructions. She heads towards the back of the house.

Jan is the only person in Pelican Narrows who keeps his house locked, but then, as he points out, he’s the only one with anything valuable to steal. What he doesn’t know is that Mavis Custer, his housekeeper, always leaves the kitchen door open. Out of spite.

The light is dim inside, but Florence can see well enough to make her way towards the jewel box that is in his parlour. Sitting on a sterling silver tray atop the bureau, twinkling in the pale sun, is Arthur’s collection of George II ale glasses, circa 1750, exquisitely engraved with hops and barley. She picks up one of these and smashes it hard on the floor. She laughs out loud, heaves another, then another, until the entire lot lies in sparkling pieces. Artemis’s and Athena’s eyes bulge even further from their heads.

Florence walks out onto the porch and opens the windows. She lifts the cloth off the parrot cage, unlatches the door. “There you are, you ridiculous creature. Vamoose!” The bird looks at her with beady eyes, but doesn’t move an inch. “It’s for your own good, you stupid thing.”

Florence returns to the parlour where she spots a decanter of brandy surrounded by lovely crystal snifters. She pours herself a shot and plops down on the sofa. Her memory of the last time she was in this place, four years ago, still fills her with rage.

Several Pelican Narrows girls had gone missing. Searches were organized, but turned up no sign of them. The village went into mourning. About a month later, Leonard Sewap was in Moose Jaw, trying to raise money for a fish processing plant. One afternoon, he spotted one of the missing girls walking along the street. He followed her to one of the brothels that were flourishing in that randy city. When he confronted her and eventually the others, they refused to come home. They explained they wanted a more exciting life than dull old Pelican Narrows could provide.

Bibiane Ratt had been seen chatting them up the afternoon before they disappeared so their parents were sure that he had something to do with their running off. But this was never proven.

One Saturday morning, Florence was arranging some wild flowers on the altar of St. Bartholomew’s in preparation for the next day’s service. Annie Custer, the Wentworth’s housekeeper, was washing the floor.

“Mrs. Smith, could I talk with you for a moment,” she had asked.

Florence replied, “Of course,” and Annie poured out her story. Her second daughter Helen had always been an irritable, frustrated kid, the trouble-maker among her six siblings. She was now in open revolt, refusing to obey any of the rules Annie and her husband, Alphonse, laid down, particularly the eight o’clock curfew. She was seen late the previous evening talking with Bibiane Ratt, and by this morning she hadn’t come home. Her few clothes were gone. Could Mrs. Smith help in any way?