A Light in the Wilderness (21 page)

“A wife own land?”

“So they tell me. But I can’t marry again. You understand that, don’t you? Zach is all there’ll ever be for me.” She looked at her daughters, all sitting listless, close to their mother. Maryanne, her face as pale as a fish bone, lounged against a wagon wheel while Martha stared into space. At least when Baby Martha squealed, Martha paid her attention. Samuel had buried himself with the men’s work, taken little Edward with him. Sometimes she felt as though she’d lost both boys. The lost Meek train held more losses than people knew of. “Zach might still live and find us. How awful if he waited and then . . .”

Nancy wasn’t certain they’d have the strength to resist the mountain fever that swirled around them, let alone go more miles that
people said were the worst of the trip. Maryanne was still poorly. Maybe from eating food not fully cooked when they arrived at the Columbia River. Everyone was so desperate for nutrients they grabbed at even rotten food. But they all lived. Zach had been so sure of this journey. What was it she was supposed to discover in this wilderness place of the soul?

“The worst is not having the certainty, just as with Laura. A wooden cross from another piece of quilt frame. I’ll never see those crosses again. They were here one moment then . . . gone. I didn’t even tell him that I loved him.” She blinked back fresh tears, rocked back and forth, her arms empty, no one to hold. “We told each other those words every day. I thought I’d have the evening to say it.”

“You alive. Kept your chillun alive. You still dream, for your chillun now. Later you dreams for you.”

Nancy looked at the indigo face of her friend. “But I have not the will. I am so very weak.”

“Just live today. Lord take care of tomorrows.” Letitia handed back the satisfied infant, adjusted her apron.

Nancy had always prided herself on taking each day as it came without worrying about the morrow. Maybe now she’d have to rely on the hope of the future to keep her facing forward.

“Letitia, they won’t wait forever,” Davey interrupted, insistent.

“I keep lookin’ for you,” Letitia told Nancy. “Leave you a message, ask people going to Oregon City to tell you where we end up.”

Nancy’s kin would take the river route too but on rafts the families worked on building. They needed more days to gain weight back and shudder less from their weeks of meandering, burying those who didn’t make it.

They said their good-byes and Letitia let Davey lead her back to the craft. “Doc Hawkins dead,” she said. “Nancy wished she told him words she never get to say. So I’s tellin’ you words.” She corrected herself. “I’m telling you words.” She faced him. “I want you
to make it through, Davey Carson. I’s hoping we have a good life together when we reach that valley.” She didn’t know if she loved the man or not, but she was tied to him in her heart and maybe that’s what love was. She’d do anything for him and she believed he’d do nearly everything for her. He’d paid money to Hudson’s Bay men and he’d not have done that if he didn’t care about what happened to her and Martha. She chewed her lower lip. “I feel for you, Davey Carson.”

“Do you now.” He looked at her. “I feel for you, Tish.” He touched her forehead in the center where her hair came to a little peak. She felt callused fingers. His voice was soft as he said, “Do what the men tell you to do and you’ll be safe. And wait for me. I’ll be coming with Charity. You trust that. We’ve come a long way, Tish. Lord willing, we’ll meet up in ten days.”

His reminder of the Lord’s willingness to look after them and his hopeful words comforted. So with more confidence than she’d felt in a long time, she stepped onto the wide boat, supplies wrapped in the canvas sitting in the wagon boxes, wheels stacked, saplings limp but alive, Roth standing beside them, tail wagging. On soft lips, she pressed a prayer onto the forehead of her daughter. She waved at Davey and they pushed off into the current well below the dangerous falls, headed for the other side. She said a prayer for Davey too and then one for herself, that she’d see him again and their life would finally be settled in this wilderness place. They’d come this far, Davey had reminded her. The Lord had been willing. She’d hang on to that.

Davey and four other sturdy and younger men started pushing several families’ cows as well as their own—about 150 head—up the “walk-up trail.” Davey captained their small party and took as a compliment that the men called him “Uncle Davey.” They were a kind of family after all this time, looking after each other, enduring trials, partying now and then as they’d come across the plains. That’s what families did for each other, wasn’t it? He planned to party when they reached Oregon City, that was certain. He could hear Charity’s cowbell clanging as they moved through blackberries and bramble, crossed streams and found themselves in steep, narrow ravines.

On the third day out light rain fell. When the rain let up, fog took its place.

“Hello! Hello!”

Davey turned to the direction of the call. Out of the timber murk came a woman riding a horse, and a boy, maybe nine or so, and four men. One of his drovers preceded them and told Davey he’d
found Mr. and Mrs. Walden and their small party whose provisions had been stolen by an Indian. “They hope to travel with us.”

“Well, of course.” Davey thought Walden daft for bringing his wife and children this way, but he kept his thoughts to himself. The terrain demanded too much.

The next day they spent hours going around a fallen tree. Another day an elk trail beckoned but led too high. They returned to spend the night where they’d left the camp that morning. On the seventh day, Davey frowned at what route to take. Laurel shrubbed its way beside the path and a few cows ate it before the men chased them away. But before the afternoon was out, several died. “We dare not eat the meat,” Davey said. “We’ll perish as they did.” He didn’t have enough supplies for all of them. They’d have to ration. All this way and at the end starvation threatened. Didn’t that beat all. And he was responsible, the one who said “do this or that.” Maybe conferring with others as Letitia always wanted wasn’t such a bad idea when it came time to spread fault.

A raging snowstorm and high winds pushing against tall timber woke them in the night. The roar and biting sleet pierced their clothing and within a short time each was soaked through. They rushed about, trying to break camp, check the cows.

The cows were gone.

With cold fingers they ate a biscuit each and reloaded their pack animals with what they had left and began a descent, hoping to find a lower elevation trail. But the wind blew snow into their faces, covered the questionable path and their own tracks, and by noon their horses were giving out and had to be led. Davey held his hat in front of Fergus’s face to keep the snow from the animal’s eyes. Davey’s beard froze, his lashes crusted with ice, and he lost sight of the pack animals forward. The group splintered.

“Go back and let the stragglers know we’re ahead,” Davey shouted to a drover through the din of wind. By night, the snow lit the way such as it was, and for the first time Davey felt the gall of fear in his throat. They were out of food, cold and frozen. The
storm might continue for days. And they were lost. The woman, Sarah Walden, was soaked through, wearing only a blanket dress. He could hear her teeth chatter. He was the captain. Responsible. Sleet cut his face like thousands of bee stings, keeping his thoughts from marching straight. He pulled the neckerchief up over his nose. It was nearly frozen to his face.

Sarah Walden’s husband placed her on one of the stronger horses. She looked to be light as a child and shivering despite her husband’s placing his own blanket around her. The horse wouldn’t move nor could it carry the Waldens’ sons, either one, though the boys were small.

He thought about Letitia. She’d survive. Their child too. He should have gone with her, forgotten about the cattle. But he hadn’t. That raft had sailed. He was here now. Here. Trying to survive. He confessed his sins to God then, wishing he’d had a better friendship with the Creator so as not to be such a surprise to him now with these trembling prayers.

Letitia watched as a string of cattle followed along the river on what looked like a shell-covered trail.
Davey
could have come this way where we could have met
up at night.
But she soon lost sight of those animals and learned later the cattle would be two weeks behind, with many lost to the ridges and rivers. When Letitia saw rafts and families portaging supplies back and forth while she carried her child and her bag with candlesticks and baby-helping supplies, she realized how fortunate she was. Davey had paid for her fare and the extra work of portaging, men walking beside the barge-like crafts using ropes to wrestle it from the river until they could safely be brought back on. Davey had done right by them.

The current was swift, but they made a steady way, streaming past blue herons, and when Rothwell howled and sniffed the air, she thought she might have seen a bear on the rocky shoreline. The weather held even through the night when she slept beneath a tent,
not worrying that anyone would bother them. She wasn’t sure why she didn’t worry; if she’d been under a tent alone in Missouri or Kentucky, she would have feared through the night. Maybe that was what freedom meant, being in a place where one didn’t fear.

At the rapids of the Willamette River, they pulled ashore where other Hudson’s Bay canoes waited to take emigrants on to Fort Vancouver. Rothwell sprinted around, exploring. Letitia watched as people embarked on the
Calapooia
, a small scow schooner, and overheard that the craft would take them from the foot of the rapids upriver on the Willamette to Oregon City, heading south as this strange river ran north here. They’d land a short distance from Oregon City. Davey would have to come to that city first. What sense did it make for her—and Davey—to travel to Linnton?

She had a few coins and she could sell some of the supplies to stay there, sleeping near the wagon parts until Davey arrived. They could immediately head south to claim land rather than his having to find her.

“We’s changed our mind,” she told the Hudson’s Bay man who looked to be in charge of several people. “We going to Oregon City. That be closer. Davey Carson pay our way. We need some money back by not going on to Linnton.”

“I’ve no author-i-ty to return cash to a madam changing her mind.” He spoke with an accent.

“I knows where I’m headed. Oregon City. I needs fare for that schooner to take me and my cargo.” She pointed with her chin. “And my baby.” She turned that he might see the baby in the board on her back.

He scratched his bulbous nose with peeling skin. “
Oui.
I will tell the cap-i-tan and release the money to him. But it will be a cred-it given by the Chief Factor. Your husband will talk to the cap-i-tan. That is all I can do.”

That was enough. She boarded the craft and watched as their goods were loaded, the few barrels, ox harnesses, Davey’s anvil, and the wagon boards, bows, wheels, and canvas. As they chugged
upriver, she saw tiny cabins peek out from the undergrowth of green-needled trees. She imagined she and Davey would build such a cabin before cold weather set in. A mix of mist and smoke filled the air, drifting over trees so thin at the top they could be cut for broom handles.

Arriving at the landing of Oregon City she paid laborers to begin the work of setting up the wagon, directing them when they faltered, surprised she knew more about the piecing of the wagon, even though she hadn’t gone to Bethel long months before to see how the wagon was made. She had more than one offer to purchase the wagon, but she knew its value and people accepted that she had the right to tell them no. On the second day, with the wagon all pieced together, she placed her candlesticks and her bag for helping birth babies in the back; then came herbs, coconut oil, her medicines. Finally, she put Martha in her board and laid her on the backboard while she changed the child. Rothwell jumped through the front bow, sniffing in the wagon bed. They were in Oregon City, with sounds of voices reminding her of Kentucky and that nose-tone of folks from the cold north. New smells, new tastes, new everything except the waiting for Davey.

For Nancy and her family the rafts worked well carrying them and the oxen down the river, and then on the north side they hitched the animals to the wagons, driving through mud that bogged the oxen, exhausting everyone having to unhitch, unload, pull and tug, then rehitch. It was almost as bad as Meek’s journey, but at least they had food. They rolled past “death houses,” frame structures placed over bodies of the deceased, the houses built by Indians months or years before. People were silent through this passage but for the crunch of wheels over wind-scattered bone. At a lower landing they saw Hudson’s Bay crafts prepared to take people to the south side of the river where the men pushed cattle onto barges. Judge White, her mother, and Nancy Hawkins took the barge, set
up their wagons, and rolled on in to Oregon City. It was there she struggled with what to do next when her brother brought her “the way through your sorrow,” as he told her.

“You’re to meet Thomas Read. He’s a widower with two children and he needs a wife.”

“Tell him no. It’s too . . . I can’t.”

“He’s a farmer. Well-educated though. From New Hampshire. I knew his people.” They stood beneath one of the big trees with needles. Fir, they called them. Around them the town crowded with the influx of worn-out wagons and equally worn emigrants trying to figure out what was next in this westward trek.

“I appreciate that, Judge. But—”

“You can’t put this off, sister. Where will you spend the winter?”

“Are you saying there’s no room with you?”

“No, of course not.” Her brother was a handsome man with decisiveness like ink lines etched across his forehead. “You can’t waste time grieving over what was. You have to move on. Zach would want you to.”

“I don’t think you know what Zach would want.” She ought not be so sharp with him, but he didn’t listen to her, he never had.

He sighed, came to her as the tears rolled out, patted her back, his arms around her. “Will you at least meet the man? He’s getting ready to head south. You could marry here, then leave together.”

“It’s not possible, Judge. It’s just not. I’ll think of something to provide for me and the children.”

Judge cleared his throat. “Samuel says he wants to come with us.”

“Oh, does he.” She pulled away. “Well, his mother has something to say about that.”

“You have four other mouths to feed. And if you won’t do the sensible thing, then your eldest son at least needs security.”

He would
take my son from me?
“Tell Mr. Read we can talk. But that’s all I agree to. All. And Samuel—and Edward—stay with me.”

She’d not let her brother decide her future. She’d had enough of being weak.