The Lynching of Louie Sam (18 page)

I am so relieved to be gone from that house that I feel light and happy, despite the ache from my arm—and despite the secrets I've heard. Why do the Sumas chiefs think Mr. Osterman killed Mr. Bell? Is that what Louie Sam told them? I think back to the morning we found Mr. Bell dead in his cabin. Annie and I stayed behind while John and Will went to fetch the sheriff. Then Mr. Osterman showed up, saying he happened to be out checking the telegraph line. Is it possible he was lying? Was he in the neighborhood because
he
killed Mr. Bell and set the fire? Is Father right about his character? Is he a liar and a murderer, pretending to be a decent man? It seems Mr. Moultray has his doubts about him, too.

I shudder at the thought of looking Bill Osterman in the eye to ask for my wages, but I'll have to do it. I promised Mrs. Thompson I'd pay for Teddy's medicine today. And then I'll have to pay Dr. Thompson to set my arm in plaster. My happy feeling is gone. I feel sick inside.

I reach Mr. Moultray's livery stable, down the track from the ferry dock. It's so early, not even Jack Simpson is up and about. I have an inkling that I might find Pete inside. If it was me, that's where I would go to find shelter for the night. The horses stir in their stalls when I go inside, thinking I have their breakfast with me.

“Pete?” I whisper. I don't know why I'm whispering. I suppose all the secret talk has got me on edge. “Pete?”

“Here.” I follow the sound of his voice to an empty stall, where he's made himself a bed out of straw and a horse blanket. I woke him up. He's grumpy. “What are you doing out so early?” he asks.

“I'm going into town.”

“To see Doc Thompson?”

“To see your uncle, for my money.”

Pete grunts a reply.

“Mr. Moultray paid a visit last night,” I tell him.

“What did he want?”

“He wanted to know if it's true what the Sumas are saying, that your uncle's the one who murdered Mr. Bell.”

If yesterday I had accused his kin of murder, Pete would have hauled off and hit me. But this morning, a look of confusion comes over his face.

“Why would anybody pay any mind to what the Sumas have got to say?” he grumbles.

“Mr. Moultray is paying mind to it. He asked your pa straight out if he knows anything about Bill Osterman murdering Mr. Bell.”

Pete has no answer to that.

“Your pa didn't deny it.”

For a moment, he locks eyes with me. I see how afraid he is.

“Pete, what do you know?”

The moment is over. I've pushed him too far. He rolls over away from me and pulls the horse blanket up over his shoulder.

“It's too early for so much talking.”

That's it—that's all I'm going to get out of him. But I tell him, thinking it might make him feel better, “After you left, your pa told Jimmy to shut his trap about you.”

He's silent for a moment or two. His back is to me, so I don't know whether he's sleeping, or thinking. Then he says, “I won't be able to go get that saw for you. I can't get across the river. I'm not going near him today.”

“That's okay. Thanks, anyway,” I tell him.

“I'll see you, George.”

“I'll see you, Pete.”

At that I head out of the stable. Once again I'm happy to be out in the fresh air, away from the trapped feeling I get around the Harknesses, father and son.

Chapter Twenty

I
T'S STILL EARLY WHEN
I get to town, and all the businesses are closed up tight, including Dr. Thompson's drug store. I go into the Nooksack Hotel even though I know the telegraph office is likely to be closed, too, and I'm right. Two days ago I felt shy about asking Mr. Hopkins if I could wait in the lobby for Mr. Osterman, but today the ache in my arm makes me not care. There's a plain wood bench near the door. I sit down on it, thinking that Mr. Hopkins can't complain about my dirty clothes the way he would if I sat myself on the fancy upholstered furniture. He's eyeing me from behind his desk.

“The telegraph office doesn't open until nine,” he says.

“I'll wait, thank you,” I reply.

I'm not sitting there for five minutes when who should come down the spiral staircase from his room but the red-headed man, the one Mr. Moultray called by the name of Clark. I guess I'm staring at him, because suddenly Carrot Top is looking at me. I turn my head away, but not fast enough. He ambles over and sits down at the other end of my bench, although he has his pick of places to sit in the empty lobby.

“I saw you in here the other day, didn't I?” he says. His accent sounds Irish. “You said you were working for Mr. Osterman.”

“Yes, sir.”

There's something about him that's making me uneasy. I keep looking straight ahead, making it clear that I don't want to talk. But that doesn't stop him.

“You seem kind of young for a telegraph man.”

To which I say nothing. He nods at my arm in the sling.

“Dangerous work, from the look of it. What did he hire you to do?”

“To check the line.”

“That's a big job.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Is that how you got hurt?”

“Yes, sir.”

Mr. Moultray was right about one thing: this fella Clark asks a lot of questions. From the corner of my eye I can see Mr. Hopkins glancing over at us. He seems nervous.

“How long have you worked for Mr. Osterman?” says Carrot Top. “I ask because I heard he was going to hire another boy a couple of weeks ago.”

I answer, “I don't know anything about that.”

I'm lying. Of course I know that Louie Sam expected Mr. Osterman to hire him, but Mr. Moultray told us never to speak about Louie Sam and there's something about the way Mr. Hopkins is staring at us now from the hotel desk that is warning me to be careful.

This Mr. Clark won't give up.

“You don't know how long you've worked for him,” he says, “or you don't know about the other boy?”

“About the other boy,” I reply.

He takes out a tobacco pouch and tucks a chew into his mouth. The tobacco makes a bulge inside his cheek. I can see he plans to sit here for a while yet.

“That boy met an unfortunate end, of course. I'm sure you heard about it.” I say nothing. “I hear tell that there were a couple of white boys about his age who rode up to Canada with the lynch mob. Might you know who those boys were? I ask because there are only so many boys around Nooksack, and I presume that you all go to school together. I can imagine that a couple of kids going on an adventure like that might want to boast about it the next day. Did you hear any ballyhoo like that around the schoolyard?”

“No,” I say.

I get to my feet. I have to get away from this man. “You're George Gillies, aren't you?” he says. That stops me. “I talked to your father yesterday. He said you were off helping Mr. Osterman.” He smiles kindly, like I'm supposed to take him for a friend. “There's no cause to be frightened, George. I'm just trying to find out what exactly happened that night.”

“Why do you want to know?” I ask. “Who are you?”

“My name is Arthur Clark. I've been sent here by the Dominion Government to investigate the lynching.”

“I don't know anything about it.”

I'm a liar and a coward, but I don't want to go to jail. He seems to read my mind.

“Understand that the only people who are in trouble with the law are the ones who led the mob. A boy who just happened to tag along, he could go a long way toward easing his conscience if he helped bring justice for the native boy who was killed.”

Should I trust him? I stand there like a dumb fool trying to decide. Pete Harkness and I might be all right, but what about Father? Would they consider him a leader? He could be arrested. Mr. Clark sees me weakening.

“I talked to a friend of yours yesterday, George. Young Pete Harkness.”

This is news to me. Why didn't Pete say anything to me about being questioned by Mr. Clark?

“He told me about running into Louie Sam on the road from Lynden. Got a colorful way of describing the Indian boy. Makes him sound most fearsome. It's quite a story.”

I've got a bad feeling about where this is going, like this Clark fella has read my mind again.

“Did Pete ever talk to you privately about that, George?” says the Canadian Government man. “Did he ever let it slip that maybe somebody
suggested
to him that he saw Louie Sam? That somebody told Pete how to describe him to make him sound like he could have just come from murdering Mr. Bell? Like, for instance, his uncle, Mr. Osterman?”

That settles it—this man
is
a mind reader!

“I got to be going,” I say.

“I'll tell you what, George,” says Mr. Clark. “I'll be staying here for a few more days. You know where to find me if you think of anything that might help. Fair enough?”

Speak of the devil, who should walk into the hotel at that very moment but Mr. Osterman? He looks from me to Mr. Clark. He is not pleased to see that we've been conversing. I want to tell him that it was Mr. Clark doing all the talking, not me. I'm afraid of him as I have never been before.

“What happened to your arm, George?”

“I fell,” I say. “The wire at pole number fifty-one was hanging loose. I tried to put it back up.”

“Seems you sent a boy to do a man's job, Mr. Osterman.”

“I believe I told you yesterday, Mr. Clark, that I have nothing more to say to you.”

Mr. Clark smiles pleasantly.

“There's no law against me talking to George here, is there?”

There is no humor in Mr. Osterman when he replies. “I'd be careful about talking so much. You wouldn't want to catch a throat disease.”

Mr. Clark isn't smiling now, either.

“Are you threatening me?”

“Think of it more as good advice.”

Mr. Clark takes a couple of chews of his tobacco, then gets up slowly, like he's got all the time in the world. He sends a stream of brown juice into the brass spittoon in the corner. He turns back to Mr. Osterman, like at last he's thought of a reply.

“Then I suppose I should thank you for it.”

“Mind your business, Mr. Clark.”

“An unlawful act took place in Canadian territory, Mr. Osterman. The Dominion Government has the cooperation of your government to discover the true circumstances of that act. That makes it my business.”

With that, Mr. Clark heads outdoors. Mr. Osterman sizes me up.

“What did you tell him?”

“Nothing!”

“Make sure you keep it that way.”

He unlocks the door to the telegraph office and goes inside. I follow him.

“Mr. Osterman?”

“What?” he snaps.

“I need my wages, for yesterday.”

“You were supposed to put in a full day. You only got to pole fifty-one.”

Does he not see that my arm is in a sling, and that I'm in pain?

“I got hurt,” I say.

“Through your own stupidity. Nobody told you to go climbing the poles.”

“You told me to fix them. That's what I was trying to do.”

He sees the burn on my right hand.

“What happened there?”

“I was trying to put the line back on the insulator.”

“Don't you know enough to know the wire is electrified? You're lucky you didn't bring the whole line down.”

He's trying to make me feel ignorant and small, but instead I feel angry.

“How was I supposed to know?” I ask. “You didn't tell me.”

“Don't talk back to me, boy,” he says.

He reaches into his pocket for a handful of coins and picks out three bits. He throws them at me. There's no way I can catch them with my injuries.

“There. Now get out of my sight.”

The coins bounce off the floor, scattering. I'm burning up with anger and shame as I kneel down to pick them up.

“This is only half of what I'm owed,” I tell him.

“You did half a day's work. You get paid for half a day.”

“But—”

“Get!” he says, raising his voice. “And don't let me see you around here again.”

Mr. Osterman is a villain through and through, I have no doubt of that now. My first thought is to find Mr. Clark and tell him everything I know. I head outside and scan the street for him. But instead of Mr. Clark, my eyes fix on the one man I have more to fear from at this moment than Mr. Osterman. I see Father across the street, coming out of the drug store with Dr. Thompson.

Chapter Twenty-One