Glass looked into the circle before him. At its center, near the pyre, stood a row of four-low chairs made from woven willows. Clearly, these were the front-row seats to the spectacle that was to have been his ritual burning. He limped to one of the seats and sat down. Chief Kicking Bull said something, and two women scrambled to fetch food and water. Then he said something to the brave with the vermillion hand print on his chest. The brave darted off, returning with the Anstadt, which he placed on the ground next to Glass.
Glass spent almost a year with the Loup Pawnee on the plains between the Arkansas and Platte Rivers. After overcoming his initial reticence, Kicking Bull adopted the white man like a son. What Glass had not learned about wilderness survival in his trek from Campeche, he learned from the Pawnee that year.
By 1821, scattered white men had begun to travel the plains between the Platte and the Arkansas. In the summer of that year, Glass was hunting with a party of ten Pawnee when they came across two white men with a wagon. Telling his Pawnee friends to stay behind, Glass rode slowly forward. The men were federal agents dispatched by William Clark, United States Superintendent of Indian Affairs. Clark invited the chiefs of all the surrounding tribes to St. Louis. To demonstrate the government’s good faith, the wagon was loaded with gifts—blankets, sewing needles, knives, cast iron pots.
Three weeks later, Glass arrived in St. Louis in the company of Kicking Bull.
St. Louis lay at the frontier of the two forces tugging at Glass. From the east he felt anew the powerful pull of his ties to the civilized world—to Elizabeth and to his family, to his profession and to his past. From the west he felt the tantalizing lure of terra incognita, of freedom unmatched, of fresh beginnings. Glass posted three letters to Philadelphia: to Elizabeth, to his mother, and to Rawsthorne & Sons. He took a clerical job with the Mississippi Shipping Company and waited for replies.
It took more than six months. In early March 1822, a letter arrived from his brother. Their mother had died, he wrote, following their father after barely a month.
There was more. “It is also my sad duty to tell you that your dear Elizabeth has died. She contracted a fever last January, and, though she struggled, she did not recover.” Glass collapsed into a chair. The blood drained from his face and he wondered if he would be sick. He read on: “I hope it will give you comfort to know that she was laid to rest near Mother. You should also know that her fidelity to you never wavered, even when we all believed that you had perished.”
On March 20th, Glass arrived at the offices of the Mississippi Shipping Company to find a group of men huddled around an advertisement in the Missouri Republican. William Ashley was raising a fur brigade, bound for the upper Missouri.
A week later, a letter arrived from Rawsthorne & Sons, offering Glass a new commission as the captain of a cutter on the Philadelphia to Liverpool run. On the evening of April 14th, he read the offer one last time, then threw it on the fire, watching as the flames devoured this last tangible link to his former life.
The next morning, Hugh Glass embarked with Captain Henry and the men of the Rocky Mountain Fur Company. At thirty-six, Glass no longer considered himself a young man. And unlike young men, Glass did not consider himself as someone with nothing to lose. His decision to go west was not rash or forced, but as fully deliberate as any choice in his life. At the same time, he could not explain or articulate his reasons. It was something that he felt more than understood.
In a letter to his brother he wrote, “I am drawn to this endeavor as I have never before been drawn to anything in my life. I am sure that I am right to do this, though I cannot tell you precisely why.”
EIGHT
SEPTEMBER 2, 1823—AFTERNOON
GLASS TOOK ANOTHER LONG LOOK at the rattlesnake, still lying torpid in the all-consuming state of digesting its prey. The snake hadn’t moved an inch since Glass had been conscious. Food. His thirst quenched at the seeping spring, Glass became suddenly aware of a profound and gnawing hunger. He had no idea how long it had been since he had eaten, but his hands trembled from the lack of subsistence. When he lifted his head, the clearing spun a slow circle around him.
Glass crawled cautiously toward the snake, the imagery of his horrific dream still vivid. He moved to within six feet, stopping to pick up a walnut-size rock. With his left hand, he rolled the rock, which skipped toward the snake, bumping its body. The snake didn’t move. Glass picked up a fist-size rock and crawled within reach. Too late, the snake made a sluggish move toward cover. Glass smashed the rock on its head, beating the serpent repeatedly until he was certain it was dead.
Having killed the rattlesnake, Glass’s next challenge was to gut it out.
He looked around the camp. His possibles bag lay near the edge of the clearing. He crawled to it, emptying its remaining contents on the ground: a few rifle patches, a razor, two hawk’s feet on a beaded necklace, and the six-inch claw of a grizzly bear. Glass picked up the claw, fixating on the thick coat of dried blood at its tip. He returned it to the bag, wondering how it got there. He picked up the patches, thinking that he might use them for tinder, bitter anew that they would not serve their intended purpose. The razor was the one true find. Its blade was too fragile to make of a weapon, but it could serve a number of useful purposes. Most immediately, he could use it to skin the snake. He dropped the razor into the possibles bag, slung the bag over his shoulder, and crawled back to the snake.
Already flies buzzed around the snake’s bloody head. Glass was more respectful. He had once seen a severed snake head implant itself on the nose of a fatally curious dog. Remembering the unfortunate dog, he laid a long stick across the snake’s head and pressed down on it with his left leg. He couldn’t lift his right arm without setting off intense pain in his shoulder, but the hand functioned normally. He used it to work the razor, sawing the blade to sever the head. He used the stick to flip the head toward the edge of the clearing.
He sliced down the belly beginning at the neck. The razor dulled quickly, reducing its effectiveness with each inch. He managed to cut the length of the snake, nearly five feet to the vent. With the snake laid open he pulled out the entrails, throwing them aside. Beginning again at the neck, he used the razor to peel the scaly skin away from the muscle. The meat now glistened before him, irresistible in the face of his hunger.
He bit into the snake, ripping into the raw flesh as if it were an ear of corn. Finally a piece tore free. He gnawed at the springy meat, though his teeth did little to break it down. Oblivious to anything but his hunger, he made the mistake of swallowing. The large chunk of raw meat felt like a stone as it passed through his wounded throat. The pain made him gag. He coughed, and for an instant he thought the chunk of meat might choke him. Finally it passed down his gullet.