The Captain's Dog by Roland Smith Read Free Book Online Page A

and fire were Shannon's and not some passing Indian's.
    I decided to wait for another opportunity and arrived back at the river in time to see three Indian boys jump in the water and swim out to the keelboat. Dorion spoke with them and told the Captain that they were Yankton Sioux boys. The rest of the tribe was a few miles upriver.
    "Good," Captain Lewis said. "We'll set up camp here. I want you and Sergeant Pryor to go up there and invite them to parley with us."
    That evening the Captain and I went out for a ramble and I picked up Shannon's trail again. I started barking and whimpering and carrying on to get his attention.
    "What is it, Sea?"
    I ran ahead, with the Captain following close behind. After half a mile I came across a clear moccasin print near some berry bushes where Shannon had been grazing. I barked at the print and the Captain bent down for a closer look.
    "No wonder we can't find Shannon," he said. "He's ahead of us! I wonder how far ahead?"
    Three days and moving quick, I knew, but I had no way to convey this information.
    When we got back to camp, Captain Lewis explained "his" discovery, and the following day he sent Colter out to catch Shannon, loaded with extra provisions, knowing that Shannon would likely have a hollow belly.

    Two days later Sergeant Pryor arrived with a group of Yankton Sioux.
    "These Yanktons are real friendly," he reported. "They wanted to carry me into their camp on a buffalo hide, but I declined, telling them that I wasn't the chief. When I got there they fed me a fat roasted dog. Delicious!"
    I looked around at the men, expecting to see them disgusted by this horror, but all of them just stood there grinning like a bunch of fools. At the time I thought they were just hiding their revulsion.
    That night, after Captain Lewis had given his speech and handed out gifts, the men built three large bonfires and had a party. The Yanktons put on their best buffalo robes and vests decorated with beads, feathers, and porcupine quills. They danced and sang in the firelight to the sound of skin drums and rattles made from deer hooves, which I liked much better than the squeak of the fiddle. The Yankton women danced next, waving around human scalps that had been taken by their fathers and husbands in battles.
    Not to be outdone, Private Cruzatte played some whiny tunes on his fiddle and the men danced to the music. One of the French boatmen showed the Yanktons how he could dance on his hands, then York got into the fray, dancing until he nearly collapsed, which impressed the Yanktons greatly. The young girls looked at the ground and covered their shy smiles every time York caught them staring at him in admiration.
    The next morning the Yankton chiefs met with the captains before we proceeded on. They told the captains they needed guns, not medals and beads, to protect them from their enemies. The captains said they could not give them guns, but assured them that their new father would give them gifts beyond their imagination if they would go to visit him in Washington. The chiefs said they would go, and Dorion stayed behind to guide them there.

September 6, 1804
Still no sign of our man Shannon ... This is truly the land of plenty. Everywhere we look there are deer, elk buffalo, and other creatures previously unknown to me. But Shannon is no hunter, and I fear he may be dead...
    ONE OF THESE new creatures was a small hoofed animal with stiff, buff-colored hair, large eyes, and short-pronged horns. It was an awkward-looking beast, but it was the fastest thing on hooves I had ever seen. It sped across the ground in long graceful bounds, faster than a bird could fly.
    "I swear to god," Colter said, "that animal can outrun a musket ball." It took several days and dozens of shots to prove this theory wrong.
    Another animal we discovered during this time was
the whistling rat—at least that's what I thought it was when I first laid eyes on it.
    Captain Lewis and I were on a ramble one afternoon