was easy to see now that some of the voyageurs were getting impatient with the time spent at these villages — stops that lasted anywhere from an hour to all night. But Thompson wouldn’t risk offending any of the Indians along the way. “They’re good people,” he said. “They ask for very little.”
By Thompson’s calculations they were at a village near the confluence of the Snake River when the Simpoil said it would be useless to go farther since they didn’t know the languages of the people down the river. “This is trouble,” Boulard said.
Thompson appeared unconcerned, though. “There are a man and his wife here who wish to return with us to their village downriver.”
Boulard seemed surprised. “They speak our language?”
Thompson shook his head. “Charles, our steersman, speaks a little of the man’s tongue. He’s the one who told me the man wishes to go with us. I think he’ll prove to be of help.”
Charles was able to translate, but in Peter’s opinion this made conversations with village people even more lengthy and tedious. Thompson, however, was pleased, for several of the chiefs they met asked for a post to be built on the river, and he promised that would be done where the Snake River emptied into the Columbia.
Peter received that bit of information with dismay. Did that mean they would have to camp long enough to build a fort? he wondered. With each day that passed it had become increasingly clear that when they returned to the east they again would cross the height of land in the winter. It was an effort to keep his feelings from showing on his face when they reached the waters of the Snake and Thompson ordered the boat to shore. But Peter breathed a sigh of relief when the mapmaker announced they wouldn’t camp there. On Thompson’s orders Côté and Vallade stripped a tall pine of most of its branches, then the explorer firmly tied a paper to the tree.
While Thompson stared up at the paper, lost in thought, the men whispered, “What is it on the paper? What does he say?”
Peter read the notice carefully, then said, “The paper is a claim to the land all around this place in the name of England. And it states that the North West Company will build a trading post here.” He examined the paper again. “And Mr. Thompson signed his name and the date — 8 July 1811.”
If their leader had planned a small ceremony to honour the occasion, he must have been disappointed, for the men granted him only a quick cheer and leaped back into the boat, ready to take on the mighty river again.
The Columbia widened to about eight hundred yards as it carried them southwest on fairly placid water. Suddenly, on the left, a huge white mountain loomed over the trees. It was so perfectly shaped in a cone that Peter thought it looked as though it had been drawn on a piece of blue paper. From his place in the bow Thompson said, “That mountain is called Hood. It was first seen by the captain of a ship named the Columbia, hence the name of this river.”
Silently, Peter rejoiced. Months ago Thompson had spoken of Mount Hood. This had to mean they were near their destination. If there were no more rapids, perhaps they would be at the mouth of the river in a few days. However, the calm of the Columbia proved to be deceptive when Thompson suddenly called out a warning to Charles.
The mapmaker pointed at the walls of rock that jutted menacingly into the river, shrinking its width to less than a hundred feet. Even from that distance Peter could see the river raging high against the vertical slabs of basalt that forced the water into a boiling torrent. As one man, the paddlers pulled hard for the shore, but they made little headway as their canoe gained speed and the current swept it sideways toward the rocks.
The velocity of the current kept increasing, and Peter anxiously watched the efforts of the men as they paddled more rapidly than ever before. One moment they seemed to gain distance, and in another instant they appeared to be losing their struggle until Boulard, waving his arms and shouting, urged Charles to point the helpless craft at an angle to the shore. When the steersman did so, it seemed they were getting closer to the beach, but the cliffs loomed close enough now to cast a shadow on the small boat.
About ten feet out Charles suddenly leaped into water up to his chest, the rope in his hand, and began to pull. Boulard, too, jumped in, followed by Vallade, and waded to the bow of the canoe to help the steersman. Following Thompson’s lead, Peter snatched one of the paddles they had dropped. His arms ached with his efforts to help keep the back of the canoe from swinging around and allow the current to broadside the canoe, and his breath came in ragged gasps. Long moments passed before the boat landed on a narrow strip of stones and dirt not more than fifty feet from the first perpendicular slab of rock.
No one spoke until the canoe had been pulled out of the water and they had dropped beside it. It was Charles who broke the silence when he glared at the two passengers they carried and shouted at them angrily. The woman seemed frightened, but the man rose from his seat on the ground and answered in kind. The conversation lasted for several minutes before Charles turned to Thompson, disgust written on his face. “He say people of the village where we stopped did not tell him bad waters were ahead. He say we passed his village. They go back now.”
Boulard’s eyes followed the man and his wife as they walked upstream along the river. Dripping water, the big voyageur trotted after them when they disappeared around a sharp bend about a half-mile away. Peter, meanwhile, sat with the rest of the group staring upward at the sheer face of the hill they had to climb. It appeared to be impossible. For a moment even the mapmaker looked defeated, but his face changed quickly when Boulard reappeared, calling his name. ”David, there is a way. The man and his woman followed a trail made by animals.”
“A trail for animals, not men, to be sure,” Côté grumbled as they struggled up the zigzag path, sometimes pulling, sometimes carrying the canoe.
Boulard heard and replied with in an exaggerated tone of hurt, “Me, I am very happy I have the great intelligence to find this trail. Perhaps you would prefer to fly in the canoe over the water?”
As the two men bantered back and forth, Peter’s feelings of admiration came to the fore again. When Thompson agreed they would portage on that trail, Boulard had been the first to jump hip-deep into the river to push the heavy canoe along the shore while Côté had snatched the bow rope to pull. They had managed to get their craft upstream again to the beginning of the trail where each, including Peter, made two trips uphill and downhill until they crossed the land above the rocks, carrying bales and boxes of goods and the hindquarter of a horse, the last of their food.
The work was heavy, but no one stopped to rest. The man and woman who had disappeared might be blameless, but then again they could have hurried to tell their village of the big canoe and what it carried. If the village was large, the brigade could be hopelessly outnumbered.
CHAPTER 16
The mapmaker had no way of communicating with the few Indians they saw in the next two days, but from their gestures he thought there might be some falls and carrying places ahead. He was right, much to Peter’s relief, for it was beyond tiring to sit all day in the canoe and brush mosquitoes away from his face and off Dog’s nose. Surprisingly, she didn’t snap or growl when he did so, leaving Peter to believe the tiny bugs bothered her plenty, too.
Their canoe reached a series of low cascades studded by huge rocks that didn’t discourage the voyageurs at all.“Allez!” Charles shouted, and the canoe shot over the first drop to dip its bow into the white foam and back up again, darting and weaving between the rocks. Clutching Dog’s rope and drenched with spray, Peter laughed. He envied Charles and vowed that someday he, too, would steer through rapids.
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