She stepped slowly away from the clump of ferns and birches. She was satisfied that her continued love and care would bring her child through the bad sickness to good health. She slept peacefully for several hours.
In the gray, misty dawn, Clark made an onion poultice for the reddened swelling under the child’s ear and gave him a cream of tartar slurry to swallow. Pomp had to be coaxed. He could not swallow comfortably.
The next morning, Clark made a fresh poultice and let the child sleep. Sacajawea stayed close, letting Clark take care of the ailing natives alone or with the sporadic help of York.
“Don’t think me selfish not helping you with the sick natives,” she said once, “but I cannot leave Pomp today.”
“Janey, you must stay with him,” said Clark. “You must tell me if there is any change, either way, better or worse. This child is more important to us than all those Nez Percés with aching backs.”
The child slept, and she sat beside him in a makeshift lean-to of hides and pine branches. She noticed the Nez Percés as they waited their turn to be doctored by Clark.
The men were stout, portly, good-looking, rather like her man, Charbonneau, without his facial hair. They were better dressed than the Chinooks, Clatsops, or Walla Wallas. Their tunics were clean and white, as were their leggings of deerhide. They wore bandeaus of foxskins like turbans on their brows. The women were small, with good features, and they dressed neatly in tight-fitting woven-grass caps and long buckskin skirts, whitened with clay.
Then she watched several small boys carrying a wicker coop with some young eaglets from one lodge toanother. They raised the birds for their tailfeathers. She daydreamed of Pomp dressed in white leather with a vermilion breastplate.
The child whimpered, and she darted quickly to his couch. She rocked him in her arms and sang to him. His feverish eyes opened, sought restlessly for some object, and rested on four black puppies nipping at the heels of two small girls. The girls began to run after Lewis’s big black Newfoundland, Scannon. They were trying to show him the puppies. It dawned on Sacajawea that the puppies were, in fact, Scannon’s offspring. The huge dog stopped and sniffed at the pups. Then he pushed one off its feet, then another and another. He barked for them to get up, and he romped through the camp with the puppies following. And so—he is proud of his children, thought Sacajawea.
Pomp’s eyes shifted and rested on Clark, who had come into the lean-to. “My throat hurts,” he whispered.
“I know,” Clark replied quietly. He looked at the child’s swollen neck. Pomp cried out when his fingers passed over the left side. “Get Charbonneau to hunt more onions.”
Sacajawea laid the child in Clark’s arms and ran to find her man.
“That boy, he is only cutting teeth,” said Charbonneau at first. But seeing how concerned she was, he followed her to the lean-to and looked on as Clark fed Pomp another dose of warm water with cream of tartar. Much of the slurry trickled from the corners of his mouth.
“The neck, she is puffed. My son is ill. Do something now, for he must get well!”
“Well, now, you get some onions,” said Clark, giving the child to his mother. He reluctantly left to help York give out more eyewater and laudanum to the ailing natives.
Charbonneau then turned to face Sacajawea. “Do not give the boy any of those dirty Indian cures, like putting some magic bone on his neck or plastering it with horse dung. I’ll get a beaver castoreum to rub on the redness and cover it with the beaver’s tail. That is the best cure for this poison.”
She shook her head at the old French-Canadian coureur de bois treatment and shook her finger at the onion poultice. “Chief Red Hair’s medicine is best.”
Charbonneau sulked off with a sharp digging stick so that he could easily ply the onions from the dark loam.
The following day, Pomp was no better, but he was no worse. He was too warm and fussed a great deal. Twice Clark applied a fresh onion poultice, and twice he threw out a wad of beaver fur that Charbonneau had slipped in the swath of bandaging that held the poultice.
Sacajawea ate little during mealtimes, but hurried back to see if her child would begin nursing. She held him as though trying to pour a bit of her strength into his weakening, feverish body. Clark managed to get a few drops of water into him several times a day. The child needed fluids badly. Discarding the onion poultices, Clark tried a salve of pine resin, beeswax, pitch, and bear’s oil.
Within a week, the abscess began to ooze. Clark decided not to lance it because he was certain the tissue would scar less if he did not cut it open to drain. He was certain that the child would have a large enough permanent scar from this infected mastoid. As the abscess continued to drain, Clark continued to apply the hot pine resin.
When the abscess stopped oozing, Charbonneau was certain his son would be well. He begged Sacajawea to leave him on the pine couch and help with food preparation for the outfit. Sacajawea would not go. She rocked the child back and forth as he slept. Sometimes he shivered in his sleep. Other times he perspired profusely. She could see his body was no longer plump, and his rosy brown coloring was only a grayish tan.
The day that Pomp eagerly searched for her breast and nursed hungrily, Sacajawea, too, was certain her child would be well. His fever now subsided quickly. Even though he was weak, he smiled and chattered baby talk. Sacajawea took him out in the warm afternoon sunshine to see the doves cooing and the camass flowers covering the prairies like a deep blue lake. She picked yellow glacier lilies growing at the edge of the pine forest, the pink moccasin flower, and the pairedyellow flowers of the honeysuckle. She showed Pomp the delicate petals and stamens. Then she looked eagerly for the tall, dense racemes of beargrass with its slippery, grasslike leaves, a sure sign that the snow had receded from the foothills. Returning to camp, she nuzzled the warm body of her child and thought, I could hold him in my arms forever.
For years he would be her most precious and prized possession. In a country where material goods were few, men found some token or talisman to prize above all other things. It was their innate instinct to have something, no matter how small or insignificant. Often a warrior prized one certain arrow and would give his woman or daughter up before he would loose that prized possession. A man could always take another woman and have another child, but never another arrow with the magical powers of the prized one.
The child meant many things to Sacajawea. He was of her flesh, and he was white, like her beloved Chief Red Hair. He was a symbol of joy and laughter. He had gone with her on this long trail into many strange nations, and his eyes had covered much land, sky, and water. He had endured hardship, and shared in the plenty the men had enjoyed. He could speak words of several languages. And she knew, as a mother knows, he would be great among her people and among the white men.
CHAPTER
31
Retreat
Clark’s Journal:
Tuesday June 17th 1806
our baggage being laid on Scaffolds and well covered, we began our retrograde march at one P.M. haveing remaind. about three hours on this Snowey mountain, we returned by the rout we had advanced to hungary Creek, which we assended about two miles and encamped, we had here more grass for our horses then the proceeding evening, yet it was but scant, the party were a good deel dejected, tho’ not as much so as I had apprehended they would have been, this is the first time since we have been on this tour that we have ever been compelled to retreat or make a retrograde march.
BERNARD DEVOTO, ed.. The Journals of Lewis and Clark. New York: Houghton Mifflin Co., 1953, p. 405.
The expedition moved several miles down Commearp Creek on May 18, then turned north along the Kooskooskee, which was very high and overflowing its banks at many places because of the melting mountain snows. The next day, the expedition forded the river at a wide, shallow spot and swam the horses over, with the baggage tied securely to their backs. York found a circular area about thirty feet in diameter sunk nearly four feet in the ground and surrounded
by a three-and-a-half-foot-high wall of earth.
“That is something very old,” agreed Sacajawea. “It was used for defense against enemy attack. Many men could hide inside behind that earth wall.”
Captain Clark suggested the men erect shelters of sticks and grass facing outward, and within the sunken area erect a shelter from skins and place the baggage there.
The Nez Percés told the group that they could not cross the mountains for three or four weeks at the earliest. “The snow is too deep to walk in, and there is no forage for your horses.” Each day the men looked at the snow-covered Bitterroots and confirmed the Nez Percés’ statements among themselves.
The free time available while waiting for the snow to melt gave the men considerable relaxation. Footraces were run with the Nez Percés, and many dances were held. Baptiste LePage and Charbonneau went to the Nez Percé village to test their skill at trading elk’s teeth and squirrel tails for more camass roots. “Janey will pound those roots dry, and York will make that good, crisp flat bread,” said LePage.
During this time Shannon, Collins, and Potts traded for a Nez Percé canoe, which they used to cross the Kooskooskee to trade in another river village for kouse roots to use as vegetables. One day late in May when they landed on a narrow strip of beach, the canoe swung broadside against some trees and filled with water. Potts had to be pulled out because he could not swim. While pulling him out, Shannon and Collins had to leave a couple of blankets, a capote, and all their trading beadsin the bottom of the canoe so that they could fight the rapids. Shannon told Captain Lewis, “We lost all our goods, sir, but we saved good old Potts.”
When Charbonneau heard the story, he snorted, “Damn careless! Those blankets and things should have been tied in that canoe. They would be wet, but not lost for good.” Then, two days later, LePage and Charbonneau themselves lost a dressed elk skin, packets of vermilion paint, and their packs. They were going to trade for more camass roots, but they had not tied the packs on securely, and as they forded the river, the packs loosened and were lost in midstream.
That afternoon, both Lewis and Clark cut buttons off their threadbare blue Army coats and gave them to Hugh McNeal and Ben York, along with eye-water and pine salve to use in trading across the river. By evening, the two men had returned with three bushels of camass and some flat bread made of kouse-root flour.
That same afternoon, Drouillard came back from a trading mission to report that some Nez Percés had taken a couple of tomahawks that belonged to the expedition. “And one of those we all prized highly, because it belonged to Sergeant Floyd.1 Those God-cursed, thieving savages.”
Captain Clark could see Drouillard was in a temper and tried to calm him down. “Go back to those coots who stole the tomahawks and see if you can trade something to get them back.”
“That whole outfit stinks like polecats in rut! They make my guts boil,” said Drouillard.
“Here are some pink scallop shells Janey found on the beach above Fort Clatsop. They should catch their eye. Try to get the tomahawks back for these.” Clark handed the shells to Drouillard, who seemed to be calming down.
“For Christ’s sake, those men had better trade back those tomahawks. They are offal, but what can one expect from people who are childish and without manners. I’ll get them back. You can count on it!”
“That’s what I want to hear,” said Clark. “I’ll personally return Floyd’s tomahawk to his family when we get back to the States.”
I ought to put their heads on spikes, thought Droui-llard.. He did not say his thoughts aloud, though, because his fit of temper had somewhat subsided. It left altogether when the Nez Percés gave the tomahawks back for the scallop shells.
Each day, the captains watched the rising river and melting snows from the mountains. Bratton was so well now that he rode in the bareback horse races. Pomp ran about with Nez Percé children watching the games and pitching quoits.
One day a young woman, her hair tied back with a thong, brought her dark-skinned, kinky-haired newborn to show off proudly to Sacajawea. The new mother wore only a skirt and a leather vest carelessly untied over her breasts. “See, how big he is already! And he came two moons early,” she said proudly. “He is strong like the father.”
“Something good. Skookumchuck,” said Sacajawea, cradling the papoose and humming to him while he slept. She knew York had fathered this papoose on the westward trail. “He is called York?” asked Sacajawea.
The young Nez Percé mother sat on the ground, her body half-covered, but she was totally unconscious of affectations. “Ai, York,” she smiled, her eyes crinkling. “Small Man York. He will be something great in this tribe. See, he does not cry even now. There is no other papoose like him in any village.”
Sacajawea did not say what came to her mind. She thought there were probably several others that York had left in the various villages the expedition had visited. And maybe, she mused, half-white papooses had been left by some of the others.
The evening she first heard the piercing, eerie singing, she began to think that some of the Nez Percé women were a little flighty. The night was still and the sound was easily carried over a wide area.2 She noticed that it made Ben York shift uneasily, put another log on the fire, and look around anxiously at the others, as if he wanted to move out somewhere. He finally did sidle back to the edge of camp and then lope off into the woods.
Sacajawea could not imagine what had got into him. He had been holding Pomp and making the child laughand giggle. He stopped and just seemed to sniff the air and listen. Most of the others didn’t seem to hear it, or ignored it as some wood noise.
No one paid him any attention as he went away to the edge of camp and then disappeared. Why am I wondering? thought Sacajawea. York can take care of himself.
She washed Pomp’s hands and face and took him to the back of the camp, where he knew what was expected of him before going to bed. Quickly he pulled off his leggings, relieved himself, pulled off his shirt, and ran back to his mother. Sacajawea cleaned him with a handful of leaves. She patted him goodnight on his pile of pine boughs and pulled a robe up to his chin. The fur tickled and he pushed it away, turned on his side, and was asleep in a moment.
The whistle came again, this time close to the edge of the camp. Curiosity, always high in any woman, especially an Indian, got the best of Sacajawea. She stepped away from her sleeping child and tried to follow the strange, shrill whistle. It seemed to come from the edge of the clearing, then from behind a tree. Just when she thought she was close, it moved. It was neither a bird nor an animal. Suddenly she saw a pretty young Nez Percé woman standing in an opening, with tall pines on either side. She was dressed in a deerskin shirt and leggings, which were fringed. A leather band around her forehead kept her long black hair off her face. She moved with a subtle rocking motion, blowing through her hands, which she held in front of her mouth. Sacajawea waved to the young woman. The woman did not seem to notice her. She turned her back and whistled again. From behind a tree came York, his white teeth flashing in the moonlight. He ran for the young woman.
Sacajawea hurried back to the campfire, chuckling to herself, thinking how York followed the whistling like a buck deer followed the sashaying of a desirable doe. That excited Nez Percé woman was leading him all over the Nez Percé country, through the brush and between the pines and through the tall prairie grass. She would be caught sooner or later, and maybe beforenext spring the fun-minded woman would be the mother of another curly-headed Nez Percé papoose.
On June 10, Lewis announced, “Strike camp. We are moving a little farther into the foothills so that the hunters can find more game.”
None of the Nez Percés followed the camp. Shadow left the expedition that evening on the pretense that he wanted to go down to the river to fish. He never returned. Sacajawea knew that he had become more Chopunnish than Shoshoni now and did not actually wish to go over the mountains to see any of his Shoshoni cousins. She tried to explain this to Clark. “I
t is not surprising that he does not want to go with us over the mountains. He is now like the people of the Nez Percé nation, who did not wish to travel outside their own territory often. He misses his adopted tribe and wants to be with them.”
“We’ll miss him. He was good with translations around here and understood the art of negotiation when we traded with the Nez Percés. I’d hoped he’d escort us across the mountains and parley with the Nez Percés for several more guides. So—if our guide leaves us, we’ll go over the mountains by our own wits,” said Clark.
Five days later, Lewis made another announcement. “Collect the horses, pack the baggage, and strike the camp. We are moving up over the mountains onto the Lolo Trail early tomorrow morning. I have already sent Windsor and Colter out with their rifles to look for deer, wolf, fox, or rabbits for our meals.”
Two hours after dawn the next morning, the two hunters were ten to twelve miles ahead of the main party. They stopped to examine the gray sky. “Looks like snow,” said Windsor.
“Those can’t possibly be snow clouds,” answered Colter, squinting in the sky at the grayish overcast.
“You can’t deny those are snowflakes,” said Windsor when the huge flakes began drifting down.
Slowly the men tramped upward in the mountain tanglewood. Then they noticed that the firs were bent from wet snow and they were walking on a path only by guess. “I can tell by those dead branches hurtling down and the occasional dead tree falling that the windis stronger than usual,” said Windsor, turning to face Colter. He turned more quickly than he had planned, and his rifle struck a boulder. It broke near the muzzle and was impossible to fix.
Sacajawea Page 67