Guy Vanderhaeghe - The Englishmans Boy

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The Englishmans Boy

A stunning performance. Hugely enjoyable. I couldnt put it down.

Mordecai Richler

The canvas is broad, the writing is vivid, and the two story-lines are deftly interwoven to contrast cinematic truth with history as it happened. An intense and original piece of writing.

The Bookseller (U.K.)

A richly textured epic that passes with flying colors every test that could be applied for good storytelling.

Saskatoon StarPhoenix

Characters and landscapes are inscribed on the minds eye in language both startling and lustrous.

Globe and Mail

Vanderhaeghe succeeds at a daring act: he juggles styles and stories with the skill of a master.

Financial Post

There isnt a dull moment.

Toronto Sun

A fine piece of storytelling, which, like all serious works of literature, as it tells its tale connects us to timeless human themes.

Winnipeg Sun

The Great Canadian Western.

Canadian Forum

Thematically, this is a big book, an important book, about history and truth, brutality and lies.

Georgia Straight

A compelling read.

Halifax Daily News

Vanderhaeghe shows himself to be as fine a stylist as there is writing today.

Ottawa Citizen

Copyright 1996 by G & M Vanderhaeghe Productions Inc.

All rights reserved. The use of any part of this publication reproduced, transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, or stored in a retrieval system, without the prior written consent of the publisher or, in case of photocopying or other reprographic copying, a licence from the Canadian Copyright Licensing Agency is an infringement of the copyright law.

Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication

Vanderhaeghe, Guy, 1951
The Englishmans boy / Guy Vanderhaeghe.

eISBN: 978-1-55199-570-0

I. Title.

PS8593.A5386E54 2003 c813.54 C2003-901414-2
PR9199.3.V384E54 2003

We acknowledge the financial support of the Government of Canada through the Book Publishing Industry Development Program and that of the Government of Ontario through the Ontario Media Development Corporations Ontario Book Initiative. We further acknowledge the support of the Canada Council for the Arts and the Ontario Arts Council for our publishing program.

The author wishes to express his gratitude to the Canada Council for the Arts and the Saskatchewan Arts Board for financial assistance received during the writing of this novel.

SERIES EDITOR: ELLEN SELIGMAN

EMBLEM EDITIONS
McClelland & Stewart Ltd.
75 Sherbourne Street
Toronto, Ontario
M5A 2P9
www.mcclelland.com/emblem

v3.1

To Montana Dan Shapiro,
a true-blue man to ride the river with.

1

E ven from such a distance Fine Man could smell their camp, the fried-pig stink of white men. He took up a pinch of dirt, placed it under his tongue, and made a prayer. Keep me close, Mother Earth, hide me, Mother Earth. It was light as day, the moons bright face a traders steel mirror, the grey leaves of the sage and wolf willow shining silver, as if coated with hoarfrost. Under a full moon, it was dangerous to steal horses even from foolish white men.

One of the wolfers rose from his blanket and stepped away from the fire. The one with the ugly hair, red like a foxs, he stood making his water and talking over his shoulder. A noisy man lacking in dignity. It must be a poor thing to be a wolf-poisoner, to be ugly, to eat pork, to hate silence. There was nothing to envy these people for, except their guns and horses.

The red-haired one rolled himself back up in his blanket and lay like a log beside the fire. Say goodnight to Jesus, said one of the other men wrapped in blankets. They all laughed. More noise.

Fine Man felt Broken Horns body relax beside him and knew Horn had been covering Red Hair with the fukes, a sawed-off Hudsons Bay musket, the only gun they carried between them. Broken Horn was edgy. Fine Man sensed Horn no longer believed in the promises and the truth of his dream.

In his dream, there was heavy snow, biting cold. Many starving, shivering horses, coats white with frost, had come stumbling through the high drifts to crowd the entrance of Fine Mans lodge. There the grass of spring pushed up sweet green blades through the crust of the snow, tenderness piercing ice, and gave itself to strengthen the horses, even though it was the black months of winter. Fine Man read this as a power sign that somewhere there were horses wishing to belong to the Assiniboine. But Broken Horn did not trust Fine Mans sign any more, and Fine Man did not trust Horn with a gun in his hand.

Suddenly the white mens horses began to mill about, hopping in their hobbles like jack-rabbits. Powdery dust rose like mist, to hang swirling and shaking in the moonlight. Fine Man shifted his eyes to the fire. But none of the lumps under the greasy grey blankets raised a head, their ears were deaf. How did white men distinguish their corpses from those who had only gone to sleep?

The herd broke apart, horses turning and spinning, bumping one another like pans of ice in the grip of a swift current. A moment of complete confusion, rumps and heads bucking above the dust, then the strong current found a shape and stood alone, a big blue roan, broken hobbles dangling from its forelegs, teeth bared, ears laid back.

Lit by the moon, the roan was stained a faint blue, the colour of late-winter-afternoon shadows on crusted snow. Coat smooth as ice, chest and haunches hard as ice, eyes cold as ice, a Nez Perc horse from beyond the mountains which wore snow on their heads all the year round, a horse from behind the Backbone of the World.

When he saw him, Fine Man knew the promise of the dream was true and he rose from behind the juniper bush to show himself plain to the winter horse. Broken Horns sharp intake of breath through the teeth was a warning, but Fine Man gave no indication he heard him, his ears were stopped to any sound except the singing inside him, the power chanting in him. He stood upright in the moonlight, upright in his Thunderbird moccasins with the beaded Bird green on each foot, upright in the breechclout his Sits-Beside-Him wife had cut from the striped Hudsons Bay blanket. He gazed down at his hands, at the skin of his muscled thighs, at his belly, and understood. White moonlight was his blizzard, a blizzard to blind the eyes of his enemies who lay frozen to the ground in the grip of his medicine-dream, drifted over by the heavy snow of sleep.

He edged toward the horse, addressing him in a soft voice, politely. Fifty yards to his left, the fire was rustling, hot embers cracking like nuts, spitting like fat. Behind him, Horn lifted himself to one knee, swiftly spiking three arrows in the ground near where his bow lay, and aimed the fukes at the sleeping body of a wolfer.