Purple Palette for Murder

by R. J. Harlick

  A rising plume of smoke marked a forest fire, as did another farther to the east. Apart from the odd solitary cabin on a lake, the land bore no scars of man’s presence until Digadeh loomed into view. A clutch of buildings occupied a peninsula jutting into a broad river. I could see the single brown line of a runway.

  The airport was devoid of aircraft when the wheels of my plane touched down on the gravel and taxied toward a single-storey building proclaiming itself the Digadeh airport. Any wishful thoughts of Uncle Joe’s flight being delayed were nixed the minute I asked the airport agent. The return Yellowknife flight had taken off seven minutes ago.

  The woman was more reticent when it came to telling me the direction Uncle Joe had taken. Eying me with suspicion, she at first denied knowing him. After I countered that in a community of less than three hundred it was unlikely she didn’t know one of its elders, she admitted she might have seen him but was too busy checking in the outgoing passengers to notice where he had gone. To avoid giving me his address, she picked up her ringing phone, turned her back to me, and answered the phone instead.

  I walked out of the airport hoping to find someone more forthcoming, or better yet, catch sight of the two men. But I was greeted by a long stretch of empty road lined on either side by stunted evergreens that looked more like bottle brush cleaners than trees. I was going to have to trek to the distant houses of Digadeh to find them.

  Though the day was warm, the biting black flies and mosquitos forced me to zip my Gore-Tex jacket up tightly and pull the hood down over my brow. By the time I reached the first bungalows, I was sweating and cursing the bugs.

  I stood in the middle of a gravel road that t-boned another several hockey rinks away in the direction of the water. Vinyl- and wood-clad bungalows, some in better repair than others, were scattered along either side of the street. In addition to muddy ATVs and skidoos, most had canvas tipis erected in their yards. I later learned these were used for smoking fish.

  A gaggle of school-aged girls were playing in front of one house, while a man on an ATV sped away from me. But I didn’t see the limping figure of Uncle Joe or his striding son.

  I approached a couple of elderly women coming toward me. Each carried plastic bags bulging with goods, likely bought at the windowless grey building at the bottom of the street with a faded sign announcing it to be the Digadeh General Store. They were wearing what I would also learn was the usual outfit worn by women of a certain age: a pleated skirt made from a bright satiny material, white ankle socks with dark shoes, a colourful nylon jacket, and a head scarf with cherry red, shocking pink, or royal blue as the colour of choice. An old friend, also a scarf wearer, had once told me the scarf kept her dreams from flying away.

  As was later pointed out, the outfit closely resembled the uniform these women would’ve worn at residential school when they were being taught to be well-behaved Catholic girls. The main difference was in the brightness of the colours, as if in defiance of the dull browns and greys the nuns would’ve decreed.

  The moment I saw the blank stares in answer to my question about Uncle Joe, I knew I had a language problem. We exchanged embarrassed smiles and continued on our respective journeys, though when I glanced back, the two ladies remained standing where I’d left them, eyeing me suspiciously. I gave them another hearty wave and continued walking.

  The gaggle of schoolgirls didn’t suffer from the same language difficulties or reticence as the airport agent. They gleefully told me where Uncle Joe lived and skipped along beside of me to the t-bone junction and pointed out his house, a white bungalow with a new red-shingled roof midway down the water side of the abutting street.

  His yard also sported a tipi and next to it another larger house-shaped canvas tent with a sprawling rack of caribou antlers guarding its entrance. The only mode of transportation in his weed-strewn yard was a skidoo, an Arctic Cat with the sheen of newness barely rubbed off, the kind of machine Jid drooled over. I sensed Malcolm’s role in its acquisition.

  I tramped up the wooden stairs to the front door and knocked, at first lightly and then harder. This door, too, remained firmly closed.

  “Joe’s in Yellowknife,” a man called out from the house across the street.

  “He’s back. Came in on today’s flight. Do you know where he could be?”

  “Try the community centre.” He pointed to a larger newish building farther along the water side of the street, newish only because its brown paint hadn’t faded. “He might be at Florence’s place too. She lives near the church.” I could see a steeple rising above the houses behind him. “Though come to think of it, she’s gone to their camp.” He grew silent and stared at me for a minute or two before asking, “Whaddya want with Joe?”

  I thought if I mentioned my relationship to the elder, he would be more amenable to sharing what he knew with me.

  Instead, by the time I finished introducing myself as the wife of Eric Odjik, a longtime friend of Uncle Joe and father of Teht’aa Bluegoose, I knew I had made a big mistake.

  “That the guy who killed Frank?” His eyes narrowed.

  “He’s innocent,” I retaliated.

  “Not from what I saw. He had the bloody knife in his hand.”

  It took a few seconds for his words to sink in. “You found him.” I walked closer to reduce the need for shouting. I didn’t want the whole neighbourhood listening in. “I’ve been wanting to talk to you.”

  “What for? I told the RCMP all I know.”

  “I’d like to know if you saw anyone else close by.”

  “RCMP never asked me that.” He paused as if debating whether to tell me. “What you gonna do with it if I tell you?”

  “Use it to prove my husband innocent.”

  “Your man’s a good guy. Teht’aa’s done good by him. She was having a hard time before they linked up. Yah, I’ll tell you what I saw.”

  He clambered down the stairs and stopped within whispering distance. “Frank had it coming, but Eric don’t need to be the man to take the fall, so maybe what I seen will help. Yah, I seen somebody. No one else was behind Frank’s house, except Frank and your man. But I seen someone running away. Caught a glimpse of their back when they run around the corner of the house next door.”

  “Did you recognize them?”

  “I seen them later in an ATV going to the airport.”

  “How do you know it was the same person?”

  “They were small.”

  “Like a woman?”

  He pulled a crumpled package of cigarettes from his jacket pocket and lit one. After a couple of puffs, he continued. “They was wearing a pink jacket.”

  Pink jacket. I knew one person who wore pink. “Could this person have been Gloria Bluegoose?”

  “Like I said, I didn’t see much.” He spewed out a stream of smoke and stared at me as if daring me to ask the next question.

  “Does anyone else in Digadeh wear a pink jacket?”

  He ground the toe of his running shoe into the dirt. “Larry’s kid. Her auntie give it to her. But she’s away at a school.”

  I think I had my answer. “Gloria has gone to Florence’s hunting camp. I need someone to take me there.” I was hoping he would offer, for I was suspecting that Uncle Joe and Malcolm had already left.

  “Joe can take you.”

  “Do you know where I can find him?”

  “Sure. Turn around.”

  I whirled around and almost fell into the old man.

  forty-eight

  Without a word, not even a grunt of greeting, the old man shuffled across the street to his house with me trying to walk slowly enough to keep from bumping into him.

  “Want me to send the RCMP to the camp?” his neighbour called out.

  “Nope,” was the clipped reply.

  “But Uncle Joe,” I said, mounting the front steps after his lumbering form. “Glori
a might’ve killed Frank. That man saw her leaving the crime scene.”

  “Yup.”

  “Yup what? That you knew she killed her cousin or that she was seen leaving?”

  “He beat Gloria up. Send her to the hospital many times.” He opened the door and stepped inside.

  “Did they live together?” I followed him into a surprisingly neat kitchen. Surprising, because I’d never known a man to put anything away, not even Eric.

  He grunted an answer I couldn’t decipher.

  “Is Frank the father of Gloria’s child?”

  Another grunt, which I took to be a yes.

  “What about Teht’aa? Did he beat her too?”

  “He hurt her real bad, long time ago.”

  “What about the assault last week?”

  “Gloria know.”

  “Are you saying that Gloria went after Frank because of what he did to her cousin, the only person, besides you, who cared enough to help her?”

  Another grunt.

  “Why haven’t you told this to the police? It would prove Eric’s innocence.”

  “It take time. He understand.”

  “Is Gloria the person he’s protecting?” I could see my husband wanting to help someone he viewed as a victim. He would want to prevent her from ruining her life completely, especially if he thought the killing was justified.

  “Ready to go?” he asked, avoiding my question.

  I gave up. “Go where? To the camp?”

  “Yup.”

  “Where’s Malcolm?”

  “He already gone.”

  “Why didn’t you go with him?”

  “I wait for you.”

  “I thought you didn’t want me.”

  “You stubborn. I know you come.” His eyes twinkled.

  He opened various cupboards, telling me to take the food I wanted. Since it was more than a day to Florence’s camp, we would be camping overnight.

  “You like sleeping under stars? I got no tent.”

  “No problem, but I don’t have a sleeping bag.”

  “I have plenty gear.”

  “Wait a minute, I can’t go. I have to be back in Yellowknife tomorrow for Eric.”

  “More better you come with me.”

  “Why? What do you mean?”

  Once again I was treated to his avoidance tactic as he clamped his mouth shut and focused on a bulky vinyl canoe pack leaning against the fridge. He dragged it into the middle of the kitchen with more strength than I thought he had in him. He crammed my selection of two soup cans and one of baked beans between faded Hudson’s Bay Company blankets and a battered metal pot.

  He added a bag of flour. “For bannock. We eat fish too. You good fisherman?”

  “Nope.” I didn’t have the patience.

  “I teach you.”

  Before I went any further, I had to ask the question. “Are you aware that Malcolm is part of this mining scheme with Reggie and Hans?”

  “Yup,” he answered without hesitation.

  It so startled me that I took a good minute to hone in on the implication. “Are you involved too?”

  “No more talk. We go.” He cinched the pack up tightly and with a mighty heave, thrust his arms through the straps and hefted it onto his back.

  “You bring beer.” He nodded in the direction of a red Coleman cooler standing next to the back door.

  “Beer?”

  “Good for talking. Beer don’t work, I use gun.” He picked up the rifle propped against the wall and headed outside. “Close door behind you.”

  I lifted the heavy chest with both hands, balancing it on the outside railing while I dutifully closed the door and clambered down the stairs after him. I stumbled on an unseen rock, almost dropping the weight on my feet before regaining my balance. I let it drop on the sand beside an aluminum motorboat lying within dragging distance of the water. While the boat looked as if it had encountered numerous rocks over its lifetime, the raised 50 hp Mercury outboard motor still wore the manufacturer’s stickers. Another gift from Malcolm, as I suspected the fancy canoe pack was.

  Feeling confused and nervous, I decided to try again. “Why don’t I run over to the detachment and get the police to come with us?”

  “No RCMP,” he growled.

  “We could be heading into a dangerous situation.”

  “It family matter. You don’t like, you stay.”

  He pushed against the boat’s bow in an effort to shove it into the water. It didn’t budge. I joined him, and together we managed to move it a half foot until it ground to a halt.

  “Move, aside, Joe,” a familiar voice ordered.

  Uncle Joe’s neighbour and another man easily dragged the boat into the water. The neighbour walked it out until it floated while the other man hefted the heavy pack onto his shoulder and dumped it into the boat. He smiled broadly as he placed the cooler beside the pack. “Party time, eh?” He tossed the rifle and a paddle with a clatter into the aluminum hull.

  “Whaddya doing with the beer, Joe?” the neighbour asked. “Ya know it ain’t legal. You even approved the alcohol ban when you was on council.”

  Ignoring him, the old man waded out to his boat with little regard for the water lapping against his high-sided moccasins. The neighbour helped him climb over the side and into the boat.

  “You coming?” Uncle Joe asked.

  When I hesitated, he said, “Don’t matter you tell the RCMP. They don’t know where camp is.”

  I sought support from the neighbour, but he merely motioned for me to get in the boat.

  In the end Uncle Joe made the decision for me. The frailty he was to trying so hard to pretend didn’t exist convinced me that I couldn’t let him go alone.

  I removed my trail shoes and socks, rolled up my jeans, and stepped into the water. Gasping, I almost jumped back out. It was cold, bloody cold. I didn’t think I’d ever stepped into such icy water. I waded as quickly as I could without getting my jeans soaked, tossed my purse into the boat, and climbed in with a boost from the neighbour.

  His whispered words, “I tell Kirk,” made me feel marginally less uneasy, as long as “Kirk” was the name of one of the cops.

  He pushed us out into deeper water. Uncle Joe had the motor revving with one click of the starter. We putted out into the deeper water. With a brief wave of thanks to the men on shore, the old man turned up the throttle, and off we shot into the great unknown.

  forty-nine

  I have paddled many miles by canoe, but farther south where the trees lining a shore can blot out the sun, the rivers are more narrow than broad, the water more turbulent than flat, and the lakes mirror the surrounding forests as much as they do the sky. So I wasn’t prepared for the vastness of this northern land.

  When Teht’aa first mentioned her community of Wolf River or Digadeh, I’d assumed it lay beside a river. But the broad expanse of water, the wind-whipped waves crashing over the bow of Uncle Joe’s boat, seemed more like a lake to me. Though both shores were fringed with trees, I doubted even the tallest would blot out the sun. Down south I barely paid attention to the sky other than to note that the sun was shining or rain was on its way. I couldn’t avoid it here. It filled the frame from north to south, east to west. This land of the Tlicho could give Montana hefty competition for the moniker “Big Sky Country.”

  At that moment the sky was a brilliant deep blue, but a stretch of intermittent white suggested clouds were moving in. Given the force of the wind that had buffeted us on shore, it wouldn’t take long. A wind, I might add, with few natural barriers. The surrounding land was for the most part low, with only the occasional rise of a hill to interrupt its passage. It was also the kind of wind that would keep canoeists wind-bound on the shore. Though I preferred the quiet propulsion of a paddle over the ear-shattering roar of an outboard, I was glad we
had fifty horses to power us.

  From the grin on Uncle Joe’s face, he was liking it too and taking full advantage of motor’s unfettered acceleration. He piloted the boat like he did the BMW, swerving in and out of a string of rock islands as if they were course obstacles. While I half expected the bottom of the boat to be torn out by a submerged rock, I knew it wasn’t likely. The old man would have every hidden obstacle on this river memorized.

  I hung on to the gunnels to keep from being knocked out of the boat by the pounding waves. After a particularly strong one almost drowned me, I turned around and watched the buildings of Digadeh retreat. Although my Gore-Tex jacket kept me dry, it didn’t stop the icy water and wind from sending shivers down my spine. The wet patches on my jeans didn’t help either. But there was little I could do. My extra clothing was locked inside Malcolm’s house. At least I had gloves. I put them on.

  Despite his wet moccasins and the soaked jeans clinging to his legs, not to mention the thinness of his nylon jacket, Uncle Joe appeared not the least bothered by the cold. But he must’ve noticed my shivering, for he shouted “Blanket” above the engine’s roar, pointed to the pack, and gave it a kick in my direction.

  I pulled out a blanket and wrapped it tightly around me. Worried it could be my bed for the night, I took special care to keep it away from the water sloshing around in the bottom of the boat. Though Uncle Joe had reduced the speed to prevent further deluges, the engine noise was still too loud to talk. I admired the passing scenery and worried over what awaited us at Florence’s camp.

  I was confused. While I could understand and accept Gloria’s killing of Frank, I couldn’t see her deliberately framing Eric for the murder. At no time in our conversations had I sensed a dislike for my husband, a dislike so strong that she would willingly ruin his life. Nor could I see her planning the murder in such a cold, calculating manner.

  The young woman I had come to know struck me more as the kind of person who gave little thought to her actions. She operated on emotions. If she did kill Frank, it was either a spur-of-the-moment response to something he did to her, such as another beating, or it was revenge for his assault on Teht’aa. The only way she had known to stop the never-ending abuse was to kill him.