It wasn't long before I lost the ability to generate any power from kicking my legs. From the lack of progress of our raft, it seemed the others were weakening as well. The wind was blowing us away from the shore, negating any progress we had made. Now that I had stopped kicking my feet, my breathing slowed and I felt as though my inhalations were not deep enough to draw in the air I needed. It was as though my lungs were sluggish. A foggy haze began to drift toward me and I knew it wasn't the mist on the lake. I was still aware enough to know if my arms were to slip from the canoe, I would not have the strength to keep myself afloat and would descend quietly into the cold depths below. My shivering stopped.

None of the men spoke. We let the waves bash us, the cold wind freeze our faces, the icy rain numb our hands. It is hard to imagine in a situation like this, one would be overcome with gratitude, but that was my sentiment. Floating there, helpless, I felt the need I to thank my expedition mates for the adventure, for having gotten to know these excellent men, to have shared adversity and joy, to have experienced the land's beauty and marvelled at this wild landscape, to have had the fortune to join them in laughter and pulled together with them when needed. They had become my brothers, all of them, Grey included, and together we would make our final voyage.

I wondered too, if when my arms would soon let go the canoe and I slid beneath, the serpent, the creature who revealed itself to us with the line in the sand, the Great Snake, would be waiting to greet us. Would it let us pass into its spirit world? Or was its duty to guard against intruders like us, to keep the land and water pure, safe from the greed and plunder for which we came? We would likely try to take the snake to be ours, to own it, tame it, give it a name, use it in our art, sell it. No, the snake should let our souls float somewhere in this black water, suspended between the muddy bottom and the coming ice, our bodies pulled gradually by the current to the Northern Sea. We should have to wait until our God finds us. Our European God, the God of our mothers and grandmothers, the God of the statue of a white man in a loincloth hanging from a tree. Would our even God know we were here? Would He see it right to pull us from this watery grave and ascend our spirits to His afterlife, somewhere above? Would our God even stand a chance here?

I would welcome the Great Snake. I would say Jimmy Noland sent me. I wished Jimmy would vouch for me, say I was his cousin. But he'd likely just laugh. I could see Jimmy, hands above his head, jumping.

Out of the fog of fading consciousness and the mist of cold rain and wind on violent water, I saw a vision: a great vessel, a canoe, is suspended, effortlessly and unmoved by the waves and wind, floating above the surface of the lake. In its centre sits a great warrior, ageless and strong. He commands his spirit ship without a paddle. He reaches into the water with both arms and when he raises them to the sky, he holds one of our overturned canoes in his hands. He slips the canoe across the gunwales of his vessel and raising his hands again, turns the canoe upright, laying it across his boat. He commands the canoe to be launched into the lake, upright, and he holds it next to him. His reach now grasps the lifeless body of a man and raises him from the water, like a miracle, and places him into the righted and empty canoe. The saviour repeats his rite with another man and I see the unmistakable shape of George Gray's body raised from the depths.

The apparition slid to the next overturned canoe and conducted the ritual again, and then to the one after that. This was not the Great Snake of the underworld that we had so feared, the monster we tried to flee by attempting to cross the lake. This was the messenger of truth, a benevolent spirit who would wrap us in his warmth. I felt his hands on mine, his firm grasp on my outstretched forearms. He raised me up, he lifted me, then he placed me in the fur of an animal. I was the bear now, and under the weight of my new skin, I slept.