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through
women like water. Lisa was just the latest. For some reason whenever one or
other finished with him, he came to Edie's house to lick his wounds. He gave a
little shrug, looked away.
        'Sorry,'
she said. She wasn't consciously mean to him but sometimes a little bubble of
meanness popped out. She guessed that somewhere, somehow, she was still angry
about the situation, which probably meant that somewhere, somehow, she still
had feelings for Sammy and was doing her best to ignore them.
        'My
TV bust,' Sammy said.
        Edie
took a piece of seal out of her pack and put it on the surface in the kitchen
then switched on the kettle for some tea.
        'Plus
I broke up with Lisa.'
        They
laughed. Sammy raised his eyes to heaven. Even he'd come to think of his love
life as a bit of a joke. So long as he was the one to say it.
        'Get
together with anyone else yet?'
        Sammy
nodded, sheepish.
        'Who?'
asked Edie, a little too quickly.
        'Nancy.'
        'Nancy
Allakarialak? Pauloosie's mum?'
        'Uh
huh.'
        For
an instant all three made eye contact, then just as quickly looked away. It was
odd how sometimes they felt like a family again. Odd and unsettling. Then Joe
got up to go to his room.
        'Call
me when we need to leave?' Not his deal, this old stuff between her and Sammy.
        After
he'd disappeared into his room there was a pause.
        'I
didn't get a chance to say thanks for helping out with Felix Wagner,' Edie
said, wanting to change the subject.
        Sammy
took a swig of the beer at his side and said nothing.
        Edie
said: 'You spoke to Andy Taylor?'
        'Simeonie
just left him. Seems pretty keen to forget the whole thing and get back down
south.'
        'I
guess there'll have to be a police inquiry, right?' Edie said. 'They'll want to
call in Derek Palliser.'
        Sammy
cleared his throat and made a study of his feet.
        'That's
not what I'm hearing,' he said in a way that indicated he knew something and
was keeping it back. Edie gave him a long, hard stare.
        'Listen,'
he said defensively. 'I don't control the council of Elders.'
        Everyone
knew who did control the council of Elders: Sammy's older brother, Simeonie.
Sammy had always stood in his brother's shadow and he wasn't about to get out
of it now. Anything involving confrontation, particularly to do with his
brother, Sammy usually ran a mile. He rattled his beer can to make sure he'd
polished off the contents and stood to go.
        'Edie,
stay out of trouble. Try to toe the line, for once.'
        
        
        When
he'd gone, Edie put on her best parka and oiled her pigtails, then called Joe
from his room. They walked up to the mayor's office together. The elders had
asked them to the meeting on the understanding that they were there to give
their version of events, and would have no say in the outcome. For this reason
alone, Edie had a bad feeling about what was about to happen. It was typically
screwed up Autisaq politics. The elders paid lip service to inclusiveness but
when it came down to it, they huddled together like a group of harried musk ox.
        They
opened the door into the council chamber and went in. Sammy was already there,
beside him on one side Pauloosie's grandfather Samuelie and on the other,
Sammy's cousin, Otok. Three or four others Edie knew by name, but not well
personally. The driftwood and sealskin chair at the head of the table that had
once been taken by Edie's grandfather, Eliah, was now occupied by Simeonie
Inukpuk, who pointed Edie and Joe to a couple of office chairs brought in
specially and motioned for quiet. The only other woman in the room, Simeonie's
assistant, Sheila Silliq, was taking notes.
        Simeonie
began by thanking them for coming. The council simply wanted to hear from each
of them their version of events, he said. Perhaps, since Edie was present when
Felix Wagner had his