Sacajawea was asleep. Captain Clark felt her pulse again and heaved a sigh of relief. It was fuller and more regular.
In the morning Cruzatte took half a dozen men to a dry place on high ground and showed them how to make a cache. They cut the heavy prairie sod from a twenty-inch circle and laid it aside, then dug down to enlarge the hole underneath. The earth they removed was carried to the river and dumped in, so that there would be nothing to give wandering Indians any hint that anything might be buried nearby. When the excavation was six feet deep, the bottom was hollowed out to receive any water that might seep in, and dry sticks were used to keep the contents from touching the moist earth. When the hole was nearly filled with the things they were to leave behind—Captain Lewis’s writing desk, the forge, tools, reserve rations, salt, ammunition, tin cups, steel traps, skins, and specimens—the cache was covered with leather hides, and earth rammed in between this covering and the surface. A few days after the original twenty-inch circle of sod had been replaced, the grass had grown enough to conceal the hiding place completely. This was an Indian scheme.
The captains decided at this time to get rid of the red pirogue that Lewis and six others had been paddling upstream. They hauled it to the middle of a small island in the North Fork and tied it with leather strips, face down, with bungs out but tucked safely inside, to several low-growing juniper bushes. The bushes completely hid the pirogue, which lay snugly on the ground. The men made deep, jagged cuts in four nearby trees to mark the place where the pirogue was hidden in order to find it easily on their return trip. Also, wandering Indians would not touch anything that had been marked in such a manner.
Sacajawea slept that entire day, but during the night she woke bent over with cramps. Captain Clark gave her a dose of opium in hot water to reduce the cramps and put her back to sleep. In the morning, when she seemed no better, he bled her with his penknife, which he sterilized over an alcohol flame. She wanted to tell him that she was already bleeding profusely, but she could not find the words. He also gave her a full cup of mineral water laced with opium to drink.
“York has your man, Charbonneau, out looking for cattails for your son’s cradleboard,” he said, trying to reassure her that the child was well taken care of.
The following morning Captain Lewis, who had developed a cold and was feeling weak, with aching joints, took Scannon, George Gibson, the Fields brothers. Si Goodrich, and Drouillard up the South Fork to study the river and look for signs of Indians in that region. The others were to follow the next morning if Sacajawea was able to travel.
Captain Lewis’s party had not gone far when he realized he was really ill. By midday he had violent intestinal cramps, and as the pain increased, so did his temperature. “You and the little squaw have the same bugs eatin’ on your innards,” explained Gibson.
“Take the leaves off the chokecherry twigs there and boil the twigs in a little water. We’ll pull the canoes in here,” Captain Lewis ordered, then twisted about as another spasm of pain hit his middle.
The bitter black concoction puckered his mouth, but he drank a pint and in an hour repeated the dose.
“I wouldn’t take any more,” suggested Gibson. “Your teeth might dissolve.”
By that evening Captain Lewis was free of pain and fever. He had a good night’s rest and was ready to start out in the morning, quite revived. He recalled his mother, Lucy’s saying that an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure, and so he drank another pint of the vile astringent liquid. At noon he was able to eat several perch that Goodrich had caught.
Sacajawea insisted that she was well enough to travel, but she was fretful in the bottom of the pirogue, and she seemed delirious at times. Captain Clark tried to make her comfortable, and regretted he knew so little about relieving her ailment.
Charbonneau sat at the back of the pirogue, not looking at his woman, wishing she would not create so much attention, and praying to the Holy Mother that his “medicine” had caused her to abort, if by chance she were pregnant. He had asked permission to take her back to the Minnetarees and their Medicine Man, but Clark had refused. Charbonneau could not have managed the trip by himself, and there were no men to spare.
York held Pomp propped between his knees as he sat at the bow and paddled.
“You are a sweet-looking mother,” Charbonneau kidded him clumsily.
“Well, I don’t hear you asking to bounce your son on your knee.” York scowled. “Besides, if you did, I wouldn’t say yes. This here child is too much fun. I’se going to teach him to fish and shoot himself a bear.”
“I’d like to teach him to read and write,” added Captain Clark.
For days the canoes made their way slowly upstream on the South Fork of the river. Sacajawea was hardly aware of their progress, conscious only that Captain Clark tended to her needs and plied her with medicines. These days were hard on the men, who kept a sharp eye out for grizzlies, which were more and more numerous. The men with the tow ropes tried to keep the canoes from shipping too much water and their feet were cut and bruised on the sharp stones and spines of the prickly pears. They slipped in the rattlesnake-infested mud trying to pull the canoes past sawyers, dead trees bobbing underwater. To make matters worse, several others fell ill with the intestinal cramps, two men had toothaches, two had large boils, and another had a carbuncle plus a slight fever. Private Whitehouse had the cramps, too, but he kept quiet about them, only writing about his griping pains in his journal when the expedition camped for the night.
One morning Sacajawea was well enough to walk to the spring beside which they had camped. She gave thanks to the Great Spirit for showing Chief Red Hair the medicines to bring her health back. Soon she was examining the pink moccasin flowers, and then her eyes found the wild crabapples in most of the trees around her. She tasted one, then another. Their tartness was good. Charbonneau sauntered to the spring and gathe red a few apples, telling her that if they tasted good they certainly wouldn’t hurt her.
“Hey, don’t let Janey eat too many of those green apples,” warned Captain Clark.
Still hungry, she went to Ben York and asked if he had some perch left in the pan from the morning meal. York was so delighted to see her up and feeling better that he gave her several raw fish and pointed to the frying pan. Then he chided Charbonneau, who snatched the pan away, saying, “Squaws like raw fish best. Just look how she gulps them fish down.”
“You should take better care of your missus. Raw fish don’t seem like fitting food to me.”
When the party turned in for the night, Sacajawea awoke moaning with pain. Her fingers were clammy, and her stomach ached. She refused all medication, not wishing to cause more trouble, but became delirious. Captain Clark continued to nurse her, for Charbonneau had turned surly and refused to tend to her. When she seemed hardly able to breathe at all, Captain Clark cried out to Charbonneau.
“If she dies, it will be your fault, Charbonneau. You don’t take good care of her, you lily-livered coward. I admit once in a while I was amused by your bragging, but now I am fed up—up to here.” He put his hand on top of his head.
Ben York calmed his master down, knowing that he was worn out from nursing the little squaw. York knew also that if Sacajawea died he would have the four-month-old child to carry across the continent and back, spoon-feeding him with soup and gruel the best he could manage. “I guess we’d better use God and pray for this squaw,” he said.
And then, on the evening of June 14, Joe Fields came with a note from Captain Lewis, who was proceeding slowly up the river, to say that the forward base camp was only ten miles from the falls that Sacajawea had told them about. They would be in Shoshoni country any day now.
Captain Clark was more than happy. The news would perk up Sacajawea, and he had dreaded retracing his steps if they were on the wrong river branch. Clark went to see Sacajawea, who was bedded down in a lean-to made with the skin tent. She was much worse and looked like skin and bones. Captain Clark sat on the ground be
side her. “You must get well now,” he said.
“I am sorry to be trouble.”
“No, no, we are sorry we cannot help you. All the men depend on you. We need you. We are coming to your people’s land. Your son needs you. And your man needs you. Without you he is nothing.”
My people, she thought. My people are near. We have reached the River That Scolds at All Rivers. Her eyes filled with tears.
“There, don’t get upset,” soothed Captain Clark. “Rest and get well.” York was squatting near the entrance.
“Watch over her,” said Captain Clark to York. “I’m going to send someone to bring some water from the sulfur spring we passed about six or eight miles back. I should have thought of it then.”
Several of the men volunteered, but Shannon was the one who took a pail and hurried off. When he returned, Captain Clark forced Sacajawea to drink almost a pint of the foul-smelling sulfur water, and then gave her a mixture of quinine, opium, and oil of vitriol. He spent the night nearby, with a great deal of anxiety, as she slept.
By morning she was perspiring, and her pulse was fuller and more regular. The crisis had passed.
CHAPTER
17
Cloudburst
Clark’s Journal:
June 29th Satturday 1805
…the rain fell like one voley of water falling from the heavens and gave us time only to get out of the way of a torrent of water which was Poreing down the hill in the River with emence force tareing everything before it takeing with it large rocks and mud, I took my gun and shot pouch in my left hand, and with the right scrambled up the hill pushing the Interpreters wife(who had a child in her arms) before me, the Interpreter himself makeing attempts to pull up his wife by the hand much scared and nearly without motion, we at length reached the top of the hill safe where I found my servent in serch of us greatly agitated, for our wellfar, before I got out of the bottom of the reveen which was a flat dry rock when I entered it, the water was up to my waste and wet my watch, I scercely got out before it raised 10 feet deep with a torrent which [was] turrouble to behold, and by the time I reached the top of the hill, at least 15 feet water …
BERNARD DEVOTO, ed., The Journals of Lewis and Clark. New York: Houghton Mifflin Co., 1953, p. 152.
When the expedition reached the falls, they were faced with the unhappy prospect of an eighteen-mile portage. A hole for another cache was dug, and the white pirogue was hauled to the bank, the bungs removed, and the whole thing covered with leaves and branches after being tied to trees in the same manner as the larger red pirogue they had already hidden. The other canoes were brought as close to the falls as possible, to shorten the portage.
Eighteen miles around the falls was a long way to carry supplies, with the sultry wind and no trees to give shelter or firewood for cooking. But there would be plenty to eat. Thousands of buffalo, in one herd, went down to the falls to drink as Captain Clark watched. Elk, deer, and antelope roamed about, and there were rainbow trout, pike, cutthroats, bluebacks, and chub, all easy to catch from the river.
A base camp was set up at a place they called Portage Creek, and Sacajawea stayed there with Captain Clark, Charbonneau, York, Goodrich, and Ordway, so that she might benefit from the nearby sulfur spring. The portage began on June 20, 1805, the day Sacajawea was really on her feet once again.
It took thirteen days for the expedition to transport itself from the camp on Portage Creek. Each day meant hardship. Sacajawea spent time repairing moccasins, which were constantly torn by rocks and prickly pears, and wondering how other men, coming after these, could possibly find her people for trade. Three moons had already passed since they had left Fort Mandan, and still the expedition was not in the land of the Shoshonis. They had seen only deserted campfires and scattered, abandoned tepee frames, all belonging to the Blackfeet. Captain Clark had said there would be trading posts for her people. How?
And then came the day Sacajawea had waited for. With Captain Clark and the rest of the men who had manned the base camp, she paced off the final miles that would lead her to the boundary of the land of the Shoshonis.
The rush and roar of the falls became louder, the mist of the spray heavier, until at last they stood still, enchanted by the sight of the cascade eighty-seven feet high, fully two hundred feet across, forming a sheet of white beaten foam, hissing, flashing, sparkling. They watched, fascinated, as the water dashed against a huge abutment of rock, then rose again in great billows and vanished. The Great Falls of the Missouri was a gigantic wildlife rendezvous. Thousands of impatient buffaloes pushed each other along the steep, rocky paths to the water. Hundreds went over the cataract to feed the buzzards and wolves below.
Sacajawea raised her eyes in search of the eagle’s nest that her people spoke about, built high beyond reach of any man or beast. Then she noticed the ominous black sky. A storm from the west would soon be upon them. She touched Chief Red Hair’s hand and pointed. “When the rain comes, this will be a bad place.”
Surprised, he gave a quick start, then said reassuringly, “Well, we are prepared. I have brought along the tomahawk with the umbrella attached to the top, a present from my brother when I started on this trip. I thought it was funny, but it may well come in handy.”
He shifted the rest of his load so that he could put up the umbrella. Sacajawea laughed at such a funny contraption, like a huge leaf to keep the rain off one’s head.
“We’ve got to find shelter,” said Captain Clark. It was getting black-dark now, and the wind was gusting. He looked in both directions and then pointed. “The rocks in that deep ravine—they’ll give some protection. We’d better run for it.” A bunch of sagebrush ripped away from a dying clump and came sailing over their heads with a great swoosh!
“My feet hurt,” complained Charbonneau.
A chain of lightning dissolved with a teeth-rattling, ear-splitting crash.
Captain Clark pulled Pomp’s cradleboard from Sacajawea and tucked the child and board under his arm. He gave Sacajawea the umbrella to carry. The other things he carried over his shoulder in a leather sack.
Charbonneau, carrying nothing but his gun, sprinted toward the ravine. Captain Clark and Sacajawea followed.
The wind became fierce; the lightning flashed; the rain was coming. The ravine would be a dangerous place to be in case of a flash flood, but there was no other shelter. Captain Clark jumped toward the shelving rocks just ahead and felt the first big drops of rain strike his face. Charbonneau clambered up the rocks. Sacajawea stumbled, almost fell. Captain Clark gave her the leather sack and pulled her along. They passed Charbonneau.
“If I’d my eyes on the outside of my head, I’d never have come down into this rat trap!” Charbonneau yelled through the wind. Then he called for them to wait so he could catch his damned breath. But they went on, stumbling and gasping, the wind rising and whipping away their breath.
They reached the projecting rocks and leaned, breathless, against the side walls. Sacajawea sniffed the air. It was still warm, but there was a new smell to it. “Ai—the rain will be hard.”
Her mind was easier standing on this safe ledge, but her body was tired.
“Blow like le diable,” said Charbonneau, climbing up to them, gasping. “I never like the plains now with no trees to hide under.”
“Right!” agreed Captain Clark, putting down the cradleboard and unlacing it enough to remove the baby. He sighed, “That cradleboard is heavy.”
“So—it is packed with Pomp’s clothes,” said Sacajawea, putting down the leather sack and umbrella.
“Caw! No wonder he has outgrown the board. There is no place to put his feet!” screamed Charbonneau.
Then nobody spoke, and the darkness crashed down with the thunder. The blackness covered them. During a flash of lightning Sacajawea saw Charbonneau’s eyes contract and a shadow of terror cross his face.
The gusts of wind came in increasing frequency and from every direction. Some passed overhead with a whooping rush and scatt
ered gravel. Some pelted their backs with the gravel and tore the sand from under their feet and threw it into their faces.
“If the wind does not come out of the west, we are safe,” said Sacajawea.
“What was that?” asked Charbonneau. And as the message was passed on, some of the words were high and clear in a moment of silence, some were strained and distorted through a rush of wind, and the final words were blanked out entirely by thunder and the rolling echoes that came after.
Captain Clark had opened up the umbrella to keep the rain off the baby. “The men on the plains will get soaked along with the equipment. No help for that, though.”
Charbonneau complained that the blinding flashes and sudden blackouts hurt his eyes.
The color of the clouds had changed from ashen to a sickly yellow, full of wind and hail. The lightning flashed blue, and then the wind came out of the west, very suddenly and with devastating force, bringing rain mixed with sand and snatching the umbrella from Captain Clark’s hand, sending it sailing around like a bull boat floating in the muddy Missouri.
Then a fine mist, sucked into a partial vacuum under a curtain of wind-driven rain, felt like an early-morning mountain fog on Sacajawea’s face. It was cold. She thought, this should feel good after such a hot morning, but it is too cold.
Captain Clark screamed with the wind, “It’s a cloudburst for sure!” The rain shot directly off the top of the rocks in a hissing sheet, carrying loose gravel whistling over their heads to strike the opposite side of the ravine with such force as to dump a flood of mud and rock into the churning water that was already filling the wash below.
“Lie down so we won’t get blown off when the wind changes!” shouted Charbonneau. He lay down. He had a gnawing, sickening, uneasy feeling. At the next bright flash he looked over into the wash where they had stood only minutes before. The stream, boiling along twenty feet below, was undercutting the bank.
Sacajawea moved closer to Captain Clark, and his arm tightened on Pomp, who kicked his bare feet. Clark put his free arm protectively around her waist and drew her closer, unaware of the danger they were in.