Last Bus To Wisdom: A Novel

“Eleven going on twelve is a changeable age that way. One minute you are cultish and sappy, and the next you’re throwing a fit because you’re tired or hungry or something else upsetting is going on inside you. Right then my mood turned up like a storm. […] For if I lost the last of my family to the poorfarm or worse, with that went everything connected to the notion of a home as I had known it, and I would be bound for that other terrifying institution, the orphanage.”

Riding alone on the first leg of his trip to Wisconsin, Donal finds himself consumed with thoughts of what might happen if his grandmother does not recover from her operation and reclaim him. Thoughts of ending up on a work farm or in an orphanage plague Donal throughout. Here, those thoughts are reflected as a general but sudden anxiety, reflected in the author’s use of the simile “turned up like a storm.” Whenever events turn negative, as when Aunt Kate tries to send him back to Montana while Gram is still in the hospital, his fears become more acute.

“So, there it went, again. Out of my mouth something unexpected, not strictly true but harmlessly made-up. Storying, maybe it could be called. For I still say it was not so much that I was turning into an inveterate liar around strangers, I was simply overflowing with invention. […] Now, with no check on my enthusiasm when it started playing tricks upstairs on me—the long bus trip seemed to be inviting daydreaming, mine merely done out loud—I was surprising myself with the creations I could come up with.”

Whether necessitated by a predicament he finds himself in, as when trying to find Dr. Schneider in Yellowstone, or simply to impress others, as when he speaks here to a soldier bound for Korea, Donal possesses the ability to tell tall tales in the moment. He later feels surprised to learn that Herman and Kate also have that ability. Ultimately, the greatest compliment Donal and Herman pay to those they trust and care about is sharing the whole truth with no embellishment.

“Marriage came quick, and so did I. I had my footings poured, to use the Fort Peck term, in a thrown-together shacktown called Palookaville. Later, whenever we were living at some construction site or in another crude housing, my parents would think back to that time of a drafty tar paper shack between us and the weather of 60 below, and say, ‘Well, it beats Palookaville anyway.’”

In addition to providing exposition regarding Donal’s parents and his early childhood, Doig offers descriptions of the housing he and other characters endure throughout. He contrasts the sumptuous ranch homes of Wendell Williamson and Rags against the older dwelling of Aunt Kate and the bunkhouse where the Johnson family sleeps. He also tells of Donal and Herman sleeping in a culvert and upstairs in a hallway of the Yellowstone lodge. His intent is to demonstrate the vast residential differences encountered by his characters.

“We’ve got it knocked. Wherever it came from—World War Two? the Depression? for me the expression indeed meant something solid we were about to tap into, wages for my folks after a lean winter and a firmer place to live than wherever we’d fetched up when the ground froze hard enough to resist a bulldozer blade. […] Bud Cameron and his wife Peg declared in one voice or the other that they had it knocked. Until they didn’t.”

For Donal, the expression “we’ve got it knocked” correlates to a turn of good fortune. Like his parents before him, on virtually every occasion that Donal says that he has it knocked, an unforeseen negative event disrupts his life. As he points out several times, the waitress Letty’s inscription in his memory book holds true: “Life is a zigzag journey” (43).

“I stopped dead, which right then I might as well have been. There I was, in a strange city, with only the clothes on my back, while my every other possession—including the slip of paper with Aunt Kitty and Uncle Dutch’s address and phone number tucked into the autograph book in my coat pocket left on my seat—sped away in a cloud of exhaust. Helpless is pretty close to hopeless, and right then I felt both. For the second time that rugged day, eleven years old seemed much too young to be facing the world all by myself.”

This is one of the cascading negative experiences that Donal encounters, first on his trip to Aunt Kate’s but also later on the return journey back to Montana. Doig portrays each chaotic episode as more fraught with desperation and hopelessness than the previous one, though on every occasion Donal and his companions endure and achieve what they must to continue their quest. The newspaper van that rushes him to meet the bus proves that even when he feels alone, there are people around who can (and will) help him.

“I would have known her anywhere, an unmistakable figure in more ways than one, big around as a jukebox, jolly double chins, wide set doll eyes, hairdo as plump as the rest of her, the complete picture. […] My aunt Kitty was clearly none other than what the magazine cover described with absolute authority as America’s favorite songstress, and unless a person was a complete moron and deaf to boot, recognizable as the treasured vocalist of every song worth singing, Kate Smith.

At last, I had it knocked.”

As Herman soon confirms, Aunt Kate’s appearance closely resembles that of the mid-century singer Kate Smith. Donal feels grave disappointment at discovering that his aunt is not her celebrity lookalike. This turns out to be only the first of many grave disappointments Donal experiences as he tries to endure the summer in the care of his aunt.

“Did this whopper of a woman who was my last remaining relative after Gram hate me at first sight? Was I asking for it by showing up looking more like a stray hobo than the little gentleman she wanted me to be? What was I going to do all summer long, being kicked around in this household where the grown-ups bickered like magpies? […] [T]he only advice I could find for myself was that bit whispered from those interrupted existences Gram kept in touch with. Hunch up and take it.”

Donal can sense that Aunt Kate is just as disappointed with him as he is with her, and he finds the tension in the house uncomfortable. The expression “hunch up and take it” is Donal’s standard response when reacting to events at the negative end of the luck spectrum. His reference to “those interrupted experiences” refers to Gram keeping “in touch” with people who have died, such as his grandfather—the original source of the colloquialism “hunch up and take it.”

“Supposedly it takes one to know one, right? […] [T]his odd bespectacled yah-saying garden putterer and henpecked husband, fully five times older than me, had a king hell bastard of an imagination. Possibly outdoing my own, which I know is saying a lot. Wherever Herman Brinker got it from, he’d held on to the rare quality that usually leaves a person after a certain number of years as a kid, to let what he has read possess him.”

Donal confirms that, like himself, Herman possesses the gift of creating imaginative stories at the spur of the moment. This passage is noteworthy in Donal’s use of one of his many Montana ranch colloquialisms: “a king hell bastard of an imagination,” meaning Herman’s ability is vast. This description, of Herman retaining the youthful ability to be profoundly moved by the Western novels he reads and settings he imagines, are qualities reviewers often perceive in the works of Mark Twain. Doig’s writings demonstrate, as well, that he never forgot the power of the written word or what it was like to grow up.

“‘Good. Then you can learn canasta and fill in for Minnie.’

Upright in the chair by now and facing me dead-on, she manufactured a sort of a smile. ‘You don’t need to look so alarmed, kitten. I’ll teach you the ins and outs of the game. We have an entire week for you to learn, isn’t that lucky? It will help take your mind off your imagination, mmm?’”

This pronouncement by Aunt Kate, in which she drafts Donal into being her canasta partner to replace the absent Minnie, demonstrates the aunt’s mindset, method of operating, and difficulty with Donal. Having instructed him to work a 1000-piece puzzle, she abruptly dumps it off the card table to begin Donal’s instruction, even though he never agreed to learn the game. She perceives his inventive, curious mind to be a source of problems for herself. Aunt Kate demeans Donal throughout the process of teaching him the game, then refuses to give him half of the winnings, justifying her actions by portraying Donal as her burden.

“I had been in bars before, what Montana kid hadn’t? But this one looked like it had floated up from the bottom of the harbor. Sags of fishnets hung from the entire ceiling like greenish-gray cloud banks. Above the doorway were wicked-looking crossed harpoons, and the wall opposite the gleaming countertop bar was decorated with life preservers […] Into the mix around the rest of the long bar room where walrus tusks carved in intricate scrimshaw, and long-handled grappling hooks that looked sharp as shark’s teeth […] To me, the place was perfect from the first instant. And I could tell Herman felt at home simply entering its briny atmosphere.”

Going with Herman to a maritime-themed bar, Donal immediately perceives it to be a nautical version of the western-themed establishments he had entered back in Montana. Experiencing Herman in his own, comfortable environment and observing his relationship with the proprietor and his unerring ability to tell the difference between alcoholic beverages draws Donal closer to Herman. Their relationship becomes the only redemptive aspect of living in Manitowoc.

“I saw why the sight so unnerved her, as it did me. The forbidding old building set back from the street was spookily familiar, even though I was positive I had never seen it before. […]

‘What’s that place?’ I heard my own voice go high.

‘Just what it looks like,’ Aunt Kate responded, speeding up the car to leave the ghostly sight behind. ‘The poorhouse.’

[…] ‘And that’s another reason I must be careful, careful, careful with money and impress on you to do the same. I sometimes think we’ll end up there if a certain somebody doesn’t change his ways.’”

This passage conveys the idea that relegation to the “poorhouse” or “poorfarm” was not simply an experience dreaded by rural Americans, but also by those in extensively developed urban areas. Like her sister, Aunt Kate expresses a fear of ending up in the poorhouse. While Gram, who is virtually destitute, assures Donal they will avoid ending up in the poorfarm, Aunt Kate, who has a steady income and financial resources, uses the threat of the poorhouse to intimidate and control him. The “certain somebody” she is speaking about in this instance is Herman.

“‘Gram’s done the best she can, and I am, too, here. But you treat me like I’m a bum you took in. If I had that money you threw in the garbage, none of this would have happened.’

‘That’s no excuse for stealing,’ she said loftily […]

‘I don’t think it’s stealing,’ I cried, ‘when you won’t give me anything and I’m only taking my five bucks of what we won as partners. Why, isn’t it stealing, just as much, for you to keep it all for yourself?’”

The unspoken conflict between Donal and Aunt Kate comes to a head when Donal attempts to take his share of their canasta winnings out of her coin bank. For the first time, Donal speaks his mind, castigating Aunt Kate for withholding what is rightfully his and for losing the $30 Gram sent with him and not replacing it. Overhearing the dispute, Herman takes up for Donal. The complete honesty of this exchange results in the estrangement of Aunt Kate both from Donal, when she puts him on the Greyhound headed for Montana, and to her surprise, from Herman, who confides to Donal, “Today was the last straw on the camel’s back” (228).

“It sank in on me. No one in the entire world knew that the two of us were free as the breeze. Herman wasn’t merely flapping his lips; we were really footloose […] Or at least bus-loose—the fleet of Greyhounds ran anywhere we wanted to go. It was a dizzying prospect. Goodbye, battle-ax wife, for him, and no Hello, orphanage, for me—it was as simple as sitting tight in a bus seat to someone somewhere known only to us, the Greyhound itself on the lam from all we were leaving behind.”

This expression of complete freedom is a first for Donal, who previously went where led or sent, first by his parents, then his grandmother, and—until this moment—by his aunt. The description of unfettered liberty is intentionally reminiscent of Mark Twain’s description of Huckleberry Finn escaping his father’s abusive captivity and leaving behind Saint Petersburg, Missouri, where everyone believes he is dead.

“I have since learned that what he was trying to describe with that jawbreaker word might best be called intuition in the fingertips, something like instinct or born genius or plain inspired guesswork tracing the best possible course up from map paper there at the end of the hand. The special talent of touch and decision that comes from who knows where.”

The recurring German word Doig uses to describe Donal’s randomly running his finger across the Greyhound route map to determine their next destination is Fingerspitzengefühl. It translates as having the qualities of perception, intuition, or judiciousness. Herman confuses the words “fate” and “faith,” several times saying he is taking a “leap of fate” when he means “faith.” Donal points out that the words have different roots and meanings, though he acknowledges that decisions made on faith seem to be fated in the long run.

“Advice free for the taking if you want to live life as she be in this mad bad buggered old contraption of a country called Uhmerica. Hang in there, buddy, and take it as it comes.

It evens out in the end.

Jack Kerouac

On the road somewhere south of the moon and north of hell.”

While everyone else sleeps at night on the Greyhound, Donal converses with a young man who turns out to be the fabled Beat author Jack Kerouac. Doig, whose writing style differs completely from Kerouac’s, composes an inscription that is characteristic of Kerouac. Symbolically, the previous nod to Mark Twain along with Kerouac’s inscription, which references the title of that author’s most famous book, reveals that Doig draws from both those authors in this travel narrative, supporting the theme Adventures on the Literary Highway.

“He handed me his chaps to hold, taking the autograph book in return, a swap so momentous it nearly made me keel over. […] [I]t was that kind of dizzying moment of experience, unexpected and unforgettable, a touch of greatness tingling all through the lucky recipient. […]

‘There you go,’ he said, his signature and all the rest of the page and Kwick Klick purple ink magically matching his riding chaps—clear as anything, a sign to me this was meant to happen. Lucky arrowhead, happy coincidence, the spitzen finger that had put Herman and me in this place at this time, something finally was working in my favor this loco summer.”

Serendipitously arriving at the Crow nation western festival, Donal encounters his lifelong hero, rodeo champion Rags. Doig compares Donal’s experience to that of any American boy of the era who meets and interacts with his most admired personal hero. For Donal, this is the supreme expression of good fortune.

“Caught up in the drum music and the hey-ya-ya-ya, but most of all in the moment where imagination became real, I danced as if my flashing beaded moccasins were on fire. I danced as if the medicine pouch with my arrowhead in it was a second heart. I danced for Gram in her hospital bed and wheelchair, danced for Herman the German and his monumental little thinks, danced for shrewd Louie Slewfoot, danced for the threesome of soldiers fated to Korea and for Leticia the roving waitress and for Harvey the romantic jailbreaker and for the other traveling souls met on the dog bus and inscribed in the memory book, all of us who were hunched up and taking it while serving time in this life.”

Attempting to escape the Crow festival and Wendell’s wrath, Donal accepts an elaborate disguise to dance with young Indigenous dancers before the rodeo crowd. Here, Doig uses Donal’s dancing to comment on what drives him to write. Earlier, in remarks attributed to Kerouac, Doig speaks of the unsatisfiable muse. Here, the author describes those characters whose stories demand to be told, equating writing about these unique individuals to a literary dance.

“[B]ums don’t ride buses. Tramps, now they might if somebody was to give them the money […] Been known to happen. But these fellas are hoboes, a whole different thing. They ain’t your total down-and-outers, more like hard luck cases. Got to hand it to them, they travel around looking for work. Seasonal, like. […] [W]hat hoboes do is follow the crops. Haymakers, about now, tough a job as any […] You better understand, living rough like they do, hoboes by nature are a hard lot. Have to be. For them, it’s root, hog, or die.”

As they prepare to board a particularly old, rugged Greyhound to the Big Hole—a vast Montana valley full of hay farms—Donal and Herman listen to their bus driver explain the social distinctions between “bums,” “tramps,” and “hoboes,” three outdated terms for people without permanent homes. The key point the driver wants to impart is that the workers on the bus are traveling farm workers, distinguishing them from those who cannot or will not accept jobs. The colloquialism “root, hog, or die” implies that the type of work these men seek is the most difficult and transitory, though they must move and work for their survival.

“‘I’m Snag.’ My jack-o’-lantern smile showed off the jagged reason. ‘And him here,’ I indicated Herman, ‘is One Eye,’ no explanation needed there, either.

‘Good enough for me.’ Highpockets credited us both and flashed that OK sign again. ‘Welcome to the Johnson family,’ he left us with, and worked his way seatback by seatback up front to where he sat, the aisle a lot like the deck of a rolling ship as the bus galloped along on the unpaved road.”

As Donal and Herman quickly learn, all the workers on the bus use descriptive nicknames. Because of his jagged front tooth and Herman’s missing eye, they choose obvious nicknames for themselves. Donal told the leader of the workmen, Highpockets, enough of their story to satisfy him about their purpose. Like many others they will encounter in the Big Hole, the full stories of their lives remain secret. Highpockets’s introduction of the group as the “Johnson family” highlights the communal element of their travel and lifestyles.

“‘Luck is the star we steer by,’ he invoked for the how manyeth time.

I was in agreement for once. ‘You know what Herman?’ My mood was so high it was a wonder my head wasn’t hitting the roof of the pickup. ‘We maybe got it knocked, once and for all.’ […] Didn’t you see the clasp in his hat band? The livestock brand? […] It’s the diamond buckle. Guess who owns the ranch.’”

Though Donal and Herman were unlikely choices for inclusion in those workers selected for a particularly well-run hay farm, Donal uses his skills of persuasion to talk the foreman, Mr. Jones, into giving them a chance to show their farming abilities. Donal recognizes that Rags, his idol and brief acquaintance, owns the farm. To him, this is the ultimate expression of good luck. Near disaster quickly follows when Herman explains that he has no idea how to perform the duties in which Donal has promised he is proficient. This perpetuates the cycle of seemingly good fortune devolving into misfortune.

“‘Tell the Jones it is too much for you, can I?’

‘Don’t you dare.’ I found the strength to sound offended. ‘I’ll toughen in.’ Which I did, day by day, that path worn into the earth beside the haystacks leading me into the gritty lines of Camerons and Blegens who had hunched up and taken it since time immemorial.

And see, by the end of the first week of Big Hole haying I held a triumphant mental conversation with Gram, I’m not too young to live in a bunkhouse like a regular ranch hand.”

Faced with a labor-intensive job, Donal’s first day’s work exhausts him to the point that Herman wants to find him a different task. Donal’s ability to “hunch up” and keeping working fulfills the desire he has had from the beginning of the narrative: to demonstrate to his grandmother and the owners of the hay farms that, at 11-and-a-half, he can do the work of a grown man. Much as his grandmother speaks to and of their deceased ancestors, Donal now feels he has earned his place among those who came before him.

“Against those hard-won rewards, I now was free almost anytime to go and be with Gram and Letty as well, a dream ready to come true. But only if I paid up with either deceit or confession about my time on the loose. […] The truth had a nasty habit of coming out. At least sometimes.”

Now, as Donal finds success on the hay farm, he learns that Gram is out of the hospital and working alongside her friend Letty in Glasgow as a night cook. Thus, the existential crisis of his life shifts from mere survival to a decision about whether to stay on Rags’s farm as long as possible, or return to his grandmother. Because he has written her a summer’s worth of phony letters implying that he is still in Manitowoc, he believes that he must explain that he has deceived her. The decision of how to proceed overwhelms him, since Gram might discover his lies or might not.

“‘Who’s wearing the badge around here?’

That was the wrong thing to do. Something like a spell came over the hoboes, if a general sense of fury can be called that. I could see it in their eyes, the pent-up rage and hate from years of railroad bulls and Palookaville hick dicks beating them and throwing them into jail and kicking them out of town, the badge of authority the mark of adversity in their lives, Pooch a living reminder among them of the billy clubs of the law.”

When a diminutive sheriff from another county attempts to arrest an escaped county prisoner, he makes the mistake of trumpeting his authority. Doig describes the intense reactions of marginalized working men who have experienced indignation, mistreatment, and injustice at the hands of authorities. Pooch, one of the workers, suffers partial cognitive impairment as a result of a police beating. When Rags cleverly intervenes, pointing out the sheriff’s legal peril and demonstrating that the accompanying local county sheriff will not back up his colleague, he averts potential bloodshed and earns the respect and loyalty of his workers.