Thompson seemed to listen to the chief’s words with great care and promised to bring all he requested and more provided he gave them accurate information on the big river, particularly how well large, heavily laden canoes could travel up it.
Later, as at last they sat in a wide circle and dined on the salmon, deer meat, and berries the women had prepared, Peter found he was seated next to a young Simpoil barely older than himself. On the other side was one of the interpreters. With the interpreter’s help the Simpoil youth asked, “You find the meat to your liking?”
Peter nodded. “If your weapons aren’t good, how do you kill deer?”
“Many hunt in a big circle,” the young man explained. “With care we move to make the circle smaller and smaller until we are close enough to kill the deer we find.” He stared at the fire sadly. “Arrows of flint often do not kill, and the deer run away.”
Peter felt guilty that he was eating something that had been so difficult to obtain, so he decided not to take a fourth piece.
Thompson was so intent on getting as much information about the Columbia as possible that they didn’t leave until noon the next day. By early afternoon, they found another village where they had to stop and smoke with the people. Plainly, the Indians were unafraid of the white strangers and listened intently as the mapmaker described his reasons for coming to their village. They nodded at one another happily and then at Thompson when the interpreters translated his message. As Thompson talked, some of the villagers walked around Peter and the rest of the voyageurs, peering at their clothing and hair. Later, when Côté and Vallade used axes to split driftwood for their fire, their efforts were regarded with wonder.
Watching the village people, Peter thought of the times he had found life hard. Sometimes he had known hunger in Montreal, and many times they had had little to eat while crossing the mountains and beyond. But knowing the hunger would end when they returned east had made it easier to bear. Here the people had little to look forward to but search for food, make rush mats to cover the poles for their house, and find driftwood to burn. They didn’t seem unhappy, but he didn’t envy them, and he hoped the company would bring goods to make life easier for them. When they waved goodbye the next morning, he felt depressed.
At times, when the current appeared to slow, the men lifted their oars and allowed the canoe to drift down the river. The terrain on both sides of the river seemed to be drier and less fertile now. The soil was greyish-white, and the grass grew in short clumps. The pungent scent of sagebrush filled their nostrils when the breeze blew over the river, and the cries of hawks sounded eerily in the silence as they spiralled overhead.
Indian camps appeared more frequently now, and each time they did Thompson ordered the men to pull for shore. With the aid of the Simpoil interpreters, he engaged the Indians in conversation, always explaining he was there to learn if it was possible to bring trade goods down the river. Without fail both men and women seemed more than happy to agree to trap for furs and trade them for the goods Thompson would bring.
It was easy to see now that some of the voyageurs were getting impatient with the time spent at these villages — stops that lasted anywhere from an hour to all night. But Thompson wouldn’t risk offending any of the Indians along the way. “They’re good people,” he said. “They ask for very little.”
By Thompson’s calculations they were at a village near the confluence of the Snake River when the Simpoil said it would be useless to go farther since they didn’t know the languages of the people down the river. “This is trouble,” Boulard said.
Thompson appeared unconcerned, though. “There are a man and his wife here who wish to return with us to their village downriver.”
Boulard seemed surprised. “They speak our language?”
Thompson shook his head. “Charles, our steersman, speaks a little of the man’s tongue. He’s the one who told me the man wishes to go with us. I think he’ll prove to be of help.”
Charles was able to translate, but in Peter’s opinion this made conversations with village people even more lengthy and tedious. Thompson, however, was pleased, for several of the chiefs they met asked for a post to be built on the river, and he promised that would be done where the Snake River emptied into the Columbia.
Peter received that bit of information with dismay. Did that mean they would have to camp long enough to build a fort? he wondered. With each day that passed it had become increasingly clear that when they returned to the east they again would cross the height of land in the winter. It was an effort to keep his feelings from showing on his face when they reached the waters of the Snake and Thompson ordered the boat to shore. But Peter breathed a sigh of relief when the mapmaker announced they wouldn’t camp there. On Thompson’s orders Côté and Vallade stripped a tall pine of most of its branches, then the explorer firmly tied a paper to the tree.
While Thompson stared up at the paper, lost in thought, the men whispered, “What is it on the paper? What does he say?”
Peter read the notice carefully, then said, “The paper is a claim to the land all around this place in the name of England. And it states that the North West Company will build a trading post here.” He examined the paper again. “And Mr. Thompson signed his name and the date — 8 July 1811.”
If their leader had planned a small ceremony to honour the occasion, he must have been disappointed, for the men granted him only a quick cheer and leaped back into the boat, ready to take on the mighty river again.
The Columbia widened to about eight hundred yards as it carried them southwest on fairly placid water. Suddenly, on the left, a huge white mountain loomed over the trees. It was so perfectly shaped in a cone that Peter thought it looked as though it had been drawn on a piece of blue paper. From his place in the bow Thompson said, “That mountain is called Hood. It was first seen by the captain of a ship named the Columbia, hence the name of this river.”
Silently, Peter rejoiced. Months ago Thompson had spoken of Mount Hood. This had to mean they were near their destination. If there were no more rapids, perhaps they would be at the mouth of the river in a few days. However, the calm of the Columbia proved to be deceptive when Thompson suddenly called out a warning to Charles.
The mapmaker pointed at the walls of rock that jutted menacingly into the river, shrinking its width to less than a hundred feet. Even from that distance Peter could see the river raging high against the vertical slabs of basalt that forced the water into a boiling torrent. As one man, the paddlers pulled hard for the shore, but they made little headway as their canoe gained speed and the current swept it sideways toward the rocks.
The velocity of the current kept increasing, and Peter anxiously watched the efforts of the men as they paddled more rapidly than ever before. One moment they seemed to gain distance, and in another instant they appeared to be losing their struggle until Boulard, waving his arms and shouting, urged Charles to point the helpless craft at an angle to the shore. When the steersman did so, it seemed they were getting closer to the beach, but the cliffs loomed close enough now to cast a shadow on the small boat.
About ten feet out Charles suddenly leaped into water up to his chest, the rope in his hand, and began to pull. Boulard, too, jumped in, followed by Vallade, and waded to the bow of the canoe to help the steersman. Following Thompson’s lead, Peter snatched one of the paddles they had dropped. His arms ached with his efforts to help keep the back of the canoe from swinging around and allow the current to broadside the canoe, and his breath came in ragged gasps. Long moments passed before the boat landed on a narrow strip of stones