Song of Batoche

by Maia Caron

  Some part of him wanted to believe that Macdonald would answer a petition signed by Indians, Métis, English half-breeds, and white settlers in Prince Albert. A petition from Louis ‘David’ Riel, who said that God would not allow the Métis to be moved from their lands again. If Macdonald refused to agree to their demands and they were forced to rebel, Gabriel did not have faith that God would protect them. He believed in his gun and the need, one day, to fight the tyrant.

  the spirit is not good

  with him

  Josette lifted the coyote skin flap. Inside Nôhkom’s tipi, a pot of water hung over the small fire, now eased to glowing embers. The air filled with the cloying pungency of sage smoke that drifted up to the opening in the tipi poles, where roots and herbs had been hung to dry.

  Nôhkom sat cross-legged on the other side of the fire, eyes closed as if in a trance. She was Big Bear’s first wife, the band’s healer and medicine woman. Two years ago, Josette had come to her when her daughter was dying. But the lung disease could not be stopped by any medicine.

  Grandmother opened her eyes. Her face was etched with lines fine as those on a map, wrinkled from years of walking miles in sun or driving snow. The dress she wore was made of gingham and old-fashioned in style, her neck encircled with ropes of beads she’d likely not removed since Big Bear had traded for them many years past.

  He was out on a hunt, and Josette was thankful to visit Nôhkom without him in camp. And she was relieved to have another day to think, plan an approach. That morning, the men had left her outside the camp and ridden on for Prince Albert. Her eyes had followed Gabriel, who turned briefly in his saddle, as if to remind her that he had not forgotten his promise.

  Josette knelt before her grandmother on an ancient, tanned buffalo hide that was heavily beaded along the edges. Power coursed through her body, and she felt dizzy with the force of this sacred place. After lighting a braid of sweet grass, Nôhkom palmed the smoke over her face and body then passed the braid to Josette, who did the same. The old woman lifted her chin, as if waiting for a sign, then crumbled a sharp-smelling herb into her palm. Holding her hand over the smudge, she scattered the herb into the simmering pot of water.

  Josette thought of how Gabriel had struggled within himself at the fire last night, reminding Riel to concentrate on the petition, even swearing in frustration, something he had not seemed to notice. Riel, who had asked her to keep his vision a secret, the idea of a separate state run by his own church, because he obviously knew it was inconceivable. The talk of her becoming his Mary Magdalene had put her off. Then she had walked into Mosom’s camp, expecting to be met by children, excited to see her. But the cooking fires had not been lit and the women sat outside their tipis, glancing sidelong at her, their faces gaunt, morose. Children, too weak to play, squatted in the dust, eyes red-rimmed and defeated. She admitted the only hope for them was to join forces with Riel. She would not tell him of Riel’s dream, but she could at least convince him to sign his petition.

  Her grandmother sang in Cree as the tea steeped. Josette shut her eyes, the familiar incantation pulling her under, and the memory of Riel’s claim in her mind: God has told me He means to save you. If God had wanted to save her, He would already have done it. Yet she could not dismiss Riel’s accusation.

  Fallen angels surround you.

  It was an insult, but perhaps he knew the blackness in her heart—look where she was: on her knees, waiting for what Father Moulin would call an evil potion, ending a life to save her own. Riel had seen the bruise and presumed that Norbert was abusing her. Did he know that he had also taken her against her will and she was pregnant? There was one truth he hadn’t guessed. She was not a blood relation of Big Bear. Mosom called her Nôsisim, my granddaughter, but Josette’s mother had been adopted as a child. It had not seemed to matter until Riel said, “tell him that you—his own blood—is half-breed.” What would he do if he discovered she was not related to the man whose mark on his petition was considered more precious than gold?

  Nôhkom had dipped a cup into the decoction. Josette hesitated before bringing it to her lips, the midwife’s words in her head: The next one will kill you. She drank it down, coughing at its bitterness.

  Grandmother beckoned, and Josette knelt beside her, let her place her hands on her stomach, rocking as she prayed, eyes closed. “Great Mother who gives and takes without warning,” she sang, “bring this one back to your breast. Do it now before the earth womb of my Nôsisim makes it fast.”

  Without warning she opened her eyes and her gaze was direct. “Your womb is weak,” she said. “I cannot give these again.”

  The next morning Josette woke with painful cramps and went out into the bush to gather moss for the bleeding to come. She discovered some plants that could not be found in Batoche and rooted them up, her thoughts in turmoil. Bring back a young woman of Mosom’s tribe, one with a strong womb who will take your place in Norbert’s bed. Such a thing occurred only among the Indians. It would not be tolerated by the Old Crows. She knelt quietly in the trees, her hands black with dirt, when she heard Big Bear and his warriors pass on a nearby game trail, returning from their hunt. Her first impulse was to make herself known, greet him, but she did not yet have the courage.

  Later, when she had gone out on the prairie with the women to dig for dandelions, her mother came to find her. Big Bear was in his lodge and wanted to see his granddaughter. She went back with her, trying not to notice that her mother had lost weight she could not spare, and that her step was heavy, moccasins stirring the dust. Heat hung like a pall in the air. A sudden cramp made Josette wince, and for a moment she panicked, could not force herself to walk through the depressed camp, quiet on the banks of the North Saskatchewan. She had been here with them before, the river water running low over tumbled rocks and stones, the sound of drought.

  The village dog pack loped ahead of them. A black cur bolted across her path, and she wavered, suddenly weak-kneed and dizzy. Most likely the herbs Nôhkom had given her and not an omen or a sign. What had Riel said of Big Bear’s new war chief Wandering Spirit? “That’s the one I should talk to.” Yet he had spoken of his plans, heartfelt, honest. “The government will listen to our grievances if we stand with one voice.” She could not forget him praying in his next breath to the saints for making mistakes among the Crees.

  Big Bear’s lodge was in the centre of camp, and they passed other tipis, once grand but now in tatters. In the days of the buffalo, the skins had been replaced every few years, but now they were ragged and threadbare—stinking like creek mud from the many times they had been rolled for transport, still wet from rain or snow.

  Josette’s mother had been telling her of the Indian agent at Frog Lake, who took pleasure in withholding their rations and pawed at the young women. When Little Feather said the man’s name, Josette committed it to memory. She would ask Riel to look into this agent with the last name of Quinn. Her mother’s expression had turned bitter. “Your grandfather asks why you ride with Riel. After your father’s death …”

  “White soldiers killed papa,” she said. “Not Riel.”

  Her mother’s eyes darkened. “How can you remember? You were a girl the day Riel had Thomas Scott taken out and shot—”

  “It was the council’s vote that he should die.”

  Little Feather glanced at her. “A great chief throws the stone into the lake and knows it will splash. He knows before he lifts his hand what it will mean to his people.”

  Josette did not answer. She had reminded Gabriel that the Métis had suffered for Riel’s choice in refusing to stay Scott’s execution. Had she been too quick to accept his promise that he wouldn’t let it happen again?

  They stood in front of Big Bear’s lodge. His standard snapped in the wind at the top of the tipi poles. Once brightly painted, it had long since faded to grey. Josette ducked her head to enter the tipi, and was greeted by the potent smell of woodsmoke and sweat and hide. There he sat, cross-legged at the other side of th
e fire. Directly behind him, the medicine man held the band’s pipe bag on his knees. Big Bear wore a dark flannel shirt, a pair of worn moccasins, and threadbare pants bound with an old rope. He too had lost weight, and despite heat from the fire, had a Hudson’s Bay four-point blanket over his shoulders. His hands—veined and large knuckled—lay across his knees.

  In the circle around the fire were a few of his counsellors—Four Sky Thunder and Josette’s uncles, Big Bear’s two elder sons. Imasees sat at his left and Twin Wolverine to his right. Close by were Mosom’s other two wives. Little Feather went to sit beside Big Bear’s youngest wife and their son, Horse Child, who was almost the same age as her own son Patrice. Nôhkom was there, blinking slowly and studying Josette with eyes that did not betray their secret.

  Among the younger men was one she did not recognize. He was handsome—eyes black as his hair, which fell down his back in long waves. A grey cap of lynx fur was draped over his head, the dead creature’s eyes glittering, its teeth bared as if in final battle. The long tail dangled across his muscled shoulders. Over a dozen eagle feathers were sewn to the headdress, yellowed with age. A cartridge belt was strung across his chest, and he fingered it while eyeing her narrowly. So, this was Wandering Spirit, Big Bear’s new war chief.

  She knelt on one of the moth-eaten buffalo hides strewn on the floor and suspected many had been brought from other tipis, for her grandfather was too proud to show his relations how poor they really were.

  Big Bear looked up at her. “Welcome Nôsisim. Is it well for you?”

  Josette nodded and after he accepted her gifts of tobacco, sugar, and tea, she asked, “Did you make a good hunt, Mosom?”

  “Our medicine was good. We got some rats in the bush.”

  Josette knew well enough what kind of hunt he had made. She had helped the women gut the muskrats earlier. The disagreeable task of skinning a carcass, holding the long, rigid tail and removing musk glands and fat from the dark meat. It pained her to hear that Big Bear, one of the great buffalo hunters of the plains, now considered these unpalatable creatures, “good medicine.”

  They spoke briefly of news from Batoche and of her children. He looked across the fire at her, his familiar wizened face, scarred years ago by the pox, shadowed in its light. “You have come to speak for Riel. Does he hold his spirit well?”

  Josette forced herself to meet his eyes. “Riel has come to right wrongs done to his people by the government,” she said carefully.

  “hâw.” Big Bear nodded.

  “He seeks your influence with the other bands in the Eagle Hills and Battleford.” He stared long into the fire, and she took his silence as an invitation to continue. “Your people are starving, Mosom. You and Poundmaker can join with the half-breeds. Riel will put your grievances on his petition, and the one who is higher will listen to his words.”

  “I have tried to find a way to the one who is higher, and to the White Mother,” he said, “but it is difficult to find her. If I do not have power to bring a new treaty, Riel has no power to bring a new treaty.” He raised his eyes and squinted through smoke rising from the fire. “I am thinking of our last meeting. It was years ago. We were camped at Milk River, following the buffalo to the south feeding grounds. Hungry. Riel sent a messenger asking us to come eat with him—more like to hear him talk.” He chuckled. “We went to hear what we could hear—and get some grub. He sat across the fire as you are now and asked me to bring men to him. I nodded and ate his grub. It was good. I will eat his food again, but not his words.”

  Did Riel consider this the “mistake” he had made among the Crees? She faltered, reluctant to reveal his prophetic dream to her grandfather, but not wishing to hide it, either. “He has visions of our people and the half-breeds living in one large territory under our own control.”

  Big Bear rubbed his chin for a moment. “Riel, his words filled my ears, but not my heart. I have seen him wander through the mists of my dream journeys. The spirit is not good with him.” He gestured at the fire. “His vision for our people is smoke. He says he is like us, but he is not. Too much white blood in his veins.”

  She forced herself to breathe and not look at the men who waited for her response. To not look at the face of Big Bear, a man she had long respected and loved, who had just confirmed the same concerns she’d had about Riel. The image came to her, of a painting of Mary Magdalene in one of Father Dubois’ books—naked and swooning before the Lord, her modesty covered by long, golden red hair. Impossibly beautiful.

  “I am half-breed,” she said. “I have white blood too.”

  He bent his head, appeared to weigh her words. “Because you have come,” he said finally, “I will open my ears to him. We will see then if what you say is true.”

  Josette said that Riel waited for him in Prince Albert, and Wandering Spirit leaned forward. “Cêskwa! Our own territory? We must join with Riel.”

  Imasees turned to his father. “He cannot fill our bellies. Take a reserve and we will eat.”

  Big Bear seemed mesmerized by the flames. “I have not taken a reserve, it is true. I fear I will lose the power I have now as a wanderer to change the treaty. The whites think we will move to small bits of land and learn to farm, even as the rain does not fall or the winter winds blow snow down our backs.”

  There was a long silence and Four Sky Thunder rose, as if he had heard this speech too many times. Big Bear finally stood and exited the tipi with his counsellors around him. When she went out with her mother, the men had mounted their horses. She looked after her grandfather’s figure as he rode away. The striped blanket around him seemed too heavy on his shoulders, or perhaps he was disheartened at what lay ahead—the testing of Riel and her own judgement.

  That night, Wandering Spirit and the other young braves took advantage of Big Bear’s absence and made a grass dance, painting themselves up. They drummed and strutted around a fire in the centre of camp telling stories of their past exploits and what they would like to do to the whites. They had not the nerve to set up a soldier’s lodge, taking over from Big Bear, but Wandering Spirit danced like a war chief, swinging a sharp-bladed club around his head and uttering high, thin cries of his Chipewyan people, the fire throwing his shadow.

  Josette dipped her tin cup into a large pot of stew over the cooking fire, the smell of wet fur and ripe flesh rising to greet her. As she drew the cup to the surface, a muskrat’s head—its lips drawn back over yellow teeth—rolled in the broth. It was considered a good omen to draw a head on the first dip—a great delicacy and an insult to refuse it. Boiling in a stew for hours had not improved the look of the creature. The head turned in her cup, a lustrous eye staring. When the broth was consumed, she would be expected to take it up and gnaw the greasy meat off the skull. If she had not been ravenous, it would have turned her stomach.

  The broth was thin, with no potatoes to thicken it, so she downed it quickly and was obliged to start on the head. As the men danced and stabbed at the air with their knives and rifles, she felt the first stirring of blood between her legs. Her womb cramped violently. She doubled over and made for her mother’s tipi, crawling with relief to a buffalo robe.

  Her mother opened the flap and looked in, the silhouette of her face against the hide. “She is So. It does not go well with you. The child must have a strong spirit.” She clapped her hands around Josette, chasing away evil influence, “Awas, awas!”

  “Nôhkom said I would suffer.” The drum’s steady beat pulsed from the ground beneath her. Blood seeped between her legs as if from an old wound and her pelvis ached. The familiar rough smell and feel of a buffalo hide at her cheek, worn past usefulness yet kept by her people out of nostalgia, grief. Soon, these things would be gone to dust.

  She had been moved at her grandfather’s quiet resistance and done her best to persuade him, if only to save the band from starvation. Perhaps Riel would use his eloquence and win the last rebel Cree chief’s mark on his petition. But it was Gabriel’s face that persisted in her
memory. She had looked at him over the fire last night, daring him to deliver on his promise. I will not let him fail. Could she support Riel with that kind of passionate confidence? If she did, it would be because the best man in the South Branch had pledged his allegiance. But Gabriel did not know of Riel’s secret vision. If he did, would he still be willing to follow him to the end?

  god has told me

  It was late morning, the sky free of clouds, threatening another day of heat. Josette stood in a thicket of Saskatoon bushes. A willow basket was hung around her neck, leaving both of her hands free to pick. The berries were purplish red, not yet ripe, blighted by the never-ending drought. Josette’s children ranged along the thicket, even young Wahsis contributing his share. The plain behind them was dotted with white tents. When these berries were gathered, the women and children would move, and move again, until the entire region was picked clean.

  Madeleine Dumont tipped some of her berries into Patrice’s basket when he wasn’t looking, a smile on her redoubtable face. Her dark, thick hair fell in a braid down her back and was smeared with creek mud to keep away the flies. She had on the same long-sleeved, unforgiving dress all Métis women wore, even in the worst of heat, and set about stripping branches clean of berries, her jaw set and decisive eyes fixed on the bush—as they did on those who came across her path—incapable of suffering a fool.

  The sun climbed higher in the sky, the women sweating and joking amongst themselves that the only benefit of heat was the absence of mosquitoes that had bothered them earlier. Josette was hit with a cramp so violent she almost cried out. She bent over with the dry heaves, and turned to avoid Madeleine’s eyes on her, but could see the forbidding figure of Father Moulin standing in his black soutane, down by the creek. He accompanied the women on berry-picking expeditions, as he had to the buffalo hunts, and eyed her suspiciously.