A Time of Change

Gentle Deer was known to the Krause family and those who frequented their home and workshop as Helga. She’d visited the homeland of Chawathil First Nation traditional owners of the area of Canada where loggers operated on several occasions over the seven-year period she’d now been residing in Vancouver with her parents.

She missed the company of her married sisters and the brothers in the Indian camp who helped her father the pale faces referred to as Peter on journeys back and forth facilitating trade in Indian goods purchased from their tribe. The trade kept Ben Krause’s workshop operating in Vancouver. Her siblings were much older than she and she’d been a surprise addition to the family after Audrey’s childbearing years should normally have terminated for some time. So that had been the main reason Peter and Audrey had taken her to Vancouver with them due to her young age. Of course, there was the added attraction for Gentle Deer when Ben made it known he was returning to Vancouver to marry and set up a business there.

Ben had been a companion to her at an early age and Peter after observing the young man closely allowed her to seek him out when Ben was not working at the camp each day. The two had further bonded when Ben came down with a raging fever during the first winter experienced in the logging camp. Ben was determined not to return home as the other loggers did in winter until he could return with enough money to set himself up in business. Audrey had looked after him to use Indian remedies to bring Ben back from the jaws of death and Gentle Deer had been by her side caring for his needs through that experience. When his eyes could focus at times through his illness, he’d see this small face peering at him anxiously. He now looked on Gentle Deer as a young sister.

Gentle Deer enjoyed the journey from Vancouver with her father or brothers each time they made the trip for trade in skins and other items produced by the Indians. and it was good to breathe that pure air of the forest. The smoke of Indian fires in her homeland was different to the smog of Vancouver, and she loved to sit by campfires of an evening with the women as they chatted and cooked food for the braves.

It was nice to be in the presence of her brown skinned tribesmen and women knowing this was their country and the company camp quarters where loggers congregated mostly by themselves were viewed as a minority who were there as the Indian’s guests. In Vancouver she and her family were the minority.

It was mutually beneficial working with the loggers. The company valued them for their knowledge of the area and cooperated with them in their knowledge of afforestation and which kind of soil or location to plant replacement seedlings. Initially the company founders had planned to just cut and transport and not bother to replace. The Indians were incensed and had planned to wipe out the camp of these ecological rapists but some cool heads in the original logger camp knowing the rudiments of their language came to find out why they were being threatened and after days talk with the chief and his counsel the company accepted terms dictated by the Indians for privilege of working among them. The company erected a large hall to be used as a meeting place for the Chief and his counsellors as proof of their goodwill and there was enough room to fit in the braves when called by the chief for announcements. At first the Indians didn’t like this unusual construction erected for their use, but the chief came to like the shelter this offered in off seasons. He demanded a similar building for his own use and the company gladly erected it. Over the years more of the Indians abandoned the wigwams and itinerant lifestyle and decided to settle in proximity to the logger camp where they had free access to food and blankets during winter months and access to the company deep well saving them a trip to the river. In return for gifts from the company the Indians supplied them with fresh meat in season and dried fish and venison during winter months in exchange for corn and wheat kept in company store. Indian garments and other products were exchanged for guns and other useful household goods produced by the pale faces. Ben had hoped to corner this market when he returned to Vancouver to set up business.

Many moons in the past the tribe had first encountered pale face trappers who ventured singly or with a companion into their area in search of skins. They came with muskets and the braves on high alert surrounded them to ascertain the reason for this intrusion. That had been in her great grandfather’s time. Then had come the Catholic nuns who set up camp a hundred kilometres from where the tribe had their headquarters to educate the younger generation and hopefully convert them to the Catholic faith. Some had succumbed to the nun’s instruction and were whisked away to developing cities never to be seen again. But the majority listened and remained in the old ways and Audrey had been one of them and this is where she’d been exposed to basic English which she was able to use to communicate with the logging company administrators. The Moravians had arrived much later and set up their own village a few kilometres away offering education in exchange for permission to reside among the Indians.

Through Peter and Audrey as the loggers called them Ben had been introduced to the tribe and over time had been permitted to sit with them around the camp at nights. It was there he’d been given the name Charging Moose. Over the years Gentle Deer had been reflecting on her bonding with Charging Moose over her childhood years and the significance of their names.

The moose was the owner of the forest along with the bear and the deer looked to the moose for warning and protection from predators. She concluded that the tribe had named them both for their compatibility and as she matured her childhood expectation was they’d be together for life. It was not a problem that Ben was married to Clara her adopted sister or the age difference between them as polygamy was accepted by the tribe as normal and Clara and her had bonded from the beginning as sisters. She loved Clara’s two children as her own now and they’d get along well together. She began to look forward to the formalization of this marriage to Charging Moose as his second wife in the Indian manner at their camp in the hills. It was now a couple of years since she realized she was a woman as her mother explained what the first period meant. Now her yearning for the marriage consummation was becoming very strong.

On her return from the current trip to Vancouver she approached her mother Audrey and inquired when the ceremony with Ben was to be formalized at home in the hills with her family present to bless the occasion. Audrey had never guessed what was going through her daughter’s mind. To her the brother sister attachment had been innocent in her mind and she hastened to talk with Peter her husband. Both became alarmed.

Their tribe was isolated enough to avoid any intervention by an expanding Canadian central government, but it had been reported recently a First Nation man had been arrested for entering a multiple marriage arrangement. The pale faces had a law that made this practice illegal, but Indians and Mormons ignored this until the government began to extend their authority into remote areas and this was now becoming an issue.

Both Peter and Audrey had been considering returning permanently to their homeland as they were aging and found living in Vancouver unpleasant. They were there for the sake of their adopted son Ben, but it was time to move on. That evening Peter talked with Ben who shed tears at the thought of these wonderful friends who were more relations than just friends leaving permanently. But Ben understood the need for them to retire. He was surprised when they said they were taking Gentle Deer with them as it was time to see to her marriage in their territory. Knowing the bond between Ben and Helga they asked Ben not to mention she’d never be coming back as they made that trip this time. They wanted to deal with Gentle Deer’s grief when they returned to their roots. They’d be sending their eldest son and his wife and children to continue in the partnership arrangement with Ben for a while. Next day Ben said goodbye to the three as they headed back to the Indian camp far away his little sister Helga not to know they were never to see each other again. It was never revealed to Ben that his Helga had been planning all her maturing years to be his wife.

By now Clara was skilled enough along with her employees to make excellent garments out of skins sent from the camp to work on and Audrey continued to send her own contributions with each shipment of skins. Three weeks later Peter’s son arrived to take up residence with his wife and some of his children. He’d been making the trip back and forth for a few years now, but Vancouver would now be his home base, and his wife would take over garment making supervision and training. They had few English skills as a family, but Ben was now quite fluent in their language and Clara not far behind him in her use of the Chawathil language. By this time Clara was expecting her third child so was happy to leave the workshop in the capable hands of this new friend. The two women soon bonded together as they conversed in that native tongue and Clara made sure her new friend felt welcome and was given anything she needed personally from the marketplace.

The Indian woman was in culture shock as Clara took her around the city and introduced her to her extended family who received her respectfully and would bring her their western baked goods as a gift to show their desire to be friends. At first the woman received them respectfully and took them home to see how her children reacted. This was not something they were used to and they tasted and discarded quickly in the initial stages. Embarrassed this poor woman confided to Clara they were not used to what pale faces ate and Clara told her to just accept and when they’d departed give it to her and Ben to eat. But over time the new family acquired the taste and welcomed the gifts. She in return always took some of her handiwork to share with Clara’s extended family when the two women visited them.

Clara set up a classroom in an empty room attached to their workshop and arranged for a private tutor to teach both her two eldest children plus the children now resident with them from the camp. It took about a year before the Chawathil children began to comprehend and use English well enough to mix in the community by themselves. Their mother would listen in when not supervising and in the privacy of their quarters the children would teach their mother words and sentences in English. Within two years this Indian woman was also able to communicate in basic English and felt free to do some of her own shopping at places she knew were extended family owned.

About one year from the time Peter and Audrey had left Vancouver Audrey sent a short message to inform them all Gentle Deer was now married to an Indian brave who she’d grown up with as a child in the camp.

One evening soon after these events Hans Hoffmann arrived home leaving the children to care for closing operations at Hoffmann and Co. for the day. They were all happy in their assigned roles and the boys as parents still referred to them would be calling on their young ladies of interest downtown to talk before coming home. It looked like the boys were thinking about families at last. Anna was still not interested in a relationship much to everyone’s surprise and they hoped someone would appear to get her interest too. Hans turned to his wife as he sped through the door to the kitchen.

“Emma, I feel it’s time for me to retire. Our children are running the business very well and get along together. What do you think?”

Emma laughed.

“Hans you are a hands-on person so your parents named you well, but you could never retire and would be so fidgety at home if you retired, you’d get on my nerves trying to get the housework done and listen to you complaining.”

Hans laughed. As usual Emma had his sized up. His wife continued.

“That is unless Otto decided to retire too, and you could both go fishing or travelling each day to use up your energy and leave us women alone to do our work peacefully. Mia, Sophia and I enjoy our time cooking and gossiping each day and wouldn’t have time for you to chip in when you have no idea of how to relate to a woman’s world.”

Hans turned to go sit in the lounge room laughing as he went. Otto called in on the way home and Hans decided to put that question to his friend. Otto thought about it for a few minutes. With his latent heart condition, he was finding working more difficult now and perhaps Hans was right. They could go fishing, travel or find hobbies they enjoyed. He brightened at the thought. Then turned to Hans.

“Our children are well established by themselves, and we have enough money for a comfortable retirement Hans. Let’s do it!”

So that evening while the families ate together, they made their announcement. It was a happy occasion which was soon communicated to the married children who gave their support.

That evening as Hans and Emma prepared for bed, they talked about their life history and the pleasure seeing their children grow and take responsibility making families of their own. They went to sleep satisfied with their life dreaming of the enjoyment their own children would experience nurturing their own children until they in turn gave the future over to their grandchildren. That was the way of life.

Conclusion

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