Kathy Little Bird (7 page)

I
WAS
amazed to see the entire res assembled to honor my Mum.

Elk Woman, in her ratty coat out at the elbows and holes in her shoes, had tied a wind-band across her forehead and seemed to command large shadowy forces, reaching from the mystical Grandmothers themselves to the shaman around whom they gathered.

My grandfather.

He leaned on a cane, and the hand that held it trembled. His hair was white and very fine. It fell to his shoulders. But it was the eyes that held me. They burned with a mystic
charge. He stretched out a thin, almost transparent hand. “Child of my child. I am your mother’s father. Let us sit and talk a moment.”

He crouched down where he was, and I did the same.

He sat quietly, staring into space. Just when I thought he had forgotten about me, he began to speak.

“Among the Cree, grandparents have a large responsibility in rearing children. I wasn’t able to be that kind of grandfather to you. But I come now from across Canada, all the way from Quebec province so you would know my face, and I yours.”

“So we could trade shadows.” The old words were reborn in me, and I said them.

“Ayiii!” He brought me to his breast and held me there. His breath brushed my cheek. “Elk Woman tells me you will be a singer. But first you must be a person. You must breathe, walk, love, suffer, hope—and mostly you must dream. We are a people of dreams. Your mother will be with you in dreams.”

My grandfather might appear fragile, but his voice was strong, deep, and resonant. I felt he knew unknowable things.

“Is my mother’s soul…somewhere?”

He released me to look deeply into my eyes. “It is in the sun breaking through clouds. It is in the swaying of treetop nests and the call of the loon. You will find it in our music. Listen, it starts.”

A piercing shriek. Rattles, drums, dancers whirling in the dirt, jumping, leaping, the dancers another instrument treading out rhythm. The chant was a Cree prayer, calling to the
four points of the compass, calling life. A chant punctuated by persistent wailing that stole into my soul.

Elk Woman muttered in my ear, “The people sing of a Cree child given to Mrs. Mike and the White world. She grew up to nurse the wounded, fix automobiles, fight for Canada, take care of three husbands, bring up three children, live a life, and now returns to the ancestral dream.”

The singing died away. There was no climax; it simply ended and everybody started to eat. Children played about our feet, women breast-fed infants. Life started up again. I realized I wanted to sing Cree music. If I could get inside the rhythm I could sing the universe.

E
LK
Woman shook me awake. It was dawn, and my grandfather wanted to see me. I’d slept snug and warm on wonderful soft furs, which had been heaped over me as well.

Elk Woman poured water into a large basin. Washing was evidently important, apparently breakfast was not. We skipped that, and Elk Woman hurried me along to my grandfather’s tent. The old man preferred sleeping on the ground; a patched lean-to suited him better than a back room in a government-built house.

He was finishing his own wash-up and greeted me with a look that claimed me, as did a single word. “Granddaughter.”

Then, “We came for her sake, your mother’s sake—and found each other. Now we go back to our lives, but so you won’t forget, I have a present for you.” His eyes twinkled. “You want to see it?”

“Yes.”

“You can’t.” That was his joke, and he enjoyed it. “It’s invisible.”

“Invisible?”

“Yes. You can’t see it, touch it, hold it. You can’t smell it or taste it.”

“But I can hear it?” I was beginning to enjoy this.

“Yes, certainly. You can certainly hear it.”

“It’s music. A song? An instrument? A flute?”

“Nothing like that. I said you can’t hold it.”

He let me go on guessing. Finally we were both silent. I started to make another guess, but he held up a finger.

We waited, saying nothing. We didn’t move. We barely breathed. All was quiet.

He lowered his hand. “That’s it.” His lips silently formed the words.

What was it? What were we listening to?

All at once I knew.

It was the world breathing. It was the pulse of the universe. It was the sound behind silence.

To hear it you had to stop all motion, be absolutely still. Only then could you sense it, the song that goes on forever. The song that never ends.

J
ELLET
refrained from mentioning my absence. The boys, however, deviled me for a full account, and wanted to know if the chiefs wore war bonnets. I drew out the description into bedtime. “Cree songs are part of us,” I told them, hoping
to infuse them with the pride I felt. “They’re in our blood.”

When Jellet found out about the boys being in school, he raged as I knew he would. But there was not much he could do. His only recourse was to go on about it to the four walls. Loyalty, duty, and disobedient daughters bounced off them. Eventually he tired of it and the household settled down.

I tried at first being a mother to the boys, but they’d rather I was their sister. Morrie was too big to take on my lap; he wanted me to run and climb and intercept balls. Jason, now that he had started school, stayed late at the playground for the sports he’d missed all his life. I didn’t see anyone until dinner.

You feel numb at first, and that gets you through. It’s afterward, when things return to normal and you pick up the old routines, that’s when you feel the loss, the emptiness.

Jellet never acted on my request for a girl to help in the house, but threw his dirty clothes in the hamper as always. When he had no clean shirt to wear to the pub, perhaps then he would open negotiations.

It was a standoff. Jellet kept changing his clothes, shirt, underwear, socks, even his cap, and tossing them into the hamper, making sure I saw him—then stomped off to work.

Jas and Morrie cheered me on. They even offered to help me do nothing. Kids can be wonderful.

As I passed the hamper I slammed down the lid. It was time to start the stew for dinner. I cut up onions and potatoes, but was short on carrots. I substituted celery and sliced bell pepper.

I brought it to a boil and turned down the gas. What next? Usually this was the time I did the wash, so I could keep an eye on the dinner. I peeked into the hamper. Of course I wouldn’t do his stuff, but the boys deserved clean shirts. I fished out their clothes. There were a couple of towels at the bottom. One was his, leave it. Also, his handkerchief.

Actually, Jellet’s stuff wasn’t enough for a separate wash. I might as well do the whole thing rather than spend time sorting it out. It would save a lot of arguing and yelling. Maybe he would appreciate it and—

Whoa! What was I doing?

I was giving in.

I slammed the hamper shut.

T
HE
upshot was, Maggie Toland, thirteen, came twice a week after school to help with the house. But I didn’t have Mum. I didn’t have her to talk to or sing to.

How little I had known her. She had been a nurse. And she’d gone overseas to Cassino. She’d been in that battle. But she didn’t talk about it, and I didn’t know what it meant in her life. I wish I’d asked more. I’d never know her now as a woman.

I had to see Abram. I’d die if I didn’t.

I found him sitting on the bottom step of his porch, whittling. I sat down beside him, put my arms around him, and kissed him.

He didn’t seem surprised, but kissed me back. At first his
kissing was a bit hit-or-miss. But it improved. So did mine. We made it last a long time. I felt surrounded by him, absorbed into him, part of the healthy, clean young male smell of him.

When he finally let go of me we looked at each other differently.

I tried to look behind his eyes to get at his thoughts. “You wouldn’t think less of me if I was in love with you, would you, Abram?”

Abram wasn’t the boy I’d met for years outside the Mennonite church; he was a man, known and yet unknowable. He kissed me in a different way, a way that made me dizzy, in a way that made me want to hold him. I ran my fingers through that thick shock of blond hair. Our breath mingled, our body warmth was shared. I felt as though I couldn’t breathe.

Abram pulled back. I could see he was as shaken as I was. He told me I should go home now.

I nodded. I respected him for this. On the instant I knew I’d be safe with Abram all my life long.

I
T’S
odd how you can go along day after day and things stay the same, then some incident occurs, perhaps trivial, perhaps unimportant, even ridiculous, that changes your life. With me it happened over a head of lettuce, July 1963.

I’d been marketing and was on my way home with a loaded shopping bag. A car backfired and suddenly I was conscious of ordinary time jamming together. A horse that had been tied into traces reared, pawing the air. It broke loose and plunged down the street. Rolling bloodshot eyes, frothing mouth, laid-back ears, nostrils that snorted and flared as he dashed at me.

I pressed into a doorway. The animal’s breath scorched my face as it charged past. I stayed as I was, unable to move, hardly daring to believe I had escaped being trampled.

In a numb state I watched as the horse was coralled by its owner and led docilely back to the wagon, where it was properly hitched into the team. I managed a few deep breaths. I was even able to assess the situation. My grocery bag had split its seams; canned goods and vegetables strewed the street. A large lettuce was rolling toward the drain and I dived for it.

So did someone else, the person who owned the horse. We reached for it, trying to stop its progress, and nearly bumped heads. The owner of the horse stood up, lettuce in hand. “Sorry. So terribly sorry. Are you all right? Shaken up, I suppose? Anyone would be. Oh, here is your lettuce, and don’t worry, I’ll retrieve the rest of your purchases.”

I let him pick up celery, parsnips, lard, and a loaf of bread. There was nothing to be done about a smashed bottle of vinegar.

He was standing in front of me, arms full. “I have a flour sack in the wagon. I’ll just put these things in it.”

I followed him to the wagon. He was still talking. “I hope you’ll forgive me for frightening you to death. Although actually, I find it hard to forgive myself.”

I thought he was being a bit dramatic. “It’s all right. It was an accident. No harm done.”

“That’s very generous of you, Miss, eh…?”

“My name is Kathy.”

He removed his cap, revealing a mop of curly carrot-red hair. “Jack Sullivan at your service.”

I had to smile at the grand manner he assumed.

“I know I’m presuming on a very short acquaintance, but
as proof of your forgiveness, would you perhaps have a soda with me?”

“A soda?” That was a rare treat indeed.

We didn’t sit at the counter, but at one of the small round marble-topped tables. The chairs were wire-backed with cushions of red and white stripes. Sitting across from him, I had an opportunity to size up Jack Sullivan. He wasn’t in overalls like the Mennonite boys and men, or the farmers. That set him apart. That and the red hair. His sleeves were rolled up and there was a sprinkling of light red fuzz on his arms. He was freckled and his eyes a sort of dancing green with laughing lights in them.