Peribonka Country

THE CRIPPLED LADY OF PERIBONKA-- Tames Oliver Curwood--Doubleday, Doran ($2).

At Peribonka, French-Canadian village in the forest-river country of northern Quebec, Maria and Samuel Chapdelaine (of whose happiness Louis Hemon wrote) still keep their little store and dining room. But no longer are they the happiest people of that Peribonka valley. Happier is the Crippled Lady. She sits each day on her veranda serenely waiting for her man Paul's daily messages, for his week-end visits. He is now clearing the forest with 15 men. Nearby is the Mistassini dam, which he had built with 15,000.

Paul Kirkwood was rich and married-- to Claire, daughter of his father's financial partner. Claire felt the marriage without love, and she lugged away from Paul. It was while he was building the dam in loneliness that he saw Carla, strapping, kindly village teacher. Paul wrote Claire extolling Carla, which brought Claire post-haste to the forest-river country. There was an amiable picnic on the bank of the swift-flowing Mistassini. Paul fell in. "And then, on the cliff, one woman said to another: 'Are you going with him?' The woman spoken to gazed wide-eyed--motionless-- voiceless--and after a moment of tense waiting the other said: 'Then--I am!' " It was Carla who jumped. She and Paul were almost drowned, were sucked into a river cave, crawled out, but not before Carla was hurt by a rubble-heap slip. Claire went off with a stoop-shouldered sculptor. But not until the two women had confabulated on their emotions.

To take another author's (Louis Hemon's) locale and into it blend a tale of similar genre is a literary tour de force which James Oliver Curwood accomplished not long before his death (TIME, Aug. 22, 1927). It is written simply, directly, with just enough characterization and scene to suggest verity.