“Why we left you? But you didn’t prevent what happened. The Cayuse are your relatives, you could have stopped it. Then you sent us away and chased the hostage bateau to make sure we left.”
“You believe this?” He pushed back strands of long hair the wind teased.
“I do. You took my family up the canyon and held them hostage there. Isn’t that why my father couldn’t come to save me?”
“This is a false story you tell yourself. He could not come because his presence would have risked all the hostages, maybe your family and all those with white skin. Blood filled the air and made men foolish. But your father chose wisely, though he hated to let you be there at Waiilatpu. We had to hold him back. Your mother, too, had to hold him back. And at the end, we escort the bateau, for safety, happy the ransom was paid. We could not prevent what one tribe chose to do, but we could protect the agreement made to release you. That is what we did.”
“But I thought . . .” How had I confused their intent? “You didn’t force us from Lapwai? Prevent us from taking our clothes and books?”
“We thought it safer for you to go to those white towns for a time, but we wondered why Spaldings didn’t come back to us.”
For a time. My mind swirled like a river eddy. My father blamed the Catholics and the Mission Board. I blamed the Nez Perce. Who did my mother blame, or did she?
He looked around. “I do not see your mother or father. They have gone to heaven?”
“My mother.”
He spoke in Sahaptin to those who had dismounted, telling them of my mother’s passing. “Your mother was loved.”
“I know.”
“Your father too. We did not understand why he did not come back once you were free.”
I frowned. They wanted us back? “My father writes to the Mission Board every month, begging those men to allow him to return. But you do not want us.”
“Who tells you this?”
“You sent us away. My father . . . he tries to tell them that you are not warring Cayuse or Yakima, but all Indians are the same to the Board.”
“As some of my people see all white people too.”
“My father is coming here. You will come back when he visits?”
His face broke into a wide smile. “We will stay. We stay to see Father Spalding.”
“And us? My family and I. We are intruding, I know, but can we remain?”
“It is your way,” he said. “But we know a daughter is like her father: faithful, caring of The People and the land. Planting.” He nodded toward my small garden patch, one of the first things I’d completed after we arrived. Am I like my father in other ways too? Strident. Forceful. Stubborn. Unwilling to forgive or see other possibilities.
“Yes, planting.” That’s what my parents had done: planted wheat and potatoes but more, planted the love of God into the hearts of many.
The Nez Perce set up their camp a short distance beyond our tent, dogs sniffing history at old haunts. I thought then of how easily The People accommodated our intrusion. I brought my girls out and introduced America Jane, who curtsied her respect, then ever curious, eased her way into the throng of children who were part of the Nez Perce party. I held Lizzie on my hip, bouncing her as I listened to the sounds of people laughing as they worked, watched the horses be unloaded of their travois packs and be set free to tear at grasses. Skin-covered tipis rose up like white asters, dotting the landscape along the river. Timothy introduced me then to his wife and children. I served them dried beef and knew when Mr. Warren returned we would slaughter a cow and serve fresh meat. We’d have a feast of welcome. Maybe they had tried to keep us safe and protect my parents and siblings. At least today my girls would experience the pleasure of these people before Waiilatpu, as I once had. There’d be so much to tell Mr. Warren when he returned, to ask my father when he arrived. Evening settled on us like a knitted shawl. And in the quiet I organized my thoughts. Timothy squatted on his heels before the small fire I’d built outside the tent to keep the coffee hot.
“We aren’t far from that place where I last saw you,” I told Timothy. “Do you remember that day?”
Timothy drank the grain coffee I’d prepared. I sat on the rocking chair just outside my tent, holding Lizzie on my lap. Dogs barked in the distance and thin threads of smoke rose up into the red sunset sky. The sun felt warm against my face, heat bristled beneath my collar.
“I remember. We go by that place when we return to Lapwai, and I speak a prayer to the Great Spirit and to the Jesus God that their souls rest. I would take you there?”
“All that sadness? No. I couldn’t.”
“Sadness. Yes, this is a good way to say what happened there.” He took another sip from the tin cup and Lizzie fussed so I put her down to crawl on the blanket beside me, handed her a wooden toy I kept in my apron so she’d sit. She wasn’t yet strong enough to stand alone nor pull up without help. I wasn’t sure I was either.
“You were a sad child at that place.” Fire sparks flitted up into the sky. “I wished to rescue you but could not. It is a lesson I have learned often since. Some things cannot be changed. We must fill the vessel we are given.”
I stroked my daughter’s dark hair. “Someday, maybe.”
“When you are ready, I will take you there, Eliza Spalding, so you can put bad memories to sleep forever.”
“It’s Eliza Spalding Warren. And maybe one day I’ll go with you.” I still had another to forgive—myself. I had not acted as I might have to blunt the pain so many felt at Waiilatpu.
23
Knitting Lives
“They’re friendly Indians?”
“Yes, of course. Timothy was an early convert of my parents.”
Mr. Warren had returned, leaving the drovers with the cattle, and his welcome to the Nez Perce was a wary one as we stood outside the tent. “How’d they find us?”
“Timothy said he heard I was here. From someone in The Dalles, I imagine.”
“Will they stay the winter? They’re consuming grass here and some of those tipis are set right where I hope to build the barn.”
I hadn’t been aware of my husband’s animosity toward the Indian people. I wondered if Little Shoot had left so abruptly on his own. “They’ll likely leave as soon as Father gets here and they can see him.”
“Your father is coming? When did that happen?”
“He wrote.” I picked at a button on his vest. “He’s bought cattle and he and my sisters are bringing them through, the way you came, and heading to the Touchet River. They’re . . . it looks like they’d like to settle here, too, run their cows with ours.”
“What? The whole Spalding spawn is coming here?”
“Spawn. What a terrible thing to say of my family.”
“You’re right. I love your sisters like the ones I never had.” He brushed my hand away. “You organized this, I know it. You can’t just let things unfold on their own.”
“I have been like that, I know. And it’s brought you a consternation. But I sent the invitation to visit, really that’s all I suggested.” Hadn’t I? “I would like to have a bridge between my father and me. Between the two of you too. My father took on the rest. You know how impulsive he can be. You’re like him in that way.”
Had I married in part to get away from my father and found a man not all that much different from him? If that was so, then God must have a sense of humor.
“I don’t think I’m anything like your pa.” He cleared his throat of the dust and spat.
“Let’s just see what happens. He may not even come.” Timothy and several men approached then and I put my hand on Mr. Warren’s arm. “Be pleasant.”
He snorted, tossed what was left of his coffee onto the trampled grass, the beads of moisture sparkling in the morning sunlight.
“We would finish your cabin. If you would seek this.”
Mr. Warren didn’t say anything at all. I nudged him.
“My father helped build Father Spalding’s house,” Ti
mothy continued.
“That was a very large building.” I remembered it. “Eighteen by forty-eight feet. Mother taught school at one end and sometimes she had two hundred students. Father held church at the other end.”
“We studied outside often.”
“Mr. Warren, will you accept the offer of his help?”
“Yeah? Well, sure. Having extra hands to build would be a good thing. Especially if your father’s coming. I want a separate house.”
And so as with my parents, the Nez Perce people worked to construct our home along another river. The logs they dragged from the copses of trees that dotted the rounded hills, and the work was made so much easier with their many hands. One day two other pairs of hands arrived to assist. The O’Donnell brothers, James and John, with their Irish accents and a “bit of the thirst” they thought needed quenching. I recognized them. They were Mr. Warren’s gaming friends.
“So I’m not the only one who sent invitations.”
“I didn’t think they’d come.” Mr. Warren dropped his eyes, found his boot toe needed concentration. Later that evening he added, “They wouldn’t help with the cattle drive, so I figured . . .” I felt him shrug his shoulders as we curled beneath the light blanket in the tent. Tomorrow we’d set the ridge line on the cabin. Adobe built the fireplace, though I still hoped for that stove that Mr. Warren had promised.
“You made a promise, you said. Not to me, you said.”
“I didn’t take their offer to imbibe, did I?” He turned away from me.
I pressed my hand against his shirtless back. “No. You didn’t. And I’m grateful. And I’ll treat them as your friends. After all, they brought you home one night and probably saved your leg.”
Quick as a snake strike he turned to me. “Don’t bring up old things, ’Liza. It does no good and it angers me.”
I pulled away, startled by the intensity.
“I . . . I was only saying I’d treat them well. As I hope you’ll treat my family when they arrive.”
“Good. Just do what you’re going to do without telling me about all my past sins and omissions, all right?”
“Yes. All right.”
I lay awake long after I heard his heavy sleep-filled breathing. I wasn’t sure I knew how to have a conversation with my husband that wasn’t laced with the poisonous past. I’d worn that path so soundly I didn’t see there were other trails that I could take. With both him and my father I needed to make some change or I’d be doing what I’d always done, and that hadn’t taken me where I wanted to go.
What did I want then? To be full again, as I had been when I was ten before I lost all semblance of a normal life. To be safe. I didn’t want to imagine disasters or whine. I wanted a happy marriage. I wanted my children to know their father and enjoy his company. I wanted to see my father bounce his granddaughters on his knees. I even wanted to have a different life with Rachel, to stop comparing her to my mother. And I wanted my mother’s legacy to be remembered. Not only of her love for us but for her life’s work cut short. I could see how the Nez Perce still loved her and the stories. And The People loved me too. If I could forgive what I thought had happened, I might let their kindnesses fill up my hollow place.
Late August and the heat sweltered as I tugged at garden weeds. I could smell the fish baking at the low fires and knew we’d have a feast that night. The salmon run, as they called it, had reached the Walla Walla and the Touchet River too. We’d have slabs of dried fish to feed us through the winter.
“Mama, look!” America Jane pointed at a slender man wearing a wide-brimmed hat. He looked familiar and I recognized his walk. Joy rose up.
“Henry Hart, what are you doing here? I thought you were freighting somewhere.” My brother hugged me, his back carrying no fat beneath my fingers.
“I was. Still am in a way. I’ve a place, on the Snake River. I supply travelers and work with the army to bring food to the new reservations.”
“But how did you know we were here?”
“Word travels on Indian smoke.” He grinned. He was tall and bronzed as an Indian, handsome, my little brother. “And these are my nieces.” He held each girl. I wondered if there was a woman in his life and asked. “Nope. Still a bachelor and that’s all right. I’d like to have something to offer a wife and at present I’m still pretty . . . well, let’s just say I’m glad the Yakima wars are over and they’re letting some folks come this way looking for gold. Things should pick up then.”
“Are the strikes near here?”
“North,” he said. “They’re prospecting and a few nuggets have been found. Word will get out and then I’ll be in better shape. I’ll freight into the mines.” I hoped Mr. Warren wouldn’t take it in his head to search for gold.
“You’re here now and I couldn’t be happier. Guess who else is here?” We walked toward the tipis and my brother clasped the forearm of Timothy, a sign of respectful greeting between friends.
My father arrived shortly after. About twenty head of cattle, their long horns glistening in the sun, came shrouded in dust. “Stay away, America Jane. They’re not friendly like our milk cows. Let your grandfather push them along.”
But it wasn’t my father pushing them at all, it was Millie and Martha Jane, both girls riding astride. My father drove the wagon drawn by two fine-looking mules. Another man sat beside him. I’d hoped it might be Little Shoot but it wasn’t. I could see that from a distance, as the man was shorter. My sisters shouted and waved ropes over their heads keeping the cattle moving away from the cabin area and where the Indians camped. Several Nez Perce mounted bareback horses and kept the herd in check until they fanned out beyond us into the tall grasses turning brown away from the water. We hadn’t had any rain since the day we’d arrived.
Behind the herd and in front of my father’s wagon came two shoats. I hadn’t seen the pigs in the cattle dust. No sheep, but pigs. And there were chickens in cages hung along the wagon side. He was definitely here to stay.
Mr. Warren may not have welcomed my father with open arms but the Nez Perce did. Tears filled my eyes as I saw my father grow taller in their company, wrapped in their praises. Their happy chatter was a music chime. And then real music rose up, old hymns my mother had taught them in Sahaptin and English, sung with vigor. They all remembered the words and I did too. Even my brother stumbled through some of the Nez Perce versions. “I was never as good at languages as you, Eliza.” If I didn’t think about the language, in the music, it just came, like grace, without me doing anything to make it happen. They repeated the song in English and I so wished my mother could have been there to hear it all, to see that much remained after we left our life at Lapwai.
At the evening feast prepared in my father’s honor, my sisters and I danced with Timothy’s wife and the other women, toe-heel, toe-heel in a circle while the drums pounded. For a brief moment I heard the drums at Waiilatpu, but I made myself stay safely with my sisters, dancing beside the Touchet River. Mr. Welch, the driver who’d come with my father, let himself be pulled up into the throng while giggling Nez Perce women showed him how to circle dance. He laughed. Soon my brother joined them, his lean body as tall as Timothy’s. He smiled into the eyes of a Nez Perce girl. I looked over at Mr. Warren standing beside the cabin, thinking I’d invite him to dance, too, but he wasn’t smiling.
“Join us,” I said, walking toward him.
“Welch has two left feet and I’d have two right feet.” He scuffed the dirt with his boot, the brim of his hat hid his eyes. “Your brother’s pretty light on his toes, though.” He pulled me to him then, kissed the top of my head as he put his arm over my shoulder. He wore a sheepish grin, so he hadn’t been upset, just feeling awkward.
“But see, it’s just a simple step repeated. You’ll get the hang of it.” He made no move to join me so I stood beside him, watching.
“They love my father. And look at him. He’s smiling in ways I’ve never seen, at least not since that day when I returned from Waiilatpu. I’d
forgotten how happy he can look.”
“He’d be a lot happier if you hadn’t married me.”
I refused to pick up his bait. “But I did marry you.” I kissed his cheek. “And I have no regrets.”
“You don’t?”
“Do you?”
“You can be a hard woman to please, Eliza. But no, I’ve no regrets. And I’m glad you came along.” He turned to me then. “I’m a difficult man. I’ve made mistakes. But this cattle thing, I think we’re set with this.”
“They look to thrive.”
“And so will we. I guess your father’s coming with a few head more won’t make much difference. And he brought pigs.”
“Yes. Ham and bacon for Christmas, assuming that shoat’s pregnant.”
“But his bringing cattle means he sees the merit in this too. My own pa didn’t. He thought I was crazy. Like you did, I suspect.”
“Not crazy. Just a dreamer. I guess I’d lost my dreaming ways when Mama died.”
“I know you wanted to go to school.”
I shrugged, but his sensitivity to that loss of mine was warm water soothing my soul. “I did. But I’ve good books to read. And I can teach my girls. And more people will come here, when they see how fruitful the land is. The Whitmans did pick a beautiful country. If only they hadn’t chosen a field the Cayuse claimed as sacred.”
“What’s done is done.”
“Yes. And we are here ready to start a new life.”
But then every day is a day that starts a new life, that requires knitting and going back to pick up lost stitches.
24
Picking Up Lost Stitches
I greeted the O’Donnell brothers respectfully, fed them, watched as my husband joined in their banter, each of them drinking only my grain coffee. But the brothers weren’t here to stay. “We’re seekin’ a sheep herding job, don’t ye know.”
“We have two sheep,” Mr. Warren said.
“Aye, but they’re herded by the Kelpie. No need of us.”
The Memory Weaver Page 21