Wintering

Bear for Breakfast JULY 1801 "Breakfast off the port bow," Beloit called out. Pierre La Page was half asleep, and the shout made him lurch forward. He rested his paddle blade on the gunwale of his canoe and looked up. "Paddle, you fools," the bowman, Jean Beloit, yelled. Suddenly the crewmen in all four canoes were pulling hard for the near shore. Pierre was sick of paddling. The four-canoe brigade had started up the Pigeon River at four a.m., when the sun was only a faint glimmer in the pines, yet they still hadn't stopped for breakfast. This was Pierre's second summer with the North West Company, and though he was becoming a skilled canoeman, he was travel weary this morning. He had paddled and portaged more than twelve hundred miles since he'd left Montreal last May. It was July now, and only two days ago his brigade had carried its trade goods over the legendary nine-mile trail at Grand Portage. He'd made four trips without complaint, carrying 180 pounds of goods up the trail and returning with an equal weight of bundled furs each time. It had nearly done him in. Pierre could understand why the old-timers joked that the North West Company used voyageurs to portage the freight because they couldn't risk laming mules or horses. "I said paddle," Beloit yelled, pulling out his North West gun and aiming it over the bow. Pierre squinted into the harsh light. Beloit was the grossest man Pierre had ever seen. Though most of the voyageurs took pride in their appearance, tying long fringed sashes around their waists and carefully perching their red woolen caps on their heads, Beloit was a picture of neglect. When he wasn't bare chested, his soiled shirt hung loosely over his hips. His sweat-stained cap often sagged down over his ears, and he refused to wear socks or deerskin leggings like the rest of the crew. Beloit's hair was long and greasy, and his perpetually bloodshot eyes were small and black. One of his front teeth was missing, and he always wore an evil grin made worse because the left half of his nose had been bitten off in a fight years ago, leaving only a ragged hole. A moment later Beloit said, "Ship your oars." They held their paddles still, and the canoes went into a silent glide. When Pierre saw the bear, he felt sorry for it. Shooting an animal in the water wasn't sporting. Pierre's father always told him that the principle of fair chase meant all game should be given a chance. He said, "A true hunter, whether he's taking meat or seeking a trophy, honors his quarry by following the rules." The previous summer Pierre had watched his voyageur crew club a young doe to death while she was swimming across the Mattawa River, and the thought of it still bothered him. Since the bear was only twenty yards from shore and swimming fast, Pierre thought it might escape. Then he heard the hammer click back on Beloit's gun. "Come on, sweet Tillie," Beloit whispered, talking to his gun as he always did just before he shot. In the powder flash and roar that followed, a pair of mallards rose from a reed bed on the far shore. The crewmen cheered as the bear went limp in the water. Beloit shouted his favorite phrase, "Je suis l'homme" ("I am the man"), and waved his gun high overhead in a victory salute. From his narrow seat in the middle of the canoe, Pierre stared at the bear.Durbin, William is the author of 'Wintering', published 2001 under ISBN 9780440227595 and ISBN 0440227593.