Читать книгу The Untamed American Spirit: Historical Novels & Western Adventures - Emerson Hough - Страница 154

Table of Contents

Two days later, on August 4th, the travelers had pushed on up the valley of the Missouri, to what was known as the Two Forks, between the towns of Grayling and Red Rock. They pitched their last camp, as nearly as they could determine, precisely where the Lewis and Clark party made their last encampment east of the Rockies, at what they called the Shoshoni Cove. This the boys called the Jump-off Camp, because this was where the expedition left its boats, and, ill fed and worn out, started on across the Divide for the beginning of their great journey into the Pacific Northwest.

Now they were under the very shoulders of the Rockies, and, so closely had they followed the narrative of the first exploration of the great river, and so closely had their own journey been identified with it, that now they were almost as eager and excited over the last stages of the journey to the summit as though it lay before them personally, new, unknown and untried. They hardly could wait to resume their following out of the last entangled skein of the great narrative.

“We’ve caught them at last, Uncle Dick!” exclaimed Jesse, spreading out his map on top of one of the kyacks in which Nigger had carried his load of kitchen stuff. “We’ve got almost a week the start of them here. This is August 4th, and it was August 10th when Lewis got here.”

“And by that time he’d been everywhere else!” said Rob. “Let’s figure him out — tying him up with that note the beaver carried off. That beaver certainly made a lot of trouble.

“Lewis left the note at the mouth of the Wisdom on August 4th. On August 5th Clark got there and went up the Wisdom. On August 6th, 7th, 8th and 9th, Shannon was lost up the Wisdom. On August 6th, Drewyer met Clark coming up the Wisdom River and turned him back; and Clark sent Field up the Wisdom after Shannon. Meantime Lewis had gone down to the junction at the Wisdom, not meeting the boats above the junction. He met Clark, coming back down the Wisdom with the boats. They then all went down to the mouth of the Wisdom and camped — that’s about a day’s march below where we camped, at the Beaverhead Rock.

“Then Lewis saw something had to be done. He told Clark to bring on the boats as fast as he could. He then made up a fast-marching party — himself, Drewyer, Shields, and McNeal — with packs of food and Indian trading stuff; he didn’t forget that part — and they four hit the trail in the high places only, still hunting for those Indians they’d been trying to find ever since they left the Great Falls. They were walkers, that bunch, for they left the Wisdom early August 9th, and they got here late on August 10th. That was going some!”

“Yes, but poor Clark didn’t get up here to where we are now until August 17th, a whole week later than Lewis. And by that time Lewis had come back down to this place where we are right now, and he was mighty glad to meet Clark. If he hadn’t, he’d have lost his Indians. You tell it now, Billy!” concluded Jesse, breathless.

“You mean, after Captain Lewis started west from here to cross the summit?”

“Yes.”

“All right. You can see why he went up this upper creek — it was the one that led straight to the top. The Red Rock River, as they now call the stream below what they call the Beaverhead River — it’s all one stream — bends off sharp south. The Horse Prairie Creek takes you straight up to Lemhi Pass, which ought to be called the Lewis Pass, but isn’t, though he was the first across it. Lewis was glad when he got to what they called the source, the next day after that.

“Now, he didn’t find any Indians right away. I allow he’d followed an Indian road toward that pass, but the tracks faded out. He knew he was due to hit Columbia waters now, beyond yon range, but what he wanted was Indians, so he kept on.

“Now all at once — I think it was August 11th, the same day he left camp here — about five miles up this creek, he saw an Indian, on horseback, two miles off! That was the first Indian they had seen since they left the Mandans the spring before. But Mr. Indian pulled his freight. That was when Lewis was ‘soarly chagrined’ with Shields, who had not stayed back till Lewis got his Indian gentled down some; he had him inside of one hundred yards at one time. He ‘abraided’ Shields for that; he says.

“But now, anyhow, they knew there was such a thing as an Indian, so they trailed this one, but they couldn’t catch him, and Lewis was scared he’d run all the other Indians back West. But on the next morning he ran into a big Indian road, that ran up toward the pass. There was a lowish mountain, running back about a half mile. The creek came out of the foot of that mountain —— ”

“I know,” interrupted John, who had his Journal spread before him. “Here’s what he said:

“‘At the distance of 4 miles further the road took us to the most distant fountain of the waters of the Mighty Missouri in surch of which we have spent so many toilsome days and wristless nights. thus far I had accomplished one of those great objects on which my mind has been unalterably fixed for many years, judge then of the pleasure I felt in all(a)ying my thirst with this pure and ice-cold water which issues from the base of a low mountain or hill of a gentle ascent for ½ a mile. the mountains are high on either hand leave this gap at the head of this rivulet through which the road passes.’”

“Go on, Billy,” said Uncle Dick. “That’s all he says about actually crossing the Divide at Lemhi Pass! Tell us where they found the village.”

“Well, sir, that was beyond the Lemhi Pass, up in there, thirty miles from here, about. They’d been traveling, all right. Now that was August 12th, and on August 13th they were over, and had their first drink of ‘chaste and icy water out a Columbia river head spring.’ And all the while, back of us, poor old Clark and his men were dragging the boats up the chaste and icy waters of the Jefferson.

“Now that day they got into rough country, other side; but they didn’t care, because that day they saw two women and a man. They run off, too, and Lewis was ‘soar’ again; but all at once they ran plumb into three more — one an old woman, one a young woman, and one a kid. The young woman runs off. Now you ought to seen Cap. Lewis make friends with them people.

“He gives them some beads and awls and some paint. Drewyer don’t know their language, but he talks sign talk. He gets the old girl to call the young woman back. She comes back. Lewis gives her some things, too. He paints up their cheeks with the vermilion paint. From that time he had those womenfolks, young and old, feeding from the hand.

“So now they all start out for the village, which Lewis knew was not far away. Sure enough, they meet about sixty braves riding down the trail; and I reckon if Meriwether Lewis ever felt like stealing horses, it was then.

“Now the women showed their paint and awls and things. Lewis pulls up his shirt sleeve and shows his white skin. The chief gets down and hugs him, though that was the first white man they’d ever met in their lives. Then they had a smoke, like long-lost brothers. Then they went back to the Indian camp, four miles. Then Lewis allows something to eat would go fine, but old Cameahwait, the head man, hands him a few berries and choke cherries, which was all they had to eat. You see, this band was working east now, in the fall, to better hunting range — they had only bows and arrows.

“Lewis sends Drewyer and Shields out to kill some meat. The old chief makes a sand map for Lewis, but says he can’t get through, that way — meaning down the Salmon River, west of the Divide. Anyhow, they’d have no boats, for the timber was no good. So horses begin to look still better to Lewis.

“They had a good party, but nothing to eat, and the Indians were scared when he got them to know there were more white men back of him, on the east side the hill. He couldn’t talk, so he told it in beads, and jockeyed along till he got a half dozen to start back with him. So on August 16th he got back to this place here again, east of the summit, right where we’re camped now, and he had plenty Indians now — and nothing to feed them.

“But he waited to find Clark, and he didn’t know how far downstream Clark was, and he was afraid he’d lose his Indians any minute. So he writes a note to Clark, and gives it to his best man, Drewyer, to carry downstream fast as he can go. Lewis had promised to trade goods for horses, but the Shoshonis didn’t see any boats, and so they got suspicious.

“Well, it was night. Lewis had the head man and about a couple of dozen others in camp. He was plumb anxious. But next day, the 17th, he tells Drewyer to hot-foot down the river, with an Indian or two along with him. About two hours, an Indian came back and said that Lewis had told the truth, for he had seen boats on the river.

“Now between seven and eight o’clock that morning, Clark and Chaboneau and the Indian girl, Sacágawea, all were walking on ahead of the boats, the girl a little ahead. All at once she begins to holler. They look up, and here comes several Indians and Drewyer with the note from Lewis. There’s nothing to it, after that.”

“Go on, Uncle Dick; you tell it now!” demanded Jesse, all excited.

“You mean about Sacágawea?”

“Yes, sir.”

“It sounds like a border romance — and it was a border romance, literally.

“Here, on the river where she used to live, a young Indian woman ran out of the crowd and threw her arms around Sacágawea. It was the girl who had been captured with her at the Three Forks, six years or more ago, by the Minnetarees! They had been slaves together. This other girl had escaped and got back home, by what miracle none of us ever will know.

“But now, when Sacágawea had told her people how good the white men were, there was no longer any question of the friendship all around. As Billy expresses it, there was nothing to it, after that.

“You’d think that was asking us to believe enough? But no. The girl rushes up to Cameahwait, the chief, and puts her arms around him, too. He’s her brother, that’s all!

“Well, this seemed to give them the entrée into the best Shoshoni circles. Beyond this it was a question of details. Lewis stayed here till August 24th, trading for horses for all he was worth. He got five, for five or six dollars each in goods. They cached what goods they could spare or could not take, hid their canoes, and on August 24th bade the old Missouri good-by — for that year at least.

“They now went over west of the Divide, to the main village, to trade for more horses. They cut up their oars and broke up their remaining boxes and made pack saddles to carry their goods.

“Meantime, Clark and eleven men, all the good carpenters, had started on August 18th to cross the Divide and explore down for a route on the stream which we now know took them to the Salmon River. They traveled two days, to the Indian camp. Now the Journal takes page after page, describing these Indians.

“Now it was Clark’s turn to go ahead and find a way by horse or boat down to the Columbia. His notes tell of his troubles: