Listen to the Silence

by Marcia Muller

  “I’ll explain that later. But first, what can you tell me about Elwood Farmer? Dwight Tendoy described him as unusual.”

  “He is. Elwood was born and raised at Fort Hall; his mother was removed to there by the government after the old chief died. He got out early, though, went back East to art school. He’s a good artist, made a lot of money in the white man’s world when Indian art started to become chic with rich people. Met his wife Leila, a Saint Ignatius woman, in New York City. She was an artist too.”

  “And when did they move here?”

  “In the late seventies. I don’t know why. Elwood built his log house with his bare hands, but the day before they were to move in, Leila died in a car wreck. For a while Elwood went crazy—drank, fought, even tried to burn the house down. Then one day he sobered up completely. Started studying the traditional ways. Now he observes all the old Shoshone customs; does a lot of good for Indians throughout the state, too.”

  “How?”

  “Travels around to the schools giving art workshops. He’s a good teacher. The kids love him, really get off on the projects he assigns them. And it doesn’t cost the schools a thing; he supplies the materials and teaches for free.”

  “He sounds like quite an impressive man.” Farmer’s example was interesting to me on a personal level: He’d tapped in to his Indian roots in middle age. Was it possible I could, too? Last spring I’d come to know a Hawaiian man whose life was deeply grounded in the ancient beliefs of his people, and I’d been totally baffled by what seemed to me a spooky, superstitious connection with the long-dead past. But now that I’d heard about Farmer’s late awakening, I felt a stir of excitement.

  Will looked at his watch. “Hey, I’d better get back to my grandma’s. She’ll be thinking I’ve turned into a drunken injun.”

  The way he tossed off the offensive phrase made me frown.

  “Look,” he said, “when you’ve been pushed around as much as we have, you’ve gotta have a sense of humor. When I say stuff like that I’m really laughing at the white bigots who came up with it. So when’re you going back to Elwood’s?”

  “Ah, you know about that too. First thing in the morning.”

  “Good. Tomorrow afternoon I want to take you someplace. And I want to hear your story.”

  “What story?”

  “About why you talk and think like an Angla.”

  “I might be gone by then, Will.”

  He smiled and shook his head. “No, you won’t.”

  “How come?”

  “Trust me. I know Elwood Farmer.”

  Saturday

  SEPTEMBER 9

  10:55 A.M.

  “And that’s why I’m here.”

  I finished giving Elwood Farmer my account of the past week and waited for his response. We were sitting on a swing on the porch of his cabin, had been for most of an hour. The sun was taking the chill off the morning and raising my hopes of not losing a finger or a toe to frostbite.

  Farmer smoked silently and contemplatively, as he had the whole time I talked. Finally he said, “Come back tomorrow.”

  “What?”

  “Tomorrow morning, at nine.”

  He got up, went into the house, and shut the door.

  3:15 P.M.

  “So that’s what I told Elwood,” I said to Will Camphouse. “And then he ordered me to come back tomorrow and went in the house.”

  Will and I sat on a rocky outcropping on the west side of Flathead Lake, some seventy miles north of St. Ignatius. The sky had become overcast again, and the huge expanse of water lay placid and gray, highlighted occasionally as sun rays broke through the cloud cover. As I spoke I stared at the pine-covered hills on the far shore.

  Will said, “I’m glad you agreed to drive up here this afternoon. I wanted you to see the lake, and I suspect you’ll be leaving pretty soon. Elwood’s almost ready to tell you what you need to know.”

  “If he is, he has a strange way of indicating it.”

  He shook his head. “Not really. He’s been sizing you up, figuring out if he wants to befriend you. For us, friendship isn’t defined by distant blood ties or physical proximity; it grows slowly through a series of interactions that test two people’s mutual trust. But once a friendship’s formed, it lasts forever.”

  “But you and I were friendly from the very first.”

  “That’s different. I live in two worlds, move pretty easily from one to the other. For a lot of his life Elwood did too, so he’ll come to a conclusion about you more quickly than most of the traditional people on the rez would.”

  “Three days is quick?”

  “It can take months—years, even.”

  “Well, I can’t spend my life here, going to see Elwood Farmer every day! I’ve got a business to run—”

  “Relax. Like I said, he’s about to tell you what you need to know.”

  “Who my parents were?”

  “Maybe not that, but probably something about your great-aunt’s visit to Fort Hall.”

  “It had to be Fort Hall, didn’t it? Lemhi Valley was closed, and that was where Chief Tendoy’s family were moved to. Damn, if Elwood’s going to talk, I wish he’d get on with it!”

  “Impatient white-thinking woman.”

  We fell silent for a while. In spite of my frustration with Farmer’s behavior, I felt at peace in this beautiful place, listening to the water lap at the rocks and the birds cry overhead. The vast Montana sky, which had seemed so oppressive only the day before, lifted my spirits; I felt a reassuring connectedness—to the water, the earth, the trees, the creatures that lived here. A connectedness to all people who loved such places and sought to preserve them.

  Years ago, before I met Hy, I’d been a confirmed urbanite. Wide open spaces made me edgy, their silence drove me to distraction. But Hy, an environmental crusader, had flown me off to some of the most remote parts of the state: the White Mountains, the Trinity Alps, Death Valley. He’d shown me the comfort of their vastness, taught me to find peace in their silence.

  “One thing, Sharon,” Will said. “If Elwood tries to give you something, don’t refuse it.”

  “What would he give me?”

  “Oh, a photograph. Maybe a family treasure.”

  “I couldn’t accept—”

  “You have to. We’re a people who love to give. Value or size doesn’t matter, just the appropriateness of the gift for its recipient and the pleasure in sharing what we can. To refuse a gift is the greatest insult.”

  I sighed. “There’s so much I don’t understand.”

  “Inside, you know it all. Just let it come out slowly.”

  “You think that’ll ever happen?”

  “Sure. Let me ask you: D’you like to give?”

  “I love to, much more than to receive. And I like to give gifts at any time, for no particular reason. If I see something that’s perfect for somebody, I buy it and give it to them right away.”

  “There you go. Okay, what’re your friendships based on?”

  “… A mutual trust, I guess. A sort of implied contract that it’s give-and-take on either side. Sometimes I give the lion’s share, sometimes the other person does, but over time it evens out. I’m cautious about accepting a person as a friend, but once I do, he or she is a friend for life.”

  “You see? It’s all in the genes. Now let’s head back to town. There’re some people I want you to meet tonight.”

  8:05 P.M.

  The people were his friends and family members, dozens of them of all ages. The place was a cousin’s restaurant, and the occasion was his grandmother’s seventieth birthday.

  Long tables were laden with food: everything from chips and dip and fried chicken to dried deer meat and huckleberry tarts. Soft drinks and beer and wine were served, and nobody drank too much and became quarrelsome as we McCones had been known to do at family gatherings. Couples danced to loud music, children ran through the crowd, and everybody talked and laughed a lot. They all knew who I was and why I
was there, so they accepted me with a cordial reserve.

  As Will took me around and I sorted out names and faces, I began to pay particular attention to the women of my generation. They were lively, active, and spoke passionately of their work, families, and pursuits. Noreen was a partner with her husband in the bakery the tarts had come from; she freely admitted to having fallen victim to her own wares and talked of trying to expand the business and shrink her waistline. Gretchen, a Menominee from Wisconsin, ran a Headstart program and knowledgeably discussed grant writing with Emi, director of a youth-and-family-services agency. Violet was a weaver who talked with her hands as she described her line of capes, which were sold in specialty boutiques from coast to coast. Fran, a teacher, asked me what I thought of Elwood Farmer and spoke enthusiastically of the good he’d done her students. Janet was a writer who had put together an anthology of her tribe’s oral history; she recited a brief story for me, and the words were like poetry.

  As I listened to these women, I felt a kinship, coupled with a growing unease. They were very like my friends at home, and yet their issues—bicultural education, preservation of native traditions, eradication of alcoholism and spousal abuse—were not ones I’d had to face in the non-Indian world. As a white woman, an Angla, I’d dealt with mainstream issues, or often none at all. Now, if I were to find a place among my people, I’d be expected to identify with their concerns and move as easily from one world to another as they did. But could I do that?

  No. It wasn’t possible. Not yet, anyway, and maybe never. I felt trapped in a cultural no-man’s-land, with no assurance of arriving safely at either border.

  Sunday

  SEPTEMBER 10

  9:00 A.M.

  “Come in, please,” Elwood Farmer said.

  I stepped into his small living room. It had a woodstove at its center and was furnished simply in pine and braided rugs; the walls were covered with framed pictures. Not Farmer’s; judging from the childish technique of most, these had been done by his students. It fit with what I knew of the man that he would take little pride in his own work, but a great deal in that of the children he taught.

  He motioned at one of two padded rockers facing the stove, and I sat. Lighting a cigarette, he took the other chair and scrutinized me for a moment through the smoke. I returned his gaze, expectant and nervous about what he had to tell me.

  “You asked about Fenella McCone’s visit to Fort Hall,” he said. “That was in late summer of 1958.”

  Quick to the point, once he made up his mind to speak. “Did you meet her?”

  “No. By then I had already moved to New York. You know I’m an artist?”

  “Yes. And I know of your work in the schools. It’s wonderful, what you’re doing for the children.”

  He moved his hand as if to forestall further praise. “Most of the students aren’t as fortunate as I was. My mother encouraged me, and later my work attracted the attention of a benefactor, a rich white New York woman who had a summer cabin on the Snake River and connections with a good art school.” His lips twisted in amused memory. “She liked me, as well as my work. I guess I was good-looking back then, and I was certainly eager to please—in all areas.”

  So Elwood had his lively side. I smiled, and I could have sworn he winked at me—or maybe he was only blinking away smoke. “If you’d moved away, how do you know about my aunt’s visit?”

  “I believe my nephew has told you of the moccasin telegraph.”

  “Will Camphouse is your nephew?”

  “In a distant way. Our familial relationships aren’t as clearcut as whites’, or as formal.”

  “Does that mean he’s related to me too?”

  “… Possibly. There’s been so much mixing among the tribes, and other ethnic groups as well, that those connections are very difficult to sort out. If you and Will want to be related, then you should consider yourselves so.”

  His words opened up a startling and somewhat alarming array of possibilities. I pictured myself surrounded by circles of people, all of them strangers and each potential kin. While I wasn’t exactly a loner, I kept my own family at arm’s length and my close friends were limited to fewer than a dozen. Now, by virtue of blood, any number of people might be able to lay claim to me.

  I said, “About Fenella…”

  “She was the big news story on the moccasin telegraph that year. Remember, this was the nineteen-fifties. It wasn’t common for women to appear alone in sports cars and descend on relatives who, up till then, hadn’t been aware of their existence. And your great-aunt was very exotic.”

  “Fenella, exotic?” It wasn’t a term I’d ever associated with her.

  “Oh, yes.” Farmer nodded. “She looked Irish, with all that red hair and pale skin. The hair was dyed, the women said. She wore shorts and halter tops that showed off her figure, and usually went barefoot. The men followed her around like puppy dogs, but the women took to her too. They said there wasn’t any meanness in her. She was natural and friendly and cared deeply about her roots and our people. She was generous, and she laughed at herself, rather than others.”

  “You speak as if you knew Fenella well, but you say you never met her.”

  “I didn’t, but I feel as though I had. That year I returned to the reserve for Christmas, stayed into January. Talk of your great-aunt was rekindled when she sent presents, as well as two big crates of Florida oranges.”

  “What did Fenella do on the reservation?”

  “Mainly what my students call hanging out. She got the women to teach her the rudiments of some of our crafts, and she spent time with an elder who was a storyteller, learning about the legends and history. She took the younger people off on trips in her sports car, just piled them in and drove away. After six weeks she left, but she kept in touch by letter and sent presents till she died.”

  So there might be some correspondence in that box John had found at Pa’s.

  “Let me show you something,” Elwood Farmer said. He went to a bookcase where some framed photographs sat and brought one to me. The frame was bleached bone, carved to resemble buffalo moving nose to tail, and its contours were worn smooth by the passage of many fingers. I looked questioningly at Farmer.

  “My father made it from the last scraps of buffalo bone that my mother’s father saved after the white man decimated the herds.” The sorrow in his voice was as great as if he had been of the generations who hunted the bison and used its body for food, clothing, shelter, tools, and weapons.

  I looked down at the grainy black-and-white photograph: a group of six people, with Fenella at the center. My great-aunt smiled for the camera, clad in tight shorts and an off-the-shoulder peasant blouse, her eyes masked by big harlequin-style sunglasses. Her companions were four more conservatively attired Indian women, probably in their teens, and a slightly older white man, whose face was shaded by a cowboy hat.

  “Who are these people?” I asked.

  “Young women from the reservation.” He pointed them out. “Lucy Edmo, Barbara Teton, Susan New Moon, Saskia Hunter.”

  “And the man?”

  “… I don’t know. Could be a visitor like your great-aunt.”

  “From the way they’re smiling, they look as if they’re all good friends.”

  “They were.”

  I studied the photo’s background, a stucco building with a sign, but I couldn’t make out what it said. “Where was this taken?”

  “The old trading post in Fort Hall. It’s gone now, replaced by a mini-mart.”

  I nodded and set the photograph on the table between our chairs. So much was gone now, maybe even all these people. “D’you know where I might reach the women in the picture?”

  He shook his head, eyes turning bleak. I sensed one of the women had meant something to him, and that was why he’d kept the picture in the special frame all these years.

  “Can you think of anyone who might be able to tell me more about Fenella’s visit?”

  “Well, there’s A
gnes Running Horse, my cousin. She lives on the Middle Fork of the Flathead River near Glacier National Park.”

  “Would she be willing to talk with me?”

  Something moved under the surface of his gaze, a deep, dark current that I couldn’t define. “I’m sure she will.”

  “How far away is her place?”

  “A hundred miles, give or take, but the roads aren’t fast ones. Still, you could be there this afternoon.”

  “Will you call her and tell her who I am and that I’m coming?”

  He nodded, took a pad from the table and scribbled directions.

  When I stood to go, I said, “Mr. Farmer, thank you so much.”

  “No thanks are necessary. But I hope—”

  “Yes?”

  He shook his head, dismissing whatever he’d been about to say. “I want to give you something.” He picked up the photograph from the table, caressed its frame gently, then pressed it into my hands.

  My first instinct was to refuse such a precious gift, but then I remembered Will Camphouse’s caution against giving offense, and instead caressed the frame as Farmer had. “I’m honored,” I said. “I’ll treasure it always.”

  The dark current in his eyes moved more strongly. “I hope so, my friend. Travel safely.”

  11:48 A.M.

  “What did Elwood give you?” Will Camphouse asked me.

  “How d’you know that he did?”

  “I just know.”

  “Well, you’re right.” I slipped the framed photograph from my bag and showed it to him. He whistled softly.

  “I guess it means he thinks I’m okay,” I said.

  “More than okay. He’s accepted you as family.”

  “D’you know any of these people in the picture?”

  He shook his head. “I’ve seen it at Elwood’s place, though. I don’t know which he treasures more—the photo or the frame.”

  “I don’t know either.”

  We were seated at a weathered picnic table in the park across from Yesterday’s Cafe, eating deli sandwiches. The overcast continued, and the wind had picked up; it blew trash from a nearby barrel and sent it dancing over the packed earth.