Otherworldly Maine

by Noreen Doyle

  The waitress had poured coffee by the time Lucie returned, and she sat without ceremony. “I suspect your English is better than my French,” Alicia said after they had introduced themselves.

  “I’m sure,” Lucie replied. She turned to Jay. “So here I am. Why are you here?”

  Jay had conducted enough negotiations in restaurant booths not to blink. “I wanted to speak with you. Thanks for meeting me.”

  She shrugged. “When I get married this spring, my phone will change. You won’t be able to keep calling.” A few snowflakes began to run down the front of her glasses, which she removed and cleaned with a napkin. When she replaced them, her black eyes fixed him keenly. “You like the idea of Indians having Viking blood?”

  He smiled, unoffended. “If it’s true, then that’s interesting. I never thought about it before, because I like looking for artifacts. I heard about your test results by accident, and I won’t tell anyone.

  “Don’t be offended by this—Alicia thinks I’ll end up insulting you—but in a sense, your DNA is an artifact, or at least a record. So is mine, and everyone’s, just as every site you excavate can be documented. But not all sites are interesting.”

  Lucie glanced sidelong toward Alicia. “If you told some anthropologist, he would simply say that I have a white ancestor five or six generations back whom I don’t know about.”

  Jay was startled by the whom, then realized that she must have learned English in school. “But he would be wrong, wouldn’t he? Your people have been here for three hundred years, and the first census was in 1822. You know who is and is not full-blood.”

  It seemed a reasonable reply, but she glared. “So you have been studying us, have you?”

  “I studied what’s on the Internet; come on. Should I come up here and waste time asking you things I could find out elsewhere?” He immediately changed tack. “Besides, a European ancestor that recent would have shown up all over those results. I’ve done a little reading there, too, and the researchers made a good inference.”

  The waitress returned, and Lucie spoke to her in rapid French, indicating the three of them. Watching her, Jay found himself not thinking of anticipated objections, but simply looking at the woman, an unremarkable Native American in her twenties whose mitochondrial DNA held, like a recently deciphered codex, the unlooked-for confirmation he had never expected to find. He had no doubt that this woman’s great-to-the-forty-or-fiftieth grandmother had been a Viking settler—not of New-foundland, where the Beothuk natives probably drove off the Norsemen after a few years, but from an unknown settlement, Vinland or another, that encountered the coastal Wabanaki of what is now called Maine. The fact that genealogists would doubtless find her mtDNA line suggestive rather than conclusive meant nothing: the immediacy of her being—before him, as he knew the drowned foundations never would be—sufficed to banish doubt.

  “I ordered for you,” she said, directing her look at Jay. Before he could thank her, she added, “You’re just a typical American, unable to speak any language but your own?”

  “I actually picked up a fair amount of Norwegian one summer,” he replied mildly. Then, “Have you studied Abenaki?”

  She gave a fractional nod, wary. “There aren’t any Norse words in it, if you’re wondering.”

  “Of course not.” He decided not to tell her about the Victorian scholar who claimed that the Wabanaki trickster Lox derived from Loki, the wind eagle from something in the Edda and so on: who would certainly have pounced upon any linguistic echoes in the languages. The reasoning seemed sound, but he was beginning to understand how readily she felt his intrusion. “Is there an Abenaki word for ‘exile’?”

  She frowned, either at the question or his reasons for it. “Nakasahozik is the act of pushing out, but it doesn’t really have a political sense. Perhaps awskonomuk—it means to displace. The Wabanaki were awskonoak by the English from their homeland—‘wabanaki’ means the eastern land.”

  “Did you visit Mount Desert Island when you were living in Maine? It was Wabanaki country a thousand years ago, their easternmost extent. The bay to the west was Penobscot—Penawapskewi—territory. That’s the region where the Vikings would have landed.”

  “I don’t care.” She slashed across his point like a scythe. “The Wabanaki were driven into Québec centuries ago; do you think I am interested in details of your history, or its traces in that blood test? I did it for the sixty dollars.”

  The meal came then, three laden plates, different—he could see this as she set them down—from a Down East all-day breakfast. Thick cuts of what Jay would call ham, fries with gravy and what looked like half-melted cheese, beans atop scrambled eggs. The plates clacked down with reassuring solidity, and the three bent over them just as a chill gust blew from the door, a reminder of what was outside.

  They ate in silence, finishing meat then starch and savoring the richness of the juices, which Jay did not hesitate to sop up. (Lucie, he saw, spread butter and then jam on her toast, a fearless Canadian practice he had unthinkingly associated with Anglophones.)

  Eventually she pushed her plate away, and sat back to look at him with an amused expression. “And do you think you have Viking blood, too?”

  “I have no idea.” It had never occurred to him to get a DNA ancestry kit and try it on himself. “I grew up in Iowa.”

  She snorted. “And a thousand years ago your ancestors were where?”

  “Well, not there. Allover Europe, I guess.” Someday genetic testing would tell more; he had read up on that, too. An uncovered potsherd was physical, and unique: these ghostly bits encoded in the tiniest structures of one’s blood were neither—everyone had different proportions of the same innumerable scraps. Someday the tests would be so powerful and common that all would be known, the endless migrations of peoples, churning and recombining like seawater.

  Nobody’s story would please them, Jay thought; one more thing not to say right now. Flight, rapine, exile, all would be laid bare, plus bolts of more unremarkable lineage than anyone liked. We are all kings’ bastards, for it is to them that our mothers were brought.

  Lucie gestured as the plates were cleared away. “If you’re planning to pay with American dollars, you’ll need more than you think. It isn’t worth more than ours any more.”

  “We have Canadian money,” said Alicia, with perhaps a touch of reproof. “Maine isn’t Mississippi.”

  “And Odanak isn’t Maine.” It would be interesting to know what had brought her to study in the States, and why she had returned to the reserve. But Jay felt he had maybe two questions left him, and that would not be one.

  “Did it interest you,” he asked, “to find that you have a Viking ancestor? I know it’s not important to you, and I understand that it’s nobody’s business; but how did you feel to learn that something that happened so long ago, for which all other records are utterly gone, remains documented in your blood?”

  She seemed to consider the question. “It’s like an echo that bounced off a distant canyon. What produced the sound happened long ago. Some Indian graves are even older, but that doesn’t mean you can handle the bones and put them on display. It’s . . .” She looked at him in frank curiosity. “I don’t know if you can understand it, Mister From-Everywhere.”

  “Meaning nowhere in particular. Okay, that’s an answer.” Dispelling her misapprehensions wasn’t a priority for him, and Jay waved to the waitress to buy himself a few seconds. “Has anyone else on the reserve—”

  A cell phone rang, not Jay’s or Alicia’s. Lucie stood up, lifted the hem of her sweater, and glanced at its display. “Goodbye,” she said.

  “You walked here,” Alicia said. “Let us give you a ride back.”

  Jay was glad she offered—he knew it would be better if he didn’t—but Lucie shook her head. “Finish your coffee; you have a long trip.” She looked at Jay. “If you learn anything more, don’t call me.”

  The door banged shut as the waitress poured their last cups and set down t
he bill. Jay and Alicia regarded each other, then he reached over and poured cream for her. “She doesn’t want us to come out until she’s gone from sight,” he said.

  “She probably has enough on her mind,” Alicia replied. “Did you notice that she’s pregnant?”

  Jay stared and then shook his head. “How does that matter?” He stirred his own coffee, then sipped. The last swallow of warmth before they stepped out into the cold: he wondered if the Vikings had a word for it. Longships lacked cabins, but the Newfoundland excavations disclosed thick walls, so the act must have been significant.

  “Her bloodline runs downstream, not up.” The remark seemed to surprise her as much as him, and she smiled in embarrassment. Finishing her cup, Alicia picked up her purse and added: “She doesn’t want to represent something.”

  The temperature had dropped outside, and the afternoon sky looked bruised. The surrounding flatland felt more like the Midwest than anywhere in Maine, and Jay wondered how far the Vikings had penetrated, up the Penobscot or St. Croix, into the continent’s interior. The remains of such ventures might never be found.

  The burial ship found at Ladby had entirely dissolved, its hull’s outlines only discernible by a darkening of the soil. So the artifacts of Vinland, tokens one could lift and feel, were—he felt its truth bump hard—now vanished forever from human reach, their last traces, now copies of copies, diffusing in chemical memory like smoke.

  THE COUNTY

  Melanie Tem

  That’s a gorbey, him. Canada jay. Also known as gray jay, Whiskey Jack, moose-bird. See his furry feathers? For the cold. Put him back outside, la. You come up here to hunt moose, not gorbeys, you. Fog don’t bother him. Funny-looking little thing, isn’t he? Personally, non, I wouldn’t call him cute.

  Keep him? What for?

  Sorry to hear that. But Jack won’t make a pet for a sick child. Spirits of the dead, some say gorbeys are. Or just very smart birds that’ll do to you what you do to them.

  Oh, we got all sorts of such creatures up here, just like anywhere else. Papineau, big man like Paul Bunyan only meaner, goes from house to house begging for food, never can get full, him, puts a curse on you if you don’t give him all the food you got. Feux-follets, spirits of the damned that wander around in the woods. You’ll see ’em sometimes, little tiny flames in this thick old dark forest. Forest more like one solid tree, n’est pas? You boys ever seen anything like it?

  Fairytales? Oh, I don’t think so. So you best put that bird back outside, la. I’m telling you.

  Pea soup? Hah! “Pea soup” don’t come close to Maine fog. Thick enough you could cut it into bricks and build a house out of ’em like this one, easy. The wood all weathered gray, kind of dim and dark in here with those filmy curtains Lina likes, could just as well be made out of fog. Fog gets inside here, too. Can you see it, all shimmery between me and you? Feel it, like your skin and your hair might just dissolve any minute now? Taste it?

  Lina. My daughter. This is her place.

  Fog lifts, there’ll be good hunting. More moose than people up here. Every vehicle’s got sonic moose deflectors like on my car. You saw how straight the roads are and how the forest comes right up close. And moose are big! In a collision between human and non-human, you know who wins, non?

  Like the song says, “There’s a tombstone every mile” along the road. Forgive me, I am not a singer. He’s talking about right here in The County.

  So you gotta be careful. Don’t mess with moose, okay? Don’t mess with gorbeys. We’ll be waiting out the fog for a while here, my daughter Lina’s place, she won’t mind, she went down to Bangor, la.

  Leave him be, you. Let him go. Gorbey’s nothing to fool around with.

  Born and raised here, me. Went down South to see what I could see, nothing worth seeing, no reason to leave The County again. The Cyr family goes back a long ways. Benoit’s an old family name, too. Benoit. B-e-n-o-i-t. Like I said at the beginning, just call me Ben.

  Aroostook County. Bigger than a lot of states. Everybody in all of New England knows it as just The County, like there’s no other county in the world. Potatoes. You saw the potato houses on those farms we went by. Some of ’em are huge, potato mansions. You never thought of potatoes as beautiful? Hah. Beautiful white and purple blossoms. And you have never tasted anything in your life like my Lina’s potato cake.

  Your basic wilderness. Everything manmade is very far from everything else manmade. That’s the way we like it up here.

  Well, I am a certified Maine Woods Guide, me. Not many of us. Been leading hunting and fishing trips for longer than you’ve been alive. Believe I’d have checked that out before I signed up for this trip. Best to know who you’re in the wilderness with, non?

  This’ll be my last trip, though. Retiring, me. Lucky for you boys you come when you did, no telling who you’d’ve got.

  So, Tim, how do you say your surname, with just the one vowel? That Polish? In French, we have an abundance of vowels. Perhaps we should give you some. Hah.

  And Rob Thibideaux. You are Acadian, Rob? Ah, from Louisiana, oui. Cajun. Perhaps we are related. From the Diaspora. You don’t know the Diaspora? Your own history? 1755, when our people were expelled from the land and scattered like so many seeds, which is what “Diaspora” means? We call it the Great Derangement.

  You never heard of none of this. Mon Dieu. A man without a history is a man without a soul. You gotta do something about that, you. Maybe we can do something about that. Goes into making us who we are. You much as me. Like the Holocaust goes into making Tim who he is. Right, Tim?

  My daughter Lina’s quite the historian, her. Last winter she spent down in New Orleans, la, brought back Diaspora tales and Cajun recipes. Good cook. Pretty girl. You’d like my Lina, you. Don’t know if she’d like you. She’s picky. Says she’s got no need for a man. Always been a little bit crazy, her.

  Could be socked in for a while, can’t say. Fog’s part of the Maine experience you come here for. Third of this month was heavy fog, and some say that predicts the month. Le trois fait le mois. Don’t know as I hold with that, but that’s what some say. But then, some’ll say practically anything. Gets thick enough, you can make fog angels. Hey, after a while you’ll do anything to amuse yourself. Get to feeling sort of confined.

  Like a gorbey in a box. Take that bird outside, you, let him go. Your kid won’t like him, trust me. He won’t like your kid, him.

  What’s your wife and kids think of you leaving ’em back there in Shreveport while you come up here to the fog and the moose? Ah, oui, c’est vrai, you got to get away sometimes. Heart grows fonder, like they say.

  Divorced, me. One daughter. My Lina. Her husband’s one of those tombstones along the road that Dick Curless fella sung about. Lonely for a woman up here, never mind what she says, just her old dad to talk to and me out in the woods half the year. Don’t know why she didn’t remarry. My sweet Lina. See how nice she keeps a house, her? Get your boots off the furniture.

  Gotta take a leak. Leave the door open if you want, get some air in here. Sure, the fog’ll come in, but it’s already in, can’t escape the fog, best you can do is hunker down and not get lost in it. Here, prop this up on the table, la, so the beam points up. Helps a little. Reflecting off the fog wisps like that, kind of looks like a wedding veil, don’t it? Kind of pretty. Be right back.

  Give me the damn box.

  Rob Thibideaux, you are one stubborn Cajun, you. What is it with you and this gorbey? Stole your sandwich, did he? Mais oui. Camp robber’s another name for him. Lina tells how a gorbey come right in her kitchen window and hooked his left foot through one of her doughnuts and his right foot through another one and his beak through another one and he flew off into a tree with all three doughnuts, him. Comes back now and sits outside her window every time she makes ’em. That’s what she says. Complains, calls him names, but I’m not sure she altogether minds, being a young widow like she is and alone except for that woman comes up here sometimes from Ba
ngor.

  You think you’re gonna teach him a lesson, trapping him like that? Let me tell you something. Nobody ever taught a gorbey nothing. Other way around. You think you’re gonna take him home, put him in a cage, cheer up your little boy? Hah. Whatever you do to a gorbey’ll be done to you. Now that’s the honest truth.

  Be right back.

  Idiot.

  So, Jack, you just remember, you, it’s me letting you go. That Cajun boy, that Robert Thibodeaux, he’s the one captured you, him. Made you stay in a box. You gonna do the same back to him, you? For my Lina? Once I know we got a deal, then I’ll open this lid and you can fly off to wherever you fly to, la. We got a deal?

  Merde. Got away, you! Without a deal. Too quick. Too tricky. Hey, Jack! You owe me, you! You hear me? Merde.

  Ah, monsieur! You startled me, coming up out of the fog like that. Didn’t see you, big as you are. Foggy enough for you?

  Don’t believe we’ve met. Name’s Benoit Cyr.

  Papineau. I heard of you. You’re hungry, c’est vrai? That’s what I figured. Well, you like potato doughnuts? Plenty of good food in that house, la. Couple of hunters in there with me, waiting out the fog. They won’t mind. Come on in, you. Watch your head.

  Boys, we got company. Allow me to introduce M. Papineau. Like I said before, he’s pretty well known around here as a man with an appetite. This here’s Tim Strand and Rob Thibodeaux. Rob’s Cajun, though he don’t know it, never been up this way before, him.

  Help yourself, M. Papineau. Refrigerator, cupboards, pantry. Lina won’t mind.

  You boys come on outside, la, I’ll show you about the Maine fog. Can’t tell from in here. No, you come with me. Pardonnez-nous, monsieur.

  Now listen to me. Quiet, just listen. I know Papineau. I never met him, but I know him. Everybody around here knows him. You got Papineau in Louisiana? Wouldn’t know that, would you? He goes from place to place, especially when the fog’s in like this, and he begs for food, and he can’t ever be filled up, him. He’s big, you see how big he is, bigger’n a normal man by a long shot, had to duck and turn sideways coming through the door, la, you see that? Paul Bunyan’s maybe bigger, but Papineau’s meaner. You don’t satisfy him, he can do bad things. Put a curse on. Go ahead, laugh. But give him whatever food you got. We can stop by the store in Limestone, la.