I sat up, but my movement disturbed her. She jerked upright, saying, “Catherine! Catherine!”
For days now, Mrs. Murphy had hardly stirred from her bed. She would lie staring at the ceiling and muttering to herself, counting up on her fingers the names of those who had died around us. “Landrum,” she said, “Harriet, Margaret. Eleanor Eddy. And the babies, Louis and Catherine.” But now she gave out a bloodcurdling banshee wail, and fair flew across the room to snatch up her little grandson in her arms.
She ran back to her own bed with him. Here she crouched, panting, over the body, staring about her through the matted tangle of her hair, which over the weeks and months of our imprisonment had turned quite white.
The little girls had been frightened of her from the start, whispering that she was a witch. They tumbled out of bed and ran screaming to the far end of the cabin. Here they fell to the floor, holding on to each other and weeping in fear. I staggered across to them, falling to my knees and crawling the last yard or two. They hid behind me, and we shrank back against the wall.
James lay still in his bed, too close to death himself to take notice. Simon curled into a ball, pulling a blanket over his head. And Mr. Keseberg crossed to Mrs. Murphy’s bed, intending to take George from her; but at the sight of him she set to screaming dreadful things in her broken voice, accusations of murder and cannibalism and I don’t know what. He staggered backward to the nearest bed and sat down, with his head sunk into his hands.
We stayed that way for an age, too afraid to move. Eventually the poor woman quieted down, still holding George close to her, and muttering beneath her breath.
I gathered the little girls together and persuaded them back into their bed, and then I crossed over to Mrs. Murphy. I sat down beside her with my arm around her shoulder, and stroked her hair with my hand. Eventually she went limp, and leaned against me, tears streaming down her face, and at last she consented to let the child go.
Mr. Keseberg lifted him from her arms, so very gentle. “My dear, let me take him. He is safe now, and nothing can harm him more. I will take good care of him, upon my word I will.”
“Yes, take him.” Mrs. Murphy took Mr. Keseberg’s hand, and looked full into his eyes. “But I beg you, do not put him out in the snow for the wolves to get him. Promise me, oh, promise me you will not.”
He kissed her cheek, and said, “I swear.”
* * *
I brought James out of his bed and put him in with the little girls, hoping that their warmth would revive him somewhat. Mr. Keseberg carried George’s sad little corpse across the room and laid it in the empty bed and pulled the blanket across it. And I blew up the ashes a little and put on the few sticks of firewood we had remaining, and set some water to heat. I dropped the last little bits of hides into the cooking pot. It was the last of our firewood, and the very last of our food. When these scraps were gone, there was nothing left at all.
* * *
I left the fire, and opened the cabin door to look out, hoping that this endless night would be over and it would be daylight at last. The moon was gone, and the thousand distant stars that had shone so steady above us throughout our journey had departed with it. Just a handful remained, glimmering fitfully in the clear sky and winking out, one by one, as the sun came up.
On one of those afternoons when we were walking together—such a very long time ago, or so it seemed now, and more like something I had dreamed, only—Mr. Keseberg had told me a story. It was the story of Pandora, left in charge of a box of treasures. She was told not to open it, but she did. All the miseries of the world came flying out; but one thing remained in the box, and that was Hope.
He had told it as a good thing, how that last little bit of Hope will never desert us. But now I saw the story in a different light. It seemed to me that Hope was another name for the cruelest torment of all—an empty, deceitful promise of help that would never come.
I wished Hope gone with all my heart. It would be a comfort to finally accept that there would be no miracle for me. I would welcome death as my escape from this torment. I longed for it, more than I had ever longed for anything.
I stood in the doorway, with my face to the sunrise, and thought it would be a kindness to all if I were to turn and seize a knife, and sink it into each of us, myself at the last.
But Hope would not let me.
* * *
All that day, Mrs. Murphy could not let George alone. No matter how much I besought her to leave him be, she would rise from her bed and take the blanket from the poor child’s face, and take him in her arms, singing to him and crooning over him. And at last, Mr. Keseberg put the poor child out of harm’s way.
Decency and shame had been let go long since. When we got to the stage where we could hardly get out of the cabin and up the snow steps to the surface to see to our natural needs, necessity had forced us to turn the little room that the Eddys had occupied into our privy. We kept a pail in here for our mess, scattering ashes from the fire over it. Mr. Keseberg took it outside when he had the strength, or I did, but those days were getting fewer and fewer. Mostly the pail was overflowing, and no doubt the stench of it overwhelming, though we had become something accustomed to it, I guess.
Now, Mr. Keseberg carried George into this vile room, and when he came back, he said to me in an undertone that he had hung him up by his clothes on a nail that Mr. Eddy had driven into the wall to put his coat on, for there was no bed to lay him on, and the floor was a quagmire.
Poor little boy. I remembered him on the day of our picnic at Independence Rock, rolling on the grass with jam in his hair. And later, cowering in front of his father, with a great bruise darkening his face.
In order to distract the children from Mr. Keseberg’s grisly task, I had looked out Ada’s little tea set, and set the girls to play tea party. I sat beside Simon, recounting one of Mr. Keseberg’s stories about a boy who climbed up a beanstalk and found a goose that laid eggs of gold. But my ruse didn’t work. When Mr. Keseberg reentered the room, Frances paused in her game of pouring water from the little teapot. Instead, she smiled and clapped her hands and said, “Hurrah, today we shall have a fine dinner!”
This was the secret of how these children had come to us with such rosy lips and round cheeks! They had been kept alive by the eating of their dead fellows.
There had been talk before, of doing such a thing. In her first mad days after Catherine’s death, Mrs. Murphy had spoke of it, somehow it had become fixed in her mind and taken root there, but we had never needed to do it. We had the hides, foul though they were, and at the very worst point of hunger the first rescue had come to our aid, and then again Mr. Reed’s party.
I did not know how the folks in the other cabins had fared. I had not asked. All I knew for certain was that we had not resorted to such foul measures. Perhaps we should have, and saved poor little George Foster. Perhaps we must, to save the rest.
We all would die within a day or two if something did not happen to save us. Someone had to make the decision, and there was only me and Mr. Keseberg to do it. But even as the thought formed in my head, I knew in my heart that the decision was made. If no help was with us in the morning, I would do it. And I prayed to God with all my being, to forgive me, and to help me.
God answered my prayer, though not as I expected. Next morning Mr. Clarke arrived from Alder Creek. He was the last man who had stayed behind from Mr. Reed’s rescue, a good, kind man, unlike his terrible thieving companions. He brought with him a great slab of meat from a bear he had killed, and it was just in time, too.
My decision to use the only food that was left to us was made too late. Whether we had wanted to do it or not, it was impossible, for neither Mr. Keseberg nor I could rise from our bed.
I can only imagine Mr. Clarke’s thoughts at the sight that met him as he descended the steps into our cabin and opened the door. The cabin lit by one flickering candle. No fire, and grave-cold. The smell that greeted him, and the filth; and when he stepp
ed farther into the cabin and lit the lantern that he carried with him, the sight of George, hanging from the nail.
James Eddy had died in the night. Now little Georgia and Eliza were playing with his body like a large doll, combing James’s hair and making pretend that he was asleep, and shouting in his ear to wake him. Mrs. Murphy was sitting in her bed in all her mess, for she had so lost her senses that she would not stir from her bed even to use the pail. She was doing her counting, and singing to herself in a thin, high voice.
I could not share a bed with her, and I lay huddled next to Mr. Keseberg, both of us shaking with cold and unable to stand.
The only lively bodies were ten-year-old Simon and six-year-old Frances, who were trying to make up the fire with some last ends of twigs and pinecones, and the little girls, engaged in their horrid game.
Mr. Clarke made up the fire. He put water to heat, and dropped the bear meat into the pot; all this in terrible silence. Then he took Simon and the little girls away, and left us to our fate.
38
The next day another rescue party arrived with Mr. Eddy and Mr. Foster in the forefront, hastening to save their little boys; but they arrived too late. I was never so sorry for anyone as I was then for Mr. Eddy. The look of joyous expectation upon his face when he came into our cabin looking for his son was something terrible to behold.
Mrs. Murphy greeted the men’s arrival with an earsplitting scream, and fell upon her son-in-law, clawing at him and crying out that Mr. Keseberg was a monster, killing the children one after another for the delight of feasting on their flesh, and begging him to save her.
Mr. Foster recoiled from her with an ashen face, and I shouted her down, “Mrs. Murphy! Be silent, I beg you, for the love of God!”
Mr. Eddy lifted his son most tenderly, with tears streaming down his face, and held him close, and carried him out of the cabin. But Mr. Foster looked at George and staggered outside to vomit in the snow; and it was left to Mr. Eddy to return and take the poor little boy away.
Will Foster and Henry Eddy. We had traveled so far together, and suffered together, and our lives were bound together. I wanted to say a prayer with them over these children’s graves. And to say to them how their children had died, and that I was sorrier than I could ever say for their loss. But I was slow climbing up the steps behind them, and when I reached the top I had to sit to catch my breath; and Mr. Eddy had taken the two boys some distance away, and I could not get there.
I watched as he dug the two graves, and laid the children in, and covered them over with the snow. Throughout, Mr. Foster stood by, staring into the distance with a still face and seeming hardly to know what Mr. Eddy was about. When Mr. Eddy had finished, he took Mr. Foster by the arm, and they crossed over to the Breen cabin and went inside and shut the door.
I made my slow way across the snow, intending to go in and explain to Mr. Foster what had happened, and give my solemn vow that I had honored my promise to his wife; I had done my best for his family and could have done no more.
When I got to the door, I could hear Mr. Eddy speaking. He spoke pretty low, but his voice carried clearer than he knew, and I heard every word he said.
“. . . known as a cruel, vicious man,” he was saying. “All were agreed on that score! He got rid of old Hardkoop, if you remember, when he became a nuisance to him. He beat his wife. When good Mr. Reed called him to account, why, Mr. Keseberg tried to get the man hanged, and when that failed, he turned all against him, and had him sent away from his family!
“And as for the murder of Mr. Wolfinger—why, we never did get to the bottom of that. I swear I would have killed him with my bare hands, rather than discover that he was left in charge of my son!”
Mr. Foster made no reply.
Mr. Eddy continued, “My wife—my daughter—all my family, dead in his care!” He gave out a muffled sob. “He made out he could not walk. He has said he could not leave the camp for it. But why should we believe anything he says? I think the truth of it is that he chooses to stay behind, to be free to indulge his depraved appetites to the full!”
As if this wasn’t bad enough, next I heard my name, and I pressed my ear to the door. I did not catch what was said. I heard Mr. Eddy give a low, sneering laugh, and then there was silence.
I hardly knew whether to laugh or cry. To hear Mr. Eddy’s voice, so choked with grief, and yet his manner just the same as I remembered him night after night round our fire, cooking up a story that was a dizzying mix of lies and guesswork, with just a pinch of the truth sprinkled over to give flavor.
I could not face him. I stumbled back to our cabin, and went in. And I crossed over to Mr. Keseberg and told him what Mr. Eddy had said. He bowed his head and wept.
In all these weeks that we had been together, all boundaries had been broke down between us. We spoke of our lives—our childhoods, his father who beat him and his mother who died when he was a lad; and I of mine, in the backstreets of the city. I told him of my dreams for Landrum, that I had never admitted fully even to myself. He spoke of his wife, and how he feared she had never loved him truly, but had married him to escape her parents, stricter even than his own. We shared all, though neither of us uttered a word that suggested we had come to care for each other as anything more than friends.
But now all I could think was, that if any man ever needed the comfort of a woman’s arms around him, this was the man.
We did not see Mr. Foster again. Next morning Mr. Eddy came alone into our cabin, telling us that he had news from Alder Creek. All that was left there was Mrs. Donner and her husband, still hanging on to life by the very thinnest of threads.
Mr. Eddy said that she had sent us a message. It was the same as before. As soon as she was able—by which she meant, when her husband finally died—she would leave Alder Creek and come to find us. But he added that the rescue party could not wait. They would be departing later that day and we must decide what we would do.
“If you wish to stay and wait for Mrs. Donner,” he said, “then we will leave as much food as we can spare, enough for two weeks at least. The snow is melting on the mountain. If you are truly unable to walk, Mr. Keseberg”—and he looked away, unable to meet our gaze—“if you cannot walk out, then you might decide to wait here until we can send some mules through to fetch you out. Or if you can walk, after all, then you can come with us now.
“I will step in again in an hour, and see what you have both decided.”
Mr. Keseberg and I turned it over and over between us.
He said I should go. The men would help me, and there would be food enough to sustain me. But he would stay. He was nothing close to able to get through the mountain, he thought. And what of Mrs. Donner? How could he leave, knowing that she would arrive in the camp and find herself abandoned and alone?
When Mr. Eddy came back into our cabin, I asked him what was to become of Mrs. Murphy.
“Surely Mr. Foster would want to stay and care for her? Mr. Eddy, you promise food for two weeks more, and rescue at the end of it. So there is no reason for Mr. Foster to leave, and the poor woman is beyond help. She has been in despair with the loss of her family, and it would be such a comfort to her to at least die with him holding her hand!”
Mr. Eddy just could not help himself. He cast a quick glance over his shoulder, as if thinking someone might be listening and then turned back, leaning toward us with the avid, gossiping expression I knew so well.
“Poor man! I think him deranged! I hardly understand myself why he chose to return here, for even on our journey through with the Snowshoes he was close to breaking. But there was no stopping him, he was determined to come back.
“Think of what he must be feeling now—his child dead! And poor Mrs. Murphy—well—we can see how she is, and come to this while he and his wife have been feasting in the California sunshine; for he has been living the high life, I can assure you!
“Do you remember him, in the days after he killed his brother-in-law, Mr. Pike? That was n
othing as to his behavior now! He has not spoke a word since we arrived here, and I think he would do violence if he stayed.”
I discounted half of what Mr. Eddy said, and ignored half of what was left, but this much was true: I did remember Mr. Foster in the days after he had killed Mr. Pike. He had beat George, when he had never laid a hand to him before, and raged at his wife and insulted Mrs. Murphy to her face at every mild word she spoke to him.
I wondered what Mr. Foster would say to his wife, when he got back. Would he want me telling my friend Sara Foster the truth? That her mother had been raving, on her deathbed and mortal terrified, and he had left her so?
If anyone had a reason to wish me lost upon the mountain, it was Mr. Foster. I was afraid of him, as much as I was afraid of the mountain. And I would not leave Mrs. Murphy. Will Foster might not respect the promise he had made to his wife. But I would respect mine.
So I did not go with them.
39
In October our dedicated band of quilters assembles once more. Our squares have all been stitched together into one large piece and set upon their backing, and now we are at Minnie’s house for the quilting, for the Arbuthnot barn is the only place big enough to hold the quilting frame.
In the main the quilting stitch is only straight back-and-forth, but in reminder of where it is being quilted, it has been decided that the stitch along the plain border should be a design of apples. They are everywhere, piled up along one wall in crates and half barrels. The barn smells delicious.
The Arbuthnot land is planted with acre upon acre of these trees. For the past few years nothing much has happened except the trees get a little taller and have a few leaves more. But this spring for the first time all the trees came full into blossom, and what a beautiful sight it was, too, a great mass of pink and white flowers and the blue sky behind.
Minnie invited us for a picnic. The girls ran about collecting the blossoms that had fallen to the ground, and John Arbuthnot gave Jacob a tour of the orchard. I tagged along, asking questions all the while.
When Winter Comes Page 24
