Hard Gold (8 page)
Authors: Avi
May 12
I
WOKE TO discover our oxen had broken loose again. Mr. Bunderly had not tied them properly. Since we could not move without, I had to find them. When I did and yoked them up, I offered to tie up the oxen from then on. Afterward we went along a road of black mud.
As we went, I kept wondering if Mr. Mawr had spoken to Mr. Bunderly and what he might have told him. If he had, the barber said nothing to me about it. That eased me somewhat. But since Mawr might speak to Lizzy, too, and she being so unpredictable, I still worried.
May 13
That day we went only three miles but reached the Nishnabotna River, where we camped. I took Lizzy fishing and got ourselves a catfish. I even cooked it for her.
She watched intently. “I never saw a man cook before,” she said.
“I’m a boy.”
“Does that mean, Mr. Early, you’re going to stop when you get older?”
“Why must you always ask outlandish questions?” I said.
She tossed her hair. “I only ask what I wish to know.” Her green eyes seemed fierce.
“Need you know so much?”
“Are you comfortable with ignorance?”
“A body can’t know everything.”
“Mr. Early, I believe it’s time you started thinking.”
“Why’s that?”
“Knowing everything is impossible. But knowing nothing is despicable.”
Unable to argue, I made no reply.
As the fish was cooking, she said, “Early, why doesn’t Mr. Mawr like you?”
“Don’t he?”
“He was asking questions about you.”
“Like what?”
“He suggests there are doubtful aspects to your life.”
“Does he?”
“So when he asked me about you, I told him I knew your great secret.”
“You did?” I cried.
“I confided to him that you were the concealed, if unnatural, son of the Emperor Bonaparte.”
“You didn’t!”
“Did,” said a grinning Lizzy. “I will say I don’t care for Mr. Mawr.”
“Me neither.”
Then she said, “You haven’t noticed.”
“What?”
“Since I threw away my bonnet—the result.”
“What?”
“Freckles.”
I looked over and said, “I think you look pretty fine.”
For once, I detected something like a blush.
May 14
We forded Silver Creek near the town of Latimer’s Grove. When we got to the other side, we came upon a camp of some fifteen wagons, all going to the Cherry Creek mines.
That evening, when the men sat around the fire as they did most nights, there was much talk about Pike’s Peak.
Lizzy and I sat out on the edge and listened.
All the men agreed that the gold in Cherry Creek was plentiful. Much talk, too, about the best route to get to the place. Some championed the Platte River route. Mr. Wynkoop insisted that the Republican River trail was most favorable. Mr. Griffin mentioned something called the Smoky Hill route as the shortest.
A really clear map showing the various trails out to the Pike’s Peak diggings. When the state of Colorado was organized, it was made from parts of the Kansas, Nebraska, Utah, and New Mexico territories.
There seemed as many points of view as sparks flying from the fire. But in all the arguments it occurred to me that no one really knew. That part was like the fire’s smoke.
That so many grown men could go so far for so long without knowing the best way startled me.
May 15
It being Sunday, we rested. The weather was fine. Some took the time to cast some shot for their guns. Some baked bread. I wished Lizzy would do the same.
I heard Mrs. Bunderly complain loudly about her health. Mr. Bunderly tried to soothe her. She scolded him for being a fool, and then told Lizzy she was slatternly.
The girl stomped off.
Shortly after, Mr. Mawr came along and ordered me to watch the cattle. Sunday or not, I suppose somebody had to do it, and I was the youngest of the hired hands. So although Mr. Mawr was surly with me, I went all the same.
Apollo trotting by her side, Lizzy found me. The girl said nothing but sat on the ground and watched over the cows with me. “It being Sunday,” she suddenly announced, “I’ll sing you hymns.”
She did, too: the old Methodist song “How Can We Sinners Know,” and then “Our Ancient Fathers.”
When she was done, I said, “You’ve got a real fine voice.”
She said nothing to my compliment but then said, “Early, what do you think of bloomer suits?”
“Can’t say I know what they are.”
“Some lady by the name of Miss Bloomer invented them for ladies to wear beneath their skirts. So they might walk and run.”
“Ladies aren’t supposed to run.”
“I like to.”
I looked at her and grinned. “Then you’d best wear bloomers.”
She giggled and said, “I think I just may.”
A Bloomer girl! I’m not sure how Lizzy would have looked.
Next moment she sang “Hark, the Herald Angels Sing,” while hugging her pig, who grunted. I suspected she taught the pig to do so. I never knew what Lizzy would do next.
May 16
We crossed another creek.
Having yet to ride in the wagon, I began to wonder if I would walk the whole way.
By the road we came upon a crude gravestone. It read:
GEORGE W. RIPLEY
HARTFORD. CONNECTICUT
DIED OF A FEVER. 1859
AGE 6
RIP
Lizzy said, “Early, I will pray that his journey to paradise is nearer than Connecticut.” The grave put us in a somber mood.
May 17
We went eight miles, and by crossing Keg Creek came within ten miles of Council Bluffs—or so I was told. That evening we found a camp of some eight wagons. One wagon had these familiar words on its canvas:
PIKE’S PEAK OR BUST!
But someone had crossed off the first three words, then added some letters so that it read
BUSTED BY THUNDER
We discovered that these people, all men, looking weary and sadly worn, were coming
back
from the Pike’s Peak diggings, going home to Ohio state. I was shocked.
A “go-backer” or “stampeder,” heading back East—if he can make it.
We made camp nearby, for naturally we wanted to learn their story.
The men of our train—with Lizzy and me—approached their camp and introduced themselves.
It was Mr. Bunderly who said, “Gentlemen, we’ve only just begun heading toward the Kansas mining territory and would be pleased to gain from your experiences.”
These Ohio men, twenty-four in all, were sullen and seemed reluctant to speak. But then one of them said, “Mister, if you want the truth, it’s this: you are fools to go there.”
“There’s no gold to be had in Cherry Creek,” said another.
“Nothing?” said Mr. Mawr.
“Nothing.”
“But—”
“We’ve been there,” said another. “It’s all a humbug. A pack of lies.”
We pressed them for particulars, but the Ohioans would say little, other than to repeat what they had already said.
Our group retreated, but I stayed behind. There was one old grizzled man in the returning train who kept himself somewhat apart. I went up to him.
“Sir,” I ventured, “when you were out at the Cherry Creek mines did you ever meet a man by the name of Jesse Plockett?”
“Jesse Plockett?” he returned, his bleary eyes much more alert than before.
“Yes, sir.”
“What makes you ask about him?”
“He’s my near relation.”
“Is he now?” He studied me for a while. “Fancy that. You going out to him?”
“Yes, sir. Is he alive and well?” I asked.
“Alive? Last I heard, he was. As for being well … I couldn’t rightly say.”
“Why?” I asked, alarmed.
The man seemed to consider his words. Then he said, “They say he killed a man.”
“Killed a man!
What happened?”
“Can’t say I know for sure.”
No matter how I pressed him he would add nothing. I went back to our camp greatly agitated. The things people were saying about Jesse! That he was a robber. A murderer. All I had to do was close my eyes and I’d see his wild golden hair, his walk, and that smile which always made me glad. I could hear his easy, laughing talk, too. No, what people said was not the Jesse I knew. And since I had no doubt that Jesse had gotten gold, I decided these men were wrongheaded about all the rest they said, too.
When I got back to our camp I was relieved to see that the men did not believe the go-backers either. We would press on.
When I returned to our wagon, Lizzy came up to me. “What were you asking that man back there?”
“Nothing much.”
“Mr. Early,” she shouted after me, “there are times Apollo says more than you!”
May 18
Started at dawn and worked our way up and down through a valley, then up some hills, from which we saw Council Bluffs city. Beyond was the great Missouri River. Knowing that when we crossed the river we would be in the Kansas Territory, I became greatly excited!
We had made progress, after all.
C
OUNCIL BLUFFS was the biggest town I’d ever seen. A fellow told me that some two
thousand
people lived there. Plus, the city was stuffed with emigrants (mostly young men, but some women, too), in hundreds of wagons and tents, along with oxen, mules, and horses. I’d never believed you could fit so many people and beasts in one place, a small valley between sandy bluffs that overlooked the Missouri River.
Seemed most everybody was going to Pike’s Peak. But to get any farther west you had to cross the river. That meant, as some folks said, “leaving civilization.”
There were three ferries, which went back and forth all day. Even so, they weren’t enough to carry all the people and wagons wanting to cross. It was like water backing up behind a beaver dam. All we could do was get in line and wait to take our turn.
