Blue Ravens: Historical Novel

by Gerald Vizenor

  The train stopped at the same godly towns that we had counted on our way to war last summer. A year later nothing seemed to have changed, nothing but the memory of many soldiers who would not return from the First World War.

  Ogema Station was almost at the end of the railroad line, so we observed the exaltation at every station for the soldiers who had survived, and at the same time the great sorrow for the wounded and the many soldiers who had died in combat and were buried in France. More than a hundred thousand American soldiers had died in the war, and twice as many soldiers were wounded in service with the American Expeditionary Forces.

  The railroad stations were decorated with patriotic banners, and as the train arrived parents and teachers coached the children to salute with one hand and with the other hand wave miniature Stars and Stripes. The soldiers who returned that summer were hardly prepared to become the precious resurrection of patriotism and cheap labor in wearisome small towns.

  Patch was seated at the window with his trumpet and at the ready to play military taps at every railroad stop between Chicago and the Ogema Station on the White Earth Reservation. Naturally, we were moved by the sound of ceremonial taps, and yet we were constantly reminded of the political misuse of the rituals of honor and the extravagance of patriotism at every station.

  Aloysius painted nothing on our return to the reservation. He could not paint the reversal of war. In that sense our return was an absence of creative motion and energy. We were both inspired by the mystery, anxiety, and irony of the passage to war, to the country of our ancestors of the fur trade, but the actual return was futile, and the sense of vain nostalgia only increased with the patriotic hurrah and celebrations at each station.

  My brother turned away from the romantic praise of uniforms, heroic war rumors, and courage promoted by military decorations. He honored only the actual soldiers, and could not imagine any scene of our reversal that was worth painting. The blue ravens refused to return to the reservation that summer at the end of the war. The homey overtones of peace, the war to end wars, were deceptions and scarcely worth comment, paint, or conversation.

  The fury of the war continued in our memories, and there were no easy reversals of our experiences as scouts. The wistful notion of peace was more of a hoax, a theatrical and political revision, than a turnaround of hatred and remorse. Count more than fifteen million bloody bodies, twenty million wounded soldiers, and then consider the use of the word peace over wine, banquet conversations, and war memories.

  The French count more than a million dead soldiers, or about four percent of the national population. The survivors must honor the dead at the end of war, but not by the political return to the deceit of national and cultural peace.

  Naturally, we embraced the presence of the seasons, chance, native stories, and memories, but the horror of the war, and our experiences as combat scouts became a burden of nasty shadows and a revulsion of the political postures of patriotism. Yes, we were once soldiers, but never the patriots of a nostalgic culture of peace. Most soldiers returned to small towns and cities. We returned to a federal occupation on the reservation. Our return to the reservation was neither peace nor the end of the war. The native sense of chance and presence on the reservation had always been a casualty of the civil war on native liberty.

  My spirit had been wounded by the war, but the notion of a bruised war memory was much too conceited an emotion to share with others in conversations. The soldiers with actual bloody wounds of combat, shattered, burned, blistered, disfigured faces, and severed limbs deserved the greatest honors, quiet honors, cautious humor, and the humane native tease of remembrance.

  I was aware of my wounds when we hawked newspapers and first visited the library in Minneapolis. The comparisons of federal and church politics on the reservation, the repressive government schools, and the generous cosmopolitan world of art and literature revealed the wounds of my spirit.

  Even more of a burden, my spirit was weakened by the sudden death of Augustus. He demanded that we learn about other worlds, and he was not sentimental or romantic. My uncle always lived by the native courage of resistance, and at the same time he celebrated chance and the ironies of liberty. He was direct, difficult, tricky, a steady teacher, and never wavered in his loyalty.

  There were great native stories but no inspired literature or art on the reservation, and it was not easy on our return from the war to imagine otherwise. My mother would understand, of course, but she would be over burdened because of her perception and empathy of my moody ideas about an indefinable and wounded spirit.

  I know my mother had read the published stories about the war, and since the end of the war my stories have obviously avoided the gratuitous and conceited notions of my abstract wounds and miseries. Surely she understood that there were more war scenes that were not published in my stories.

  I watched the reflection of my face on the train window, the ethereal motion of my eyes in the trees and meadows, and was reminded of that moment outside the art gallery ten years earlier when the setters and our faces in the window moved with other faces on the streetcar. I considered the creation of my stories in motion, a great literature of motion, but not on the reservation.

  Paris easily came to mind, and especially in motion on the train. My memories turned easily to the stories of the banquet and to that marvelous dinner party with Marie Vassilieff and Nathan Crémieux at Le Chemin du Montparnasse.

  I read book nine of The Odyssey as the train departed from the Milwaukee Road Depot in Minneapolis. There is nothing better or more delightful than when a whole people make merry together, with the guests sitting orderly to listen, while the table is loaded with bread and meats, and the cup bearer draws wine and fills his cup for every man. This is indeed as fair a sight as a man can see. Now, however, since you are inclined to ask the story of my sorrows, and rekindle my own sad memories in respect of them, I do not know how to begin, nor yet how to continue and conclude my tale, for the hand of heaven has been laid heavily upon me.

  › 18 ‹

  BANQUET FRANCAIS

  — — — — — — — 1919 — — — — — — —

  The Soo Line Railroad engineer sounded the screechy whistle four times as the train approached the decorated platform of the Ogema Station. The soldiers on the train were mostly our relatives, fur trade boys from the White Earth Reservation.

  William Hole in the Day, Ignatius Vizenor, Charles Beaupré, and Fred Casebeer were honored by five traditional native elders at the train station, and our cousin Ellanora Beaulieu, who had served as a nurse and died of influenza at the end of the war, was honored with the soldiers.

  Corporal Lawrence Vizenor, our cousin, who had received the Distinguished Service Cross, was revered that late afternoon for his extraordinary bravery in combat with the enemy.

  Then seventeen other soldiers who had served in the war were honored at the station. The beat of the drums was strong and steady, and the native soldiers were ordered to stand at attention on the platform. The traditional singers and elders wore native ceremonial vests, beaded sashes, and carried medicine bundles. The spirited voices of the elders reached to the thunderclouds, and the sound rose above the steady steam of the train engine.

  We honor the flag

  We honor your bravery

  And we sing to honor

  Your return as warriors.

  Patch Zhimagaanish played ceremonial taps on his trumpet. We saluted the elders, and then at the verge of rage shouted out the names of the dead, Hole in the Day, Vizenor, Beaupré, Casebeer, Beaulieu, to honor the memory of their spirits and native presence as warriors. Public tributes to the warriors and the native dead were never the end of stories, or a truce of remembrance, and likewise peace was never a reversal of war memories.

  Father Aloysius gestured with the sign of the cross, and then he bowed his head to honor the singers and the soldiers. I was moved by the songs, by the honors, and then looked to the thunderclouds over the station.<
br />
  The railroad engineer waited for the ceremonies to conclude. He had delivered soldiers to many towns since the end of the war, but had never delayed the schedule of the train until our arrival at the Ogema Station. The engineer admired natives and he was especially impressed by the dedication of Patch Zhimagaanish. The entire memorial scene would have been shrouded in steam, and the sound of native singers, drumbeats, and trumpet obscured had the engineer started the great engine on schedule.

  Odysseus stood near the railroad engineer, and at the end of the honors and native ceremonies he moved slowly through the crowd on the platform, and sang loudly the patriotic anthem, “My Country, ’Tis of Thee.”

  We were not surprised that he had heightened the anthem with the addition of new verses. As the trader walked and sang others joined in the music, and the crowd on the platform became a great patriotic choir. Men and women removed their hats, touched their hearts, and sang to the thunderclouds.

  My country, ’tis of thee,

  Sweet land of liberty,

  Of thee I sing;

  Land where my fathers died

  …

  From ev’ry mountainside

  Let freedom ring!

  …

  My native country, thee,

  Where all men are born free, if white’s their skin;

  I love thy hills and dales,

  Thy mounts and pleasant vales;

  But hate thy negro sales, as foulest sin.

  Odysseus had omitted a single line from the original patriotic song, Land of the Pilgrim’s Pride, and then included a selection from the sardonic verses written by an abolitionist. The trader was never reluctant to tease anyone with an ironic reference to the pride of pilgrims and native land. The station choir hesitated over the absent verse, and then most natives sang along with the revised section of the anthem.

  Odysseus inspired most of the natives at the station, but never the federal agent who frowned at the words “negro sales” and was clearly pained by the irony of music. Foamy had never been at ease with natives or at public events. I smiled and waved to the agent, but he knew my gestures were not sincere. He turned to leave and never honored the soldiers.

  Naturally, our parents were there at the train station. They had waited in the shade near the ticket office with the station agent, and then when the ceremonies ended they pushed through the crowd and beamed with excitement.

  Margaret reached out and embraced Aloysius. Honoré hobbled down the platform and clutched my shoulders with his huge hands, a memorable moment because my father was seldom affectionate. He had injured his right leg in a logging accident last winter and could no longer work in the woods as a lumberjack. My father continued to hold my right shoulder for support as we talked about the troop ships, enemy submarines, rough seas, military food, and the trains crowded with soldiers.

  My father rightly praised Patch for his dedication and good nature, and for playing military taps to honor the soldiers at every station. I decided not to reveal that afternoon my critical thoughts about the rage of patriotism and the deceit of peace.

  Honoré asked me about the portrayal of painted faces in my stories as a scout. He wondered who had taught us how to paint our faces as warriors, and seemed rather concerned over my simple explanation that the decorations were invented, and nothing more. We painted our faces only to menace the enemy.

  Margaret worried when she read my stories about the enemy machine guns, and the destruction of so many towns. She was ready to care for the children of the war. Aloysius mentioned the hungry children on the streets of Paris.

  Honoré was rather talkative at the station, which was unusual, and vexed that we had served in the occupation, the enemy camp of the Germans. He expressed the native sense of the enemy way, and declared that native warriors should never carry out an occupation of the enemy. Capture, liberate, or terminate, but never occupy.

  I moved closer to hear my father, and touched his face as the engine roared out of the station. He stared at me, and then smiled, but did not move away. I tried but could not remember the image of his rugged face that year in France. Honoré was moved and actually embraced me, a heartfelt but awkward motion. He was protective, distant, never severe, and hardly listened to me as a child. No doubt the scenes in my published stories, his worries about the war, the stature of two sons in uniform, and our return without wounds brought tears to his eyes.

  John Leecy provided the transportation from the station to an informal reception for the veterans at the hotel. The Ford truck was new and had been converted with seats in the back, similar to the ambulances in the war. The familiar horse-drawn wagon was no longer necessary. He explained that in the past year there were fewer travelers, more motor cars on the reservation, and the hotel no longer had a reason to provide a livery stable.

  John was discreet and diplomatic at the reception, and handed out personal and formal printed invitations to Odysseus, Doctor Mendor, Misaabe, Catherine Heady, Shona Goldman, a cultural anthropologist who studied totems and music of the fur trade, Basile Beaulieu, Aloysius Beaulieu, Patch Zhimagaanish, and Lawrence Vizenor, who had returned a few months earlier, to a special Banquet Français at the Hotel Leecy. The banquet was scheduled a week later. Lawrence and Patch had never been invited to the high table. Patch pressed his uniform, and polished his bugle.

  The soldiers were feted for two weeks, dinners, celebrations, services, salutes, and then the dreadful memories of the war returned with the solitude of the lakes and forests. The native soldiers who were once the military occupiers had returned to the ironic situation of the occupied on a federal reservation.

  Margaret prepared a delightful family dinner for everyone that night at our home near Mission Lake. Father Aloysius saluted each and every soldier at the train station, and later that night he arrived with two bottles of sacramental wine from the namesake Beaulieu Vineyards of Napa Valley, California.

  Prohibition of alcohol would soon be the new national law, but alcohol was already banned on reservations so the only real worry was the federal agent. My mother thought it was shrewd to invite the agent to dinner. Maybe so, the agent always came by without an invitation. Foamy, of course, declined the invitation with regrets, but we knew he would appear in time for dessert. Father Aloysius, in the spirit of the moment, insisted that we toast the peace, honor the dead, and finish the bottles of wine with dinner and before the dessert visitation of the nosey agent.

  Margaret and Honoré prepared fresh walleye pike, roasted chicken, wild rice with bacon, corn, carrots, potatoes, and blueberry pie. I was home with friends and family and my wounds of the spirit were easily disguised that night at dinner.

  Patch deserved the greatest recognition, and his service as the regimental bugler was rightly celebrated. Everyone was moved by the story that he had played taps at every station on the route of the Soo Line Railroad. I told the story about the power of his magnificent baritone voice, and the incredible moment last Christmas Eve when he sang the French National Anthem, La Marseillaise, from a fortress overlooking the Rhine River and Koblenz, Germany.

  John Clement Beaulieu, our cousin, learned several love songs when he was in France, and he wanted Patch to sing La Marseillaise that night at dinner. We were the descendants of the fur trade, and the anthem of fraternité, égalité, and liberté was necessary on the White Earth Reservation.

  Father Aloysius praised the service of the soldiers, and twice repeated that so many were from the White Earth Reservation. He raised his glass to toast the memory of those who returned only in spirit. Michael Vizenor and Angeline Cogger pointed to a picture of their son, and our cousin, Ignatius Vizenor. My mother had thoughtfully placed two framed pictures on the sideboard to honor the memory of Ignatius and Ellanora Beaulieu. Angeline recounted a tender version of the familiar story that Ignatius was coddled at night in a cigar box because he was so tiny as a baby.

  Father Aloysius surprised me with an exaggerated and ironic story about the holy baptism of
Ignatius at Saint Benedict’s Catholic Mission. The priest related that the mission sisters worried that the tiny baby might be doused, so a sacramental finger thimble from the school sewing class was used to measure the holy water.

  Margaret naturally collected my seven published stories in the series French Returns. She bound the newsprint with a ribbon, and placed the stack of stories on the sideboard next to the photographs. On the wall above the sideboard were two framed paintings, scenes of blue ravens at the train station and at the White Earth Hospital.

  Reverend Clement Hudon Beaulieu, our uncle, praised my stories and promised as the new editor of the Tomahawk to continue the publication of the newsprint series once or twice a month, but with a new title, French Returns: The New Fur Trade. Yes, and my uncle agreed that the theme of my new stories would obviously be on native veterans.

  Foamy arrived with the precision of a master dessert spy, and at the same time he tried to detect the trace of alcohol. He nosed the laughter and easy conversations, but we had already consumed the sacramental wine with multiple toasts two hours earlier, and the bottles had been buried out back with fish guts, bones, and chicken feathers.

  The Tomahawk had reported that the Eighteenth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States had been ratified and would become the prohibition of alcohol law on January 17, 1920. Actually we read that the Wartime Prohibition Act banned alcohol to conserve grain during the war, but the war had already ended when the law was passed.

  The federal government had banned the use and sale of alcohol on the reservation. Foamy was the enforcer, and he took pleasure in the capture of native drinkers and traders who provided the alcohol. The agent was born nasty, sober, reactionary, authoritarian, and his conceit was hardened with the arrogance of an outsider. The greyback might have been more likable as a drinker. He demonstrated the absolute absence of any sense of humor, irony or compassion for natives.

  Foamy anticipated the national ban on alcohol and decided to enforce prohibition with a vengeance, a triple prosecution of the ratified and future law, the federal law to conserve grain, and the common prohibition of alcohol of any kind on reservations. So, our toasts that night were mighty violations of prohibition. The ceremonial use of sacramental wine was exempt from the prohibition laws, and so we designated the dinner reception a sacred ceremonial service.