Newfoundland Stories (11 page)

They spent time together nearly every day, sometimes just a few minutes, other times for hours at a time, talking to each other through gestures. One afternoon Asbut came and entered into a long and heated discussion with the women. He then took Peder by the arm and led him away.

Asbut led Peder through the woods to the nearby river whose roaring waters he had heard in the distance but never seen. There, Asbut pointed out the hundreds of salmon lining the bottom of a shallow pool, so densely packed they rested in layers above and below each other, pausing there before continuing their migration upstream to their spawning grounds. He positioned Peder next to the still waters of the pool, indicating that he was to stay there while he himself splashed about trying to drive the fish toward Peder. When Asbut used his hands to flip salmon from the water toward Peder, the young Viking readily understood that he was supposed to catch them, kill them, and place them on the grassy spot behind him.

An hour later they had landed a large number of the sleek silver fish which they then brought back to the encampment. Because of the salmon's great size, they could carry only two or three at a time.

The salmon remained in the pool for five more days before continuing their journey upstream. During that time Asbut and Peder landed many, many more, a valuable contribution to the overall welfare of the encampment. The salmon, when cured, smoked, and cached, would be a staple of their winter food supply.

The catching of the salmon also resulted in a big change for Peder. He was transferred from the supervision of the women into Asbut's mamateek, where he ate with Asbut and his family, slept with them, shared their work, learned some of their language, and in almost every respect functioned as a family member. He had been adopted.

He now lived in a man's world, no longer expected to do womanly tasks. He hunted with the men and went with them on their excursions. He wrestled with the other young men of the encampment and raced against them, often besting them at their own games. He had, in the space of a few short months, adapted to the skraeling way of life and found a degree of happiness and contentment he would never have thought possible when he was first captured.

But when he went to sleep at night he still dreamed the dreams of a Viking, of being in the longhouse with the mingled smells of sweat, ale, and peat, of listening to the ribaldry and laughter of Ralf and the others as they gathered at the end of the day to tell their stories. The face of his mother, Agata, the seamstress, still hovered over him as he slept. Despite his growing attachment to Asbut and the others, the thought of escaping was ever-present.

Autumn approached and the days grew shorter and colder. Then one day, Eduit, the chieftain, announced that it was time to begin preparations for the annual caribou hunt. Several days were spent organizing the event, until early one morning six canoes, each carrying four men, set out from the encampment and paddled northward – twenty-four hunters in all, Peder among them.

A full day of hard travel brought them to the deer fences. These were structures of rocks, sticks and fallen trees several miles long, toward which hunters would drive caribou from the migrating herds. Then they would try to turn them and force them to run alongside the fence until the fleeing animals were forced into narrow passes where other hunters were waiting to kill them with lances and arrows. This ancient device had been erected by Asbut's ancestors and had traditionally enabled his people to harvest large numbers of caribou. The annual caribou hunt was vital to the encampment's continued survival. The meat was the most essential part of their winter diet, and the hides and bones were essential for their clothing, tools, and shelter.

Peder, seeing the deer fences for the first time, could not visualize how the operation would unfold. Asbut had explained to him through gestures and drawings in the sand that they would be hunting caribou, but that was all he knew. He would simply have to stay alert, watch the others, and follow their lead.

Having beached their canoes, some of the group, including Peder, proceeded eastward until they were a considerable distance away from the fence. There they concealed themselves to wait until the caribou herd arrived. The others positioned themselves along the passes at the southern end of the fence, to wait there until the animals were driven toward them. The waiting period could be as short as a day or two or extend into weeks. Some years the caribou did not come at all. A failed hunt meant a winter of hardship and starvation.

On the fifth day the caribou came. The hunters waited in position until the major portion of the herd was between them and the fence. Then they emerged to race en masse toward the herd, screaming, striking their noise makers, and brandishing weapons to make themselves as terrifying as possible, striving to frighten the animals and force them toward the fence, and then turn them to the south where the other hunters waited. Peder followed in the rear, trying his best to emulate the others.

Pandemonium ensued – pounding hooves, snorting and bellowing animals, screaming men, dust, flying ground cover. Amid all the noise and confusion, Peder suddenly realized that this was his opportunity to escape – perhaps the only chance he might ever have. He was already several miles north of the encampment and, with a river to take him even farther north, he knew he could probably travel far before nightfall. That is, if the hunters didn't miss him. He was willing to gamble that they were all so intently focused on the hunt that his departure would go unnoticed.

He ran a short distance behind the others before veering off, running low, his heart beating wildly in his chest. He was committed now; there was no turning back. If he was seen now it would all be over.

When he reached the canoes he looked back over his shoulder and saw that no one was following him. Indeed, the distance between him and the others was widening rapidly as the hunters chased the caribou toward the passes. He pushed one of the canoes into the water. It was much heavier than he had expected and required considerable effort to move it. He paddled the craft into mid-stream where the water flowed faster, and took one last look back to make sure he hadn't been spotted. Then, paddling furiously and trying to keep the canoe straight, he let the river take him northward. Somewhere to the north were his own people, what was left of them, and he hoped that if he kept going north he would eventually find them.

He paddled all day until nightfall forced him to beach the canoe and go ashore. He made himself a bed of boughs and leaves. He was tired and cold, but sleep would not come, for his thoughts were racing with excitement and the worry that he must put as much distance between himself and the others as quickly as possible. He rested fitfully for several hours, listening to the night noises before he finally drifted off to sleep.

When he awoke in the morning, stiff and sore from his previous day's exertions, the sun was already high in the sky. Panic gripped him. He had overslept and lost much valuable time. He grabbed several handfuls of partridgeberries from along the riverbank and stuffed them into his mouth. It was the first food he had eaten in almost two full days. He pushed the canoe back into the water and braced himself for another day of hard paddling.

Peder spent that day and most of the next following the river, paddling and steering the canoe to avoid rocks and tree snags. Occasionally, to conserve his strength, he let the current carry him along while he rested. He went ashore a few times to search for berries or anything else he could find to eat. At one point, using his hands, he caught three small brook trout and ate them raw.

Early one morning he came to the falls. He'd heard the thunder and felt the quickening current long before he arrived. The falls were very high and steep, and Peder realized there was no way he could skirt them and continue his journey by canoe. From here on he would have to travel on foot.

He climbed a high ridge to try to get his bearings. Off to the east he saw the ocean, and instinctively understood that if he simply followed the coastline he must eventually reach the settlement of his people. Confident in his ability to find his way home, he set out.

The shortened days of autumn brought with them cooler temperatures which dropped even more sharply after sunset. At night, cold and uncomfortable despite several hours of arduous slogging, Peder gathered boughs around him and settled in. The branches of fir and spruce managed to take the edge off the cold somewhat. Yet, clad only in his deerskin, he still felt chilled and slept very little.

He was hungry as well. The handfuls of partridgeberries he had found along the way were not enough to satisfy his hunger and lay heavy on his stomach. And to make matters worse, his feet were raw and blistered from his long walk.

When he stirred in the morning, stiff, sore, still cold, and facing the prospect of another day of hard travel, he was tempted to settle back into the boughs and stay there. He knew, however, that to do so would only delay his progress. Steeling himself for what he had to do, he arose.

With his thoughts now focused fully on his destination, he no longer worried about the skraelings on his trail. Indeed, in retrospect, he wondered if they had even bothered to search for him at all, if they would have broken off from the hunt just to follow him. The hunt, so essential to their survival, was infinitely more important than a captive like him. Indeed, the loss of one of their canoes would have been considered far more serious.

The birch, aspens, and alders were beginning to shed their leaves, and the wilderness was ablaze with their reds, oranges, and yellows. This signal that winter was looming was not lost on Peder and instilled in him an even greater sense of urgency. He kept a constant lookout for food, finding scattered patches of partridgeberries and, in one instance, a small patch of blueberries in a sheltered area not yet touched by frost.

Much of the land he faced was open barrens, and he was able to make relatively good progress. The forests that sometimes confronted him were much more difficult, so he tried to skirt them, veering constantly toward the coastline, where he was often forced to traverse the headlands or pick his way along the rocky coastline itself.

Progress over the next few days was slow, painstaking slogging on feet that were so raw and sore he could scarcely put them to the ground. Sharp hunger gnawed constantly at the pit of his stomach, and his body was battered by the bitter winds that blew relentlessly. Peder knew he was growing weaker by the day. Unable to find the nourishment his body needed for the arduous task he had undertaken, he sometimes despaired of ever reaching his destination. Still, every step brought him that much closer to the settlement and his people, and this knowledge gave him the perseverance to keep plodding onward.

On the ninth day, late in the afternoon, he found himself on a high rise overlooking a beach, and he realized that it was the beach where the massacre of Ralf and the others had taken place. He scanned it for signs of their bodies, but scavengers or tides, or both, had done their work well, and there was no evidence that such a terrible event had ever unfolded there. There was no sign of the knarr either. He wondered if Bjoern had survived the attack and sailed it away. Or had he too been killed and the knarr taken away by the tides? Still, he felt heartened by the sight of the beach, for it confirmed his position and he knew that the settlement lay just a few more days away.

Thus encouraged, he set forth again. Three days later, by now extremely weak and at times light-headed and disoriented, Peder saw in the distance a headland that looked familiar to him. Behind it, he knew, was the settlement. He was almost home. One more day, two at the most. He knew he could make it now.

When he finally approached the settlement he felt tears coursing down his face. Unseemly behaviour for a Norseman, he knew, and he tried to stem them before anybody saw him. He was home, that was all that mattered.

Yet, even from a distance, he sensed that something was wrong. It was too quiet. No smoke rose from the longhouse and there was no sign of activity. The place was deserted.

The door of the longhouse hung awry on broken hinges, and when he entered the building it was cold and damp – and empty. He saw that the place where he had always slept had been taken over by mice. Their litter and droppings indicated that they had been there for some time.

He didn't know what to do. Where had his people gone? Would they ever be coming back? Had Bjoern, the man left on the knarr when Ralf and the others had gone ashore, somehow escaped and managed to bring the knarr back here by himself? Had he then taken the others away?

Overwhelmed with despair, Peder felt helpless. He let himself succumb to the desire to simply slip to the floor and drift off into oblivion.

The night passed, and morning found him alone on the dirt floor of the longhouse. The sun was well overhead before he stirred to face the day, beset by abject hopelessness. The flame which had brought him this far had been extinguished. Finally hunger forced him to rise, and he searched the settlement. In the small garden where his mother and some of the other women had always planted a few vegetables, he found a handful of small potatoes and a few partially eaten out turnips. These paltry remnants were the gleanings of the main crop that his people must have taken with them when they left. It wasn't much but it might keep him alive for a few more days.

Nourished by the potatoes and turnips, he felt a little stronger. He spent the rest of the day wandering aimlessly around the settlement, discovering that his people had taken everything of value with them. He found only a small piece of sail canvas which he thought he might use to cover himself to help ward off the cold at night. Late in the afternoon he gathered boughs and sticks and erected a rough shelter a short distance from the longhouse. He could not abide another night alone in the longhouse. He feared that the ghosts of Ralf and the others would grant him no peace.