Sacajawea

by Anna Lee Waldo

  “Tell them, femme. Tell them about the land of your birth. She is one big shining montagne, oui?”

  “No, many mountains, with cool green valleys in summer, and tall pines that sing in the wind.”

  “Merci beaucoup,” said Charbonneau, wiping his brow with his red kerchief and telling the captains in his halting English-trader patois what his woman had just said in Minnetaree.

  She went on, “In winter the People move to warmer valleys in the south, but the food is scarce and enemy raiders are thick. We lose many horses.”

  “Could you find your way back?”

  “Back?” Back to the People? She was sure she could find them if no enemy interfered, but it would be many days from here and there were raiding parties along the trail and it was winter now—she had told Sun Woman it was a foolish time for travel. The people had not come to find her, but she could find them if she had good horses and much food.

  Both captains watched as she spoke, using her slim hands for emphasis. They were sure she remembered her home in the mountains.

  “Do you remember landmarks on the trail? If you say you don’t, I’ll beat you plenty when we get home.”

  She looked at her man and could not answer.

  “Come on. You speak out plenty when Chief Kakoakis is talking. Why you quiet now?”

  Fear ran up her spine, and she put her hands over her face to hide her nose. He had heard, after all!

  In fact, Otter Woman had told Charbonneau. But Charbonneau had thought it rather amusing that his woman had been bold enough to speak out once again against that chief. Now Charbonneau let out an explosive sigh. “Tell about the signs on the trail! Can you remember?”

  “My nose can stay?” she asked softly.

  “Oui! You think I want a woman with an ugly face? Not Charbonneau!”

  “Ai,” she sighed, looking at Otter Woman, who was half-asleep against the wall. She looked at the captains, who had not understood. Then she said, “Much poison three-leaf creeper. I was a small child. I can remember only little. A beaver-head stone and three forks in the river. Those are on the land of the People. You will not punish me?”

  “She remembers! She remembers many landmarks,” Charbonneau translated. “There is a large rock shaped like a beaver; and the river goes three ways at one place. And the poison ivy everywhere.” Charbonneau folded his hands across his stomach and grinned at the captain. “She has a quick memory, which I, Charbonneau, have trained. My other squaw, she is also Shoshoni. Her papoose, my son, named for me, he is almost ready to talk many ways. I teach him myself.”

  Captain Lewis then asked to talk with Otter Woman, and Charbonneau sent Sacajawea to fetch the horses. She was reluctant to leave, but dared not disobey.

  When she returned and they were preparing to leave, Sacajawea took Otter Woman’s hand and asked what she had told the men. Sacajawea spoke in the soft, deep tones of their native tongue. Otter Woman stared, wondering at this outburst of long-pent-up Shoshoni words. Sacajawea did not often speak their native tongue, despite the promise to herself to do so. This questioning had aroused a great longing in her. “I told them the Shoshoni had many horses, but if the winter is bad, there will be few horses by spring, but at least the People had meat,” said Sacajawea.

  Otter Woman said, “Chief Red Hair asked if my people went through the mountains by canoe or on horse. I said no canoes could go through the mountains. Imagine a squaw telling a grown man canoes do not travel on mountains.” Sacajawea put her hand over her mouth and laughed with Otter Woman. “They asked if the Shoshoni would trade for horses. So I said for food and guns, ai.”

  “Speak Minnetaree,” scolded Charbonneau. “Keep that Shoshoni gibberish for when you reach that montagne land of yours.”

  For an instant Sacajawea looked at Charbonneau. His words sank deep within her: when you reach that montagne land of yours. Did that mean he was going to take her and Otter Woman there someday?

  Captain Clark had one more question. He wanted to know if the Shoshonis had ever seen white men before. Otter Woman shook her head; she did not know. Truthfully, she could not remember her own people.

  Sacajawea said to Charbonneau in the Minnetaree he understood, “No, not in the villages, but the People have gone south to the Spanish trying to trade for their firesticks. The Spanish would not let the Shoshonis trade for these shooting sticks, but pointed them at the men who asked for them. The men came back tired and disappointed, for they could not hunt as well with their spears and bows and arrows. I was young, but I remember the talk about those men. They were called ‘senor,’” she said, to the amazement of all.5

  In the days that followed the visit to the white men, Sacajawea worked at jobs that demanded all her attention and engaged even the deep parts of her mind, so that she forgot to think of those words her man had spoken: when you reach that montagne land of yours. She would sometimes forget her reason for being a good worker and lose herself in the satisfaction of her work, saying silently, “It is going well.” It was that way when she was making bead designs on moccasins and, caught up in the humming of Corn Woman, hummed one of the Mandan songs with her. Suddenly she saw herself clearly, and a feeling of guilt flooded over her. How could she have forgotten? She felt that she had been unfaithful to those who had loved her so many winters ago, those who lived in some snug little valley, with little food in the winter. She had asked Otter Woman what she thought of the words of their man, and she had replied, “Nothing. The words were said to make us speak in the language of this village. We are fed here, and we have good clothing. I do not wish to leave now. I do not remember any of my people, and I am forgetting the Blackfeet captors I served. This is the life for me. I have a strong, healthy child; why should I want to go away to some poor, thin nation that I do not even know?”

  A bold pounding came from the outside of the slab door. Corn Woman went to see what it meant. She screamed and ran back into the lodge, clutching at Sacajawea, who was rubbing bear’s oil on Charbonneau’s winter moccasins.

  The women looked toward the door. Bending his huge body almost double was Ben York, and he was calling Charbonneau’s name. “Monsieur Charbonneau, is you here?”

  “Devil, Okeeheede!” screeched Corn Woman, looking at the jolly obsidian giant.

  “I’se only York, the manservant of Captain Clark, ma’am. I’se come to ask Monsieur Charbonneau to come with me to see the captains.”

  Otter Woman and Sacajawea were speechless.

  Sacajawea reached for Otter Woman’s hand and started slowly toward the huge black man. York smiled down at them, his teeth flashing in the firelight. “I don’t bite,” he said.

  Sacajawea could not understand his words, but she looked at his face and could not help smiling. He held out his hand. She did not know what to do with the proffered hand. She touched his fingers shyly and said, to hide her confusion, “Would you like to rest and eat some stew?” She indicated the bubbling pot.

  “Hey there,” called Charbonneau, coming into the lodge, “she’s mine! I won her in a fair game of hands.”

  “Monsieur Charbonneau, I scarcely understand her palavering. I think she is the one called Sacajawea, though. Captain Clark, he say I would know because her eyes shine. And the other, with longer braids, that is Otter. Captain Clark did not say you have three women—you’re quite a rascal, living out here among the Indians.” York grinned broadly.

  Charbonneau shrugged.

  “Captains are waiting,” said York, pointing to the doorway. “They will talk to you about interpreting.” Then both men left.

  “Oooooo!” cried Corn Woman. “He is big and strong.”

  “Something different,” said Sacajawea. “Something good.”

  “Didn’t you see how the palm of his hand was white,” asked Corn Woman, still shaking, “and how red his tongue was? And the whites of his eyes, and his teeth—like yampa flour. Great medicine.”

  Little Tess cooed, and the women crowded around him, each wondering if he
had seen the big black man. “That is something you can tell your children about,” said Otter Woman.

  “He’ll forget,” laughed Sacajawea. “He is too young to remember the importance.”

  “I’ll keep telling him,” said Otter Woman.

  “Why did he want our man?” asked Corn Woman suspiciously.

  They were still chattering when Charbonneau returned. “By gar, I’m to be interpreter for them this winter, same as Jussome. I find why they come to this river country, by dang!”

  CHAPTER

  12

  Birth of Jean Baptiste Charbonneau

  February 11th

  We sent down a party with sleds, to relieve the horses from their loads; the weather fair and cold, with a N.W. wind. About five o’clock one of the wives of Chaboneau was delivered of a boy; this being her first child she was suffering considerably, when Mr. Jessaume told Captain Lewis that he had frequently administered to persons in her situation a small dose of the rattle of the rattlesnake, which had never failed to hasten the delivery. Having some of the rattle, Captain Lewis gave it to Mr. Jessaume, who crumbled two of the rings of it between his fingers, and mixing it with a small quantity of water gave it to her. What effect it may really have had it might be difficult to determine, but Captain Lewis was informed that she had not taken it more than ten minutes before the delivery took place.

  ELLIOTT COUES, ed., The History of the Lewis and Clark Expedition, Vol. I. New York: Dover Publications, 1965, p. 232.

  Sacajawea straightened slowly and pressed her two hands to her back to ease the ache. “Little Tess, stay close. Do not wet your moccasins.” She sighed while she looked enviously after the papoose’s mother, Otter Woman. Otter Woman was slim and agile. She trotted upriver to find a quiet place where she could break the ice and dip her stained tunic in and out of the water. Other squaws were washing skin tunics in the icy water. Sacajawea dipped a huge clay pot into the clearest water she could find. She knew that if the water were warmed the grime and grease would come out more easily. She longed for the slippery yellow soaproot that her mother had used to make a milky, frothed water that left skins clean and soft.

  Washing was a chore in the winter, when water had to be warmed in the lodge. For Sacajawea, washing was even more of a chore now—her arms did not have the strength for wringing that they used to have, and her breathing was not deep and satisfying, but shallow, coming in little gulps as the air pushed against her distended diaphragm. She could not bend easily, and her legs tired quickly. She cupped her free hand over her swollen belly as a small foot pushed against the womb’s confining wall. Then her hand dropped to catch Little Tess’s chubby fingers. With the thick wire handle of the water pot adjusted in her other hand, they walked slowly to the lodge.

  Her thoughts hovered over the morning’s activities. Charbonneau had surprised them. Unexpectedly he had said, “This day we move to the pale eyes’ camp. How you like that? The white chiefs, they want Charbonneau close to where he work.”

  “Move? In winter?” asked Otter Woman. “Our man has strange orders.”

  Charbonneau had threatened her with a stick of firewood over her backside if she did not hurry with his stewed meat and flour-and-water cakes. He had pushed her and had held a glowing stick near her feet to get them moving faster.

  Now our tunics will be clean when we move to the village of the pale eyes, Sacajawea thought. And we will be able to see that huge black man, who looks burned, more often. She smiled to herself.

  Coming to the mud lodge, Sacajawea hurried and pulled Little Tess after her. “Aiee!” called Corn Woman, who was still sitting in the sun, not moving a muscle, “you drag along that big papoose outside and a big papoose inside.” She chuckled to herself. “Pale eyes will not look two times.” She then stirred enough to point a broken, dirty fingernail toward the river. “Where is Otter Woman?”

  “She is coming. I took this jackrabbit home with me because when she turned her back to peg her tunic down to dry, he stepped into the water. Otter Woman cannot watch him all the time.”

  “Heee—when I was a papoose no one thought about me walking into the river. They deliberately pushed me, and I learned to swim. We learned to take care of ourselves in those days. This boy will have soft white muscles, like flour dough. Pagh! What kind of men will women make these days? Soft like dead fish, lazy as fat cats, pale as dusty bones—that is not men, that is shadow.”

  “Chit, chit,” answered Sacajawea. “Gather your belongings, and while the water is heating I will gather those of our man so that we can move this day.” Sacajawea pushed the lodge door open and nudged Little Tess ahead into the dark passageway. There was much work to be done.

  Sacajawea was pleased that they were moving to the fort, except that they would pitch their tent next to Jussome’s. She did not like the idea of being so close to Broken Tooth, who did not wish to be referred to as Broken Tooth anymore, but by her newest name, Madame Jussome. Otter Woman had told her this, and Sacajawea had asked what it meant. Charbonneau had explained that it was correct French for Jussome to refer to his woman as madame.

  Now Corn Woman asked, “Could you call me Madame Charbonneau?”

  Charbonneau threw back his head and exposed his yellow teeth, laughing uproariously. “Magnifique! My own mère, she was called that. Yi! She hated it. She preferred her own name, Tchandee, Tobacco. That was a fine Sioux femme. She left my papa when he called her Madame Charbonneau once too often. Femme! Mon dieu! Who knows what la jeune fille wants?”

  Charbonneau then became more serious. “Baptiste LePage, my old trapper, is back with many beaver pelts—fat, sleek ones. He has sold the pelts to the pale eyes and has joined up with them for the long journey we take in the spring.”

  Sacajawea lifted the robes from Charbonneau’s sleeping couch and folded them in a pile by the door. “Good, we like LePage,” she said. The trapper had visited with them in the early fall.

  “Ai, there will be someone we can recognize. The men in the fort all look alike to me,” said Corn Woman, grunting and puffing as she carried clay cooking pots to the door. “Except the one that was painted by the night wind.” They all laughed, thinking of Ben York.

  By that afternoon, they had moved into the fort, and with the help of the tall, skinny youth, Shannon, Sacajawea and Otter Woman had pitched their leather tepee beside Jussome’s.

  All the men of the Corps of Discovery liked George Shannon, even though he was not well versed in woodcraft—several times on the upriver trip he had got lost while hunting. But he was eager, whistling and scampering with Captain Lewis’s big black Newfoundland dog, and he took his teasing well. Charbonneau had explained to the boy that his squaws would take care of everything—that was the reason for having many femmes, after all. But this puny pale eye had actually done squaw’s work and hauled in the rolls of hide and clay pots. The women had giggled as their man made signs with the boy. No man, however young, would do a squaw’s work. Still, while Sacajawea giggled, she was glad of the help, and Shannon and Otter Woman had taken an immediate liking to one other. By the end of the afternoon, they were exchanging Minnetaree and English words.

  The first hard blizzard of the winter hit. The temperature fell below zero. From the vantage point of the tepee, Sacajawea could see the white men leaning into the blasts of driving snow as they crossed the frozen stream just outside the fort and returned to stack the logs they had dragged in from the woods. They seemed to take no account of the weather; besides, the snow on the ground eased the task of dragging the logs for firewood.

  That first blizzard was succeeded by another and, after a week of intermittent heavy snow, by a third. When the last one ceased to howl, it left in its wake the stillness of intense cold. The timbers of the building groaned, and limbs snapped from the trees. The snow creaked underfoot. Encircled by their newly finished stockade and assured by the existence of the storeroom of an ample food supply until spring, the men settled by their firesides for a pleasant respite until i
t was time for the guards to change at the gate and in the tower.

  “Whilst there’s snow on the ground, we got no call to fret about Injuns. They never like to hunt for trouble nowhere’s that’s way off from where they belong, account ye cain’t go nowheres in the snow without yer leavin’ tracks.” Young Shannon was repeating the facts of wilderness winter life he had learned from Otter Woman to Captain Clark. “It goes agin’ the grain with an Injun if’n other folks see where he’s been. Injuns ain’t a-goin’ to bother us none till the snow goes off in the spring.”

  “I hope I can count on that,” said Clark, puffing on his pipe.

  Nevertheless, the captains insisted on the regular guard.

  Dark days followed, the noons as dim as twilight. Having banished the sun and the stars, the leaden overcast seemed to have obscured the distinction between minutes and hours and days. Each day centered about the morning and evening meals. The men went hunting in groups of two or three. Charbonneau, Jussome, and the two Fields brothers, Reuben and Joseph, who were excellent woodsmen, went out early one morning and returned with an enormous bull moose. A neck shot from Reuben had dropped him.

  The Indians soon discovered that in addition to food and trinkets, the white men had strong medicine, and the Mandans began bringing their sick to the fort. The captains found themselves thawing frozen feet, amputating frozen toes, and treating pleurisy. They knew that those who were relieved of pain would know the Americans meant to help them. It was good for the women of Charbonneau’s lodge, also, for seeing friends made them feel less isolated.

  One crisp, cold morning Sacajawea awoke to a volley of rifles and a loud salute from the swivel gun. Charbonneau was already awake, trying to rouse Corn Woman to add wood to the fire and boil water for his tea. Corn Woman scratched her head and tucked a few of the hair wisps beneath her felt hat before she inspected the fire.