Dreams Beneath Your Feet (14 page)

He was now a determined bachelor. His first marriage lasted nine months, and Meadowlark died in childbirth. His long affair with Paloma Luna ended in cancer. He had made up his mind that, for him, matrimony was a blight.

They looked across at Jay, who was gathering the small limbs for the night's fire. Soon they would drag some bigger logs over.

“I don't get it, though,” said Sam. “He always rides along with Julia and Esperanza. They don't need him to mind the pack-horses.”

“He's getting well,” said Hannibal. “Getting well in the body and the head and the heart. He's had bad things happen. Worse, I expect, than he has let on.”

Julia had implied the same. So while Sam, Hannibal, and Flat Dog rode ahead and on the flank every day, scouting for enemies, Jay walked his horse along with the women. Then, in the evenings, he hung around Sam like a kid or a dog.

Sam said, “If Kanaka Boy is after his ass, he ought to help us keep an eye out for him.”

Hannibal said Jay could also help with a little of the other men's work, like taking care of the horses, sharing watch, and hunting.

“Not that he could do those without a rifle,” said Sam. A boy of fifteen without a rifle, it was an odd thing.

Sam and Flat Dog both grabbed limbs of a downed trunk. “I'm thinking something,” said Flat Dog. He said nothing more until they set the heavy log down for a moment's rest. He turned to Sam and said, “
Ba'te.
”

“Jay?”

“Yes.”

“Didn't think of that.”

“What is it?” asked Hannibal.

“Man-woman,” said Sam.

Most tribes had them, men who dressed as women and lived as
women, often even married men. They weren't what people back in the States called queer, exactly. They were called by the spirits to live that way, just as others might be called to be a warrior or medicine man or even a contrary. Men-women were commonplace among the Crows and were honored as walking a sacred path.

Hannibal took a thoughtful look but said nothing.

Sam and Flat Dog dragged the log to the camp and dropped it. They looked around to make sure, and only Julia and Esperanza were nearby.

“Maybe we figured out why Jay seems odd,” Flat Dog told his wife.

She looked at him.

“Ba'te.”

“Man-woman?” said Julia.

Sam said, “Seems that way to me, too. Jay is
ba'te
.”

Julia blinked at him several times in surprise.

Esperanza said, “That's dumb. He is no such thing.”

But Julia, considering, said, “That may be it. In fact, I'm sure that's it.”

“I think,” said Sam, “that from now on we better call him he-she and him-her.

Flat Dog chuckled. “Let's not do that.”

 

W
HEN THEY WERE
two days' ride from the Walla Walla River, Jay broke his habit of never looking Sam in the eyes. “I have a big request,” Jay said in his melodic English. “Can we stay at the Methodist mission instead of the fort?”

They were sitting at the fire after supper, enjoying their plentiful coffee. Everyone waited for Jay to go on. The mission was two easy days' ride east of the fort.

“Boy worked at the fort. So did I. Everyone knows us. If I go there, word will get back to him fast.”

“I want to stay at the mission anyway,” said Julia. “Near
Narcissa Whitman.” The two had met at rendezvous four years ago. Narcissa was definitely not the stereotype of a missionary wife. Instead of being appalled by the mountain men and Indians, she seemed delighted by them. They were delighted by her red-gold hair, full breasts, and merry laugh.

“I have to be honest with you. Me being there will make it dangerous for all of us.”

Quickly, Sam said, “Us?”

Now Jay hung his head again. “I was hoping to go on to Fort Vancouver with you.” He waited a moment and looked up. “The truth is, I'm terrified.”

“Of course you may go with us,” said Julia.

Sam took his time with what he had to say. “We're planning to spend the winter on the Walla Walla. We're going to trade for a lot of horses, break them to the saddle or the harness, and sell them to the Americans at the settlements on the Willamette.”

“That's how we're going to make our money to get started in California,” put in Hannibal.

Jay looked like a deer about to bolt.

“Of course you may go with us,” Julia repeated. She spoke in a tone hinting that men are hopeless.

“You know there's no going over the mountains with the herd until spring,” Sam said. “Too much snow.”

“Then I can help,” Jay said eagerly. “I know the trail over the mountains. It goes behind Mount Hood.”

“But won't word get back to Boy?” asked Sam.

“The Whitman mission will be all right. No Kanakas work there. I'll be careful.”

“Then we'll spend the winter with the Methodists,” said Julia.

Sam looked at Jay. He seemed to be a member of the family now. Sam kind of liked him, a sweet kid with a good heart. But why didn't he just say he was
ba'te
?

 

 

 

N
ARCISSA
W
HITMAN BOUNDED
down the steps of the mission house and swung Julia by the hands. “I can't believe it. I can't believe it. This is wonderful.”

She insisted on hugging each of the boys, which made them pull sour faces, and she lifted little Paloma out of her cradleboard and kissed her face over and over.

Narcissa was thoroughly the vivacious woman Julia remembered from rendezvous. She looked up at her friend's husband, Marcus, the physician, standing at the top of the stairs. A shadow cut his face in half at a slant, and Julia thought he seemed more somber than he used to, much more.

Then she saw that he was holding the hand of a child about two years old. Narcissa followed her glance.

“This is our Alice Clarissa!” she exclaimed.

Alice jumped down the steps two at a time and into her
mother's arms. She immediately stuck her thumb into her mouth and peered round-eyed and wary at Julia and the kids.

“She's not used to strangers,” Narcissa said. “Well, strangers that aren't Indians.”

Julia thought,
But we are Indians.

“I'm so glad to see you again,” exclaimed Narcissa. This time it sounded like a question.

“I'm going home to California,” Julia said. “We all are. The mountain life is changing.”

“Oh, it is,” said Narcissa enthusiastically. “We got six new missionaries right at the start, they came by sea, and five more families have joined us here at Wailatpu just this summer. We believe that tens of thousands of Americans will come to Oregon over the next decade.”

Julia decided not to say that was the reason her husband and their friends were leaving the mountains for California.

“I'm sure you'll be so glad to live in a house again,” said Narcissa.

“I will,” said Julia. “Even more for the children's sake than mine.”

“I should say so. Let's walk around the grounds,” Narcissa bubbled on. “You must tell me everything, and I will show you all we've done.

“Wait.” Her way was to make sudden movements with her head and hands, stop-start, the way a bird turns its gaze. “Where is your husband? Who is with you?”

When Julia pointed out the men unloading the packhorses and explained that Sam Morgan and Hannibal MacKye were along as well, and a Hawaiian boy named Jay, Narcissa got more excited. “We'll see them after our little tour.”

The mission grounds were fine, set on a peninsula between two branches of the Walla Walla River, with the big house next to the main river. “We have more than two hundred acres under cultivation,” Narcissa said, sweeping her arm to include it all. “Those
little hills”—she pointed to the east—“feed our horses and cows, even in the winter.”

She pointed out the Whitmans' large home, not of logs but sawn boards. Though they weren't yet whitewashed, she had a front door painted bright green. Clustered nearby stood a blacksmith shop, a mill, and a millpond. The new families were busy putting up basic shelter for the coming winter.

“Not only are we self-sufficient in growing our own food,” she said, “we are teaching the Cayuses to be farmers. They borrow any plow we have and break the ground themselves. They are eager to own hogs, hens, and cattle, and several of them have obtained them already.”

Julia thought there was something brittle in Narcissa's enthusiasm. Perhaps the four years of life in the wilds had aged her. The red-gold hair seemed not so lustrous, and Narcissa now wore thick glasses.

Flat Dog walked up, and Narcissa shook his hand eagerly. He waved at Dr. Whitman, still standing at the front door watching.

“My husband is telling me without saying so,” said Julia, “that it's time for me and Esperanza to put up the lodge. Mind you, we've taught the men to help out.”

“I'll come and say hello to everyone.”

The adults were old friends except for Jay, introduced by Julia. Sam, Hannibal, and Flat Dog all knelt to say hello to Alice Clarissa, who wouldn't let go of her mother's hand.

“I have a great idea,” said Narcissa. “You get your shelter up, and we'll have tea at the house late this afternoon. Just us ladies.”

Which was just what Julia wanted.

 

E
SPERANZA WAS SURPRISED
when the time came and her mother asked Jay to come along. A man? At a ladies' event? She wondered what her mother had up her sleeve.
Mother is odd.

When they came in, all three of them could see the surprise on
Narcissa's face. Everyone flushed with embarrassment. Perhaps their hostess was puzzled that they'd brought their Owyhee servant along, but she was gracious. “Welcome to our home. I get so little company. For this special occasion I've made shortbread, and a very good English tea with real cream from our cows.”

Narcissa gestured at a low table actually set with a linen cloth, damasked napkins, and fine china. Julia smiled broadly. This was what she wanted Esperanza to experience. “So, the mission board has sent out your fine things.”

“A gift from Mother, come all the way around Cape Horn, can you imagine?

“Alice, would you bring the cups and spoons? They're set out in the kitchen, one for each person.

“Speaking of fine things, here's a dazzler. “At our mission at Lapwai we have a printing press.”

“A printing press?” said Julia, amazed. Lapwai was to the east, the Methodist post among the Nez Percés.

“We've printed the New Testament in the Nez Percé language,” said Narcissa proudly, or at least she tried for pride.

Julia couldn't help thinking of what her husband would say. “Those people don't read Nez Percé, or some missionary's written version of Nez Percé, any better than they read English. It's not a written-down language.”

Alice appeared at that moment trying to carry too many cups, and Esperanza rescued her.

Narcissa said, “While this tea steeps, may I show you around the house?” It was huge, and Julia was curious.

Beyond the parlor a dining hall. “We have so many people to feed. And this,” Narcissa said as she passed into the next rooms, “is the Indian hall, a necessity. The greatest trial to a woman's feelings is to have her cooking and eating rooms always filled with dirty Indians, men, especially at mealtime. Now we devote this room to them especially, and don't let them go into the other part of the house at all.”

She passed on to the kitchen and pantry.

“It sounds unkind, but they are so filthy, we must clean up after them. We have come here to elevate them and not to suffer ourselves to sink down to their standard.”

That's what people will say about my husband and children,
Julia thought.
Filthy. But their missions and towns, with their privies, smell worse than any Crow village.

She saw Alice Clarissa with her hand in her mouth. The child had dipped the entire appendage into the cream and was sucking at one end while it dripped off her elbow at the other.

They swept into a large bedroom with a four-poster bed and—Narcissa showed this with an impish smile—a chamber pot. She went to the window. “The privy is outside. Tell them what a privy is, Alice Clarissa.”

“It's where you poo. I'm learning, but the seat is too high.”

Julia told Esperanza softly in Crow what “poo” meant.

On they went through the servants' bedroom to a room with a bookcase, a medicine case, and a desk where Dr. Whitman did his work, as he was doing now. It had a fine big window that let the morning sun in.

“We have seven large windows,” said Narcissa, “some small ones, and oil-fueled lamps.”

She showed them what Esperanza thought the greatest curiosity of all, a chest of drawers built into the wall.

“Our accommodations are fine,” said Narcissa, “and that is deliberate. Part of what we do for the Natives is show them the refinements that civilization provides. To Christianize them we must first civilize them.” Her voice quivered with hope.

Esperanza gave her mother a funny look, and Julia smiled back.
Yes, part of civilization, or at least the American version, is the fancy English some people speak.

“Ha, he,” said Alice Clarissa, “one day I try to hide from my mommy in the bottom drawer.”

They found their way back to the parlor. The shortcakes and tea, Esperanza thought, were amazing. She watched her mother carefully for manners. Esperanza knew the Americans and British
put a lot of stock in deportment, especially at the table. How odd, in her opinion, that they seemed to her not to know common courtesies. They didn't know how to listen to another person with full attention and how to avoid being intrusive, yet they made a big issue out of table manners. She noticed that Jay seemed to know what to do at table and was surprised.