The Cannibal Spirit (34 page)

It was the first time Harry had been a part of such company in a formal way. He felt a bit like a foredeck tar invited to the captain's table. So he kept his silence as much as was polite, ate with his mouth closed, and tried not to clatter and scrape his plate with the cutlery.

Once dinner was done, the women removed themselves to the drawing room, while the men remained behind, drinking a whisky that had travelled from Scotland around Cape Horn, and then by way of Victoria to the Spencer household.

“A treat to drink the real stuff,” said Albert Trelawney, his melancholy for home writ plain upon his face and in the tone of his words.

“And better than that acid-brewed shite the Indians crave,” said Walter Woolacott, and he threw a glance from under his black brows in Harry's direction.

“Well,” said Spencer, raising his glass and staring into the whisky's tawny depths. He stood. “A toast, then, with this precious liquid. To the Reverend Hall on his birthday. And to the continuance of his good works among the native population.” There were general murmurs of assent and glasses waved. Then Halliday stood.

“Gentlemen,” he said. “If you will forgive a more formal moment still. Acting as I do for the Department of Indian Affairs, and so the Dominion Government itself, I take this opportunity to offer my appreciation for, not only the good works of our dear colleague the Reverend Hall, but for those that all who are present this evening perform.” Harry guessed there would be some around the table might happily exclude him from such praise. “I propose another toast,” said Halliday. “To progress!” More murmurs followed, glasses were waved.

“Come then, Halliday,” said Spencer. “What of our progress?”

“You'd know as well as I and better, Stanley,” said Halliday.

“But your overview! I don't claim to comprehend the grander forces that are at work.” There was irony in his tone. “I simply employ the Indian.”

“And procreate with the fuckers too,” Harry heard Woolacott mutter, who'd been drinking steadily all evening, though he was far enough along the table for Spencer not to hear.

Halliday frowned at the constable, sitting close by him as he was. He said, “The Indian owned this land before ever we were here. We absorbed his country and called it our own. And we've a promise made to the Indian—and to ourselves, mind you!—that they be treated fair and squarely, with justice. And if there is injustice still—and there is that, I make no bones about it”—he glanced Harry's way as he said it—“still do I believe the schools and the medicine and the imposition of fair laws are bringing that circumstance nearer. There'll be a time when the Indians will have their enfranchisement, and become respected British subjects of the federal dominion of Canada.”

“A fair speech, William,” said the Reverend Hall, “and political as well.”

Halliday smiled thinly. “When they built Fort Rupert, it's said there were three thousand Indians came to live nearby, and today no more than
a hundred and twenty left up there. The white man has rained destruction on them. I'm hardly astounded when they resent us.”

“So it's our fault, their blasted savage ways?” said Woolacott.

“Yet that is no reason,” Halliday went on, ignoring the constable, “not to aid in their improvement. Indeed, our task is only made more earnest by our culpability.”

“You'd perhaps to tell my boys that,” said the headmaster, “when they stick a knife to themselves and, claiming injury, beg to be returned to their families.”

“Adding another to my sick list,” said Trelawney, “and it so long already.”

“And the girls,” said Hall, “sent south to the cities to prostitute for the monies needed for their ceremonies.”

“'Tis true the Indian seems to lack that fine feeling we call sentiment,” said Halliday.

Harry turned a spoon in his fingers. He wondered what might Annie Spencer's sentiment be to such opinion. At the head of the table, her husband seemed barely to be listening at all.

“Ain't that a bit general?” Harry said.

“I've lived here all my life, Harry,” said Halliday. “Forgive me, but your take on matters Indian is scant as yet … and, shall we say, privileged.”

“Well, let us speak on a particular matter,” said Reverend Hall. “George Hunt is away to Vancouver, and the good constable just returned from taking him there. What news, Mr. Woolacott?”

“He's at the police station awaiting trial.”

“A very unfortunate case,” said Hall. “I've known him now so many years. His father helped me open my first mission, at Rupert, back in '77.” He laughed, his otherwise frail voice rich in its humour. “George was quite the good Christian back then.”

“You speak lightly of a serious matter,” said Halliday.

“I know he is no friend to you,” said Hall. “Believe me, I have argued with him many a time on issues relating to the scriptures, and of its teaching to the red man. But he is a passionate advocate for their rights and their traditions. I respect him, even as I do not agree with what he has to say.

Still, I know my colleague Reverend Crosby has not such sympathy on the matter.”

“He's a damnable menace,” said Woolacott.

“Walter,” said Halliday. “Remember in whose house you are.”

“Aye,” he grunted toward Spencer. “I am sorry for that.”

“I'm currently in no mind to disagree,” said Spencer.

“Well.” The Reverend Hall gazed at nothing in particular as he spoke. “It seems he has truly brought misfortune on himself at last.”

“So it's true then that there are cannibal feasts still happening here on the coast?” Trelawney said. His whole body quivered, but his eyes glittered.

“Believe it!” said Corker. “Somewhere out there even now a corpse is being most hideously butchered, and the fire is being laid.”

“It seems incredible.” Trelawney's bottom lip hung open slightly in his excitement. “Is it every part of the body that is consumed? Do the women and children also partake of such meals?”

“Mainly the men, as I have heard it,” said Corker. “Though it would not surprise me to hear they were all participants together in sin.”

“Well,” said Trelawney. “Really it is remarkable in this modern era to imagine such events continuing!”

“Dirt-worshipping fucking heathens, all of them,” said Woolacott.

“Enough, Constable!” said Halliday.

Harry's resentment had been rising as the conversation continued. Now he could hold on no longer, even in such company. “Seems to me it's more that George is subject to conspiracy than that any of these damned insults be true.” He gazed about the table in defiance.

Halliday eyed him without expression. Hall looked down at his whisky, and Corker looked as if he was ready to burst, his face near purple. Trelawney shifted in his seat.

“What might you mean by that?” said Woolacott. “If you've accusations, make them plain.”

“You're the policeman,” Harry said. “It is you that is making the accusations. George a cannibal! If I accuse you of anything, it's stupidity, man.”
Woolacott eyed him dangerously. But Harry stared right back. Only the vacant chair where Woolacott's wife had been lay between them.

“Yes, yes,” said Halliday. He raised his hands to invite calm. “That's quite enough of this, I believe. From both of you—if you will forgive me, Mr. Cadwallader.”

“Halliday told me what happened at Rupert with the family's property, Harry,” said Spencer. “An unfortunate business. I understand you feel anger about it.”

“I'm surprised you ain't feeling it yourself,” Harry said, aware he was close to offending his host. “Yet it is made more so by the Indian agent's refusing to tell the whereabouts of them now.”

Halliday looked uncomfortable. “If you'll give me time to organize their return,” he said.

“I've a better thought,” said Harry, and he stood up from his dining chair to look down the table at Halliday. Woolacott, in his place between, still glared black thunder at him. “You tell me where they are, and I'll go fetch them.”

“It's not so simple, Harry.”

“And why's that? Seems simple enough to me. I've a boat to do it.” “Give me time, is all I ask.”

Harry blew air from his lungs and clapped the table with his palm. Trelawney jumped slightly, then half laughed in his nervousness. Harry looked to Spencer. “The two of you discussed the case against George?” he said.

“There's little enough to say,” said Spencer.

“Then you'll let him rot, Mr. Spencer?” Harry said. “You'll buy the tale that George travels along the coast, stops off in the villages, chops up dead bodies, fries them up over fires, serves the body parts up for feasting like the beef we supped tonight?” He picked up, for want of other options, a coffee spoon, and threw it down in the middle of the table. “Can it only be me sees the lunacy of this?” All now looked away from him. He stood quietly for a moment. Then he said, “How is he even to make his defence, when he's locked up in Vancouver?”

“Right where he should be,” said Woolacott. “Attacking a clergyman!”

“Now we come to the right of it,” said Harry. “Pushing Crosby at the funeral is what truly brung all of this about, eh? Not the damned cannibal dances you are all so salivating over.” Part of him wanted just to stride straight out the door—through rage, yes, but also for his own gall in standing up like this to these men of substance, in whose midst he found himself but of whom he was not an equal. Instead, he sat once more. He drummed his fingers upon the table.

Halliday sighed. “Not entirely,” he said, “though it did prove something of a spur to action, I'll confess it. Assaulting a member of the priesthood in full sight of the whole village! It just could not be allowed to stand.”

“So why not charge him with that?” said Harry. “Bring him up before the judge—even if that be you yourself—here in Alert Bay. Be done with it. It was his son's funeral. Crosby came rampaging in. God's truth, I'll stand in his defence and state that there was circumstances mitigating.”

Harry gazed about the table, but none would meet his eyes. “Mr. Spencer!” he said, when he could bear it no longer.

Spencer tapped his fingers in uneasy rhythm on the tabletop. “I had a telegraph come from him,” he said quietly.

“What? George? When?”

“Yesterday.”

“What does it say?”

“That he is awaiting trial, kept in the police station cells. As Woolacott has told us.”

“That's it?”

“He wants money for bail. Five hundred dollars.” Spencer looked around the table, his chin high, defiant. “But not from me. If he's to play this idiot game, I'll not be a part of it.”

The others remained silent.

“Mr. Spencer,” Harry said at last. “Sir. With the greatest respect to you—and I apologize for my manner of a moment ago—but, sir, you are married to his sister!”

“I made my position clear to him, Harry, when you were in hospital. That's all there is.”

“Mr. Spencer,” said Halliday. “If I may.” He coughed. “I know that I am, in Harry's eyes at least, somewhat the enemy of this piece. Yet I'd like to say something about George. I've had my battles with the man for some years now. We disagree on many, if not most, issues. If the allegations against him are proven true—and the evidence is compelling—then he must be punished to the full extent of the law.”

Harry made to speak but Halliday went on. “However, I do agree with Harry when he says George cannot prepare a proper defence while he remains incarcerated in Vancouver. I do not believe George is a man to up and run. And I'd be much surprised if any round this table thought as much. In posting bail, you'd not be
giving
him money then, since it would be returned on his coming to trial. At least you'd offer him the chance for a fairer hearing.”

“You'd lock him up and after support him?” Harry said.

“I'd see things done fairly. Not just for him but for all to know that this were done with due diligence to the law.”

“Stanley,” said Reverend Hall after a pause, “I must say I believe Mr. Halliday is right. Justice in these matters is important.”

Spencer leaned back in his chair, raised his glass to his lips and drained it, then lifted his eyes toward the ceiling and sighed. “Damnation on that man!” He rapped his knuckles on the table for a time. “All right,” he said, “I shall front his bail. But nothing more.” He leaned back in his chair and put his hands on the top of his head. “Not one penny more. Anything else he might need, he'll have to raise himself. Or, if there be any left along this coast whom he has never wronged, then they can come to his aid. I have a cannery to run and no time nor money more to be spent on that man's foolishness.”

The following morning, Harry woke late, sore in his shoulder, but refreshed. Fragments of dreams played strongly still in his mind. The usual images from those dark days in Hong Kong, but mingled with brighter impressions: a seal twisting and diving in sunlit waters, a woman's impish laughter, the fine grain of highly polished wood beneath his fingers.

Over breakfast, Spencer mentioned that this was the first day of cannery production. “You'll have to take your boat out some and moor it away from the jetty, I'm afraid. There'll be a deal of trawler traffic for the next few days.”

So he strode down the beach in a brilliant morning. Up on the jetty ahead, he could see Chinamen barking and scurrying, wide-brimmed hats flopping, arms beckoning and gesturing wildly to each other. Spencer brought them in each summer from Victoria, housing them in the dormitory flophouses he'd built farther inland through the trees. Harry had heard them singing their strange tunes in the night, smelled cooking rice and frying chilies, as if the experiences of his previous life had manifested themselves through his dreams into reality.