The Forest Lover Read Online Free PDF Page B

Lulu.”
    Sophie scowled. “Lulu is not a Christian.”
    â€œShe’s a good person.”
    â€œShe is not a Christian.”
    Sophie knelt to wrap her baskets. The large one with the eagle she left sitting on the floor.
    â€œWhat about this?” Emily said, picking it up for her.
    Sophie stood up, rigid, and shook her head. “By and by, you come to Squamish Mission Reserve and paint a Christian village. We have a church. You remember me, Sophie Frank. Jimmy Frank’s my husband. I call him Frank. He works longshore. We live right by the water. You ask for Basketmaker Sophie.”
    Emily smiled. “By and by, you come here too. Come soon.”

4: Douglas-fir
    â€œGood of you to come for Father’s birthday,” her sister Lizzie said.
    â€œHis birthday? Today? Imagine that,” Emily said, piling on the innocence in a voice higher than her usual deep tone. “I came for the old clothes.” She moved a blouse from the questionable pile onto the discard pile on the chesterfield.
    â€œDon’t tease us.” Lizzie dropped her old pink Easter dress onto the pile, her long, thin fingers extended a moment in midair.
    â€œI’m not going with you, if that’s what you have in mind.”
    â€œ Honor thy father and thy mother, Millie.”
    â€œThere’s no heavenly grace earned by visiting graves, Lizzie. Now if their bodies were folded up and put in boxes in trees like the Nootka do so they could feel a breeze or two, I might go.” She chuckled, and held up a worn, flared skirt. Its forest green appealed to her.
    â€œEvery Carr daughter goes on his birthday. Mother’s too,” Alice said. “Why won’t you?”
    â€œSeeing his grave would only whip up my anger over some things he said to me.”
    Rebels like you are burned or hanged in public squares, was one thing he’d said. The house still echoed his words.
    â€œYou used to go with us. You used to like going with us,” Lizzie said.
    â€œNo. You wanted to think I liked going.” She hated all that sham homage she’d performed since she was seventeen, the year he died.
    Dede came into the parlor, and Emily glanced at her to see if she’d heard. Uniform creases in formal balance, like parentheses around her mouth, stood guard against any random and unreasoned smile that might escape her.
    â€œYou’ll go with us now or—”
    â€œOr you’ll send me to bed without any supper? Please, Dede. Is playing parent the only role you know? I’m thirty-three, if you haven’t noticed, and I’m bored with it.”
    It was their great gap in age that made Dede capable of breathing in loudly through her nose for an interminably long time before exhaling, as she did now, her sign of exasperation.
    Dede folded carefully her old blue serge skirt and matching jacket, and set them on the pile. “Are these for a church or an orphanage bazaar?”
    â€œNeither. They’re for a Squamish woman at the North Vancouver Reserve.”
    â€œA siwash?”
    Emily prickled at the ugly term.
    â€œYou’re wicked not to tell us that straight out.” Dede looked at her suit as if she wanted to snatch it off the pile.
    â€œShe came to my flat selling baskets. I’m going to take her the clothes next weekend.”
    â€œShe can get clothes from her mission,” Lizzie said, tucking a loose strand into her brown bun. “You don’t have to take them to her yourself. It’s too personal.”
    â€œI’m not going for charity. I’m going for friendship.”
    â€œHonestly, when will you get it in your head that we can’t condone this unwholesome socializing with primitives? It’s a disgrace to the family.” Dede’s breath was loud and long. “If Father were alive, he wouldn’t approve.”
    â€œNo, he wouldn’t—he who sold sacks of raisins crawling with maggots to Songhees lined up at