Ghosts of James Bay

by John Wilson

  The war party had withdrawn to a safer distance, leaving the warrior to watch and wait. They would return after dark to see what he had discovered. The warrior had been watching for several hours now and the sun was already touching the horizon. Small parties of Iri-akhoiw had been out hunting or collecting shellfish, but they had returned. A large fire was being built within the stockade, and through the gaps in the wall of branches, the warrior could make out moving figures.

  The warrior’s concentration was disturbed by a noise from along the beach. Another hunting party was returning. As they moved into his field of vision, the warrior almost gasped. The party was led by a wounded warrior and had captured two prisoners—the two boys from Hairy Face’s camp. Had that been the meaning of the loud noise he had heard in the morning?

  As the warrior watched, the Iri-akhoiw leader shouted. Others came out of the stockade to welcome him, and his companions prodded the boys viciously to hurry them up. Amid much shouting, the new arrivals were ushered into the stockade and the gate was closed.

  The warrior felt sad. He knew the others must be dead, so there was now no chance of contacting them and trading. He also knew the two boys soon would be dead and that the manner of their dying would not be pleasant.

  ELEVEN

  The huge fire cast its glow over everything within the stockade. Almost naked dancers, their bodies glistening with sweat, gyrated around the fire. Shadows flickering wildly over the stockade walls, the huts, and the rock against which Jack and I sat.

  It was my rock. This was my father’s camp, but much different from when I had last seen it.

  The last hour of daylight had been a nightmare of exhausted stumbling down the beach. Jack and I had been forced almost to run to keep up with our captors. If we slowed or fell down, which we did often and painfully since our hands were still tied behind us, we were beaten until we continued. My body was covered with cuts and bruises that ached dreadfully. It had been almost a relief to arrive at this fearful place where at least we could sit down.

  When we arrived, we were immediately surrounded by a mob of howling warriors. Jack and I were herded into the stockade and made to sit, still tied, with our backs to the rock, the very same rock face I had tried to climb so unsuccessfully and so often. As I glanced over at the roaring fire and the dancers, I was looking at the spot where my father’s tent would be. Was he there now, worrying about my mysterious disappearance?

  A few hours ago I had wished to be here. Now I wished to be almost anywhere else. The thought of what awaited us when the dance ended didn’t bear thinking about.

  “I fear, Al, that this is the end,” Jack said quietly beside me. “I think these salvages do not wish to trade and our ending will shortly follow the one my father found so bravely this morn. It has been a brief friendship, but I am glad to have met you. I should have liked to have visited your home.”

  “And I would have liked to show it to you,” I replied, shifting uncomfortably. “I’d also like to cut my hands loose. I think I’ve lost all the feeling in my arms.”

  “Wait!” Jack’s exclamation was so loud I had to tell him to be quiet and not attract unwanted attention, but he spoke over my protests. “The arrowhead.” I looked at his eager face in the firelight. “In my leather pouch. In the hut this morn when the salvages attacked I retrieved the head of the arrow that flew inside. I thought it might be of use. It is sharp. If you can fetch it from my bag, we might be able to cut the bonds.”

  In that moment I saw a glimpse of an escape. “Can you climb?” I asked.

  “Passably well. I have scrambled over rocks in some strange corners of the world.”

  “Good. Could you climb this rock behind us?”

  Jack tilted his head back and looked up. In the flickering firelight the face of the rock looked daunting—a patchwork of smooth, bright lumps and black shadows. I didn’t think it was necessary to tell Jack I had tried to climb it and failed. It was the only way out.

  “Perhaps,” Jack said uncertainly.

  “Good,” I repeated with as much confidence as I could muster. “Then let’s get our hands free.”

  Jack rolled onto his side with his pouch uppermost. By turning, I could just reach it. It was tied shut and I had trouble undoing the knot with my numbed fingers, but at last I succeeded.

  The first thing I felt was the square shape of Henry Hudson’s journal. It fitted snugly in the pouch and I had to slide my hand down its sides to search for the arrowhead. On one side was the gold angel; on the other was the arrowhead. The first I knew of it was as it sliced almost effortlessly through the skin of my forefinger. I had the unpleasant feeling of my skin being opened, but the arrow was so sharp there was hardly any pain. Working with less speed and more care, I grasped the broken fragment of shaft and extracted the piece of stone.

  “Can you cut your bonds?” Jack asked, rolling back into a sitting position.

  “I think so,” I replied, turning the arrowhead in my hand. By grasping the broken fragment of shaft between my thumb and forefinger, I could hold it against the cords and move it, very slightly, up and down. It kept slipping on the blood from my finger, but the sharpness was now an advantage and I soon felt the bonds loosening.

  I was so engrossed that I didn’t see one of the dancers leave the group and approach us. Jack had to nudge me painfully in the ribs. I looked up to see the figure looming over us. It was the wounded warrior who had led us back here. His wound had been cleaned and his arm was strapped to his side. He was painted like the others and his head was shaved except for a topknot from which three huge eagle feathers hung. In his right hand he held the spear I had so carefully taken from the hut that morning.

  Moving slowly, the man began his own dance in front of us. Mostly it consisted of stamping on the hard earth, but occasionally he would leap in the air. When he did so, he would wave the spear at us, often frighteningly close to our faces. It had to be some kind of test, so I determined to sit as still as possible. This seemed to work and the warrior spent more and more time taunting Jack, who flinched each time the spear was thrust at him.

  At length the man tired of the game. I watched in horror as he took one last leap into the air and plunged the spear point into Jack’s thigh. Jack’s body arced forward in shock and pain. With a loud shriek the dancer withdrew the spear and flung it away before rejoining his companions beside the fire.

  “Are you okay?” I asked urgently.

  Jack’s teeth were clenched and he was slumped forward. Gasping in pain, he leaned back and spoke. His voice was strained and his words were difficult to make out. “It hurts. I think it missed the bone and the bleeding is not too much. I do not think, though, that I will be able to climb your rock.”

  A faint smile crossed his face in the dim light. As he had been speaking, I had resumed working with the arrowhead. All at once the bonds fell loose and I could move my hands.

  It took several minutes of painful movement to regain feeling in my hands and arms fully, and I had to be careful to keep them behind me in case any of the other dancers were watching. However, they all appeared absorbed in their activities around the fire. Leaning over, I cut Jack free.

  “Thank you,” he said, clenching and unclenching his fists. “Now you must be quick. The salvage may return.”

  “But what about—” I began. But Jack cut me off with his urgent whisper. “You must go! Climb the rock. When the feelings return to my hands, I shall try to find a hole on the fence and join you. But you must hurry.”

  I looked over at my friend. I saw the sense in what he was saying. Climbing the rock, difficult though it would be, was the best chance of escape. Even if Jack managed to find and crawl through a hole in the stockade, he wouldn’t get very far with a spear hole in his thigh. If anyone was going to escape, it had to be me, and the way out was over the rock. I would have to desert Jack just as he had had to leave his father. The fact that there was no choice didn’t make it any easier. Tears formed in my eyes.

>   All along I had known that my friendship with Jack was impossible and doomed, but I liked him. I enjoyed his company and listening to him tell of his life four centuries before my own. What had I told him in return? Suddenly it was very important for me to tell him at least some of the truth of my situation. It couldn’t matter now.

  “Jack,” I began slowly, “I do come from a place called Ottawa, but it’s not the way you think. My Ottawa is many centuries in the future. Somehow in the fog out in the bay I travelled back to your time.”

  Jack absorbed this information quietly, all the while staring intently into my face as I continued. “I can’t explain it, but it’s true. I know that you, your father, and the others weren’t rescued. You all disappeared in the summer of 1611. What happened has remained one of the great mysteries of exploration. Your father became famous. The river you travelled up on the third expedition was named after him as was this great bay he discovered on this one.”

  Jack stared at me thoughtfully for a minute. “This explains much of your strangeness and the things you seem to know.” He paused, then asked, “And the Strait of Anian to the north is truly blocked by ice?”

  “Yes,” I replied. “It won’t be travelled for three hundred years and many men will die looking for it. It’s not and never can be a commercial route from west to east.”

  I hesitated, not wanting to start explaining about air travel or even steamships. Jack surprised me with his next question. It wasn’t about the wonders of the world of his future. “Why were you in the fog in your time?”

  “Well,” I began, thinking through my reasons as I spoke, “I was here, at this very rock, with my father digging in the remains of an old camp. We had found a coin, maybe the very angel you have in your pouch, and my father was trying to find more. No one believed him when he said that other Europeans were here before your father, so he had to find more evidence. The story your father told about the Jonathan proves that my father was right. But no one will believe that, either. The reason I was out in the fog was that I was feeling lonely. My father isn’t easy to talk to. He’s very wrapped up in his work and focused on proving his theories. I wanted to get away for a while.”

  Jack nodded understandingly. “I know what it is like to be lonely. My father, too, lived for one idea. Now you tell me the idea was wrong. At least his name is remembered. I was always closer to my father than my brothers. Very early I realized that I could not compete with his obsession. If I wanted to be with him, I would have to make it my obsession, as well. Thus I persuaded him to take me on his voyages. At least that way we were together. And that way I met you, my friend Al, and heard your strange tale. You have given me much to think on as I wait for what must come. But what of Juet, Greene, and the other mutineers? Did they perish in the Furious Overfall?”

  “No,” I replied, searching my memory. “Greene, I think was killed by Inuit, and Juet died of starvation, but some of the others made it back to England. Bylot did become quite famous as an explorer himself. We know what little we do from the journal kept by Abacuck Prickett.”

  “So Prickett’s writings survived. I am glad. He was a good man and not one like Greene or Juet. You must go, Al, but I have one final question that your strange foreknowledge may be able to answer. What of my mother? Does the future speak of her?”

  “A little,” I said, recalling a small footnote I had read somewhere. “She struggled to get the government to search for your father, with little success, I’m afraid. Then she went to India where she became rich in, I think, the cloth trade. She returned to England and died a wealthy woman.”

  Jack smiled. “That at least is good. Thank you, Al. I do not understand this or you, but I am comforted by your tales. I shall not find my father again, but I hope that you find yours. “Now you must go,” he continued more urgently, glancing back over at the fire. “The salvages are still busy with their dances and you must be gone before they think of us again.”

  Jack held out his hand and I took it. For a moment we sat looking into each other’s face, friends across time. Then he released me. “Go!” he said. “And God bless you.”

  Tearfully I stood, turned, and began the climb. The ground level was lower by about a metre in Hudson’s day, so the climb was longer, but the first couple of holds were easy, even in the poor light from the fire. The problem was the smooth overhang near the top. I felt almost naked in the flickering light and dreaded hearing a wild scream and the zing of arrows approaching.

  I concentrated on the rock. What was it my dad always said? The rock won’t change. You have to adapt to it.

  The shadow beneath the overhang was pitch-black. This was where I always failed. The reach over the overhang was too long and my fingers couldn’t get enough purchase to haul my body over. Maybe things would be different this time. Tentatively I reached up and over—smooth rock, polished by thousands of metres of ice grinding over it. I moved my hand from side to side. No handhold magically presented itself.

  I began to sweat, even in the cool night air. I couldn’t do it and the longer I stood here, the more chance there was that one of the dancers would look over and see me. That would be the end.

  I strained to reach farther. It felt as if I were trying to stretch my body. Still nothing. The toe of my right shoe was on a tiny protuberance, and the fingers of my left hand were wedged into a small crack. Both my foot and hand were aching. I had to do something, or I would peel off the rock and crash to the ground below.

  The rock won’t change. You have to adapt to it.

  That was it. I was thinking too linearly. At the camp with Dad the rock was an intellectual challenge. I deliberately took the straight route up because it was the most difficult. I wanted to defeat the worst the rock could throw at me. Now my goal was different. I wanted to survive.

  Gingerly I retreated a step and scanned the face. To the right the overhang looked less daunting. Slowly I felt my way across the face. The footholds were more secure here where the moving ice had plucked out pieces of rock as it ground past. I reached up with my right hand.

  Yes! There was a hold. I tested it. It appeared secure. Pushing up from my toehold, I took my weight on my arm and began hauling. My aching muscles and joints protested, but I got my left hand over and onto a grip. The overhang pushed uncomfortably into my belly and my arms felt as if they were on fire, but I was moving. I swung my leg up, got purchase, and pushed. Suddenly I was lying on top of the rock, gasping.

  Rolling over, I looked back down. The camp was laid out before me, illuminated by the fire. Several rough huts and lean-tos were scattered within the enclosure. About twenty figures cavorted and danced close to the fire, still engrossed in their ritual. I looked down, but the overhang obscured a last view of Jack.

  Slithering over the flat top of the rock, I scrambled down the much easier outward face and ran for the trees. It was a lot darker away from the fire and that, and my fearful desire to distance myself from the stockade, meant I didn’t see the figure who threw out a hand that clamped firmly over my mouth while its companion locked itself around my body.

  The warrior strained to make out the dark figure crossing the clearing from the Iri-akhoiw camp. The okimah and the war party had joined him and were crouched by his side.

  “At least one to kill,” the okimah hissed into his ear. But something was wrong. This figure was not one of the Iri-akhoiw. This was one of the captive boys.

  “No,” the warrior breathed back. “This is not Iri-akhoiw.This is one of the strangers. If he can escape, the spirits may yet have given us a way in to slay our enemies.”

  “We will capture him then,” the okimah said.

  The strange boy knew nothing of bushcraft, so the capture was easy. The warrior sat on him, hand over his mouth to silence him. The boy squinted up at him, his eyes wide with fear. The warrior placed his own finger to his lips in the sign for silence. Gradually the boy began to relax. The warrior slowly removed his hand, and the boy stayed silent.

&nbs
p; “How did you escape?” the warrior asked.

  The boy shook his head and said something the warrior could not understand. Rising, he pulled the boy to his feet. As the boy straightened, he became aware of the others in the war party and glanced around in fear at the dark shapes.

  By repeatedly pointing to the boy, the stockade, and where they now were, the warrior managed to ask how the boy had escaped. It was slow. These strangers were certainly not intelligent, but at last the boy seemed to understand. He made signs to indicate the shape of the stockade with his clenched fist to mark the rock. Then he climbed the rock with the fingers of the other hand. So that was how he had done it—over the rock. Could the war party enter that way? The warrior doubted it. Even if they were undetected, the rock was only large enough to allow one or two over at a time and the Iri-akhoiw would be able to pick them off piecemeal. But perhaps one man could get in undetected and open the stockade gate.

  With painful slowness the warrior repeatedly explained his plan in signs. It was frustrating because, any second, the Iri-akhoiw might notice the boy’s disappearance and all surprise would be lost. Eventually, to the warrior’s relief, the boy nodded. Good.

  Hurriedly whispering instructions to the others, the warrior took the boy by the arm and led him back toward the stockade. It was very strange, the warrior thought, to be going into battle with one of the intruders. This was not what he had planned, but then the spirits often organized the world in unexpected ways. Reaching the foot of the rock, the pair began silently to climb. On the other side the dancing continued unabated.

  TWELVE

  Even in the darkness away from the fire, I realized almost instantly that the man who captured me wasn’t the same as the ones in the stockade. He was wearing more clothes and had long, greasy hair hanging down on either side of his face. More important, he didn’t try to kill me but merely held me down and kept me quiet. Then he tried to talk to me. I couldn’t understand a word, but we did better with signs. I felt like an extra in a bad western TV show, but we made some progress. He wanted me to take him back into the stockade.