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I have always depended
the kindness of strangers
Blanche DuBois
Mary Whitefish
by Charles Le Guin
Towards the end of October, fog came for good,
and rain, and Indian Summer was over. Summer is
good, Indian Summer is glorious, but the return of
the rain and the fog is like the return of an old friend
It is the grandparent time of year, come to embrace
with gentle, soft familiarity. For the rain, if
constant, is gentle and the fog moderating and
benign, fending off the penetrating cold that can
come down from the Gulf of Alaska. The
temperature is generally comfortable and the great
dark fir forests are highlighted by outbursts of gold
from maples and alders and red from vine maple. In
the subdued light of swirling fog, the forest colors
are like matches flaring in gloom. Bridger Bay is a
cocooned world when late Autumn comes, lulled by
the rhythmic sounds of the waves as they break on
the beach; the noisy tumult of very high tides as they
break against the foot of Bay Street alternating with
the distant soft murmur, slap and slush and sizzle, of
the corresponding low tides, far out on the beach.
This is an inward time of year, and I like it very
much indeed, though you probably have to be a
North Coast person to believe that.
Mary Whitefish is a North Coast person, of North
Coast people who were here long before my people
ever knew there was such a place. But, as
discovered when we met, she and I shared similar
feelings about our common place.
Early in November, Steve, Mary’s friend and
mine, told me that he had gone to see if Mary were at
home. She was: it was now the home time of year,
she told him. He asked if he could bring me, his
friend interested in the Bridger Bay area, its history,
its people and their legends, for a visit. She said it
was ok, we should come to see her the following
Saturday afternoon, after Steve had finished his
work at the motel.
The day dawned typically, drizzling and foggy,
very wet; by noon the drizzle had let up a bit, but not
the fog—it was not always easy to tell the difference.
Early afternoon, Steve appeared at the house and we
set off for Mary's.
Immediately south of Bridger Bay, just across
South Arm Creek, is a promontory jutting perhaps
some four hundred feet westward into the sea, a
bulwark protecting our town to the south. (There is
a similar conformation, across the North Ann River,
to the north of town.) The south promontory is
known as Cape Disappearance. How it got that
name I'm not sure, but it is well named, for it truly
does disappear into fog and rain most of the time
between mid-October and mid-February, and often
throughout much of the Spring as well.
We walked across the promontory on the old road
and turned onto a small trail that wandered down to
the cove on the south side of the Cape, where Mary
lived. The trail was cut through the undergrowth of
thick salal and huckleberry and large sword fern, and
in the fog it was like making a very damp descent
into a tangled void. At the bottom we found what
Steve referred to as “Mary-Land.” It was a small,
deep cove, perhaps five hundred feet wide at its
ocean edge, with a steeply banked beach, a narrow
sand strip from which ascended a broad stretch of
rock, ranging in size from gravel to boulder. A
small, clear, rapidly flowing stream rushed down
and emptied into the sea. dividing the cove into two
nearly equal halves. It was embraced, all around on
the landward side, by huge trees, fir and hemlock, all
but lost in the fog.
Towards the rear of the cove, nestled against the
trees that grew on the steeply rising Cape, as far
from the shore and high seas as possible, was
Mary’s cabin. In the hazy light the cabin looked as if
it had grown out of the landscape of Mary-land. an
integral part of the place. It had obviously sort of
accreted there, taking shape and size as materials had
been accumulated and arranged. It was principally
constructed of driftwood and of whatever had been
gleaned from sawmills in the area. It looked entirely
native, entirely natural, and this outward impression
was confirmed by the interior. It was essentially one
large room, with various lean-to additions that served
specific purposes; in one, snugly fitted and separated
from the main room by a curtain, was Mary’s bed, a
sleeping platform. Other extrusions were closets,
pantries, storage places. One end. nearest the
stream, was given over to the stone hearth, which
provided Mary with heat and was also where she
cooked. It was massive and the smoke escaped
through an arrangement that looked makeshift but
was clearly functional: half an oil drum faced
outward over the fire and a stove pipe led from the
drum head out through the roof. The room was
sparsely furnished—a long wooden table with
benches; a couple of shelves with basins, pots, a
water bucket, and various other utensils; two well-
used, low slung, and rump-sprung arm chairs; and a
couple of three legged stools. There was a kerosene
lamp on the table, and a couple more in wall sockets.
There were rugs on the floor and on some of the
walls; there were blankets on the chairs and on a
shelf, easily at hand when needed. The cabin had an
aura of cleanliness, derived from the silvery sheen of
the driftwood from which it was principally made,
and busy-ness, revealed in the idiosyncratic ordering
of its contents. Permeating it was a heady aroma, a
combination of the sea-salty smell of the wood, the
wood smoke, the fog, and various herbs and
condiments that hung from the rafters and around the
walls. I had never been in a home like Mary's
before; I never expect to see its like again.
We knocked and were glad to be invited in from
the damp of the late afternoon fog, now thick in the
cove.
In the warm twilight interior, in an armchair by the
fire, sat Mary Whitefish. No introduction seemed
necessary. She recognized me as Steve’s friend with
a smile of welcome that creased her round placid
face. The smile and further acquaintance confirmed
that Mary accepted Steve and anything and anyone
connected with him without question or reservation
or unnecessary words. In the dim light, she seemed
like some giant frog, some beneficent Buddha. She
was a small and stocky person; her face and hands
were like delicate soft leather, well tanned and
creased and crinkled by a thousand wrinkles, like
bronze-golden eel-skin. Her long, coarse, still black
hair hung in two braids, one over each ear trailing
down over her generous, shapeless bosom. Her
eyes were like Steve’s eyes, fathomless pools of
intense dark night. Unlike Steve's eyes, which
sparked with the challenge of living and the
uncertainty of quest, Mary's eyes had the resigned
look of having lived. They shone with the humor of
humanity, which was accentuated by several deep-set
crow's feet emanating from the corner of each eye.
A dominant nose and a generous mouth added their
effect to Mary's memorable face. Seated there in her
chair in the twilight, she looked ageless, ancient, for
all the world like an idol in a meditative mode. I
would see her more clearly as our acquaintance
grew, but my initial impressions remained always the
strongest.
Mary took me in, as she had taken Steve in, as a
feature of her life. She accepted me. w ithout fuss or
bother or even special notice, and I realized that all
the things I wanted to ask her could be asked only in
the way she wanted them asked and then only when
she was ready to answer them. If Mary taught me
anything, it was that acceptance and patience were
positive things, that things would come to me if I
deserved them, that they might come to me even if I
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BASEBALL
The Cubs signed Dave Madigan to
play third. Madigan, to Sandberg, to
Grace. It has a nice ring to it. Spring
training begins next month!!
did not deserve them, and that they would, at any
rate, come only in their own way and pace, over
which I had little authority or control. I have come to
appreciate that this was not the least of Mary's
lessons.
“You can make us tea," she indicated to Steve in a
deep, resonate, guttural voice, strongly suggestive of
a mellifluous bullfrog. We sat quietly — Mary never
saw the need of unnecessary talking — while Steve
took water from the kettle on the fire-hook and
poured it over the peppermint leaves that Mary had
collected and dried. While the tea was brewing, I
was aware that Mary was studying me; I studied the
fire, though under the heat of her scrutiny I felt it
was cool air that I needed.
As we drank our tea. Mary remarked, slow ly,
deliberately as was her way. “Fog has escaped and
won't be caught for many months.” I was having
my first lesson in patience, and in time I was
rewarded. After what seemed to me a very long
C o n tin u e d
m
o N
- thaee .
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