Wilderness Days (4 page)

Men began arriving on
a daily basis from as far away as Maine, having heard word that a man could earn his fortune in oysters on Shoalwater Bay. They came by horse from the East overland, and by schooner up the coast. Many of the men who had not found gold in California were determined to strike it rich at last, or, at the very least, claim their own land.

In short order we had a retired sea captain, a mason, a carpenter, and a gentleman called Red Charley, who liked to take all the hard-earned money of the other men by selling whiskey at exorbitant prices. I longed for another woman to arrive, but it seemed that fortune hunters were not good husband material. In addition to bathing infrequently at best, the men arriving on Shoalwater Bay were of very questionable character. It was widely suspected that more than one of them was fleeing the law or some other trouble from where he came. None of them brought a wife.

Mr. Russell’s cramped cabin could no longer accommodate all the visitors, and there was suddenly a buzz of activity as small cabins were erected and tents pitched along the arch of the bay to house the new arrivals. I was thankful not to have strange men staying in the cabin any longer. Well, except Mr. Swan, Mr. Russell, and Brandywine the hound. There was talk of building a proper store, and one enterprising young man even constructed a nine-pin bowling alley in an abandoned Chinook lodge, where men could be found drinking and bowling and playing card games long into the night.

I kept busy cooking and cleaning around the cabin, and for extra money I took in mending and laundry. The laundry was pure drudgery, and after a week of darning socks, sewing holes in sleeves, and cleaning pants that had been on a body for so long they deserved a proper burial, I resolved to pursue something else.

Mr. Swan and I owned an oyster business together. To be clear, he owned a claim on a sizable patch of oysters on the bay, and I owned a sturdy Chinook canoe. Oysters were very popular everywhere in the States, although I found them quite disgusting. Even so, the slimy gray things did bring in a silver dollar apiece in San Francisco, and while harvesting them was hard work, it didn’t involve scrubbing bloodstains from collars. We’d had a very successful oyster harvest in July, and I had used some of my earnings to purchase a new pair of boy’s boots and blue calico fabric for new dresses. But now my funds were rather low.

I set out looking for Mr. Swan one late October morning.
Men were working hard everywhere, building cabins and mending canoes. As I followed the path that led to Chief Toke’s village and then onto the beach where I suspected I’d find Mr. Swan, men called out to me and whistled wolfishly. Jehu saw me coming down the trail, and put down the axe he was using to chop wood.

“I’m looking for Mr. Swan,” I said.

He wiped his forehead. His thick black hair was damp with sweat, and it clung to the nape of his neck. “I think he’s down on the beach scribbling in his diary.”

“What are you doing?” I asked.

“Father Joseph wanted me to build him some more benches. Seems he’s hoping to get a bigger parish with all the new arrivals,” he said with a knowing wink.

I laughed. Father Joseph had a very difficult time getting the men to come to church. I suspected that if he offered whiskey instead of communion wine, he’d have a full house every week.

Jehu hefted a piece of wood onto the small pile. His arms were muscled from years of working on ships. I stood there for a moment, just watching. I had, of course, seen Jehu around the settlement, but he most often stayed at Chief Toke’s lodge. It seemed that he and Keer-ukso were becoming fast friends. Even so, he was a sailor, and I wondered why he was still here on the bay.

“Jehu, what are you doing here anyway? Hasn’t the
Hetty
left? Shouldn’t you be sailing back to San Francisco or some exotic, faraway place?”

Jehu regarded me appraisingly. “I thought I’d stick around here for a bit. Maybe even put in a claim on a piece of land.”

“Hmmf.” I was unimpressed. The last man who had tried to tell me about the merits of homesteading had been a scoundrel and a swine. William Baldt had wanted to marry me in order to gain more land, for a single man in the territory could only claim half the amount of land that a married one could. This was the reason he hadn’t bothered to wait for me to arrive but had married another woman—he hadn’t wanted to lose all that land.

“What about you?” Jehu asked, studying me carefully.

“I want to start oystering again,” I said finally.

Like many men, my former betrothed had been very much against a wife’s working outside the home, but Jehu just nodded and squinted into the sun, saying nothing.

I swallowed hard, and started walking.

“Jane,” he called. “Let me know if you need help.”

I turned back and smiled at him gratefully. “I will,” I promised.

The gray clouds parted and the sun peeked out, sending shafts of light dancing across the blue expanse of the bay, and I felt my heart lighten. When it wasn’t raining, Shoalwater Bay was like a charming young man courting a lady—all smiling and full of good humor.

Just as Jehu said, Mr. Swan was perched upon a fallen log on the beach, sketching in his diary. Mr. Swan was interested in the flora and fauna of the region, so much so that he had, in fact,
abandoned a wife and children in Boston to come to Shoalwater Bay to study them. Mr. Swan was rather peculiar, but I was very fond of him.

“Why, hello, my dear,” Mr. Swan said cheerily, setting down his pen.

“What are you working on?” I asked. Mr. Swan kept notes and drew pictures in his diary. He had great plans to publish it one day, and I took pains to display interest in it as he was so proud.

He displayed a sketch of a feathery-looking plant. “Toke told me that this plant is quite therapeutic for all manner of skin ailments.” His enthusiasm reminded me of Papa, who could talk for hours about an interesting case. “Apparently one is supposed to put the leaf directly on the skin.”

“That’s very interesting,” I replied.

“And this is a salal plant,” he explained, turning the page. “They grow very tasty berries. Chief Toke showed me where a lovely patch grows. Perhaps you could make one of your famous pies using the berries one day, my dear?” he asked hopefully.

“I’m sure I could,” I said gently, and then turned the conversation to matters at hand. “Mr. Swan, I would like for us to start harvesting oysters again.”

He looked at me blankly for a moment and then clapped his hands. “What a capital idea, my dear girl! I’m nearly broke.”

I didn’t have to ask where his money had gone. Mr. Swan, like every second man in the territory, was afflicted with a costly fondness for his friend, Old Rye. Whiskey.

“Do you know a schooner we can hire?” It was important that a schooner be on the bay on the day of the harvest; otherwise the oysters would go bad before they ever reached San Francisco. “There seems to be a constant stream of them.”

He rubbed his beard thoughtfully. “There should be a number arriving, my dear. I’m afraid we shall have to negotiate. We aren’t the only ones who need to ship oysters these days. And of course, we shall also have to consider hiring some help. We could always hire some of the pioneers if we can’t get any of Toke’s people.”

“We should hire Chinooks,” I said firmly. “They are more skilled, and far more knowledgeable. After all, Chief Toke was the one who helped you find the oyster bed in the first place.” I wanted to add that they smelled better than the pioneer men as well. The Chinooks bathed regularly, a custom I had come to appreciate greatly.

“Very well, then. Let’s get started,” Mr. Swan agreed.

Mr. Swan and I mapped out how much we could pay for our help and the schooner and still turn a profit. The oyster beds were on the bay, and Mr. Swan’s claim was marked by a wooden stick with a carved swan. All the men identified their claims in a similar manner.

In order to reach the beds to harvest the oysters, we would use my beautiful Chinook canoe. The canoe, which I had acquired over the summer when bargaining with Suis, was carved from a single cedar log and was over forty feet long, nearly six feet wide, and decorated stem to stern with snail
shells. It was a marvel of construction and perfectly suited our purposes.

“If we hire another canoe, my dear, we could easily double our profit,” Mr. Swan said, reviewing the figures in his journal.

“But you have no funds to hire another canoe,” I said.

His face fell. “Ah, yes, that is an impediment.”

I sighed. It made me very nervous, but after a moment’s consideration, I said, “I have some money we could use.”

Mr. Swan immediately brightened. “Capital, dear girl! It is a gamble, but I have every confidence that it is not a risky one. And you shall be well rewarded for your fortitude.”

We determined that we would need at least ten people, including Mr. Swan and me, to man the two canoes and harvest the oysters. All that was left to do was hire the men, the schooner, and the additional canoe.

I could barely fall asleep for excitement, and I was up bright and early the next morning. Mr. Swan was not to be found, so I set out on my own. M’Carty, from farther up the bay, was the first man I approached. Honest and likable, M’Carty was from Tennessee and very plainspoken. He had bought and shipped our oysters during the summer and had a very good relationship with Chief Toke, as he was Toke’s son-in-law.

“Sorry, Miss Peck,” M’Carty said, puffing on his pipe. “My schooners are booked up for the next three months.”

“But we can’t wait that long. It will be winter then!”

I had heard the stories of how whole beds of oysters had been lost to a heavy frost the previous winter.

He tilted his head in agreement and looked up, considering. “You should speak to Red Charley. He’s got a boat here already.”

I grimaced. In addition to the deplorable fact that he provided whiskey to the men of the bay, Red Charley also had the uncommon ability to live in the same shirt for three weeks at a time before bringing it to me to launder. He was a filthy man.

“You know I’d help you out if I could, Jane,” M’Carty said with a shrug.

I squared my shoulders and went in search of Red Charley. He lived in a flimsy cabin not far from Chief Toke’s village. I worried that he would trade whiskey with the Chinooks, but Father Joseph assured me that he was keeping a hawk eye on the greedy man.

I found the disreputable fellow in his dank little cabin drinking whiskey.

Red Charley grinned toothily when he saw me, his cheeks ruddy and bright as two tomatoes. “Come for the laundry, gal?” He licked his lips in an unsavory way.

I bit my tongue and forced myself to smile at him. “Actually, I’m here to discuss hiring your schooner.”

Charley snorted. “You?”

It was disconcerting to be negotiating with the same man whose shirts I washed. “Yes,” I said firmly.

He grunted, settled back in his chair, and took a long drink of whiskey. “Don’t do business with womenfolk.”

“Actually,” I said, “Mr. Swan is my partner, and he would be
here himself except that he was called away on a very important errand.”

Red Charley looked like he didn’t believe me. “Swan, eh?”

“Truly,” I said.

“Well, I was waiting on some lumber, but how much are you willing to pay?”

My friend Suis had been an excellent trader and had taught me how to bargain, a useful skill on the frontier. I named a sum that I knew to be far too low.

The red-bearded, filthy man chortled. “I can get me ten times that if’n I wait for my lumber.” And then he countered with an offer much too high.

“By the time your lumber is cut and ready to load, your schooner could be gone and back with more whiskey,” I added and named a price a little higher than my initial offer.

His eyes narrowed in greed, as if calculating his future riches. “That may be so, but that’s still too low. Got to pay my crew, after all.”

I countered, and named a price a little higher, and then he countered. This game went on for some time until we met in the middle, which had been my intention all along. I was quite pleased with myself as I had come in below the budget I had discussed with Mr. Swan, but I was careful to mask my true feelings.

“You got a deal, gal,” Red Charley said, his grin revealing tobacco-stained teeth. He spat in his hand and held it out. “Let’s shake on it.”

I looked in horror at his hand.

“Come on, gal,” Red Charley said, thrusting his hand out farther.

I gingerly placed my hand in his and he pumped it hard. “It’s a deal,” I said, gritting my own teeth, and then I turned and strode quickly from the cabin and down to the stream, where I threw my hand in the rushing water.

I enlisted Keer-ukso’s help as interpreter. My knowledge of the Chinook Jargon, the local trading language on the bay, was limited. The Jargon was mostly Chinook, with some French and English mixed in. Even though some of the Chinooks spoke English, most of them spoke the Jargon, and it was the only common language among the tribes and settlers in the territory.

Keer-ukso was happy to help, and in the end I negotiated for an additional canoe and for the services of eight men. Keer-ukso instructed them to be standing by in two days’ time. We were ready.

I related the good news to Mr. Swan after supper.

He had been occupied for the day settling a dispute before guns were drawn. There was no law on the bay, and as Mr. Swan had some experience in legal matters back in Boston, he was most often called upon in situations like this.

“I’m afraid we had to kick Hairy Bill off of the bay,” Mr. Swan said with a heavy sigh. “He was caught redhanded with the stolen goods. Been stealing from nearly everyone, judging from what we found in his tent.”

“That’s terrible,” I said, and served him a slice of leftover pie.

“Capital, dear girl!” He took a bite of pie, closing his eyes in delight. “You make the best pie in the territory, my dear.”

I smiled. It was almost like being back on Walnut Street with Papa, the two of us eating Mrs. Parker’s cherry pie and discussing the day’s events.