So Wild a Dream

by Win Blevins

  The message?

  “That’s for General Ashley’s ears.”

  Soon, though, it was known to every man on both boats. Henry wanted Ashley to trade whatever was necessary for lots of horses and bring them. Traveling to the Indian villages to trade, hunting the beaver, all this required mobility, which meant horses. The price of a horse in Missouri was doubled when you got to the villages of the Sioux, and doubled again up where Henry was. The firm needed horses.

  Someone yelled, “We’ll get them from the Rees.”

  Edgy, crackling laughter everywhere.

  Sometimes the Rees were cordial. Two months ago in March, though, they beat and robbed hirelings from Cedar Fort. Not long after, they got nervy and attacked the fort itself. The mountain men—that’s what the fur men were calling themselves—fought the attack off, killing two Rees and wounding several others. One of those killed was the son of Grey Eyes, a principal chief.

  Plenty of reason to approach the villages with sharp eyes and ears.

  Sam gaped at the two villages there on the right bank, less than a quarter mile apart on a big horseshoe bend in the river. The earthen lodges were surrounded by pickets, new ones.

  “They’re ready for an attack,” said Diah Smith.

  “They won’t get one from us,” answered Ashley. He was glassing the lower village with binoculars. “I think there’s a ditch just inside the pickets.”

  “Probably expecting trouble from us or from the Sioux,” said Smith.

  Sam didn’t say much in this crowd, but he liked to be near Ashley and hear what was going on. Ashley had said any friend of Hannibal MacKye was a friend of his, and he stuck to it.

  Anchors were being set in midstream.

  “If they trade us horses, where shall we hold them?” asked Smith.

  “On the far bank,” said Ashley.

  Smith shook his head. “I’ve seen Indians over there already.” The ground was high and broken, with lots of good places to hide.

  “On that bar then.” A wide sand bar bordered the bank below the villages.

  “No really good place,” said Smith.

  “We’ll have to move the land party away fast, then. Sam, bring me Mr. Rose.”

  Sam took the small skiff, dropped down to the other keelboat, and called out for Rose.

  Edward Rose was a dark-skinned man, by his claim a mulatto, sired by a white man and birthed by a Cherokee-Negro woman. He looked scary—his face was much scarred, and his nose had been bitten off, he said in a fight. He’d been in Indian country a long time, and said he’d lived with both the Rees and the Crows. Not that he said much. Most of the men didn’t trust him. But he was invaluable to Ashley, because he knew the country and spoke both Crow and Ree.

  “We need horses to travel in Crow country. We’ll send a party from here on horseback. That’s if the Rees will trade horses. Will you guide them?”

  Rose nodded yes.

  “What route will you take?”

  “Drop down to Cheyenne River, follow west.”

  That river was about seventy miles back down the Missouri. They talked a little about practicalities. Rose wanted to know how many men. Ashley said it depended on how many horses they could get. Rose said a party of at least twenty was needed for safety. Ashley answered that he was thinking even bigger.

  “Smith, will you command the party?”

  “Sir?”

  “You’re the most experienced man here. These voyageurs are good hired men to run boats, not traders and trappers.”

  “I’d be honored, sir.”

  This Jedediah Smith always seemed a little formal.

  “How do you see this, Rose?”

  “The Rees are dangerous. Always. The Sioux maybe troublesome. Once a hoss gets to Crow country, he’s safe. To them I’m a big man.” He said it matter of factly, not like a boast, but Sam wondered.

  Just then two Indian men, chiefs from their dress, came down the bank to the sand bar, making signs.

  “Sam,” said Ashley, “get the skiff. We’ll go parley on the beach.”

  In half an hour they were back on board, with Grey Eyes in tow. Chief Little Soldier had declined to visit the boat. To Ashley’s surprise and delight, Grey Eyes agreed to come, alone. Rowing them out to the Packet, Sam wondered why he didn’t act angry about the death of his son, and why Grey Eyes wasn’t worried about his own safety.

  They sat on the lazy board, normally the pilot’s spot. Ashley gave Grey Eyes several big twists of tobacco, a beautiful six-point light blue blanket, and some red cloth. He had coffee served.

  At length Ashley began. “We had nothing to do with the fight at the Cedar Fort. Nothing. I can’t be responsible for what every white man in the country does.”

  Rose translated, and the chief’s eyes said he understood.

  “I promise that the Great White Father will investigate. If the white men deserve punishment, he will punish them. In the meantime, we’d like to trade with your people.”

  Grey Eyes told Rose that the Rees had to consider this matter in council. His expression gave nothing away.

  Sam rowed Grey Eyes and Rose back to the beach. The morning sun lit the chief’s face but shrouded his deep-set eyes in shadow. Sam couldn’t help wondering.

  They all wondered. Ninety men on two keelboats lounged in the sun and wondered whether the Rees would be friendly and trade with them, or rain death down on them. Every man measured the distance from the pickets to the boats with his eye.

  That afternoon Grey Eyes came back to the beach. Sam rowed Ashley and Rose in to talk to him. Grey Eyes motioned them to sit. Sam couldn’t help looking up at the pickets, to see if any Rees with arms lurked there. He saw no one.

  “We have good hearts toward you,” Grey Eyes said. “We will trade.”

  Or that was how Rose translated the chief’s words from his own language. Sam had wondered downriver, at the Sioux camps, how much the two peoples misunderstood each other because of translations. Did Grey Eyes really speak of hearts, for instance, or use another expression? When Ashley spoke of the Great White Father, what words did Rose use in Ree? Sam figured the idea of a distant white man being his father, well, that would be absurd to Grey Eyes. It was absurd to Sam.

  Ashley said how glad he was to be able to trade with his friends the Rees. He would especially like to trade for forty to fifty horses—he planned to send about forty men west by land. Rose flicked his eyes sideways at Ashley but said nothing. Sam suspected he didn’t like the Rees knowing their plans.

  Grey Eyes answered with a suggestion that Ashley pitch his tent on this beach in the morning for trading. The Rees would bring the horses then.

  Ashley nodded and looked at Rose. The interpreter made some statements in the Ree language, apparently compliments, assurances, and protestations of good faith.

  Grey Eyes stood, turned, and left without another word.

  “I’ve never been so relieved in my life,” said Ashley.

  “You damn well should be,” Rose said. “It shines to wake up alive.”

  Ashley decided not to trade from a tent on the beach. He had Sam and two voyageurs ferry trade goods in with the two skiffs, the small boat rowed by one man and the big one by two. That way most of his trade goods stayed on the boats at any given time. The Rees would not be able to swoop down and make a bonanza in one raid.

  In return Ashley wanted horses and buffalo robes. His great aim was beaver pelts, which the men of the fur business called “plews” from a French word. Most of the thick hide was not germane to Ashley—he had no use for the whole, or for the thick guard hairs that kept the beaver warm in cold mountain streams. He wanted the beaver’s underfur, which made the finest felt known, and fine felt made fine hats. Frontiersmen wanted beaver hats. Gentlemen and ladies in the great cities of the East wanted them. The monied, the aristocracy, even the crowned heads of Europe wanted them. Beaver was a fortune. But the Rees were too far downriver to have beaver skins.

  John Jacob Astor had
made his fortune in the trade. Pierre Chouteau and the other entrepreneurs of St. Louis were in mid-stride making theirs. Now Ashley intended to make his by journeying to the most prolific beaver country left on this fertile continent, the Rocky Mountains. It was risky not only for the trappers and traders, who might lose their hair, but for the owner of the company. Last spring, for instance, one of Ashley’s keelboats sank, and he lost ten thousand dollars in trade goods. Trapping parties got robbed—sometimes they lost everything and got left helpless on the prairie. A man who outfitted fur brigades could lose a fortune as quickly as he could make one.

  All day long Ashley bargained. To the Indians went cotton cloth, three- or four- or six-point blankets (the points indicating that it was worth that many beaver plews), metal tools, and other bounty of an industrial society. Ashley gave them everything that was customary in the fur trade but high-quality guns and whiskey. Whiskey was too dangerous, right at the moment. The Sioux didn’t want the Rees to have good guns. Neither did the mountain men. Instead Ashley traded them the cheap, inaccurate fusils.

  In return he got nineteen horses and more than two hundred buffalo robes. A good day’s work.

  Until one chief insisted on trading for the good American guns. Ashley refused. The chief got loud and belligerent. In a few minutes Ashley had himself, his men, and his merchandise back on the keelboats, and double watches posted. All was safe except for those nineteen horses and the Kentucks on the beach who guarded them.

  As everyone else was packing to leave the beach, Ashley told Diah Smith, “We ought to move these horses to the other side.” He glanced up at the logs picketing the downstream village, and Sam knew he was thinking of the guns that might stick over them.

  “Not enough time,” Smith said. “I’ll take charge of them for tonight and move them in the morning.”

  Sam could hardly believe his ears—he wouldn’t have camped on this beach, right below the pickets, for a moment.

  “I’ll need men.”

  On the Packet and then the Rocky Mountains, Ashley asked for volunteers for the beach detail. Nearly a score of the American backwoodsmen stepped forward. Not a single voyageur came forward—not one Pierre, Jacques, René, or Yves. Sam felt humiliated for them. After a deep breath, he stepped forward himself.

  “No,” Ashley shook his head, “I want you with me.” Sam suspected Ashley of protecting him, and he felt mixed about that.

  Sam and a huge voyageur took the big skiff and rowed the Kentucks to the beach. Sam couldn’t keep his eyes off his fellow oarsman, who was contaminated by his countrymen.

  As the Kentucks splashed through the shallow water onto the shore, Sam looked at them with an odd longing. Diah Smith gave him a thin smile. “Don’t worry. Probably nothing will happen tonight.” Men were already gathering driftwood for a bonfire. They would be all eyes and all ears all night. Sam looked up at the pickets and wondered what dawn would bring.

  The night was perfectly quiet, except for one thing Sam thought was incredible. Several men took the small skiff without asking and went into the villages. A huge French-Canadian, Gideon, rowed them in. When he brought the skiff back, he came to the bow and sat next to Sam on watch. He offered a hand. “Gideon Poor Boy.”

  Sam shook the hand “Sam Morgan.”

  “Ze Americans call me Poor Boy. Real name Dubois.” He let out a deep chuckle. He was a barrel-chested man sporting a big, silky black beard with streaks of silver in it. “Some men, zey want ze woman big-big, no?”

  Sam felt like he had to answer. “I guess.”

  “Ze cock, it is divining rod. You hold it in front of you, it lead you to trouble.” Gideon laughed. He looked around the boat. Men were sitting up everywhere, talking. “No man sleeps tonight.”

  Sam didn’t answer.

  Gideon got out his small white clay pipe, filled it, and lit it.

  “You think French are coward, no? Coward because we do not go to beach, be ready to fight?”

  “Yeah.”

  Gideon chuckled. “Different men, they are brave for different things. Zese men, they run rapids that would make ze Kaintocks get out and walk. I swear it.”

  This didn’t impress Sam much.

  “Some things we don’t like. Don’t like ride horse so much, don’t like shooting war.”

  He fished out a second clay pipe and filled it. “Here,” he said, handing it to Sam. “Enjoy.”

  Sam took the pipe and thought what the hell. Gideon lit it for him.

  “I am not French, exactement, you know? I am Jew.”

  “Jew?” Sam had never even seen a Jew, as far as he knew.

  “Oui. My father, he is Montreal Jew. My mother, she is Cree.”

  “Indian?”

  “Oui. My father, he give me name.” He pronounced it the English way, GI-dee-on, the first syllable as in GI-dee-up.

  “I thought you were called zhee-day-on.”

  “I like the way Americans say it. Whatever, it means ‘strong in battle.’ So I must be brave.”

  “What kind of man was your father?”

  “A fur trader. I am hivernant. Understand?”

  Sam shook his head no. He drew the smoke into his mouth and puffed it out. Tasted pretty good.

  “A winter man. I spend two winters in the interieur. The voyageurs, they are most engagé, hired men who paddle the canoes to Fort William on Lac Superieur in spring, carry things trade to Indians. Then summer, paddle back to Montreal, carry furs back. Compris?”

  Sam nodded. He blew smoke at the moon, and wondered if he could learn to blow smoke rings.

  “Some men, they are choisi—chose?—to stay the winter at the forts, among the Indians. These men become—how you say?—very tough. Strong against cold. Make long snowshoe trips in bad, bad weather. Sometimes carry a message, maybe, from one fort to another. Very, very tough.”

  Gideon tapped the ashes out of his pipe into the river and put it away. “You like that pipe?”

  “Yeah.”

  “You keep. Ashley, he issue you some tobacco.” Gideon chuckled. “And charge you mountain price.”

  Gideon refilled his own pipe. “Once I saw two men, Chouinard and Robles, brag big about how very brave. One man tell a story how much courage he has, other man tells a bigger one. Chouinard tops Robles story, Robles tops Chouinard.

  “Not long they get angry. ‘We fight,’ says Chouinard, ‘see who is more man.’

  “All men listening say, ‘No, no, not fair.’ Chouinard is greatly small, Robles greatly big.

  “But Chouinard, he insist. They make ready. Throw off blankets and pouches that get in the way. Set rifles and pistols aside, but not knives. Make big circle of men watching, fighters must stay in circle. Every man fears Chouinard will get hurt, we all like him.

  “Then personne holler out, ‘Grizzly!’ Vraiment, a grizzly now walks right in camp, sniffs for food.

  “Robles, he say, ‘Man who fight the grizzly bravest, he win.’

  “Chouinard, he shout, ‘Yes!’

  “Each man, he take up rifle. Robles, he aim. But Chouinard, he walk in line of fire, toward grizzly. He hold his ramrod in the air. Someone say, ‘He going to conduct bear music.’ Is very funny.

  “Chouinard walk straight on, closer and closer to grizzly. Bear, he don’t know what to think. Man seem very, very crazy. Bear sniff in every direction, try understand what happens.

  “Chouinard, he just walk forward.

  “Bear, finally, he stand up hind legs. He twice tall as Chouinard. He roar. Me, I near piss pants, even so far away.

  “Chouinard, he walk straight forward, like walking into bear’s arms, walking into mouth of death. He no stop, he get close, I bet he smell bear’s breath. Then he reach out and tap bear on head with ramrod.”

  Gideon gave a peculiar smile. “Oh, t’ink on zat. He count coup on grizzly bear standing up, ready to fight. Then he turn and walk away calm.

  “Grizzly, he don’t know what to think. This is crazy man. He get down all fours. He look
around. He wander off.

  “We all laugh, shout, clap Chouinard on back. Every man say Chouinard bravest man in camp, even Robles say. Count coup on grizzly bear!”

  The dawn brought rain, thunder, lightning, and howling wind. Ashley had Sam skiff him to the beach, and they nearly got swept downriver. Diah Smith and the others on the beach were all agreed that the horses couldn’t be moved in this weather. Doubtful they’d even go into the water, and if they did, they’d go wild and some would be lost.

  Ashley went back to the boats grim.

  He waited for the weather to break. And waited. And waited.

  Late in the afternoon the wind calmed and the rain eased.

  A Ree chief, Bear, sent out an invitation for Ashley to join him in his lodge. Several men thought the general should ignore it, but Ashley said he couldn’t let Bear think the white chief was afraid. Sam rowed him and Rose, the interpreter, to the beach.

  Smith came up. “Now’s the time to move these horses.”

  Ashley answered, “Wait until I get back. Chief Bear wants to talk to me.”

  Smith accepted these instructions, even curtly delivered as they were, with only a mild look.

  Sam was glad someone followed orders. Most of the crew, he guessed, both Frenchy and Kentuck, were strictly every man for himself. A fight would be a chaos. Sam supposed that Ashley, as a military man, hated that.

  “Wait here for us, Sam,” said the general. He and Rose made their way up toward the lower village.

  Sam sat down on a log and tried his new pipe. Jim Clyman sat down next to him. Clyman’s job was party clerk, since he was older and more experienced and had some education.

  “I don’t like it here,” said Jim. He was tall and lanky. A sunken place on one side of his mouth suggested he’d done some fighting somewhere. His gray-blue eyes saw everything and gave back nothing.