Summary
After a time, Old Woman floats ashore again, where she is greeted by a man with a rifle who introduces himself as Nathaniel Bumppo. He insists on calling her Chingachgook even though she tries to explain that is not her name, confusing her with his Indian friend. He also lists off distinct categories of what he considers to be Indian traits and white traits. Bumppo is eager to use his gun and decides to shoot Old Woman. When he tries to do so, he ends up being shot himself, and before he dies he gives her the name Hawkeye.
After Bumpo dies, the real Chingachgook appears and while he and Old Woman are talking, a group of soldiers appear to investigate the death of Bumppo. When Old Woman gives her name as Hawkeye, they arrest her for impersonating a white person, and take her to Fort Marion, in Florida.
The morning after the intrusion at the Sundance, Dr. Hovaugh and Babo set off on their bus tour. Near the lake, Clifford and his colleague are astonished by the sight of cars floating in the lake. Bursum, enjoying his lakefront cabin, sees the same sight, as do Babo and Dr. Hovaugh from their tour bus.
At his cabin, Eli has been joined by the four elders. All at once, a violent earthquake breaks out, triggered by Coyote’s singing and dancing. The force of the earthquake breaks the dam, letting the waters go flooding out. In the other narrative, with Old Woman/Hawkeye’s arrival in Florida, the elders decide to leave, and the four of them walk out of the prison, triggering another, or perhaps the same, earthquake, and bringing the story lines together.
The action resumes a month later. The cabin was destroyed in the flood, and Eli was killed, but Norma is now rebuilding it with Latisha and Alberta’s help. Charlie has lost his job now that there is no longer a legal case, but he is going to Los Angeles to visit his father. Lionel agrees to help work on the cabin, sensing the possibility of a renewed relationship with Alberta. Back at the hospital, the elders have peacefully returned, satisfied with what they accomplished during their trip.
Coyote and the narrator decide to begin the story again.
Analysis
The fourth creation story concludes with another encounter with a figure from Western literature. Nathaniel “Natty” (sarcastically referred to as “Nasty” in the novel) Bumppo is the protagonist in James Fenimore Cooper’s popular series of novels. Bumppo is a woodsman and hunter and in Cooper’s representation is presented as a hero. However, when Old Woman encounters Bumppo, he is mostly interested in creating a rigid hierarchy between Indians and Whites, reinforcing stereotypes about how the two groups are different. Bumppo assigns a name to Old Woman, confusing her with the character Chingachgook, who was his Aboriginal sidekick in the novels. This confusion suggests that to Bumppo, all Indians seem to be the same.
Bumppo is also both violent and incompetent; he insists on shooting something but ends up being shot himself. It is not clear who shoots him, but one possibility is that it is his sidekick Chingachgook, who emerges from hiding. At the very least, the hiding suggests that the two did not have the friendly relationship that was traditionally portrayed between them. King thus undermines another traditional narrative of benevolent White protection of a Native character. At the same time, when the soldiers appear, Old Woman is assumed to be guilty because of her race. She suggests the name Hawkeye as an alias, borrowing one of the names Bumppo also went by in the novels.
Meanwhile, the action in the contemporary plot line comes to an abrupt climax with the earthquake, destruction of the dam, and subsequent flood. This seems to be a disastrous and destructive event, but it also symbolizes a necessary cleansing and renewal. The cars floating in the lake, and the collapse of the dam, suggest that nature (in the form of land and water) have triumphed over artificial structures. These events also suggest the importance of accident and chance: after all the years of legal battles, it is a seemingly random event that resolves the question of the dam’s fate. Although the earthquake is associated with the escape of the four elders, and the convergence of the story lines, it is also partially accidental, and caused by Coyote’s spontaneous and joyous celebrations.
After the earthquake, the collapse of existing structures and plans leads to fresh starts. Charlie is on the road to reuniting with his father and also symbolically coming to terms with his own identity as a Blackfoot man. Lionel is finally able to take steps towards a more adult future and to become someone who can truly share Alberta’s life. Alberta’s pregnancy represents the fulfillment of her hopes, and interestingly, after she has spent so much time agonizing over who should father her child, it turns out to not matter to anyone who the father might be, a mystery that is left unexplored.
The fact that the novel’s conclusion focuses more on new beginnings, such as Alberta’s pregnancy and the reconstruction of the cabin, is echoed by the final dialogue between Coyote and the narrator. They have returned to the origin story over and over again, trying to find a satisfactory way of telling a story that can encompass big and universal questions. It is now clear that there will never be a final answer, since a story can be told over and over again, becoming something richer each time it is told.
