The Travels of Jaimie McPheeters (Arbor House Library of Contemporary Americana) (14 page)

“Gentlemen,” said my father grandly, stepping up, “I want you to meet—” and right there I gave out with my best lung blast and yelled,
“It’s the murderers!”

Well, it was a lively scene. Those villains straightened up pretty quick, and Shep made a motion to go for his gun, but John stopped him, and after an effort to get hold of himself, said:

“The boy’s mind’s affected—it’s a case of mistaken identity.”

I don’t think I ever saw my father look so unhappy. “Surely there’s a misunderstanding here—” he began, but I didn’t aim to let anything interfere with putting those fellows where they belonged.

“I tell you, these are the men that kidnapped me and killed the farmer and his wife!”

“It’s his word against ourn,” said Shep, “and even if it wasn’t, there ain’t no St. Louis sheriff that’s got jurisdiction out here.”

“Hold your tongue!” said John; he said to us, “I’ve never been one to ruffle up at the babble of infants, but I draw the line at criminal slander.”

My father spread his hands in a soothing way and said in a low tone, for a curious crowd was beginning to gather, “I’m sure this can all be straightened out—the lad’s been ill; he’s not responsible—”

I was in such a fit at not being believed, even by my own father, that I was stamping my feet the way they say people do in books, but then I thought of something. It was all as clear as daylight, and I don’t know why it hadn’t occurred before.

“Wait a minute! We’ll go get Jennie—Jennie can tell you, if you don’t believe me.”

“Now you just do that, son,” said John in an easy voice, looking as though he pitied me in my sickness and distress. “That’s exactly what I’d do—I’d go get Jennie, if there is a Jennie. And if
there isn’t, why you come on back. There’ll be no hard feelings—we don’t hold grudges against children out of their heads.”

“This is all very embarrassing,” said my father, mopping his face with a handkerchief, “and I want you to know I’m grateful for your attitude—”

“Don’t think about it, humor the boy, doctor; go right along and fetch his Jennie. We’re entirely at your disposal.”

But I was dragging my father off by his coattails, and urging him to hurry, so we left, and in all that time I don’t believe Mr. Kissel had changed expression by the flicking of an eyelash; he just waited. And somehow, thinking it over as we half ran back to the wagon, I was mightily relieved he’d been along.

Jennie turned pale when she heard the news, but the way she snapped on her bonnet seemed to me a very bad sign for those scoundrels. I was in a sweat to get back, but sure enough, following her mule’s custom, she insisted we get the law officer to take along, and by the time we located him, playing faro in a saloon, we’d wasted upwards of an hour.

I didn’t need to be told—they were gone, bag and baggage, when we got back at last to their tent. The deputy—he was a deputy something-or-other—took out a notebook and asked a lot of ignorant questions of the people nearby, but he did manage to establish, by accident, mostly, that John and Shep had scooped up their traps, packed their mules, and skedaddled.

The deputy closed his book with a wise look and said, “There was a mule company going out at noon—they’ve likely joined it.”

“Well, stop them! Get after them!” cried my father, who had finally worked himself around to believe that he’d thought they were the murderers all along.

“We haven’t got the facilities,” said the deputy. “Moreover, they’ve omitted to lay themselves open to charges, as far as I know. And I ain’t the one to deliver them to St. Louis—are you?”

So we trooped on back to the wagon and talked it over. “What’s to be done?” asked my father, glancing around at us all, as helpless as a baby in this crisis. Then Mr. Kissel spoke up to make his
first voluntary statement of the morning. “Leave them be,” he said, “and have some cold chicken.”

It seemed like a very good idea; besides, it was time now to get ourselves organized on to California. That afternoon we made a tour of the companies forming, and next day we signed on, as passengers, with a group called “the Beaver Company.” But I’ll let my father’s letter of June 20 take it up from there.

Encamped on the Little Vermilion Creek
June 20, 1849

My dearest Melissa:

We are stopped to rest, on a Sunday, beside this beauteous stream that races clear and limpid over a red sandstone bottom. All is proceeding with delightful ease, save for those few inevitable hitches that plague the most seasoned expeditions. You will recall that in my missive of Tuesday last, I expounded on our Heaven-sent fortune in recovering our boy, and laid forth in detail the events preceding the flight of his tormentors. As to those last, they have shown a clean pair of heels. May they be swallowed up by an inhospitable desert:
Fiat justitia ruat caelum
[Let justice be done though the Heavens fall].

To acquaint you with our actions of the interim, I shall resume my chronicle from that point. In concert with the Kissel family of which I spoke, not neglecting the girl Jennie, who escorted our Jaimie to Independence, we have joined the Beaver Company, comprising thirty-three “messes,” or family groups, each in its own ox-drawn wagon, and are actually on the overland trail to California. Gold in abundance awaits at the end of this simple journey; and be not misled—it is there for all to dig. We have that intelligence from the remnants of a mule company, four in sum, who crossed us in return only yesterday. They had got as far as Bridger’s Fort, where some are recuperating, a few settling permanently, and these four, as stated, going back, but all with wondrous secondhand tales from California. I hasten to add that their failures have no bearing on the certain success of our mission. A number of troubles, easily avoided, beset them, namely that they started before the grass was properly up, their pack mules had a tendency to run off
and unload independently of human aid, they lacked a knowledgeable leader, and they were too easily affrighted by thieving Shawnees and Pottawattomies.

We of the Beaver Company are blessed with a paragon of trail lore, bearing the name of Buck Coulter, who was hired in the dual roles of hunter and trail “boss.” I find him a tolerable companion though gruff and unsuggestible, even something of a tyrant in his way. There can be no question that he fancies his knowledge of pioneering to exceed that of the Almighty himself, and he has laid down petty rules and duties without recourse to sager counsel. Be that as it may; we shall see.

Our means of locomotion is walking, Kissel’s and mine and Jaimie’s, with the women, and the children—a melodious quartet rather heavily freighted with Biblical labels—inside for the most part. Mrs. Kissel is one of those stringy, tireless, uncomplaining Samaritans, thoughtless of self and devoted to the whole of humanity. Her husband, a giant for strength and size, exerts less conversational strain, as we plod along, than any other man of my recollection. A superficial person might consider him a fool, but there is much more in his pithy comments, such as “Pretty,” “Careful!” and “Pass the bacon,” than meets the eye. As to the last member of our little group, it is hard to know what to say. This girl Jennie is as fresh and sparkling as a rosebud, now that her spirit is mended, but I must add in fairness that the lovely petals are protected by a thorn. Masked over by an innocent smile, she has a caprice of steel. It is painful to recount that only last night, before supper, she announced that she felt it time to wash both Jaimie’s and my underwear; moreover, she stood flintly by until we had gone in and handed them out. Woe betide the young man upon whom her managerial glances light, and already she has widened her sphere of influence to include the melancholy Brice—Adam Brice, whose wife, the sufferer from the cyst, died exactly as I predicted. In his despair, he sold his home and business, a sizable icehouse, and has elected to make a new beginning apart from the scene of his loss. His wagon traveling in tandem behind us, our women, the allembracing
Mrs. Kissel and the immovable Jennie, help attend his wants; indeed, we mess together.

In making our decision to go, we were compelled to choose between mules and oxen. The two animals, having a strong mutual aversion, are seldom mixed for purposes of expedition. The mule was never born that could resist the chance to kick an ox, especially if tied, and oxen take keen pleasure in crowding mules out of any available grass. Our choice was easily arrived at for the reason that the Kissels already had oxen, though they would cheerfully have relinquished them for the general weal and, I have no doubt, switched to reindeer or kangaroos with no serious loss of composure.

The selection of oxen is a fortunate one, I feel. The more I see of mules (and I shall explain in a moment why my vision is thus enriched daily), the more taken I am with the lowly, toiling, virtually tireless ox. Light oxen under six years of age are the ideal beast of burden—I hear this everywhere and have it, in particular, from no less an oracle than Buck Coulter himself, whose marvel-ously short, graphic expletives dealing with mules shall not be set down here.

We Beavers are presently joined for a few days by a mule company, called the Hornets, organized by Colonel Ralston, an outfitter in Independence and comprising forty-eight mules (six for each team) and a bell-mare, which latter is supposed to keep the former from straying, but I regret to say that a whole congress of mares ding-donging day and night could scarcely keep these pestiferous beasts on the straight and narrow. And indeed they have slowed us perceptibly.

As to our health—it is excellent. In buying our provender we were warned to allow for an appetite on the road of almost twice that at home, and such has proved the case. The sight of our Jaimie in the early morning, at “catch-up” time, would warm your heart. His attempts to eat all the bacon in Kissel’s wagon have been remarked as courageous beyond the call of duty. In this connection (of food) I should add a note on Jennie, who has appointed herself the implacable custodian of us all, if the truth were stated bluntly. On the third morning out, she announced that the frontier’s morning fare of fried bacon, coarse-flour biscuits and, occasionally,
beans, should be enlarged to “a rounded diet,” and she began, surprising us all, to forage on her own.

It appears that back in Illinois, where she came from, poor waif, her father and brothers were ardent hunters of small game, and in consequence she is a shooter on a level with Boone and Crockett. So she said, and you may imagine our hearty but good-natured laugh at the concept of this slender blossom stalking like Diana through the forests. But her reply was only a slight tightening of the lips—a mannerism I have come to identify with the donkey’s bray—and she took down Kissel’s double shotgun, which is suspended from a sling in his wagon, and walked out into the prairie, alone, despite earnest advices from several men on the danger of becoming lost in this silent, billowy vastness. Upon her return, some two hours later, she had eight brace of prairie plover (an excellent roast bird, tender as quail) and an apronful of eggs. Perhaps the great stickler in this incident was the fact that she had only fired seven times. And at Kissel’s well-phrased inquiry of “Oh?” she said carelessly, “Five doubles and two triples.”

Enjoying this repast that evening, and foregoing the usual dinner of “salt junk,” or pork, we looked at her with something akin to tenderness. And I must say that in Brice’s glance, as he filled his mouth with breast and dripping drumstick, was a glint of speculation. Since that happy beginning, our starchy Nimrod has produced in addition, duck (when once we camped beside a broad flash of water), prairie snipe, and hare; and from a stream whose name escapes me she drew an abundance of large catfish. Each evening, now (since we must contrive to camp near water) she and Jaimie set out “night lines,” so that often for breakfast we have an abundance of these last finny viands. Only once have we boggled at her supplemental fare. When, yesterday, having skirted the train at a distance of three or four hundred yards for an hour, she marched in with three prime rattlesnakes, we declined to make ourselves available. “It cooks up as good as eel,” she said with the old steely look, but I rejoice to tell you that we only stared back, unmoved. So that in the end she was obliged to cast the horrid creatures into the weeds, and I honestly feel that she was relieved to do so, for a good many of her actions spring simply from a stubborn notion of being in the
right. Rattlesnakes may in fact provide a delicacy for the gourmet’s table, but for my part, I’d as soon eat a platter of bats.

Now I wish to add a paragraph on our expenditures and general finances, then close, with a parting observation about one of our number who I think is likely to cause us concern, a young swashbuckler fancying himself a great rough, who rides out looking for Indians while wearing two huge revolvers strapped to his waist

In Independence, before our start, we conferred with the best men of our company, also with the talkative Coulter, and agreed that Ware’s
Guide
must be passably accurate about the necessaries for the trail. Accordingly I made arrangements for storing in Kissel’s and Brice’s wagons, paying them for the privilege (over their lively protests) the following articles: One Additional Rifle—$20; One Pair Pistols—$15; Five Barrels Flour, 1080 pounds—$20; Bacon, 600 pounds—$30; Coffee, 100 pounds—$8; Tea, 5 pounds—$2.75; Sugar, 150 pounds—$7; Rice, 75 pounds—$3.75; Fruit, dried, 50 pounds—$3; Salt, Pepper, etc., 50 pounds—$3; Saleratus, 10 pounds—$1; Lead, 30 pounds—$1.20; Powder, 25 pounds—$5.50; Tools, etc, 25 pounds—$7.50; Mining Tools, 36 pounds—$12; Tent, 30 pounds—$5; Additional Bedding, 45 pounds—$12.50; Cooking Utensils, 30 pounds—$4; Lard, 50 pounds—$2.50; Matches—$1.00; Candles and Soap, 50 pounds—$5.30.

These are supplies for one year for three persons and come to a total of $170.00, so you may see I am now traveling very light with regard to coin of the realm. Out of common charity, Kissel and Brice and I concluded to divide the cost of Jennie’s travel amongst us, making the above calculations subject to a considerable rebate. Also, in her tearful gratitude, the girl herself has sworn vows of recompense, and if I am any judge of character, she will indeed return these loans if it is her last act upon earth. And so we set out, a sturdy band of hopefuls, undaunted by the prospect of difficulties and trials. The way thus far is not hard to scout—the wagon ruts of other emigrants before us lie plain in the mud and weeds.