heels, we noticed a horde of shadowy figures
moving in silhouette against the red glow of
the leaping fires. They seemed strangely
unreal as they leapt and contorted around
with a slight limping motion to the pounding
of the tom-toms. Beyond, bathed in the
blood-red radiance of the flames, were other
contorted figures, their faces set, and eye-
balls rolling as they worked themselves into
a frenzy.

The noise was almost deafening as we
edged into the circle of light, the Beavers
apparently oblivious to our presence. Near-
by, silent sinister figures, stood the Crees,
transported into the dim traditional past,
their black eyes snapping with age-old
hatreds as they gazed at the leaping forms
of their hereditary enemies. Each dancing
couple limped around the fires, linked with
the respective gifts with which they'd been
led out—a pack-saddle, a silk scarf, a raw-
hide quirt or a side of blackened dried meat
that looked as though it had come from
Pharaoh’s tomb. Armed with tin dippers
broad-hipped squaws dispensed a vile con-
coction of tea and chewing tobacco with a
view to pepping up the show.

Suddenly a guttural wave of excitement
swept the gathering. Andree, the medicine
man, had led out Attachie with his best
racehorse, a fine big strawberry roan. A
crude drawing of a horse on a scrap of
buckskin was all that passed, but evidently
it was sufficient. Everyone waited on tip-
toes to see what Attachie would do. Only
that morning his bay mare had beaten the
roan in a race at the aboriginal race-course

a peg.

on the hill, and custom decreed that Attachie
should “dance” his own horse back in ex-
change. But Attachie hadn’t traded all
these years with old Beatton for nothing.
A born trader and a tribal politician to
boot, he was jealous of the attention being
showered on the new arrival from Pouce
Coupe and was anxious to bring him down
When he led the medicine man back
into the dance-circle with nothing but a
rusted Winchester rifle, Andree’s discom-

F. W. Beatton, Hudson’s Bay factor and magis-
trate at Fort St. John who passed sentence on the
Medicine Man. Beside him is the old fur press.

forture was as obvious as the silent an
ment of Attachie’s tribesmen.

Still the episode was loaded full of ds
mite. Having been publicly humiliat
Andree, as soon as he conveniently co
sneaked away from the fire with his br;
rounded up the horse he’d danced a
and proceeded to swim it across the river
the intention of spiriting it-away next day
As the horse plunged ashore on the so
side near the temporarily deserted bar
of the B. C. Provincial Police two shad
figures arose from the willows. Qui
lightning a rope shot out, fell neatly oy
the horse’s ears, and as he started
affrightedly was pulled taut about his ne
Scenting what was in the wind, Attac
had taken his own peculiar way of taki
possession of the gift. ic

Returning to the camp Attachie enter
his tepee and joined the excited bunch
gamblers going to it with a will. To t
accompaniment of guttural A-ha’s two p
spiring drummers were pounding on th
tom-toms while two kneeling teams fac
each other, their shoulders jerking to t
rhythm of the drums. Their clenched f
beneath a striped Austrian rug, the opposi
team tossed the covering aside, shot bo
upright and_ still. jerking like marionet
held their clenched fists, tauntingly und
the noses of those opposite.

Poised like a snake about to strike, A
tachie searched the faces of the swayi
figures. His palms came together with
explosive crack, his fingers sprang o
grotesquely to indicate which fists ““palme

Light ‘

TRAIL, B.C.

Goat River

Page Seventy-eight

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