Summary
Back on the canoe heading downstream, Niska asks Xavier when the last time he saw Elijah was. Instead of responding, Xavier tells her about the time he and Elijah were almost killed in the forest fire. Lying down again, his thoughts return to the war. Xavier remembers when Sean Patrick was shot in the neck by a sniper after staying in the same position in the trench for too long, and he feels guilty for not warning Sean Patrick to move because he didn’t want to offend him. McCaan orders Xavier and Elijah to kill as many German snipers as they can, but days go by without either making a shot. As they watch and wait in sniping position, the two reminisce about a winter when they killed a dozen caribou after Xavier used smoke to herd the animals past Elijah’s waiting gun. Finally, Elijah discovers a pattern in the German snipers’ shooting habits: they fire immediately at sunrise, leaving the window-like metal plates in the trench open while they take two shots. Xavier and Elijah fire at these plates at sunrise, and while Elijah is sure that he killed his sniper, Xavier thinks his shot might have been too late.
Xavier and Elijah are determined to kill the prolific German sniper who works behind the trenches, the one who shot Sean Patrick in addition to many other men. Thompson tells Xavier that killing this sniper will bring him and Elijah a better rank, more money, and more freedom. As the soldiers head to reserve for a few days of rest, Xavier notes that the soldiers are less friendly to him, since the now-dead Sean Patrick was the bridge between Xavier and the others. Elijah spends most of his time with Gray Eyes, and Xavier is angry that Elijah wants to test himself to see how long he can resist trying morphine. One night, Xavier wakes up with the realization that the German sniper must be shooting from no man’s land, not behind the trenches as he originally thought, because the bullet that killed Sean Patrick entered his neck from below him.
Xavier and Elijah return to their snipers’ nests. As they watch and wait, Elijah tells Xavier that Gray Eyes convinced him to try morphine while he was seasick on the ship from Canada to England. Gray Eyes asked Elijah to cut his forearm so that he could go to the infirmary for stitches, and steal syringes while there. Afterwards, he administers the morphine to himself and Elijah. While high, Elijah imagines his head floating away from him, viewing the ship from above.
When morning comes, Elijah shoots the bloated belly of a dead horse to check his rifle’s accuracy. The explosion reveals that the prolific German sniper, the “phantom sniper,” was hiding beneath the horse’s body. The phantom sniper shoots at Elijah; he misses, but the spray of dirt from the bullet temporarily blinds Elijah. Xavier kills the phantom sniper with two shots.
The narrative switches back to Niska. She sets up camp in the evening and continues to tell the ailing Xavier the story of her past. After her mother helped Niska escape from the residential school, the two become awawatuk: Cree who continue to live in the bush and are viewed negatively by other Cree for not accepting the wemistikoshiw. Niska takes over the role of her father as a diviner and medicine man. One winter, she finds the traps of a white hunter and plays a game with him by leaving her own tracks, then climbing a rope into a tree so that the tracks disappear. The game continues throughout the winter, and Niska fantasizes about catching the hunter and keeping him as a pet. Finally, she decides to lead her tracks straight to her askihkan, her handmade shelter, to trap the hunter. At this point, Niska stops telling the story aloud to Xavier, but silently reminisces about the hunter entering her askihikan for the first time. He speaks in French, and although Niska can’t understand him, she understands that he wants to have sex. She also decides to have sex with him. When she wakes up, the hunter is gone.
After Niska goes to sleep in the tepee, Xavier stares at the fire and thinks about the day he killed the phantom sniper. McCaan sends Thompson, Xavier, and Elijah out to no-man’s land to frisk the dead sniper. The three retrieve the sniper’s rifle and bayonet. Elijah sneaks up on German soldiers and discovers that they are digging a machine gun placement.
The next night, Lieutenant Breech sends six soldiers—Thompson, Xavier, Elijah, Grey Eyes, Gilberto, and a sixth, new soldier—out on a raiding mission, which Xavier thinks is too many men. As the men wait to leave on their raid, the atmosphere in their trench grows tense. Elijah asks Grey Eyes for tobacco, and when he says that he used all of his yesterday, Xavier notes that Elijah is intensely angry at Grey Eyes. Elijah leaves to ask a medic for a morphine tablet, but the medic refuses to give him one. The medic sends a subtle warning to Elijah when he suggests that, if he didn’t know Elijah as well as he does, he would report him to McCaan for displaying signs of an addict.
Analysis
These sections explore the seeming randomness of death that comes in war. Throughout the book, Xavier grapples with the idea of death. He and the other soldiers must live under constant threat of attack, a draining idea that loses its terrifying edge as Xavier and the others become desensitized by endless months of destruction. Sean Patrick’s death breaks through this numbness and affects Xavier, as he thinks he could have prevented the death by pointing out his friend’s bad form. In addition, Sean Patrick’s death exemplifies the difficulties Xavier has in fitting in with the other soldiers: not only was Sean Patrick kind to Xavier—perhaps a function of his upbringing with other Ojibwe Indians—he also connected Xavier to the other men.
The German sniper introduced in this section is symbolic of ruthlessness and a love of death—ideas which begin to seduce Elijah. Although no one can deny the sniper’s skill, his tactic of hiding in a dead horse’s stomach sickens the soldiers in a different way than the senseless, brutal trench warfare does. The sniper “loves death,” able to lie unmoving around decomposing bodies for hours at a time as he goes about the business of murder. Before he is shot, the sniper tantalizes Xavier and Elijah: he eludes sighting while shooting many of Canadians. He represents the constant, unpreventable threat of death that lies heavy on many of the soldiers throughout the war. His ability to descend into a landscape of complete destruction foreshadows Elijah’s descent into depravity.
Elijah’s first use of morphine exemplifies the drug’s role in the novel as providing short-term relief and benefits along with devastating long-term consequences. In this case, Elijah uses the drug out of curiosity and discovers that it gives him the ability to have visions—similar to the supernatural visions that Niska uses for good back home. Xavier knows that Elijah tempts himself with the drug, and his friend’s reckless disregard of his own well-being angers him, pointing to the fact that Xavier still deeply cares for his friend even as war puts heavy strain on their friendship. Morphine returns again and again throughout the novel, representing an escape from reality that makes reality more and more difficult to return to.
The white hunter’s entrance into Niska’s life represents an overlap of cultures that is uncommon for the awawatuk, the Cree who live alone in the bush. Niska’s decision to live on her own translates into a rejection of the wemistikoshiw, but her continued fascination with them is evident in her intense desire for the French hunter. The fact that the hunter leaves by the time Niska has woken indicates that his intentions with her might not be for her own benefit. This section also depicts Niska’s entrance into adulthood as she begins to live alone and make her own decisions, even in the face of resentment or criticism from the Cree who live in town. In addition, Niska’s role as a medicine woman and diviner indicates that her father’s skills have been passed down to her; they mark her as a person with a special purpose, essential to the continued survival of the awawatuk.
Elijah’s enthusiasm for war becomes more evident in this section as well; as he sneaks up on the German soldiers, he has to suppress a giggle at his good fortune in finding them defenseless and unprepared. Elijah’s unseemly relish for war is clearly at odds with Xavier’s disgust at the smell of death associated with the battlefield. In addition, in his continuous efforts to impress the white Canadian officers and soldiers, Elijah attempts to conform with them. His habit of speaking in a British accent, once a joke, is now a permanent tone that makes him feel more confident and respectable. The theme of conformity deepens in the scene where Xavier and Elijah try on wemistikoshiw clothes. Elijah tends to showiness, wearing a preacher-like outfit, while Xavier is more reserved. Xavier also refuses to part with his moccasins, retaining at least one aspect of his culture, which Elijah views as a “problem.”
Issues of special treatment and superiority within the army combine with the existing jealous tensions in Xavier and Elijah’s relationship. Xavier is proud to take ownership of killing the sniper, since Elijah assumed he would be able to take the shot and is surprised he wasn’t able to. This points to the fact that Xavier is more talented than Elijah, but his lack of ruthlessness, which others see as bravery, causes him to get passed up for wider recognition. In contrast, Elijah’s reputation earns him special benefits, such as the medic letting him off with a warning rather than reporting him for morphine addiction. Ironically, these special treatments harm rather than help Elijah, fueling the dependency that makes him more and more likely to kill—Xavier’s observation that Elijah is tempted to stab Grey Eyes points to his friend’s wearing patience and self-control, and foreshadows events between Elijah and Grey Eyes later in the novel.
