Across the Endless River

by Thad Carhart

  JULY 1816

  Prancing Wolf had allowed him to remain in the lodge that day to see the initiation of the boys his age. “Since your path is with your father’s people, you cannot be a Mandan warrior,” Prancing Wolf told him. “But you can stay and watch, and send your friends your good medicine.” The pronouncement was harsh but true: since Baptiste would not be living with the tribe, he did not have to be excluded like all tribal members except the elders, the shaman, and the initiates. He sat to one side of the lodge, between the elders in their eagle-feather war bonnets and the drummers who chanted rhythmically over their ceaseless pounding, watching as the young men were led to the center of the lodge in groups of two and three. Each one submitted to the offices of a pair of experienced braves, who prepared them with grim efficiency for the ceremony’s climax.

  Each young man was allowed to choose whether to lie facedown or on his back for the trial that would make him a man. The initiate stayed still as an elder grabbed the skin and muscle of his chest or upper back, pulled the handful of flesh away from his torso, and pierced the taut skin between his fingers with a hunting knife, once on each side. Another brave then passed a sharpened foot-long length of wood through the slit until it protruded from both sides. Then he fastened the skewer with a length of cord lowered through a hole in the roof and over the lodge’s main roof timber by braves waiting outside. The same was done with smaller pieces of wood through the skin on both arms and legs, and to these were fastened the initiate’s bow and shield and a horned buffalo skull. When the brave wielding the hunting knife was satisfied, he signaled to those outside by pulling on the two cords. Immediately the young man was raised up by the skewers until he swung above the heads of those in the lodge. His body was distorted in a terrifying way, its full weight bearing upon the skewers and cords and stretching the flesh on his chest or his back until it seemed as if it must give way under the strain.

  They were pulled up to the lodge’s roof timbers two or three at a time, blood dripping from the cuts and their bodies shivering with the effort at self-control. The drumming and chanting continued their hypnotic cadence in the quivering light cast by a fire that was constantly stoked. After a lull, one of the elders approached the hanging bodies and gently touched their shoulders with a long pole, turning them as they dangled from their cords. They twisted slowly at first, then faster and faster as the pole repeatedly struck them, until their obdurate silence gave way to cries of agony that soon turned to entreaties to the Great Spirit for protection and strength. The screams grew louder and resonated for what seemed like an endless time until they overpowered the drumming and chanting. Then one by one the initiates fainted and grew silent, their bodies still as they twirled slowly overhead. The elders examined them closely for any sign of movement. When they were satisfied that the young men’s spirits had temporarily left their bodies, they tapped lightly on the cords, the signal for them to be lowered gently to the ground. Each boy had to die completely in this way before he could be born anew as a man, and experience the transformations that awaited him in the rest of the ceremony.

  Baptiste had watched as close friends, cousins, and childhood playmates from the Kit Fox Society filed in to undergo the rite of full membership in the tribe. He had been jealous of their new status, but as he watched the ceremony unfold he felt apart from his kinsmen. Partly he feared the violence that was being visited upon his friends, but he knew that fear was normal—many times they had talked about it as boys. The principal undertaking was to appear fearless. Beyond that visceral response, though, a voice spoke clearly in his head: This is not your world. That he could witness their change was the ultimate expression of his difference: in strengthening their bonds through a shared ordeal, his friends were also excluding him from their number.

  When Jumping Fox entered the lodge and submitted to the elders’ knives, Baptiste saw the chasm widen before his eyes. He hardly recognized his sinewy playmate standing before him in the dancing light. As Jumping Fox lay on his back, he turned his head and sought out Baptiste’s gaze. His eyes burned fiercely, and Baptiste wanted to look away as the knife flashed, yet he was unable to avert his eyes, so strong was Jumping Fox’s hold on him. His friend’s face was bathed in sweat, his jaw muscles were clenched, and when the knife pierced his chest, an involuntary shudder coursed across his face. But in the seconds before the knife was again forced through his skin and muscle, Jumping Fox smiled at Baptiste and his quivering lips appeared to be saying with fierce pride, I will undergo this and you will not. When the braves pulled on the cords and raised him up, his mouth opened in pain, and with a horrifying intake of breath he closed his eyes and threw back his head as his body was drawn upward.

  Baptiste held his breath as he looked up at his friend dangling like the flayed body of an animal. Even though he knew it was what Jumping Fox and his companions wanted most in this world, it was like watching them die. Their acquiescence added to the atmosphere of sacrifice, resolution, and courage. The smell of their blood and sweat mixed with the smoke that rose around them to exit through the hole in the center of the lodge’s roof. The drumming and chanting cast a feverish spell, and the firelight flickering across the feathered headdresses and buffalo skulls threw lurid shadows on the hide-covered walls. As an elder began to turn Jumping Fox’s hanging form, Baptiste was overcome with concern for his friend. His body turned faster and faster and Jumping Fox cried out to the Great Spirit in a voice that Baptiste had never before heard. “Help me!” he yelled desperately. “Help me!”

  Baptiste wanted to help his friend, he wanted to run from the lodge and have nothing more to do with their trials, he wanted to cry for being different from them. Suddenly Jumping Fox’s cries ceased, and his body turned slowly overhead, its spirit departed. Baptiste closed his eyes and clutched his spirit bird tightly, repeating inwardly to himself over and over, Their path is not my path.

  FOUR

  JULY 1823

  CURTIS & WOODS TRADING POST ON THE

  MISSOURI, 400 MILES UPRIVER FROM ST. LOUIS

  He noticed the horses first. Even from a mile away he could see that they weren’t the usual half-broken Indian ponies that scouts rode with a mule or two strung behind to pack supplies and that walked a plodding, even gait. These two were tall, broad-chested bays with black manes and tails; they held their heads high, alert to every scent as they advanced along the river’s grassy shore. They had the shiny coat and the bearing that Baptiste remembered from Auguste Chouteau’s carriage team in St. Louis, yet they didn’t seem troubled by the unusual terrain or the sights or the smells. These were no ordinary frontier saddle mounts. I’ll be damned, Baptiste thought, those are purebreds.

  The two riders sat their horses differently, too. Rather than the slouch so common on the frontier, which a man could sustain for days at a time if he had to, these two held their backs straight and their shoulders squared as they advanced at a rapid pace, one ahead of the other. In a quarter of an hour they reached the small storehouse at the front of the camp, where Baptiste was counting pelts on the porch with Henri, the old Creole who had been with Cyrus Curtis since the beginning.

  The two men rode up to the small clearing, drew up their horses, and raised their arms in an awkward salute. The one in front, considerably younger and heavier than his companion, addressed Baptiste in a formal and accented English.

  “Good day, sir! We are looking to find Mr. Andrew Woods and Mr. Cyrus Curtis. Do you know of their whereabouts?”

  Baptiste took them in as he straightened up and acknowledged their presence with a nod. The newcomers wore broad-brimmed felt hats and tailored broadcloth coats, clothing not only too fine for where they were but far too heavy for midsummer. Their boots and tack were of beautifully worked leather. Two greenhorns, he thought.

  “Mr. Curtis is up the river for several days on business, but you can find Mr. Woods in the main storehouse.” Baptiste gestured to his left, where the stream curved through the woods a few hundred yards distan
t. “I will take you to him.”

  Henri helped the newcomers hitch their mounts to one side of the clearing and let their horses drink from the water trough as he attended to their needs. These two intrigued Baptiste. They were new to the frontier—that much was clear—but they didn’t resemble the fur traders who sometimes came up the river from New Orleans, nor did they look like anyone he’d ever seen in St. Louis. They were reserved and had an air of quiet authority, particularly the younger one. They were used to having their way without a fuss and clearly had money. Baptiste was reminded of Père Raynaud, the Jesuit priest who had tutored him in Latin and encouraged his fascination for music by introducing him to the mysteries of the keyboard on the church’s pump organ. Not only did they show some of the same measured reserve in their movements but they displayed a similar attentiveness, like schoolboys listening carefully to everything around them. Their eyes were alert, taking in their surroundings as if committing every detail to memory.

  The older man removed a leather satchel from the pommel of his saddle and slung it diagonally over his shoulder. Then he took a briar walking stick lashed to the outside of the rifle sling and handed it to the younger man, who took it from his companion, rubbed the ivory handle and brandished the stick before him, as if feeling its weight in his hand gave him great pleasure. It was clear now that the older man, if not exactly a servant, was some kind of retainer. He anticipated the younger man’s needs before any word was spoken.

  Baptiste introduced himself, rolling out his full name with a fastidious French accent. “I am Jean-Baptiste Charbonneau.”

  “Yes, of course. General Clark talked about you when we were in St. Louis.” The younger man extended his hand. “Forgive me, I should have introduced myself. I am Paul Wilhelm of Württemberg. This is my traveling companion, Mr. Schlape.”

  With the mention of General Clark, they now talked easily. The two were from Europe, from a German-speaking kingdom to the east of France. They were visiting the still-wild parts of North America to learn about the plants and animals that could only be found there. Paul Wilhelm called himself “a student of natural history,” a term Baptiste had never heard before, and said he was very interested in learning about the Indian tribes in the region.

  They set off toward the storehouse at a brisk walk, and the younger man—Baptiste guessed he was about thirty years old to the other’s fifty—breathed deeply and smiled as he exhaled, planting his walking stick firmly in the flattened grass at the edge of the prairie. He said, “General Clark suggested that we engage the services of your father as interpreter and guide when we visit the Indian villages.”

  “He would be the right man to have along,” Baptiste said.

  He was starting to understand, and yet there was still something that puzzled him. His father was often paid to accompany the typical fur company hangers-on to the Mandan and Hidatsa encampments because he spoke the languages. Such men occasionally arrived from St. Louis, restless men with impatient looks who wanted to “visit the Injuns” or “see the operation,” and who coaxed shoddy new trade goods—beads and blankets and tools—on the trading post factors. These two were far more polished than those jobbers and clerks, yet Paul Wilhelm had the same eager look in his eyes that Baptiste always saw when “the Indian villages” were the topic of conversation. What are they hungry for? he wondered. What besides money gives a man that look?

  They talked with Andrew Woods for a quarter of an hour outside the main storehouse. Woods seemed bemused by the unexpected presence of rich Europeans. The letter from Pierre Chouteau, Auguste’s nephew, presented by the one who called himself Paul Wilhelm made Woods take them more seriously than he would have otherwise.

  “These gentlemen most particularly want to see some Indians,” Woods said to Baptiste, raising his eyebrows. “A band of Kansa hunters were down from Wakanzere’s village last week,” he said, motioning toward the river with his head. “You might find them if they want to be found.”

  That afternoon, Baptiste took the two up the Kansas River in a canoe. At first they made awkward progress. Paul Wilhelm settled himself in the center of the canoe and passed forward to his companion the paddle that Baptiste had handed him. Schlape was worse than useless, though, and dropped the paddle twice before Baptiste told him to quit and propelled them from the rear of the canoe. The back current from the Missouri calmed the Kansas considerably and, together with the heat, lent the placid waters upon which they advanced the air of a lake.

  Paul Wilhelm concerned himself with writing in a small notebook, several times asking Baptiste about the river’s seasonal flow or the types of parrots they saw perched in noisy profusion in the trees along the riverbanks. Once when a group of large white cranes flew directly overhead, the older man produced a telescope from his bag, extended it, and handed it to Paul Wilhelm, who tracked the birds’ passage with utter concentration.

  “They are larger than our cranes,” he announced as he lowered the glass. “An exceedingly pretty bird.” He turned at once to his notebook and made an entry. Then he looked around at Baptiste and asked, “Can you tell me what tribes may be seen in this area?”

  “Well, it would depend on the season,” Baptiste told him. “These are the lands of the Kansa, and the Oto and Pawnee lands are nearby. This time of year, though, when hunting parties wander far from their homes, you might come across Cheyenne or Arapaho, even Omaha or Ponca.”

  “And Sioux?” The younger man’s voice conveyed anxious anticipation, even in his heavily accented English.

  “No,” Baptiste replied, “it would be unusual to come across Sioux in these parts. They live much farther north, along the river.”

  After an hour of slow progress they approached a large, heavily wooded island. Easing the canoe toward the right-hand channel, Baptiste noticed movement in the underbrush that covered the island’s point, still a hundred yards distant. A sizeable animal would not normally be moving in the midday heat. His senses quickened, alert now to every noise or motion that could tell him what lay beneath the thick cover of summer foliage. Something hung in the air, and Baptiste paid close attention.

  The two men seemed unaware of the change in atmosphere until Schlape noticed a movement among the trees on the island, just beyond the water’s edge. Soundlessly the older man handed the telescope back to his companion, but before he could extend it, Baptiste hissed, “Put that away!”

  Paul Wilhelm started to protest. “But I merely—” But Baptiste cut him off.

  “It might look like a gun,” he whispered. Baptiste focused more intently on the island, and as if in response to his piercing gaze, the heads and shoulders of half a dozen Indian men rose above the underbrush. “Don’t make any sudden movements,” Baptiste said in a low voice.

  The canoe had entered the river’s right-hand channel, and the overgrown bank where the Indians stood half-concealed lay twenty yards ahead. They followed the canoe’s lazy progress as it glided slowly along, the heavy back current making for almost slack water. One of the men came out of the brush to a small clearing at the water’s edge and glowered at them. He wore a breechcloth and held a bow in his left hand. Around his neck hung a strand of glass beads, and they were close enough to see the pattern on the loops of shell pieces that hung from his ears. His head was shaved except for a tall, stiff roach of hair that ran down the middle of his scalp and from which two eagle feathers dangled.

  Paul Wilhelm turned to Baptiste excitedly. “Can we meet him and his band of warriors?”

  Without taking his eyes from the man standing in the open, Baptiste replied quietly, “We will see if he wants to meet us.”

  Baptiste back-paddled and stopped the canoe in front of the Indian. Raising his hand in a greeting, he addressed him in a variant of Mandan. These were Omahas, he knew, and he could usually make himself understood to them. The two exchanged words, and the two visitors from Württemberg could sense the tension rise palpably as each man made his declarations. It seemed to them that it was not
a conversation, but a series of rhetorical flourishes. The Indian had quickly become agitated and narrowed his features into a scowl as he made jabbing movements with his right arm. Once he held high his left arm and brandished the bow as his voice rose in what sounded like anger, while his fellow warriors raised their bows, too, in menacing uniformity.

  When the weapons were raised in silent threat, Baptiste slowly raised his right arm and lowered it, then spoke in the clear, soothing tones one might use to calm an injured animal. Gradually the Indian’s threatening tone subsided and the two talked in what seemed to Paul Wilhelm a calmer register for another few minutes, apparently exchanging information. Baptiste then waved his arm slowly in acknowledgment, nodded, and turned the canoe back from where they had come.

  After they had moved well away from the island he said, “Something bad has happened up the river.” To their questioning faces he merely shook his head. He did not know the details. The Omaha brave had spoken darkly of “big trouble” and “many dead” and ominously mentioned “blue jackets,” soldiers, but Baptiste guessed that he did not yet know exactly what had happened. He was upset because another Omaha hunting party had gone up the river some weeks before and should have already returned. “We have to go back,” he told the newcomers as he leaned into his paddle strokes. Hearing the urgency in his voice, neither questioned his judgment.