I Heard The Owl Call My Name

Vicar Mark Brian is heading up the coast of British Columbia in a boat helmed by an Indian boy named Jim Wallace. As he observes the landscape, Mark reflects on the advice he received from a retired canon (senior priest) named Caleb who had helped Mark man the boat until they picked up Jim. Caleb had instructed Mark on the operation of the boat as well as the customs of the Indians. He cautioned Mark not to refer to the Indians as cannibals, saying that this reputation was due to a forgotten ceremonial dance that reenacts the myth of a young man “maddened by the cannibal spirit” (12). Mark also reflects on what the Bishop told him about the tribe’s history and custom: The Indian name of the village is Quee, meaning “inside place,” and according to the tribal legend was founded by two brothers after the great flood. The brothers borrowed skins of wolves so that they could travel easily through the woods until they found a place to settle, after which they returned the skins to the wolves. Consequently, the wolf is an important tribal symbol, as is the ceremonial wolf dance. The Bishop also named the Cedar-man—a cedar tree who was ordered by a “great voice” (19)to become a man—as the most powerful of the tribe’s gods. Before Mark began his journey, the Bishop explained that the village is composed of the myths, the animals, and the landscape, and that once Mark arrives there, he will become part of the village. He finally cautioned Mark that there is no word for “thank you” (20) in the tribe’s language, Kwákwala.

Mark and Jim arrive at the mouth of the river that leads to Kingcome. Jim takes a small boat up the river and returns with four Indian boys in canoes, who lash them together in order to transport Mark and the new organ piano he has brought to the village. When Mark arrives at the village, he discovers that a small boy whose growth was stunted—called weesa-bedó by the Indians—had drowned 10 days ago and was being kept at the vicarage while the village waited for an investigation and burial permit from the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP). The boy’s body is decomposing, and when the Constable finally arrives, he brings his girlfriend, to which Mark and the villagers conclude that he had put off traveling to the village while waiting for pleasant weather. The Constable criticizes the Indians for moving the body from the accident scene even though the boy drowned days ago, and he becomes ill when he inspects the body and throws up in the bushes. Mark holds a service for the boy at the old burying ground, where he sees the trees where the tribe members used to lay their dead to rest by suspending their coffins from trees. When he returns to the vicarage with Jim, someone has tried to air it out to eliminate the smell and has left behind a dish of seaweed and corn, called gluckaston, for Mark. Jim guesses that it was Marta Stephens who left the dinner for Mark.

This chapter gives an overview of some of the major characters in the village and their hopes for Mark. It begins with the perspective of the villagers, who are discussing their positive and negative impressions of Mark Brian. They make fun of his use of the royal “we” when speaking (something Caleb had told him to do) and suspect that Mark will ask them to build a new vicarage for him since the current one is falling down. However, the village elder, T.P. Wallace, observes that Mark was respectful of their burial customs, and Chief Eddy admires how Mark refrained from laughing at the Constable when he became ill. The village matriarch, Mrs. Hudson, is glad that the village has a vicar because it improves her social standing and power, but she also feels slightly antagonistic for Mark since he is an intruder. Meanwhile, the kind village grandmother, Marta Stephens, is knitting a hat for Mark, and Mrs. Hudson’s granddaughter, Keetah, is wondering if Mark will see that Gordon, the boy she plans to marry, feels trapped in the village. The poorest villager, Sam, an alcoholic who beats his wife and daughter, Ellie, wonders how he can convince Mark to lend him money. A carver named Peter wonders: “How long will he be here before he knows that I live among the dead?” (32). The narrator reveals that the other white man in the village, the school teacher, has been there for two years and does not like the Indians. The chapter ends with 13-year-old Ellie, who sleeps with men in order to get away from her father, returning home just before dawn. 

On his first morning, Mark inspects the vicarage and realizes it is falling down. He receives a note from the Bishop indicating that he plans to send mark a pre-fabricated two-bedroom house for him to assemble to replace the old vicarage. Mark is overwhelmed with the prospect of having to transport all the materials up-river by canoe and writes the Bishop back, asking him not to send the house. He then begins to clean and repair the vicarage. Mark and Jim visit neighboring villages by boat, and Mark arranges to hold services each once a month. He notices that all the Indians are polite and begins to feel lonely. He vows to himself that he will not ask the Bishop for the new vicarage unless the Indians offer to help him with it first. Sam comes by and asks Mark for money, but Mark turns him away. He then meets the schoolteacher who complains about his housing, proclaims that he is an atheist, and asserts that any man who professed Christianity must be “incredibly naive” (39). Mark counters by quoting Schweitzer, saying there are two kinds of naïveté: “One not even aware of the problems, and another which has knocked on all the doors of knowledge and knows man can explain little and is still willing to follow his conviction into the unknown” (39). When Mark returns to the vicarage, a small boy and girl are waiting, and he befriends them. Chief Eddy comes by when Mark is patching the roof and instructs him on how to pronounce the name of the tribe: “Jowedaino,” which is spelled Tsawataineuk. Mark has difficulty pronouncing it, and at the first Sunday service tries to memorize everyone’s English nickname. Marta gives Mark the hat she knit and reveals that she remembers the first man from the Anglican Church to come to the village. 

Mark and Jim go for supplies to continue repairs on the vicarage and begin discussing the life cycle of the salmon, called the “swimmer” (44) by the Indians. Jim describes how the young fingerlings are afraid to enter the ocean but are eventually carried downstream or preyed on. The adult salmon return to the river, swimming upstream to spawn, then die and are swept back into the ocean. Mark asks to see “the end of the swimmer” (45) and Jim takes him to some pools surrounding the falls, where they see a salmon struggling in a gentle stream before dying and being swept away. The sight saddens Keetah, but Mark and Marta console her, telling her it is natural. Marta explains that the village used to refer to sets of twins as “swimmers,” and Mark reveals that he has a twin sister, prompting Marta: “The swimmer is your relative. You belong to the salmon people” (47). Jim and Mark discuss Keetah, and Jim reveals that her grandmother, Mrs. Hudson, has arranged for her to marry Gordon, a boy who is away at the government school in Alert Bay. Jim, however, is confident that he will be the one to marry Keetah because Gordon is “fast moving water” and Keetah is “the pool” (48).

In October, the fishing season dies down and the men turn to hunting. The men kill a wolf, and as Jim and Mark walk together, Jim imitates Mark’s use of the royal “we,” and Mark resolves not to use it anymore. Mark confesses that he can’t hunt or fish well and expects he can’t even handle his boat. Jim consoles him by saying that he can helm the boat almost as well as a 10-year-old Indian boy. Mark realizes that he and Jim have become friends.

In November, an Anglican Church doctor visits and runs a makeshift clinic. In December, three children in a neighboring village die in a fire. Mark realizes that his circle of acquaintances is widening, and he has a good rapport with Calamity Bill, whose float house he passes while he and Jim are out on patrol. The church organ, which had been unplayable due to dampness, finally starts to work, and Mark and Jim deliver Christmas presents donated from churches in Vancouver to all the villages in the area. On Christmas, as all the people of the village arrive for midnight service, Mark thinks of them as “the people of his hand and the sheep of his pasture” (58), and feels a deep commitment to them.