'Damn,' said Anawak.

'Listen, I'll give you a call, all right? Or I'll ring Licia, in case you're asleep.'

'I'll be waiting to hear from you.'

'She's doing nicely, don't you think?'

Of course she was doing nicely. You couldn't wish for anyone more dedicated. 'Yes,' mumbled Anawak. 'Now, is there anything I can do?'

'Think. Go for a walk. Visit a Nootka chief Ford laughed wryly. 'I bet the Indians know something. Just think what a relief it would be if they came out and told you that all this had happened hundreds of years before.'

Joker, thought Anawak. He wrapped up the conversation and stared at the pictures on the screen.

After a few minutes he started pacing up and down. His knee was throbbing but he carried on, as if to punish his body for letting him down.

At this rate he'd soon be paranoid. He already had the feeling he was being sidelined. No one ever called him up to tell him anything unless he called them first. He wasn't disabled: he had a limp, for Christ's sake. Sure, things had been a bit much lately, but…

That wasn't the problem.

He froze in front of the plastic whales.

No one was treating him like an invalid, and he wasn't being sidelined. Ford was doing him a favour and saving him a trip to Vancouver by sifting the data himself Delaware was doing her best to be supportive. They were only being considerate – nothing more, nothing less. He was the one acting like he was crippled. He was the one with the problem.

What's the best thing to do, he asked himself, when you're going round in circles? Break the cycle. Do what it takes to get back on the road. It's no good looking to other people. Look to yourself. Do something out of the ordinary.

But what?

Ford had said he should visit a Nootka chief.

The Indians know something.

Was it true? Canada's Indians had passed their knowledge from generation to generation until the Indian Act of 1885 had broken the chain of oral tradition. It had encouraged them to sell their identity by leaving their homeland and sending their children to residential schools to be 'integrated' into white society. Like a forked-tongued serpent, the Indian Act promised them one thing and offered another. With a smile it talked of integration, but the Indians were integrated in their own communities, yet that wasn't good enough for the snake. The nightmare of the Indian Act continued. For decades Canada's native peoples had been trying to reclaim their lives. Many had picked up the thread of memory where it had been severed a hundred years earlier. The Canadian government had made reparations, but nothing could bring back their culture. Fewer and fewer Indians knew the old lore.

Whom could he ask?

The elders.

Anawak hobbled on to the veranda and looked down the street. He'd never had much to do with the Nootka. They called themselves the Nuu-chah-nulth, meaning People Along the Mountains, and with the Tsimshian, Gitksan, Skeena, Haida, Kwakiutl and Coast Salish, they were one of the main tribes on the west coast of British Columbia. It was almost impossible for outsiders to understand how the various tribes, bands and linguistic groups were related. Most people's attempt to get to grips with Indian culture failed at the first hurdle, before they got anywhere near regional dialects and customs, which differed from one bay to the next. However, if you wanted to find out about Vancouver Island's Pacific coast, it made sense to ask the Nootka, from the west of the island. You might be lucky. On the other hand, you might get bogged down in the myths of the various bands of which the Nootka were composed. Each band had its own territory. To say that the Nootka's traditions were closely bound up with the landscape of Vancouver Island and that their mythology was rooted in the natural world meant everything and nothing. At the heart of Nootka belief was the story of a creator, a figure capable of changing shape and form. In, say, the stories of the Ditidaht, wolves were of particular significance, but orcas played a key role too, and anyone wanting to find out about orcas had to get to grips with the wolf legends. Animals and humans were spiritually linked, so animals could transform themselves into other creatures and some had a dual identity. If a wolf went into the water, it changed into a whale, and a killer whale on land became a wolf. In the eyes of the Nootka, to tell stories about whales without thinking of wolves made no sense at all.

Since the Nootka had traditionally hunted whales, they knew countless whale stories. But not every band told the same ones, and a similar basic story varied, depending on where it was told. It was a moot point as to whether the Nootka included the Makah, but at the very least they shared a language – Wakashan. Apart from the Inuit, the Makah were the only North American people with a treaty to hunt whales, which, after a century of abstinence, they were planning to exercise, prompting widespread concern. The Makah didn't live on Vancouver Island, but on the other side of the water, on the north-westerly tip of Washington State. Their oral tradition included stories of whales that were also told by the Nootka on the island, but when it came to describing the reasons behind a whale's behaviour- its thoughts, feelings and intentions – they all took a different line. That was only to be expected, though: the whale was also known as the iihtuup or 'big enigma.'

Do something out of the ordinary.

Asking Indians for advice would certainly be that. Whether it would be helpful was a different matter.

Anawak gave a sour smile. It was the kind of thing he usually avoided like the plague.

Although he'd lived in Vancouver for twenty years, he didn't know much about the local peoples, mainly because he'd never tried to find out. Every now and then he felt a yearning for their world, but suppressed it before it could take hold. He found it too embarrassing. Delaware had mistaken him for a Makah, but he was the least suitable person to grapple with Indian myth.

Other than Greywolf.

It's pathetic, he thought bitterly. No self-respecting Indian ran round with such a lame-assed Wild-West surname. All the chiefs were called Norman George or Walter Michael or George Frank. None called themselves John Two Feathers or Lawrence Swimming Whale. Only arrogant jerks like Jack O'Bannon indulged in that kind of nonsense.

Greywolf was an ass.

And as for himself. . .

They were as bad as each other. Greywolf tried to be an Indian, and wasn't; while he looked like an Indian and was determined not to be one.

His goddamn knee had started him thinking, and he didn't want to think. He didn't need Alicia Delaware to send him back along the path he'd come.

Who could he ask?

George Frank was a chief he knew. He wasn't exactly a friend, but he was a nice guy, who also happened to be the taayii Haw'ilh of the Tla-o-qui-aht, one of the Nootka lands from the Wickaninnish area. A Haw'ilh was a chief, but a taayii Haw'ilh was a step up from that – a head chief. The taayii Haw'ilh were a bit like the British monarchy: their status was hereditary. These days, most bands were governed by elected councillors, but the hereditary chiefs were still respected.

In the north of Vancouver Island the big chiefs called themselves taayii Haw'ilh, but in the south they were called taayii chaachaabat. George Frank, he guessed, was more likely to be a taayii chaahat. Maybe he'd avoid Indian words.

He could easily visit the chief- he lived a short distance from the Wickaninnish Inn. The more he thought about it, the more he liked the idea. Instead of waiting for Ford's call, he could break the cycle and see where it took him. He found Frank's number in the phone book and called him.