Jessie

by Judy Alter

  John's self-confidence was at a high peak. "Ah, but I know how to meet those dangers," he said.

  "Still," I persisted stubbornly, "you can't change the weather or make the Indians disappear."

  "No," said Father dryly. He had been listening in unusual silence. "But an expedition mounted by the government will show an interest in settlement of the lands beyond the South Pass. It will tell the public that the land there is important."

  Later, in privacy, John said to me, "It's as though I have no choice in this, Jessie. I couldn't stop what's been set in motion if I tried. My life is caught up in the cause of westward expansion now, and in some ways I'm no more than a puppet."

  "You shall be the puppet-hero, then," I said.

  "Always to you, I hope, if to no one else," he murmured.

  As I gave him physical assurance of love, I fought back the dark shadow of foreboding that crept into my mind too often those days.

  * * *

  In March of 1843 Father left for St. Louis, going first to Kentucky on business, and John took his mapmaker, Charles Preuss, to New York to buy instruments for the trip. From there they would go by rail and steamboat to St. Louis. I was left to pack up the household, including Mother, and journey to St. Louis by stage. It was a tortuous process, and many times during that journey, as I nursed Mother, reassured Mathilde and Sophie that they were not going to meet Indians, listened to Lily fuss, and jollied Susie and Sarah along, I resented the men in my family, who had gone off willy-nilly on their own affairs, and left me to tend to the family.

  We took the National Road to Wheeling, but, as we could make at best twenty-five miles a day, it was a long and grueling journey bouncing along in that stage.

  "Mother? Are you uncomfortable?" It was a foolish question, asked only as a means of showing my concern.

  "How could I be anything else?" she answered in her still-garbled speech, and I was reassured by that small measure of humor.

  "How long till we get there, Jessie?" Susie demanded, while Sarah chimed in, "I'm tired of this coach. It's boring."

  I placated them with stories of the West, telling them some of John's adventures in terms they could understand, and their wild imaginations then took them off on pretend journeys, which they found much more exciting than this real one, which seemed endless.

  From Wheeling we went by boat, finally reaching St. Louis nearly a fortnight after we'd departed Washington. Mother was perilously tired, I thought, and the young ones were cranky, while I myself felt exhausted.

  But all my exhaustion was washed away in one fell swoop when John, who had beaten us to the city, wrapped me in his arms. I surrendered to that blissful feeling of love, protection, comfort—all the things a woman wants in life—only to rouse myself almost instantly with the thought that he would soon be leaving me for months and months.

  "What is it, my darling?" he whispered in my ear.

  I forgot enthusiasm and glorious adventures and all those things in favor of honesty. "A premonition," I said. "A strong fear, like someone walked over my grave... or yours."

  Suddenly he was harsh and angry. "Jessie, don't ever say such a thing again. You could... you could put a jinx on the expedition."

  In spite of my own irrational fears, I could not believe he was serious. Fortunately, I did not laugh and managed to say lightly, "La, don't take seriously the fears of a woman in love."

  It was the right thing to say, and it smoothed away his fears. But nothing soothed my own.

  At the last minute, just days before his departure, John applied to Colonel S. W. Kearny, commanding the Third Military Department near St. Louis, for a small howitzer cannon. "The Indians," he told me in explanation as I wrote the necessary letter, "have been known for treachery and audacious bravery. It would be better to have the protection and not use it than to be without when we needed it. There, Jessie, say that to Kearny, old stick that he is."

  "Should I say that too?"

  He grinned at me with the look of a schoolboy caught making gestures behind the teacher's back. "No, I guess not. But there's not much give in the man."

  "He is an old friend," I said. "I have known him since I was a child. He is stern, but he is a good friend, and I have no doubt he will give you whatever you want."

  What he wanted included five hundred pounds of ammunition for the cannon and the necessary carriage to drag it along. I had my doubts that John would find it practical to haul a cannon over the Rockies and all the way to Oregon, but I bit my tongue and wrote the letter.

  To make sure that John's request didn't get bogged down in the proper channels, which would have delayed the expedition beyond bearing, Father went to see Kearny. He returned home triumphant.

  "The colonel has ordered the arsenal to fill your request without waiting for the customary approval of the War Department," he told John. "You may get the howitzer two days from now." He paused and looked thoughtful. "Didn't Jedediah Smith take one of those blasted things and find it more trouble than it was worth?"

  John bristled ever so slightly. "Smith never had to face a horde of hostile Indians."

  Father was still unconvinced. "Can't imagine that Indians have enough weapons that you'd need a howitzer. But you know best....Sure you aren't expecting to meet some unfriendly Brits... or maybe even a Mexican or two down in California?" One corner of Father's mouth turned up ever so slightly as he said this.

  "My instructions are to go to Oregon and back," John said. "California is not on my itinerary. And I am to avoid hostile encounters when at all possible. I do not expect to use the howitzer." But he gave Father a long look that said more than his words.

  Father slapped him on the back. "There, now, no need to get huffy. I was just thinking about possibilities. I have great faith in you, John, and if you think you need a howitzer, then you need it."

  As soon as John and I were alone, I confronted him. "You do plan to go to California, don't you? In spite of your orders."

  He had the look of a schoolboy caught denying a prank. "Of course not, Jessie. That would be foolhardy—it could ruin everything I've worked for."

  "It could also," I said thoughtfully, "bring you great honor, if you could bring back a meaningful report on the political climate in California."

  "Why, my dear Jessie, you are a schemer! Does that mean you'd approve of a side trip to California?"

  "Not at all," I said lightly. "It would keep you away too long." But I knew in my bones that he would cross the Sierras, just the same.

  John was taking thirty-nine men on the expedition, many of them seasoned explorers, mapmakers, and hunters. He would take Preuss, the mapmaker who had gone on the first expedition and had proved difficult—"obstinate" was John's word. But John insisted his talents were worth the trouble. Most of the others I never knew or met, but there was one who was almost as much in my thoughts as John himself. His name was Theodore Talbot, and I did meet him when he came from Washington to join John in St. Louis. He was eighteen and looked to be tubercular, though John assured me he was in good health and would "toughen up" as soon as they were on the trail.

  "Mrs. Frémont," he said diffidently, "I am pleased to meet you. My mother... she sends her regards and asks..." He blushed furiously and rushed on. "She asks that you write her occasionally. She's already worried about me."

  I took his hand in mine and assured him I would write her faithfully. "She is not the only one who is worried," I said. "We women left behind cannot help but worry, even though I know you'll be as safe traveling with John as you would be home in your own bed." Would that I believed what I was saying to that poor innocent young man! My heart nearly broke when John told me later that Theodore carried a volume of Byron's poetry in his pack.

  John left on May 13, anxious to be off and meet Kit Carson at a prearranged point. For me his departure came far too quickly—and not soon enough. I would have delayed it forever if I could—Father had even reminded me that he could easily secure John a comfortable post in Washing
ton that would require no travel—but I knew that John by his very nature had to go on this expedition and probably many more. If I loved him, and if I wanted to link my life with his, then I must endure long absences—and the sooner I got used to them, the better all around. I firmly believed that the rewards of my endurance—a second report more brilliant than the first, fame and glory for John—would justify whatever unhappiness I endured during his absence.

  But having told myself all this time and again, I wanted him to be gone. The waiting was almost more unendurable than his absence. If I was to live without him and be miserable for eight months, then I wanted to rush headlong into it and get it over with. Instead, we had more than a month of preparation in St. Louis, a month when the expedition was an everyday presence with us... and yet not begun. The experience told on my nerves, and I sometimes wondered if John wouldn't be delighted to be gone, just to escape my tenseness.

  Anyone who envisions a romantic last night spent together before a long separation does not know much about explorers and their zeal and knows nothing about John Charles Frémont.

  When the last pack was ready, the list of supplies checked one more time, the farewells said to the family, including a session of throwing Lily in the air until she was near sick with excitement, John and I retired to our room. But there was no rush to shed our clothes this night. We almost danced around each other, nervous, ill at ease, uncertain what to say, how to behave.

  Our first night together, I thought to myself, was less awkward than this. "We will be just fine, John. You must not give us a thought, but simply get on with your work."

  "I know," he muttered, standing at the window, his back toward me. "But I shall miss you." He turned to look at me.

  Should I have rushed into his arms? Later I often wished I had done just that, but then the tension and the uncertainty kept me rooted to the spot. "I know you will. And Lily and I shall miss you. But it is only for eight months."

  "Yes, that's all." He turned to the window again.

  Later we lay, together but separate, in the bed, our few fumbling attempts at lovemaking having come to naught.

  "Jessie..."

  I put my finger to his lips. "I know you love me, and that you are sure of my love. We have no need to demonstrate it every minute. Besides," I added lightly, "you left me enceinte the last time you left, and I've no need for a repeat performance of that."

  He laughed and reached a gentle hand to stroke my cheek.

  "Just hold me, John, hold me tight."

  And so we spent the night wrapped in each other's arms, comforted and yet tense, neither of us sleeping at all. We greeted the dawn with relief, and when John marched resolutely away from our St. Louis home, I stood proudly on the veranda and waved until he was out of sight. My smile was brave and almost sincere, and there was not a tear in my eyes. I had learned to be game, because I knew I had to be.

  Oh, that's not to say that I didn't give way to tears once he was gone. For two days I wandered around the house in a fog, frequently retiring to my bedroom, where I indulged in smothered sobbing—not wanting anyone to hear, lest the family be upset—and then emerged to visit Mother, play with Lily, or seek out Father, who was mostly gone visiting this constituent and that.

  * * *

  The letter from John's immediate commander, Colonel Albert of the Topographical Bureau, came only a few days after John had left. Among his parting words were instructions to open all mail and forward only what had to do with the expedition. Unconcernedly, I slit the envelope and pulled out this letter addressed to John.

  "You are hereby ordered to return to Washington immediately to explain by what authority you requisitioned a cannon for an ostensibly peaceful expedition to gather scientific knowledge. A replacement will be sent to lead the expedition."

  The letter fell from my shaking hands. A replacement? Take the expedition away from John? All because of that silly cannon? It was inconceivable to me that John should be bothered by bureaucracy, when he was, to my mind, above such petty things. Following my first impulse, I would have taken the offending letter straight to Father, trusting him to take care of the matter. But Father was away in a far part of the state. And, besides, John and I could not always rely on Father. I knew that I, and I alone, could act to prevent this terrible blow.

  It took me almost two hours to come up with a solution, and when I did, it seemed painfully obvious. I would send the message, but I would make sure it reached Kaw's Landing on the Missouri River—the departure point where the men were gathering and seeing to the final assembly of supplies and goods—after John was well away. Meantime, I would send my own message by courier from St. Louis. Basil Lajeunesse was still in St. Louis, tending to an ailing wife; he was to meet John's party at Kaw's Landing.

  To his hand I entrusted a message that read, "Only trust me, and go."

  "You can deliver this immediately and send back a reply?" I asked, handing him the sealed envelope.

  "Yes, Mrs. Frémont. I need only to get my horse, and I will be gone. I will send back a reply by my brother, who is with the party now and will return to St. Louis."

  "It is extremely urgent," I stressed. "I cannot tell you how important haste is." I feared that Colonel Albert had sent a duplicate letter to Kaw's Landing.

  "I'm gone, ma'am," he said and was actually down the veranda steps as he spoke.

  Within days I had a reply back. "I trust and go," John wrote.

  I felt ennobled—there is no less pretentious word for it—by my part in securing John's mission. Bother the Topographical Bureau! They were men of small imagination and large jealousy, and with my help John had outwitted them.

  That sense of purpose carried me through the hot, sticky St. Louis summer, though the days were long and the nights empty. Mother was some better, in spite of the heat, and we shared some of the care of Lily, though the burden fell on Mathilde and Sophie, as usual. Father traveled frequently, but when he was home, I helped him with odds and ends. The term describes my life that summer—odds and ends—a little bit of helping Father, a little bit of caring for Lily, a little bit of visiting with Mother, even a little bit of responsibility for the house, but nothing that engaged my energies.

  I saw very few people—two who did come regularly to cheer me were the sons of old friends of the family. Montgomery Blair was a lawyer some ten years older than I, and he had recently been joined in the practice of law by his younger brother, Frank. Their father, Francis P. Blair, was editor of the Washington Globe, and we three had known each other since childhood. Beyond the Blairs I saw few people—Father's widowed cousin, Mrs. Brant, and one or two others. I went out only occasionally, mostly to church. Behind all this surface activity my life was in suspended animation, waiting for John.

  Still my optimism ran high, fed on visions of John's fame when he returned, and I did not really suffer from loneliness and boredom. In September word came from John—a letter dated late in June from somewhere on the prairie west of the Missouri and delivered by two Indians, reporting that all was well and the expedition was progressing as expected. They were some behind the season's immigrants, who passed them on the trail. "To see all those prairie schooners, my darling," he wrote, "is a thrill beyond words. Your father would not be able to contain himself were he to see all these brave souls heading westward. They do, however, need direction and guidance, and I am grateful for the chance to provide that for them."

  We shall be home by the Christmas holidays, my darling, and I shall hold you in my arms once again. Until then, please think of me lovingly and often, for I miss you. With regards to your parents and love, of course, to Lily,

  John

  The last words were, I knew, automatic, the expected lament of a faraway husband. But they did not reflect John's true state, for he was, I knew, exuberant with excitement. If he planned to be home by Christmas, he had given up California. Intrigued as I was by the possibilities a California expedition opened, I was more pleased at the prospect of h
aving him home soon.

  To Theodore Talbot's mother I wrote that the party would be in St. Louis by Christmas and she should have her son home by the New Year, without fail. She should not, I cautioned, worry about her son, for "Mr. Frémont, knowing him to be an only son, is most anxious to bring him home to you in safety." It pleased me to be able to reassure the elderly woman.

  In the fall Father returned to Washington, of necessity, and urged that the family accompany him, but I had promised John that we would wait in St. Louis... and wait we would.

  "Your mother—" Father began, but I interrupted him. "She is in better health and spirits than I have seen her in some months, Father. I think she should stay with me."

  "Perhaps you are right," he said, and I sensed that he was relieved to be free of worry about Mother.

  Not two days after he left, Mother collapsed with chills and fever, and I called the doctor. He, bless him, ignored Mother's request that she be bled and suggested that she had an ague, which would pass with care. So I spent days in a darkened room with her, coaxing hot broth into her reluctant mouth, keeping warm blankets wrapped about her, and crooning gently to let her know that she was not alone.

  Occasionally, she managed to murmur, "Poor Jessie, you are so good," and I would clasp her hand all the tighter.

  At night, when Mathilde sent someone to spell me at my watch, I collapsed into my bed, after a perfunctory hug for Lily. One night she clung to me with great, overwhelming sobs.

  "That baby misses her mother," Mathilde said in gentle reproach.

  "She's too young to understand I must tend to my mother," I replied wearily. "But she is well cared for, what with you and Sophie."

  "Babies don't understand 'well cared for,' " she said. "They understand love and being the center of your world."

  The thought startled me. Of course, Lily was not the center of my world, but neither was Mother—nor was Father, though he had once been. John was the reason for my whole existence, and I was marking time with all of them until he returned. Even caring for Mother, which I did with such devotion, was a way of making time pass until Christmas—or whenever John came home.