Chapter VIII: The Massacre

The congregation was kneeling.

A moment later Wandering Spirit entered. He wore his lynx-skin war-bonnet, with its five big eagle plumes, and carried a Winchester across his arm. He dropped on one knee in the centre of the church, resting the butt of his rifle on the floor. His eyes burned and his hideously painted face was set in lines of ferocious intensity. Never shall I forget the feelings his appearance excited in me, as he half-knelt, glaring up at the altar and the white-robed priests in sacrilegious mockery. He was a demon, a wild beast, roused, ruthless, thirsting to kill. I doubted then that we should any of us ever again see the outside of the chapel.

Prayers ended, the priests warned the Indians against committing any excesses and we were allowed to leave the church. The Catholics dipped their fingers in the water at the door and crossed themselves as they passed out. I returned to the shop and the other whites were soon after taken by the Indians back to the agency. King Bird, Big Bear’s second son, accompanied me.

“_N’Chawamis_,” he asked, “with whom do you side, Riel or the police?”

“Cousin,” I replied, “here we are all friends. The half-breed war is far from us. Let them fight it out between themselves.”

He asked for the loan of the Hudson’s Bay Company’s flag for the dance he said they intended holding later in the day.

Quinn, cool and self-possessed, his Scotch cap on the back of his head, his hands in his trouser pockets, dropped in on his way to the agency and we spoke together for a few minutes. Leaving, he said to me:

“Well, Cameron, if we come through this alive we’ll have something to talk about for the rest of our days.”

Wandering Spirit appeared in the door. “Go to the instructor’s,” he ordered, “where the other whites are!”

I complied. The Indians were sacking the police barracks. As I passed it, Yellow Bear came out, stopping me. Earlier in the day he had asked for a hat, but after thinking a moment had replaced it on the shelf, saying he would get it later. It was now ten o’clock.

“I want to get that hat,” he said.

King Bird danced up to me, the Hudson’s Bay flag over his shoulders. He shook with suppressed excitement. We had always been good friends.

“_N’gowichin!_ (I’m cold!)” he said. He came closer and added meaningly, in a whisper: “Don’t stop around here!”

I turned to Yellow Bear. “You can have the hat,” I said. “Come with me.”

He hesitated; the old man balked at missing his share of the police plunder. “Won’t you bring it to me?” he asked.

“Wandering Spirit has just ordered me here,” I answered. “If he saw me going back he might shoot me.”

“Very well, then,” said Yellow Bear; “I will go with you.”

It was not much more than a hundred yards to the shop. Half way we met the war chief. He was running, carrying his rifle at the trail. He stopped and looked at me menacingly. “I thought I told you to stay with the other whites!” he cried.

Yellow Bear answered for me. “He is going with me to get a cap. I have none and the sun is strong.”

Wandering Spirit considered. “Hurry back, then!” he said at length, and he ran on.

As I passed the Hudson’s Bay house, I saw Big Bear talking with Mrs. Simpson in the kitchen.

Yellow Bear got his cap and I was locking the shop again, when Miserable Man appeared with an order from the Indian agent. I glanced across and saw Quinn standing on the hill I had just quitted.

I turn to an old scrapbook and from a piece of foolscap pasted in the back copy the faded lines, the last writing of my brave friend. It is worn and soiled, for I carried it in my waistcoat pocket for many weeks. It is undated, but to me nothing done on that 2nd of April needs a mark. It reads:

“_Dear Cameron_,

_Please give Miserable Man one blanket._

_T. T. Q._”

Miserable Man was, I think, the most brutal-looking Indian I have ever seen. His face was deeply pitted by smallpox, and the yellow ochre with which it was coated made it appear even more repulsive than usual.

_Facing p._ 68
]

“I have no blankets,” I said.

He did not reply, but stood regarding me doubtfully with an ominous look in his rat-like eyes.

“What are you looking at him for?” demanded Yellow Bear. “Don’t you hear him say he has no blankets? I know. They have even taken the blankets off his own bed.”

Miserable Man was as great a coward as ever breathed. “Well, I suppose I can get something else.” Yes, I told him.

“How much?”

“Five dollars.”

He selected a shawl, a carrot of tobacco and some tea. I poured the tea into the shawl, as was our custom, and he was tying it up, when a shot rang out a short distance away. It was followed by two more in quick succession.

At the first shot the eyes of Miserable Man opened wide. He caught up the bundle and dashed out of the shop.

I followed, locking the door and putting the heavy brass key in my pocket. Two months later, on the day of my escape from the Indians, I left that key, hanging in a poplar bluff near Frenchman’s Butte, in the pocket of a discarded pair of trousers. It was all that remained of the Hudson’s Bay Company’s business at Frog Lake. Perhaps some day a learned archæologist will discover it and write an interesting thesis showing how it came there and when, and deducing from the fact that they made locks and must therefore have lived in houses, additional proof of the high state of civilization of the mound-builders.

On the hill before the police barracks which I had quitted ten minutes before lay the form of a man. It was the lifeless body of poor Quinn. The air was thick with smoke and dust. It rang with whoops and shrieks and the clatter of galloping hoofs. High over all swelled the deadly war-chant of the Plain Crees, bursting from a hundred sinewy throats. I heard Wandering Spirit shout to his followers to shoot the whites, and crack after crack told of the deaths of other of my friends.

“_Atim-eenawuk!_ (Dog-men!)” exploded Walking Horse savagely, but half-scared, looking out of the Company’s house. Big Bear rushed out of the kitchen door and toward his followers, waving his arm and shouting at the top of his voice:

“_Tesqua! Tesqua!_ (_Stop! Stop!_)”

He was too late. The smouldering fire of inherent savagery had burst into flame and he was powerless to quench it; the spring of blood of the old chief’s dream had broken forth and spurted through his futile fingers!

My first thought was to seize an axe, lock myself in the house and brain the first man to force the door. But I looked about me and could see no axe. An Indian raced up to me, holding his gun before him.

“If you speak twice, you are a dead man!” he cried.

I saw a half-breed, Louis Goulet, run past, followed by two Indians. One was his brother-in-law. He was protecting him from the other. Goulet’s face was like paper. I turned to Yellow Bear.

“What shall I do?” I asked.

The old man seized my wrist. His hand shook as with the palsy.

“Come this way!” he muttered, dragging me toward the scene of horror. But when he reached the corner of the house, he halted, glanced across and turned back. Big Bear’s band had moved during the night and were now camped with the Wood Crees, a mile away. “No!” said Yellow Bear. “These women are starting for the camp. Go with them; do not leave them. They will not shoot among the women!”

Yellow Bear feared openly to befriend me—he would not accompany me—but I did as I was bidden, though I had little hope of reaching the Indian camp. I had gone but a short way when I met the Indian I had seen chasing Goulet. He was riding the half-breed’s white horse, with his rifle across its withers. There was a fence on my right, making it impossible for me to avoid him. I drew back involuntarily, anticipating the worst. He raced up within six feet; then jerked his horse to a sudden stop. He eyed me narrowly for a moment.

“Go on! Go on!” he cried, then. “I don’t want to hurt you.”

I walked on. Mrs. Simpson looked off to the right in the direction of the firing. She began to tremble violently.

“Oh!” she exclaimed, tears streaming down her face; “the priest has fallen!”

I thought she was about to fall. I stepped back and caught her arm. She pulled away. “Run, white man!” she cried in Cree.

“Do you think they will kill me?”

“Run, white man!” was her only answer.

I walked on. It was useless to run. Death staring me grimly in the face! That was what I saw. Just that. Terrible! I fixed my eyes on the ground before me, held them there determinedly, momentarily expecting the fatal bullet. I did not wish to see when or whence it came. The sooner the better. So I felt. It would be hard for me to describe my feelings in those awful moments of suspense. I was, I believe, resigned. I know I felt that it would be a shame to live when so many of my friends were being foully done to death a few short yards away. I did not even look toward the spot where the tragedy was passing. It seemed that if I did I should be impelled to rush over and fall with my luckless companions. To die without a chance to defend oneself—therein lay the supreme horror! Shot down like a dog! If only I had a gun!

The moments passed. I still lived, and I took heart and raised my eyes at last.

Other armed Indians were running on the ridges near by. Two passed quite close to me. And at length I reached the camp unharmed. I was told to enter the lodge of a Wood Cree. The women occupying it, all weeping, made tea and gave me a cup. I felt sick and faint.

Soon I heard Wandering Spirit’s voice. He was striding up and down through the camp, speaking in his ringing tones:

“_Kapwatamut nipahow!_ (I killed The Sioux Speaker!) I met him before the interpreter’s house. ‘Kapwatamut,’ I said; ‘you have a hard head. You boast that when you say no you mean no. To-day, if you love your life, you will do as I tell you. Go to our camp.’

“‘Why should I go there?’ he demanded.

“‘Never mind,’ I said. ‘Go.’

“‘My place is here,’ he answered. ‘Big Bear has not asked me to leave. I will not go.’

“I raised my rifle. ‘I tell you—_go_!’ I shouted, and I shot him dead.”

Three Indians entered the lodge and sat down near me. They looked at me curiously. I knew them well, but I did not speak. They had watches belonging to the murdered men. One, Papamakeesik, Père Fafard’s murderer, held out a watch and asked me the time. It was eleven o’clock.

I groaned, sitting there, thinking over the horror. I expected each moment they would come for me. The suspense became unendurable. I could not longer rest with my fate undecided; I must go out! I told these Indians. They were friendly enough to suggest that I disguise myself in a blanket, but I said no. I might be recognized. If I were I should be shot on suspicion of attempting to escape.

I walked across the camp into the brush. William Gladieu, the Wood Cree who had befriended me in the morning, followed with his gun. He put his arm about my shoulders.

“My brother,” he exclaimed, “you are not to be killed. Before that happens they will walk over my dead body. Come.”

He took me to the tent of Oneepohayo, head chief of the Wood Crees. Here a council was assembled. Yellow Bear, Little Bear, Gladieu and others, including the chief himself, spoke of kindnesses received at my hands—trifles as they seemed at the time, but which were to stand me in good stead now. They agreed that I should live and left me to secure Wandering Spirit’s consent.

The Plain Crees were in council outside and the war chief made a speech to the band, instructing them that I was not to be harmed. They brought him to the lodge.

“This is the young man whose life we ask,” said Chief Oneepohayo.

“Ah-ha!” answered the war chief. “He has done me favours too.” He held out his hand.

Can anyone realize how sweet life really is until he comes near to losing it? I doubt it. Mine, I began to think, might still be endurable—worth an effort to save. Though my spirit revolted I took the hand that had sped the bullets that sent two of my companions to a sudden and awful end, for besides the agent he had shot one of the priests.

“Walk about during the day as you please,” he said, “but don’t go out at night. You might be shot. One of the young men might do it and we wouldn’t know who. And don’t try to escape.”

At Cold Lake, forty miles to the north, H. R. Halpin was in charge of the Hudson’s Bay Company’s post. A party was leaving to bring him to Frog Lake. I took advantage of their amiable mood to put in a word for him.

“Promise you’ll spare his life, also,” I urged. They debated the matter and made the promise. “So that he won’t be surprised, I’ll give you a note for him,” I said, and on the back of an envelope I wrote in pencil:

“_Dear Halpin_,

_The Crees have murdered every white man here except myself. They are
going out for you and have promised not to harm you. At your peril,
offer no resistance._”

Beverley Robertson, the lawyer who defended the Indians, had this note at the time of the trials, but I do not know where it is now.

Toward evening James K. Simpson arrived from Pitt. He was an old officer of the Hudson’s Bay Company, with supervision over several posts and headquarters at Frog Lake, where I lived with him. As he drove into camp the Indians stopped his horses, unharnessed and appropriated them. He was an old friend of Big Bear and although a white man, in no great danger, for his half-breed wife had two sons members of the Wood Cree bands.

“Big Bear,” said Mr. Simpson before the whole band, “I have known you for twenty-five years and I never thought I should live to see a thing like this!”

There was deep feeling in the old chief’s voice as he answered sorrowfully: “It is not my work. They have tried for a long time to take away my good name and they have done it at last. If you had been here, this might never have happened.”

Mr. Simpson was allowed his own tent, while I was lodged with one of his stepsons, Louis Patenaude. I was deadly weary, and with the boastful jests of the murderers in my ears, lay down early and slept that night as soundly as ever I did in my life. It was a blessed relief to be able to forget in sleep the appalling events of that day.

These were the first hours of my memorable two months with hostile Indians.

I may here appropriately mention the fact that no servant of the Hudson’s Bay Company was killed by the Indians during the whole of this stormy period. Their treatment by the Company had always been considerate and humane. If an Indian was sick he went to the nearest post and was supplied with food and medicine until he became well. When ready to go on a hunt he was outfitted with provisions, traps and ammunition, for which he paid in furs on his return. The Company made him advances in goods on account of his annuity and waited almost a year for payment, trusting entirely to his honesty for settlement of the debt. After a trade he always got a small present. When hungry he was never denied a meal.

It was this policy of liberality that created the bond of friendship that existed between the red men and the Company for more than two hundred years and of which they were not forgetful even in their moment of savage vengeance.

Yet the fact that I was an employee of the Hudson’s Bay Company would not alone have saved me in that awful hour, and I cannot conclude this story of the massacre without recording here the sense of deep gratitude I shall always feel for life preserved under circumstances I can never cease to regard as anything but miraculous.

I have not yet mentioned Henry Quinn, the agent’s nephew. He was warned by the friendly Mondion some fifteen minutes before the massacre and escaped to Pitt.