Into the Unknown

Chapter Fifteen

Some moments we never forget. They are indelibly seared into our memories. When we think of them, they are as fresh as when they happened.

This was one of those moments for me. I thought for sure Jordy would yell and the others would leap up, with dire consequences.

But quick as lightning, Blue Water Woman drew his knife and plunged it into his ribs. Jordy’s back arched and his mouth opened. She clamped her other hand over his lips before he could yell, and like a punctured water skin he deflated and sank onto his side on top of his rifle. She tugged at the weapon, but it would not come free. She snatched one of his pistols instead. Then, yanking the knife out and beckoning to me, she rose into a crouch and moved toward the horses.

I was on my feet and at her heels in a twinkling. I was stunned, my mind sluggish. We were halfway to the string when I realized that if we rode off, I would have to leave my journal, paintings and sketches behind. I could not do that. I stopped.

Blue Water Woman reached the first horse. She glanced back, and motioned.

I shook my head. I refused to leave my work in the hands of cutthroats who might destroy it.

She motioned a second time, urgently.

I had to make her understand. I hurried toward her to explain.

That was when the horse, apparently smelling the blood on the knife, whinnied.

Jess Hook rose onto his elbows. He saw his brother. He saw us. His hand swooped to his pistols and he roared, “Cutter! They’re trying to get away!”

Fingers wrapped around my arm, and I was pulled bodily into the dark. I did not resist. Too much was happening too fast.

A flintlock boomed and lead buzzed past my ear. Suddenly my life took precedence over my work, and when Blue Water Woman broke into a run, so did I. Fortunately, she retained her grip on my arm. It was pitch-black in the forest, and I could barely see her. Trees and other objects streaked by. How she managed, I can’t say.

The crackle of underbrush warned me of pursuit. From the sounds, only one of them was after us. I suspected it was Cutter. Jess would be checking Jordy; his rage would be boundless.

Blue Water Woman was uncanny. She threaded swiftly through the trees, avoiding obstacles with a facility that made me marvel. And she did so while making no more noise than a wraith. I wish I could say the same, but compared to her, I was a blundering ox.

I stepped on a dry twig. At the crunch, the night behind us flared with thunder and a tree I was passing thudded to the impact of a slug. I ran faster.

Soon we came to a slope and started down. I was running blind, relying completely on Blue Water Woman.

A sudden blow to the forehead rocked me on my heels. I had blundered into a low tree limb. Everything spun. My knees were wobbly. I staggered and groped for Blue Water Woman. Her hands found my arm, and she pulled me down to the ground and placed a palm over my mouth. Her warm lips brushed my ear.

“Be still, Robert.”

Cutter was crashing toward us. Apparently he had thrown stealth to the wind. The crashing stopped about fifteen feet away, and I spied his silhouette. He cursed and turned right and left.

He had lost us!

From the camp came a shout.

“Cutter! Get back here! Jordy’s hurt bad! I need your help right away!”

Swearing anew, Cutter wheeled and flew back up the mountain.

I was both elated and vexed. Elated that we had gotten away but vexed at leaving my work, which was everything to me. I was also disturbed that Jordy still lived.

Blue Water Woman did not move. I was growing impatient when she at last whispered in my ear, “We can go on.”

“You, not me,” I said.

Her face loomed so near that our noses practically touched. “What are you saying, Robert?”

“I can’t leave my work. All I have gone through will have been in vain.”

“You cannot go back. They will kill you.”

“Maybe not,” I said hopefully. “But it is a risk I must take. In the meantime, fetch your husband and the Kings.” I started to stand, but she still had hold of my arm and did not let go. “Release me, if you please.”

“I cannot let you do this.”

“Don’t worry about me,” I said. “The important thing is that you are safe.” Even more important were the fruits of my weeks of labor, but I did not come right out and say that.

“When I said I cannot let you, I meant it.” So saying, Blue Water Woman pressed the tip of the blade against the back of my right hand. A sharp pain shot up my arm. I tried to recoil but she held me fast.

“What in God’s name are you doing?” I demanded.

“You are coming with me whether you want to or not. Refuse, and you will never paint another animal or make another entry in your journal unless you learn to do so with your other hand.”

Her meaning was clear. “You wouldn’t!”

“I will save you however I must.”

“It is my decision to make, not yours. You have no right to force me against my will.”

“I will not have your death on my conscience.” Without taking the tip of the knife from my hand, Blue Water Woman pulled me to my feet and we resumed our flight.

I was horror-struck. One misstep, and the blade would slice into my hand, severing tendons and nerves.

Gradually, my horror gave way to simmering fury. We had gone about two hundred yards and I had lost sight of the campfire when I drew up short. “Take that knife away this instant.”

“Will you stay with me if I do?”

“Are all the Salish so stubborn?” I rejoined.

“We do not let those we care for die for no reason.”

I submitted, partly because I was touched by her concern and partly because I doubted my ability to find my way back in the dark. Still, I fretted with every step that took me farther from that which meant so much to me. Some might deem it foolish, but consider that it would be impossible for me to reproduce the paintings and sketches. Oh, I might render other animals and plants of the same kind, but I did not have canvas and paper to squander, and the sum of my work would be that much less.

“I am sorry I had to do this, Robert,” Blue Water Woman said as she finally lowered the knife.

“Don’t seek to make amends,” I said bitterly. “You don’t realize what this could cost me.”

“Which is more valuable, your work or your life?”

“I measure the one by the other. My work defines who I am. It will endure long after I am gone.”

“Your outlook is peculiar,” Blue Water Woman said, glancing over her shoulder. She grinned. “Even for a white man.”

“On the contrary,” I said. “Many whites measure their worth by what they do and not who they are or how much they have.”

“Are they as serious as you? Do they ever relax and savor being alive? Or have they forgotten there is more to life than work?”

“I have not reached that point,” I said defensively. Or had I? Ever since I crossed the Mississippi River, I had become obsessed. But who could blame me, what with the bounty of new species to be recorded and the possibility of a position at a prestigious university?

We fell silent after that. Blue Water Woman moved so rapidly, I soon tired.

“Is it necessary we walk ourselves into the ground?”

“The sun waits for no one,” Blue Water Woman responded, and gestured at the eastern horizon.

A rosy glow presaged the dawn.

“How soon do you expect them to come after us?” I asked.

“As soon as it is light enough.”

I prayed she was wrong. They had horses. They would swiftly overtake us, and unless we were very lucky or very crafty, or both, we would again find ourselves their captives.

It was incentive to keep up with my liberator.

Suddenly I was struck by a thought. I was the man, yet she was saving us. Was I so puny that I needed a woman to rescue me? Yes, I am a naturalist, not a frontiersman or a soldier or a law officer, and my wilderness skills were laughable. But was that sufficient reason to let her take charge?

I decided it was. I was perfectly content to let her handle things. The arrogance that causes men to treat women as inferior, I can proudly state, is not one of my faults.

Degree by degree the sky was brightening. The sun had not appeared but the whole of the eastern sky was pink and orange. Some people say that sunrises never rival sunsets, but I have seen my share of dawns, and they can be as spectacular.

A bird warbled. As if that were a signal, a legion of others broke out in song.

Blue Water Woman stopped and cocked her head, listening. “They come,” she announced.

I did not hear them, but I took her word for it. We ran to a thicket and she dropped onto all fours and crawled in among the brambles, urging me to stay close to her. Not so easily done, what with the sharp tips of the branches threatening to poke out my eyes. We went forty or fifty feet and then were up and running, the thicket behind us, pines ahead. I sensed she was making for a specific spot and soon she proved me right. The vegetation thinned and we came to a stop on the bank of a stream.

“Wade in,” Blue Water Woman said, doing so.

“I know this trick,” I told her. “Zach used it to try and shake the Hooks and Cutter off our trail.” I added, “It didn’t work.”

“Let us hope we have more success.”

Sticking to the middle, Blue Water Woman headed downstream. She did not hike her dress as many white women would do.

The water was cold. I was soon soaked to near my knees. A stiff breeze from high up the mountain added to my discomfort.

Neither the water nor the wind seemed to have any effect on Blue Water Woman. She was made of iron.

In due course the sun poked over the rim of the world. The forest was alive with birds, and other small creatures were stirring after their night of rest.

“No sign of pursuit yet,” I said.

“They will come,” Blue Water Woman declared.

I wanted to keep talking. It took my mind off how cold I was, and my empty stomach, and my paintings and my journal. So I gave voice to the first thing that popped into my head. “Do you ever regret marrying a white man?”

Blue Water Woman broke stride and glanced back at me. “A strange thing to ask at a time like this.” She moved on.

“Zach King told me that a lot of whites and Indians look down their noses at those who wed outside their own kind.”

“I do not care what others think. I do not care what they say. I live my life as I want and not as they want.”

“You are happy, then?”

“Happy beyond words, Robert Parker. Shakespeare is a special man, and I am honored he loves me.”

“Have you ever wished Shakespeare and you had children?”

Blue Water Woman was quiet a bit, then she said, “It is my one great sadness.”

“Forgive me for asking.”

“When a woman loves a man, she desires to please him every way she can. I know Shakespeare dearly desired a family, and I yearned to give him one. But it was not meant to be.” She paused. “Perhaps it is just as well. We married late in life. It is hard when you are old to keep up with the young.”

Despite their years, I did not think of them as old. “I hope to heaven I have half his vitality when I am his age. Or yours, for that matter.” She moved with a supple grace I found enticing.

“My husband likes to say we are as old as we think we are,” Blue Water Woman mentioned. “When he has lived one hundred winters, I imagine he will behave as if he has lived fifteen.”

I chuckled.

“But to answer your question, no, I do not regret taking him for my mate. I love him, and I will go on loving him with all that I am until the day I die.”

At that instant I would gladly have pushed Shakespeare McNair off a cliff. But I settled for saying, “He is fortunate.”

Blue Water Woman glanced back at me again. “Tell him what I told you, Robert, if something should happen to me.”

“Don’t talk like that,” I said. Intimations of death crept over me, but I shrugged them off. Nerves, I decided. Nothing but nerves.

“We all die.”

“Yes, but we need not die today.”

“The time and place is not always ours to decide.”

I was uncomfortable talking about it. “Perhaps you are mistaken. Perhaps they won’t come after us, and the rest of the day will be uneventful.”

Hardly was the statement out of my mouth when we rounded a bend and Blue Water Woman drew up so abruptly, I nearly walked into her.

“What is it?” I asked, stepping to one side to see what she was seeing.

“Stand still!”

On our left was a bank, approximately shoulder height. And crouched on the bank was a mountain lion.