The Handsome Stranger
Kiyas, a long time ago, a Métis community was holding a New Year’s celebration in the townhall. Everyone brought food and there was music and dancing. They were having a great time. It was one of those nights when great big, fluffy snowflakes were falling from the sky covering everything in a glistening white blanket of snow.
Walter J. Phillip, “Red River Jig,” 1931, e010835251-v8. Print, woodcut on wove paper. Library and Archives Canada.
It was late in the evening when there was a loud knock at the door. When they opened the door, in stepped a handsome stranger. He was dressed in expensive clothes that impressed everyone. He immediately went around the room shaking hands with the men but taking the hands of the women and gently kissing them.
As the music played, he invited different women to come and dance with him. He twirled and dipped the ladies, moving them around the dance floor with grace and ease. Of course, all the women wanted to dance with him. The men were watching with envy and annoyance.
The band announced they needed to take a break. The handsome stranger had other plans. He asked for a fiddle and offered to play for a little while. His first tune was soft and romantic and made the women’s hearts swoon.
His second tune started slowly but then the pace sped up until he was playing so fast that the audience couldn’t believe any person could play so swiftly, skillfully, and accurately. It was like The Devil Went Down to Georgia! The applause was thunderous. As it ended, the men started heading for the door gathering up their jackets.
The handsome stranger invited a young woman to dance with him, twirling and dipping her around the floor. At one point he spun her around and sent her twirling away from him. Meanwhile he headed to the door, grabbed his coat, and was gone.
Before anyone could react to the odd behaviour of the handsome stranger, they heard sobbing from the girl he had been dancing with. She was leaning against the wall with her hands over her face.
Suddenly she turned away and everyone saw that the back of her dress was shredded from the neck all the way down to her waist and her back was scratched and bleeding like she had been attacked by a wild animal. People were in shock, wondering how this could have happened. The women gathered around and comforted the poor girl.
Lucille Scott, 2021. Acrylic. In Ride, Gabe, Ride. Burton, Wilfred. Your Nickel's Worth Publishing, 2021, p. 31. Source: Wilfred Burton.
The men decided to go outside and fire off their guns. The custom of the day was for the men to fire off their guns at midnight to signal the start of the new year. They would return to offer their support.
As the men opened the door, they were greeted by the sight of everything covered in a blanket of soft, fluffy snow except the fresh footprints of the handsome stranger. They could clearly see his footprints going across the deck and down the steps. They could also see that at the bottom of the step the footprints changed into wolf paw prints that led out the gate, down the road, and out of town.
It was then the people realized they had been visited by a Roogaroo. A cursed creature in human form that had to be the best looking, best dressed, best dancer, and the best fiddle player. But he was a Roogaroo with inner rage. He was compelled to scare people; so he shredded the girl’s dress and scratched her back, leaving her and the crowd in shock. Lastly, he shape-shifted at the bottom of the steps to leave wolf prints.
Everybody knew they were visited by a Roogaroo!
CORT DOGNIEZ was born and raised in Saskatoon. He was an educator for over forty years until his retirement in 2020. He was fortunate growing up listening to his Kohkum’s stories about her life and her family. He now honours those stories and passes them on to his family, his relatives and friends, and the general public who want to know more about the Métis people. His first children’s book, Road to La Prairie Ronde, was nominated for two Saskatchewan book awards in 2021. Cort's in retirement as a writer and presenter at schools and in public events. He is a consummate storyteller who dazzles his listeners with traditional and contemporary stories.
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