Sacajawea (47 page)

Sacajawea wanted to follow Captain Clark. She knew he was on the correct river. But she had taken cold during the days of drizzle and squally rain. She felt quite miserable. She did not tell the captains she felt ill; she was ashamed of showing any weakness. She would not tell Charbonneau, either. He would not know what to do for her. He would accuse her of giving the sniffles to him or his son. But by the time the men returned, she was feeling feverish.

Pierre Cruzatte argued with Captain Lewis, saying the North Fork was the river for the expedition to follow.

Captain Clark’s party had gone forty miles up the South Fork, and found snow-covered mountains to the north and south—more evidence that the South Fork led directly to the Continental Divide. Captain Lewis’s party had gone upstream sixty miles on the northern branch, which he named Maria’s River, after his cousin in Albemarle, Maria Wood. He reckoned if Clark and Gass could name rivers for girls, he, Lewis, could do the same.

The captains were in complete agreement that the South Fork was the correct branch to follow, but Cruzatte stoutly maintained they ought to take the North Fork. He had great skill as a waterman, but he had no knowledge of topography. The other men, knowing nothing of the problems, agreed with Cruzatte. Suddenly Captain Lewis had an idea. He brought Sacajawea into the circle of men and asked Captain Clark to find the elk hide that the Wolf Chief had made for them. The hide pictured the Missouri dipping south of the sunset where there was a series of falls. “A creation of the Great Spirit, this river scolds all other rivers,” the Wolf Chief had told Captain Clark.

The men crowded around the painted hide. “Now, where are those waterfalls?” asked Bill Bratton.

“Up the South Fork,” replied Sacajawea, standing on the outside of the men’s circle. “Long ago my relatives roamed around the falls. My people tell stories of them.”

“Have you seen them?” asked Cruzatte skeptically.

“No, I never went there with my people,” she said. “But the falls are there. Put your knife in the ground and put your ear on the handle.”

“I can’t hear a damn thing!” shouted Cruzatte. “I guess there are too many big feet tramping around.”

“Smell,” Sacajawea suggested, pointing her nose southward.
¹

Charbonneau laughed, pointing toward his woman. “She thinks she tell a bunch of men where to go! Ha! That squaw got some skeeters in her head buzzing around. That’s what she hears.”

Sacajawea felt fever in her body that evening, and she asked Charbonneau to feed Pomp. “I am worn out from nursing him.”

Charbonneau looked at her. “I know that papoose, he is all mouth, but you are getting lazy. I don’t know nothing how to feed the
enfant.
He is too little for me. Besides I got no titties.”

She walked a short distance away and sat upon a bunch of soft grass, too weary to go farther. “Bring a bowl of thin soup from the cooking meat and a spoon. I will feed him.”

“You not nurse him?” asked Charbonneau, not believing she would suggest feeding his son soup.

Her sickness had started in an ordinary enough manner. With the rain and dampness she had caught cold and the chills. Her body ached. Then out of contrariness she had eaten several clusters of wild red currants, even though the berries were barely colored. That night she had tossed under her robe, and by morning she had had abdominal cramps, which she had not admitted to until now with Charbonneau. She sat up and told him it was nothing but underripe currants.

“Non,
it cannot be,” he said. “Currants do not cause such cramping. I have ate them myself.”

“What is it, then?” she asked, afraid of the griping that built up in her body as though it had turned on her.

“Charbonneau knows! You are with another
enfant!”
he exploded. “You let yourself be mauled by one of these men. Now I know—it is
le capitaine.
You are always gathering the flowers in the woods for that Red Hair. What else do you do in the brush? I, Charbonneau, am no fool! I can figure that one out. It is the nature of Indian women to lie in the brush, like a bitch.”

“Oh, no!” she screamed. “You have a mind of scum and think men and women do only one thing. It is not true. Go talk with Chief Red Hair.” The pain became worse, and she doubled over. She cried, at first low and indistinctly; then her cry rose shrilly.

There was nothing Charbonneau could think of to do about her. He could move her farther toward the spring and away from the camp so that the men would not hear her cries. He did that, and she slept some until he woke her up and muttered fiercely about her selfishness, callousness, cowardice, clutching her desperately so she would not leave him alone with a small child. He talked out of spite and hatred of her. It was hard for her to understand. There was nothing she wanted him to do except to see that the baby was taken care of.

“It is like a squaw to get a fellow in a spot. The men will tease me—Holy Mother, they will tease when she becomes large with another man’s child. Damn fugging Indians!” He kicked at the grass she was sitting on, and she fell forward in a faint. When he pulled her up, he realized that her arm was unnaturally warm. He laid her out on the grass and tried to think. With the heel of his hand he pounded his shaggy head.

He looked over at the swamp grown up with reeds and red willows, then up at an eagle coasting alone over him. His eyes lowered to the cream-colored lilies clustered in the undergrowth like grass heads in a hay-field. He remembered seeing Sacajawea walking through the lilies to gather the wild currants and gooseberries, which were not ripe, and he also remembered her with an armful of wild roses. Their pink blossoms with large yellow stamens and sticky stems covered the hillsides. Captain Clark would gather his own roses! The sky got red and then dark. Charbonneau could see the campfire and hear the men joking and singing. He remembered something else. Chief Kakoakis had said something about getting rid of things early. What exactly had he said? Was it the beaver castoreum? Beaver castoreum was good for nearly everything else. Maybe that was it. It was worth a try. He got up.

“No use keeping on with this,” he said. “I’m going for soup to feed the
enfant.”
That was not honest, but he patted the sleeping squaw and left to find where his son was perched in the cradleboard. When he found him he said, “He is too large for that bed. My son grow big!”

Sacajawea stirred and awakened. She was ashamed of her weakness and wished desperately she had not eaten the berries. She began to wonder if she would die. People left alone and helpless have been known to drift on to the Land of the Shadows. She was afraid to fall asleep. Her head seemed hot and her mouth dry. Her throat hurt if she swallowed, and her bones ached.

Charbonneau was back with a leather pouch. “Dried beaver castoreum ought to work the trick,” he said, taking out two or three round stones and pounding them on a flat rock.

“Where is Pomp? Did he get soup?”

“Oh, well, he is sleeping now. This is the important job.”

“What is it for?” she asked, smelling the strong odor of beaver.

“Lie back,
ma chérie.
This is what your smart Charbonneau remembers from Kakoakis. He know many papooses not good for the squaw.”

“I am not having a papoose. You know that. I do not talk with a split tongue. Take that smelly stuff away!”

“I will not be the laughingstock of these men. The men are jealous of Charbonneau already because I have a squaw and they do not. I don’t boast about our sleeping arrangements. It was not I who violated the Indian custom of no cohabitation for one year after a birth. I did not tell you to refuse to keep my bed warm. They would find out you kept another warm. Spread your legs, damn you. Don’t fight with your man!”

He sat on her legs to hold them apart.

The blood pumped audibly in her ears, and she closed her eyes.

He jabbed and pushed his long forefinger with a gob of beaver castoreum mixed with buffalo fat up, up as far as he could go. He held her. His fingernail cut into soft tissue.

She stifled her scream and tried to twist from his grasp. He placed his fat leg higher and jabbed once more, thrusting his finger up and down. She caught her breath and gave a loud sob.

“Shut up. Charbonneau fix you. See, your man know where to poke, eh? I not forget. Tomorrow the blood, she rush out along with what is left
of l’enfant
that has now got hold of your insides. We knock him out!” He thumped on her belly, pummeled her to and fro, and Sacajawea gave up attempting to hold on to her courage. The fact that he was responsible for new pain seemed to release her from any obligation to stand it, and she turned on him, crying and accusing.

“You are a beast. You torture me. You leave your child uncared for. Take the child to York or to LePage. They will care for him.” She sobbed and could not talk further.

Charbonneau got up, wiped his hands on his leggings, and slowly picked up the cradleboard.
“Mon petit,”
he said to the sleeping child. “Your
maman
not make eyes at anyone but me. I fix her. Your
papa,
he’s a smart one.”

Sacajawea was engulfed in a stupor. She remained in the same position until the campfire was low. Then her senses slowly began to revive; she realized she was lying on the ground, that no one knew where she was except her man, and that Charbonneau had pushed the evil-smelling castoreum inside her.

In the night silence, she could hear the gurgling of the spring. It was difficult to move, but she was determined to clean herself. She started toward the spring, then looked back at the campfire on top of the hill; it began to swim, dip, and sway off center. Her legs trembled, and she hung on to a small juniper with clammy hands. She found her way to the water. It was cool. Slowly she removed her moccasins and put them to one side.

“No, better put them in my lap before I lose them.” Next moment, she forgot all about them. She took off her tunic and laid it next to a stone. She was shaking violently from head to foot; she had to lean back against the damp earth.

She got up and squatted near the water, scrubbing all over with sand. She did not want any of the greasy beaver castoreum left on her. Something warm ran down the inside of one leg. She scrubbed. What had her man done? She was bleeding. Bright red blood streamed down her leg. She felt weak and sat down. It was not time for this! Big beads of sweat stood on her forehead. She pulled herself out of the cold water and felt her inner heat. The outer cold made her head light. She fumbled with her tunic; finally she had it over her shoulders and fastened at the waist. She found her moccasins floating near the bank of the spring and slipped into them, pushing the water out with her feet. She swayed toward the base of a willow.

“—Come on, Sacajawea, help me a bit. Put your head forward—that’s a girl. Can you make it up the hill? Say something!”

She put her face down, crying silently; she had clasped her hands together with a grip of iron, but soon she had to break the grip to wipe the tears away. She lay thus until the paroxysm had passed and she felt she could master herself. The inner heat had solidified into a strong pressure on the back of her neck.

“There’s a warm fire up yonder. Capitaine Clark sent me looking for you.
Sacre,
you can’t stay here all night. This is your friend, LePage. Big Tess said you were not well and went for a walk. It’s not like you to be so foolish.”

Whenever she tried to speak, her throat closed. When she opened her eyes, she felt she was staring at the ground miles below, between two sloping hills. Then she saw that the hills were her legs, and her head was being pushed between them. In the process, her middle was doubled up. It felt as if somebody were squashing it between two flat stones covered with the spines of the prickly pear.

“Haaaiii!”
she gasped, trying to straighten up, trying to relieve the intolerable pressure inside her body. “Let me up!” she whispered hoarsely.

The weight on her neck instantly lifted, and she straightened her back. Crouched beside her, Baptiste LePage looked anxiously into her face. The darkness by the river made his hair seem to be hanging in long strands from under a fur cap. She was sure he did not wear a cap.

“You must have fainted!” he exclaimed in awe. “Luckily I came looking along here. Whatever happened? Did Big Tess give you a drop too much rum? He came into camp asking for a dram. Capitaine Clark gave it to him, believing it was for you. He said you had a chill.”

Sitting up had done nothing to relieve the cramping agony inside her. She clasped her forearms over the pain and bit her lips. It was deep inside her belly, agonizing.

“You feel hot!” LePage cried. “Come on, you can’t stay here in the night dampness.”

Fright began to take hold of her again. She felt she had to tell him something. It was the first time for her bleeding after the child was born, and it was a great hemorrhage. Having him know that much made her feel able to stand it.

“Maybe in a few days, when all this clears up, you will be all right,” comforted LePage. “I’ll tell one of
les capitaines.
They know what to do for most every kind of bellyache.” He knew not a thing about female problems, but he was aware the Indians viewed these things with no greater propriety than talking about how to fashion a new moccasin. They were not stuffy or Victorian in their explanations or discussions of sickness and sex.

“It’s not far. On your feet. That’s a good girl.” Coaxing and hauling, he managed to get her upright. She clung to LePage and tried to keep her nails from digging into his arm. With the other hand she pressed her belly. It made the pain worse, but she kept hugging it, holding it. With LePage urging her, she put one foot ahead of the other and started to move. She talked herself into so much courage that the pain died down for a moment, and she relaxed her hold. Then it came again like a whiplash.

Without protest she sat by the fire drinking cup after cup of strong willow-bark tea.

“She fainted,” explained LePage to Captain Lewis; then quietly he told him about the loss of blood she was suffering. “Someone ought to get packings of cattail fluff for her.”