Hay Stack
He was sore, spiritually sore, so he went to the church and sat in a hard wooden pew. The bush dance had gone on all night. Barnes had blundered about, mostly doing a boxer’s shuffle. He’d drunk whiskey. As always, it went straight to his head. His shuffle had turned into a lumbering jig and he’d stumbled out the door. In separate visits to the woods, first with Doris and then Valentine, he’d encountered a frightening degree of responsive kissing. Also, biting. Valentine had left her marks. The evidence was still upon him. He was pretty sure things could have gone further. But his feelings were with Pixie! Weren’t they? Perhaps he was becoming promiscuous. How could he possibly go on teaching and boxing and training the other boxers, especially his protégé, when he was now attracted to three separate women at the same time and they all were, he imagined, the dearest of friends? It was a relief, but also upsetting, that he could think of anybody besides Pixie Paranteau.
The air in the church was soothing and faintly scented with spice. Perhaps incense. He was not a Catholic. He didn’t know how to make the sign of the cross, but he waved his hand across his chest with a pleading gesture and looked up at the statue of the mother of god. She was fixed inside a painted oval with pointed ends. It reminded him of the mare at Homecoming. His mind careened from that thought. The oval was lined with red and decorated with golden points directed sharply inward. Within the center, she floated. Her gaze darted here and there as the light changed, an eerie effect. She was definitely keeping an eye on him. At no time did she seem to approve. And there were even times she hinted that he should adjourn the encounter. Just go his way and leave people here to live out their lives without interference from Mr. Barnes. Hay Stack Barnes. He didn’t like it, but everybody up here had a nickname. And it could have been worse.
But here he was. He meant to face his problem head-on.
First, there was Pixie, of course. Oh, he’d been through all of that. There wasn’t a known inch left unlonged for, undesired, uncataloged, although there was of course much unknown.
Second, there was Valentine. What a perfect heart-shaped name for a woman whose face wasn’t heart-shaped at all, but thin, a narrow face, slippery eyes. Valentine was a bit sly, like a lady fox. Yes, a dainty lady fox trotting through the woods with a dead rabbit drooping in her jaws. Not exactly . . .
He pressed his jugular vein, his shoulder, a place on his chest where she’d actually drawn blood. Was it normal?
Third, surprisingly, Doris Lauder with her skin moist and white as a peeled apple. And that little hint of baby fat beneath her jaw and waist was just delectable. Her round arms and solid legs. The honey-brown red of her waves of hair. Clipped back, it wasn’t much, but when she let it fly out! Oh, she was a russet peach. A toothsome tempter. And she was a known quantity at that, being not an Indian, which made her less exotic and fascinating. But maybe he’d had it with the fascination. Maybe he just wanted a nice girl he didn’t have to work to impress. Maybe just a person whom he knew what was what with and who knew what was what with him.
“Here you are,” said Thomas Wazhashk. He slid into the pew beside Barnes and removed his mittens. He was dressed for winter in a heavy coat with a knitted muffler. “I’ve been cold,” he said.
“I’m just praying a little,” said Barnes.
“I came to do the same thing,” said Thomas. “And I did. Had a little talk with Jesus way back in the corner. Sat there waiting for you to get up and walk back outside where I could bend your ear. But I need to leave now, so I decided to bother you. For which I don’t mean to intrude.”
“No, that’s all right,” said Barnes, flattered at having the sort of solitude someone could intrude upon. “What was it? I’m all done with my praying.”
“It’s about putting up a boxing card,” said Thomas. “We are going to have to raise funds to send a delegation.”
“It’s about the bill, right?”
Thomas nodded. “It’s not as if the government is going to give us money to go and testify against what they are aiming to do. So we are going to have to raise the money ourselves. They’ve set the time. We’re on the March calendar. We have to be ready with everything by then.”
“You mean”—Barnes was groping for the right set of words—“you provide testimony? That sort of thing?”
“Put up a lot of evidence against it. That’s right. We are contacting a tribal scholar, too. She might be our secret weapon. And we need to pay for train tickets, a place to stay.”
“So. A boxing card.”
“With a cover charge. I figure if we put Wood Mountain up against Joe Wobble again we’ll fill the house.”
“I think you’re right. But maybe Joe, or maybe Wood, aren’t interested in a fight. It wasn’t a good fight. I have questions.”
“You’re not alone. That’s why a repeat of that fight would draw a crowd.”
“Yes,” said Barnes, “I can see that. We could use the community center. I can get Mr. Jarvis to put in a loudspeaker of some kind. We can get a real bell, not from the post office.”
“And the right kind of ropes.”
“Pretty girls. Scorecards,” said Barnes, in hope.
“No,” said Thomas.
“Well, a thought.”
Thomas nodded. He didn’t want to see Sharlo walk around with a number raised high overhead to be whistled at and leered at by rough men. It would be a clean fight and other boxers on the card, to lead up to the big event.
“If he’s fighting Joe Wobble again,” said Barnes, “I’d better get to work on him now.”
This had set him free, he thought later, as he made his way out of the church. If he was working on Wood Mountain for the good of his people, then nothing—not his delicious but distressing feelings for all three of the girls, not even his secret rivalry with his star boxer—would mean more than getting Wood Mountain into fighting shape to beat Joe Wobleszynski.
* * *
Funny how things happened, because that same week who should walk into the Four Bees restaurant looking forward to a farmer’s breakfast but Joe Wobleszynski himself. And there was Barnes, hair combed down and held flat on his head with water so it resembled one of the golden pancakes he was forking off his stack. Barnes greeted Joe as he walked by, shook hands, invited him to sit down since he was alone. Joe declined to order food and said he was supposed to meet a friend, but he could sit with Barnes for a coffee at least. There were no hard feelings there. Or anywhere, really, with Joe Wobble. He was not out to demolish his opponent’s coach, or even his opponent, outside the ring.
“Would you be up for it?” asked Barnes, when he’d described the venue, the reason for the card.
“Would I be getting a percentage here?”
“It’s for that trip to Washington for them to testify, like I said. Nobody’s benefiting. But it might help your standings if you definitively beat my guy.”
“Yeah, I didn’t like that whole timekeeper thing. It made me look like I was losing.”
“You’re a good man,” said Barnes.
“Maybe. I don’t know why I should care if they go to Washington.”
“Don’t you know any Indians?”
“What do you think? Hell yes, they work for us.”
“On your farm, right?”
“Stone Boy family, couldn’t do without them. They’re good Indians. I started sparring with Revard, you know.”
“He never said! He’s improving. Now I know the reason,” said Barnes, all strategic generosity.
“He’s a strong kid,” said Joe, smiling down into his coffee.
“You’d make a good coach,” said Barnes, in earnest. “Look here. I found out some stuff. If this termination thing goes through, we all lose. I’ll be out of a job. They’ll be moving people off this reservation—won’t be one anymore—the Stone Boys will end up in the Cities. This place is hollowing out already.”
“I see that,” said Joe. “My brother’s off in Fargo and says he likes it.”
“I’m not a big one for cities,” said Barnes. “I wouldn’t mind living out here.”
Joe looked serious. “We’ll have to find you a girlfriend.”
Barnes waved his hand, not cheerfully. “Don’t bother. I got that covered.”
More than covered, thought Barnes, as Joe rose to meet his friend. Barnes watched. Square as a brick house Joe was, but leaning a fraction to the left, visible when he sat down in another booth with his friend. Barnes watched Joe’s back for a few more minutes, noted that his left shoulder was definitely lower than the right. Good to know.
“Wobble’s lopsided,” Barnes said to Wood Mountain. “I don’t know what it means, but it could be something to study.”
Barnes had broken down and bought a speed bag with his own money. Wood Mountain was making it go.
“He walked kind of like this, sat kind of like that,” said Barnes, replicating the left-leaning walk, the droop of shoulder. “Could be he got injured. Or maybe there’s a weak spot in his training, something’s off. We got to keep that in mind.”
“Okay,” said Wood Mountain. “Or maybe he was just a little off that day. Or maybe he’s putting the fake on you.”
“The fake? Could that be true?” Barnes was struck by the possibility.
“I dunno. But it makes sense somebody might try that.”
“Like us,” said Barnes. “Let me think.”
“Nobody’s stopping you,” said Wood Mountain.
“I got it,” said Barnes. “You’re gonna wear a fake plaster cast on your right hand up your wrist. Just for a couple weeks. Take it off to train, but no other time. Nobody sees you without it. I’ll get Jarvis to make it—he’s good at theater props.”
“Seems kind of underhanded,” said Wood Mountain.
“Ha-ha!”
“Ha-ha what? Oh, underhanded! That’s a good one!”
For the next half hour they came back to the joke again and again, finding more hilarity in it each time. They agreed it was a real shame they couldn’t tell the joke around to people.
“It would become a classic,” said Wood Mountain, a bit wistful. He hardly ever got off a good one.
“You winning will be a classic. So let’s keep our mouths shut,” said Barnes.
Thwack
Wood Mountain had begun to worry. The sound she made chopping wood last time had actually aroused him. Just a little. The clean split, the sureness of it, the certainty, the sound of her ax meeting the wood. Each of her strokes was accurate and powerful. There was just something to it he could not describe. Something it did to him. A shiver inside. A flipping fluttering. A warm drench of sensation that he’d hidden by suddenly sitting down in the chair and leaning up close to the table, with the baby, who regarded him with a gummy smile. Who the hell could resist? Zhaanat turned from her little stove and set a camp bowl on the table. She’d made him oatmeal, no raisins, no sugar, nothing. It had to be they were scraping bottom that week. It was Thursday.
Zhaanat saw him staring at the oatmeal.
“Don’t worry,” she said. “Our girl gets paid tomorrow.”
She took the baby and began to feed him drops of oatmeal pablum on the edge of a spoon. The baby seemed to think it was a sumptuous treat, so Wood Mountain also ate the oatmeal, slowly, as the chopping went on. Thwack. Thwack. Goddamn. Cracks in his chest. Softness floating out. Thwack. Thwack. How could she do this to him? He flashed on her as the waterjack. He wanted to punch himself.
* * *
Barnes had got his uncle to come give Wood Mountain his wisdom. He was there the next day, a skinny fellow, excitable, with hair just like Barnes, sticking out over his ears on every side like a busted bale of hay. He also wasn’t called the Music for nothing. There was actual music involved in his training regimen. He had brought an electric turntable and he played records, the latest ones, at the highest volume, fast and furious, to inspire jump-roping, cross-skipping, double-jumping. He worked the rhythm of Wood Mountain’s combinations with speeded-up versions of “El Negro Zumbón” and of “Crazy Man, Crazy” by Bill Haley and His Comets. The songs he used stuck in Wood Mountain’s brain and they were all he could hear. They colored his world. His fists began to move with their own life.
The Tonsils
Since the Homecoming weekend and what Valentine and Doris referred to as “the chirps,” which had something to do with a bush dance, riding in the backseat had become even more annoying for Patrice. It was as if they were talking in a secret language up there, referring to certain incidents with nonsense words. But who cared. What did they know? The two seemed so young that she envied them, and so ignorant that she despised them. Scorn burned behind her tongue as she sat there in the backseat gazing out the window, a serene look pasted on her face. There was more than enough to occupy her thoughts. At home Gwiiwizens was coming out of his new-baby slumbers. Along with his charming, gurgly laugh, he was beginning to use his stare. He had an unnerving stare. Not soft, like other babies, but hard. When his eyes fixed on Patrice they drilled right into her soul. It was like he had something to tell her. Had Vera left a message with him? A location? A demand? Would he remember to tell her when he learned to speak? Her heart beat faster. By then it would be too late. So far there was no word from anyone Thomas contacted down in the Cities, and no word from the one who might know. Bernadette had to know. If Patrice went back down there, if she waited outside Bernadette’s house, if she cornered Bernadette, could she find out what had become of her sister?
At work, she carefully sized up the others. Was there anyone who would possibly give up sick days, the way Valentine had given up her days? And not keep talking about it the way Valentine was now talking about her generous gesture? The one friend she might have approached, Betty Pye, had already used up her days getting her tonsils out. And she had perhaps gone a little too far with the tonsils. That day she brought them to lunch.
Betty took out her lunch box, which was an actual cardboard box covered with tinfoil. Then she put a jar beside her box. It contained some dark greenish-brown squiggles.
“Anybody besides me missing their tonsils?”
“I had mine out when I was at boarding school,” said Curly Jay.
She was down at the other end of the table. There was silence at the end of the table where Betty sat with her tonsils in a jar.
“I kept mine because they were supposed to be so unusual. Besides, they were mine!” said Betty to the group. She bit into her egg sandwich and chewed as she blandly reviewed her co-workers. They edged away from her. Doris said something and as usual Valentine laughed. Only Patrice did not look away from Betty Pye, but she also didn’t look too directly at the tonsils, though you could hardly miss them. They looked like a couple of leeches. Patrice was hungry and had a baked potato for her lunch. She’d dressed out rabbits, deer, porcupines, all sorts of wild birds, muskrat, beaver, and pretty much could not be bothered by a pair of tonsils.
“Did you use up all the toffee in the parade?” she asked Betty.
“No,” said Betty. She reached into her box and slid a wrapped piece across the table to Patrice.
Unexpected! Patrice put the toffee into her lunch pail. Zhaanat’s face would light up when she brought it home. To make Zhaanat happy, just for a second or two, was one of her main efforts these days, and Pokey’s too. Even the baby tried hard, she could tell. He made Zhaanat smile with his toothless little grin. But he never did smile when he looked at Patrice.
Mr. Vold came into the lunchroom with a self-important mug on. He informed them that higher-ups would be coming soon to inspect the premises. Everything must be perfect. Also, for the time being, there would be no more afternoon coffee breaks. He tried to make his weak eyes steely. Then he vanished. The women looked at one another, cleaned up every crumb, went back to work. After a while, they began to murmur. No coffee break in the afternoon? How would they manage? Just when you felt your body about to give, when your eyes crossed, when your neck was killing you, the thought of the coffee
break was the only thing that kept you going. Without it? Collapse. Patrice still worked just beside Valentine, and when Doris wasn’t around, sometimes Valentine still talked to her. They agreed about the coffee break. Then Valentine’s tone shifted.
“You probably wonder what we have up our sleeves,” she said in a coy whisper.
“Sleeves?”
“So to speak. Well, he kissed us. Kissed the two of us.”
“At the same time?”
“Ooooh shaaaa. No.”
“Aren’t you going to ask who he was?” said Valentine after a while.
“Barnes?”
Valentine gasped. “Did he tell you?”
Something wicked in Patrice made her answer, “Yes.”
And there was silence after that.
But they talked to her on the way home, and didn’t talk anymore about “chirps” or about Barnes. It was all so very strange. Here she was, with no men on her mind, except the faceless ones who had kidnapped, or maybe did something worse, to her sister. No men but terrible men were on her mind. Patrice certainly did not think about Barnes, unless he was right in front of her. And she didn’t think about Wood Mountain either, though that was harder because he stopped by regularly to see the baby. Who smiled at him! Yes! Wood Mountain got the smiles that should have belonged to Patrice. If she was jealous of somebody, it wasn’t Valentine or Doris, it was Wood Mountain.
The Night Watchman Page 20