The stink of their tobacco and drink and especially of him wafted up from the clothes that I wore so that I thought my head would split. I stood and tore them from me, ripped every stitch from my skin and flung the material into the river and finally I stood naked under the moon, my head back and mouth open, the howling of a hurt animal constricting my throat.
Falling on all fours, I drank deeply from the river to ease the burning in my throat and my pounding head. Then I stood shakily and began to run. I ran along the riverbank, not caring about the sting of bushes on my naked thighs, about the sharp rocks under my feet or the branches of the trees that hung low. I ran until I closed in on my little camp and my canoe. I ran fast enough to try to catch up with what I’d lost back there.
I did not wait till morning but began to paddle my canoe immediately, and I did not stop paddling until I reached my home, keeping up my strength by vowing a thousand times never to return to that place. The fear that he really had taken my power from me chased me all the way down that river.
I slept long and deep as soon as my head touched the floor of my lodge. When I awoke I knew what to do. Choosing the stones carefully from the riverbank, I heated them up in a fire for a full day as I carefully constructed a lodge according to my father’s directions. Round after round I opened the flap to that small place and crawled inside, poured water on the rocks so that the steam became a living, burning thing, and prayed to the four directions and to the earth, the sky, the water and the air, pouring more water onto the rocks until I thought that my lungs would catch fire. I prayed harder for purification until the pain became ecstasy, and when I completed the last round I crawled out of the lodge and collapsed on the cool ground, the world around me a fresh and clean place again.
When I heard the Frenchman’s voice in my head, my fear and anger came back to me so that I needed to prove to myself that I still had power. I constructed my shaking tent and went inside to pray. It did not take long for the spirits to come to me. My tent filled with a light as if a thousand fireflies had entered it. And then the spirit animals began to arrive, the spirit of the bear, the moose, the fox, the wolf, the sturgeon, rallying around my hurt in that tent like night insects to a fire. It was the lynx that came to me most strongly, his growl puffing out the walls of my tent like a great wind trying to escape. And I asked the lynx a favour that would change me forever. I asked him to go out and find the source of my hurt and extinguish it. As soon as I whispered my request, the tent went silent and the light of the spirit animals left it, so that I lay on my back in the dark of night, alone and shivering.
I tried not to think of that night again. A sense of peace came over me as I prepared for another winter alone in the bush.
It was just shortly after the first hard freeze that my old mother travelled out to see me. I was surprised at her visit, had thought her days of travel were behind her. But I was happy to see her. I heated up water for tea and warmed moosemeat over a fire and we sat comfortably with one another for a time. We ate and talked of small things, and as the evening grew dark she told me that word had come to her that the Frenchman had gone mad in that town and taken to running up and down the streets trying to escape pursuing demons. She watched me for a reaction, and when I did not give her one, she finished her story by saying that no matter what he did he could not escape them and so he ran to the top storey of the hotel on the main street and flung himself through the window. The same priest who had taken me away to residential school years ago deemed the death of the Frenchman a suicide and refused to give him a Christian burial.
I stared into the fire for a long time after that story, not able to look at her.
MISTATIMWAK
Horses
IF I AM TO TAKE ALL of it at once and in this way end my pain for good, I will have to do it soon. Only a few needlefuls are left, and I do not know what I will do when it is gone. All morning Auntie paddles me further north in even strokes, sometimes humming songs to herself, sometimes speaking directly into my muffled world with stories of her youth. My body cries out for the medicine so loudly that I decide not to even try to hide what I do.
Right there in the canoe, I extract the needle and the rawhide from my pack, prepare my bruised arm and inject some directly into a vein, just enough to take the knife’s edge of pain away. I can feel Auntie’s eyes on my actions, and I feel like a pathetic criminal under her gaze even though I know she does not judge me. I want to talk to her about all of this and know that soon I must, but for now I allow myself to drift back to the comfort of old friends.
On the day before we are to move up into the trenches once more, Sergeant McCaan comes to Elijah and tells him that it will be at the very least a couple of months before Thompson returns and that he would like Elijah to be acting corporal until then.
Elijah barks out, “I’d be delighted, Sergeant,” and as he walks back with this news swelling inside him he begins to count the freedoms that come with the rank. But it still doesn’t help him to take a shit, he tells me. He’s been bunged up from the moment Driscoll gave him the morphine. At least his arm is out of its sling.
Me, I’m clearly invisible to the officers. How is it that Breech refuses to recognize that it isn’t only Elijah out there killing Fritz? We are a team. If nobody will recognize this, maybe I will force them to.
Our battalion is sent to a village named Albert, close enough to the front that Hun artillery reaches it easily and constantly. The Allies hold the town, but with a good view of the surrounding countryside I can see it is clearly a prize that Fritz would like. Not much left of the one side of this town except for rubble. But on the morning that we move up to the front of the town, Elijah and I see the most amazing thing since our arrival in France. The Virgin Mary, golden and thirty feet tall, rises up from the ruins of a great church. She leans at such an angle that we wonder how she’s not tumbled to the ground. She holds a cherubic baby Jesus in her arms, and his chubby weight seems to threaten to topple her further. Elijah tells me he thinks he sees a look of serene disapproval on her face as she stares down at the fighting below.
It seems that this leaning virgin has become a symbol for the troops that surround her. Talk circulates that she’s a miracle come to life, that as long as she stands the Allies will not lose this town. Some go further and say that as long as she stands the Allies will not fall, either. But if she does tumble so will they, at the hands of the Germans. There must be something magical to her, Elijah says. Fritz has played a game for months, sending artillery in her direction, but thus far has not been able to send her to the ground.
“Her crown would make a perfect sniping position,” Elijah jokes to me, and the joke suddenly becomes an idea he can’t shake. If only we were within sniping range of any Hun!
Our company moves out of Albert and up the Albert–Bapaume Road under cover of darkness. Everyone is tense. We are entering the place that has devastated the British all summer, the place of the thundering artillery that echoed in our ears for months. But tonight is eerily calm. Near the place called Courcelette we take cover by the road and await morning anxiously. Courcelette is held by Fritz. The Canadians are to try and take it.
While the others close their eyes and pretend to sleep, I watch Elijah sit and jiggle his knees, wishing for the light to come so that he can see the layout of this place. Breech has ordered that Elijah and I are to move out in an advance position and do what damage we can when the Canadians go over the top and attack Candy Trench, one of the trenches guarding Courcelette. We have been told that a candy factory once stood nearby, but I do not know if this is true.
McCaan has already warned us not to go out directly in front of the Canadian line. The Canadians have thought up a new strategy, something called a creeping barrage. Our own artillery will walk through no man’s land, and the infantry will follow. “You and X don’t want to be caught in front of it when it happens,” McCaan says. He shows Elijah on a map the approximate width of the creeping barrage. Elijah has a
lready figured a plan. He and I will head as far to the right of the platoon as we can, which will put us directly south of Courcelette. We can enter no man’s land that way, find a place of good cover and snipe as many Fritz as possible when the Canadians go over the top.
Elijah and I sneak about on higher ground behind our own lines the next day, peering through our scopes for hiding places in the field. There seem to be plenty. Destroyed barns, tumbled houses. Sunken roads and old sap lines crisscross the area. Now we must find a good place from which to shoot at Boche and still not get smashed by our own artillery.
I spot the site first. A slight ridge crests up from a wrecked farmhouse halfway across no man’s land, maybe five hundred yards in. This means a five-hundred- or six-hundred-yard shot into the town itself at any Hun support troops and no more than a two-hundred-or three-hundred-yard shot at the front trenches. The distance is perfect, the cover seems like it will be perfect, and there’s a natural escape route out behind the ridge if we are spotted. It seems almost too good to be true.
We spend the rest of the daylight hours peering through our scopes at this place, Elijah working out in his head all the possible scenarios. Good cover from artillery and machine-gun fire. A wide view of the German lines, although this might leave Elijah and me open to snipers from the other side. The Hun trenches curve gently around the farmhouse so that they are exposed on a wide angle, which is good for us but also makes us more open to fire. And then there’s always the possibility that the farmhouse is being held by Fritz. Neither Elijah nor I have seen any movement around it all day, but that means nothing.
When dusk settles, we lie on our backs beside one another and stare up at the evening sky. Purple-streaked, fading into black, the sky is pinpointed with the light of stars rising in the east.
“What do you think of that place?” I ask in Cree.
“I’ve a good feeling about it,” Elijah says.
“Me too,” I answer.
“Then that settles it.”
We make our way carefully back to our own line and report to Breech. McCaan has made sure to join us so that he knows where we will be. Elijah and I see how little McCaan trusts Breech. Elijah tells them of the wrecked farmhouse and the ridge, the good line of fire that he and I will have, the escape route if necessary. Breech holds his chin, doesn’t answer for a long time. Is he going to say no, I wonder, with us forced to stand here like children awaiting a parent’s decision? Apparently Breech is reconsidering sending us out. Elijah tells me later that he had decided already that he would go anyway if Breech ordered us to go over the top with the others tomorrow.
“All right, gentlemen,” he finally says. “But I want results.”
Elijah and I salute and turn to leave. McCaan follows. We walk along the trench together, McCaan instructing. “Bring enough food and water to last you at least a couple of days. Bring plenty of ammunition. Don’t forget anything. You won’t have a chance to make it back safely until tomorrow night at the soonest.”
“He’s like a worried father,” I say in Cree.
Elijah smiles.
We take off our boots and pull on our moccasins before we make our way down the trench and slip over the top while no flares brighten the sky. We carry more gear than we normally would out here, Elijah’s and my ammunition and rations tied into sacks that we wear strapped tightly to our backs so that they don’t slip or let the contents rattle. Elijah cradles his Ross, the scope carefully wrapped in rags. I carry a rifle in each hand—my treasured Mauser and another Ross. We do not have enough rounds for the Mauser alone, and when I run out I will have to resort to the other. I have even sighted it in.
We go slow, taking cover and waiting behind whatever we come across. We plotted our route out carefully earlier in the day, finding the way that offered the most protection. We blackened each other’s faces with charcoal. We checked each other’s gear. Elijah checked his moosehide bag. I didn’t know at the time what it was that he was checking inside.
Now we are only a couple of hundred yards from the collapsed farmhouse. The desire to crouch and run to the ruins is very strong, but I know to ignore it.
We slither closer like snakes until we are a stone’s throw away, lie still and listen, watching for a glint of movement. Nothing much is left of the barn’s structure but the cellar and beams collapsed across it. We stare at the outline in the low light and see the best place to enter, the place by the ridge. Elijah signals to me that he’s going and for me to follow and take a position to cover him.
The cellar is black, and if anyone is in there, he is very good at hiding.
It is easy for me to see him, imagine Elijah closing his eyes and asking the medicine to help him. A low glow behind his eyelids. He can’t smell the vinegar stink of the Hun. He slips in, trying not to make noise, but kicks a stone that rattles on the floor. Something on the other side scurries then settles. A rat, maybe. Elijah crouches and removes his pack, lays his rifle beside it, slips his knife from its sheath and his revolver from its holster. He looks up above him, senses more than sees me above, rifle ready, as I lie with most of my body out of the cellar. I will cover Elijah.
Elijah makes his way along the littered floor. Beams and bricks make most of it unmanageable, but a small path weaves through to the other side. He takes a few steps in his moccasins, stops and listens. A few more. Slight moonlight through the beams by the place from which Elijah wants to shoot at the German lines. Something on the floor below it? A body, maybe, wrapped in a blanket. He looks around carefully but he senses nothing else here. He sneaks up to the form on the ground and prepares to stab the knife deep, but the bundle is just a sheet of rolled-up canvas. The blood pumps through Elijah so that he can feel its heat on his skin.
One more long look about the place to quell his nerves, and Elijah gives a low whistle for me. I come up soundlessly with all of the gear. We break it open and prepare ourselves for the coming morning.
A round of howitzers down the line and behind us shakes the broken beams near where I sit. I would sleep if my nerves allowed it. Elijah is fidgety, stands up from beside me once in a while to peer over to the German line. Rifle fire crackles out in bursts, but other than this it is a relatively quiet night.
Elijah sits back down. “Tell me a story, X,” he says. We still have a number of hours before daybreak.
For a moment I have no words, then ask, “What do you want me to tell you?”
“If I knew that then I would tell you a story,” he says. “Tell me something that will take my mind away from this night. You never talk much, and it might be good for you.” I see his teeth flash in the darkness.
A long time passes before a memory comes to me from somewhere in the night. It is not a happy memory, or a welcome one, but Elijah asks again for me to speak and so I give in. It’s a memory he already knows, but one that I know he likes. And so I tell it to him as we wait for morning.
Elijah remembers the ship we rode on to England. I’d never have believed a ship could be so big if I had not ridden in one myself. And I did not know waves could be so large as those out on that winter ocean.
Early in the voyage and at dawn the seas are twenty and thirty feet high. Men hold onto whatever they can. All of us violently sick. The ship does not give to the waves like a canoe but rams them, fights each one, metal groaning. I’ve taken the horses as my own responsibility. But down here is far worse, the boom of waves bouncing, horses panicked and kicking stalls. Elijah visits me and sees that I am so sick I can barely stand, but still I stay with the wretched animals, trying to calm them. He knows me. I feel comfort with animals. They make me feel closer to land.
Elijah tells me about up top where he stands in the blasting wind, the salt spray freezing to the deck so that it’s impossible to walk on. He tries to stay out of the wind best he can, squeezes against a wall behind a post, staring out at the mountains of water and angry white-caps all around him, imagining himself slipping as the ship climbs a wave, sliding down and o
ff the icy deck to the freezing water below. This much water frightens him. He is so drained that nothing is left to come out of him. They’ve not served a meal because it’s too rough, but Elijah cannot imagine eating anyways.
Below decks, men talk of German U-boats patrolling like great iron fish all around the North Atlantic. They find a ship like this one and fire torpedoes until the ship is ripped apart, then surface to watch the men struggle in the freezing water before drowning. They take no prisoners. Elijah talks about this with me down below when he has the stomach to do it. The waves have not receded. They’ve gotten worse. The animals look frightened, but they’re gaining their sea legs, bracing themselves at the right moment, learning to relax when they can.
Elijah and I lean against a stall. Being this deep in the ship is confusing to our senses. It is harder to gauge when we are climbing a wave or when we are falling, and the boom of steel smacking water echoes like the deep bellows of a wounded moose. The ship groans down here horribly. The smell of the horses’ shit, of their fear, is overwhelming.
“How do you stay down here?” Elijah asks me in Cree. “Why don’t you come up above with me?”
“I like it with the horses,” I say. “I’m worried I’d be flung off the ship into the sea up there.”
“You know about the U-boats?” Elijah asks.
I look at him, wanting a story.
“They are boats that can travel underwater like fish and fire great bombs at ships and sink them.”
“Boats can’t travel underwater.”
“Where we stand,” Elijah says, “we’re underwater now. Their U-boats operate according to the same thinking.”
“They can’t do anything to us in this weather,” I say smartly.
“Under the water you don’t know if it’s stormy above. It’s the perfect time to hunt us. Our attention is focused on surviving the storm.”