The Snake River

by Win Blevins

  “You bet!” said Sima, using Flare’s pet expression.

  Chapter Fifteen

  “A month,” said Palea, pointing, entire arm extended. The arm seemed to languish with sadness. “It took us a month to sail here.” Sima knew his friend was homesick a lot, but he had never seen him as forlorn as he was today. Palea didn’t mention it until Sima asked, but he looked constantly toward the western horizon, his eyes far away.

  Flare and Skye had gone across to the wreckage in canoes with the local Chinooks, to make sure there was nothing salvageable. Was it the sight of a wrecked ship and thought of death that saddened Palea, or just the look of the long reach of ocean that separated him from the Hawaiian Islands?

  The two teenage boys sat on a big rock and looked at the gray sky and said nothing more. They were at a great point reaching into the sound, their view toward Hawaii blocked by islands. At Vancouver Mr. Skye and Miss Jewel had shown Sima a big drawing of the earth, as they called it. North America, this piece of land, was huge. Sima saw where the Shoshones lived, and where this coast was, and where the Hudson’s Bay Company’s main houses were in Montreal, and more on a big bay to the north, and where Miss Jewel came from, inland from the ocean to the east. Skye showed them how one captain had sailed all the way around the earth, and how the disease-carrying Cook had found many islands, including Hawaii.

  The earth was so huge, and the drawing so full of knowing. Sima felt awestruck in the presence of such medicine.

  Now he had seen this big water for himself. He had always known about it, always had the sense of it, for the salmon trout (as the white men called them) came from this Pacific Ocean up the Snake River a thousand miles to the streams of his homeland. The Shoshone name for one of the bands of his people was Salmon-Eaters.

  He had not known it was so huge, this ocean, the biggest on the earth—an ocean big enough to throw two or three of the North and South Americas in, and lose them. Yet an ocean the white men sailed easily in their enormous ships. The furs Flare and Mr. Skye intended to recover would cross the ocean to a country named China. The white people had strong medicine to sail such seas.

  In fact, the big ships never stopped circling the earth with goods to trade. They started in England, an island, and took knives, guns, blankets, and other goods to Fort Vancouver for trade to the Indians (a white-man name) for furs. The furs they took to China, and traded them for tea, spices, and a fine cloth called silk. These items they took to London and exchanged them for knives, guns, and blankets again. And so on, a ceaseless circling.

  Sima understood circling. Men lived in a circular tipi to acknowledge the never-ending circle of a day, a year, a life, the life of the tribe. The circle honored life, but the white men had no sense of this honoring. He didn’t understand the point of this circling until they mentioned money again. Money explained everything.

  All this white-man knowing seemed an indescribable grandeur to Sima. They said it was for money, and often they did seem small of spirit. Yet surely not even white men would have ventured forth for all this knowing only for money.

  So now he had seen the big water, and he was glad.

  His friend, though, suffered from seeing. It made Palea more than homesick—it made him angry. Set him to thinking about how white men had destroyed his people and had ripped him away from his home. It made Palea sullen. And there was no point in that. That only turned things nasty.

  Sima saw the canoes start back from the wreckage. They’d spent almost no time there—there must be nothing to save. He studied Palea’s long face. “Let’s meet them on the beach,” he said.

  “Bastards,” Palea muttered, and started down.

  “Stay by my side regardless, lad. Keep your hands off your weapon unless you see me actually fire.” Flare repeated for emphasis, “Don’t even touch your weapon unless I fire. You might get us all killed.”

  Sima felt nothing in the world, not the earth under his feet, as keenly as he felt the new rifle in his hands. Flare had taught him to shoot it, and at a reasonable range he could hit. He had fantasies of protecting Flare by felling an enemy. He still couldn’t use the word “Indian,” even in his mind. The village was Chickeele, he told himself instead.

  He was proud not to have been left in camp with Mr. Skye to guard the horses and gear, like Palea.

  They walked into the village boldly, every man holding a rifle. The Chickeeles didn’t look at them, except for some children who had no discipline yet. The women hurried into the lodges, taking the children, and the men stood at the entrances.

  Flare was pleased that it fell into place quickly. An old man appeared carrying his pipe, and followed by three men in their thirties and forties. They invited the whites to smoke and talk in a big cedar hut. Flare assured Sima they’d be safe. They left their rifles outside under a close watch. Flare took only Sima inside with him. The Indians would think that strange, but bugger them.

  They smoked. Speaking in the trade language of the region, Chinook, they exchanged expressions of goodwill.

  Flare occasionally summed up the talk for Sima—the lad needed to learn. Out of politeness, Flare waited until the proper time to bring up the issue. Then he told them matter-of-factly what the Hudson’s Bay Company knew of the wreck, the loss of cargo and life, and said he knew the tribe’s young men had killed some of the sailors and had stolen a lot of furs. He met their eyes.

  He got polite denials.

  The company would not accept these furs in trade, Flare went on. It demanded they be turned over freely. Now. For return to their rightful owners, the Russians who hunted furs from the post at Sitka. Flare’s tone said he would tolerate no disagreement, or even hesitation.

  More denials, still polite. Oh, perhaps this band had a few items plundered from the ship, items they’d gotten in trade from other Indians. As a gesture of goodwill toward the whites, they would give Flare these few honestly acquired items, to show their hearts were good.

  Flare waited. It was done. Two oilskin slickers, several knives, a sailmaker’s awl. Not a single fur.

  So Flare smoked once more and made a promise—that he would find the furs in this village, lodge by lodge, take them by force if necessary, and return them to the Russians. He said all this holding the pipe, and told them he spoke the truth when he touched the pipe. Which was by God true.

  When he repeated all this to Sima, he added, “Keep your wits about you now, lad. Don’t touch your knife. If we have to shoot, we’ll likely be left for the vultures here.”

  As they came out of the lodge, Flare ordered the men to take their rifles and search the entire village, inch by inch. Tolerate no interference, he said, “and for good Christ’s sake harm no one.”

  Then men went in pairs. Flare and Sima stayed in front of the ledge, in front of the village. A half dozen Chickeeles stood in a triangle around them.

  Suddenly Sima understood that he and Flare were hostages. If anything went wrong during the search, if one person resisted and was hurt, these Chickeeles would take Flare and Sima prisoner, or kill them.

  Sima felt his heart beat crazily in his chest. He looked helplessly at Flare. The man was simply looking around, his eyes keen, his face calm. Sima had no idea how Flare could do that.

  An outcry in French from the far end of the camp. Flare smiled reassuringly at Sima. Sima looked around for a way to run, just in case. There was no cover anywhere, except a boulder as tall as an aspen opposite the council lodge, on the side of camp away from the creek. In case of trouble, Sima decided he would run like hell for the boulder.

  One of the French-Canadians came toward them with an armload of otter skins, haranguing at a Chickeele man in French and jerking the furs away from the man’s hands.

  Flare quietly told Sima to take the furs. The Frenchie went back to the search, still barking at the Chickeele in a language the man couldn’t understand.

  Flare and Sima stood by the furs in the center of the village. Two more Frenchies brought stacks of otter skins
in and laid them down. Flare watched attentively, like when he played cards. Like nothing was at stake except a couple of bets.

  Sima’s skin was feverish. They weren’t going to get out of here alive. Oh, God, he wanted Ribbon again before he died.

  Skins kept coming. They were going to have to bring the packhorses even to get the peltries out of the village. Several pistols appeared in the hands of Frenchies.

  Separately, two of the Indians around Flare and Sima disappeared surreptitiously. They came back with guns, old fusils.

  One of the Frenchies was coming toward them, yelling at a Chickeele woman, and she was yelling back and trying to yank the furs away from him. Flare just watched them calmly.

  When the two got close, the Frenchie jerked the furs away from the woman one more time, and she fell down. Then she jumped up, yelling and screeching at the Indians around Flare and Sima, pointing at the Frenchie and the furs, stomping her foot, demanding that they do something.

  The Indians stirred uneasily. Flare stared at them, man after man.

  Suddenly the woman bit the Frenchie’s arm. He dropped the furs on the pile and backhanded her. Hard—she went sprawling.

  The first Sima heard of it was a metallic click.

  One Indian raised a fusil toward Flare.

  Flare looked hard at the Indian and made no move.

  The muzzle swung into a line with Flare.

  The crash of a shot.

  Flare grabbed the old chief leader and put his knife to the man’s throat.

  Echoes of the shot through the village.

  Sima didn’t understand.

  The Indian with the cocked fusil sprawled on the ground, bloody on the chest.

  Every Indian had a knife or tomahawk out. The lone remaining armed man held his fusil on Flare.

  “Easy, lad,” rasped Flare, his eyes on Indians.

  Two Indians kept glancing up nervously.

  On top of a boulder stood Mr. Skye. He held one rifle on the group. Another lay at his feet. A Frenchie stood up behind him, rifle at the ready.

  Skye roared, “Who else wants to die, you cowards?”

  Flare translated the words into Chinook. He brought his knife blade up harder under the old chief’s chin. He permitted himself a small, fierce smile.

  The old chief said nothing.

  The Frenchies came walking and watching, their guns at full cock. Now they surrounded the Indians around Flare and Sima.

  The old chief squeezed a few words out. The Indians grumbled. Stepped back. Lowered their weapons.

  Flare nodded at the Frenchies to get the stolen goods.

  “Now let’s walk out of here, lad,” said Flare loudly. “Slow and easy.” There was a peculiar joy in his voice.

  He started backing up, knife at the old chief’s throat. The old chief backed with him. Flare whispered into his ear a sweet song of death.

  They made the camp secure against attack. It would take the Indians time to make medicine, Flare said, but a head start wouldn’t work. The Chickeeles could kill every man jack of them if they were determined. But the price would be higher than the Indians were willing to pay.

  When the leaders came in to make peace, Flare was still hard with them. The old chief was going to Fort Vancouver, he said. He could go as a prisoner. Or the Chickeeles could send several men as guests of the Hudson’s Bay Company. The great McLoughlin would be pleased to receive them as guests, he said, and would give them many presents. And then every spring and every fall they would trade their furs to Dale, the trader at Fort Nisqually.

  It was a clear deal. The Indians took it.

  On the morning of the third day, Flare said to Sima and Palea, “We’re clear of trouble.” The Chickeeles had truly accepted.

  Palea and Sima had trouble accepting the sight of the four chiefs riding in the middle of the brigade. They were half guests, half hostages.

  Sima asked what would happen to them at Vancouver. The chiefs would be wined, dined, given presents, feted in every way, and overawed, he said. They would see the fort and the crops and livestock and sawmill and military power, Flare said, and would decide cooperation was the only policy. That was the way of the Honorable Company. It would work. It always did.

  Sima said uncertainly, testing it out, “What if we did wrong, Flare? Maybe we did.”

  “Wrong to save our own lives, lads?” He included Palea. Palea seemed to be going through some bitter passage of his own, and was full of complaints about the world.

  “Wrong to go there,” said Sima. “Wrong to meddle.”

  “They stole, lad. They murdered.”

  “Not from us. Not our people.”

  “Lads, if we tolerate stealing from any white men, they’ll steal from all white men.”

  “Palea and I aren’t white men.”

  “You are, half. Palea may well be.”

  They rode in silence for a moment.

  “We Shoshones don’t set ourselves up to rule everyone else.”

  “Aye, lads. Believe me, half the time it seems right enough, half the time I think it’s a rotten business. The whole time I can’t figure out another way to live here.”

  “Then get out,” snapped Palea.

  “The world is mine to walk,” said Flare equably. “I’ll not have it otherwise.”

  “Your Hudson’s Bay Company is stinking up the earth,” Palea said.

  Maybe the missionaries had the right idea, Sima said. They brought very few guns, they worked by persuasion, not force, and they had a doctor to heal the sick.

  Flare eyed the lad and answered, “I cannot speak about the missionaries.” He thought he’d best say nothing against them, not yet. The lad was promised to go to the mission for the winter, and learn reading and writing. “As a Hudson’s Bay man,” he declared, “I’ve done me best to make things work right.”

  In the early days of the Northwest Company, he said, the traders gave liquor to the Indians, and the destruction of white and Indian life was terrible. Since Flare got started with the HBC, the company had refused to let Indians have liquor. He himself had applied this policy strictly, and it turned out best. The company also forbade wanton killing of Indians, and severely punished men who drew blood without cause.

  “But everything’s your way, your white-man way. Even ‘right’ means your white-man idea of right. You get what you want. And you want to rule.”

  “Nay,” said Flare. “I want to live.”

  “How are the Indians of this Pacific Coast living since you came here?” Palea said challengingly.

  “They’re dying,” said Flare. “Just like the Sandwich Islanders. Hawaiians,” he corrected himself. He looked sympathetically at Palea. “Three quarters of those near Vancouver are already dead from diseases their bodies can’t withstand. I don’t know why.”

  “It’s what you really want,” Palea said hotly. Sima was about to burst in, too.

  Flare held up a staying hand. “What I want?” Flare chuckled a little. “Nay, not a bit of it. Think to the future. When the Indians and the wild lands are gone, there’ll be a world run by rich swells, tight-assed preachers, and power-mad sheriffs. They’ll put fences everywhere, tax our whiskey, and tell us no women without a bloody marriage license. No place to roam for the likes of me and Mr. Skye, come those days.”

  He grinned at the youths. “In the meantime, we can waggle our tails and live.”

  He chucked his horse and trotted ahead. He muttered to himself, “If we can stay alive.”

  Palea broached the subject in a gingerly way, as if afraid of disapproval from even Sima.

  It was the middle of the night. The two youths had drawn the midnight watch. They were careful to stay awake and keep their eyes working. Skye had threatened them with bodily harm if they fell asleep on watch, and they feared he meant it. Plus, he had a nasty habit of trying to sneak up on them during the watch and crack their heads with belaying pins.

  “Among the Shoshones,” Palea began, “are there…?” The word he
finally used was incomprehensible to Sima. Palea fidgeted, unable to plunge forward. Finally he said in his soft, melodious English, “Men who love other men.”

  Sima looked at him big-eyed. “Yes,” he said simply.

  Among the Shoshone there were teni-wiaphs, men-who-would-be-women. Men who lived entirely as women, dressed like women, used the language of women, performed only women’s tasks—and married men. They also had some sacred functions, a special place in various ceremonies. They lived as they were told to live in a dream. But Sima had been cautioned by Flare not to talk about men-who-would-be-women. The subject made white people crazy, he said.

  “I am one,” said Palea.

  Sima gawked at his friend. He thought of the two men-who-would-be-women in his own band. They acted like women. The white trappers who visited never even understood that they didn’t have women’s bodies. If Palea was one, why did he dress like a man, act like a man?

  “I am in love with an older man,” Palea said sheepishly. “Very fat, very kind, a lot of fun. A generation ago, we would have been together. Now the missionaries forbid it.” He laughed ironically. “White people love to forbid many things, but this one…” He made a throat-cutting motion. “My father is dead. To avoid humiliation, my uncle sent me away with the Englishmen.” The youth was miserable, near tears.

  Sima looked at his friend in the eyes. He didn’t know what to say. He tried at last, “It must be different among you.”

  “Why?” Palea was anguished.

  “Among the Shoshones,” Sima said carefully, “a man-who-would-be-woman follows his medicine. He has no choice. It is strange medicine, but it is his.”

  “And people are not ashamed of him?” Palea asked painfully.

  “It is his medicine,” said Sima, emphasizing every word.

  Palea nodded. He pondered a moment, biting his lip. “I had to ask. You’re the first person I’ve known well enough to ask who wasn’t a white man.

  “My father’s uncle is also a man-who-would-be-woman. But he has to dress as a man and pretend to be a man. He hates the white men for that. Before the missionaries came, he says, only ten or fifteen years ago, Hawaiians honored their men-who-would-be-women. But the missionaries said it was worse than fornication, worse than stealing, worse than murder. Finally the people got ashamed of it.”