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But me?--a tormentor of toms?--a filcher of feathered birds?--I am no Indian. Ok, maybe part-time, if I was unjustifiably framed. A few turkey feathers on my coat means nothing. Suggests no proclivity for poultry-napping. Maybe a passion for feather dusters and cleanliness, a military trait. Oops, maybe I speak too much.
Yet, it all comes back, at least some does. The voices never go away. Indian Butch's mocking face materializes at the worst moments, "My confidant and brother", my partner in Indian insanity. At the strangest times, I find myself hitchhiking back to my Alaskan haunts down the dreary Tok Junction Highway.
"Not much luck"--I remember Butch saying. We gazed at the graveled road that stretched into the drizzle of Alaskan infinity.
"Who is going to pick up a guy hitching with an Indian?", I muttered. We had been walking for miles.
"Maybe it's the damn Boy Scout flag you stole?" He glared at my festive but patriotic garb.
"Don't be a hater," I said.
I was a boy scout in my youth. So, in a way, I only borrowed the Tok Junction flag. True, we broke into the Scout shack to stay warm, and the big flag around my shoulders helped, even if it did say Tok Junction Boy Scouts in big red letters, and made me look like a nylon-wrapped dancing bear. But stealing?--resourceful is the word I like. I pulled my stocking cap down.
"Do you know where this road goes?" I asked.
"You tell me," Butch said deprecatingly. "Apparently, you're the scout."
Yes, there were times I hated him. There were scouts, and there were Boy Scouts, and there were boys. Even now, with the O'Brien conundrum back here in Spokane, all kind of Indian sleights, and I don't mean sleights of hand, seem to simmer beneath the surface. Spokane is named for the Spokane tribe, Children of the Sun. Tell me that in the dark winter. I remember Native American author Sherman Alexie, a year ago, when he visited Spokane (near his former Wellpinit Reservation) say that O'Brien's Vietnam novel, The Things They Carried, was his favorite book. Why would Alexie like a book about killing Vietnamese?--no matter how masterfully crafted? What could O'Brien know about Indians, anyway, back in Minnesota?
Anyway, Butch and I decided to split up. Out in the Far North, it was more likely a single Indian would get a ride. A single brave, I thought as I watched Butch head up the road. He still wore his tin hat, for some god-awful reason. Maybe he thought he was a tin soldier. A poor disguise.
Later, of course, I learned that O'Brien knew more about Indians than I thought. He mentions a "celebrated" Minnesota massacre without going into detail. I found that curious. It raised my pin feathers.
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(Article changed on February 19, 2017 at 23:08)
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