The Great Hardisty Creek Deluge, Gumboot Caper & Whodunnit – Saga 1

In Three Sagas, Boystown, Alberta, ca.1962

By

Wayne A. Melvin

INVOCATION, WARNINGS & LEGALESE

“In the name of mighty Thor, I do hereby invoke Thorslov for the following tale – an ikke en tilståelse, (un-tilståelse or un-confession).” – Invocation from the Nordic Nu-Sagas

WARNINGS:

The following tale is not suitable for those persons timorous by nature or for those with moral scruples or who are partial to legal quibbling. Nor is it intended for oh-so-sweet, but utterly naïve citizens who cannot imagine or abide by the disturbing fact that there be monsters in our midst.  In short, it is not suitable for anyone over the age of about 12.

– Frequent use of swears as well as other crude, coarse and even poetic language

– Frequent carnage and excessive partaking of mead

– No animals were harmed in the telling of this tale, but they are they are the only ones who escaped unscathed.

Now, my Friend, if you still insist on venturing into this dark and crazy-making tale, it must be hereby stated, by way of a final dire warning to you, that some small-town Alberta tales have been clinically proven to be deeply distressing to sensitive, and even to, so called, normal persons, in particular schoolteachers, members of the ministry, constabulary, judiciary – and especially Scout Masters. This, following saga deals with one such deeply disturbing mystery from a smoky little mill-town land-locked deep in the vast, wild boreal forests along the Eastern slopes of the Canadian Rockies.

The chronicle you are about to hear reveals much of what is most unsavory about the human condition, especially of small-town boys, the type who like to boast to city cousins, and any ‘Muricans that cross their path, of keeping timber wolves, Wampus cats and venomous snow snakes for household pets. And, not that it will do any good whatsoever, but this story is also intended as a cautionary tale for stoopid boys, of all ages, whoever they are and wherever they may be lurking and snerching about.

LEGALESE:

This following account does not meet the legal definition of a confession to a crime in either Canadian or Danish (Greenland) jurisprudence. Nor is it an admission of moral or ethical wrongdoing in any known country, culture, religion or pagan cult. It is more of a forensic account of outright stoopidity regarding the despicable event, described herein, by yours truly. It is, verily, a “100%” true, dispassionate accounting of a long-standing cold case reported here for the first time and solely for the public good and the entertainment of all, some sixty years after the infamous Gumboot Caper went down. In short, the invocation of Thorslov herein, hereby and forever absolves the teller of any criminal charges, civil liability or moral responsibility for the contents of this “un-confession” saga. You’ll soon see what I mean.

SAGA 1

ABIDING MYSTERIES

(AN ESSENTIAL PROLOGUE TO OUR TALE)

Now it seems to me, that every fair town, miserable village or hardscrabble gathering of huts has its own full measure of secrets, intrigues and mysteries. Oh, yes, my friends, even Hinton the Good – aka, Boystown! So, let me fill you in on a few facts, pertinences, moral dilemmas, Scout lore, and Viking Myths and Berserker customs you need to know about regarding the whodunnit that I’m about to share with you.

You see, some so-called secrets are not even secrets at all for they are known to one and all, but never, ever, like never spoken about directly or aloud. You can still guess there’s mysteries and secrets lurking in the murky shadows of polite conversation by the awkward silences, furtive glances, contagious coughing fits, and abrupt changes of conversational topics that such intrigues invariably invoke amongst those in the know. Then there are the mysteries that smack you in your face like a wet mop in a high school locker room. No ignoring them. These are the kind of puzzlers that are open to much earnest speculation and heated debate. Such secrecies are argued about vociferously replete with flaming eyes, flying spittle and arms flailing the air for theatrical emphasis leading inevitably to head butting, bare-knuckle fisticuffs and swordplay. They provoke dismay, laughter or outrage in cafes, bars, backyards and country kitchens, sometimes for decades. But these open-ended mysteries – about who done what, to who, and why, and how – are often forever left without satisfactory resolve or closure. In other words, they remain nagging, stay-awake-at night, handwringing, hair-chewing mysteries. Nasty torments they may be! But, let’s admit it, we all relish a good mystery.

It’s like this, you see: some mysteries and secrets are passed down from one generation to another like cherished family heirlooms, like, say, a stuffed Massasauga rattlesnake; a mason jar full of glass eyes; your great aunt’s ribald love letters from her misspent dotage in Paris, Istanbul and Vladivostok; or maybe even a priceless collection of Victorian chamber pots. That kind of thing. The best of these enduring tales inspires indignation, terror, revulsion, lust, envy, and disgust and, as a result, are endlessly fascinating to us mortals – as well as to the Norse Gods, of course. But the best of the best are mystery stories that combine all these elements in a single yarn – the kind that totally enrages and grosses out all polite society and especially your big sister, like Sharon, for instance. That is the supremely high measure of a mystery story we are forever seeking. Few tales meet that exacting standard. And this sure as heck isn’t one of them.

This, my Friend, we need to realize: there’s often a good reason why some people like to keep mysteries, well, mysterious. And, believe you me, it’s not only the guilty parties or the government that want to keep things hushed up. There are also those who simply cannot bear to face the day when their mystery is no more. A sad, sad day, indeed. Spoiler alert: be prepared to gnash your teeth and weep, because, well…. OK, Ok, hold on! Why don’t we just wait and see how this whole mystery thing goes down, before we ruin everything for you, shall we.

So back to my point: When you deeply delve into the nitty gritty of them, mysteries and secrets are brewed like some strange, intoxicating potion in every storyteller’s personal cauldron. Each teller spices the story up with their signature blend of exaggeration, restraint, fibs, facts and outright lies that are burbled and stewed in the fevered brain and in the repeated telling of said tales over the years. Then they are shared, traded or stolen – personalized, you could say – to then be whispered about conspiratorially late into the haunted night around a crackling campfire in the Rockies while the wolves howl at the moon. Or told boisterously at a Viking longtable over tankards of mead and a stolen sheep carcass.

Now here, my Friend, this is where you enter the story. Until this very moment, well, until a moment soon to follow, this story has been a closely guarded town secret known only to the two nefarious, gangly-armed, pin-headed, gumbooted, beany-topped perpetrators of the evil deed in question. They be namely, Scrawny, aka, me. And my sidekick, Slick. Oh, and let’s not forget, Slick’s dogpal, Scruffy, after all this valiant pooch is a major player in the story too.

This “un-confession” has been a long time coming. Why tell it now, you ask? Well, you see, some tormented/demented folks just need to know the outcome of this mystery, or they’ll be haunting me forever from the ghostly shadows of the Great Abyss (I heard it’s kinda like Edson there, but worse, as if that’s even possible.) But first we need some safeguards.

You might soon judge me as guilty of sin as a swashbuckling Barberry Pirate, a loathsome Valdemort, a venomous Gollum, or any villainous black hatter from the Wild West, but I’m not yet completely doltish. It’s quite simple, you see, I don’t really fancy hanging from a gallows tree, fighting a duel, engaging in fisticuffs, burning in hell, or in any other way paying for my sins, I just want to be able to boast about them like any other Vandal, Goth, or Viking Jarls, Karls, and Thralls, thus the declaration that this be a so-called un-confession. So, before we go much further, though, we gotta pledge a pact of secrecy here – just between the two of us – at least for now. Stick with me, Friend. Here’s how this thing works.

In gamle dage, or ancient days, when Nordic punkers first started dressing in bearskin T-shirts, wearing wonky hats and scary makeup, and terrorizing the northern seas, they called this “going on a Viking”, thus their name. Part of the fun of being a marauding pirate was chipping in to build huge meadaerns or grand mead-halls, also known as pralaerns or boasting houses. This is where  the marauders would hang out after going on a Viking to feast, get stoopid drunk and brag about their exploits, you know, pillaging, plundering, marauding, berserking, inflicting noogies on Irish monks, and the like. Naturally when a bunch of louts get to drinking and boasting stuff gets said that shouldn’t be said in public. For example, bragging about how you razed Ye Olde London Towne is considered fair game and a simple out-of-town team sport. No biggie, right? Upon your return home you get a participation ribbon or a re-purposed bowling trophy. But then you get carried away and crow about how you got your neighbour pie-eyed drunk so you could steal his prize sheep. Oh, boy… That can be bad. Real bad! People tend to hold a grudge about such things, especially if everybody on the longboat or mead hall is laughing – except for them.

Something had to be done to protect the guilty or the supply of stories would surely dry up through instantaneous murder or century-long feuds, vendettas and wars. The end of the Viking race!!! Nobody left to tell the tales, and what’s the good of that. So, those wily Vikings invented a spanking new and very clever custom called the ikke en tilståelse, or un-tilståelse. The ”un-confession”. This legal and karmic loophole meant that – as long as your story was entertaining enough – and thats key here – nobody could hold you accountable for your exploits.

The only recourse an aggrieved party had was to pull off a crazier caper than you and to tell a better tale. See: You steal a guys sheep while he’s deathly drunk and hanging over the ships railing and you get a raucous laugh at his expense, well thats just great, but pretty much standard story material. But, when he sneakily follows up on your exploit a few years later by stealing your entire flock and convinces you it was all the workings of a shape-shifting magic fox, and then sets you adrift on an iceberg for your own protection against the spell, well, now, that’s truly worthy of thunderous applause and the thumping of tankards ”Skol! Skol! Skol!” And you pay for the mead every time the tale is re-told, providing, of course, you ever make it back to shore again. That’s how it works. Great, eh!

Image Credits: Magic Fox, exemplore.com

Thorslov and the pastime of telling un-confessions meant that there was a neverending supply of exploits and stories to keep the mead-hall regulars entertained through the long cold Nordic nights when there wasn’t much actual marauding to do, only the wife’s ubiquitous job jars over-flowing back at the longhouse or hovel.

You can see how this brand-new, custom-made, insta-tradition met with so much enthusiasm. It became so popular, in fact, that it was soon declared as Thorslov (Thor’s law), named after one of the most renowned of Nordic merry-mischief-mayhem-makers and storytellers. Thorslov and the pastime of telling un-confessions meant that there was a neverending supply of exploits and stories to keep the mead-hall regulars entertained through the long cold Nordic nights when there wasn’t much actual marauding to do, only the wife’s ubiquitous job jars over-flowing back at the longhouse or hovel.

So, let’s remember, there are undoubtedly those out there who will still be seeking revenge on the perpetrators of this so-called “Gumboot Caper” that I am about to reveal, despite the many intervening years since its execution. Especially keep the secret from those, although of geriatric vintage, are still of sufficient muscle tone and steely resolve to carry out their dire threats they’ve uttered feverishly and frequently throughout the past six decades. That especially means keeping this story from anyone who ever belonged to Cubs or Scouts in Hinton – or anywhere else for that matter. Those dreaded Cubs and Scouts all stick together. All that dib, dib dibbing and dub, dub dubbing week-in and week-out has mesmerized them into becoming one ginormous worldwide howling wolf pack vigilante posse.

“Hah”, those guys?”, you might scoff while snickering at their Smoky Bear hats, short pants, green socks, goofy skull caps and whistles on a string.

And they’ve got the badges to prove it!

Oh, yeah, you better believe it, when they’re coming to get you, they come equipped for the chase and armed for the kill. “Be Prepared”, is their motto. And boy do they mean it! We don’t want that pack of heavily armed, wolf-howling beastie boys hot on our trail. So, like, you get it now, right? Cause I don’t like surprises! You vow, promise, pledge and swear to keep command of your yapper? “Yup!”, you say. Ok, so, lets continue. Hang on to your hat, things are about to get weird.

Watch for Saga 2 of this Three-Part Series. Coming Soon to this Blog Site.