Sacajawea

by Anna Lee Waldo

  As it grew dark, Catches Two came from the prairie, where he had played games with some other braves. They had ridden their horses as fast as they could, passing a stick among them. The rider finishing at the designated stopping place with the stick in his hand was left out of the game next time.

  “I’m hungry as a bear in early spring,” he said.

  “No food,” announced Talking Goose with a hiss and a dark look toward Sacajawea.

  “You lazy squaw. There is plenty of food. Take the winter squash from storage. It is time to use it before it spoils.” Catches Two looked from one face to another. The women stared back, their faces blank. “Didn’t any of you do anything today?” Again he looked at the women.

  “She took a bath,” said Talking Goose, pointing to Sacajawea.

  “A bath!” He jerked Sacajawea toward him. “And a new dress! You get the squash and boil it fast,” he snapped.

  Sacajawea looked about frantically. She did not know where the squash was stored.

  “She went for a bath, also,” said Old Mother, pointing a sharp, ragged fingernail at Antelope. Her mouth bunched. “She knows the grease keeps her warm, but she scrubbed it off today. And she gave a name to ourslave girl. She is now to be called Sacajawea.” Her voice became high-pitched and singsong. “Soon she’ll think she is too good even to fetch water. Her head will be in the clouds with her namesakes, the birds.” Then, quickly, she turned to Catches Two. “And you—you played games. You did not go after meat.” She began to scold everyone.

  Catches Two flushed and swung about, letting go of Sacajawea. He snorted, “I am waiting now to be fed.” He sat himself cross-legged by the fire. “If you take much longer, the squash will sprout mold!”

  A shift of wind gusting down the smoke hole blew up the ashes and made the fire in the pit smoke. Old Mother scolded the wind for its bad manners, scolded the fire for waywardness, made the fire tidy, set the pot of water more firmly, and went back calmly to measuring bits of hide for moccasins for Little Rabbit.

  “You are expected to get the squash and prepare it,” whispered Antelope, her chin indicating the boiling pot.

  “But I do not know where.” Sacajawea felt the old fear coming to her throat, making it squeezed up and tight. “Where do I find squash?” Her voice squeaked.

  Talking Goose turned her back on Sacajawea to show her displeasure, and squatted, her well-padded backside spread on her heels.

  Antelope led Sacajawea to the far side of the lodge next to the sleeping compartment of Old Mother. She pulled off large hunks of packed dirt and river sand. Underneath were poles and hides over a hollow space that had skins around the sides. Antelope pushed the poles aside so that anyone as skinny as Sacajawea could squeeze through. Into the darkness she went and blinked to accustom her eyes to the lack of light. Soon she saw the huge rounded squash stacked neatly on the ground of this cache. She pulled out two and, climbing out, felt their smooth, firm sides. They were orange as the summer sun. Sacajawea replaced the poles and skins, and Antelope helped push the dirt and sand in place. Talking Goose clucked. She gave Sacajawea a kick just as she bent to get the squash off the floor. This sent the child flying, and the squash broke. Again, Talking Goose scolded.

  The broken squash was slippery and hard to handle.

  Sacajawea wiped the dirt-soiled pieces on the edge of her skirt, smearing her new dress, and put the squash in the pot.

  “You don’t put the seeds in the cooking pot, you dumb Bird,” snorted Catches Two. “Save those to plant. Dry them in the sun.”

  Sacajawea reached into the iron cooking kettle to fish out the seeds. She cried out that the water was too hot and burned her fingers.

  Little Rabbit began dancing around the cooking pot singing, “Bird Woman, Bird Woman, Bird Woman, Bird, Bird, Bird, Sacajawea.”

  Catches Two looked up at Sacajawea, who was now seven or eight years older than the toddler, Little Rabbit, and laughed, his strong blunted teeth white against the dark of his face. “The clumsy girl burns her fingers,” he said. “You are careless. You are nearly a woman; you should act more like one.”

  “At, it is hard to please so many,” whispered Sacajawea.

  Antelope brought a horn dipper and a leather pouch. “Put the rest of the seeds here. Dried, they are good to eat. Save some for planting, and some for eating.”

  Old Grandfather snored, and Old Mother reached over his head for the buffalo paunch. One eye of Old Grandfather opened, and he whacked Old Mother and laughed. She thrust his hand away and laughed with him, shoving the paunch into Sacajawea’s hands. “More water for the cooking pot.”

  First Sacajawea stirred the boiling squash with the dipper, then she started for the water hole. Old Grandfather grinned as she walked past him and shot his foot out, bowling her over. She crawled up and scrambled for the paunch. Old Grandfather pinned her arms back. Catches Two let out a long, wild “Yeeeeiiii, kiyi.” Talking Goose mumbled something, and Antelope slunk off to her sleeping couch, not daring to interfere with the men as they continued to tease Sacajawea. After all, it was up to any slave girl to do the master’s bidding.

  Old Grandfather heaved chestily and crawled over Sacajawea. She felt her hands sweat and her throat go dry. He pulled down his breechclout. Her scream of horrified disbelief attracted attention, which turned atonce into a general roar of laughter. The next minute Catches Two imitated Old Grandfather and pulled down his breechclout and tumbled Sacajawea over in his robes, wanting her intensely, suddenly. Old Grandfather pushed him to the floor. Sacajawea whacked the old man’s chest, pummeling him angrily but again he caught her hands and held her helpless. Her back and legs hurt; her hands felt squeezed between two stones. Old Grandfather was heavy against her, and he pushed the wind from her lungs. Her thighs ached, and a searing pain went to the pit of her stomach. Then, feeling the blood warmth in his old bones, Old Grandfather shoved her away and stood, arranging his clout. Catches Two heaved himself on her. Her breath came in gasps, and she felt his hot, piercing fire, the pain spreading through her buttocks. In another instant she was certain her breath would be gone; then, suddenly, her breath came back in small gasps and a great spasm shook the body of Catches Two.

  Talking Goose began to laugh hysterically. It was a sight to see these grown men entertained on such a skinny little girl. Sacajawea was resigned to the certainty that she herself would not live through the night. Catches Two snatched a stick from the fire and began to run about the room, waving the blazing end and crying “Kiyil” Old Grandfather at once took it away from him and threw it back in the fire. Sacajawea inched her legs up and pushed down her skirt. Her legs moved, she turned on her side, and slowly, on hands and knees, she crawled to her couch while the others smacked their lips over a meal of soft, boiled squash.

  There crept over Sacajawea a colder apprehension than she had felt when she had taken it for granted that she was soon to die. The threat that now appeared was more real because it was more familiar.

  The Shoshonis did not practice incest—not because they understood the genetic principles of the inheritance of recessive defects, but because it prevented alliances gained through marrying-out. There was no advantage in marrying a granddaughter, since a man would be marrying into a kin group with whom, because of his previous marriage to the grandmother, he already maintained good relations. If a man married his ownsister, he gave up all possibility of obtaining aid in the form of brothers-in-law. But if he married some other man’s sister, and yet another man married his own sister, he then gained two brothers-in-law to hunt with or to avenge his death in a quarrel. The Shoshonis looked upon incest as something more threatening than repulsive. Incest established no new bonds between unrelated groups; it was an absurd denial of every man’s right to increase the number of people whom he could trust. Marriages in the Shoshoni society were alliances between families rather than romantic arrangements between individuals. The alliances between families were maintained during the very long periods in which the fami
lies never saw each other. Each family spent approximately 90 percent of its time isolated from other families as it wandered about in small groups or tribes in quest of food. Yet when families or tribes did meet, marriage alliances served to make interfamily relations less haphazard, for kin cooperated with kin whenever possible.

  The Minnetarees did not have an aversion to incest. They were not a people that had to range for food, and their camp was permanent, which gave them much security. Incest did not appear to have caused them any deleterious effects from inbreeding. Their people were strong, healthy, and intelligent, and they had survived many generations of sexual contact between mother and son, father and daughter, brother and sister.

  Sacajawea could not remember a time when she had wanted a man, although she had heard other girls speak of the desire. But this attack of Old Grandfather and Catches Two was an abomination—she had not been ready, she had not thought of it, and it was as a punishment, a vile hurt. They would come again and again merely because she was not to be considered—she was a slave among these people, and her feelings were of no importance.

  By the time the lodge fire was dead, the hurt in her loins had quieted to a dull throb. Sacajawea eased herself from the couch and hunted for the buffalo paunch Old Mother had shoved into her hands as she ordered, “More water for the cooking pot.” She found the paunch and crept outside. Her whole body felt bruised.

  An animal about the size of a wolf or large coyote skulked in the brush. Sacajawea hurried past the slinking animal, swinging her water paunch. The crackling brush became quiet. She heard a whine or whimper, then the animal was in front of her on the trail. She stopped. It looked like one of the camp dogs, but Sacajawea instinctively knew it was not used to human contact. It cautiously sniffed the ground. She could not move, her thoughts came in slow motion. She saw its eyes—deep amber in the moonlight. Its coat was a grizzled yellow to buff. The tail was dark-tipped.3

  The paunch slipped from her stiff fingers and rolled on the ground. The dog slowly pounced on it and growled deep down in its throat as it gnawed the rawhide wrapped around the water container’s neck. Then its head lifted and its ears twitched nervously. One ear looked as though something had chewed it. There were pinkish patches of bare skin on one shoulder. The dog barked, leaving the paunch, and stood in the center of the dusty trail, moving its head as though catching a sound or smell.

  Sacajawea forced herself consciously to breath. She moved her eyes to the side of the trail, looking for a stick or stone to throw at the troublesome wild dog. “Go, Dog!” she whispered.

  She breathed deeper and caught the rancid, rank odor of bear. The dog again growled—a low, vibrating rumble. The woods crackled with snapping twigs. With the gracefulness of a huge boulder rolling down a mountainside, a young bear with massive, humped shoulders bolted down the trail in front of them, crashed into the other side of the woods, and sniffed. The sniffing was as noisy as a glacial waterfall whooshing down a long rock embankment. There was a scraping on bark and both Sacajawea’s and the dog’s eyes widened as the bear stood on its hind legs and raked long, straight, yellow claws two or three times down a fir tree that was black in the waning moonlight. The bear dropped on all fours and loudly sucked something from the chunks of bark. With ease, two golden, half-grown cubs charged through the brush to join their mother in eating the insect delicacy in the peeled bark. In another moment the femaleand cubs moved away with a light gallop, cracking and popping dead twigs and branches underfoot.

  The wild dog began to bark furiously, like a warrior kiyi-ing to unnerve an enemy. Then it stopped, sniffed the ground and the fallen water paunch, lifted its leg, and trotted quietly off in the opposite direction from the grizzlies. It never looked back.

  Coming to her senses, Sacajawea realized the wild dog had saved her from a deadly mauling. She had been between the female and her cubs, and if that grizzly had moved downwind she would have smelled more than insects in a rotting tree. The wild dog kept Sacajawea from moving. She was grateful. She had a secret helper, a friend. The thought pleased her.

  She returned to the creek, filled the paunch, and sloshed cold water over her naked loins to numb the ache. The coldness made her shiver. She noticed blood on the inside of her legs and washed it off.

  Refilling the paunch, she took it to the lodge and poured the cold water into the stew pot. She had no appetite for the leftover squash. She blew on the fire and started it crackling, then eased herself back into her robes, exhausted, but waiting for the morning light to come. During these last several weeks she had become an intense and stoic adult, at the precocious age of only ten or eleven summers.

  That summer, Sacajawea was given a rake made from reeds curved at the end, separated from each other by interlaced rods, and with the handle bound with leather thongs. Antelope taught her to use a hoe made of the deer’s shoulder blade. She learned what “garden” meant. Catches Two had an acre plot of corn, beans, and squash that his women cultivated. Also on the plot the kinnikinnick was allowed to grow wild. This was the sacred tobacco used in the pipes of men, and women were not allowed to touch it.

  The plot of each lodge was separated from the others by brush and rocks and pole fences. At times Sacajawea was able to talk with Moon Woman, Pine Woman, and Fish Woman, who worked for those who needed them. They were still public slaves. Seldom did they see Water Woman, except at the women’s bathing place. Water

  Woman seemed happy enough, and her boys were plump and laughing. Moon Woman never said a lot, but Fish Woman and Pine Woman complained about the large lodge they had to keep clean and the hard work they had to do each day.

  Other women who had been captured also worked as slaves for their families in the fields. Besides the Shoshonis, there were Blackfeet, Crows, and Utes. Each Hidatsa family had from half to one and a half acres to cultivate.

  Sacajawea watched the corn grow from the first two slender blades. The stalks seldom exceeded two or three feet in height, and two ears formed near the surface of the ground. The grain was small and hard, and Antelope told her it was covered with a thicker shell than the corn raised in warmer climates. They would harvest about twenty bushels from the acre. When it was still green, a portion would be pulled, slightly boiled, then dried, shelled, and laid by in the cellar beneath the lodge floor. The Hidatsas called this sweet corn. It could be preserved indefinitely, and if boiled with a little water, it did not taste much different from that taken from the stalk.

  The squashes grew on large, strong vines. The Hidatsas either boiled these, ate them when green, or sliced and dried them for winter use. The unbroken squash could be kept in the cold for several months before molding. If dried, they were strung and became very hard—these required an age to cook and were not Sacajawea’s favorite dish.

  Sacajawea thought it strange that these people had to plant seeds in the spring, tend them through the hot summer, and at last harvest the crops. She thought of the many plants that grew wild whose roots had been food for her people. Her people did not plant and tend, they simply harvested. They harvested what nature planted and tended for them. They dug roots and picked berries. But they did not think of planting seeds or caring for the growing plants. Why should they go to all that trouble when so much grew wild, thought Sacajawea. Yet these people had food for the winter and her people never had enough.

  Sacajawea hated the back-breaking slavery of gardening. The eternal, brain-numbing monotony made her draw farther into herself for some time. She crawled out of bed at dawn to water the horses, hoe the interminable rows of corn and beans, grub up alders and roots for a fresh field, transport rocks from the fields to the long gray walls around them, pull the sunflowers from the squash patches, rub bear’s grease on the tethers of the horses so they would be soft, strong, and pliable, and perform all the chores women were expected to do, or be punished by the elder wife of her owner, Catches Two.

  She hated to sit down to her meals, drenched with sweat, too tired to say anything except “More
soup.” She hated the waves of weariness that swept over her each night. As soon as she had served the men their stew and the women had eaten, she was glad to stumble into her sleeping couch. She hated the nights that Old Grandfather grunted and groaned on top of her, or Catches Two spread her legs and lay between them, playing with her small breast buds, pushing his large erect penis deep within her belly. She endured this and accepted it as something that could be sustained, such as the hot enclosure of the lodge in summer and the leaden slumber that brought surcease from her labors, but no rest.

  Some days she had no time to look at and feel the things around her, although they kindled sparks of curiosity within her all day long—the broad, quiet water of the river, running slowly toward the fast white rapids at the river bend, then moving on—where? She wondered about the round bull boats that the men and boys took fishing; the round, clay-covered lodges with rooftops so strong that people could sit on them in the coolness of the evening; the flat prairie with few trees but much fragrant blue sage, whose pungent odor was a constant reminder of her own mother; the clear blue skies and the shadows of morning, noon, and evening. Soon her child’s brown hands were so callused and her fingers so stiffened that she doubted they would ever again hold a needle for stitching.

  Only one thing made the hatred of this drudgery bearable—the wild dog.

  As Sacajawea hoed the beans at the edge of the fieldone hot afternoon, she became aware that the mangy yellow dog was watching her about fifty man-lengths away. It simply stood there, staring at her. Across the fence, Moon Woman looked up and threw a well-aimed dirt clod, which struck the dog’s side and drove it howling into the willow brake.