Solomon Gursky Was Here by Mordecai Richler

left fork on the trail leading out to the prairie.
    â€œI thought we were going to Montana.”
    â€œWe’re heading north.”
    â€œWhere?”
    â€œFar.”
    â€œAre you drunk again, zeyda? ”
    Ephraim laughed and sang him one of his sailor songs:
    And when we get to London docks,
    There we’ll see the cunt in flocks!
    One to another they will say,
    O, welcome Jack with three years’ pay!
    For he is homeward bound,
    For he is homeward bound!
    They travelled all through the night, Solomon snug under the buffalo robes. Ephraim didn’t waken his grandson until he had already built their first igloo, warmed by a stone lamp. Then he asked Solomon to help him sort out their things. “But mind how you go,” he said.
    Surprisingly, among the supplies that had to be unloaded, there were a number of books, including a Latin grammar. “Right after breakfast,” Ephraim said, “we’re going to start in on some verbs.”
    â€œMiss Kindrachuk says Latin is a dead language.”
    â€œThat school of yours is no bloody good.”
    â€œI don’t have to stay here with you. I’m going home.”
    Ephraim tossed snowshoes and his compass at him. “Then you’re going to need these, my good fellow. Oh, and no matter how tired you get don’t lie down out there or you could freeze to death.”
    Outside, an indignant Solomon wandered in a sea of swirling snow. He was back within the hour, his teeth chattering. “The Mounties came to our school yesterday,” he said, testing.
    â€œHave a cup of char. I’ll make bacon.”
    â€œThey came to get André Clear Sky. There was a big fight on the reservation.”
    Ephraim undid a canvas bag and laid out fresh clothes for Solomon. “This,” he said, indicating a parka with a hood attached, “is an attigik . And these,” he added, holding up wide pants, reaching only to the knee, “are called qarliiq .” Both garments, he explained, were made of caribou hide and were to be worn with the skin side against the body. There were also two pairs of stockings, the inner pair to be worn with the animal hair inside, the outer pair the other way round; and a pair of caribou-hide boots.
    â€œWhere are we going?” Solomon asked.
    â€œTo the Polar Sea.”
    George Two Axe was right. He is crazy in the head.
    â€œNow you eat your bacon and then we’ll get some kip.”
    â€œHow long will we be gone?”
    â€œIf you are such a baby and want to go home that badly, take the dogs before I wake and beat it.”
    Ephraim propped his rifle beside the sleeping platform and drifted off, his mouth agape, the igloo resounding with his snores. Solomon briefly considered knocking him out with the rifle butt and making his escape, but he doubted that he could manage the dogs, and he didn’t want to go out into the cold again. Tomorrow maybe.
    â€œYou still here?” Ephraim asked, wakening. He didn’t seem pleased.
    â€œSo what?”
    â€œMaybe you were worried about how I would manage without the dogs.”
    â€œI’ve never seen the Polar Sea.”
    Ephraim brightened. He actually smiled. They travelled through the night again, conjugating Latin verbs, Ephraim taunting him, “Now I’m stuck with you, and I don’t even know that I brought along enough food for two.”
    The next evening on the trail Ephraim said, “Why don’t I keep warm under the buffalo robes tonight and you run the dogs for a change?”
    â€œWhat if I took the wrong direction?”
    â€œYou see that big diamond there, low in the sky, well you just keep heading right for it.”
    After the first week they no longer travelled by night. Neither did Ephraim bother to destroy all evidence of their igloo before they broke camp. He taught Solomon how to harness the dogs, looping the shortest traces through those of the laziest ones stationed closest to the