(1:51:26) Alice – And I think Jim Deegan wrote about that in his book of poems. I am pretty sure it is in there.
(1:51:42) Alice – [Living on a highway district you never knew what a knock at the door meant] One night the mosquitoes were so bad and this guy came up and this was in the new house and he came [to the front door] most people usually came to the back door because the office was there and what not. Nobody ever came to the front door because there was no path or anything around there. That night, Gaul darned, I looked up and here is this guy. He was at the dining room door you know. And he didn’t look right. I’ll tell you it worried me. So I went to talk to him at the door and he wanted a drink of water. He asked for a drink of water…You [Ole] was over at the old house, was it Skjonsberg’s that were there then? Anyways I said to Karen, “Go get on your bike and go over and get dad.” Gosh, she just went flying down that road on her bike and she said, “Mom said to come home, there’s a bum on the step!” So Ole came back right away and he went and talked to him. The mosquitoes were so bad that I think that he was almost nuts.
(1:53:15) Ole – He was carrying his stuff in an old overcoat over his arms.
(1:53:20) Alice – Ole said, “I can find you a place to stay.” He had called the police and what not. They took him up to the Divide didn’t they?
(1:53:28) Ole – Yeah, he was going to BC. So they took him up and radioed somebody, an RCMP in Radium. They met him and took him on into BC.
(1:53:45) Alice – And then we were getting ready to go to Jasper and we’d taken down our drapes and taken them to the cleaners. So I mean there is our front room with all the lights on and Robert had gone with his dad. So it was just Karen and Larry. Larry was just a wee guy. You know, I never used to lock the darn door when I think about. Anyway the front door bell rang. It wasn’t locked. So I went to the door and there was a guy standing there. He was clean and nicely dressed, very neatly and he asked me for something to eat. So I thought, well I’d better not say no. So finally I said, “You wait out here and I’ll go and get something.” I happened to look over the step and he had a rake. A metal rake with a long handle that you use to rake the yard. And I thought that’s the funniest thing I’ve ever seen. Why has he got that? And it scared the hell out of me. So anyways I backed into the house and I locked the door. I didn’t know that Larry had come up behind me. He said, “Mom! Why are you locking the door?” I tried to shut him up! But I went and made him a sandwich and I took him a mug of water. And I went out and he thanked me and he sat down and he ate it. So then I locked the door again. I went into the bedroom where I could see what he was doing. He ate and drank his water and what not. Then he picked up his rake and away he went back onto the highway. Now that scared me, why did he have a rake? Now if he hadn’t had nothing, I wouldn’t have thought anything about it. But that rake really bothered me. Then I watched and he went back to the highway. He was hitchhiking. But who would give him a ride if he was packing a big rake? Unless he had a car parked down the road and I couldn’t see it. That could have been. That was living on a highway. That was the years when Trudeau was encouraging all the young people to hitchhike across Canada and what not.
(1:56:33) Alice – One day I went to the door and there were two girls there and one had fallen and had dislocated her shoulder. The other one wanted me to pull on it. I just looked at her and said, “I’m not pulling on her arm!” I said, “You are only six miles to town so you go in and go to the hospital.” She was really in pain. But the thing is, I wasn’t going to go jerking on her arm. So they thanked me and away they went into town. It’s these things that happen…
(1:57:15) Alice – Then one day we had the office at Healy Creek there. Then you just went into the backdoor and you were into the kitchen. Before they built the office, they (visitors) would be right into the kitchen. I sold more fishing licences and checked out people than Ole did because I was there. This one day, again the doors are all unlocked and here’s this guy and he’s in the kitchen! I had the table set for supper. I was making supper and he said, “Oh, just in time.” And I thought, God, I’m sure I don’t know you. It was an American…he just wanted some information…He was just as friendly as all get up!
(1:58:18) Ole – You’d run into all sorts of them.
(1:58:25) Alice – Ole did his work. He was in the backcountry, maybe all day. So it was the warden’s wife, you know. You were there. You answered the door and what not. But I never really worried. I really didn’t. I never thought anything. Of course they had to walk six miles in there (into Healy Creek) from town. I never worried about anybody coming through because they either would have to come on a horse or a bicycle. At night they wouldn’t. And I never locked that blasted door. I never even thought of it.
(1:59:09) Alice – One night I was really sleeping sound and I woke up and I thought I heard the door slam. I thought what the heck was that? So I listened. Gaul darn, that’s voices. So I got up and put my house coat on…They had high windows and I crawled up on the cupboards to look out the window and here’s these two guys out there and their two horses. The thing was I happened to recognize it was Jimmy Brewster. Well, I recognized his voice because he used to stop so many times. So it didn’t scare me a bit. So I crawled back down because he headed back in for the house. I was standing between the front room and the window was behind me. I never thought, but you know your silhouette was there because the light wasn’t on. So I’m standing in the doorway between the kitchen and the front room with the window was behind me. And Jim came in and of course I scared the hell out of him. He had knocked the first time he was in and there was no answer. I hadn’t even heard him. As soon as he came in the second time, he said ‘Alice?” Well I knew it was him. He tried to ring the old wall phone and he couldn’t get an answer at night because nobody was ever on it. Here they had rode in from Assiniboine that day. That was about 40 miles. It was a long, long day. Yes this was about ten or eleven at night. So anyway we had the cabin and nobody was staying there at Healy Creek at the old house. I didn’t feel like cooking them any supper. I knew darn well they hadn’t had any. So I said, “I’ll tell you what I’ll do. I’ll get you a pan.” I put in some bacon and eggs and some jam, a loaf of bread and butter and some coffee. I said, “You guys can stay in the cabin. Put the horses in the corral.” Because Ole was away. There were no horses in there. The feed was there. I said, “But you have to cook your own supper.” Whether they did or not, or whether they were so tired I don’t know. Or whether they waited to breakfast…They ate half a loaf of bread and the stuff that I had given them. But I’m not saying they did it that night. Of course, I went back to bed! But after that door slammed I thought, if you are going to sleep that sound you better start locking that door! Then I did.
(2:02:31) Alice – Before they built that log cabin there was the warden cabin, that what’s his name Bill…Peyto had.
(2:02:40) Ole – But Bill Peyto never used it.
(2:02:44) Alice – No he didn’t. He went up there on the rock. So he could look down.
(2:02:55) Ole – He had a wire running down and he run his bucket down the wire. Pick it up in the creek and pull it up. The wire was kind of like a high line.
