Where the Lost Wander(60)

“It’s too deep to cross here. I’ll go upstream a ways. The Mormons have a ferry several miles up, but we might not need to go that far. Water the animals, let them graze, and I’ll see if I can find a better place to ford,” I tell Abbott, who readily agrees.

I stay on the shore, veering down to check the depth of the water every so often, while keeping an eye open for a break in the trees where the wagons can cut down to the riverbank without too much trouble.

After I’ve traveled about fifteen minutes, I see a band of more than a hundred Indians—mostly women and children—gathered on the shore, their animals packed to the hilt with lodge poles and skins, an occasional child perched high on the loads. The few men among them begin to urge the animals across as if they are familiar with the river and its low points, and the women don’t wait for them to reach the other side but follow without hesitation, children on their backs and baskets in their arms. A few rafts constructed out of branches and braided together are piled with more supplies, and older children cling to the edges, pushing the rafts through the water, keeping a tight hold as the water laps at their chests. The dogs plow into the river alongside them, swimming as fast as they can, fighting against the current and often losing, though they manage to fight their way to the other side eventually. I pull the dun up short, watching the band’s progress and gauging the depth of the water, certain that I’ve found the best place for the wagons to cross.

As I watch, keeping my distance down the shore so the tribe will not feel threatened, I notice a woman near the back of the group. She leads a pack mule with two small children sitting atop a tightly bound pack and carries a papoose on her back, the round face of a black-haired babe peering from the top. Maybe it is the mule that catches my eye. He stops every few feet until she tugs on his rope, and then he bounds for a yard or two before he halts again. The third time he does this, the river bottom evades him, and he panics, dunking himself and the two children on his back and pulling the woman off her feet.

The two children shriek, and the mule drags her along, obviously concluding that crossing is his only option. The woman lurches forward and goes under but recovers almost immediately, never letting go of the rope.

But when she finds her feet, the papoose is empty.

A small bundle whirls in the swift current, rushing away from the chaotic procession, down the river, and the woman starts to scream. She throws herself after the baby but catches a different current and is drawn in the wrong direction. The infant is light, and it offers no resistance as the water propels it forward.

I dig in my heels, urging the dun into the water, and keep my eyes locked on the helpless form whirling down the center of the river. For a moment I think I won’t reach the child in time, but the current cuts back, sending it careening toward me, and I let go of my horse, hurling myself toward the baby and scooping him—her—out of the water and up against my chest. The dun begins to swim, but my feet find bottom, and I let the horse go, urging him forward as I fight to stay upright. The baby isn’t crying. She is naked—I don’t know if she entered the water that way or if the current stole whatever she was swaddled in—and her little limbs are still. She is bigger than Wolfe, older, more substantial, but still so small and slick I’m afraid I will lose her again in the water. I wedge her belly against my shoulder and begin to pat her back with one hand as I cling to her legs and bottom with the other, fighting to maintain my balance the remainder of the way. Several of the men are running toward me; the mother has not yet made it out of the river, though she is almost to the shore. I sink to my knees, setting the baby before me on the sand. I turn her onto her side, still patting her back, and a sudden rush of water erupts from her white-tinged lips. She immediately begins to squall and fight, her arms and legs pumping for air, and I scoop her up, resting her tiny belly against my forearm as I continue to pat her back.

When the first man reaches me, his long hair flying out behind him, his breeches and moccasins wet from the river, I rise and extend my arms to him, holding the angry baby girl out in front of me. He takes her, looking her over before passing her to the old man behind him.

I make the sign for good, and he nods, repeating the hand motion. “Att,” he says, and I recognize the word. Good.

Seconds later, the mother arrives, panting and crying, her sodden, empty papoose still hanging from her back, and clasps her shrieking daughter.

She thanks me as she rocks back and forth, holding the child to her chest, comforting them both. And though she still cries, her words tripping and tumbling out of her weeping mouth, I realize that not only do I understand her, I know her.

“Ana?” I gasp, dumbfounded.

She peers up at me, suddenly seeing beyond her emotion, and freezes midsway, midthanks.

“John Lowry?” she asks, rubbing her eyes as though she cannot trust her vision. “John Lowry?” She says my name in exactly the same way Jennie has always said it, and I laugh as I pull her into my arms, planting a kiss on the top of her head.

The growing crowd around us exclaims at my affection, and the older man who was second to reach my side shoves at my arms. I find out soon enough that he is her father, and he doesn’t like the familiarity.

Then she is telling him and the people gathered around us who I am and how we know each other.

“John Lowry, all the way from Missouri,” she says. “John Lowry, my white Pawnee brother.”