The Witchin' Canoe

by Mel Bossa

  “Honoré…” Bernard’s voice trails down the gloomy second-floor hallway. He wants to run, but something holds him back. Fear. Imminent loss. As he slowly makes his way to Honoré’s room, he passes the wood-paneled chamber, and glimpses the deep, four-legged porcelain bath standing there—a testament to evil. He enters the damp cold room and his attention jumps from corner to corner, from detail to telling detail, and he quickly understands. Towels are strewn across the floor and counters. Ice still floats in the clear water. Doctor Beaufort was here again, playing God with Honoré. Bernard has always despised that long, thin, gaunt, spectacle-wearing man. His questionable methods as well. Has the doctor taken Honoré away?

  He cannot delay any longer. He must know. Bernard walks resolutely to Honoré’s room, and with his heart ready to burst, looks into it. The bed is empty, in complete disarray. He examines the premises. There is that awful tube they use for bleedings, hanging there on the bedpost. Drops of blood soil the sheet. Coats, vest, shirts, and undergarments, all stained or badly wrinkled, have been thrown over couches, the floor, the Portico clock. “What have they done to you?” he whispers, searching the room for more glues. Wringing his hands, he swallows dryly. Must keep his wits about him. He hurries out of the room and straight to Gédéon’s quarters. In there, he finds empty cognac bottles, overfilled glass cigarette trays, a stripped bed, clothes, and jewelry scattered everywhere. But on the desk, a pile of papers calls his attention. The letters are neatly stacked near the ink pot, as though Gédéon recently placed them there.

  Bernard bends over the various papers.

  It doesn’t take long for him to grasp the situation. This is George’s will. Brief and clear, it names Honoré Louis Hippolyte as sole heir on January first 1887, Honoré’s twenty-first birthday. Underneath the testament, Bernard finds a letter addressed to Gédéon, along with a short yellow form. When he sees the Saint-Jean-de-Dieu crest atop the form, his chest tightens so hard, he has to sit and take a moment to steady his raging pulse. No. No. No. His eyes race over the banal, but tragic words sealing Honoré’s doom.

  Patient: Honoré Latendresse

  Age: Twenty-one

  Height: Five feet seven

  Weight: One hundred and forty-seven pounds

  Eye color: Blue

  Hair color: Black

  Diagnosis: Dementia. Melancholia. Polymorphic tendencies.

  Date of admission: January First 1887

  This is in less than two weeks. But have they precipitated the event?

  With a trembling hand, Bernard picks up the short letter signed by the admitting doctor. In it, the man informs Gédéon that he must have Honoré sign the form, and henceforth, Gédéon will have the right to deposit his nephew at the asylum on New Year’s Day. He goes on to assure Gédéon has made the soundest decision in this sad and delicate situation, and that his young nephew will receive the best care.

  The best care! Never!

  Bernard rips up the letter and then shreds the form, before stuffing the pieces into his pocket. But that won’t be enough. What power does he truly have? Where is Honoré now? And Gédéon? What diabolical spell is he under? Gédéon is the mad one, for God’s sake!

  Honoré needs divine intervention.

  Bernard pauses, his mind racing. Then the obvious answer dawns on him as he stares down at the blank papers on the desk.

  What Honoré needs, the only cure to his ailment, his nervous condition, this damn curse, is McGauran O’Dowd.

  Growing calmer, Bernard searches Gédéon’s desk for the post office address nearest to the Latendresse lumber camp. He pulls drawers open, rummaging through them with speedy fingers. In the second drawer, he discovers a pile of letters bound together with a red ribbon. Each envelope is torn, but the letters are still inside. He leafs through them. They are all addressed to Honoré Louis Hippolyte Coffin. He pulls one out. Reads the first few lines. His heart sinks.

  These long letters are all from McGauran. Dated October. October. November. November. November. December. December.

  Evidently, Gédéon kept them from his nephew.

  For a moment, Bernard shuts his eyes, overwhelmed with compassion for Honoré. All these months…that poor young man. He presses the letters to his heart. These two men belong together. This must end. This hex, or human folly, whatever it is, must end. Gédéon will face his demon, imagined or not. Honoré will not be led like a lamb to the slaughterhouse to atone for his uncle’s sins. Bernard will end this, if it’s the last thing he ever does for Honoré. For Jean-Jean. For him. For every man who has ever loved another man.

  He picks up the fountain pen, dips it into the bold blue ink, and guided by some force he cannot name or understand, he writes, the words forming on the page without effort or thought.

  Montreal, December 19th

  Dear McGauran

  I pray that this letter finds itself in your capable hands before the clock strikes midnight on New Year’s Eve…

  Chapter 29: The Ferryman

  Lying on his cot, McGauran tries to rest, but it’s going to be a long night. The men are already drunk, getting louder by the hour, and though he could use some company and a little laughter, he can’t join in. No…he’s been outcast by the Sullivan brothers, and everyone else has since followed their lead. He heard Danny and Tom talking today, whispering about him.

  They believe he’s brought them bad luck. First, there was Jimmy’s accident last week. The kid lost half a toe in a trap. Then a few days later, Simon went into the village to get their share of supplies, but there was a mix up with the deliveries and their load was missing half of its usual items. They had to cut rations, and that sure put a dent in the men’s moods. A fight broke out between the Irishmen and the French Canadians and Louis lost a tooth. Yesterday, it was raining ice pellets. The dampness in the cabin got so bad, they had to sleep in wet clothes on wet cots. They’ve been out here in this godforsaken camp for three months and the worst is yet to come…January begins at midnight tonight. That’s all this eve is to him. Not the start of a new year, but the beginning of the last stretch. The hardest, cruelest one he’s yet to experience.

  The men watch him from time to time with eyes full of suspicion and superstition. He catches them staring at his red hair when he dares to warm his frozen hands at the fire. He’s become their scapegoat, no, the reason for their troubles.

  He’s never been so lonely, even when he was roaming the streets back home. This rejection tortures him. He’s tried to make up for the two weeks he was out of shape, but no matter what he does, he never does it right. He gets dizzy at the slightest effort. Disoriented. He tires too easily and can’t keep up with the work. That thing out there has been feeding on him in some invisible way, he knows it. He’s no coward. He’s worked the docks. Cut ice for the city. Been at the camps at the age of eighteen.

  Now look at him. No wonder the men avoid him. He’s haunted with something.

  All that keeps him from sinking into complete despair, is the memory of Honoré. Any time he needs to, he can visit those lavish rooms in the Latendresse house, can relive the afternoon he met Honoré for the first time. He hears him playing the piano inside his mind. Tchaikovsky and Chopin. He can picture Honoré’s gray-blue eyes gazing at him from the pillow next to his. He remembers the gentle smile that would form on Honoré’s lips after he’d kissed him there. Or what his arms felt like around his waist. The way Honoré tipped his head and listened to him with such interest, even when he was only recounting his boring days at the docks. He doesn’t miss him anymore.

  No, he’s starved for him.

  But he hasn’t heard from Honoré since October. Not one letter. Not a word. Has Honoré given into his melancholy? Has he lost his faith in him, in the promise he made before he left?

  Every day McGauran goes into the forest to fell those trees, he can feel that beast, out there, observing him—waiting. But if that devil believes it can scare him, threaten him with hell and damnation, it’s wrong.


  Because he’s already in hell. Honoré’s silence, forced or chosen, has put him there. He knows something is wrong. Can feel it in his bones. And yet, here he is, helpless to do anything about it.

  When McGauran hears Jimmy moan a little on the cot next to his, he turns to check up on him. The kid has been brave and seems to be healing well. Still, McGauran worries about him. “Are you all right?” he asks, speaking for the first time today. The sound of his own voice almost startles him.

  Jimmy isn’t sleeping. He lies on his side, bleary-eyed. He’s the only one who hasn’t forsaken him, but he’s careful when they talk. The kid can’t afford to be excluded and McGauran understands. “Yeah,” Jimmy whispers. “I’m fine. It’s not hurting so bad tonight.”

  “But you sounded like you were in pain.”

  “I did?” Jimmy shrugs and turns to his back. “I miss home, I guess. I miss my Ma’s cooking, too.” He cracks a smile. “And maybe I miss Brianna a little more than I thought I would.”

  “Oh…is she your girl?” It feels nice to talk. To break this isolation he’s been living in.

  Jimmy shoots him a quick glance. “Not really, no. But she could be, I guess. I’ve been thinking about her a lot. She’s got a lot of spirit. I think she hates me.”

  McGauran laughs a little and it almost makes him want to cry.

  Jimmy smiles wider and this time, really looks at him. “What? Isn’t that how it works?”

  “Sometimes,” McGauran says, smiling again.

  They fall back into silence for a few seconds. Then Jimmy sits up a bit. “How about you? You missing somebody?”

  McGauran tenses, looking away at the fire. Danny has taken out his fiddle and the men have gathered around him. “No,” he finally answers, locking Honoré’s name inside his secret heart.

  Jimmy searches his face with candid young eyes. “Then why would you put yourself through this then? I mean you don’t seem to be…any good at it.” He pauses and then quickly adds, “I’m sorry, I mean—”

  “No, no, you’re right.” That pride everyone warned him about is gone. He’s never felt so humble. No, humiliated. Is this how Honoré felt when he was forced to be around his uncle’s colleagues? Less of a man? Yet, he knows he’s more of a man now than he ever was before. “I shouldn’t have come. But I needed to make some money before spring.”

  “Why?”

  “‘Cause I wanna leave. Wanna get out of Griffintown, out of Saint-Anne’s ward.”

  “Oh…” Jimmy nods. “Why?”

  Why? Jimmy shouldn’t be asking why. He should be asking how can I get out, too? Before McGauran can answer, there’s some commotion in the cabin and he looks over Jimmy’s shoulder to see Simon stepping inside, carrying a few jute bags. “Listen up,” Simon calls to the men who stop singing and clapping. “Octave at the shanty store was nice enough to collect a few late Christmas gifts for us all around the village. Some cakes and pies mostly. Mitts and socks.” Simon tosses the bags on the rugged wooden table. He starts taking things out. “And some liquor, too.” He shows them a bottle of Jamaican. “The good kind.”

  Gene and Frank step up to the table, and the rest of the men follow suit, including Jimmy. They gather around the bags, shouting happily and passing gifts around. Simon shakes the snow of his shoulders and slips his hat off. He gives McGauran a quick look and throws his chin up. “Mac, you got some last-minute mail here for you. Marked urgent.”

  McGauran jumps to his feet, and ignoring the hard glances of the men, walks up to the table. “Thanks,” he sputters, not looking at anyone’s face and taking the letter out of Simon’s hand. He walks away, going back to his cot.

  “Don’t you want some of this rum or a cake or something?” Jimmy asks from the table over the men shouting.

  But McGauran doesn’t even answer. He can’t. No voice. No air in his lungs. Urgent. He wants to open the letter, but his fingers won’t cooperate. URGENT. He knows this type of envelope. Can feel the thickness of the paper inside. He doesn’t need to read the top corner. Latendresse. 110, rue Laval.

  He gently rips the side of the envelop, and around him, the yelling and singing dims lower and lower, until the sounds seem to be coming from the inside of a sunken ship at the bottom of the sea. His heart beats inside his ears. He pulls the letter out. At first glance, he recognizes Bernard’s handwriting. He can’t go on. He presses the letter to his chest. Bernard would only write to him if…

  Oh, Lord. Oh, please. No. Don’t. Don’t do it to me. Don’t. Please. Lord. Don’t do it to me. I can’t. You know it. You made me. You know I can’t take him being gone from this world.

  The letter pulses against his chest, moving with every loud thump of his heart, but reaching deep inside himself, McGauran finds the courage to bring the letter up to his eyes again. The words dance and he can’t remember how to read. He rubs his face, his brow. He clutches the paper and tries again.

  Montreal, December 19th

  Dear McGauran,

  I pray that this letter finds itself in your capable hands before the clock strikes midnight on New Year’s Eve. There is no time for nothing else but the ugly truth. Honoré never received your letters. It broke his heart.

  McGauran, they have decided to intern him. Do you understand? It is right here before my eyes. His internment form. January First. They are going to send him to the madhouse unless you intervene. Unless you…

  Do you understand what I am asking of you?

  The words I dare not write?

  Find it.

  Ride it.

  Oh, my dear man, I will pray for your soul!

  Bernard

  McGauran watches himself stand. Sees his fingers working the lace on his boots. He hears the yelling and singing of the men, but when he looks up at the cambuse fire, the scene is so vivid, so finely rendered, he thinks he’s looking at a painting: An image straight out of some diabolical dream.

  Find it.

  Ride it.

  In the light of the flames, the men’s faces glow, each grotesque expression captured by McGauran’s heightened vision. The fiddler’s bow slides and glides across the strings and the music swells inside the hot, smoke-filled cabin, its frantic notes carrying the men into a sort of exaltation.

  His internment form.

  January First.

  Do you understand?

  His internment form.

  January First.

  His internment form.

  With hard hands, McGauran pushes the shanty door open, and no one stops him or calls out his name. Outside, the night is cold, clear, the air crisp around his face. Above, a thin crescent moon shines dimly in an indigo sky. For a brief instant, he scans the night air, searching for yellow eyes. Where is that beast?

  Without any hesitation, he runs into the black woods, hard snow breaking like glass under his heels. Ice has covered each black pine needle with a fine coat of crystal that glimmers wherever the moonlight reaches.

  His internment form.

  I will pray for your soul!

  Desperate, McGauran runs faster, tripping, sliding dangerously through the forest, branches cracking and needles popping under his boots, the sound of his labored breath filling the silence. Aware of every detail, yet alienated from himself, he watches the scene from his mind’s eye.

  He’d promised Honoré he’d protect him. Swore it to him.

  Will you run from me?

  Never.

  Truly, never?

  Never.

  McGauran stops and bends, leaning his hands on his knees to catch his breath. After a moment, he leans back and looks around at the darkness. There’s no way out of here! He’s a prisoner of these woods. “Where are you!” he shouts, despair turning to anger. “Show yourself!” He slaps his chest. “I’m right here. Show yourself!” He stops. Waits. Then, searching the trees, he slips his mitts off and blows into his hands, trying to warm them. His coat is heavy and guards him from the cold, but his toes are burning up inside his boots. It doesn’t matter. No
thing matters. He’ll die out here if that’s what it takes. With wide eyes, McGauran looks around, turning and studying each direction.

  There’s nothing here. Nothing.

  Honoré.

  No…he failed him.

  Suddenly, the sorrow cuts his air. He needs to be in Honoré’s presence. To hold him inside his arms. To reassure him.

  They won’t hurt you. You’re not mad. You’re not cursed. You’re not evil. You’re not perverse.

  “Oh, Lord, please.” McGauran falls to his knees. “Please…Lord, help me. Please.” But is it really God he needs? Stillness around him. Darkness. He inhales, nostrils flaring. The snow pushes into his knees, hurting him. “Help me…” he says again, his stomach knotting. “I’ll do anything.”

  Anything.

  He waits, trepidation and anticipation heating his blood. But minutes pass, and nothing stirs around him. For weeks he’s been seeing that black dog and now he’s deserted him? Why? To torture him? To drive him insane? Who can help him?

  A wave of grief and regret washes over him, and kneeling in this vast merciless forest, exiled from the only man who’s ever understood him, McGauran weeps into his hands. They’ll lock Honoré up in a room tomorrow morning. Take away his piano. They’ll inject him with poisons he can’t name. Convince him of his illness. Honoré will believe them. His mind, his beautiful mind, will believe them. Tears, warm and salty, trickle into McGauran’s mouth, and he sways, rocking back and forth.

  When something wet and cold touches his forehead, right above his hands, startled, McGauran uncovers his face. He freezes up, muscles hardening under his coat. The dog—it circles him, happily wagging its tail. When the black beast approaches him again, McGauran leans away so swiftly, he nearly falls on his back. The dog barks and runs around him with ears pricked up.

  McGauran steadies himself and slowly stands.

  The dog barks again, runs around him, and then pushes its solid, furry black head under his hand. Surprised and confused, McGauran can’t help petting the thing. It feels nice to touch an animal and, moved by the affection the dog suddenly shows him, he slips his frozen fingers into the dog’s black fur. The beast quiets then, obviously enjoying the caress. Tears blur his vision, but McGauran smiles through the pain and despair he feels. “What are you?” he breathes, sniffling a little. “Where’s your master?”