The Lynching of Louie Sam (22 page)

“I have proof,” I tell him.

“Proof of what?”

“That Louie Sam didn't do it. Mr. Harkness told Pete to lie to Sheriff Leckie about seeing him on the day Mr. Bell died.”

“You mean he didn't see him?”

“He saw him all right. But all Louie Sam was doing was walking along the road minding his own business. He wasn't carrying a rifle. All that talk about Louie Sam having murder in his eyes, that was pure invention coming from Mr. Harkness. I think he was in on Mr. Bell's murder, Father,” I tell him. “Dave Harkness and Bill Osterman were in on it together.”

Father draws on his pipe, looking out over the pond while he takes this in. He doesn't seem the least surprised.

“We have to do something,” I tell him.

“Who said,” he asks, as though he hasn't heard me, “‘For every action there is an equal and opposite reaction'?”

Father is fond of testing me like this. I should know the answer, but at this moment I am too flummoxed to recall it. I hazard a guess.

“Charles Darwin?” I say, knowing that Father is a great admirer of the famous man of modern science.

He gives me a pitying look for my ignorance and tells me, “It was Newton.”

I'm still not following him. What has Sir Isaac Newton got to do with Pete Harkness lying about Louie Sam? He gives his pipe a suck and lets go a long stream of smoke.

“Whatever action we take, George, we must think carefully about the reaction,” he says.

So that's it. He's worried about what will happen if we take a stand against Mr. Osterman and Mr. Harkness. Never before have I felt the need to talk back to my Father as I do now. I remember the Bible passage, the one from Deuteronomy—about making amends.

“Those two spilled innocent blood, twice over,” I say. “We have to make it right in the sight of the Lord, don't we? Like the Bible says.”

Father casts me a look. He doesn't like my tone. He doesn't like being preached to.

“Explain yourself,” he says sternly.

I do my best to stay calm and put my feelings into words.

“Louie Sam was just a boy,” I tell him. “He had a mother, and people who mourn for him. He didn't deserve to die the way he did, alone and scared. He deserves justice, same as Mr. Bell does.”

Father's watching me like a cat watches a trapped mouse he's going to devour any minute. But then I get the shock of my life.

“I can not argue with ye there, son,” he says. “I can not argue with ye there.”

He goes quiet. A wave of relief runs through me that he's not angry I spoke my mind, but it's more than that—it's a feeling of hope that maybe together we can set things right. I sit down on the grass beside him. The two of us watch the mallards dive and surface until it's almost dark. As we're walking back to the cabin together, at last he speaks.

“In the South, they'll string a white man up as a traitor for so much as believing that coloreds should be free.”

“But slavery is over,” I say. “Mr. Lincoln settled that.”

“Aye,” he replies, “and look what happened to him.”

A Confederate shot Mr. Lincoln dead, that's what happened.

“There's no need to worry your mam about this business,” says Father. “Let's keep it between us men.”

“Yes, sir,” I tell him, proud that he includes me as a man. But now I feel the weight of being a man, too.

W
EDNESDAY MORNING FINDS
Father and me seated side by side on the wagon bench with Mae and Ulysses trudging us toward town. It's a clear morning, but it rained overnight, making the track muddy and hard going. John, Will, and Annie are in the back. They're getting a treat—a ride to school instead of walking. But Father's and my destination is not the schoolhouse. We are heading to Sheriff Leckie's office. It is two weeks since we last saw him, when he met the posse on the Whatcom Trail on his way back from Canada. Two weeks since Sheriff Leckie witnessed the Canadian lawman take Louie Sam into custody, and since Louie Sam died. With the Canadian detective run out of town and everybody else too scared to speak the truth, Sheriff Leckie is our last hope.

The sheriff's office is at the far end of Nooksack Avenue. It was one of the first buildings they put up, back in the gold rush days of twenty years ago. From the look of it, it was thrown up in a hurry—really nothing more than a small square shack fancied up by a false clapboard front meant to make it look less paltry. Father and I wait outside in the wagon for nigh an hour before we see Sheriff Leckie coming down the boardwalk from the Nooksack Hotel, where he's probably been breakfasting.

We climb down from the wagon. Father shakes Sheriff Leckie's hand and introduces himself, and me—just in case the sheriff has forgotten us since that Sunday morning when we met over the body of Mr. Bell. But Sheriff Leckie remembers me just fine and praises me for my clear-headedness on that occasion.

“What can I help you fellas with this fine morning?” says the sheriff.

“May we talk inside?” Father asks, because even though there is barely a soul on the street at this hour, the business that brings us to talk to the sheriff is for his ears alone.

As we follow Sheriff Leckie inside the jail, he asks me how my arm got broken and I tell him. Inside, the first thing that hits me is the smell—like an old privy. The jail is sparsely furnished—just a desk, a wood stove, and one small cell with iron bars set in the door as a window. It looks like it hasn't been occupied in a long while. I'm guessing it got more use back in the gold rush days when there were lots of folks passing through hoping to make a fast dollar, be it from panning or pilfering. The sheriff sets about starting the wood stove, which I'm grateful for because it's cold and damp in here. The only chair in the room is the one behind the sheriff's desk, so Father and I must stand to say our piece.

“George has some information he'd like to pass along,” says Father.

“About what?” asks the sheriff, stoking the fire he's got started in the belly of the stove.

“About the murder of James Bell.”

At this the sheriff looks up.

“I already talked to your boy the morning of the murder, Mr. Gillies,” says the sheriff. “I don't see what else he could have to add now.”

Father tells him, “It's new information.”

Sheriff Leckie closes the door on the stove, then takes his time crossing the room to his chair behind the desk. He reaches into a drawer and brings out some paper and a pencil.

“Well, George,” he says to me, “what have you got to tell me about a murder that's already been solved?”

He sounds annoyed, but I stand my ground. It helps to have Father by my side.

“The wrong person was punished for Mr. Bell's murder, sir.”

“That's quite a claim. What makes you believe that?”

“I found out some things about Louie Sam, the native boy.”

The sheriff slams the desk drawer shut, like the very mention of Louie Sam is a vexation to him.

“I haven't forgotten who Louie Sam is, son. And it's not likely I'm going to with the governments of two nations breathing down my neck about him, from Governor Newell on up.”

I tell him, “He didn't kill Mr. Bell.”

“You'll forgive me if I beg to differ with you on that point.”

Father pipes up in my defense. “Sheriff, you should listen to what George has to say.”

“All right, son. I'm listening.”

He's looking up at me from his chair and waiting. Wouldn't you know that my mind picks this moment to go blank? There's so much to tell. I don't know where to begin. Then all of a sudden it's spilling out of me so fast that my tongue can't keep up with my brain.

“What people said about Louie Sam was dead wrong. He wasn't carrying a rifle with him when he came into town that Sunday morning to meet with Mr. Osterman—so he couldn't have shot Mr. Bell—and he didn't have murder in his eyes on his way out of town, neither. People were just making up stories to make Louie Sam look guilty—”

“Whoa. Slow down,” says the sheriff. “What people?”

“Bill Osterman,” I tell him. “And Dave Harkness, too.”

Sheriff Leckie moves forward in his chair, leaning his elbows heavily on the desk.

“These are serious accusations you're making, George. You better have something to back them up with. You ever heard of a little thing called slander?”

I catch myself. I have a vague idea of what slander is.

“It's when you say something bad about somebody.”

“It's when you say something bad about somebody
that's a lie
,” he corrects me.

“I'm not lying! It's the truth!”

Father quiets me with a look, then tells Sheriff Leckie, “George hasn't said anything about this in public, and he won't. That's why we've come to you.”

“There's nothing I can do with a bunch of rumors. Give me facts. Give me witnesses. What exactly are you basing this on? What makes you so sure Louie Sam didn't have a rifle on him?”

“I can't say who told me,” I tell him. “I promised I wouldn't.”

Sheriff Leckie throws his pencil down on the desk.

“Well then why are you in here wasting my time? What do you expect me to do? Go out and arrest Bill Osterman because a bunch of Indians say he's the guilty one?”

“Yes,” I tell him. “And you should arrest Dave Harkness, too. And Mrs. Bell.”

“On what charges?”

“Murder!” I say. “I'm a witness.”

Father shoots me a look of surprise. It wasn't part of our agreement that I would say so much, but I can't stop now. Sheriff Leckie narrows his eyes.

“Are you telling me that you saw Bill Osterman, Dave Harkness, and Annette Bell murder Jim Bell?”

“I didn't see them, but I heard Dave Harkness and Annette Bell talking with Mr. Moultray about it.”

“George,” says Father in a warning voice, but I won't stay silent.

“Mr. Harkness and Mrs. Bell as good as told Mr. Moultray that Mr. Osterman did it, and that they were in on it, too.”

“Where did you hear this?”

“At their house, on Sunday night—after I broke my arm. I stayed there.”

“What exactly did you hear?”

“Mr. Moultray asked Mr. Harkness and Mrs. Bell right out if they or Mr. Osterman had something to do with Mr. Bell's murder on account of Mr. Bell suing Mr. Harkness, and they didn't deny it.”

“I can't go around arresting upstanding citizens of Whatcom County based on hearsay from a kid.”

A thought occurs to me.

“But, Sheriff, you have to arrest Dave Harkness and Bill Osterman anyway!”

“What are you talking about?”

“Governor Newell said just last Friday that he's ordering that the leaders of the lynch mob be arrested.”

He looks me straight in the eye.

“I don't know what you're talking about, son. Nobody knows who led that posse.”

I'm flabbergasted. He's the sheriff, sworn to uphold the law. How can he be speaking such a lie?

“But … you were there,” I say. “I saw you. You were talking with Mr. Osterman and Mr. Harkness that night. And Mr. Breckenridge and Mr. Moultray, too. And Mr. Hopkins. They were the leaders. Everybody knows that.”

“What I saw was a group of men disguised in such a way that I can not be certain of their identities.”

“But—”

Father takes hold of my good arm.

“Leave it, George.”

“But Father—”

“I said leave it!”

Father guides me out into the street without so much as a good-bye to take leave of Sheriff Leckie. He keeps his eyes forward. His jaw is tight as he unhitches Ulysses and Mae from the post. I'm confused by what just happened, and by Father's angry silence.

“I'm not sorry for what I said,” I tell him.

Now he looks at me. There's surprise in his eyes, and maybe even a little pride.

“I'm glad to hear it,” he says. “It's not you that should be apologizing, son. It's not you.”

Chapter Twenty-Seven

F
ATHER POINTS
M
AE AND
U
LYSSES
back the way we came and we head down Nooksack Avenue in the direction of home. As we pass the Nooksack Hotel, who should we see coming out the door onto the boardwalk but Mr. Moultray? Maybe he's been seeing Mr. Osterman in the telegraph office, or maybe he was breakfasting with Sheriff Leckie.

“A conspiracy of ruffians,” Father calls it. “I wish to God I'd had the good sense to listen to your mam that night,” he says. “I wish I'd had no part in their filthy business.”

“There's others that feel the way we do,” I reply. “There's Mr. and Mrs. Stevens. And Mrs. Thompson. Maybe Dr. Thompson, too,” I add, although I haven't forgiven the doctor for giving up on Teddy the way he did.

Father says nothing. I can see he's thinking it over.