Sixteen

It’s late afternoon and it will soon be growing dark. I grab James’s coat and tell Mr. Steeves he’ll have to do without me for a time. I have some searching of my own to do. He doesn’t pay me much attention, though, as his gaze is fastened out the window. Coming down Dominion Avenue is the night shift, the trapped miners, worn out and bedraggled, looking like walking dead men. Cries of disbelief, cheers and toasts ring out in the barroom.

I stop in the road just long enough to hear how they managed to still be alive.

The miners heard the roar and felt the blast shake the earth like everyone else. At the moment of the slide, wind rushed through the tunnels, blowing out their lamps and throwing them against the walls. Working at their separate locations, they immediately began to make their way to the mine portal. They discovered it blocked with fallen timber and rock. It would be an impossible task to move the debris with the tools they had, particularly when they had no idea how far they would have to dig.

The lower tunnel was filling with water. Knowing their air supply would soon be cut off, they climbed through a manway into a coal chamber. Gas was accumulating quickly and their time was running out. It was then one fellow recalled a particular coal seam, an outcrop running to the surface of the mountain. They began to dig their way through the coal. Hours later, worn and exhausted, they broke through the surface. Seventeen of the twenty miners were now coming down the street. Three other men were not so lucky. They had been sitting outside the mine entrance on their dinner break when the slide hit. All three were swept away in the rock. One of those was Mr. Clark, whose cottage on Alberta Avenue had been swallowed up with all but one of his daughters inside.

I wish for my own miracle as I set out across the swelling limestone sea. Boulders still tumble down Turtle Mountain at random, so I have to be alert. The river has backed up so that it now forms a lake. It covers the area where the tipple, mine buildings and power plant had once stood. With all the landmarks gone it’s hard to be sure, but I head in the direction I know the camp to be.

Through the lingering dust, I pick out figures clambering over the rocks. They are still searching for bodies or anyone too injured to move, listening for cries for help. I climb to the top of a boulder the height of a hayloft. From here I have a much better view of the slide and the path it took. After breaking off and sweeping down the mountain, it spread across the valley, spilling in a fan shape far up the slope on the other side. It was the air from high up that froze everything. This had been the theory of some fellows discussing it in the bar, but I can now see how it makes sense. The mass of rocks plowing down the mountainside had brought with it the frozen air from 5,000 feet, forcing the warmer air out of the valley.

I continue to make my way across the rock, turning around often to gauge how far I’ve come. The slide is bordered by Gold Creek at its western edge. I scramble over the rock for close to two hours. As time drags on and I become wearier, I begin catching the toes of my boots and tripping more often. I miscalculate jumps between larger rocks, fall hard several times and whack my shins on the sharp edges of the boulders. My clothes are muddy and torn; my skin is bruised, scraped and bleeding. My nose and eyes burn with the limestone dust when I finally sink to a rock.

I have to admit I have come at least as far as where the camp should have been. Maybe even much farther—probably I passed back and forth over it and have been walking in circles. But considering how close it had been to the river, and seeing how the whole area is flooded, there is also a good chance it’s now beneath the lake.

There isn’t going to be a miracle for James. There isn’t going to be a miracle for any of the men camped in the valley who had come to the North-West Territories with hopes of a better life. They had left their kin at home until they got settled and could provide the comforts children and women need. Now they lie beneath the rock while their families carry on, not knowing their fate. Of course, there are some who’d come wandering through on their own, and they might never be missed. That’s just as sorrowful a thought.

I’m thinking all these things, trying to hold on to my grief, when—at a distance—I spot something in the rocks. Under a sky that is now growing quite dark, I make my way over to whatever it is. I have to climb high to reach what’s wedged between a giant boulder and a smaller rock. I wrestle with the object, a battered, flattened piece of forged metal. Perhaps it’s something from the blacksmith’s. When it finally gives, I fall backward, whacking the metal against the rock with a scraping sound. I turn it over in my hand. It’s blackened at one end, and all that’s identifiable is a spout. A coffee pot.

For a moment I just stare at what’s left of that coffee pot. Then, in the next few minutes, all the lonesomeness I’ve felt since losing my brother Jack comes tumbling out as forceful as the slide itself. I can’t keep it trapped in any longer. I feel more helpless than I have in my entire life. I’m angry at everything: at Jack for abandoning me, at the Home for sending me to this horrible place called Canada, at Buck and Albert for mistreating me the way they did. I’m furious at James for being my friend and getting my hopes raised for a decent future and then going and getting himself killed! I want to punch something, but with nothing but rock around to punch, I’d break my hand if I did.

I go on wailing for some time until there doesn’t seem much point in going on any longer. If I haven’t succeeded in raising the fellows I’d come to know as my friends with my caterwauling by then, it isn’t likely I will. I wipe my face on the back of my sleeve. The rock dust mucks in with my tears so my cheeks feel tight, like they’re smeared with wall plaster.

I sniff again and concentrate on pulling myself together. There’s nothing to do but head back toward the lights of town. I wedge the coffee pot back between the rocks, thinking that, someday, someone else might be searching for answers. Maybe it will explain something to them. I start back toward Gold Creek. As I make my way across the slide, I feel like I’m dragging my heart strapped to my boot, hauling it behind me like one of the broken rocks.

It’s strange to hear water lapping at the shores of a lake so close by. The cool woods of jackpine, poplars and lupines are gone, and ahead of me is only a desert of rock. I don’t know this place any longer. I won’t be staying. There’s nothing to keep me, and I have only Cody left.

There is still much confusion on the streets. Folks chatter, exchange stories or bits of information as they load belongings into wagons or wheelbarrows. I overhear one fellow tell another that one of the mine tipples was found a mile away. Rails had been discovered twisted like licorice at the furthermost reaches of the slide. A woman is wailing because the cemetery is buried in rock, so how can they give a fitting interment to the dead folk? An older lad tells of Mr. Clark, who had been eating his dinner when the slide struck, and how his body was found a quarter of a mile away from the mine.

People continue to wander down the railroad track toward Blairmore, dazed, carrying what must have seemed important to grab hold of in their confusion: a soup ladle or a sack full of mending.

Mr. Steeves kindly offers me a room at the hotel for the night. Maddie comes by, but I don’t feel much like visiting. I tell her I’ll come see her in the morning, after everything that has happened has had a chance to settle in my mind. I pick up a bit of soup in the dining room, then retire to my room to wash before returning to the barroom.

It’s a simple room with a bed, washstand, chair and table. I pour water into the basin before pulling James’s coat off and tossing it over the chair. Something falls to the floor: a long, narrow pocketbook. Sitting on the edge of the bed, I bend to pick it up. I run my hand across the rugged leather. It was important to James or he wouldn’t have stored it in his pocket. I untie the knot binding it up.

A number of papers and folded documents fall out: James’s bank book issued by the Union Bank, a letter of credit from the same bank in Winnipeg to another in St. Albert, and an amount of cash. The last paper I unfold is the Dominion land office receipt for ten dollars, attached to an official agreement for James Tuttle to prove up 160 acres within three years. The directions give its location as just north of Edmonton near the village of St. Albert.

I’m not sure how long I stare at these documents, shuffling through them, reading every word, hardly aware of taking a breath. Finally I tie them all together and return them to the pocket of his coat. I wash the rock dust from my face and hands, as I’ve come to the room to do, before returning to the barroom to work for Sam.

I try to keep my thoughts under control by concentrating on my work. I’ve heard many of the stories flying about the room, and some I haven’t heard. But my mind is too occupied with those in the valley, who were close to me, to stop and listen in, or to be blanked out by keeping busy.

When I finally collapse, I can hardly sleep for all that I’m feeling. For the longest time I can’t control the fits of bawling. I keep seeing James in my mind, and I can’t believe he’s gone. I see the other fellows, all used to working in dangerous circumstances—quick to risk their lives for others—now all crushed beneath the rock. I go on like this for what must be hours because when I’ve finally wrung all the tears out, the moon is starting to fade as dawn begins.

I then begin tossing over and over what I’m going to do from here. I remember something James said. It was when Buck showed up and there seemed no way out for me.

Charlie, there’s always options. They may not always be staring you in the face. And you might have to make them for yourself, but you’ve always got a choice in how you live your life.

I picture James sitting across from me by the fire, telling me this. I imagine him looking back and discussing it in light of his own death. I imagine him advising me, knowing that once he’d got over the shock of his passing, he’d be as direct and straightforward as he’d been about Ling Yu’s demise.

He’d say that the terrible thing that happened to him had just happened, and there was no way of changing it. It was an accumulation of coincidences and unlucky occurrences, as it was with Ling Yu. It was fate. He’d then go on to say, “But if you think about it, you’re fortunate, and not just because you have your life. I’ve left you an opportunity, and Charlie—you’d be a fool to pass it up.”

I sit up in bed with my mind racing. I now focus on what I’ve been afraid to think about since I came across the pocketbook.

I think of James and how he’d come from circumstances the same as my own. I think of his time spent in foster homes and how he’d gone to the industrial school. He’d be fiercely disappointed to learn the land and the future he’d worked so hard for had passed back to the land office and into the hands of a stranger. I knew him—maybe not for long, but I knew how much his accomplishments meant to him.

I’d be letting him down if I didn’t at least make an effort to work his land. James would expect that I wouldn’t just quit. He’d want me to use the opportunity he’d left me to show that chaps like us—and of a similar sort—could do it. Despite all else, we could prove up. He’d come so close to doing it himself. In a way, we’d still be doing it together.

And if I took on the responsibility of working his land, I could still go by my Christian name of Charlie. I’d just say it was my middle name, James Charlie Tuttle, and I’d always been known by it to distinguish me from my dad. Besides, the name isn’t of much consequence. As Mr. Wittecombe had once told me, it’s not the name that’s important; it’s what a boy makes of what’s inside.

I now can’t sleep for excitement and fear of what I’ve made up my mind to do.

Just after daybreak, I walk into the barroom where Sam is already preparing for the day. I stand at the bar.

Sam looks at me in a puzzled way.

“A shot of Arbuckles,” I tell him.

Sam smiles. “Yes, sir, whatever you say.” He pours me a mug of the strong, black coffee. “Yesterday was a tough day on you, Charlie, what with losing your home and your friend.” He passes me a biscuit along with the coffee.

I hold up my mug. “To my birthday tomorrow. May first.”

“Well, I’ll drink to that.” Sam pours a mug of coffee for himself. He clinks his cup to mine. “Best wishes on your birthday. And how many will that be?”

“Eighteen,” I tell him.

I hope it’s come out convincing. I would really only be seventeen, and I might not even be that considering it isn’t my true birthday. It was the one bestowed on me by Mr. Wittecombe at the Home.

“Eighteen,” he muses, smacking his lips. “A fine age.”

I nod. Yes, all considered, it is a fine age.

Sam begins polishing a tray of glasses.“Say, did that big fellow—the one that was in here bullying you the other night—did he ever come back?”

I know he has to mean Buck. I shake my head. “No, he left town.”

“Good.” Sam inspects the glass he’s just polished by holding it up to the light. “I told him I didn’t welcome the business of anyone who abuses my employees, particularly those that work as hard as you. But I generally don’t expect his type to listen.”

So that’s what Sam had pulled Buck aside to say. I begin thinking maybe it wasn’t just the slide that drove Buck out. Maybe after what Sam said, Buck saw things were different, and it struck him they could never go back to being the way they were. It’s difficult to tell Sam what I’ve really come to say after hearing him describe me like that. But I’ve got to do it.

“There’s something else I’ve got to tell you, Sam. I’ve got to say goodbye. I’m on my way now, but I want you to know I appreciate all you’ve done.”

Sam’s smile fades. But I don’t think it’s just me saying goodbye. I think it’s the effects of the calamity and the accumulation of the tragic stories and losses. “This whole thing has put everyone on edge, and I think we’re all thinking this may not be the place to be. But I don’t blame you for getting out before you set down roots. I’ll be sorry to see you go, but all the best to you, Charlie. You’ve been a good employee here.”

I step onto the street wearing James’s coat with the pocketbook stowed safely inside. Dust is still settling and the occasional rock still bounces down the mountain as I walk toward Mr. McDonald’s Livery. At the end of the street, passengers from the train have just arrived. The CPR has come as far west as it could before it was stopped by the slide. The passengers had no choice but to disembark and cover the final stretch into Frank on foot, hauling their carpetbags over two miles of rock. Weary and confused by the unusual circumstances of their journey, they now stand on the platform, waiting for another train so they might continue west.

I collect West Coast Cody at the livery. I then set out for Violet Love’s cottage, my last stop before heading out of Frank. On my way, I think that maybe, someday, I’ll find Mr. Longhurst and pay him for my horse. Perhaps once I’ve harvested my first crop.

We trot up the street toward the Loves’ cottage. Standing outside, Cody snorts and his hoof scrapes the earth. Violet and Maddie, accompanied by a swarm of children, come to the front yard. Violet plunks her hands on her hips; the look she’s wearing asks me what I’m up to.

“I’m off to work James’s land, Violet. I’ve got a lot to do if I’m going to prove up in three years.” I then explain how I’d spent the evening considering what James had said. “It’s what he would have wanted, and I learned that I’m capable from the fellows in the camp. I can’t pass up the opportunity. Especially when not so many chances have come along in my life.”

When it sinks into Violet’s head that I’m leaving, she begins twisting her apron in her hands. She says she wishes I wouldn’t go and that she would be very pleased if I’d consider staying. I’d have to share her affections with all her other children, but she has plenty to go around.

I smile, thinking how things might have been if I’d run into Violet ten years earlier. I then tell her I’m too grown up for that. But so she doesn’t take it that I don’t appreciate the offer, I say, “But I did lose some friends in the slide. I sure could use another.”

Violet says she’d be delighted to be my friend. She then goes on to tell me that I’m certain to come across more people like James and the others in the camp.

“You’ll find out as life goes along that most folks aren’t like the Brookses.”

I nod. I then look at Maddie, standing quietly off to the side. A small boy whimpers and tugs at her skirt, and I think back to the first time I’d seen her, looking so pretty, sitting by the campfire in her buckskin dress, working at her quilling in between tending the smoking deer meat. I then think of something Roly had said. It was when he was talking about asking Olivia for her hand in marriage, and how he wanted a wife who was warm and kind. He also wanted a wife who knew what to expect. “Someone who’s not going to hightail it out of here the first time she gets a blackfly bite or gets whomped on the head with a nugget of hail.” I remember what he’d said about a man not being able to do it on his own. He’d seen the results.

“Maddie,” I say, “I’ll be back in the fall. I’ll need to work the winter months for supplies. I’m going to try to get on at one of the mines in the pass. Will you still be here?”

Violet pulls her close. “Of course she will.”

Maddie smiles. Her future is as uncertain as my own, yet she’s reassuring when she pats the head of the child clutching her knees. I know Violet will look after her well.

“I’ll write to you,” I tell her.

Maddie suddenly removes the beaded neckband she wears, brings it to Cody’s side and ties it around my wrist.

I thank her.

“You go now, Charlie,” Violet Love tells me. “You go sink your plow into the earth, and you write and tell us if the soil is good.”

My heart is thumping wildly. I have no idea where the courage to strike out and do what I’m about to do has come from. I suppose part of it might be having learned that what Violet said is right; most folks aren’t like Buck and Albert. On the other hand, maybe it’s been there all along—maybe it was deep down, waiting to surface when all other things were just right. Like the final cold snap that combined with all other existing forces and caused Turtle Mountain to walk.

But right now, all I really know for certain is I owe it to James and those like him. I tip my cap and start Cody toward the trail heading north.