The Forest Lover by Susan Vreeland

Author:Susan Vreeland [Vreeland, Susan]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Tags: General Fiction
ISBN: 9780143034308
Publisher: Penguin
Published: 2004-02-01T05:00:00+00:00

22: Raven

“A secret,” Tillie’s mother, Beatrice James, said softly on the beach at Alert Bay where Emily was painting. A full-bosomed woman wearing large abalone-shell earrings, Beatrice carried herself with authority. “Chief Wakias got an invitation for you to Chief Tlii-Tlaalaadzi’s potlatch.”

“A potlatch! Me?”

“Sh!” Tillie scowled in exaggerated seriousness. “You can’t tell them at the mission house.” Then she grinned.

“Tell Mrs. Hall that my husband, Mac James, is taking you to paint at Quatsino. Then they go wrong way to find us.”

What would Claude think of this? Would he be there? He’d be surprised to see her. His eyebrows would pop up.

Lizzie would be starched silly if she knew, but Victoria was more than two hundred miles south. Emily imagined a missionary society meeting in the family parlor and Lizzie announcing crisply, As long as those Indians still do their cannibal dances at pagan revels and then go to church afterwards, there’s plenty of the Lord’s work left to do. We’re not finished until we’ve rooted out all heathen practices and backsliding.

Whatever they did at potlatches, it had to do with totems, Claude had told her. If she was ever to paint the poles with expression or understanding, she had to find out what they meant to the people who created them. Whether potlatches were illegal or not, she’d be a fool not to go.

“What’s the chief’s name again?”

“Chief Tlii-Tlaalaadzi.”

“That’s quite a name.”

“Means great big bonfire,” Beatrice said. “What do you do if you are too close to a bonfire?”

“Back away.”

“That’s what other chiefs do too if they want to give a potlatch. They know they can’t give one big like he can. You will see. Many things he will give.”

• • •

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.