The Night Watchman(102)

Senator Young spoke well and said exactly what the tribal committee members had hoped he would say. He insisted that the state could not step in and take over the responsibilities of the federal government. That, if anything, the government should fund an expensive job-training program on the reservation.



Thomas began.



First, the introductions, the courtesies, the insistence that the record show that this trip by tribal people to Washington had been paid for by the generosity of local people, not the government. Nothing was said about the boxing match.



Sitting behind Thomas in the row of supporters and interested parties, Patrice blinked and remembered Wood Mountain’s broken eyebrow. For a moment that snowy day, her glasses had slipped and she saw how the scar had formed across the bone, a living and still healing interruption. What would she do about him?



Instead of arguing the premise of termination itself, the tribal committee had decided to buy time. The government’s five-year plan was insufficient because the reservation was currently unable to sustain itself without support. Hammer that. Then as a point of outrage demand more money from the government.



A description of the Turtle Mountain Reservation.



A statement of strong opposition. Then a ladle of corn syrup—appreciation for the efforts and time of the government, extra dollops for Senator Watkins and Associate Commissioner of Indian Affairs H. Rex Lee, the authors of the two measures that would strip the people of everything.



Watkins interrupted. Watkins started talking.



Thomas thought: Oh hell, stick with it, stick with it, don’t let him give you the teacher-eye, don’t let him throw his eight-dollar words at you, don’t let him . . .



. . . and suddenly Roderick was in the room.





Roderick


The instant that Roderick saw Senator Arthur V. Watkins, he knew exactly who he was. Watkins was the teacher who’d taught the Palmer Method, the little man who’d whacked his hands with the ruler’s edge, who’d pulled his ears, who’d screeched at him, who’d called him hopeless, who’d punished him for talking Indian. Watkins was the man who’d dragged Roderick to the cellar stairs and said to Thomas, “Would you care to join your friend?”

Senator Watkins: In my area, whites got the poor land on the reservation. Within a year, however, the Indians leased their allotments. They just didn’t want to farm. That is true today. I think most of the Indian allotments are under lease to white people. That is why I seriously doubt that Indians like to farm.





Patrice, Thinking


He’s another white farmer like Doris Lauder’s family who picked up cheap Indian land after the taxes came due on allotments. I know damn well he didn’t get the poor land because no white person would buy it. He got the only farmable land.

Senator Watkins: If I may ask, do you work, Mr. Wazhashk?

Thomas Wazhashk: Yes. I farm.

Senator Watkins: It is too bad we haven’t more like you in these tribes.

Thomas Wazhashk: What farmable land there is on the reservation is mostly farmed by Indians.

Senator Watkins: I have noticed Indians, wherever I have seen them, in mechanical jobs, jobs requiring skill with their hands. They seem to like that.





Patrice


They seem to like that? I guess they do. I guess we do.





Millie


I won’t look down at my dress. I won’t get lost in my sleeves. But I’ll be fine because I’m dressed in the elements of geometry. Beyond which I must not go in my thoughts until I have delivered my study.

Thomas Wazhashk: In view of the fact that employment has shown a considerable downward trend throughout the United States as a whole, we believe the relocation program is ill timed and would be fraught with insurmountable difficulties. We want to point out that the relocation program has limitations. It doesn’t cover our problems.

Senator Watkins: I wouldn’t say it covered them all. No. Because, after all, the government can’t solve your problems for you. Most of them have to be solved by yourselves.





Thomas


Is that you, Roderick?





Roderick


Yes, it’s me. Hold out. Don’t get mad. They don’t like an Indian to have brains. Ignore old Mr. Pantywaist and put your sentences together.

Senator Watkins: Oh, surely. There would be nothing permanently cured that you don’t cure yourself. No government, no matter how benevolent, can put ambition into people. That has to be developed by themselves. You can’t legislate morality, character, or any of those fine virtues into people.

You learn to walk by walking.





Thomas, Thinking


We didn’t get to the Turtle Mountains by riding in a covered wagon.





Roderick and Thomas


For the rest of his life, when Thomas thought of the moment his teacher asked whether he wanted to join Roderick in the cellar, Thomas imagined saying, “Yes, yes, sling me down there, you scabby rat.” But he hadn’t said that. No, Thomas had gone silent and let Roderick take the blame. But it hadn’t been entirely out of cowardice. No, because after all, it was just a cellar and Roderick had been in worse. No, because behind the teacher’s back, Roderick shook his head at him to stay. He knew that kids had been forgotten down there a week at a time. No, it was strategy. From up above, Thomas could bust Roderick out.