“Pretty, isn’t it?”
I recognized him then, underneath the dirt and the sweat. He was from Otter Lake, and was distantly related to some distant relatives of mine. Duanne … Something. Duanne North. That was it. I’d seen him, even talked with him a few times while I was growing up. He had helped teach Sunday School the few times I went. During the long winter months in Otter Lake, your options of things to occupy your time were rather limited. Both his parents were well known for their religious fervour. In fact, Duanne’s father had been the lay minister for the village a number of years ago. Everybody had always expected Duanne to follow in his father’s footsteps.
But Duanne had problems of his own. A minister is supposed to minister to his flock, but I remember somebody once telling me that Duanne didn’t like being surrounded by people. It made him claustrophobic. As more and more people in Otter Lake had more and more children, resulting in more and more houses being built, he felt increasingly uncomfortable. Add to that the sudden influx of Bill C-31 people, Duanne felt compelled to move farther and farther out into the bush. And at one point, I’d heard he’d disappeared somewhere out west in the wide open spaces. Evidently he was back, ministering to his congregation of dogs. And stealing birch bark.
“Andrew’s your name, ain’t it?” I nodded, but my attention was still on what literally was a vast wall of birch bark. It was mind-boggling, not just the fact that nobody in the world had ever seen anything remotely like this to the best of my knowledge, but the obvious amount of work that had gone into it, for whatever mysterious reason. “Sorry about the dogs, we don’t get many visitors up here. They won’t bother you no more.”
He chuckled to himself before following my gaze to what I assumed was his handiwork. “I was hoping to keep it a secret until it was finished but I guess with something this big, this glorious, somebody was bound to find out. What do ya think?”
I could see the stitching that connected every single section of bark with every other section, and in some places, a form of tar or paste that had been used to seal the stitching, making it watertight. It was looking more and more like a huge birch-bark canoe. But it couldn’t be.
“What is it?”
Smiling proudly, almost glowing with pride, Duanne formed the words slowly. At first I wasn’t sure I’d heard properly. “It’s a what?”
“An ark.”
An immense, enormous, incredibly big, birch-bark ark, out in the middle of the woods. I asked the only logical question. “Like the one in the Bible? That ark?”
He wiped his hands on his stained overalls, the way a workman does when surveying his accomplishments. “Yep. My ark. Still got a ways to go yet, be another year or two, but every flood starts with a raindrop.”
“You built an ark?!”
“It’s hardly an ark yet. Wouldn’t float worth a damn right now, but give me enough time and she’ll ride out any flood. Took me a while to figure out how to make it strong and hold up. It’s all in the bracing, eh?”
“You built an ark?!”
“That’s what I said. My ark.”
I couldn’t say anything more. What more was there to say, standing there in front of a birch-bark ark. Nice ark?
“Want some tea?”
“Um, sure.”
He went over to the an old wood-burning stove he’d evidently carried up and left outside for just such an emergency. He put the kettle on the top and checked to make sure there was enough wood still burning. I just stood there, looking at the birch bark ark.
Duanne cleared some bark shavings off two stumps near the stove. “Hey Andrew, come over and sit a spell. How’s your mother and father?”
“Fine.” One syllable words seemed so innocuous in front of that wide expanse of white.
“You still go to church?”
“No. Not much.”
He smiled and gazed at the world around him. “Me neither but I figure you don’t need a building of brick and wood to worship God. He’s everywhere. He can hear me atop this small mountain as well as in any church, huh?”
I swallowed, not really knowing how to reply. “I guess.”
There was silence. I could hear the dogs wandering back into the camp. But this time they seemed a little more respectful of me and kept their distance.
“Not much of a talker, are you boy?”
“You’re building an ark?!”
“And when you do talk, you repeat yourself. I admit it’s not something you see every day, but that’s no reason to be anti-social. Sit and talk a while. You’re the first one up here to see my little project. How’d you find me?”
Finally I managed to take my eyes off the thing and focus on Duanne North. “From the bay. You could see something big and white in the woods. I got curious.”
He looked out towards the bay but all you could see was intermittent spots of blue though the leaves. “Figures—the trees are a might thin in that direction. I picked this spot because I thought it would give me a bit of privacy to finish my little project, but no place is perfect. I’m surprised I got away with it this long. God knows it’s hard to keep a secret in this village. Milk and sugar?”
“Please.” Sitting on the stump by the stove gave me a different view of Duanne North’s ark. It was hollow, just some rudimentary framing on one side of the interior, but the whole other side was set to be fitted with the remaining birch bark. The scale of what this man had done, and planned to do, was astounding. I couldn’t get over it. The Phantom of the Forest was an aboriginal Noah.
“How big is it?!”
“Oh, the usual. Three hundred by fifty by thirty cubits. Supposed to be made of gopher wood but I don’t reckon there’s much of that around here. So I improvised. Decided to do it the way our grandfathers would have done it. Our people travelled far and wide with birch bark. It seemed only natural for me to use that instead. Doing pretty good so far.” He beamed proudly, almost glowing in his accomplishment. Like he said before, it’s hard to keep a secret in Otter Lake, especially when you’re the one keeping it. There seemed to be an eagerness, almost an anxiousness to share in him, a desire to bask in his achievements.
“What the hell is a cubit? Oh sorry, I didn’t mean to swear.”
The kettle went off and Duanne proceeded to make our tea while lecturing me in the fine art of ark building. “I was curious about that myself. I’d never heard of a cubit before, except in church. But in Genesis, it tells you a cubit is the length from the tip of your finger to your elbow. So doing a little calculation, I sort of figured out what it would roughly come to. So the ark’s about four hundred and fifty feet long, seventy-five feet wide and forty-five feet high. That sounds about right, don’t it?”
“Sounds good to me.” That thing was almost five hundred feet long and three stories tall. That was a lot of birch bark. I drank my tea trying to process and understand all that was happening in this little place near the shores of Mukwa Bay. “Why?”
“Why what?
“Why build an ark?”
“I felt like it,” he said uncomfortably. That was it. He smiled weakly, absently reaching down and scratching one of the dogs that had come to investigate our tea drinking.
“People do not feel like suddenly building an ark. At least I don’t think so. Not in my experience anyways. Now correct me if I’m wrong but hasn’t it only happened once before? And if I remember correctly, Noah had the voice of God telling him to do it.” I felt a wet nose and slightly chewed ear rubbing against my left hand. Another of Duanne’s congregation. “This … thing of yours must have started somewhere.”
Without a sound, he undid the straps to his overalls, letting the front drop open. On his chest, above each nipple were two horizontal scars, each about two inches in length. Duanne looked embarrassed, there was almost a hint of disgrace in the way he refused to look at the scars.
They looked familiar, like I should know what they were. Then I remembered. He’d gone out west. “Those aren’t what I think they are, are
they?” He nodded forlornly. They were Sundance scars. A highly religious prairie ritual that involves having wooden pegs pierce the flesh of your chest. These pegs are attached to a central pole and the object is to pray and dance continuously around the pole until they rip out. It’s not for the faint of heart. In fact, Duanne was the first person I’d ever seen with the scars. But what was a good Christian boy doing with Sundance scars?
“I strayed.” Turning away from me, he did up his overalls again. I could tell those scars were not the badges of honour they were intended to be.
“How … ?”
“Because I’m weak. You must have heard I went out west to do some missionary work. While I was there I ran into some people.” I didn’t like the way he said “some people.” “They … I believed them.”
“Did they hurt you?”
“No, I hurt myself. I did this. Of my own free will. That makes it all the more … wrong. This was not God’s work. I should have known better. I should have guarded myself against the words of false idols. For a while, I believed there was another way, a different, better way. But like the Bible says, God is the only way.”
“Duanne, I think you’re over … ”
“I had to do penance. Make my peace with God for wandering from the path.”
“I don’t think participating in a Sundance ceremony is a bad thing. Most people would consider it an act of courage, even piety.”
“I allowed myself to believe that. But I have put all that behind me. I am reborn, for there is no other way but the Lord and the Bible. I am forever scarred by my actions, but I might be able to save my soul. By building an ark!”
I was beginning to feel exceedingly uncomfortable. It’s one thing to believe in the Bible, my parents do, and to a lesser extent, so do I. But it’s another thing to build an ark. And to have tea with the builder. This was not covered in any Sunday School class I ever attended. I am of that generation that was drifting from the beliefs the white institutions had forced upon us, and was now considering what had been believed before the dark times had come. I was hardly fundamentalist in any sense of the word and I was respectful of both belief systems.
It was my turn to sip my tea nonchalantly. “Have you, like, heard God telling you to do this? I mean, have you actually heard a voice or something?”
His attitude changed and he laughed out loud, scaring the dog away. “You mean burning bushes type thing? No, nothing like that. I’m just a simple man. But I hear my duty inside me. “You should build an ark,” it said. I was meant to create this ark, I know this, and if I keep up the pace I’ve set, I should have it finished a couple months before the millennium.”
“The millennium? What does the millennium have to do with anything?” This was beginning to get way over my head.
“Don’t you pay attention to anything! The millennium! It’s all part of the whole big picture. Great and wonderful things are expected to happen. Serious and fantastic things happen every thousand years. Somebody once estimated that Creation happened in 4004 BC. Practically a millennium, if they had them back then. The Great Flood happened five thousand years ago. More recently, Jesus Christ, our Saviour, was born two thousand years ago, and a thousand years later the Mayan civilization died out. I think we’re due for another flood, especially with this El Niño thing I keep hearing about. And Andrew, I think Native people are the chosen people!”
“Otter Lake people?”
He nodded confidently. “Yes. And what better way to redeem yourself then by saving Otter Lake! The rains should start on January first and everybody here can sail away in my ark. Now there’s a hell of a way to get out of Hell, wouldn’t you say?” He paused for a moment, a look of thought crossing his face. “Though January’s a hell of a time to be out on the water.”
Duanne finished his tea before getting up. “Sorry, got to stir my tar. Excuse me.” I couldn’t help wondering if Noah had been this polite. He half waddled, half scurried over to another large circular fireplace a dozen or so feet from the ark. Over it was a large pot, almost a cauldron, boiling away. He picked up a large paddle-like object and began stirring it. “If you’re not careful, the whole thing will boil away and harden. I’ve had that happen a few times already, I get so caught up in my work. Can you pass me that bucket over there, please?”
The bucket was near the pile of unused birch bark, down wind of the fire. I fetched it for him and immediately my eyes stung and watered so badly I almost dropped the bucket. Whatever I had smelled earlier down the drumlin was emanating from the cauldron. And however noxious it was a quarter of a mile away, it was beyond belief a dozen feet away. I coughed and ran around the fire as fast as I could trying not to spill the contents of the bucket. “You get used to it after a while, but it sure clears out your sinuses, don’t it?”
I didn’t trust myself to answer without rapidly emptying my stomach. Instead I handed him the bucket and watched him through tear-stained eyes pour some of it into the larger pot. “The dogs love it though. That’s how they all ended up here. They can smell this concoction miles away. I know I’m supposed to have two of everything but what the hell, I like dogs.” The viscous goo pouring out of the bucket smelled familiar, like concentrated pine. “Pine gum,” he said. “Some pine gum, bear fat and some wood ash and a few other odds and ends will seal this thing tighter than a duck’s ass. Old family recipe. You think finding enough birch bark was hard, try finding enough bear fat. It don’t grow on trees, you know.”
“You’re doing this all by yourself? At least Noah had a family to help.”
“Most of my family don’t talk to me much. I like to think these dogs are my family but they sure don’t help me much either. Just bark and run around a lot. Actually, they are a lot like my real family.” With that, he let out a hearty laugh. Taking a large spoon, he reached into the cauldron and scooped up a large piece of bear fat that hadn’t been rendered yet, and threw it at the dogs. Four of them scrambled to swallow it in a frenzy of barking. “Got to be careful to pick a piece that the pine gum hasn’t touched. They hate boiled pine gum. Come to think of it, I’m not to particularly fond of it myself.” He laughed again.
While still stirring, he shared his most serious expression of the afternoon. “I suppose you think I’m crazy? Building an ark like this?”
“No. No, not at all. It pays to be prepared I guess.”
“Wanna help?”
With those words, I could see a look of hope, or friendship, being expressed, an olive branch being extended. It was a big job, huge in fact. He definitely needed help. But I couldn’t help looking at the reality of the situation. He was building an ark for an up-coming flood, here in the woods of Mukwa Bay. I believe in religious tolerance, even in preparing for the future, even in Murphy’s Law, but this went beyond everything one could fit into any logical equation. Andrew’s Law dictates, “whatever can go wrong, you stay away from.”
“I don’t think so. Sorry Duanne. I’ve got other obligations”
Disappointment spread across his face. Apparently he had held serious hope I would join him in his venture. More hope than a knowledge of reality. “I guess it is a lot to ask. Thanks anyway, Andrew. I guess I’m supposed to finish this myself. But you will keep it a secret, huh? Please? I mean, I’ll tell everybody when the time comes, that’s why I’m building it. Just not right now. And I will need a lot of help later on, to go off to the zoo to get all the other animals we’ll need. You know everybody who owns a pickup truck, don’t you Andrew?”
Offering as much assistance as I could without promising anything concrete, I left Duanne North, high on the drumlin with his ark. A couple of dogs followed me down to my boat before becoming bored or convinced I had no food. I spent the rest of the afternoon sitting in our family boat, pretending to fish. I would cast, then fifteen minutes later remember to reel the lure in. I had a few nibbles but nothing struck with any real interest. All the time, I could see the white surface shining out from beneath the green foliage.
<
br /> I went home without two thousand dollars or a new motor. As I motored my way along the shoreline home, it surprised me how many white or light coloured houses lined the green shores of Otter Lake. I had promised Duanne I would keep his secret. And I would. Part of me did it out of respect for Duanne’s dream, the other, more evil part was curious to see what would happen on January 1, 2000, when Duanne unveiled his birch-bark ark to Otter Lake.
During the next few weeks, whenever I found myself near Mukwa Bay or Japland, I vainly tried to see if I could detect any evidence of something white proudly announcing its presence in the forest. But the ark was too well camouflaged, hidden too far back in the woods to be seen from civilization. Its secret held. In my mind’s eye I could see it growing, getting bigger, taking form. I estimated Duanne might have two thirds of one side done by now. Still a long way from completing it, but probably becoming more than just a dream—each day coming closer to being a reality.
Then came late September. I was taking the shortcut through Japland to a nearby small town to pick up some groceries for my mother. All along the sides of the road the birch bark trees had been harvested, the bands of black indicating where Duanne North had tapped the resources of Mother Nature to do the bidding of God. Hopefully Duanne had gotten himself enough to continue his work over the winter. Come the spring, I had a feeling Duanne would be finding himself wandering farther afield in search of more raw materials.
At one point, the road climbs halfway up another drumlin, cutting though the crest, revealing to the driver a wonderful, if momentary, vista of the surrounding area. One of the prettiest spots in the village, I often stopped there to enjoy the view. But this time it was marred by a large black cloud rolling out of the forest, about three miles west of the road. There had been no thunderstorms with lightning to start fires, and nobody I knew lived out that way. Towards Mukwa Bay. Except Duanne.
Fearing the worst, I jumped back in my car and headed toward Joplin’s Turn, the nearest spot a car could get to Duanne’s camp. Still, the Turn was over two and a half miles away from the drumlin and it took almost an hour before I reached the ark. Or what was left of it.
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