The Cast Stone (13 page)

“But think about it.” Ben was into the discussion. “Just think, if we had a big enough of a land base for us all, if we joined together, we might be a Nation. The reason we have tiny little reserves is because when we were negotiating Treaty, Commissioner Morris didn't want us to have big reserves. He wanted to break us up so that we would be weak and less of a threat to Canada. The reason we have small reserves here is because Canada had a weak military. They were afraid of us.”

“That's not how I heard it.” Leroy couldn't stay out of the discussion. “The way I heard is that the old chiefs selected their own reserves. Now here William Charles was chief at the time of Treaty and he selected this place for the reserve. Some of the people wanted to be over to the west where the national park is now, but William chose the biggest lake because it would have the most fish.”

“Yeah, that's how I heard it too.” Roderick agreed. “From what I been able to piece together, my family have lived here as far back as anyone remembers. Always lived here beside this lake. Used to be, we lived up by Thunder Mountain on the west shore, but when the reserve was made we moved here to the south end. But you know what will happen if they make one big reserve. They'll move all the Indians from the South up here. Government always wanted to do that, put the Indians on empty land.”

Leroy's hand paused, held the cup of tea half way to his mouth: “Not anymore, I don't think. They might move us down there on the prairie so they can take the resources from here. Americans need lumber and paper and especially our water. No, my bet is if they move us, they'll march us down there to the empty prairie; we'll walk another trail of tears.”

Roderick disagreed, “Naw, they been taking the resources from here all along. Used to be they could just buy it and our government would sell it to them cheap. Didn't matter that we were here or not. Just look at all the highways in this country. They all run north–south. That's not so that we could get around. That's so that they could get the resources out of the North and sell them to the Americans. Won't be anything different now.”

“Well, Thoreau sure as hell didn't sell us out, did he?” Leroy shot back.

“All the ones before him did, didn't they? And look what happened when he shot off his mouth.” Roderick was beginning to have fun.

Leroy the Liberal had to defend Thoreau, had no choice at all now. He would have to stay a Liberal because Elroy died a Conservative. Roderick knew well the ferocity of his cousins' politics. He had mediated between and around them for decades, knew of the rivalry and the campaigning, and who put up more posters for their party and who attended more rallies, and speeches, and who was the best prime minister and who was running the country into ruin.

“People blame him for bringing on the invasion, but you got to remember he stood up, them spineless Conservatives had us in so many wars defending the bastards that the world was beginning to think we were the same country. That's probably why nobody's helping us now. Sure Thoreau was a radical, that's why we elected him, remember. It took a Liberal to stand up to the Americans.”

“Well the way I remember it, Liberals weren't much better before Thoreau; they gave away as much as the others.”

“What about Trudeau? What about Chretien? You can't say they gave in to the Americans. Compare them to Harper or even Mulroney, remember him? Now that's going back maybe a little too far for you. But do you remember free trade, remember what that did?” Leroy was on a roll. How dare anyone knock the Liberals.

“I always thought that Thoreau was a populist,” Ben joined in. “He won that election because of anti-American sentiment. People didn't vote for the Liberal party as much as they voted on a single issue — ‘get back at the Americans'. He didn't really have much when he threatened to close the border. The border was closed. They had already built their fences and towers, Black Hawk helicopters, cameras, all that.”

“It wasn't a single issue.” Leroy defended. “We were going to do something about global warming remember. The big oil companies were screaming and spending money on that election. Every spare dime they had went against Thoreau. We had a plan for greenhouse gases that was the most aggressive in the entire world. Canada was going to become a showcase for the planet. We were going to prove that you could do something. Canada was about to shine again after years of following the Americans. We were going to stand out in the world again.” The old fist, knuckles scarred, rested on the table, not pounding, not yet. “The world was beginning to think that Canada was America, and after Afghanistan, and how we acted under the Conservatives over Iran, it's no wonder.”

“I gotta agree with you on that.” Roderick hesitated while a young man cleared away the stained paper plates. “It was getting so that the rest of the world saw us all as one, and that used to worry me. If we were too close to the Americans, their enemies became our enemies, and the Americans were good at making enemies.”

“You bet,” Leroy spoke in a rush. “We were set to change that when they annexed us. We never got the chance.”

Ben held his ground. “I wonder if Thoreau really would have followed through with his threats. He won the election on the promise to do something, but he was in power for two years and was still only making noises.”

“Thoreau was only one man,” Leroy defended. “It takes a whole nation to make change, especially the big changes we were trying to effect.”

“Well, Ben might not have believed Thoreau, but Wright sure did.” Roderick sided.

Ben put his study of obscure history to use. “I don't know, the Americans always intended or at least contemplated taking over Canada; Thoreau's noise only offered an excuse. In the nineteen thirties the Americans had detailed plans for invading Canada.”

Roderick also remembered history. “1812, was the first, eh.”

“Then the Fenians.” Leroy knew history too.

Ben set the record straight. “1775 was the first one. That was the Quebec invasion. The next was 1812. Some historians have suggested that the reason for the American Revolutionary war was not because of the tax on tea as popular history would have you believe but was rather started by the Americans as an excuse to invade Canada — annexation, expansionism seems to have been part of the American ideal since its inception. They thought it was going to be easy, in fact Jefferson said it was ‘just a matter of marching'.”

“What about the Fenians?” Leroy wanted to know.

Roderick held up an old hand. “Before you go there, I thought the American Revolution was about taxes and conscription. You're saying it wasn't?”

“I'm not saying anything. I just said that some Canadian historians have written that the American Revolutionary war against Britain was started by the Americans as an excuse to invade Canada.”

Roderick thought about it. Let it settle in. “Makes sense.” He concluded.

“The Fenians.” Leroy still wanted to know.

“1866 to about 1871.” Ben exercised his memory. “The Fenians were Irish revolutionaries who wanted to cut Britain off from its colony. There were about a half dozen raids into Canada over that time period. The Americans looked the other way. President Andrew Jackson was supposed to have said, “We'll recognize the established facts,” meaning of course that if the Fenians were successful, America would recognize the annexation.”

“That's right.” Leroy rested his hands on the table.

Ben continued his history lesson. “There was also a lot of talk after the American Civil War about another invasion of Canada. After the North beat the South they were looking at us. Some people say they would have invaded if the American people had any stomach left for war.” He paused for a taste of his tea, something to wet his dry throat. “Of course the famous 1870 Wolseley expedition sent out to Manitoba was not only about Riel and the Metis. John A. MacDonald was reacting to American newspapers in the West calling for an invasion of Canada.”

“If we're counting attacks we can't forget the Cyprus Hills massacre,” Roderick added.

Leroy asked. “What was that one again?”

“Remember, the American wolf hunters who attacked the Nakoda at Cyprus Hills, accused them of stealing horses?”

“Oh, yeah, that was an American whiskey fort, wasn't it?” Leroy remembered.

Ben put his cup down. “If we're talking about American commercial activity in Canada, I'd say we have to consider all the big corporations that have taken over.”

“Now that was an invasion.” Roderick leaned forward. “One thing I really learned when I was chief was that if an American company wanted something, the Canadian and Saskatchewan governments went out of their way to make sure they got it. If a First Nation wanted something we had to wait. Weyerhaeuser, the American pulp and paper giant, wanted all the trees in this territory. We were trying to save some — know who the governments sided with?”

Leroy nodded, “It was always like that. But it got worse under Hopper. It was him who made an agreement with them to use each other's armed forces in case of civil disasters. He invited the American army in. We almost lost Canada in '08 without a fight. Hopper was ready to give it away.”

“You know they always planned on an invasion.” Ben spoke softly. “In about 1928, maybe '30, they had plans to invade. They were going to take Halifax first to block British support, then attack Winnipeg to cut the rail system. Most of the attack was aimed at Ontario and Quebec. Even when the plans were declassified in 1974, nobody in Canada made much of a fuss about it. A few people went to the American archives in Washington to look at the plans, a few articles appeared, but it was mostly written off as a hoax or something. Nobody really cared.”

“Yeah, and look what happened. All the warnings were there and nobody did anything.” Roderick leaned back.

Leroy defended: “Well, Thoreau was going to do something.”

A silence followed as the three Elders remembered how it had been. Ben looked back at the table where Rosie, Elsie, and Benji continued to sit. Benji seemed to be in conversation with Elsie; Rosie still held her granddaughter, wasn't going to let her go.

Ben wondered if Benji felt deserted.
Well, he came to find
out about me — Rosie is a part of me that he needs to know.

The gymnasium buzzed with conversation, occasionally a laugh rattled across it. People ate, visited, remembered, relished the memories, the good times and those memories washed away the sorrow, the loss of a respected Elder.

Ben had never really considered himself an Elder before tonight, but here he was, sitting at the Elder's table with the very old Leroy, and Roderick who had always been older, but now was clearly old.

“It don't do Thoreau much good now.” Roderick interrupted Ben's thoughts. “Governor Johnson sure as hell isn't going to legislate against the oil companies.”

“Governor, my ass.” The old fist hit the table. “Canada is led by a prime minister, and Thoreau is our prime minister until he's defeated in a fair election. Just because Johnson was appointed don't give him any authority. You can bet Canada will resist until there isn't a breath left to fight with.”

Ben came back to the conversation. “That's the problem. The Americans aren't going to go away. We're stuck with them. Like the Borg used to say in the old Star Trek movies: ‘Resistance is futile.' We can resist, like we resisted Canada when they were stomping on us. Didn't do a lot of good. They still stomped on us. Now the Americans are stomping on Canada. We have a new supreme master to live with. We'd better learn how. Did you hear the other day about those kids that crucified themselves at the border? A dozen of them nailed to crosses. It didn't change anything. Hungry for three days, sore hands, a little media attention, but they'll be forgotten soon enough.”

“They weren't hurting so bad,” Roderick paid attention to news. “Morphine; they were all higher than kites on morphine, didn't feel a thing. And the nails they used, weren't even real nails. Did you see them, they showed them on CBC, ground down to the size of needles.”

“It wasn't so much how they did it,” Leroy liked what the kids had done. “It was that they did it. It wasn't against the government so much as it was a shot at the Christians; a shot at the new Zion. Those are the crazies we have to watch out for, the ones going around preaching the end of times and that America was prophesied in the Bible as the Promised Land. That's what's behind all this you know. Got nothing whatsoever to do with security or oil or water or nothing. It's them crazies and their millions showing up for revivals and screaming their salvation. They're the ones that are war crazy. Those kids did something. They might have been on morphine, maybe they ground down the nails. So what that they didn't nail their feet. They did something about the real enemy. They embarrassed the Christians, reminded them about Christ for a minute and got them out of the Old Testament.”

“I have to agree with you, Leroy,” Ben nodded toward the older man, a man in his nineties with vigour and strength. “It's that ‘One People, One Country, One God' stuff that's worrying. Now that's supremacy, pure and simple supremacy.”

Roderick entered with a little more excitement now: “That's where it comes from, from the Supreme Being stuff. All those Christians believe in a supreme single God. That's their culture. It's all about hierarchy, every bit of it.”

“It's certainly cultural. But it's not limited to Christians. Muslims and Hebrews believe in a supreme God too.” Ben needed to be balanced. An argument that was too one sided, could not persuade. “It goes back to Plato and his theory of Gold, Silver, and Bronze people. Organized society has tried to follow his formula ever since, and spread the idea to the rest of the world during the era of expansion. Not only to the Americas — this idea of supremacy was used in Africa and Asia. It never diminished. When the academics started to speak of a postcolonial period in the last century as though colonialism had ended, we had the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank forcefully spreading the economic dogma of the Super Powers, America, and the European Union, on the third world. Colonialism never ended. It just changed forms. If we want to understand this symptom we have to examine the cause, and I've been saying for decades that the cause is supremacist ideology”