The Morning River Read online

  The Morning River

  W. Michael Gear

  TO

  Joseph /. Cook

  FOR TEACHING ALL THE HARD LESSONS

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  The book you now hold would never have made it to your hands without Kathleen O'Neal Gear's constant encouragement. From its original draft in 1985, Kathy always believed in the story and characters. She kept the book alive despite countless rejection letters from all manner of publishers.

  Harriet McDougal, our incomparable editor at Tor/Forge, dissected the manuscript with her usual competence. Harriet always pushes us further than we think we can go—but, then, she is the best in the business.

  Linda Quinton, marketing director at Forge Books, deserves special thanks for her constant support and encouragement. She likes packrats and buffalo, too.

  Special appreciation is given to Sierra Adare, our hyper-efficient business manager, for all her hard work. Doug Nichols, our ranch manager, had to listen to bits and pieces of the story over coffee in the morning, and was very patient with a writer's odd proclivities. Thanks, Doug.

  Finally, special thanks go to Jessie, Berdina, Pancho, and Firedancer for helping to remind me what is really real.

  Contents

  HISTORICAL FOREWORD

  ONE

  TWO

  THREE

  FOUR

  FIVE

  SIX

  SEVEN

  EIGHT

  NINE

  TEN

  ELEVEN

  TWELVE

  THIRTEEN

  FOURTEEN

  FIFTEEN

  SIXTEEN

  SEVENTEEN

  EIGHTEEN

  NINETEEN

  TWENTY

  TWENTY-ONE

  TWENTY-TWO

  TWENTY-THREE

  TWENTY-FOUR

  TWENTY-FIVE

  TWENTY-SIX

  TWENTY-SEVEN

  TWENTY-EIGHT

  TWENTY-NINE

  THIRTY

  THIRTY-ONE

  HISTORICAL FOREWORD

  I accept as axiomatic that history is nothing more than the official version of the myth. As an anthropologist and historian, I've always been disappointed with historical novels written about the American frontier. Most such novels have consistently rewritten the old myths, and while occasional authors will research white history with great diligence, the Native peoples are usually stereotyped in one way or another.

  The Morning River is set in 1825, at a time when white Americans were about to enter the tail end of a three-hundred-year-old North American industry: the fur trade. Lewis and Clark had explored the length of the Missouri River and crossed the Northwest. The Astorians had followed in their wake. Manuel Lisa had outfoxed his competition and placed ephemeral fur-trading posts up and down the Missouri until his death in 1820.

  A wealth of goods were flowing along the Missouri, making chiefs rich, upsetting the old social order. Disease followed on the heels of the white traders, rolling up the river in waves, decimating entire villages, weakening established tribes. At this time, too, the Sioux swept westward like Mongols, murdering, stealing, looting, and pillaging all that lay before them.

  In 1823, the desperate Arikara fired on William Ashley's expedition, killing several men and goading a military response. Hearing of the army's advance, the Sioux allied with the American military in hopes the joint effort would end in the extermination of the Rees. Instead, the Arikara withstood a bombardment that blew their village apart, and ghosted away in the middle of the night. The Rees were loose, and the Sioux were furious and scornful of anything American. As a consequence, the Missouri was closed to traders until 1825 when Congress sent the Atkinson-O'Fallon expedition to reopen the river.

  This, then, is the story of the beginning of the end for the peoples of the Northern Plains.

  One of the goals of The Morning River and its sequel, Coyote Summer, is to give the reader a glimpse of the incredible cultural diversity present in the Northern Plains prior to American acculturation in the mid-nineteenth century. While some traits were shared by most Plains people, each band or tribe had its own stories, social structure, and unique adaptation to the land. Some, like the Pawnee, had stratified, hereditary chieftainships, while others, like the Shoshoni, lived in fluid ethnic bands governed by community consent. The Omaha were patrilineal, the Crow fiercely matrilineal. The Arikara and Arapaho spoke languages more different than English from Persian. Many, like the Sioux and Cheyenne, were newcomers to the Plains, originally corn farmers from the East. This wealth of rich cultural detail has been largely ignored in American fiction.

  We have created many myths about the Plains Indians since their final conquest. The truth, as usual, is a little less palatable to modern tastes. The people of the Plains took slaves, murdered women and children, committed genocide on their neighbors, and broke treaties. From archaeological sites, we know that scalping dates back at least five hundred years before the arrival of the Europeans—and the taking of trophy heads more than two thousand. Once the rose-colored glasses of the modern age are doffed, historic Native peoples become curiously human in retrospect.

  The Morning River and Coyote Summer were originally contained in one manuscript that grew too large to be published as a single volume. A Selected Bibliography is appended at the end of this volume for those who wish to learn more about Native American ethnology or the fur trade era.

  ONE

  Here then is the only expedient, from which we can hope for success in our philosophical researches, to leave the tedious lingering method, which we have hitherto followed, and instead of taking now and then a casde or village on the frontier, march up directly to the capital or center of these sciences, to human nature itself; which being once masters of, we may everywhere else hope for an easy victory. . . . We must therefore glean up our experiments in this science from a cautious observation of human life, and take them as they appear in the common course of the world, by mens behaviour in company, in affairs, and in their pleasures.

  —David Hume, A Treatise of Human Nature

  Boston—January 1825

  A bitter wind drove an angry chop across the gray waters of Boston Harbor. Waves slapped the hoar-frosted hulls of ships snugged against ice-cloaked piers. The gale moaned through the furled rigging, sang in the taut lines, and whispered past the red-brick buildings facing the waterfront. It whipped down the cobblestone streets in eddying gusts that twirled faded bits of paper and soot-speckled snow across patches of dirty ice. The hanging signs swayed and creaked forlornly over firmly latched oaken doors.

  Driven by the wind, the terrible chill ate through wraps and woolens until a man's bones ached, and a deep breath seared the lungs. The few courageous pedestrians shivered as they hurried along Boston's slick and winding streets. They scuttled forward, bent into the wind, coats hugged tightly about them, lost in thoughts of warm fireplaces and cheery stoves. Exposed flesh prickled as the relentless blow tore frosty breath from nose or mouth to hustle it away into the gray afternoon.

  The freezing wind bulled across the Commons to rattle the paned windows of an imposing house. It surged against the firm brick walls, twisted at the gables, and wormed around the fretwork and trim; but the house stood as solidly as the stout man poised behind the quivering second-story windows.

  Like a master at the wheel of his ship, Phillip Hamilton had his feet braced, hands clasped behind him. A black cummerbund graced his thickened waist and snugged the crisp white shirt. A full-cut coat hung from his shoulders. Once so broad, they had bowed with age.

  His rough-hewn face looked bulldoggish. The stubby nose might have been mashed onto the thick cheeks. Lines strained the pale skin around his clamped mouth as though h
e were enduring pain, and hard gray eyes glared out at the world from under grizzled brows. His brown hair was shot through with silver now, and pulled back into a severe pony-tail—archaic, given the fashions of the time.

  Phillip Hamilton lifted his chin as he caught sight of the figure that rounded a far corner, glanced back and forth, and started irresolutely across the track-dimpled Commons. Against the powdery white background, the young man seemed to be a wavering apparition, hardly human in form. He progressed in halting, uncertain steps, peeking at the house as if he could sense Phillip's hard gaze.

  Is there nothing of me in him?

  Richard John Charles Hamilton—Phillip Hamilton's only son—shuffled his way through the drifted snow. From Phillip's window he looked as if he were taking an absurd pleasure in the agony of his cold feet and the needling sting on his half-frozen face.

  Phillip rocked on his feet, frustration wrapping around his heart. Damn it, just once couldn't the boy act like a man? Walk with pride in his step, head back?

  Not when he understands what is about to happen. Surely he must know why I've sent for him.

  Phillip snorted, fortifying himself. Dealing with will-o'-the-wisp Richard always agitated him, set his stomach to churning. God's blood, if the boy didn't grovel so, maybe it wouldn't be so tempting to grind him down. A little backbone, that's all it would take.

  My fault. . . all my fault.

  Richard stamped snow from his feet as he stepped onto Beacon Street. He thrust balled fists deeper into his coat and kicked at a pile of frozen horse manure.

  Come on, boy. Let's get it over. It's just as hard for me as it will be for you.

  The trees on the Commons formed a black lace of branches, stark against the sullen gray-white sky. Occasional crystals of ice drifted down, dancing in the numbing wind. Richard raised his apprehensive gaze to his father's redbrick house.

  Phillip instinctively stepped back into the shadows. To either side of the bulging bay windows hung the Belgian lace curtains Phillip's wife had once delighted in.

  Thoughts of her touched that deep-seated callus of anxiety and grief. I should have been there for Caroline. His eyes narrowed as he watched the boy. And for him.

  He'd been at sea when Caroline bore Richard. During the following weeks when her life ebbed slowly out of her body, Phillip had been in Paris, Madrid, and Amsterdam, negotiating the agreements that would make his fortune.

  What God gives with one hand, He takes with the other. A triumphant Phillip Hamilton had returned to his house one week to the day after his wife's death. And, there, had encountered the end of his dreams—and an infant son lying in a wet nurse's arms.

  Phillip craned his neck to see the street below.

  Richard had slowed to a stop in the center of the street, and his thin body erupted in shivers. With a mittened hand, he reached up to brush a loose strand of honey brown hair from his sensitive brown eyes.

  Caroline's eyes. You can see so much of her in him. But where is that spark of daring and courage? How could he have so many of her looks, but so little of her spirit?

  Richard had received his father's summons that morning. Jeffry, Phillip's household servant, had described the young man crouched by the tiny tin stove in his rented room, cocooned in threadbare blankets, studying a new translation of Hegel's Phenomenology of Mind.

  Phenomenology of mind? What kind of idiocy could that be?

  Upon sight of Jeffry, the boy had gone pale, his hand trembling as he broke the wax seal and read the note. Phillip's perfectly formed letters stated: Richard, I need to see you immediately to discuss your situation. A carriage is waiting for you downstairs.

  For long moments Richard had stared glumly through the panes of his little window, the sill delicately mantled with snow.

  Jeffry had reported him as saying, "I can't come now. Not now. I—I'm feeling poorly."

  In his preoccupation, he had accidentally kicked over the clutter of empty wine and ale bottles amassed along one wall. They had rolled across the slanted floor in a tinkling racket.

  "Your father's carriage is downstairs." Jeffry had that cold, precise nature about him. Phillip could imagine him, standing tall, black face as graven as solid walnut.

  "I have errands," Richard had stated, and Phillip could imagine the tremor in the young man's voice. "I'll be there as soon as I can. Tell him . .. tell him at one. I'll be there at one."

  Jeffry had inclined his head, taken his leave, and reported back. Phillip needn't glance at the old ship's clock to tell that it now lacked fifteen minutes of two. And there the boy stood, shivering in the snow, trying to muster the guts to knock at his father's door.

  So, where had the boy been? That student's hideout, no doubt: Fenno's Tavern on Washington Street. Was that it? Did young Richard need a stiff shot of whiskey just to face his father?

  I've failed. . .failed miserably. From the shadows behind the lace curtains, Phillip watched his son close his eyes, breath puffing before his thin face. He'd be a handsome young man were there a little color to his cheeks, a little meat to his shoulders and arms. The high brow, the thin nose, both spoke of aristocracy and privilege—of everything Phillip Hamilton could never have been or had were he not American.

  Apparently, Richard nerved himself. One by one he climbed the steps and reached for the ornate knocker on the heavy door.

  The hollow sound carried to Phillip's second-story study.

  They had fought this same battle many times before. Richard, for all his talk of philosophy, freedom, and natural law, clung desperately to the umbilical cord of Phillip's purse. It seemed that one could not be a philosopher unless one had a wealthy father to support the luxury.

  Today, however, Richard's luxury was coming to an end.

  Rousseau .. . yes, Rousseau, Richard liked to imagine himself as a man in the state of nature, possessed only of virtue and happiness. What had the boy said that day? Yes . . . ' 'Father, you have embraced all the curses of civilization: property, money, power, greed, and the corruption of the soul that led one man to place another in bondage."

  And he'd had the audacity to say that at the very instant that Jeffry was ladling soup into Richard's silver bowl!

  "Father, you find no study more fascinating than a ledger page. All you do is hunch at your cherrywood desk, peering at your books by the light of an oil lamp. You call that life? Balancing figures over and over again?"

  Yes, boy. Those figures keep your belly full and buy your books. Or, at least, they have up until now.

  The younger Hamilton claimed that civilization had fallen from God's natural grace.

  Well, boy, you may have God's grace. Unfortunately, today you 7/ have to deal with mine.

  The heavy door downstairs closed with finality.

  Phillip sighed, hitched around on his good leg, and stumped across the ornate parlor. After the death of his wife, Phillip had practically lived here, behind the cherrywood desk, surrounded by his fortress of ledgers. Here he'd made war on the markets with tobacco, rum, slaves, lace, tinware, porcelain, muskets, glassware, tea, and all the other things that ebbed and flowed in the international trade. He'd lost ships and crews to hurricanes, icebergs, pirates, disease, and impressment. He'd battled tariffs, interest, and insurance with the same fiery spirit that he'd once shown the British. Just over there, across the bay at Breed's Hill.

  He stepped into the gracious hallway, bracing himself on the handrail as he walked to the head of the stairs. Plush carpets lay underfoot, carried here from the Ottoman Empire. Walnut wainscoting rose to white-plastered walls. The giant brass-mounted ship's clock tick-a-tocked monotonously where it hung next to the oak-banistered stairway that led downstairs. Phillip stopped at the head of the stairs, looking down at the first-floor landing. To the left, a double doorway led into the office where he met with his agents and factors. To the right sat the hall chair with its tall mirrored back, and beyond that the French doors which led into the dining room.

  Jeffry stood betw
een Richard and the door, a hand extended as he asked, "May I take your hat and coat, Master Richard?"

  Richard pulled off his frost-crusted hat, baring his light brown hair. His shabby black coat hung loosely on his skinny frame. The boy wasn't eating right again; his normally pale complexion looked death-pasty in the dim light.

  Jeffry stepped away, bearing his tattered prizes to the cloakroom with stately grace.

  "Richard? You're late." Phillip struggled to keep his voice from turning gruff. "I suppose philosophers don't pay much attention to time. One o'clock is just about as good as two, wouldn't you say?"

  "Yes, sir. I—I mean ... no, sir." Richard lowered his eyes.

  Damn it, did the boy always have to look like a whipped puppy? "Join me in the study, Richard."

  Resigned, Richard climbed, eyes focused on his wet boots. They left droplets on the walnut steps. At the head of the stairs, he sought to muster a smile that died stillborn.

  Phillip could hear Richard's nervous breath rasping in his throat as he gestured the boy through the doorway. Phillip hesitated, fingers on the cool oaken door. Richard jumped when the door closed solidly behind them.

  Phillip sighed and limped toward his ornately carved desk and its neat piles of papers. The fireplace popped and crackled, the brass wood bin beside it half-full. Books covered one wall from floor to ceiling. From the bulging bay window behind Phillip, the Charles River could be seen, ice-choked now, the water pewter in the afternoon light. Two whale-oil-filled glass lamps, one to either side, illuminated the desk. A crimson Persian carpet cushioned the floor. In one corner sat a globe, and behind it, the Charleville musket, powder horn, and bullet pouch Phillip had carried in the Revolution.

  Phillip reached the overstuffed French chair and, with effort, lowered himself behind the huge desk. Here he was in his element, everything in place: the quills in their stand; the ink in its well; a solitary copper button he'd ripped from the scarlet jacket of a British officer he'd killed at Breed's Hill; and beside the left-hand lamp, his ledgers. Finally, his wife's heavy leather-bound Bible lay just at the extent of his reach to the right. He sighed before pulling some papers from a stack. Thick fingers pinched his glasses onto his nose.