John Gardner - The Sunlight Dialogues

“All right,” Hodge said. “It’s not my fault that it’s part of my profession to give the criminal the full benefit of the law. And it’s not my fault that the Chief of Police is a half-senile old coot who’s got no more business in his job than a scarecrow’s got in church. My hands are clean of the whole thing. But it’s got to be somebody’s fault.”

The Indian had put down his comic book and was coming over toward them, shirttail hanging out, long, thin shoes untied. He had a face that looked run over. “Don’t think I’m doing all this because I like it,” Hodge was saying. “If the police would do their job there’s nobody would be happier about it than me. Just the same, it’s a fact that the boy’s got something to do with me — because of Ben, that is. Ben, my brother, the one on the farm.”

Freeman nodded.

“And because of my boy, Luke. They wash their hands of him, the Indian I mean, Nick, and there he is out roaming the countryside with a gun in his possession — what am I supposed to do?”

The Indian tipped back the hat and put his hand on the fender and looked at them. “Hod do,” he said.

Freeman tipped the hat and smiled. “Good morning.”

“Help you people?” the Indian said. He had a wrinkled cigarette between the first two fingers of the hand he leaned on.

“My son Luke, now,” Hodge stared past his fists on the steering wheel. He mused.

The Indian said, “You looking for somebody?” He took a drag on the cigarette. Behind him the sky was sharply blue. One of the willows was dead.

“We want to see somebody?” Freeman said.

Hodge leaned toward the window. “You seen any sign of Nick Slater?” he said.

The Indian showed nothing. “Slater?”

“You know him,” Hodge said. “A young fellow, thin.” He tried to think how to describe him. But he was thinking of Luke.

The Indian scratched his stomach.

“There’d be a bearded man with him,” Hodge said.

The Indian drew his mouth down, then slowly shook his head.

Hodge looked toward the willows. At last he said, “Chief around?”

“Lives in the woods,” the Indian said. He frowned. “You mean Nicodemus?”

“Who’s Chief?” Hodge said.

“Two chiefs,” the Indian said. “Nicodemus is the Chief according to him. According to the old women Sun-on-the-Water’s the Chief.”

“Well, whichever you think,” Hodge said.

Freeman nodded, satisfied.

“Sun-on-the-Water’s in the woods,” the Indian said.

“Well,” Hodge said. He waited.

The Indian thought about it. After a minute he said, “Wait here.” He walked slowly back toward the porch. As he opened the screen door he glanced back, sharp-eyed.

Hodge turned off the motor and spoke of his sons. After a long time (not long to Hodge) the screen door of the Activities Center opened and a boy came out — a lanky Indian in jeans and glasses and a red shirt. He came to the car.

“Hi,” he said. “Welcome.” He bowed.

Hodge nodded.

“This is the Activities Center,” the boy said. “We have many exhibits.”

Freeman said, “It’s nice!”

Again the boy bowed. “You’re looking for Nick Slater, I understand. The Chief will be glad to help, I’m sure. So therefore follow me and I’ll take you to our leader.” A second too late, he grinned.

Freeman laughed. Hodge pretended to smile.

“Concerning Chief Sun-on-the-Water there are many stories,” the boy said. “If you prefer, I will tell you some as we walk to where he is.”

“Great!” Freeman said.

Hodge felt for the doorhandle and took a deep breath, preparing to get out and walk.

Inside the woods of the Old Part it was dark and still musty from last night’s rain. The woods were full of brush, and there were young saplings everywhere, pushing against each other, struggling upward. In the old days, the boy said, the Indians used to burn out the brush and leaves every year, but no one bothered any more. No one lived here now except Sun-on-the-Water and some of the old women. The others lived in the new houses toward the edge of the Reservation, where they could get out to the gypsum mines and the tannery when they wanted to. The children went to school in Akron now, and when they were through a lot of them left the Reservation. The older girls went to colleges, and the older boys got jobs down south toward Olean or moved to Idaho. Nobody spoke the old language any more. Some of them could if they had to, but they never did. The trail was so narrow they had to walk single file, and Hodge was now too far back to hear more than a phrase now and then. It was just as well. The heat of his indignation at Clumly had passed and had left behind it a gloom like the gloom of the woods, a memory of pleasant times so long gone he could no longer believe in them, memories of hopes proved years ago to be ashes in the wind. He saw again in his mind the performance Chief Clumly had put on last night, trying to distract them from the truth. One could see well enough what he was up to. Before you knew it he would be saying there had been no escape at all, maybe even believing it. Yet a good man once. He’d spoken to the Lions Club sometimes, and it was a pleasure to hear him. But now you could never be sure he would even remember to come, and if he came you could not be sure he would have his speech ready or, if the speech was ready, whether the facts would be even approximately right. Hodge felt more and more depressed. Let Miller worry about it, he thought. But Miller had pretended to go along with it, standing there nodding like a puppet, and who could blame him? Ordering intelligence, he thought. One of Will Jr’s phrases, something he’d picked up in college. He sighed. His shoes squished in the mud. The sticks across the path seemed to have lain here for years; they were soft as bread. But he could see the greenish light of a clearing ahead of them, and as they came closer he saw what appeared to be a cabin.

The boy was saying, “He never comes out any more. They even have to cart his whiskey in to him. Old woman lives with him, some say it’s his sister. They use to cut wood and sell it, but his tractor gave out and besides he got too old to haul it, and also he drank, so therefore he left it go and now the buzzsaw just sits there growing vines and moss and the tractor just sits there behind the house growing vines and moss too, and they don’t do anything, as far as I know, just wait for people to come in with the whiskey. Sometimes Mr. Bailey comes in and asks Sun-on-the-Water to have a meeting at the Longhouse, but Sun-on-the-Water says no, they don’t need no meeting, and they let it go, or else Nicodemus has a meeting. Nicodemus isn’t even an Indian, or anyway not a Seneca, that’s what my father says. But he runs things, since nobody else will. He sold off half the land to the telephone company for nothing but free telephones for whoever wanted one. A lot of people were mad about it, but nobody used the land anyhow and they let it go. Nicodemus said we should all be proud, and some of the people took his side — I don’t exactly understand the whole thing — but anyway, after that Nicodemus said he was the Chief and some of the people said ok. Mr. Bailey said Sun-on-the-Water was Chief, and so did Mrs. Steeprock, but Sun-on-the-Water wouldn’t come out of the woods, so therefore that’s how it was.”

“Maybe we picked the wrong Chief,” Freeman said. He looked back along the trail and scratched his beard, but he was still hurrying, each step a little kick, exactly as he’d been walking when Hodge first saw him.

“That’s the place,” the Indian boy said. “He’s prob’ly asleep.”

Hodge nodded.

“The Senecas use to be a independent nation,” the boy said. “In the War of 1812 the Seneca army declared against England and they saved the Port of Buffalo, people say. They say the United States Army promised to meet them there and help fight the British, but then the United States Army got thinking and they decided to wait and see how the Indians made out, so they waited and the Indians fought the British theirselves, and after they’d won the victory the Americans came and gave them congratulations.”