The Morning River

by W. Michael Gear

  What miserable work. They slipped and trudged their way along the bank, stepping over fallen trees, slogging into muddy little creeks, and forcing their way through thickets of sumac, hazel, and tough grapevines. The brush was the worst. Hell must be full of these thick twisted brambles, for only the Devil could torment a man so.

  The air grew hot, muggy, and stale. Sweat beaded and trickled as they wound their way along the river's edge. Flies buzzed around their heads as men mumbled, swatted mosquitoes, and pinched ticks off their flesh.

  Richard tripped and fell. He was kicked to his feet again and forced on. Muscles quaking, he clawed through the brush, planting his clumsy feet in the steps of those before him.

  Around him, the engages sang. What sort of men were these? They had none of the virtues which he had thought common to all. This life had nothing to do with the teachings of the philosophers. Reason dominated the philosophical quest, yet here on the river, among these savages, it seemed as ephemeral as the breath of God.

  "Why do you beat me?" Richard asked over his shoulder.

  Trudeau scoffed, "To make you work. You are lazy and soft, like the maggot, norc?"

  "But why do you beat me? Why do you not just encourage me to achieve the same purpose?"

  "Eh? You would leave us at the first opportunity, oui! The bourgeois, he say so."

  "You have no proof that I would leave."

  "Sacre! It is what I would do were I walking on your feet! What you get out of this trip? Nothing! So you leave, you get away, and you be free sooner."

  "Perhaps. But why should you care? What is my leaving to you?"

  "Ah, mon ami, if you run, the boat has one less body to help pull it upriver. My burden grows heavier while yours is less. Besides, we 'ave hauled you this far. Perhaps I want you to haul me now."

  "Yes, but what about the morality of the situation? I have been sold like a slave. I am a man, Trudeau. I'm not a draft animal. What was done to me was wrong. Doesn't that mean anything to you?"

  "Cochon! What do I care of your problems? What do you care of mine? My problem now is that you do not pull hard enough. You pull harder, or I shall kick your skinny ass so high you fart through your ears. Pull! I've had enough talk."

  Richard threw his full weight against the rope. After straining for several minutes, he called over his shoulder again:

  "Trudeau? I'll tell you what. I'll pull my hardest, I give you my word on that. If I make the effort, will you not make the effort to treat me better?''

  "Oui! You pull like the mule, and I no kick you to keep you moving."

  Soon Richard was grunting and gasping for breath. Still he struggled. All right, Richard, if your mind is truly superior, you should be master of your body, protesting though it might be. This is nothing more than a problem of perception. I am fit for this job. I can do it.

  A couple of hours later he wasn't so sure. He stumbled more than he pulled. Trudeau began to curse again.

  "I'm giving it my best," Richard grumbled to his tormentor. "How many years have you been hauling boats up the river?"

  "All my life, rich man," Trudeau growled. "It does not take skill to pull the cordelle. Pull."

  Richard strained against the weight. "I have pulled a boat for one day, now. It will take me at least a week to become as strong as you who have done this all your life."

  "Ha! We shall see. I think you never make good on the cordelle. I think you'll die soon, weak man."

  "A week," he gritted back and strained at the cordelle. "Tell you what. I'll bet you ten fine plews."

  "And where will you get these? Everyone thinks you will be dead."

  "Bet me."

  "It is done." Trudeau raised his voice. "You hear that? This Yankee says he can pull with the best of us in a week! Ten plews, that's what the vide poche bets!"

  Laughter rang out.

  At long last, the sun settled blood-red into the distant trees. After the bow line, the one they called a painter, had been run out from the Maria and was securely tied, Richard reeled to the gangplank. He staggered onto the deck and propped himself against the cargo box. The cool evening breeze blew across his face. He swatted a mosquito that landed on his neck and scratched at the older bites on the back of his neck and along his arms.

  Another itch pestered his leg, and he lifted his fraying pants to see a tick embedded in his calf. He pinched the bug off and threw it into the river. Damn this country! He looked across the opaque brown water at the trees on the far bank.

  God be my witness, I'm tired.

  What would Will Templeton think of him now? He stank of sweat and filth. Scratches crisscrossed his arms and face. He hadn't had a true bath in weeks. His tattered clothes were almost black with filth and grease, coated with mud.

  "I was a gentleman," he mumbled wistfully. "Now, I look like a wretched criminal."

  Very well, Father, you son of a bitch. You wanted me to see reality, and if this is it, I don't find it uplifting at all.

  "Be talking ter yerseff?" Travis asked, dropping next to him with a plate of food.

  "That I am, jailer."

  "Hah! Jailer, be I?" Travis grinned, and it didn't help his ruined face at all. "That be some, after where I been a time or two, Dick."

  "The name is Richard. If I must be condemned to this damned voyage of yours, I might at least get a little respect as a man."

  "Watch yer tongue, pilgrim. If'n yer wanting respect now, ye've yet to earn it."

  "Or what? You'll beat it out of me?"

  "Might," Travis said through a mouthful of food. He wiped his jacket sleeve across his lips and swallowed. Then he glanced at Richard. "So ye comes from Boston town, do ye?"

  "Yes, that's my home. God, how I wish I was there now."

  "Been there onc't upon a time. Got skunked on good likker and woke up next day on a brig headed fer J'maica. Spent two years on that bark. Then we made port at New Orleans and this coon skipped, I'll tell ye. Made me way upriver to Saint Loowee and took ter the Plains. Seen me a sight of places since then. Seen the Shining Mountains and trapped me a plew or two."

  "Want to go back to Boston?" Richard shot a shy glance at the man.

  "Hell, no! This child never lost nothing in them waters." He forked another mouthful and chewed thoughtfully.

  "I could make it worth your while. My father has a lot of money. You could be richer than you ever thought to be."

  Travis chuckled. "Do tell? Don't reckon I'd take kindly to them doin's, though. Reckon as how this child couldn't put up with them Yankee sops."

  "Never know until you try."

  "I know's 'nuff 'bout them diggin's." Travis gestured with the bent fork he held. "Saint Loowee is enough civilization fer this coon, an' that's some, it is. Naw, I reckon

  I'm fer the mountains. Man can float his stick where he will."

  They were silent then, and Richard went and dished him up a plate from the big pot. The stew had been built around fresh venison that Travis had shot that day. He returned and sat next to the old hunter.

  "I want to thank you for giving me that whiskey the first night"

  The hunter nodded.

  "What's it like upriver?"

  A strange light grew in Hartman's blue eyes. "It be some, Dick. Thar's open land as far as ye can see. Makes a man sit right pert, it do. Thar be open prairie an' high mountains that shine in the sun. Ain't no people but the Injuns, and they be few and scattered. Thar's buffler, and prairie goats, and elks, too. Open land, Dick. Free land, where a man's what he's meant to be."

  "True freedom? Why do you say that? Freedom only exists in the mind."

  "Waugh! Them words'11 rot in yer gullet after ye been in the wilds fer a season or two."

  "Freedom comes from philosophy, Travis. It comes from investigating your actions and motives by logical frameworks and manipulating your environment by perception. It's from reason—not a physical thing. There is an inward path, a quest for totality of experience, the primacy of will and nature as spirit. The worl
d around us works according to rational plans and can be understood when we develop our perceptions."

  "Whar'd ye figger that from?" Travis arched an eyebrow.

  "You need to read Hume, Hegel, and Kant." Richard set his plate down to gesture with his hands as he talked. "Hegel, for instance, in the Phenomenology of Mind, documents how men can grow. Right now, you're in a master-slave relationship with the world. Dave Green is the same as my father, a master. Others work, like you and me, or my father's employees, so that the master can consume the fruits of their labor. But that's only one step on the way to truth."

  "Do tell?"

  "Indeed, I do. The master-slave relationship leads to what

  Hegel calls 'the unhappy consciousness.' That is the condition in which we all seek more than material satisfaction. It's the search for a higher truth. Let's see if I can remember. Hegel says, 'It is in thinking that I am free because I am not in another but remain completely with myself.' That's where your freedom lies, Travis. In overcoming the myth of civil institutions such as the master-slave relationship, breaking the bonds our civil conditions have placed us in, and being free to pursue higher truth through reason."

  Travis sat silently and pulled his pipe and tobacco from what he called his possible sack. He tamped the tobacco into the bowl, rose, and walked across the deck toward the gangplank, his moccasined feet silent on the wood. The somber trees seemed to watch Richard, an unforgiving presence. An owl hooted in the forest, and he could hear the distant lowing of cattle from a farm hidden somewhere back from the river.

  Richard picked up his plate, satisfied with his translation of Hegel's complex ideas into something the hunter could understand.

  Hartman returned, having found an ember to light his pipe. He puffed contentedly and settled cross-legged on the deck.

  "Well?" Richard asked as he chewed.

  Hartman finally looked at him pensively. "Maybe so, Dick. Reckon though ye better sit back and wonder about this hyar. Seems ter me that's there's a hitch in all that. This coon sees two kinds of freedom. Thar be the ability ter use yer noodle fer thinking, and thar be the ability ter pull yer traps and head whar ye will. Reckon a man can't be free lessen he can do both. Them thar Boston folks can't just up and skeedaddle fer the timber if'n they get the urge. Reckon they can think all they wants, though. See whar me stick floats?"

  "It's your mind that is important, Travis. Your mind is your ultimate freedom."

  "So's a good smoke, warm blankets, and a hunk of buffalo haunch roasting in the coals while all the stars are twinkling overhead."

  "But that's only catering to the animal instincts. You must rise above a base state of nature. That's what civilization has attempted so poorly to do. You must free your mind, and the only way is through reason."

  Hartman exhaled a blue cloud and removed the pipe stem from his mouth. "Yer still seeing one side of the beaver hide, Dick. It ain't the whole beaver. Yer claiming that to be whole, you can only be a half. Ain't nobody, not even yer mister Haggle—"

  "That's Hegel. Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel."

  "All right, all them fellers, too. They can't jist think their way through life. It's like walking on one leg. A feller can only hobble."

  "You're missing the point."

  "Do say?"

  "Or you're purposely being thick-headed."

  "Tell me, Dick. Did ye ever see a bear what'd been raised in a cage?"

  "I did, once. A bit barbaric."

  "Do ye reckon that thar bear be free to think anything he'd want ter, huh?"

  "Bears don't think."

  "Painter crap! Bears think as good as the next critter. So ye don't know shit about bears. Wal, that don't matter, let's just agree he can think, all right?"

  "All right."

  "So, yer bear's been raised in that cage. He can roll back on his arse and think from Hell to breakfast. Still, he'd not know the first thing about what it be ter be a bear, now would he?"

  "Men and bears are different, Travis." Richard sighed. "It isn't the same thing. Men have different needs than bears. We have the ability to transcend earthly needs. We have spirits and souls. We are not base."

  Travis gave him a level stare. "Reckon ye been in a cage too long yerseff, Dick. Be best if n ye took that noodle yer so proud of and did ye some more thinking." Travis stood up, nodded politely, and walked off.

  "Damned old fool," Richard muttered. "He has no idea what I was trying to teach him."

  Packrat had never felt so utterly miserable. The woman's blood had stained his very soul. At night, his dreams were tormented; horrible images of Heals Like A Willow capered through them. The eye of his soul saw her consorting with mole, weasel, and owl—all evil spirit helpers. Packrat had taken to sleeping with his blanket covering his face lest Willow shoot a witch pellet into his mouth.

  By day, he couldn't shake the jittery sense of impending doom. Any confidence he'd had in himself had evaporated like cool spring rain from sun-warmed ground. Even now, he checked himself for pains, for sores, for any indication that his health was failing.

  They'd passed the sand hills, always following the north shore of the river. These were familiar hunting grounds. He had ridden here as a boy, full of dreams. Now, returning on what should have been his first great triumph as a man, Packrat felt as empty as the grassy plains that spread around them.

  He shot a nervous glance at his captive. She rode her mare with a particular grace, head high, back straight. How could she look so calm and proud when disaster lurked everywhere? His gaze darted at the sky and then around at the hillsides, expecting Sioux raiders to top each hill. His horse shied at nothing. Packrat mumbled his prayers, hoping that some spirit beast wasn't lurking nearby to steal his soul.

  I ought to kill her, find myself some peace.

  But if he did, he'd be haunted by her ghostly face, grinning at him in triumph. After all, she knew about the Death star, and Wolf, and the other powers sacred to the Pawnee. Wouldn't she come back in death to haunt him?

  At no time did he allow her out of his sight. Once, encamped, he'd stripped her, searching through her clothing.

  "What are you doing?" she finally signed.

  In Pawnee, he'd told her, "Searching for an owl claw, mole skin, weasel hide, or sole skin from a corpse's foot. That, or anything else you could witch me with."

  She'd studied him with those penetrating dark eyes and signed, "Why don't you let me go?"

  "You would win," he had told her.

  Packrat looked out over the rolling plain. The river ran just to their south, its course marked by the thick band of cottonwoods that had begun to bud out in a green haze. Piled white clouds built against the blue vault of the sky to the north. The grass had greened; some, like the junegrass and bluegrass, was already heading out Wildflowers dotted the earth in white, yellow, and blue.

  Spring, the time of renewal. The stars known as the Swimming Ducks had appeared in the night sky to rouse the animals and inform the Pawnee that ceremonies were due. Thunder had awakened in the sky. Careful hands would have prepared the Evening Star Bundle by now. The ground-breaking, the Pawnee planting ceremony, would have just passed, the fields tilled and corn planted.

  And here I am, far away, riding with a Snake woman who may be a witch.

  If nothing else, the long days and hard travel should have worn her down. Where did she get the stamina to maintain that poise? His gaze strayed to her muscular brown legs, and followed the rounded curves of her calves, up along those sleek thighs until they disappeared under the leather of her dress. How slim-waisted she was, lithe and supple. The fringes on her dress swayed with the horse's gait, accenting the full swell of her hips. At the same time, her hair, washed glossy the night before with yucca root, gleamed with blue tints in the sunlight.

  How he longed to run his hands over her smooth skin, cradle her soft breasts in his hands and...

  Fool! That's how she polluted you in the first place! "I can't believe myself. Here I am, dreaming
about a witch!"

  She turned at his voice, raising one of those perfect eyebrows into a questioning arch.

  "Nothing," he growled. "I'm just wishing I'd never captured you." With his hands he signaled, "Turn around. Ride."

  "You do not seem happy."

  "Why should I be?" he signed. "You have ruined me."

  Her quick hands replied, "Do not take women captive. And if you do, don't lie with them."

  He listened to the trill of a meadowlark and signed: "What do Shoshoni men do with women they take?"

  'They lie with them. That doesn't mean a woman likes it."

  "You're a captive. Not even a real person."

  "Only Pawnee are real persons?"

  Packrat snorted derisively. "Everyone knows that."

  "And the Sioux?"

  "Worse than animals! Homeless raiders, too lazy to work for what they can steal. One day, the Pawnee will kill them all for the vermin they are."

  She laughed. Her fingers signed: "People are the same everywhere. If you were raised Sioux, you would say the same thing about Pawnee."

  Raised a Sioux! By the light of Evening Star, what a ludicrous idea! "Sioux can't even speak in a human tongue!"

  "And you can?"

  In Pawnee, he told her, "Yes, I can. Only Pawnee speak like real people."

  Her smile was flirtatious. "Good. Me human," she told him in passable Pawnee.

  Packrat's mouth had fallen open and he closed it foolishly. "Where did you learn Pawnee?"

  "I listen. Have some words. You teach." She tilted her head innocently. "Keep talk to me. Signs help me learn. You say Pawnee-talk make real person. In you rules, me real person."

  "You'll be Snake—and not a real person—until the day you die, witch."

  "No understand all your talk."

  "Good. I'm going to keep it that way!" He shook his head. Of course she would learn to speak. Captives usually did, if they lived long enough. "And I'd better stick to making signs."

  To his irritation, she'd heard that.

  Preoccupied with this new problem, he was slow to notice the riders, no more than two black dots in the distance. Heat waves shimmered off the spring grass, but even that far away, Packrat could tell the difference between men on horseback and buffalo.