In Fond Remembrance of Me by Howard Norman

give her more time—months, in fact, if not a full year—had opted for murder now. Her groans, paleness, and grimaces scared me. It felt like an invisible murderer had entered the room.
    â€œHelen, I think we should get you to a hospital, right now,” I said.
    â€œI’m not doing what you think I might be doing.”
    â€œYou look pale, Helen. Your hands feel clammy.”
    â€œI’ve been pale and clammy, as you say, ten thousand times. I ache deeply inside, and I’m having stupid, bad thoughts. Mark would say, ‘Spirits are using her.’ Maybe they
are.” She dozed off for a moment, opened her eyes, and said, “Would you consider reading Lieutenant Chappell’s report to me?”
    â€œOf course. Yes.”
    â€œJust until I nod off. I like that phrase, ‘nod off.’”
    This was about eight o’clock or eight-thirty at night. I began to read from the preface, which, in Chappell’s day, was called the Advertisement: “‘Towards the close of the year 1814, a young naval officer, Lieutenant Chappell, of His Majesty’s ship Rosamond , who had recently returned, for the second time, from an expedition to the North-eastern coast of America , brought to Cambridge a collection of the dresses, weapons, &c. of the Indians inhabiting Hudson’s Bay; requesting that I would represent these curiosities to the Public Library of the University.’”
    The notion that Helen’s exhaustion and medications, in concert with being read to, would act as a soporific proved false—or, as Lieutenant Chappell wrote, a falsehood of some note —because Helen stayed awake through my reading of the entirety of Chappell’s report, Advertisement all the way to page 246, where he ends the narrative proper by writing: “I shall here conclude this Narrative; merely adding, that the Rosamond and her convoy again sailed from the Orkneys on the 7th of November , and arrived safe at the Nore on the 17th of the same month; when an inspection having been made of the Rosamond ’s defects, she was reported to be totally unfit for sea, in consequence of the damage she had sustained amongst the ice of Hudson’s Straits ; and she was accordingly put out of commission, and immediately advertised to be sold out of His Majesty’s service.”

    (I did not read the Appendixes: “Statement of the Variation of the Compass,” “Table of the Voyages of the Company Ships, since the year 1773,” “Thermometrical Observations,” “Dresses, &c. OF THE ESQUIMAUX INDIANS in Hudson’s Strait,”A Vocabulary of the LANGUAGE of the CREE or KNISTENEAUX INDIANS,” though the language in those was decidedly evocative.)
    It was now about 2 or 3 a.m., I think, though more likely I had lost track of time, which is the best way to read, or listen to someone read. “Thank you, Howard Norman,” Helen said when I set the book down on the bedside table. “You’re second only to the CBC announcers. Of course, they’re not available upon request, are they.”
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    SEAL HUNTERS LIVE ON THE ARK AWHILE
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    A big wooden boat appeared on the horizon. Some village men paddled out to it in kayaks. When they got to the boat, they heard, “Two of you can stay—the rest of you go away!” The villagers saw a long wooden stick with bristles waving in the air and ravens flying off the bristles. The ravens landed on another part of the boat.
    â€œI’ve seen that tool before,” a man said. “I saw it in a dream.”
    â€œLet’s find out who’s sweeping ravens,” another man said.
    â€œYes, it’s not right, to invite two to stay and tell the rest of us to leave,” another man said. “Very selfish.”
    A few men climbed up the side of the boat. While they were climbing, winter arrived. Sometimes this happens, winter lands suddenly as a raven. Now it was