Miss Jacky Faber
On the Mississippi River
On board her ship, the Belle of the Golden West
Dear Jacky,
I have collected my thoughts, my raging temper, and myself, after the events of the past few weeks, enough to continue these letters to you, letters that I compose in my head, having no paper or pen with which to write them down.
After my settling with those two bandits on the Frankstown road in Pennsylvania, I made my way to the Ohio River, and there I managed to purchase, with the money I emptied from the pockets of the recently deceased McCoy and Beatty, a canoe called a bull boat. It has a light wooden frame over which has been stretched a buffalo hide, taut as a drum. It is quite fast and very maneuverable and I like it quite a lot.
I have become a very good marksman with my rifle, so I do not go hungry. I hunt, I fish, and I buy what flour and lard and such that I need from the small towns I pass. I camp on the shore and when the weather is wet, I sleep underneath my overturned canoe. What I catch or shoot I cook in the pots and pans that Clementine had left me, and I must confess I feel a pang of regret every time I use them, thinking of the sweet, simple girl who is forever lost in the northern forests of this wild land.
Yes, I have heard many tales of you and your boat as you make your way down these rivers and I paddle my way down after you. I have heard of the shows you have performed and guessed at some of the deeds you have done—the blackened hole that was once the outlaw stronghold Cave-in-Rock has your mark upon it, for sure.
I figure I am maybe a week behind you now, since your boat must be largely drifting on the current of the river, while I can paddle and gain a few knots per mile. While I have had to avoid several bands of hostiles—one in particular led by a rascal who paints his face half red—I feel that I am gaining on you.
My hopes are of seeing you soon, Jacky, hopes that I know in the past have been cruelly dashed at the very moment of fulfillment, but still, still, I hope for the best....
Chapter 48
We have been going along this trail for several hours now, at a half-walk, half-lope pace. They are certainly not making any allowances for me, that's for sure. I've got on my serving-girl gear, the skirt knotted at the side for ease of movement, and I'm able to keep up, but just barely, so I'm both startled and grateful when an Indian warrior appears on the trail in front of us. It seems that he is a sentry, guarding this particular path into his village, and it also appears that Chee-a-quat and Lightfoot and he know one another very well, as there is much talk and laughter among the three of them.
I hardly get a glance, let alone an introduction, but I do get to put down the sack of trade goods I've brought along and to catch my breath. Crow Jane had lent me an Indian shawl to put over my head so I wouldn't be quite so noticeable with my light hair when we got to the encampment, and I put it on now, as we are surely getting close.
Presently we all four start up again, and within several hundred yards, we can see the village, or town really—there are about fifty tepees grouped together on the banks of a small river. There seems to be great excitement among the people of the town.
"What's going on?" I ask quietly of Lightfoot, who has fallen back next to me as we enter the village.
"Chiefs of the Five Nations gatherin' to talk. The Creek and Cherokee here now. The rest soon. Tecumseh comes tomorrow."
Hmmm ... Big doings. Best keep alert. If these Indians do decide to get together and go on the warpath, it could bode ill for the Belle.
"Me and Chee-a-quat gonna go see our father now. I'll put you with the girls. You behave now, y'hear?" he warns.
I nod. Of course I'll behave myself. Don't I always?
"Your father?" I ask, as we get deeper and deeper into the town. All along there are calls of welcome and greeting. Lots of folks think Indians are always solemn and reserved, but that's only when they're in the company of strangers. When they're with their own, they laugh and cavort as much as any people, which is what they're doing now. I am starting to draw some attention from the younger members of the tribe, I notice.
"When I was a young'un, I ran away from home, and my father Tak-a-lay-to took me in and made me his son. Chee-a-quat is my brother. I am Shawnee," he says, with a good deal of pride.
Ah. Well, that explains a lot, I'm thinking. We come up on a group of girls, mostly my age as far as I can tell. They are dressed in very handsome buckskin shirts and skirts that come to their knees, and they are wearing moccasin leggings that come up to mid calf. Their clothes are decorated with much beading and quillwork and are very handsome—it must be their good clothes that they have on for the occasion of this grand powwow. Lightfoot speaks to them in Shawnee, and one of them, a girl only slightly taller than I and totally without expression, comes forward and takes my hand to lead me off, to what, I don't know. The other girls follow silently.
I am led around the back of a group of tepees, down a path, and to a small meadow next to the river. They stand in a group apart and regard me, saying nothing.
Well, we can't keep this up forever, can we? And I've found that nothing breaks the ice like a good tune, so I whip my pennywhistle from my sleeve to play "Poll Ha'penny," and accompany it with my dancing feet. As I do it, my shawl slips from my head, revealing my hair, which Higgins just this morning had put up in a French style with a blue ribbon holding it all together.
Now, I ain't a true blond, not like Clarissa Howe, I'm more of a sandy-haired type, but compared to these girls with their raven locks, I am surely a jolie blonde, no doubt about it. They stand astounded at both my appearance and my music.
I slip the whistle back up my sleeve and regard my audience. I put my tightly closed right fist in front of my face, my fingers toward me, my knuckles facing toward the girl who escorted me here. Then I point with my index finger to the girl, my hand moving away from my face as I do so. It is the sign for "What's your name?"
"Tepeki-kweewa-nepi," she answers, and makes the same sign back at me.
"Jacky Faber," I reply.
"Yaw-kee-a-berra," she tries, and at this, all the others are consumed with fits of laughter. "Yaw-kee-a-berra! Yaw-kee-a-berra!" they chant over and over. With my keen sense of when I'm being mocked, I assume that my name, when mispronounced by them, means something crude or silly in their language.
Then Tepeki-kweewa-nepi gets control of herself and admonishes the rest of them to knock it off and they do, which is good, for I didn't come here to be laughed at. She makes the sign for sorry and then pantomimes me playing the pennywhistle again, so I pull it out and start playing a simple dance tune.
Immediately the girls get into a circle around me and commence a shuffling kind of dance, punctuated with songs and high trills, and I can tell from the signs that they are making that it is a dance of welcome.
When they are done, I put my right hand at my shoulder level and bring it down sharply four inches or so. It is the sign for sit down, and they look at each other, but they do it. I open my bag of trade goods and pull out the string of sleigh bells I had gotten for a song back in Pittsburgh, and using my lacings from my vest, I tie up the bells in groups of three for each length of lacing. Then I kneel down and tie three bells to each girl's left ankle. I have just enough bells and just enough lace to do them all, with one bell left over, which I toss back into the bag. Never know when it might come in handy.
"All right, everybody up," I say, motioning with my hands. Some things don't have to be in sign language. "Now let's do it again." And I play the same simple tune again, and again they do their shuffle dance, but this time it's shuffle, shuffle, ching! shuffle, shuffle, ching! shuffle, shuffle, ching!
Their delight is plain on their faces. Tepeki, after singing an especially joyous song that the others respond to with yips and yi-yi-yi-yis and various other vocalizations that I do not understand but that do seem to fit, motions with her hand and the group shuffles and ching!s toward the center of the town. I'm beginning to suspect that this Tepeki is maybe a chief's daughter or something, 'cause she seems to have a good deal of cheek.
We take our dance through the town and are applauded with shouts and, of course, many wah!s and yi-yi-yi-yis. I think we are a hit.
We stop, eventually, on the outskirts of the village, at the tepee of a very old man, who sits cross-legged outside his home. By his side is a collection of many flutelike things. Tepeki shushes the other girls and sends them away. I suspect they are going back to the meadow next to the river. Then we sit as she addresses the old man in a very respectful tone and then gestures for me to play on my whistle.
I do "Willow Garden," a slow and wistful piece, and when I am done, he nods and then picks up one of his own flutes and begins to play. He plays the thing by blowing across a hole rather than through a whistle, and the sound that comes out is breathy and woody and wondrously beautiful. He plays a sad song in a tuning I have never heard and will never be able to play, but it is plain why Tepeki brought me here—she brought me to sit at the feet of a master.
When he is done, I take my pennywhistle and extend it to him as a gift. He takes it and runs his hands over it and smiles. Then he reaches over and picks one of his flutes, one that is similar in size to my pennywhistle, and he hands it to me. Tepeki gives me a nudge and we leave to go join the others in the meadow.
No, it was not the same pennywhistle that Liam Delaney gave me back on the Dolphin—no, not that battered but holy old relic, which rests in honor in my sea chest, no—rather it's one of many that I have picked up in my travels. And now, in exchange for it, I have an American Indian version of the same.
When Tepeki and I get back to the meadow, I once again take up my bag of trade goods and begin passing out gifts. There are mirrors and combs, of course, always a big hit with girls, no matter who they are or from what country, and yards and yards of ribbon to tie back their hair. There are satisfying expressions of delight.
When all is passed out, Tepeki jabbers off some orders and two of the girls fly off to the town. Tepeki takes me by the arm and leads me down to the river, and there, they begin to undress me. And they begin to disrobe themselves.
I express alarm and make the sign for Men?
Tepeki shakes her head and signs, No ... Men. Girl. Swim. Place.
Ah. So I let them take my clothes.
They exclaim at the fairness of my skin and the pinkness of various of my parts and the blondness of my hair in all the locations it chooses to grow, but really, skinwise, I'm not much lighter than they are, especially in those places where I am tanned. They are certainly not red.
My arm sheath raises some eyebrows, and my tattoo of course gets a lot of attention and comment. I cannot, however, come up with enough signs to explain that little item away.
We plunge into the water and have a great time of it, hooting and hollering and splashing one another, just like any girls in the world, but before we get out to let the sun dry us off, Tepeki takes me to the edge of the river and cups some water in her hands and pours it with great ceremony over my head, intoning, "Wah-chinga-sote-caweena-que-tonk!" This, I suspect, is my new name.
The two girls who had left come back, and we get out of the water and dry off with the blankets they have brought. They also bear gifts for me, and wondrous gifts they are.