The Lynching of Louie Sam (12 page)

“Howdy, George,” she says, with that Australian twang of hers. Her boldness comes across as unseemly. “Where have you been hiding yourself?” she asks me.

I stumble for a reply. “Nowhere, ma'am.” Then, “I have to fetch my mother.”

I reach the middle of Nooksack Avenue before I stop and glance back. I can see Mrs. Bell through the telegraph office window as she goes in to talk with Mr. Osterman. She's heated up about something, pointing out the window. Mr. Osterman looks outside—directly at me! The next thing I know, he's outside on the boardwalk in his shirtsleeves, despite the rain coming down.

“George!” he calls to me. “On second thought, there's no reason to wait on those repairs until summer. Come see me around noon on Saturday. I'll get you started. How does a dollar and two bits a day sound?”

It sounds like the best thing that's happened in a long, long time. My heart takes a leap, I'm so excited.

“I'll be here!” I tell him. “Thanks, Mr. Osterman!”

“You're welcome,” he says. “Come prepared to work hard, now.”

“I will!”

I head over to meet Mam at the doctor's office, suddenly walking on air. I must be in Mr. Osterman's good books, after all, or he wouldn't have given me the job. Maybe now we Gillies can start living down our reputation as Indian lovers. Maybe now we can all get back to the way things were, before.

W
HEN
I
WALK INTO THE
drug store, Mrs. Thompson is behind the counter handing Mam a bottle of Dr. Thompson's special patented medicine to help ease Teddy's fever. Mam has to ask Mrs. Thompson if she can pay for it next week, and Mrs. Thompson says all right. She's nice about it, but I know Mam hates having to ask. Once we're settled in the wagon and headed back out of town, I tell Mam not to worry, that soon I'll have the money to settle our account.

“And how might that be?” she asks.

“Mr. Osterman's paying me to check the telegraph line,” I reply. I'm so excited I could burst. But instead of being pleased she looks wearier still, like now she has one
more
thing to worry about. “What's wrong?” I ask. “I thought you'd be happy.”

“I am, George. I am. Just be careful how you tell Father,” she says.

“Don't you see, Mam?” I tell her. “The fact he gave me the job means he's forgiven Father. Now everybody will be friends with us again.”

I have seldom heard my mother speak in anger, but it bursts from her now.

“Your father needs forgiving from God, and sometimes from me,” she says, “but never from those hooligans!”

Hooligans! And not a word about me finding a paying job. I thought she would be pleased.

“They're not hooligans,” I tell her, “any more than Father and I are!”

“You talk like you're proud of what happened to that boy,” she hisses, wrapping her shawl tighter around the baby as though she needs to protect him from me.

For a moment I can't speak. I don't know if I can keep my voice steady.

“I'm not proud of it,” I say at last, and my voice breaks just as I feared.

I'm aware of her looking over at me, but I keep my eyes straight ahead to where the motion of Mae's and Ulysses's hindquarters is blurred by tears. She reaches out her hand and squeezes my arm.

“You're a good boy, George,” she tells me. “I know you're a good boy.”

I wipe my nose on my sleeve, and Mam doesn't remind me not to. I'm grateful for the drizzle that disguises the wet running down my cheeks.

B
Y THE NEXT MORNING
, the tonic has made Teddy's fever go down, but he's still not feeding right. He sleeps all the time. Babies are supposed to sleep a lot, but Mam says they should wake up hungry and yelling for food, which Teddy does not. She is worn out with worrying. If Father is worried about Teddy, he doesn't show it the way Mam does. I think I know why. Speaking for myself, I am not attached to Teddy the same way I am to my other brothers and sisters. If he's going to die, I don't want to feel bad, the way I did with Baby Marie.

F
IRST THING AT SCHOOL ON
Tuesday, Miss Carmichael makes me recite that poem by Mr. Emerson she made me learn—in front of the entire class. Pete and Tom snicker, but Abigail tells them to hush up, and they do. On Wednesday, the boys invite me to play catch with them at the lunch break, like they normally would. The mill stays quiet all week, though, so maybe we Gillies haven't been completely forgiven like I'd hoped. But it's been a mild winter and the farmers are busy getting a head start on their spring wheat. Father has started ploughing, too, which keeps him occupied and improves his mood. I mind what Mam said and wait for the right moment to tell him about me working for Mr. Osterman.

I'm in the shed milking on Thursday evening when Father comes in to hang up the plough for the night. I watch him take handfuls of oats from a sack and put them in a feed bag.

“Ulysses is getting a treat tonight,” I say.

“Aye, he's earned it. We finished the lower field up to the creek.”

“That's good.”

Father is on his way out of the barn with the feed bag, whistling softly. This seems as good a time as any.

“I got a job,” I say. I keep pulling on the cow's udders. He stops, turns back. I look up at him and tell him, “With Mr. Osterman.”

He studies me for a long moment, but he isn't mad. Not yet, at least.

“What gave you cause to speak to Mr. Osterman?”

“I went on Monday when Mam and I were to town, to tell him what Joe Hampton told me about the Sumas attacking us.”

He peers at me.

“About
what
?”

“Joe says the Sumas are gathering … on account of what happened. But it's all right. Mr. Osterman said not to worry about it, that he knows from the telegraphs coming through the line that the Canadians have got the situation under control.”

“And why did you not think to tell your own father about this before telling Mr. Osterman?”

“I tried,” I say, not wanting to tell him why I did not succeed.

I wait for his anger, but it doesn't come. For a moment, he seems unable to look at me. I tell him, “Mr. Osterman said not to tell anybody about the Sumas lest it starts a scare. He told me to tell you the same.”

“Did he now?”

“I told him about Joe saying Louie Sam was innocent, too.”

Father takes a step toward me. “What's that?”

“Joe said Louie Sam told his mother he didn't murder Mr. Bell.”

“And Mr. Osterman told you to keep quiet about that?”

“That's right.”

I can see that Father is thrown.

“You're to stay away from Mr. Osterman,” he says. “Do you ken me?”

“But I'm working for him, repairing the telegraph line. He's paying a dollar and two bits a day—enough to pay for the doctor, and Teddy's medicine.”

Father shakes his head. He's building up steam. When he speaks, his voice is low and dangerous.

“You think I'm not capable of paying for the doctor?”

“No, sir. I mean, yes, sir! I mean …” Nothing is coming out right. “I want to help,” I say.

He's quiet for a long moment. He won't look me in the eye. Then he says, “I appreciate that.”

He goes out to give Ulysses his feed. Quickly, I pour the milk in my pail into the collecting barrel and follow him outside with a lantern. He's inside the paddock scratching Ulysses's ears while the mule eats from the bag of oats he's holding up for him. Mae noses up to them, wanting her share. He pats her neck, but pushes her away. I know this much about how my Father thinks: rewards must be earned.

“Why don't you like Mr. Osterman?” I ask.

“Who says I don't like him?”

“Father, why don't you?”

There's a long pause. I'm taking a chance pressing the point, but I know that for some reason he is distrustful of Mr. Osterman. Maybe it's the dim evening light that lets him admit that I'm right.

“I heard a story about him,” he says. “Seems he spent a goodly amount of time drinking at the Roadhouse when he was younger, before he acquired respectability. One night, he and a mate by the name of John Quin drank corn whiskey 'til they passed out, so Doc Barrow put the two of them in a room to sleep it off. Only problem was, come the morning, Quin wakes up dead.”

He gets a wry smile, but I don't see what's funny.

“What killed him?” I ask.

“That's the question, isn't it? Some people say it was the whiskey. But it's curious how people seem to wind up dead around Bill Osterman.”

“He's nice to me,” I tell him. “Everybody looks up to him.”

“You watch yourself around him. That's all I have to say.”

Ulysses has finished his oats. Father takes the feed bag into the shed, and I go into the house. Mam is in the rocking chair by the stove with Teddy in her arms. He's sleeping again.

“I told him,” I say. “About Mr. Osterman.”

“What did he say?”

“To be careful.”

“Aye,” she says, pulling the blanket up around the baby's head. “That's always good advice.”

Chapter Fourteen

O
N
F
RIDAY AFTERNOON
, there's an event that the whole of the Nooksack Valley has been looking forward to for weeks and weeks, before the murder of Mr. Bell took everybody's attention. The governor of the Washington Territory, Dr. William A. Newell himself, is coming to The Crossing all the way from the territorial capitol in Olympia to speak to the issue of statehood, at the behest of Bill Moultray. A dance is to follow in the hall above Mr. Moultray's livery stable, which, truth be told, is the event that most folks have been counting the days toward, at least the younger folks. Before the murder business took hold, all Abigail Stevens and the other girls at school wanted to talk about was their new dresses and hair ribbons.

It's the view of most folks in the Washington Territory that statehood is long overdue. The federal government in that other Washington—the nation's capital—argues back that we don't have enough people in our territory to warrant becoming a state. But along with the Dakotas and Montana, we keep pushing for statehood anyway. It's the nature of frontiersmen to want to rule themselves. We want to elect our governor, not have him appointed by the president of the United States, as he is now. And we want seats in the U.S. Senate, too, instead of our paltry one seat in the lower house.

Friday at school, Miss Carmichael dismisses us early so we can all be front row center when the speeches begin over at The Crossing. By four o'clock, a lot of folks have turned up in the open space between Mr. Moultray's store and his livery stable to listen to the bigwigs. The sun is shining and there's a nice feeling of excitement in the air, as though everything is normal again. I scan the crowd for Father, and I feel happy when I spot him toward the back, talking with Mr. Stevens, Abigail's father—as though we Gillies, too, are back to normal.

Dave Harkness is in the crowd, and beside him stands Mrs. Bell. If she is aware of what people say about her behind her back, she doesn't seem to care. She's wearing a fancy hat and holding her chin up high, as though she wants folks to notice her—standing beside Mr. Harkness like they belong to each other, with or without the benefit of a preacher. I look over to where Pete Harkness is shining up to a couple of the girls from school. The girls are giddy at whatever it is he's saying to them, giggling and carrying on. I wonder what special power the Harkness men have over women. Or maybe it's the women who have the power over them.

Abigail Stevens comes up beside me.

“How do I look, George?” she asks me.

I don't know what to say. She looks pretty, like always, except today she's wearing a bonnet like the grown-up women. Instead of braids, she has dark curls peeking out from under the brim. She bats her eyes.

“You look nice,” I tell her.

But that just makes her mad.

“Is that all you got to say?”

I don't know what I said wrong.

“You look very nice.”

“For your information,” she says, “my mother ordered this hat all the way from Seattle.” She lifts the corner of her overcoat to show me the dress she's wearing underneath. “It's to match my new dress for the dance. You're coming to the dance, aren't you?”

“I wasn't planning on it …,” I say.

I'm about to impress her with the fact that I can't be up late tonight because I have a job working for Mr. Osterman starting in the morning when she hits me with the little purse she's carrying, which also matches her new dress for the dance.

“You are as slow as a fat toad on a hot day, George Gillies!”

She stomps away. I'm thinking that maybe I should go after her and find out why she's suddenly acting crazy as a loon, but at that moment several men come out of Moultray's Store, among them Mr. Moultray and Mr. Osterman—and a man I take to be Governor Newell. Chairs have been set up for them along the boardwalk, facing the crowd. Governor Newell is old, tall, and lanky, with big mutton chops. Father says he's a Yankee easterner through and through—the president's man. Father doesn't mean that as flattery.