Nine Lies of B.G. Davies

The Line in the Sand (Part 1)

 Images and italicized quotations copyright The Queen's Printer for Ontario 

Four men looked at the ground. Two stood on each side of the line, staring at the strange mark in the dry sand. No one spoke. 

I waited at the water's edge, along with the other three canoemen and the Indian, anticipating George Gray's conclusion. Tucked low behind a beached canoe, Mac turned his back to the gale blowing down the lake, spread open his parka and tried to light his pipe.  The wind was too strong to keep the match burning.  He snuck a quick glance at the four men huddled together on the shore, but Rudy gave him a swift kick on the shin. Mac looked back at his unlit pipe. He knew better.

Wally first saw the track in the sand about ten minutes before we pulled up to the beach. He pointed his canoe paddle to the clay bank of the lake and said, to no one in particular, "What dat?"

George Gray motioned to the shore and Mac, his stern paddler, steered their canoe closer to the bank. Then he called to Jimmy, the Indian guide, to come take a look. The track emerged from the dark water and onto the wet clay bank, where what appeared to be the bumps of a creature's scales pressed deep depressions into the mud, like a cast or a mould of something. Above the high water mark, the indentation had solidified and was, in places, covered by the loose sand of the lake shore. The track ran along the beach and followed a course parallel to the water's edge, wiggling here and there, until it eventually disappeared beyond our sight, presumably continuing its path northward.

Mac was paddling with George Gray, as he had since the canoe expedition first launched onto the waters of Wanipitae Lake, four and a half months earlier. Gray believed Mac—Mackenzie Clouston—to be the strongest and most experienced canoeman in the party. He was born in the Orkney Islands, the eldest son of a respected voyageur who had plied the waters of Northern Canada with the old Northwest Company and later, for the Hudson Bay Company. "Good stock," Gray said about the Clouston lads, all three of them still working in the fur trade. With a powerful stern stroke, Mac rammed the red canoe into the mud. Gray shouted again for Jimmy.

Jimmy Noland paddled by himself. The old Ojibway-Cree guide said he couldn't swim, and didn't trust the White Men to not tip his canoe. While no one knew exactly how old Jimmy was—Jimmy kept changing the stories of his own birth, placing his birthday sometime between when the Great Ice moved the caribou to the barren lands and the time the church at Moose Factory floated out to sea. Most of the guys figured he was in his seventies, but it was impossible to say for sure. Standing in the centre of his canoe packed with the tents, provisions and camp gear, he poled his way up rapids with the agility and grace of a gymnast. Sitting on a log at the campfire drinking tea or huddled under his bearskin blanket, the flicker of light on his weathered face illuminating his toothless grin, Jimmy appeared like an ancient spirit, an apparition of a man-bear watching the eight men from outside their circle.

Jimmy slid his canoe next to the shore and stood. He didn't say anything at first, just scanned up and down the bank.

"What do you think made this track?" Gray asked.

Still no reply from Jimmy. He took his paddle and prodded the mud before stepping out of his canoe. The old native held the boat's bow line in one hand, his paddle in the other, and stepped closer to the track. He dropped to his knees and slowly placed his hands on the ground, as though he was bowing in reverence. He lowered his face to the earth. From my point of view, still floating on the lake, it was unclear if he was sniffing the track or merely bending to afford himself a closer examination.

Then he stood, turned to face Gray and proclaimed in his usual mumble, "I don't know."

Gray threw his paddle into the canoe behind him and stepped out, his boot sinking into the muck. He pulled it out with a sloppy 'pop'. "You have no idea, Jimmy? Have you ever seen a track like this before?"