DR. CLARENCE MATHER SAT at a disorganized desk in the bowels of the Anthropology Building. He always came down here to relax, and he needed relaxation because his office was being bombarded with crank calls concerning the murder of Justin Summers and the disappearance of David Rogers, and because his Native American literature class had become a terrible power struggle with Marie Polatkin. Though fairly intelligent and physically attractive, she was rude and arrogant, thought Mather, hardly the qualities of a true Spokane. As if it ran in the family like some disease, Reggie Polatkin had also failed to behave like a true Spokane. Mather knew he could teach both of them a thing or two about being Indian if they would listen to him, but it seemed all of the Spokanes were destined to misunderstand his intentions.
Mather and Reggie Polatkin had been friends from the very beginning. Though Reggie couldn’t have said as much, he’d immediately felt a strange kinship with the white man who wanted to be so completely Indian. Reggie was a half-Indian who wanted to be completely white, or failing that, to earn the respect of white men. Mather and Reggie were mirror opposites. Each had something the other wanted, and both had worked hard to obtain it.
Reggie and Mather traveled to men’s gatherings and went into the sweathouse together. Reggie had usually been the only Indian at those gatherings and willingly played the part of shaman for the sad and lonely white men, many years his senior, who’d come to him for answers. For the first time in his life, Reggie felt as if being Indian meant something, as if he could obtain tangible reward from simply behaving as an Indian was supposed to behave, acting as an Indian was supposed to act. And the act became so convincing that Reggie began to believe it himself. His Indian act earned him the respect of white men and the sexual favors of white women.
Through Reggie, Mather was able to obtain entry into the Seattle urban Indian community. He went to parties where all the guests were Indian. He used a counterfeit tribal enrollment card to play in the all-Indian basketball tournaments. Together, Mather and Reggie went into Indian taverns and snagged Indian women. While Reggie went to bed with the most attractive woman of any pair of friends, Mather slept with the other, only slightly less attractive, half.
This had all continued until Mather found that box of recordings of traditional Indian stories. Mather had always enjoyed negotiating the narrow passageways, rummaging and foraging here and there. A few years earlier, he had found two boxes of reel-to-reel tapes filled with the voices of Pacific Northwest Indian elders. Recorded by a forgotten anthropologist during the summer of 1926, the tapes had just been collecting dust in a storage room when Dr. Mather stumbled upon them. Excited, but still protective of the discovery, Mather had decided to play the tapes for Reggie, one of the brightest Indians Mather had ever encountered.
The professor thought Reggie had a grasp of Indian history almost as strong as his own. And Reggie’s knowledge of Spokane Indian history was probably a little more complete than Mather’s. Mather thought the young Spokane might have been able to clarify some aspects of the story.
“Listen to this woman,” Mather had said to Reggie as they listened to an Indian elder telling a story. “She’s Spokane. Do you think you can identify her?”
Reggie didn’t speak Spokane well, but he’d recognized that Spokane Indian elder’s story.
“That’s a family story. It belongs to the family. Not on some tape. It’s not supposed to be told this way. You should erase that tape.”
Mather had been shocked by the suggestion. Up until that point, Reggie had been a dedicated student. In fact, Mather had seen himself as a father figure for Reggie, and the young Indian had become something of a son. Mather had trusted Reggie, maybe even loved him, and had always assumed that Reggie felt the same about him. But Mather had felt only disappointment when Reggie said he wanted to erase the tapes. The professor had wanted to make them public and publish an article about them, but Reggie had heard the recorded voice of that old Spokane woman and had been suddenly ashamed of himself. He’d heard that ancient voice and wanted to destroy it. He’d wanted to erase the tapes because he had not wanted anybody else, especially a white man like Mather, to have them. He’d wanted to erase them because they’d never be his stories.
“This is a very valuable anthropological find,” Mather had said. “I mean, nobody even tells these stories anymore. Not even Indians. We have to save them.”
“Stories die because they’re supposed to die,” Reggie had said.
“But these stories aren’t dead,” Mather had said. “The elders must have wanted them to be saved. They allowed the anthropologist to record them.”
“Look, I’m sure the elders definitely didn’t understand how these stories were going to be used. Dr. Mather, you have to let these stories go. Burn the tapes. Or I’ll burn them for you.”
Reggie had stared at Mather with such startling anger that the professor had stepped backward and, frightened, had promised to burn the tapes. Later, angry at himself for having played the tapes for Reggie, Mather had hidden them in a dark corner of the basement instead. When Reggie had asked him later if the tapes had been destroyed, Mather denied that the tapes had ever existed. Mather had told that first lie because he believed he was protecting the recordings. He’d come to see those stories as his possessions, as his stories, as if it had been his voice on those tapes. He’d lied to preserve his idea of order. But with each successive lie Mather had told, he’d begun to lose track of the original reasons for lying. Layer after layer of lies. As an anthropologist, Mather could have dug into himself for years and not discovered the truth.
For Reggie, Mather’s lie had become the breaking point after which he believed all white men were lying all the time. Reggie knew the history. Mather’s friendship had simply become another broken treaty. Another beautiful series of promises that had been, in fact, a worthless stack of paper.
“I’m sure I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Mather had lied to Reggie first, and then to Dr. Faulkner, the department chair, after Reggie had lodged a formal protest. All three men had been sitting in Faulkner’s office, along with Bernice Zamora, the department secretary, who’d been taking notes.
“Why do you think Mr. Polatkin would make these kinds of accusations against you?” Dr. Faulkner had asked Mather.
“Frankly, I think it’s because of Reggie’s distrust of authority figures. In particular, Reggie has had an extremely difficult relationship with his father, a white man. I don’t pretend to be a psychologist, but I believe Reggie is confusing his feelings about his father with his feelings for me.”
“You liar,” Reggie had said and left the office. He’d understood that Mather’s lies would go undetected and unpunished. Later that day, Reggie had cornered Mather in the Student Union Building.
“I trusted you,” Reggie had said.
“It’s you who violated my trust,” Mather had replied. “You certainly aren’t behaving like a true Spokane.”
Reggie had punched Mather then and wrestled him to the ground, but a few other students had broken it up quickly. Naturally, Reggie had been expelled from the University.
Now, as Mather sat in the Anthropology Building basement and listened to his beloved secret tapes, he was professionally disappointed that he could never reveal their existence. Still, he was personally in love with the Indian elders’ voices, men and women, Snohomish, Makah, Yakama, Spokane, and he’d memorized all of the stories. With those tapes, Mather owned twelve hours’ worth of magic. He listened to the magical recording of a Spokane Indian elder telling a traditional story. A true Spokane. She spoke fractured English, which Mather could barely understand, but her fluent Spokane was being translated by a Bureau of Indian Affairs agent. The story was about Coyote, the trickster, and it echoed through the cluttered basement. Boxes of various artifacts were stacked in tall piles. A maze of doors, small rooms, and hallways. Some rooms had not been opened since the early part of the century, and exploring the basement involved a contemporary sort of archaeology. The basement even had its own mythology. Chief Seattle’s bones were supposedly lost somewhere in the labyrinth. And the bones of dozens of other Indians were said to be stored in a hidden room.
As the Spokane Indian elder finished her trickster story, the basement went dark. Mather smiled and thought of Coyote, assuming it was just a temporary power outage. But as five minutes passed, then ten, Mather grew agitated. At least, he told himself he was agitated. Actually he was becoming very frightened. The building creaked and groaned. Other mysterious noises in the distance sounded like footsteps, whispers, a door slowly opening.
“Hello, this is Dr. Mather.” His voice echoed loudly. “I’m in the northwest corner. By the furnace.”
Dr. Mather listened for a response, heard nothing, and then realized he’d given away his exact position. If somebody was trying to hurt him, he’d know where Mather was. Nonsense, Mather thought, someone’s coming to help me. But then he realized that nobody knew he was in the basement. It was late. Very late. Probably nobody was in the entire Anthropology Building except Mather. Or, nobody should be.
“Hello?” Mather asked, a question now.
He continued to sit at the desk and listen carefully. He heard somebody breathing, though he soon realized he was hearing his own inhalation and exhalation. Holding his breath, he listened, and heard a strange rattling. There, off to his right, that rattling again. Not like a snake, but like beads shaking, or sand in a shell, or bones rubbing together. Mather sat up straight in his chair. He thought of the Indian remains in that basement. The forgotten bones and fragments of clothing, Chief Seattle’s bones. The rattling again. Mather was sweating, telling himself not to be such a child, a superstitious fool. Be analytical, he thought, decipher the sound. Wasn’t it there before? Hadn’t it been there all along? The total darkness had intensified other senses. You’re hearing things you simply didn’t notice before, Mather told himself. You hear better with your eyes closed. So what is it you’re hearing? He listened. Bone moving against bone, ancient and forgotten. Calm yourself, Mather thought, and then something brushed against his face, and he panicked. The instinct for flight took over and Mather was up and running, tripping over boxes, smashing into shelves and closed doors. He could feel that something was chasing him, was right behind him, reaching for his neck. Mather ran for his life. He was still running when the lights suddenly flickered and brightened. Nearly blinded, he caught a brief glimpse of the low overhang ahead of him just before he ran into it, knocking himself unconscious.
“Dr. Mather?” asked the janitor as he came around the corner and saw the professor lying on the floor. “Is that you?”