The Redemption of Oscar Wolf Read online

  Also by James Bartleman

  As Long as the Rivers Flow (2011)

  Raisin Wine (2008)

  Rollercoaster: My Hectic Years as Jean Chrétien’s Diplomatic Advisor 1994–1998 (2005)

  Out of Muskoka (2004)

  On Six Continents: A Life in Canada’s Foreign Service (2004)

  The

  Redemption of

  Oscar Wolf

  James Bartleman

  For my mother, Maureen Benson Simcoe Bartleman,

  a member of the Chippewas of Rama First Nation who was born in Muskoka in 1922 and spent her summers at the

  Indian Camp in Port Carling as a child.

  Contents

  Author’s Note

  Cast of Characters

  Prologue: 1914 to 1917

  Map of Muskoka

  Part 1: April to June 1930

  Chapter 1: The Journey

  Chapter 2: The Indian Camp

  Chapter 3: The Fire

  Part 2: 1930 to 1935

  Chapter 4: Dark Nights of the Soul

  Chapter 5: Fitting In

  Chapter 6: The Rupture

  Part 3: 1948 to 1958

  Chapter 7: Home from the War

  Chapter 8: Claire and Rosa

  Part 4: 1958 to 1962

  Chapter 9: Australia and Its Aboriginal Peoples

  Chapter 10: South Africa and Apartheid

  Chapter 11: Redemption

  Epilogue

  Reader’s Guide

  Acknowledgements

  Author’s Note

  From the early to mid-twentieth century, the period covered in this book, Canadian indigenous persons usually described themselves as Indians or Natives. Today, we refer to ourselves variously as Aboriginal persons, First Nations persons, Native Canadians, Natives, Indians, or by our national and tribal identities such as Chippewa or Ojibwa. Many of us no longer use the term Indian because in the past some non-Natives employed it in a derogatory or racist manner. Likewise, in the timeframe of the novel, Australian indigenous persons generally described themselves as Aborigines. Today, many prefer to be called Aboriginal persons or by their regional names such as Koori, Murri, and Nunga. I use the terms Indian, Native, Chippewa, Ojibwa, and Aborigine as appropriate to reflect the historical context of the novel.

  This book is a work of fiction. With the exception of members of my family, any resemblance between the characters and individuals, living or dead, is entirely coincidental. Port Carling is a composite creation, based only in part on the village of that name. The fictional village incorporates physical features taken from other small communities that dot Canada’s Precambrian Shield country. The attitudes of its inhabitants toward Native people are an amalgam of attitudes prevalent in mainstream Canadian society prior to and after the Second World War. In recent years, the real village of Port Carling has emerged as a place whose people maintain close and welcoming ties of friendship with their Native neighbours and community members.

  Cast of Characters

  Oscar’s Family

  Oscar Wolf: the protagonist

  Stella Musquedo Wolf: Oscar’s mother

  Jacob Musquedo: Stella’s father; Oscar’s grandfather

  Louisa Loon Musquedo: Jacob’s wife; Oscar’s grandmother

  Caleb and Betsy Loon: Louisa’s parents; Oscar’s great-grandparents

  Amos Wolf: Oscar’s father, killed in action in the Great War

  Rosa Morning Star: Oscar’s wife

  The Others

  Clem McCrum: village drunk, Port Carling

  James McCrum: Clem’s father and prominent local businessman

  Leila McTavish McCrum: Clem’s mother

  Reginald and Wilma McCrum: Clem’s grandparents, Muskoka pioneers

  Reverend Lloyd Huxley: minister of Port Carling Presbyterian Church

  Isabel Huxley: wife of Reverend Huxley

  Claire Fitzgibbon: tourist from “Millionaires’ Row,” Muskoka

  Dwight and Hilda Fitzgibbon: Claire’s parents

  Harold Winston White: Claire’s husband

  Mary Waabooz (Old Mary): Chippewa elder

  Gloria Sunderland: the butcher shop owner’s daughter

  Georges Leroux: Canadian ambassador to Colombia

  Pilar Lopez y Ordonez: receptionist, Canadian embassy, Bogota

  Luigi Ponti: anthropologist, Colombia

  Robart Evans: Canadian high commissioner to Australia

  Ruth Oxley: secretary to High Commissioner Evans

  Reverend Gregory Mortimer: chairman, Australian Royal Commission on the Status of Aborigine Peoples (ARCSAP)

  Father Adrian Murphy: member of ARCSAP

  Captain Mary Fletcher: member of ARCSAP

  Anna Kumquat: Australian prostitute

  Larry Happlebee: deputy minister of Indian Affairs

  Stuart Henderson: Canadian ambassador to South Africa

  Bishop Jonathan Tumbula: Anglican bishop of Soweto

  Joseph McCaully: minister of External Affairs

  Sergeant Greg Penny: Ontario Provincial Police

  Chief Zebadiah Mukwah: Osnaburgh Indian Reserve

  The Creator, the old people used to say, put tricksters like you on Mother Earth so he could have a good laugh at your expense from time to time.

  — Betsy Loon to Oscar Wolf, September 1935

  Prologue

  1914 to 1917

  1

  The afternoon newspapers had reported that thousands of Canadians had been killed and wounded at the Battle of the Somme, and the mood of the people of Toronto was grim on that hot and humid September evening of 1916. Streetcar operators clanged their bells angrily at the cars and trucks ahead of them in the traffic, and drivers in turn honked their horns impatiently at defiant jaywalkers. Men and women out for an evening stroll to escape the oppressive heat of their apartments and houses were quick to take offence, shoving back when jostled, however accidentally, by other pedestrians.

  Stella Musquedo, a tall and muscular Chippewa teenager, who looked much older than her sixteen years, with dark-brown skin, piercing coal-black eyes, and straight raven-black hair, walked through the crowds, oblivious to the mood of the others. Married against her will just two months earlier to a soldier she barely knew who had shipped out to the trenches of northwestern France a few weeks later, she had just learned she was pregnant. But the last thing she had ever wanted was to bring a child into the world who would suffer as she had suffered from the lack of parental love, and she wanted to end the pregnancy as soon as possible. She had made an appointment with a doctor who was prepared to break the law to perform an abortion, and was on her way to see him.

  Stella’s earliest memory of Mom dated back to one summer when she was four or five. It was early morning and she was camping with Mom and Dad on an island somewhere near the Indian Camp. Dad had caught a fish, and even though it was gooey, she had helped him scale and clean it, cut it into pieces, roll them in flour, and drop them into a frying pan of sizzling lard over the fire. Mom, as usual, had let them have all the fun.

  After they ate, Dad took the canoe and went back out fishing. It was such a beautiful day. There were big white clouds in the blue sky and seagulls and crows were circling, looking for some scraps to eat. It was so hot, and Stella wanted to go splash in the water. There was no use asking Mom to take her. She would say no; she always said no. So Stella started walking toward the shore alone. There were bushes with blueberries on them, and she ate a few; they tasted so good. There was a little black and white bird sitting on branch singing, but it flew away as she approached.

  When Stella reached the water she peered in and looked at all the pretty stones on the bottom. It didn’t look deep at all,
so she slid down on her stomach into the water. But it was suddenly over her head and she was choking. Stella scratched at the rock with her fingernails until she managed to pull herself out. She looked up, there was Mom looking down, smiling at her as if she really wasn’t there. Mom had been watching the whole time but had not helped her. That was when Stella knew Mom did not love her; Mom wanted her dead.

  When Stella was six, Mom died. She cried for a little while because she thought that was what everyone wanted her to do. Dad lifted her up onto his knees and told her he had met Mom many years before when he had a job way up north. She had come south to marry him but had had a hard life away from her family. He said he missed her a lot, and he knew how much Stella must miss her as well. But she didn’t really; Mom had wanted her dead.

  Stella became really worried when Dad told her he was sending her to residential school because he couldn’t take care of her anymore. But he told her that the white people there would teach her all sorts of useful things. So she helped Dad pack her clothes and they walked hand in hand along the dusty reserve road to the railway station early one morning.

  The train arrived in a lot of smoke and noise and confusion and they got on board. The seat was made of some sort of cloth but was so hard and itchy that Stella got up and stood at the open window looking out at the trees, houses, and barns that rushed by. The rocking of the passenger car and the clickety-clack of the wheels on the track made her sleepy, but the smoke and ashes pouring in the window made her cough and kept her awake. Another train went slamming by, going the other way. She cried out and stepped back in fright and Dad laughed, lifted her up beside him on the seat, and told her there was nothing to be afraid of.

  Dad bought her a chocolate bar and a bottle of pop and pointed out things to her as they went along — cows and horses and cars, things like that. Dad had never been that nice to her before and Stella was really happy. She went back to the window and watched the sun race behind the telephone poles and yet never move. She thought of Mom who was dead and felt guilty for not being sorry. She thought of Dad who was still alive but who would grow old someday. She wanted Dad to be like the sun racing behind the telephone poles, but never changing and never dying and making her feel sad.

  It wasn’t fun anymore when they got off the train. It was dark and she was tired. A man was waiting for them at the station and he took them in a car to a big building where there were lots of lights burning. She went in with Dad and the man, and everyone was friendly, but when she turned around to say something to Dad, he was gone. He had left her alone with a lot of strangers.

  Someone took her someplace and cut off her braids and shaved her head. Someone else poured coal oil on her naked skull and it stung. Another person gave her new clothes to put on. After she had something to eat, Stella went to bed. That’s when she got real homesick and started to cry. She missed Dad a lot and didn’t understand why he had left her. She told herself he’d be back in the morning, but when he didn’t come back, she knew he had never loved her either. He had just been pretending when he had been nice to her on the train.

  Stella did not see her father again for ten years. Every June at the end of the school year the other children left to pass the summers with their families, returning when school started again after Labour Day. Each year, Stella would spend the summer at the school together with a few other children who either had no homes to go to or who were unwanted by their families. For the first few summers she was disappointed, but each time he did not appear, she made excuses to herself for his behaviour: He had been attacked and beaten up by burglars. He had slipped and broken a leg. He didn’t have the money for the train fare.

  As she grew older, however, and her father still didn’t come for her, her disappointment turned to desperation and then to anger. She blamed her mother for dying and her father for leaving her in the hands of people who beat her for coming late to class, who asked her to their offices to touch her private parts and in return to reveal their private parts to her, who made her work long hours cleaning floors and scrubbing pots and pans, who fed her slop hardly fit for animals to eat, and who allowed the big kids to bully the small ones.

  As more years passed, her anger turned to a deep feeling of betrayal and bitterness. No one ever said she loved her, held her when she was upset, or took her hand when she was sick. To the staff, Stella was just one of hundreds of Indian inmates to be fed, watered, and educated in the ways of the white man until they were released back into their communities like prisoners who had served their terms. By the age of thirteen, Stella was bullying the smaller students as she had been bullied. By the age of fourteen, with her wide hips, large breasts, and a loud laugh, she radiated an animal magnetism that attracted grown men and rendered adult women uneasy in her presence. By the time she was fifteen, she decided she would not let her father get away with leaving her in such a place, and wrote him a letter:

  May 30, 1915

  Dear Dad,

  I am your daughter and you haven’t been nice to me. You took me to the school when I was six and forgot about me. I am now fifteen. The people here have been mean to me. Beatings, lots of awful things. I guess you don’t care otherwise you would not have left me in such a place. The others get to go home for the summers. You forgot me. You never came although I used to wait for you. I remember going to our place at the Indian Camp in Muskoka in the summers and the fun I had there playing in the water with the other kids when I was a little girl. You are responsible for me aren’t you? If so, come and get me on June 30 when school is out and let me have some fun this summer. I’ll be outside on the steps with my things. Please don’t let me down!

  Your daughter,

  Stella

  P.S. Don’t forget to come. It’s not too much to ask.

  On the last day of the school year, Stella waited outside on the school steps with the other students going home for the summer, but her father did not come. She had had enough. She would make him sorry and teach a lesson to all those people who had mistreated her over the years. She would go to Toronto and make her own way in the world. She got to her feet, left the bag with her clothes behind, exited the school grounds, and began walking south on the gravel highway.

  A car pulled up beside her and the driver rolled down the window, stuck his head out and said “Want a lift?” Stella opened the door and climbed in.

  “Running away from school?” the driver, a middle-aged white man wearing a white short-sleeved shirt and tie, asked her. His jacket was lying on the back seat.

  When Stella didn’t answer, he said, “I thought so, but don’t worry, I won’t tell on you. How do you like my jalopy?” he asked, putting his car in gear and continuing down the road. “Just bought it,” he said, patting the dashboard. “It’s a brand new Model T Roadster, the only one in this neck of the woods. It’s my car and I can do anything I want with it. My wife has her own, but it’s not a Roadster: she uses it to drive the kids around and go shopping. And to show you I’m a fine fellow, in addition to letting you ride in my brand new fancy car, I’m going to share a drink with you.”

  Stella took the already opened bottle of gin that he held out to her, raised it to her lips, and drank deeply. It was the first time she had tasted alcohol, and it burned her throat. But it was good. She took another long drink and that was better. She took a third, longer drink and that was even better.

  “Hey, slow down, that’s all the booze I got in the car,” he said, yanking the bottle from her hands and drinking from it until there was no gin left. Stella leaned back in the seat and closed her eyes, her head spinning. A few minutes later, she felt the car turn off the highway and she opened her eyes as the white man drove up a gravel driveway and parked in front of a house secluded in a dense grove of poplar trees.

  “This is the old homestead,” he said, turning and smiling at her. “Want to come in and look around? Maybe have a bite to eat and a glass of lemonade before you hit the road again? What do you say?”

 
Stella nodded her assent, opened the car door, and, although unsteady on her feet, followed the chattering white man up the walkway.

  “You’re really lucky you ran into me,” he said, taking out a key, unlocking the door, and holding it open as she went in. “The police keep a sharp eye out for runaways on that stretch of road. You wouldn’t have got far before they caught you. How old are you anyway? Eighteen? Nineteen? I thought they let you kids go home for good when you turned sixteen. But I guess they make exceptions for exceptional students. Now just make yourself at home while I make us something to eat,” he said, steering her into the living room and telling her to take a seat on a sofa.

  “I make good sandwiches. Want one?

  “I see you’re a little shy,” he said when Stella did not respond. “I don’t blame you. You probably think I invited you in to take advantage of you. But I’m not like that. I’m a respectable insurance agent who goes to church regularly and follows the Golden Rule in everything: Do unto others as you would want others to do unto you. That’s been my motto since my Sunday school days. Now please excuse me, while I see what there is in the icebox,” he said, grinning at her as if he was privy to some secret joke.