White Pine (10 page)

At first, I thought that I was dead. But
something prickly poked my face and something sticky dripped onto
my lips.

“Sevy... Sevy? Where are you?” I heard
someone calling my name all scared and worried-like.

“Hear anything?” someone demanded.

I heard ‘em, but it all sounded strange and
far off.

“Sevy!”

I licked my lips and realized that I was
tasting pine needles. “I’m here.” It came out a whisper. I tried
again, “I’m here.”

Shards of daylight pierced my darkness. I
understood that branches were being pulled off of me. Then, I
glimpsed the gray sky and then saw frantic blue eyes and a black
beard.

“Vivant! Dieu merci! Merci, Alain.”

Roget and the rest of the crew worked to pull
me out from under the pine tree. Amazingly, no one had been
seriously hurt, though my head didn’t feel quite right. When I was
free, Roget gave me a hand to pull me up. Then, he bear hugged me
and kissed both of my cheeks.

“This boy,” he announced, speaking to the
rest of the crew, “he saved my life. This, Fabien Roget will never
forget.”

The other men nodded and commented. I held my
head high despite the tell tale red creepin’ up my neck. But after
that, we all returned to work as if nothing had happened. That’s
how it was when you were a jack: one moment, you were eyeballing
death and the next, back to work. ‘Course, the fellas didn’t let me
do much of anything for the rest of that day, and I didn’t argue
much because I felt a little sick to the stomach and tender at that
spot on my head. By the time we got back to camp, I figured the
whole thing would be old news, nothing special, just another day in
the Northwoods.

It turned out, I was dead wrong. It wasn’t
nothing for Roget. That night, some caterwauling outside the
bunkhouse woke me. Some fool was singing loud, like one of those
fellas coming home from one of the taverns near our house in
Shawtown.

“Alouette, gentille Alouette
.
Alouette, je te plumerai
.’’ The bunkhouse door swung wide
like it had been kicked in.

“Hush now, Fabien. The other fellas are
already asleep,” Dob muttered.

I looked up from my pillow and saw the two of
them in the doorway, Roget and O’Dwyer, black shadows against the
white brightness of the moonlight on the snow outside.

“Shh.
Ouais
.”

The pair stomped their way in. Then, I heard
a thump, like someone bumped into a bunk.

“Keep it down, fellas,” one of the jacks
said.

“It’s Roget,” another fella stated.

“Alouette
” Roget sang out, crashing
into another bunk.

“Sure is, and he’s drunk as a skunk.”

“Some people are trying to sleep here.”

“
Yeah, keep it down!”

There was more thumping about and muttering.
But none of the fellas dared say anything more. After all, Roget
was the best knife thrower of the group and no one wanted to mess
with him when he was pie-eyed drunk.

What’s gotten into Roget?
It was sorta
like seeing your pa drunk for the first time. I don’t know why I
did it, and it may have been because I was no more than half awake,
but I got up off my bunk, and carefully climbed down, so I didn’t
kick the jack in the bunk below mine. Then, wincing against the
cold floor under my socks, made my way over by the preacher’s
bench, where Dob had managed to prop up Roget.

“Can I help?”

Dob cocked one bushy white eyebrow at me. He
was out of breath and rumpled. He used one shaky hand to press back
his forelock. “Yes you can, Sevy. Let’s get him on that bunk over
there.”

Easier said than done, for Roget was dead
weight. I took the top half and Dob took the bottom half as we
tried to lift the nearly out-cold Quebecois.

He weighed a ton. He turned his head and
groaned when I shifted his weight.

“Phew,” I nearly gagged when I caught a whiff
of his breath. His eyes were unfocused.

We managed to shove him up onto the bunk.

“Sevy, you get his boots,” Dob directed.

I had one boot unlaced and was working on the
other, when Roget came to.

“This boy.
Oui
, this boy.” Sitting up,
he grabbed me with one huge hand and dragged me up beside him.
“This one is saving my life.”

“Yes, Fabien. Sevy’s a fine young man,” Dob
remarked calmly.

Then, to my amazement, Fabien’s blue eyes
grew moist. “
Mon petit frère
. My brother Pierre, this one.”
He tousled my hair. “He is like him. Brave. So young. Too young.
Trop petit
.” Roget began to sob, great heaving sobs that
shook his body.

“Good Lord, we’re trying to get some shut
eye,” someone muttered.

“It’s Roget.” Someone else snorted. “You know
how he gets.”

Dob pushed Roget back down onto the bunk.
Roget didn’t protest. In fact, he just kept muttering to himself in
French; it sounded like a prayer.

A few minutes later, he seemed to settle. Dob
turned to me and said, “He’ll be all right now. He’ll sleep this
off and probably won’t remember much tomorrow.”

“Do you think the Push’ll fire him?” That was
the usual consequence for drinking at the logging camp.

“He doesn’t need to know about this and none
of these fellas will tell him... Poor Fabien. You’ll learn this,
Sevy, sometimes a man is so filled with pain that he does foolish
things to forget about it for a little while.”

“I’ve seen other fellas drunk like him
before.”

“Some fellas drink for pleasure and some for
pain. Regardless, they all end up facing their problems the next
morning anyway. I’m not saying it’s right, but Fabien, he’s got a
lot of pain inside him and sometimes it all just spills out. Maybe
once a season, he’s like this. Tomorrow, he’ll be back to work as
usual and all of this will be forgotten. I ain’t saying it’s right,
but we all have weaknesses and sometimes it’s our Christian duty to
forgive and forget. You understand me, Sevy?”

“Yes sir.”

“You saved Fabien’s life today when you
pushed him out of the way of that widowmaker.”

“Anyone would have done it,” I mumbled, but
Dob shook his head.

“That isn’t so. You put yourself in danger
for him and that’s tough for a man like Roget to take. He’s pretty
much alone in this world. But that wasn’t always the case. You see,
Fabien had a younger brother, Pierre. When their mother passed on,
Fabien paid some folks to take care of the boy. That was the way
things were for a couple of years, but Pierre was always after
Fabien to let him go lumberjacking with him over the winter.
Finally, when Pierre was about your age, Fabien gave in. Those two
boys were close and they didn’t like being apart.”

Dob paused and took a deep breath. “One
winter, they were working at a logging camp up near Hayward. There
was some kind of accident. I don’t know exactly what happened, but
I knew Fabien before they went into the woods that winter and I met
up with him again when he came out after losing Pierre. He wasn’t
the same man. Sure, he’s still a heck of a lumberjack, but he takes
risks that he wouldn’t have before. He isn’t always careful when he
should be, not that he ever puts anyone else at risk. I think he
doesn’t think he has anything else important to lose.

“I know that Roget’s been hard on you. That’s
probably why he wasn’t keen on having you here this winter. Because
you remind him of Pierre.”

Dob stood up slowly, his knees creaking as he
got to his feet. “I’m getting old.” He grasped a blanket and tossed
it over Roget who was snoring softly. “Go to sleep, Sevy. The
morning’s coming fast.”

I climbed back up into my own bunk with a
whole lot to think about.

Chapter Ten

~ A Decision ~

The next morning, Fabien was up at dawn with
the rest of us. He looked rough, but he put in a full day’s work.
He was his usual gruff self with me, but something had changed
between us. Maybe it was something as simple as I looked at him
different. Before, I’d thought he didn’t have a weakness, now I
knew better. The difference was that Roget was a normal fella to me
now, not a legend like that there Paul Bunyan they tell stories
about. Before, I’d thought that Fabien took risks and ran headfirst
into danger because he was brave. Now I knew that he took risks
because he’d lost everything that really mattered to him.

Days turned into weeks and though it was
still so cold that it hurt to breathe and it made my teeth ache, I
no longer bothered to ask the Push for the temperature. The truth
was I had finally settled in. The news from home was good, too. Ma
wrote me a fair amount and from her letters I learned that Pa was
getting around a little better each day and that they were getting
by. All in all, I was feeling pretty good.

One Sunday night, me and a couple other
fellas were sitting on the Preacher’s bench just jawin’.

“Just a few more weeks, fellas,” Mr. Walker
commented with a sigh as he leaned his wiry body back up against a
bedpost. “Then, I get to take Bob and Gus home and see my wife and
kids.”

“There’s a pretty girl I know in Chippewa
Falls,” another fella commented. “I may go get her a store bought
hat. Something fine with flowers and ribbons on it.”

“If you have a hankering for a girl, don’t
waste your money on a bonnet,” Bob Johnson commented with a leer.
Then he grunted as Johan Johnsen elbowed him hard.

“That’s enough, Bob,” Dob commented. “Some of
us here have respect for ladies. Why my Martha, God rest her soul,
would turn over in her grave to hear you talking like that in front
of these two youngsters.” He gestured at me and Bart.

“What are you going to do with your money,
Dob?” Adam Clark asked.

“Try to hold onto it past that first
weekend.” Dob shook a finger at them teasingly. “Each year, I warn
you boys to hold onto some of your season’s pay. But I can’t think
of anyone who listens.”

“Hold onto it for what?” Ole scoffed. He
pointed his thumb at his chest. “I come back next winter and earn
more.”

“We’re saving up.” The words burst out of
me.

All of the fellas turned to stare.

“I mean, my folks and me. We’re saving up to
buy a farm of our own.”

Ole burst out laughing. “What fer?

A couple of other fellas chuckled and I felt
my cheeks flush red.

“Oh, Sevy. It ain’t you,” Dob responded.
“It’s just that most of the fellas aren’t saving up for something
particular. Most go into town their first weekend off and blow a
season’s pay in just a few days.”

I looked at the faces around me and most were
nodding.

Bob Johnson asked, “Why save the money? We’ll
earn more next year.”

Johan, who was a man of few words, agreed,
“This is what we do. We are lumberjacks.”

“Wouldn’t want no other life,” Mr. Walker
agreed, “Come winter, up in the Northwoods is where I want to
be.”

This comment was supported by a chorus of
“Ayes” and “Yups, and a few “Don’t ya knows.”

“My pa’s always talked about us having our
own place one day,” I said. “We’ve been saving up for it.”

“It’s not that we doubt you, lad,” Dob
continued. “Farming is just fine for some folks. But once you’ve
had a taste of this life, often it’s hard to settle back into the
harness and work the land. Up here in the Northwoods, a man is
truly alive. Some fellas, they just can’t give that up.”

Johan, Ole, Adam, Mr. Walker, and the others
nodded, murmuring in agreement.

I didn’t say anything else. What could I say?
I found the lumberjacking life tolerable, but I couldn’t see myself
missing it when I left it.

* * * *

Winter don’t gently fade into spring up in
the Northwoods of Wisconsin. I thought that particular winter was
never gonna end. The cold got right down into my bones and I felt
tired and sick. And then, one day when I was comin’ in for supper,
I saw that it wasn’t quite so dark outside, that the days were just
a bit longer.

But Old Man Winter didn’t let go that easy.
Just when I got to feeling better, thinking that I might be warm
again sometime soon, we got a heck of a snowstorm that buried us
for a few more weeks.

At the logging camp, life went on as usual.
But things felt different, maybe it was just in the attitudes of
the men. The end was in site. We were all working hard, maybe even
harder than before because the Push wanted us to bring in as many
board feet as possible before the end of the season. But the men
were already dreaming of downtime and of all of the possibilities
in the sawdust cities for a man with money to spend.

Some of the men started heading out. As the
weeks passed, more and more left camp. It was then that I got
another letter from my ma. It read: